POLAND'S EFFORT

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 93, 17 October 1939, Page 10

POLAND'S EFFORT

BY NO MEANS IN VAIN

VALUE NOW ASSESSED

COST TO GERMANY

(British Official Wireless.) (Received October 17, noon.) RUGBY, October 16. While the Polish army and people were heroically resisting the German invasion British people had little time and little heart carefully to weigh the contribution of that gallant fight to the Allied cause—feelings of admiration and sympathy crowded out calculations of advantage. But now that Poland has temporarily been overwhelmed there is a chance calmly to assess the military value of her sacrifice, which by no means has been in vain.

It was, indeed, always fully understood in competent military circles that should Herr Hitler decide to attack Poland nothing could long delay his success there, but that retribution would overtake him on the Western Front.

The Poles, therefore, undertook heroic resistance, which they knew to be impossible, thereby occupying the undivided attention of 70 German divisions and the bulk of the much-vaunted German air force.

Not only did this greatly assist French mobilisation, which was undisturbed, and the safe transport of men, but it also disclosed to the Allied High Command valuable information as to German tactics in the use of aircraft, tanks, and motorised units. German losses in material were also considerable. In one attack alone they lost 83 tanks on a narrow front, and, in General Sosnkowski's successful counter-attack near , Lemberg on September 16, they are reported to have lost over 100 tanks. Freedom tnroughout the world has every reason for gratitude to the gallant Polish army and people.