World War Two

How to Make Aggression Sound Like Defense - Q2 1939

By the spring of 1939, Hitler’s Germany is no longer merely threatening war, it is preparing to launch one while insisting that every act of aggression is really self-defense. In this episode of Death of Democracy, we look at Germany in the second quarter of 1939: the launch of the battleship Tirpitz, the secret planning for Fall Weiss - the invasion of Poland - Hitler’s 50th-birthday military spectacle, the renunciation of the German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement, the Pact of Steel with Mussolini’s Italy, and the diplomatic moves designed to isolate Poland before the coming attack.