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Soviet annexation of Polish lands in 1939 (in red), superimposed on a modern map of Ukraine. On the basis of a secret clause of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union invaded Poland on September 17, 1939, capturing the eastern provinces of the Second Polish Republic.
Fighting was concentrated in south-eastern areas of the Second Polish Republic and western Ukraine. The occupation of Poland by Germany and Soviet Union in September 1939 led to demands by Ukrainian nationalists for a new Ukrainian state which would include the Polish areas of Eastern Galicia and Volhynia.
The eastern part of Poland was annexed by the Soviet Union; Volhynia and Eastern Galicia were attached to the Ukrainian SSR. After the annexation, the Soviet NKVD started eliminating the predominantly Polish middle and upper classes, including social activists and military leaders. Between 1939 and 1941, 200,000 Poles were deported to Siberia.
The Polish–Soviet border, as of 1939, had been determined in 1921 at the Treaty of Riga peace talks, which followed the Polish–Soviet War. [7] Under the terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, two weeks after the German invasion of western Poland, the Soviet Union invaded the portions of eastern Poland assigned to it by the Pact, followed by co-ordination with German forces in Poland.
1940 USSR postage stamp celebrating the "liberation" of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. On the basis of a secret clause of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union invaded Poland on September 17, 1939, capturing the eastern provinces of the Second Polish Republic.
On September 17, 1939, the Soviet Union declared all pacts with Poland null and void as the Polish state had ceased to exist, and the Soviets joined Nazi Germany in the occupation of Poland. [ 3 ] : 83 The forces of the 6th Red Army of the Ukrainian Front , under Filipp Golikov , crossed the border just east of Lwów and started a quick march ...
Polish prisoners of war captured by the Red Army during the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939 In October 1939, Molotov reported to the Supreme Soviet that the Red Army had suffered 737 deaths and 1,862 wounded men during the campaign, a casualty rate that widely contradicted Polish specialist's claims of up to 3,000 deaths and 8,000 to 10,000 ...
The borders of Poland resembled the borders of the German-Russian gains in World War 2, with the exception of the city of Bialystok. This is called the Curzon line. The small area of Trans-Olza, which had been annexed by Poland in late 1938, was returned to Czechoslovakia on Stalin's orders. [citation needed]