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Before World War II, the Polish lands were noted for the variety of their ethnic communities. Following the Polish-Soviet War, a large part of its population belonged to national minorities. The census of that year allocates 30.8% of the population in the minority. [30]
Population distribution by country in 1939. This is a list of countries by population in 1939 (including any dependent, occupied or colonized territories for empires), providing an approximate overview of the world population before World War II.
The history of interwar Poland comprises the period from the revival of the independent Polish state in 1918, until the Invasion of Poland from the West by Nazi Germany in 1939 at the onset of World War II, followed by the Soviet Union from the East two weeks later.
Poland was a diverse country before World War II, with only around 2/3 of the population being ethnically Polish. Due to German and Soviet war-time resettlements and genocides, and after-war population transfers, post-war Poland was one of the most ethnically homogenous countries in Europe and stayed that way until the 21st century.
In all, about three million Poles died as a result of the German occupation, more than 10% of the pre-war population. When this is added to the three million Polish Jews who were killed as a matter of policy by the Germans, Poland lost about 22% of its population, the highest proportion of any European country in World War II. [111] [112]
Crimes against the Polish nation committed by Nazi Germany and Axis collaborationist forces during the invasion of Poland, [3] along with auxiliary battalions during the subsequent occupation of Poland in World War II, [4] included the genocide of millions of Polish people, especially the systematic extermination of Jewish Poles.
Around 6 million Polish citizens perished during World War II: about one fifth of the entire pre-war population of Poland. [1] Most of them were civilian victims of the war crimes and the crimes against humanity which Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union committed during their occupation of Poland.
The Polish population transfers in 1944–1946 from the eastern half of prewar Poland (also known as the expulsions of Poles from the Kresy macroregion), [1] were the forced migrations of Poles toward the end and in the aftermath of World War II. These were the result of a Soviet Union policy that had been ratified by the main Allies of World ...