How much of a buff are you on World War II? Can you quote the minutia of tank, ship and plane statistics? Do you know which country had the 4th largest army in Europe in 1939? Can you describe the opening battles of World War II? Evening if you can do all that, you still can learn a lot from Robert Forczyk's Case White: The Invasion of Poland, 1939.

Robert Forczyk provides a revisionist history of the standard story of the Polish invasion by diving into Polish history and telling the story from the Polish viewpoint as much as possible. He spends the first four chapters on laying the groundwork of the formation of the 2nd Polish Republic, its enemies, its preparation for survival, its arms race with its neighbors, and the bad hand it was dealt by the Western Allies. Then comes the war. And this is not the brief tale of German victories over hapless Poles. Rather this is a tale of inept leadership, bad planning, lack of support, and that was just on the German side! The Poles fought hard, but also suffered from inept leadership, lack of resources, lack of support from the West, and the dagger stuck in their back by the Soviet Union.

So if you are looking for a scholarly, readable study of the 1939 Polish Campaign replete with notes, maps, and bibliography that has a strong viewpoint, Case White could be that book!

This is not a light read -- I had to switch off between this and lighter reading fare -- but it shares excellent background knowledge of the start of WWII and Poland. Since oftentimes U.S. history gives much more detail of WWII after the U.S. entered it, it was nice to read in detail about Poland in WWII.

This is an interesting account of the invasion of Poland that has a lot of good information for those wishing to know more about what really happened. Although at times, this book can feel a bit disjointed and heavy with information, overall it gives the reader a chance to see a side of this important series of events that most history books do not offer.

This is not a short book or an easy fluff-read and the reader who takes it upon themselves may find that there are points in which you must walk away for a bit in order to absorb the information overload you have just received and to organise your thoughts.

Still, I think this is an important addition to the greater history of WWII and particularly the role that Poland played, or rather, was forced to play in one of the biggest real-life dramas to ever unfold. If you are an historian, teacher, scholar or just a private reader with an interest in this time period, you should perhaps consider giving this book a second look.

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher, provided through Netgalley. All opinions are my own.

***I was granted an ARC of this via Netgalley from the publisher.***

If you have studied the Second World War, you know that Poland was the first to fall victim to the forces of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. This five-week action tends to be glossed over in most popular histories of the war with Germany shown to be an unstoppable, efficient machine. In the book, Case White: The Invasion of Poland 1939 by Robert Forczyk, he strives to show the campaign in detail and dispel any myths that have been propagated. In the introduction, Forczyk points to the lack of western historians using Polish sources to inform the histories of the campaign. He seeks to remedy that with this book. He starts by giving the reader a brief history of Poland from the middle ages to the first world war. Then he provides the military affairs and politics of interwar Poland and Germany and the road that led to war. He spends most of his time on the opening moves of the war and how those opening successes and failure on both sides eventually led to the Polish downfall. He does a great job in covering the ground, air and sea aspects of the campaign as well. Forczyk also offers a great evaluation of the campaign from both sides and how both sides could have fought their campaign better, what lessons the Germans should have but didn’t, the failure of the Allies response to German aggression and German and Russian crimes in Poland. The author has done an excellent job in giving a blow by blow of the Poland campaign and providing detailed insight into the consequences of decisions made before, during and after the campaign. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in military history, World War 2 history and Polish history.

Rating: 4 stars. Would recommend to a friend.