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Offbeat Warfare Facts that Will Confound History Buffs

Khalid Elhassan February 15, 2021 36 min

Consolidated B-24 Liberator - Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress — Staff Sgt. Alan E. Magee poses for the camera halfway into his ball turret. Historic Wings

Passport issued by the Polish embassy in Tokyo, which continued to function for more than two years after Poland was conquered by Japan’s ally, Germany. Our Passports

28. The Strange War Between Poland and Japan Lasted for Sixteen Years

Japanese-Polish cooperation continued even after WWII began with Germany’s 1939 invasion of Poland. Despite close German-Japanese ties, the fact that they were both signatories of the anticommunist Anti-Comintern Pact of 1936 and the Tripartite Pact of 1940, Poland’s embassy continued to function in Tokyo. That strange situation lasted until German pressure forced its closure in October 1941. A Polish espionage network functioned out of the Japanese embassy in Berlin, and Polish agents were supplied with Japanese passports – including diplomatic passports – that allowed them to move freely throughout German-occupied Europe.

The Japanese embassy in Berlin during WWII, which helped Polish spies against Germany and furnished them with Japanese passports to facilitate their movement throughout Europe. Bundesarchiv Bild

Odder still was that, even after Poland had declared war against Japan, Japan continued to cooperate with the Poles. Polish agents continued to move throughout German-occupied Europe with passports provided by the Japanese government. Japanese and Polish intelligence services continued to exchange information about Germany and the USSR throughout the war. It took sixteen years for the strange Polish-Japanese War to come to a formal end, when the People’s Republic of Poland finally signed an agreement with Japan to restore formal relations.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.