Wilhelm List - Poland, 1939

Poland, 1939

It was List′s task to advance his army into southern Poland immediately on the outbreak of hostilities, to form the extreme southern wing of an encircling manoeuver carried out by the German forces aimed at trapping the Polish field army in the general region of Warsaw. He didn′t fulfill this mission, although he met advance elements of the German XIX Panzer Corps—under General Heinz Guderian—a short distance south of Brest-Litovsk, on 17 September 1939.

Following the conclusion of the fighting in Poland, which was accelerated by the occupation of the eastern part of the country by Soviet forces (as agreed to in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact), List and his army remained posted as occupying forces on Polish territory. List was promoted to Generalfeldmarshall (Field Marshal) on the conclusion of the campaign. In early 1941, German troops were being steadily massed on the Eastern frontier of the Third Reich, in preparation for Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union. OKW believed that before Barbarossa could be launched it would be necessary to eliminate the possibility of interference from Greece by militarily subduing this country, in an operation codenamed Operation Marita. Field Marshal von List was delegated to negotiate with the Bulgarian General Staff, and a secret agreement was signed allowing the free passage of German troops through Bulgarian territory. On the night of 28/29 February 1941, German troops—including List, who now commanded the 12th Army—took up positions in Bulgaria, which the next day joined the Tripartite Pact.