[83] To ensure the Oder–Neisse line would be accepted as the new Polish border at a future Allied Conference (Potsdam Conference), up to 300,000 Germans living close to the rivers' eastern bank were expelled subsequently. The flyover has been rescheduled for Saturday. Flight 42 was on its way, when it comes across an unidentifiable storm. Upon questioning Sheffield they discover that history is not gone as it should be; the Dunkirk evacuation was apparently a complete disaster for the Allies (rather than a victory for the Allied forces that were evacuated successfully), and the Germans somehow have the advanced Messerschmitt Me 262 jet fighter in 1940, when it historically only became operational in 1944, and that somehow they have developed accurate surface to air missiles. A similar fate occurred to the Czech speaking residents of the Czech Corner in Kladsko Land who were transferred to Czechoslovakia. A young soldier (Robbie Kay) tells them they are in the middle of a war zone. Check out some of the IMDb editors' favorites movies and shows to round out your Watchlist. Dodging bullets and bombs the flight will attempt to make it back to modern day, without changing history too much. Captain Strong eventually manages to glide the plane to a safe landing, discovering that they have landed in Berlin, fortunately not under Nazi control. The responsibility for leaving millions of Germans in these vulnerable areas until combat conditions overwhelmed them can be attributed directly to the draconian measures taken by the German authorities against anyone even suspected of 'defeatist' attitudes [as evacuation was considered] and the fanaticism of many Nazi functionaries in their execution of Hitler's 'no retreat' orders. When And How Did Segregation End In The US? World War II, conflict that involved virtually every part of the world during 1939–45. In the former German territories the Soviet authorities did not always distinguish between the Poles and Germans and often treated them alike. [3] The first mass flight of Germans followed the Red Army's advance and was composed of both spontaneous flight driven by rumours of Soviet atrocities, and organised evacuation starting in the summer of 1944 and continuing through to the spring of 1945. [21] There were incidents when Poles, even freed slave labourers, protected Germans, for example by disguising them as Poles. Poles were classified as sub-humans (untermenschen) by the Nazis, with their ultimate fate being slavery and extermination, while Germans occupied position of privileged "ubermenschen" that were to rule over Poles and other nations; when Stanisław Mikołajczyk joined the "Government of National Unity" as a deputy prime minister in 1945, he justified the expulsions of Germans by national terms following communist Władysław Gomułka, but also as a revolutionary act, freeing the Poles of exploitation by a German middle and upper class. [87], While the Polish administration had set up a State Repatriation Office (Państwowy Urząd Repatriacyjny, PUR), the bureau and its administrative subunits proved ineffective due to quarrels between Communists and opposition and a lack of equipment for the giant task of expelling Germans and resettling Poles in an area devastated by war. Hitler killed himself in a bunker in Berlin, hiding from the Soviets that were close. All maps, graphics, flags, photos and original descriptions © 2020 worldatlas.com. Soviet soldiers committed reprisal rapes and other crimes[21][22] In most cases, implementation of the evacuation plans was delayed until Soviet and Allied forces had defeated the German forces and advanced into the areas to be evacuated. [66] However, the West German Red Cross estimated in 1964 that 233,000 German civilians were deported to the USSR from Poland as forced laborers where 45% (105,000) were dead or missing. [citation needed] Between 23 January 1945 and the end of the war, 2,204,477 people, 1,335,585 of them civilians, were transported via the Baltic Sea,[54] up to 250,000[55] of them to occupied Denmark. Ares, Graz, 2006. [117], According to the Polish census of 1946, there were still 2,036,400 Germans in the "Recovered Territories", 251,900 in the pre-war Polish territories (primarily eastern Upper Silesia, Pomerelia and Greater Poland) and the former Free City of Danzig, and 417,000 in the process of "verification" as "new" Poles. [32] The final decision to move Poland's boundary westward, preconditioning the expulsion of Germans, was made by Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States at the Yalta Conference in February 1945, when the Curzon line was irrevocably fixed as the future Polish-Soviet border. The surrender of Germany happened in May, so both the 8th and 9th of May are the days Europe celebrates the so-called V-E Day, which stands for Victory in Europe Day. The devastation caused by the atomic bombs was so horrific, so Japan declared its surrender on August 15. With the Soviet Vistula–Oder Offensive, launched on 12 January 1945, and the parallel East Prussian Offensive launched on 13 January 1945, Soviet gains of pre-war German and annexed Polish territory became permanent. [67] The West German Red Cross also estimated 110,000 German civilians were held as forced labor in Kaliningrad Oblast where 50,000 were dead or missing. The dedicated website can be found at airspacemag.com/flyover. Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth - Century Europe. With just hours before the bombs of Operation Ardennes Fury fall, the tank's commander makes the risky decision to rescue an orphanage. Selwyn Ilan Troen, Benjamin Pinkus, Merkaz le-moreshet Ben-Guryon. [42][43] Yet as the war went on, Lower Silesia also became a Polish war aim, as well as occupation of the Baltic coast west of Szczecin as far as Rostock and occupation of the Kiel Canal. [21] The most infamous incidents during the flight and expulsion from the territory of later Poland include the sinking of the military transport ship Wilhelm Gustloff by a Soviet submarine with a death toll of some 9,000 people;[21] the USAF bombing of refugee-crowded[57] Swinemünde on 12 March 1945 killing an estimated 23,000[58][59] to 25,000;[60] the desperate conditions under which refugees crossed the frozen Vistula Lagoon, where thousands broke in, froze to death, or were killed by Soviet aircraft;[61] and the poorly organized evacuation and ultimate sacrifice of refugee-crowded Breslau by the local German Nazi authorities headed by gauleiter Karl Hanke. Philipp Ther, Deutsche und polnische Vertriebene: Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/DDR und in Polen 1945-1956, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998, p.306, Przyłączenie Śląska Opolskiego do Polski (1945-1948), Instytut Studiów Politycznych PAN, Warszawa 1996 Prof. dr hab. [99] Of the 1,104,134 "verified autochtons" in the census of 1950, close to 900,000 were natives of Upper Silesia and Masuria. When contact with Corporal Sheffield is recovered, they learn through him that the Allies also do not have radar as they were supposed to. They manage to evade the attackers momentarily, but only after taking serious damage and the co-pilot is wounded. The cities are protected from the inhospitable Martian atmosphere by ... See full summary ». Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Mai 1974. [18] Germans considered "indispensable" for the Polish economy were retained; virtually all had left by 1960. [122], According to Philipp Ther, pre-1989 Polish historiography has in general either underestimated or concealed the role of force during the expulsions. For more information regarding the Arsenal of Democracy Flyover, visit www.ww2flyover.org. After Flight 42 travels through a storm they find themselves in France, 1940, during World war II. Airline Pilot Captain William Strong (Faran Tahir) is flying International Airlines Flight 42 from Washington, D.C. to London. World War II officially ended with the formal surrender of Japan on September 2, 1945 after the U.S.A. dropped two atomic bombs on the country, which killed over a 100 thousand people. [30] Created on order of Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler, a Nazi ethnic German organisation called Selbstschutz carried out mass murder during Intelligenzaktion alongside operational groups of German military and police. Suddenly, the German fighters return and hit the airliner with a missile, punching a hole in its hull and killing some of the passengers. [90] On September 13, 1946 President Bierut signed a decree on "the exclusion of persons of German nationality from the Polish National Community"[citation needed] The major evictions were completed in 1946, although another 500,000 Germans arrived in the Soviet Zone from Poland in 1947. [90] Much abuse also came from large Soviet contingents stationed in Poland after the war. Germany's Generalplan Ost strategy for Central and Eastern Europe envisioned the creation of a Greater Germany, which was to be built by means of removing a variety of non-Germans from Poland and other areas in Central and Eastern Europe, mainly Slavs and Jews believed by Nazis to be subhuman. It won 2 awards at the Atlanta Horror Film Festival in 2015,[1] "Best Sci-Fi Feature."