What have we learned in 80 years?

President Donald Trump is planning to solemnize Poland's suffering on the 80th Anniversary of Hitler's invasion of Sept/ 1, 1939; the date many historians consider the start of World War II.

Der Fuhrer felt secure in his aggression because a week earlier, his foreign minister von Ribbentrop had signed a treaty with Stalin's foreign minister Molotov to carve up Poland. I can recall a cartoon from that era showing Hitler and Stalin in bed, one had a butcher knife and the other a handgun under his pillow. Such love

While German troops reached Warsaw in a week, it took Stalin's army over two weeks just to reach Poland's eastern border. Was Stalin waiting to see how England, France and others would react? Or was that the fastest the Soviet Socialist army could move?

This fait accompli of Nazi (National Socialist) and Communist (international Socialist) aggression took less than one month. While the Polish people suffered greatly, the Nazi-Communist romance lasted less than two years. On June 22, 1941, Germany attacked the USSR on a continuous front from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea.

Voila, a miracle. Hitler's unintended consequence happened. Stalin was transformed from a war criminal to war hero. Roosevelt became Stalin's sugar daddy to transform the USSR from a horse-drawn economy into a world class military slavery complex. All courtesy of the Lend Lease Act of 1941 and American tax payers.

The bad guys of World War II are now enjoying their eternal rewards. But what about their philosophical progeny now living? Have we learned anything from these events of 80 years ago? Tyrants and wannabe tyrants come and go; some not recognized for what they really are until it's too late.

Paul Tait

Mount Prospect