A very interesting development has occurred in the eastern NATO region. After President Obama rebuffed an appeal by the Ukraine for weapons to defend itself against Russia (first link), the Ukraine quickly took an alternative course of action. The Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania announced the formation of their own military quick reaction force to be composed mostly of Poles (second link). It will have between 4,000 and 4,600 troops, and this is a different quick reaction force than the one planned by NATO. This new force may conduct training exercises as soon as next year, so these three nations are in a hurry to get started. This force will be headquartered in Poland and could form the nucleus of a larger NATO force in time. This development happened so quickly that it appears the Ukraine was pursuing this option even as it was also seeking direct help from the USA–which Obama refused to give.

I find it very interesting that two NATO nations would form their own military alliance with the Ukraine even though the larger NATO group did not do so yet. Many Americans, who are taught very little history in public schools, may not realize it, but this alliance makes historical as well as current sense. How many realize that World War I was scarcely over before the new nation of Poland had to defend its independence in a war with Bolshevist Russia from 1919-1920? I’ve included a history of that forgotten but important war in the third link. The best article I’ve seen on this war was in the June 2010 issue of Military History magazine. It was under their “Intelligence” column and was authored by Arnold Blumberg. I wanted to include it in this post, but I could not find it available in a web search. It is interesting that France sent military advisers to help Poland, and that group included the then-Captain Charles de Gaulle.

The Military Heritage article states that the war “became inevitable in January 1919 after the Red Army seized Byelorussia and Lithuania, areas granted to Poland after World War I.” The war began with Poland capturing Lithuania, Byelorussia and Latvia then advancing their armies to Kiev in the Ukraine. Then, a powerful Russian counterattack drove the Poles all the way back to Warsaw and it looked like the Polish nation would be stillborn. However, with the help of superb code-breakers, the Poles went back on the counteroffensive and captured 66,000 Russian prisoners as they drove the Russians back as far eastward as Minsk in the central part of the modern nation of Belarus. The article in Military History had a tidbit of history I’d never heard of before: that Polish code-breakers were responsible for breaking the German Enigma code in 1932, which later helped the Allies win World War II.

During the Cold War, Lithuania and Poland yearned for freedom from Soviet domination. It came after the Soviet Union collapsed and the former Eastern European nations of the Warsaw Pact joined NATO. These nations have no desire to ever again be conquered by Russia. The historic connection between Lithuania, the Ukraine and Poland also goes back centuries prior to World War I when Poland was a stronger nation and wielded much influence in Eastern Europe. The Poles are determined to bolster their national defense abilities now that Russia had again become aggressive. The fourth link reports that Poland is buying 40 medium-range cruise missiles that can hit Russian targets from Polish airspace, and they are also upgrading their F-16s. It also reports that, unlike the Obama administration, Poland is willing to sell military weapons to the Ukraine. [My thanks to a friend for sending me the fourth link which came as I was drafting this post.]

The final link shows that the Poles are also working on developing their own new weaponry. It details that Poland is developing a new high-tech “stealth” tank of their own design that will be ready in a few years. Far away from the attention of Americans and the media, these nations are preparing to stand together to defend themselves against Russia.

The prophecy in Ezekiel 38-39 indicates that they will need all those preparations when the Russians, Chinese, Iranians and their allies launch a surprise attack against the western world and its allies in a final, age-ending World War III. For a detailed examination of the Ezekiel 38-39 prophecy, please read my article, What Ezekiel 38-39 Reveal about a Future World War III. You will see that a biblical prophecy, written over 2500 years ago, has been fulfilled with stunning accuracy in today’s modern alliances–a fact ignored by the world. This could only occur if a Creator God authored the original prophecy and is guiding world affairs today to full his ancient prophecies just as he penned them–an ability God proclaims for himself in Isaiah 41:21-26. God also declares that one cannot understand the future unless you understand past history, a conclusion with which I heartily agree.

  1. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/09/18/ukraine-poroshenko-speaks-to-congress/15819211/
  2. http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_67634.shtml
  3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish%E2%80%93Soviet_War_in_1920
  4. http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2014/09/22/Poland-buys-medium-range-missiles-from-US/3911411406991/
  5. http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2014/03/polands-futuristic-invisible-stealth-tank-video-photos-2926026.html