This article is part of the series The Road to World War II .

On January 26, 1934, Germany and Poland signed a non-aggression pact in which the two countries committed to forgo armed conflict for a period of ten years.

The pact ended both the border disputes that arose in the aftermath of the Versailles Treaty, and an economically damaging custom’s war.

Hitler’s motives for signing the pact were to

• gain time for his re-armament programme and his “Lebensraum” expansion plans into the East
• a public relations exercise to convince at home and abroad that his goals were peaceful
• to shatter into pieces the French Eastern European security system that France had built in the 1920’s against Germany¹

The pact was a success for Hitler as he fulfilled all his aims. He won valuable time for his re-armament program and expansion plans; the public was wooed into believing Hitler a man of peace; and, most importantly, the French security system, which had up until then provided a two-front protection against Germany, was destroyed.

¹ The Franco-Polish Military Alliance, signed February 1921 in Paris