At full mobilization, Poland had 30 active divisions formed from the 84 regular infantry regiments and six mountain regiments (all of these regiments had 3 battalions). Poland also had nine reserve divisions, three mountain brigades, and a number of infantry brigades formed from ON units. Other independent infantry formations included 10 rifle battalions, seven machine gun battalions, seven KOP regiments and a number of fortress units of various sizes.

Poland's infantry was organized into three regiment divisions, like most of the rest of Europe's armies at that time, but with a rather limited allocation of heavy weapons. Great efforts were being made to increase the firepower of all Polish formations in this period, as this table shows:

Infantry Division	As of Sep. '39	Planned by 1941
Strength	16,492	16,770
Light MG	326	340
Heavy MG	132	168
Light Mortars (45mm)	81	81
Heavy Mortars (81mm)	20	36
Antitank Rifles	92	92
40mm AA Guns	4	6
Antitank Guns	27	54
75mm Guns	30	24
100mm Howitzers	12	24
105mm Guns	3	4
155mm Howitzers	3	8
Reconnaissance Tanks	16	19

There were many equipment shortages, particularly of motor vehicles. As of September 1939, only 18 divisions had their reconnaissance tanks. The nine reserve divisions did not have their AA batteries or reconnaissance tanks and had only 18 AT guns. The two mountain divisions had 75mm guns in place of the heavier pieces.

Polish infantry weapons were a mixed lot, and many Polish soldiers were still equipped with machine guns and rifles from World War I. The model '98 Mauser was the most common rifle, but there were also large numbers of Russian Moisin-Nagant rifles and the Polish wz 38, an improvement on the Russian weapon. The Poles had as standard equipment their version of the Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR M1918A1), known as the rkm wz 1928, which they called a light machine gun. They also had numbers of the French Chauchat Modelle 1915.

In heavy machine guns, they operated their copy of the Browning M1917, the wz 1930, along with an assortment of older weapons, including the Austrian Swartzlose, the French Hotchkiss, and various versions of the Russian Maxim. All of the above-mentioned weapons fired a 7.92mm round.

The most interesting weapon in the infantry arsenal was the Karbin wz 35 Maroszok, an anti-tank rifle of unusual hitting power that fired a bullet with a tungsten core. Although not an impressive weapon by later war standards, it was able to penetrate the armor of virtually all the tanks the Germans would operate in the campaign.

Poland 1939

Introduction
Infantry
Cavalry
Artillery
Armor
Air Force
Navy
Campaign Overview