Operation Pike

davebender said:

If Britain pledges military support they must take steps to send troops. Otherwise British diplomatic promises are worthless.

Better not to make such a promise then to make a promise and then break it.

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Do you think declaring a war on the German invader and then carrying it was not enough on the British side?
Poland's fate after the war was unforeseeable during the September '39 crisis, and was beyond the control Great Britain or any other non-communist ally for that matter.

davebender said:

26 Aug 1939. French Army partial mobilization.
1 Sep 1939. French Army complete mobilization.
3 Sep 1939. France declares war on Germany.
7 Sep 1939. 11 French division (i.e. a complete field army) invade Germany along a 20 mile front.

Looks pretty aggressive to me.

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Hardly.

The French-Polish mutual assistance pact obliged France to launch a major offensive against Germany within three days of the declaration of war. The Saar offensive met that obligation in letter, if not spirit. The French attack was timid, to say the least.

Of the 11 French divisions committed, only 6 made it more than 4 miles into German territory. The French advance was so "aggressive" that one French division was halted for two days by a minefield. Other divisions halted their advance after being engaged by single MG defensive positions. After the first week of the "offensive", all the French divisions has basically assumed a defensive posture. No French divisions made it more than six miles into German territory.

Gaemelin ordered no contact was to be made with the Seigfried line before pulling the plug on the whole escapade with a personal order to halt the advance on the 17th of September. A withdrawal was ordered on the 30th and all French division were out of German territory by the 17th of October, helped by an equally timid German counter offensive launched on the 16th, although at least the Germans managed to keep their tiny foothold in France.

France had built up the mindset that it could sit behind the Maginot Line and force Germany to bleed itself out attacking fixed positions. Of course, the Germans didn't ascribe to this point of view, much to the dismay of the French come May 1940.

I've just read a synopsis of the book (I've never paid £100 for a book, and I'm not about to start,) and my reaction is "so what?"
Russia had allied itself to Germany, and taken the opportunity to grab half of Poland for itself. Britain was hardly likely to view Stalin as a potential ally, in fact there was a distinct possibility that he might assist Germany militarily (I doubt that Britain knew about the clause in the Germany/Russia pact that, in the event of one going to war, the other would remain neutral.)
Any nation that doesn't prepare for any eventuality is doomed to play catch-up, with all that entails; the seriousness with which the plan was viewed can possibly be judged by the fact that, during a large part of 1940, Slessor was part of the Purchasing Commission in the U.S., hardly the ideal place to plan for an attack on Russia.
Much is made of Stalin not trusting the British, but he didn't trust anyone, even Russians, which is why he murdered so many of his own countrymen. All that mistrust did was cause thousands of his soldiers to die (not that he cared.)
The twin-engined aircraft, used for the photos, would have been either a Blenheim, or Cotton's Lockheed 12A, which were painted in Cotton's "Camotint" invention, a green (not blue) paint. It would not have been used after September, 1940, since it suffered bomb damage at that time.
There were certainly plans to use the Lockheed in the Middle East, because Cotton had two extra 70 gallon fuel tanks installed, which increased the still-air range to 1,600 miles, and this was done in June 1939.