Lieutenant General Stanisław Maczek was a Polish tank commander of World War II, whose division was instrumental in the Allied liberation of France, closing the Falaise pocket, resulting in the destruction of 14 German Wehrmacht and SS divisions. A veteran of World War I, the Polish–Ukrainian and Polish–Soviet Wars, Maczek was the commander of Poland's only major armoured formation during the September 1939 campaign, and later commanded a Polish armoured formation in France in 1940. He was the commander of the famous 1st Polish Armoured Division, and later of the I Polish Army Corps under Allied Command in 1942–45.

The Battle of Lwów was a World War II battle for the control over the Polish city of Lwów between the Polish Army and the invading Wehrmacht and the Red Army. The city was seen as the key to the so-called Romanian Bridgehead and was defended at all cost.