Complex 20th century
After World War I, the balance of power in Europe changed, with the fall of empires including Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary, which had carved up Poland (also known as the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) in the 18th century. Thus, the reborn Poland sought to regain its pre-partition state borders.
In 1918, an unclear demarcation of the border separated Poles and Ukrainians. The best example is the city of Lviv (early Lwów), where before World War II the majority of the inhabitants were Polish and Ukrainians lived in the surrounding villages.
In November 1918, the Poles lost the battle for Lviv with Ukraine's newly formed People's Republic of Western Ukraine.
In July 1919, the entire region of the so-called Eastern Galicia (formerly part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire) fell into Polish hands.
In 1923, the Council of Ambassadors (the Council of Ambassadors of the Principal Allied and Associated Nations, established in Paris in January 1920, was the Supreme War Council. Recognized Polish sovereignty over Eastern Galinesia and created three provinces there: Lviv, 57 percent Polish and 34 percent Ukrainian; Stanisławów, 22 percent Polish and 69 percent Ukrainian; Tanopol, 49 percent Polish and 46 percent Ukrainian; and Volhynia Province (which belonged to the Russian Empire during World War I) had only 17 percent Poles and 69 percent Ukrainians.
But the Polish authorities' policy toward Ukrainians was inconsistent, either supporting, ignoring, or repressing, including restricting the functioning of Ukrainian schools, institutions and organizations. In retaliation, radical Ukrainian nationalists (OUN, which, while guided by a specific "integral nationalism," were some type of fascism) carried out bloody attacks with the support and funding of the former Soviet Union, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, and Germany.
In 1931, Tadeusz Khołowka, a member of the Polish House of Representatives, was assassinated, and in 1934, The Minister of the Interior, Bronnisław Piyalaki, was also murdered. From 1921 to 1939, 36 Ukrainians, 25 Poles, and one Russian died at the hands of Ukrainian nationalists.
UPA
During World War II in 1942, nationalists formed the Ukrainian Rebel Army (UPA). Beginning in 1943, UPA guerrillas killed as many as 100,000 Poles, mostly civilians (including in Eastern Galicia), according to Polish historians. The Poles also responded with force, killing at least thousands of Ukrainians.
The National Institute of Memorials of Ukraine (IPN) set April 12, 1960, the date of their last battle, 15 years after the end of the war. In this way, the UPA and its leader Stepan Bandera became anti-communist symbols in Ukraine, a man who still occupies an extremely important place in Ukraine's historical policies in the struggle against Russian influence.
Kiev, Ukraine, January 1, 2015. Supporters of the Ukrainian nationalist party Svoboda and Stepan Bandera.
In the 20th century, the large-scale armed struggle in Ukraine was mainly led by the UPA.
Bandera, the leader of OUN and the spiritual patron of upana, was murdered by Soviet agents in Germany in 1959, and many streets of today Ukrainian cities are named after him. This was unacceptable to poles, who were bandar's number one enemy before 1939. Thus, in this regard, the contest between the two sides has been continuous, and these factors have accumulated into the conflict since the end of the Second World War, leading to one of the amendments to the bill of the Polish National Memorial Institute, which was submitted to the Polish Parliament by the small nationalist party Kukiz.
The Act deals with the recording and prosecution of crimes and political repression committed between 1917 and 1990 against Poles (not necessarily citizens of the Republic of Poland) and Polish citizens (not necessarily of Polish ethnicity, including Jews). The amendment also specifically mentions the crimes of "Ukrainian nationalists and members of Ukrainian organizations cooperating with the German Third Reich (Nazis)."
Lviv, Ukraine, 1956-1957. Former Galician Savings Bank building (left). © (PAP)
Poland's strategy in the post-Cold War era
The post-Cold War period was a sensitive period when Poles felt threatened to come from the East.
In the negative mood, the growth of "Russian-phobic" attitudes and Russia's perception of a country that is not particularly friendly to Poland is evident. But the overall picture comes not from Moscow, but from a large number of negative views of Russia by the media and politicians, which has led to a growing sense of threat at home. The atmosphere of threats created by the makers of public opinion from Russia has led people to take for granted that the Kremlin is planning to take "unfriendly" behavior toward Poland.
IV Rzeczpospolita, the Fourth Polish Republic, is a project of moral revolution and political change proposed by the Polish conservative philosopher Rafał Matyja in the late 1990s and used in public discourse to describe the period of legal and just government in power from 2005 to 2007. The plan was to rebuild a Polish Empire stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea.
But this new imperialist ambition of Poland is one of the main causes of the Disaster in Ukraine. The 2014 coup in Ukraine, for example, was in Poland's interest.
According to a recent study by the US think tank IRI, 58% of Ukrainians have a positive or very positive attitude towards Poland, while only more than 1% have a negative attitude; the EU as a whole lags behind Poland (54% vs. 6%), belarus (52% vs. 1%), followed by Canada, Germany and Lithuania.
Poland's "Intermarium Geopolitical Theory"
Poland's recent panic stems from the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian conflict, which has revived memories of darkness and haunting the past. As the conflict becomes protracted, the looming Russian "threat spillover" has become a topic of conversation for many Poles today.
As a western border country sandwiched between Germany and Russia, the fears and anxieties in Poland's heart are not new, whether humanitarian or geopolitical. But it is more likely that Poland's current predicament is the cornerstone of the revival of its past geopolitical ambitions, the rebirth of the inter-seas.
Intermarium, or Międzymorze in Polish, is a geopolitical idea derived from Józef Piłsudski after World War I, which hints at Poland's glorious history of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which continued to change from 1386 to 1795.
Joseph Piłsudski
Poles have longed to return to that once glorious history. In fact, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, at its peak, was the largest and most powerful of all European states, and succeeded in blocking the ambitions of Ivan the Terrible, the Teutonic Knights, and the Ottoman Empire.
Although Intermarium has evolved into a concept over the past century through several iterations of its former Commonwealth, its core refers to a loose group of federal states located "between the seas", i.e. the Baltic Sea, the Black Sea extending to the Adriatic Sea, in order to maintain its security and independence from Russia and Germany.
But to understand the spirit of this Polish grand strategy or inland, it is necessary to refer to its historical concepts.
Between 1795 and 1918, Poland did not exist as an independent state, and it was divided between Russia, Prussia, and austria-Hungary. In addition, the Congress of Vienna in 1815 established a crippled Kingdom of Poland, de facto ruled by Russia. Independence was also lost at this time, and it inspired Poland to begin reformulating the idea of reviving the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
This was demonstrated in the plan laid out by the Polish prince Adam Czatoryski, who linked Poland's independence to the independence movements of Europe, Eastern Europe and even other countries in the Caucasus, and was eager to be supported by Britain, France and the Ottoman Empire.
Moreover, in his long dealings with Russia, Czartoreski believes that Russia has always been a "threat" to Europe, especially to Poland. But because of skepticism and disapproval from other states, his federal plan never materialized. But Czartoresky's ideas laid the foundation for Piłsudski's "Intermarium Doctrine," which in the 1920s made the Intermarium claim and became a topic of debate in foreign policy.
After World War I, Piłsudski, as Field Marshal, became the new head of state of the newly independent Poland (Second Republic), again mentioning Czartoreski's plan to establish a union of federal states in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe to counter the geopolitical equilibrium ambitions of Russia (and Germany) imperialism.
In addition, Piłsudski's other geopolitical strategies gave birth to the "Promethean Plan," the main purpose of which was to systematically dismantle the former Soviet Union and strengthen Poland's eastern borders. Piłsudski understood that the Former Soviet Union, as the successor to the Russian Empire, would pose a "threat" to Polish sovereignty. Thus, his "Prometheus Plan" aimed to weaken the former Soviet Union by supporting the independence movements of non-Russian constituent states in the Baltic, Black and Caspian Seas (Ukraine, Georgia) and forming a defensive alliance against the former Soviet "threat".
The initial plan of the "Intermarium", which included Poland, Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine, sought to rebuild the medieval Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
Unfortunately, due to the vast geographical scope involved, the great diversity of countries, differences in interests and foreign policies, and distrust of Polish ambitions, Piłsudski's two major geostrategic projects (Intermarium and the "Prometheus Plan") met with great resistance and failed to gain much support in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, including the West.
After Piłsudski's plan was foiled, fear became a reality. Poland continued to face difficulties, not only during World War II, but even after 1945, when it was included as a buffer state within the scope of the Iron Curtain of the former Soviet Union until 1990. So, Poles probably know better than anyone the seriousness of the Russian "threat."
In the nearly 200 years before liberation in 1990, except during the two world wars, it was often conquered by Russia (and sometimes Germany) in one way or another.
As history has proven time and time again, the Central European countries were often the main battlefields of war, and they all had similar fates during World War I/World War II, so they all had historical reasons to join the alliance.
Fearing its history of living under Russian rule, Poland's geopolitical ambitions after the Cold War manifested itself in a firm integration with the West, i.e. blocking a possible Russian "threat" in the form of NATO membership (1999) and later membership of the European Union (2004).
From the perspective of the West, especially the United States, NATO's rapid expansion into the Visegrad group of states (Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and later Slovakia) and later to the Baltic and Balkan states under the "open door policy" is based on three assumptions.
First, liberalism argues that newly integrated states in the post-Cold War "grey zone" will promote democracy and free markets, thereby encouraging cooperation and non-aggression in order to create a "peaceful Europe" (democratic peace theory).
Second, the idea of including the "buffer states" of Central, Southern and Eastern Europe in NATO would prevent any future reconciliation between Germany and Russia, no matter how small.
Finally, the Promethean Plan argues that this integration based on the principle of collective security will deter any future threats from Russia.
The program was further expanded during nato's Bucharest summit in 2008, inviting Georgia and Ukraine, two former Soviet republics, to join NATO.
For the United States, Poland is particularly important for NATO's future. Poland is an industrialized country, a medium power on the Russian border.
Screenshots
Note: Part of the land in the circle in the picture originally belonged to "East Prussia", and its capital was Königsberg, which is now Kaliningrad. After the end of World War II, it became a state of the former Soviet Union--- Kaliningrad Oblast, and with the collapse of the former Soviet Union, the three Baltic states declared independence, and Kaliningrad Oblast became an overseas "enclave" that was not connected to the Russian mainland.
Poland's "soft annexation"
The current geopolitical situation in Ukraine has been influencing the decision-making process in Poland. The transition from military non-intervention to a high degree of active participation is becoming a "priority" for Warsaw.
Recently, Polish President Andrey Duda met with Zelenskiy in Kiev. A series of agreements signed between the two countries indicate warsaw's intention to profit handsomely from the war to strengthen its political-military, economic, and cultural influence in western Ukraine. Polish nationals will be allowed to be elected to Ukrainian government institutions and even expected to become constitutional judges. In practice, this means that Kiev almost transferred the administration of Ukraine's defeated state to Poland. Warsaw didn't even have to send troops, which was called a soft annexation.
In fact, the United States is happy to see it happen. Any containment strategy adopted by NATO toward Russia must include Poland as its main eastern wing ally. As a staunch NATO ally of the United States, Poland has also become one of the few countries in the alliance to spend 2% of its GDP on defense, and is willing to allow NATO forces, defense systems and battle group alliances to exist on its borders, and even support the deployment of nuclear weapons in Eastern Europe by the United States, becoming NATO's current geopolitical and logistical center against Russia.
Most provocatively, Polish Deputy Prime Minister Kaczynski also called on the NATO military bloc to establish a new command center in Poland, similar to the command center in the Dutch town of Blensum, "from where joint NATO deployments will be planned and carried out." "This is undoubtedly a clear signal to Russia that the military alliance is now also present in Eastern Europe at the command level."
It is clear that Poland's Intermarium ambitions and Piłsudski's geopolitical ambitions will lead Poland in the future towards a "completely unforeseeable" direction of the situation...