Through the Eyes of a Strategist and a Diplomat: Polish-American Relations post-1918

Abstract

This work appeared in connection with the centennial of Poland's rebirth as an independent state in 2018. Its focus is Poland-United States diplomatic relations. It is a most welcome addition to what we have in this field, most notably Piotr Wandycz's The United States and Poland (1980) and Wandycz and John S. Micgiel's edited volume, Reflections on Polish Foreign Policy (2007). Contributors to this collection are prominent public officials from Poland and the U.S. who bring both expertise and experience to the subject.The biographies of the five contributors appear at the end of the book. Robert Kupiecki, Poland's ambassador to the United States from 2008 to 2012, provides two pieces—an introduction and a review of Poland-U.S. relations after 1989. Ambassador/historian Bogusław Winid, who served as Poland's representative to NATO, analyses the relations between the two states between 1918 and 1945. Professor Jakub Tyszkiewicz of the University of Wrocław takes up the years of the Polish People's Republic (1945–1989), a period Wandycz and Micgiel did not cover. Daniel Fried, the United States’ ambassador to Poland from 2005 to 2009, offers his overview and eye-witness discussion of U.S.-Poland relations over the past forty years. And Mariusz Brymora, who has served the Republic of Poland in a number of diplomatic postings in America since 1989, provides a useful list of important dates in U.S.-Poland diplomatic history over the past century.In his introductory essay, Ambassador Kupiecki deals with the a-symmetrical character of the relations between the two countries, with the United States a great power internationally and Poland a medium sized European state wedged geographically between Russia and Germany. A second critical factor defining U.S.-Poland relations involves Poland's wrenching experience over this past century, first as a nation restored to two decades of independent statehood after 123 years of foreign rule, followed by its devastation in World War II, then its forty-four years under Soviet domination, and concluding with its rebirth as a sovereign democracy in 1989—the Poland of the Third Republic. Here a key aspect defining U.S.-Poland relations has been America's support for Poland's entry into the NATO alliance in 1999. And as he notes, over the past century U.S.-Poland relations have not existed in a vacuum but have been affected by the changing international situation and by domestic economic and political conditions in both countries.Bogusław Winid's remarkable contribution on U.S.-Poland relations from 1918 to 1945 begins with his discussion of pianist/patriot Ignacy Paderewski's extraordinary role in gaining President Woodrow Wilson's support for Poland's independence and his work with the leaders of America's Polish community. Of note is his appraisal of the seldom mentioned U.S. Secretary of State Robert Lansing's role in backing Poland's rebirth.After assessing the period between the two world wars as a missed opportunity for building closer Polish-U.S. ties, Winid offers a highly critical discussion of World War II Poland's tragic experience in working with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Evaluating FDR as duplicitous in his treatment of his Polish ally, he concludes that he was clearly no Woodrow Wilson.Given Roosevelt's complicated task of building closer ties with Josef Stalin, the Soviet Union's ever suspicious ruler, both in defeating Hitler and then winning his support for his grandiose postwar goals, things could hardly have been otherwise. As a result, Poland's postwar fate was sealed and in two steps. Thus, at their first summit meeting in Teheran in December 1943 with British Prime Minister Churchill, FDR agreed, amazingly, to cede half of prewar Poland to Stalin. He asked only that their discussion be kept private. As he told Stalin, he planned to run for re-election in 1944 and winning a big Polish vote would help insure his victory. In step two, at the “Big Three” leaders’ second summit in February 1945 at Yalta, the road was paved for a Soviet -run post war Polish state. FDR glossed this over in his report to Congress on the Yalta conference. Winid concludes by noting the memoir by Jan Ciechanowski, free Poland's last Ambassador to the U.S., a work he titled Defeat in Victory.This reviewer has but one difference with Winid's masterful essay. It involves his somewhat overly severe criticism (p. 49) of the Polish American community for having not done more on Poland's behalf in World War II. In fact, Polonia was restricted from lobbying for free Poland due to America's neutrality before December 7, 1941, the day the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. From then until 1944, Polonia's leaders continued to trust, wrongly, in Roosevelt and Churchill's commitment to their “Atlantic Charter” pledge to support their Polish ally's sovereignty and territorial integrity. They were further hamstrung by the favored treatment FDR and his advisors gave to three, well positioned, pro-Soviet activists (Professor Oskar Lange, Reverend Stanislaus Orlemanski, and trade union leader Leo Krzycki) who claimed they spoke for Polish Americans about Poland.But in June 1944, Polonia's leaders did convene a great congress in Buffalo, New York of more than 2,500 elected delegates from across the country. The gathering came at a critical moment. Soviet troops had just entered Polish territory and the great Allied Normandy invasion was about to begin. The Polish American Congress’ founding was indeed a “most colossal affair” as the President's observer reported. But with FDR's Teheran arrangement with Stalin kept secret, all in Buffalo pledged him their loyalty, their commitment to victory in the war, a just peace, and a postwar Poland whole and free based on the lofty principles of the Atlantic Charter.As Winid notes, in the months after FDR continued to mislead Polish Americans about his bombshell agreement with Stalin so as to hold onto their votes in November. On October 11, Pulaski Day, he met with PAC leaders in the White House seated in front of a giant map of prewar Poland. Then on the eve of the election, he spoke with PAC president Karol Rozmarek. Repeating his support for the principles of the Atlantic Charter, FDR won Rozmarek's personal vote for him. His operatives then broadcast Rozmarek's pledge as if it was the Congress’ official endorsement.1Given these realities, it is hard to imagine how the World War II Polish American community could have had anything like the impact on Poland's behalf comparable to that of its predecessors in 1917–1918. Even had Polonia been blessed with an advocate as prominent and eloquent as Paderewski, could that have made a difference?Professor Tyszkiewicz's rendition of U.S.-Poland relations during the forty-four years of the Soviet-dominated “Polish People's Republic” is useful as a comprehensive chronological review. Its strong point lies in his discussion of U.S. policy as two pronged – with Washington maintaining formal relations with the “People's Poland” regime while doing its best to develop positive ties with its subjects. Here the author provides much useful information about the economic aid programs aimed at winning over the Polish regime and improving its people's lot. He is mindful in discussing the positions taken by successive U.S. presidents towards Poland, whose own leadership also went through a series of changes. Still, might his presentation have given more recognition to the chronic crises that impacted Poland—in 1956, 1968, 1970, 1976, 1980—more than all the rest of the Soviet-run East European satellites combined? Could the role of Pope John Paul II after 1978 received some attention, along with that of the incredible Solidarity movement that brought down “People's Poland” in 1989? These were indeed matters of great importance in America as well as Poland.The activities of the organized American Polonia during the forty-four years of People's Poland receives no mention. Thus, the herculean efforts of the PAC and its presidents, Rozmarek and his successor, Aloysius Mazewski, émigré activists like Stefan Korboński of the Assembly of Captive European Nations, and Jan Nowak of Radio Free Europe go unnoticed, despite their tireless work to influence U.S. policy makers. Yes, it was regime policy to black out (or misrepresent) information about them. But they are part of this story.2Ambassadors Kupiecki and Fried's essays make for very interesting reading. Both deal mainly with relations between the Poland of the Third Republic and the United States following the communist-run regime's demise. Both focus on Poland's efforts to join the NATO alliance, which they view as a key to Poland's sovereignty, security, and prosperity, and the debates within the Clinton administration over NATO expansion and, indeed, its very future.Both hardly mention the role Polish Americans, as individuals and as activists in the Polish American Congress, in helping achieve Poland's entry into NATO. Ambassador Kupiecki does cite the contributions of Jan Nowak, Zbigniew Brzeziński, and a few others, but that is about it. Ambassador Fried makes a veiled mention of the role of the Polish American community. This is unfortunate, since in NATO expansion, the Polish American Congress and its controversial President, Edward Moskal, were both active and influential.3Indeed, while most of the authors of this excellent work assume that U.S.-Poland diplomatic relations have been two-sided in nature, the story might be better seen as three-sided—with the vast, well organized Polish diaspora an engaged participant over the past century and more. Its service can be compared to that of the Jewish American community in U.S.-Israel relations.Ambassador Kupiecki takes up and disposes of the post-Soviet complaint from Russia that the U.S. and its allies reneged on their promises at the end of the Cold War not to expand NATO into east central Europe. He cites the opinion of Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev from 1990 that no such promise was made. He also notes the pledge made in Warsaw in 1993 by Gorbachev's successor, Boris Yeltsin, that Russia would not oppose Poland's entry into NATO. But he notes (with Fried agreeing) that Russia's opposition to NATO expansion into East Central Europe has become “dogma” (pp. 100–104, 137).Ambassador Fried covers much the same ground as Kupiecki and ends his excellent, highly personal appraisal of U.S.-Poland relations over the past thirty plus years with words of wisdom that merit quoting here. Writing as a friend, he reminds Poles about the adverse impact that Poland's leaders’ domestic policy decisions have had, and can have, in undermining its international standing. But his sober words need to be taken seriously by neo-isolationist-minded Americans too: The American leadership in the West, and the free world more broadly, remains indispensable. That leadership is based, at its best, on the recognition of the fact that America's values and America's interests ultimately advance together. The history of the last one hundred years teaches us that when America does not lead, others will fill the vacuum. Together Americans and Poles realized a common goal of freedom within central Europe and an undivided Europe in the lifetime of the current generation. It remains a common task to defend this achievement for the sake of future generations. (p. 173)