Triumph and Tragedy (The Second World War) (71 page)

— Stalin’s Speech — The Curzon Line and the
Western Neisse — Soviet Charges Against the
Polish Underground — Dangers of a Collision —

Mr. Roosevelt’s Letter to Stalin of February
6
—

New Proposals by M. Molotov, February
7
— A
Transfer of Populations — My Telegram to the
Cabinet, February
8
— The Anglo-American Draft

— Forming a Polish Government — A Crucial
Point in the Conference — Allied Unity and Public
Criticism — The Need for a New Start — And for
Full Information — Lublin Versus London Again —

Polish Enthusiasm for Soviet Russia — Stalin
Promises to Hold Free Elections — Molotov
Produces a Formula, February
9
— Plans for a
Moscow Meeting — A Considerable Advance —

Mr. Eden and I have a Private Conversation with
Stalin, February
10
— The Final Draft of the Yalta
Declaration — An Important Omission.

P
OLAND WAS DISCUSSED at no fewer than seven out of the eight plenary meetings of the Yalta Conference, and the British record contains an interchange on this topic of nearly eighteen thousand words between Stalin, Roosevelt, and myself. Aided by our Foreign Ministers and their subordinates, who also held tense and detailed debate at Triumph and Tragedy

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separate meetings among themselves, we finally produced a declaration which represented both a promise to the world and agreement between ourselves on our future actions. The painful tale is still unfinished and the true facts are as yet imperfectly known, but what is here set down may perhaps contribute to a just appreciation of our efforts at the last but one of the war-time Conferences. The difficulties and the problems were ancient, multitudinous, and imperative. The Soviet-sponsored Lublin Government of Poland, or the “Warsaw” Government as the Russians of all names preferred to call it, viewed the London Polish Government with bitter animosity. Feeling between them had got worse, not better, since our October meeting in Moscow. Soviet troops were flooding across Poland, and the Polish Underground Army was freely charged with the murder of Russian soldiers and with sabotage and attacks on their rear areas and their lines of communication. Both access and information were denied to the Western Powers. In Italy and on the Western Front nearly half a million Poles were fighting valiantly for the final destruction of the Nazi armies. They and many others elsewhere in Europe were eagerly looking forward to the liberation of their country and a return to their homeland from voluntary and honourable exile. The large community of Poles in the United States anxiously awaited a settlement between the three Great Powers.

The questions which we discussed may be summarised as follows:

How to form a single Provisional Government for Poland.

How and when to hold free elections.

How to settle the Polish frontiers, both in the east and the west.

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How to safeguard the rear areas and lines of communication of the advancing Soviet armies.

The reader should bear in mind the important correspondence between the President and Stalin, and my share in it, about Poland, which is set forth in an earlier chapter. Poland had indeed been the most urgent reason for the Yalta Conference, and was to prove the first of the great causes which led to the breakdown of the Grand Alliance.

When we met on February 6 President Roosevelt opened the discussion by saying that, coming from America, he had a distant view on the Polish question. There were five or six million Poles in the United States, mostly of the second generation, and most of them were generally in favour of the Curzon Line. They knew they would have to give up East Poland. They would like East Prussia and part of Germany, or at any rate something with which to be compensated. As he had said at Teheran, it would make it easier for him if the Soviet Government would make some concession such as Lvov, and some of the oil-bearing lands, to counterbalance the loss of Königsberg. But the most important point was a permanent Government for Poland. General opinion in the United States was against recognising the Lublin Government, because it represented only a small section of Poland and of the Polish nation.

There was a demand for a Government of national unity, drawn perhaps from the five main political parties.

He knew none of the members of either the London or Lublin Governments. He had been greatly impressed by Mikolajczyk when he had come to Washington, and felt he Triumph and Tragedy

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was an honest man. He therefore hoped to see the creation of a Government of Poland which would be representative, and which the great majority of Poles would support even if it was only an interim one. There were many ways in which it might be formed, such as creating a small Presidential Council to take temporary control and set up a more permanent institution.

I then said it was my duty to state the position of His Majesty’s Government. I had repeatedly declared in Parliament and in public my resolution to support the claim of the U.S.S.R. to the Curzon Line as interpreted by the Soviet Government. That meant including Lvov in the U.S.S.

R. I had been considerably criticised in Parliament (as had the Foreign Secretary) and by the Conservative Party for this. But I had always thought that, after the agonies Russia had suffered in defending herself against the Germans, and her great deeds in driving them back and liberating Poland, her claim was founded not on force but on right. If however she made a gesture of magnanimity to a much weaker Power, and some territorial concession, such as the President had suggested, we should both admire and acclaim the Soviet action.

But a strong, free, and independent Poland was much more important than particular territorial boundaries. I wanted the Poles to be able to live freely and live their own lives in their own way. That was the object which I had always heard Marshal Stalin proclaim with the utmost firmness, and it was because I trusted his declarations about the sovereignty, independence, and freedom of Poland that I rated the frontier question as less important. This was dear to the hearts of the British nation and the Commonwealth. It was for this that we had gone to war against Germany —

that Poland should be free and sovereign. Everyone knew what a terrible risk we had taken when we had gone to war Triumph and Tragedy

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in 1939 although so ill-armed. It had nearly cost us our life, not only as an Empire but as a nation. Great Britain had no material interest of any kind in Poland. Honour was the sole reason why we had drawn the sword to help Poland against Hitler’s brutal onslaught, and we could never accept any settlement which did not leave her free, independent, and sovereign. Poland must be mistress in her own house and captain of her own soul. Such freedom must not cover any hostile design by Poland or by any Polish group, possibly in intrigue with Germany, against Russia; but the World Organisation that was being set up would surely never tolerate such action or leave Soviet Russia to deal with it alone.

At present there were two Governments of Poland, about which we differed. I had not seen any of the present London Government of Poland. We recognised them, but had not sought their company. On the other hand, Mikolajczyk, Romer, and Grabski were men of good sense and honesty, and with them we had remained in informal but friendly and close relations. The three Great Powers would be criticised if they allowed these rival Governments to cause an apparent division between them, when there were such great tasks in hand and they had such hopes in common. Could we not create a Government or governmental instrument for Poland, pending full and free elections, which could be recognised by all? Such a Government could prepare for a free vote of the Polish people on their future constitution and administration. If this could be done we should have taken one great step forward towards the future peace and prosperity of Central Europe. I said I was sure that the communications of the Russian Army, now driving forward in victorious pursuit of the Germans, could be protected and guaranteed.

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After a brief adjournment Stalin spoke. He said that he understood the British Government’s feeling that Poland was a question of honour, but for Russia it was a question both of honour and security; of honour because the Russians had had many conflicts with the Poles and the Soviet Government wished to eliminate the causes of such conflicts; of security, not only because Poland was on the frontiers of Russia, but because throughout history Poland had been a corridor through which Russia’s enemies had passed to attack her. During the last thirty years the Germans had twice passed through Poland. They passed through because Poland had been weak. Russia wanted to see a strong and powerful Poland, so that she would be able to shut this corridor of her own strength. Russia could not keep it shut from the outside. It could only be shut from the inside by Poland herself, and it was for this reason that Poland must be free, independent, and powerful. This was a matter of life and death for the Soviet State. Their policy differed greatly from that of the Czarist Government. The Czars had wanted to suppress and assimilate Poland.

Soviet Russia had started a policy of friendship, and friendship moreover with an independent Poland. That was the whole basis of the Soviet attitude, namely, that they wanted to see Poland independent, free, and strong.

He then dealt with some of the points which Mr. Roosevelt and I had put forward. The President, he said, had suggested there should be some modification of the Curzon Line and that Lvov and perhaps certain other districts should be given to Poland, and I had said that this would be a gesture of magnanimity. But the Curzon Line had not been invented by the Russians. It had been drawn up by Curzon and Clemenceau and representatives of the United

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States at the conference in 1919, to which Russia had not been invited. The Curzon Line had been accepted against the will of Russia on the basis of ethnographical data. Lenin had not agreed with it. He had not wished to see the town and province of Bialystok given to Poland. The Russians had already retired from Lenin’s position, and now some people wanted Russia to take less than Curzon and Clemenceau had conceded. That would be shameful.

When the Ukrainians came to Moscow they would say that Stalin and Molotov were less trustworthy defenders of Russia than Curzon or Clemenceau. It was better that the war should continue a little longer, although it would cost Russia much blood, so that Poland could be compensated at Germany’s expense. When Mikolajczyk had been in Russia during October he had asked what frontier for Poland Russia would recognise in the West, and he had been delighted to hear that Russia thought that the western frontier of Poland should be extended to the Neisse. There were two rivers of that name, said Stalin, one near Breslau, and another farther west. It was the Western Neisse he had in mind, and he asked the Conference to support his proposal.