Foreign Relations of the United States, Diplomatic Papers, 1943, The British Commonwealth, Eastern Europe, the Far East, Volume III

760C.61/1047: Telegram

The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Standley) to the Secretary of State

Moscow, April 28, 1943—9 p.m.
[Received April 29—6:49 p.m.]

366. For the President and the Secretary. I want you to know that in my conversation with Molotov (see my 350, April 26)⁵⁰ which took place at 5 p.m. on the day before the receipt of the President’s message to Stalin, I beseeched him most earnestly for almost an hour to withhold publication of the Polish note until the President had had an opportunity to reply to Stalin’s message. I explained that the President had been absent from Washington and in all sincerity expressed the hope that a delay in publication even for 2 or 3 days to give the President a chance to communicate with Stalin might have an important bearing on the unfortunate developments. Molotov, however, was as intransigent as I am informed he had been just previously with the British Ambassador. I later learned that the note had been read at about the same time to the Chiefs of Mission in Kuibyshev and released to the press.

I now realize that the policy of the Kremlin had been predetermined before my interview with Molotov and that an intercession on my part or that of the British Ambassador could have been of no avail. From what I can gather here, it would seem that any hopes for reconciliation were apparently destroyed today upon the publication of an article in Izvestiya by Wanda Wasilevskaya, the so-called chairman of the Union of Polish Patriots,⁵¹ editor of Wolna Polska and incidentally the alleged wife of Kornechuk, newly appointed Vice Commissar of Foreign Affairs.⁵² This article which was entitled “The Polish Patriots are against the Government of General Sikorski”, maintained in no uncertain terms that the Polish Government in London, a hangover from Rydz-Smigly’s⁵³ “Government of Poland’s September defeat” was neither chosen by nor representative of the Polish people and that it is now controlled by Hitlerite elements. The leadership of its army under General Anders is accused of anti-Semitism, chauvinism, anti-Sovietism and even cowardice for “refusing to fight and withdrawing its forces from the Soviet Union”. Its diplomatic representation in the Soviet Union is charged with robbing the Polish exiles of money and supplies. Its links with Berlin are stated to be as evident as its imperialistic intentions to Soviet territories. The article concludes that the Union of Polish Patriots has requested the organization on Soviet soil of Polish units “which would not sit for months in tents but would proceed to the front to fight shoulder to shoulder with the Red army”. I am telegraphing a more complete summary of the article.

It is perhaps significant that whereas at first the foreign correspondents here were obliged to use the phrase “suspension of relations” later Soviet censors permitted them to refer to the development as a “break” or “rupture” in relations. However, it is the consensus here that the publication of the aforementioned article has now definitely closed the door to any rapprochement between the present Polish Government and Moscow.

Many qualified observers here anticipate in the near future the formation on Soviet soil probably as an offspring of the Union of Polish Patriots and as such a satellite of the Soviet Government of “Free Polish Government” which would maintain that it alone represented the real Polish people of German-occupied Poland and not the “reactionary” émigré Polish circles abroad. Although quite possible, I am not convinced that such an estimate is sound. Firstly, doubt whether the realistic Kremlin has forgotten its abortive attempt prematurely to organize and publicize the Terijoki Government at the beginning of the Finnish War.⁵⁴ Secondly, there are apparently no Polish leaders here of sufficient stature to the Polish people to make such a government popular. The formation of an organization similar to the French National Committee in London would appear more convincing. In any event I believe we should be prepared for some move in this direction whether it be in the form of a Free Polish Government Union or Committee and realize that any such organization on Soviet soil must be completely under Soviet dominance. By the same token a similar development in relations to any Slavic or bordering country outside the 1941 Soviet frontiers which does not vouchsafe the policy of the Soviet Union is possible.

The nucleus of any European Government can be found in the Soviet Union and especially those governments in which the Soviet Union has geographic or strategic interests.

It has occurred to me that we may be faced with a turnabout in European history. In 1918 Western Europe attempted to set up a cordon sanitaire to protect it from the influence of bolshevism. Might not now the Kremlin envisage the formation of a belt of pro-Soviet States to protect it from the influences of the West?

Standley

50. Not printed, but see telegram No. 354, April 26, 6 p.m., p. 396.
51. A Soviet-sponsored organization of Communist-inclined Poles in the Soviet Union.
52. Alexander Yevdokimovich Korneichuk, whose appointment had been announced on March 23, 1943.
53. Edward Smigly-Rydz, Marshal of Poland, Inspector General of the Army, 1936–39. He was Head of the Government of Poland at the outbreak of war in 1939.
54. The “Democratic Republic of Finland” was a puppet government set up by the Soviet Union at Terijoki under Otto W. Kuusinen as President early in December 1939. For correspondence regarding relations between the Soviet Union and Finland, and the Winter War of 1939–40, see Foreign Relations, 1939, vol. i, pp. 952 ff., and ibid., 1940, vol. i, pp. 269 ff.