760C.61/2119¼: Telegram
The Ambassador to the Polish Government in Exile (Biddle) to the Secretary of State
[Received 8:33 p.m.]
Polish Series [No.] 82. For the President and the Secretary. Polish Foreign Minister Romer has requested me to transmit to you the communication and memorandum quoted below. A similar communication has been addressed to Mr. Churchill.
“London, 16th November, 1943. Mr. President: The Polish Foreign Minister has today handed to Ambassador Biddle my memorandum, concerning Polish-Soviet relations and has requested that it be transmitted to you through his intermediary.
I am anxious besides to present to you orally certain alternatives for the solution of existing difficulties and should be grateful if you could give me the opportunity of doing so.
I am prepared to undertake at any moment and with absolute discretion the necessary journey.
Please believe me to be, Mr. President, sincerely yours, S. Mikolajczyk, Prime Minister of Poland.
Confidential memorandum.
In the course of his last conversation with Mr. Cordell Hull on October 6, before Mr. Hull’s departure for Moscow, the Polish Ambassador, M. Ciechanowski, placed before him a memorandum in which the Polish Government, endowed with the full confidence of the Polish people at home, gave expression to the complete trust placed in the United States and Great Britain by the Polish people and the Polish Government. In this memorandum an appeal was made for guarantees and the safeguarding of the right of the Allied Polish Government to assure administration on Polish territory immediately after its liberation from German occupation, and also for the safeguarding of life and property of the Polish population in the event of the march of Soviet troops into Poland. At the same time an appeal was made for intervention which would bring about the resumption of Polish-Soviet relations, which, in the present circumstances, has become a matter of particular urgency.
[Page 482]The unwillingness of the Polish Government to enter into discussions on frontier questions is based on the following considerations:
- 1.
- Poland, who entered the war in 1939 in defense of her territory, has never given up the fight and has not produced any Quisling, is fully entitled to expect that she will emerge from this war without reduction of her territory.
- 2.
- Eastern Poland which is the object of Soviet claims extends to half of the territory of the Polish Republic. It contains important centres of Polish national life. It is closely knitted with Poland by ties of tradition, civilization and culture. The Polish population which has resided there for centuries forms a relative majority of the population of these lands. On the other hand, the lower density of their population and their possibilities of economic development furnish Poland with a socially sound means of solving the problem of the over-population of her western and southern provinces.
- 3.
- The Polish Government could not see their way to enter a discussion on the subject of territorial concessions above all for the reason that such a discussion in the absence of effective guarantees of Poland’s independence and security on the part of the United States and Great Britain would be sure to lead further and further to ever new demands.
The attribution to Poland of Eastern Prussia, Danzig, Opole Silesia49 and the straightening and shortening of the Polish western frontier are in any case dictated by the need to provide for the stability of future peace, the disarmament of Germany and the security of Poland and other countries of Central Europe. The transfer to Poland of these territories cannot therefore be treated fairly as an object of compensation for the cession to the U.S.S.R. of Eastern Poland which for reasons adduced above does by no means represent to the U.S.S.R. a value comparable to that which it has for Poland. The attempt made to prejudge the fate of Polish eastern territories by means of a popular vote organized under Soviet occupation by the occupying authorities is without any value either political or legal.
It would be equally impossible to obtain a genuine expression of the will of the population inhabiting these territories in view of the ruthless methods applied there today and those which have been applied in the past by consecutive occupants.
Recalling the confidential memorandum handed over to Mr. Hull before his departure for the Moscow Conference, the Polish Government gives below a main outline of instructions which have been issued recently to the underground organization in Poland.50
A rising in Poland against Germany is being planned to break out at a moment mutually agreed upon with our Allies either before or at the very moment of the entry of Soviet troops into Poland.
[Page 483]In accordance with the principles adopted in Quebec, the Polish Government is entitled to exert sovereign authority over Polish lands as they are liberated from the enemy.
Consequently, in case the entry of Soviet troops into Poland takes place after the reestablishment of Polish-Soviet relations, the Polish Government would be anxious, as it has already informed the American Government, to return immediately to Poland together with the Commander-in-Chief51 and to cooperate there in the further struggle against Germany.
The entry of Soviet troops on Polish territory without previous resumption of Polish-Soviet relations would force the Polish Government to undertake political action against the violation of Polish sovereignty whilst the Polish local administration and army in Poland would have to continue to work underground. In that case the Polish Government foresee the use of measures of self-defense wherever such measures are rendered indispensable by Soviet methods of terror and extermination of Polish citizens.
The Moscow Conference has not brought the question of the resumption of Polish-Soviet relations nearer a satisfactory conclusion. In the meantime, the situation on the eastern front indicates that Soviet troops may be expected soon to cross the borders of Poland. The Polish Government has, moreover, reasons to fear that in present conditions the life and property of Polish citizens may be exposed to danger after the entry of Soviet troops into Poland and the imposing on the country of Soviet administration. In that case, desperate reaction of the Polish community may be expected following the violation of the principle adopted in Quebec assuring to the United Nations their liberty and their own administration.
The principles foreseen in the case of Italy by the Moscow Conference52 could by no means be satisfactory for Poland. The administration carried out in Poland by a commander of Soviet troops even with the cooperation of American and British liaison officers would place Poland, an Allied country, on the same level as Italy, an enemy country; in practice the cooperation of a limited number of American and British liaison officers could not be a safeguard for the interests of the Polish population in the territories occupied by Soviet troops.
In this situation the Polish Government addresses a pressing appeal to President Roosevelt to intervene with Marshal Stalin with the view to restoring Polish-Soviet relations, safeguarding the interests of the Polish state and the life and property of its citizens after the Soviet troops have entered Poland.
Polish airmen, sailors and soldiers, in carrying out the fight against the common enemy, must be assured that their families will be restored to them and that they can expect to return to a free and independent homeland. London, November 16th, 1943.”
The outline of instructions recently issued to the underground organization in Poland, as referred to in the foregoing memorandum, [Page 484] has today been transmitted to the Navy Department with the request that a copy be brought to the Department’s attention.53
- Upper Silesia.↩
- The text of the “Instructions for Poland Established by the Polish Cabinet Meeting” was handed by Polish Prime Minister Mikolajczyk to Ambassador Biddle, who transmitted it to the Department in despatch Polish Series No. 463, November 16; not printed.↩
- Gen. Kazimierz Sosnkowski.↩
- For text of the “Declaration Regarding Italy,” November 1, 1943, see vol. i, p. 759.↩
- Copy was transmitted to the Department by the Navy Department on November 17; filed under 860C.20/116.↩