862.014/5–445: Telegram
The Chargé in the Soviet Union (Kennan) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 4—3:30 p.m.]
1467. Personal for Durbrow.10 Since I cannot take action before Monday on Department’s 1000, May 3, 6 p.m., concerning Polish administration in certain German districts I am taking the opportunity to let you know how I feel about it. This instruction is one which it would cause me considerable anguish to carry out. I have in mind the interpretation the Russians will put on our action if we feign ignorance or disbelief of a situation which neither the Soviet Government nor the Warsaw Government has been at any pains to conceal and which is common knowledge to every sparrow in eastern Europe. When the Warsaw Government has passed a decree incorporating certain of these districts formally into its own state system; when this has been duly reported by the Pravda itself; when we have photographs showing the leaders of the Warsaw Government participating in the ceremonies of incorporation of the territories into Warsaw Poland; when we know that both provincial and municipal officials have been appointed directly by the Warsaw authorities; when we see that Drobner,11 until recently a Cabinet member of the Warsaw regime and by no stretch of the imagination an “indigenous official”, has been appointed Mayor of Breslau; when we would not be able to point to a single difference in treatment between these districts and the remaining portions of Poland under Warsaw rule—when all these facts are before us, I fail to see how we can seriously pretend to believe that [Page 278] local administration has merely been entrusted as a matter of convenience to indigenous Polish officials in no way agents of or responsible to the provisional government now functioning in Warsaw. For us to take this position could only mean to the Russians that we are eager to sanction their unilateral action but are afraid to admit this frankly to our own public and that we will leap at the pretext, however flimsy, to conceal the real situation.
I feel that this sort of connivance on our part at Soviet attempts to mask the real nature of their activities in Eastern Europe creates a most deplorable impression on the Soviet mind and one which cuts smack across our present line of policy toward other questions involving Poland and Central Europe.
It seems to me the best thing we and the British could do at this stage would be to recognize the Soviet action in Eastern Germany for what it is, to express publicly our regret over this unilateral evasion of our agreements concerning the treatment of Germany and to make it plain that we now consider ourselves free to dispose of German territory in the west to our Western Allies on similar conditions, without reference to the views of the Soviet Government. This solution would not restore the status quo ante in Eastern Germany; but it would at least make the best of a bad situation, give us a chance of acquiring some needed merit in the eyes of our Western Allies and teach the Russians an overdue lesson.
If you give me the word I will proceed to act on this instruction without further remonstration but I would appreciate your confirmation that the Department has really given thought to all its angles and implications and that an official questioning of my instructions on my part would not be useful.12
- Elbridge Durbrow, Chief of the Division of Eastern European Affairs.↩
- Boleslaw Drobner, a left-wing Polish Socialist who had been in charge of labor welfare, social security, and health in the Polish Committee of National Liberation at Lublin but was not included in the Polish Provisional Government established on December 31, 1944.↩
- Telegram 1018, May 5, 1 p.m., to Moscow directed the Chargé to withhold action on Department’s telegram 1000 pending the receipt of further instructions (862.014/4–1845).↩