Foreign Relations of the United States, 1946, Eastern Europe, The Soviet Union, Volume VI

711.60C/12–1846

Memorandum of Conversation, by the Acting Secretary of State

[Washington,] December 18, 1946.

Participants:	Mr. Acheson, Under Secretary,
	Mr. Hilary Minc, Polish Minister of Industry,
	Dr. Ludwik Rajchman, Head of Polish Supply and Reconstruction Mission in the United States,
	Mr. Janusz Zoltowski, Minister and Financial Counselor of the Polish Embassy.

Dr. Rajchman invited me to lunch today with Mr. Minc and Mr. Zoltowski. The luncheon was at Dr. Rajchman’s house. Aside from greetings on arriving and leaving the entire period of an hour and a quarter was devoted to the conversation outlined below. Dr. Rajchman acted as interpreter.

Mr. Minc said that he attached great importance to his visit in the United States not only because of the matters which he had under discussion with Mr. Clayton and his colleagues but because he believed that the interests of Poland and the United States very largely coincided and he wished to lay the foundation for extensive and mutually beneficial economic relations. He asked me whether I shared his view and desire.

I replied that it seemed to be plain that the economic interests of Poland lay in expansion of trade and financial relations with Western Europe and this hemisphere; that in the long run Poland’s hope of raising her standard of living depended upon the trade which I had mentioned since it was quite obvious that the Soviet Union did not have raw materials or manufactured goods which Poland needed and would not have them for many years to come. I also thought that Polish exports would be an important factor in restoring the economy of Europe and, therefore, I fully agreed that American interest in furthering a sound economy in Europe and Poland and Poland’s interest in the same thing entirely coincided. I added that it seemed to me unfortunately true that the pursuit of these common interests might be utterly frustrated if the Polish Government took action in the internal political field of a repressive nature which seemed to be both ill-advised and silly.⁸⁸

The Minister then made quite a long speech, the tenor of which was as follows: Elections were ephemeral things which raised strong passions which however soon subsided. He was concerned with more enduring economic relationships. The Polish Government had no intention of interfering with any opposition which restricted its activities to peaceful measures. It was forced, however, to take strong steps to suppress underground and subversive activity directed toward overthrowing the Government by force and toward civil war. The Government wished to remove not the ballot but machine guns from the opposition. Turning to the economic field he said that until some months ago he had hoped that the United States and Poland were moving toward economic collaboration. However, certain actions have been taken which raised serious questions in his mind. He gave as an illustration the matter of exports of coal from Poland and imports of cotton. He said that it was to Poland’s advantage to buy cotton from the West and to export coal to the West. However, this Government had imposed impediments to that with the result that Poland was being forced to import cotton from the Soviet Union and to pay an excessive price in coal. He thought that this gave rise to economic relationships which were not advantageous and were hard to rearrange. Poland wished to have friendly economic and political relationships with both the East and the West. He wished to say frankly and emphatically that Poland did not wish to be absorbed either politically or economically in the Soviet system and it did not wish to adopt for itself the Soviet system either in the political field or in the economic field. He, therefore, earnestly hoped not only that he would be successful in the immediate matters which he had under discussion but that he might lay the basis for still further collaboration.

At this point I made quite a long speech along the following lines: In brushing aside as he had done the political factors the Minister was seriously misjudging the American political situation. This country was not governed by officials who were free to act under cold-blooded economic calculations without regard to the temper and mood of the American people or the attitude and composition of the Congress. There were certain controlling factors in regard to our attitude toward Poland which the Minister was leaving out of his calculations. One of these was that the country was not prepared to make extensive loans and economic arrangements with countries which appeared to be accepting this help merely for the purpose of building up a domestic economy which would be joined to the closed economic system of the Soviet Union. The form of government which a nation had was, of course, its own affair but it was of vital importance to the United States in considering the extension of help to any nation whether or not the economy of that country was to be an important factor in raising the whole level of economy in Europe and this hemisphere or whether it was to join a system, the operation of which was either of no benefit to the rest of the world or an actually depressing factor. I said furthermore that this country had been very deeply disturbed by three cynical exhibitions of the use of western democratic electoral machinery to produce the most autocratic and repressive results. These experiences had been the two elections in Bulgaria and the recent Rumanian election. If another such example occurred in Poland it would make it next to impossible for this Government to go forward with any extensive economic help for Poland. This was true not only because of the general feeling in the United States but also because of the large number of Poles and the not unimportant fact that many of these were located in Michigan, the Senior Senator from which state was the new Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate. I said that I mentioned this not because American policy was a matter of personalities but because while it was difficult for some deep-seated feelings held by the people of this country to find expression, it would not be difficult in the case that I mentioned.

I went on to say that the American attitude toward Polish internal politics could not be changed by skillful dialectics. We would, of course, not argue that an opposition attempting to overthrow the government by force was the kind of opposition contemplated in the democratic process. I should say, however, in all frankness to the Minister that if a government in Poland or elsewhere put tens of thousands of political workers of one party in jail and removed all representation of that party from the electoral lists of a large part of the country, the United States would never believe that the resulting election was fair or that such action was taken to preserve law and order. The mere argument that such a step was necessary to preserve law and order would raise in the minds of the American people a very strong belief that the system which was being protected by such measures must lack any considerable element of public support.

I went on to say that no one in the United States questioned for a moment the necessity for any government in Poland maintaining the friendliest relations with the Soviet Union. The interest of the American people in the Polish election was not directed toward furthering the fortunes of any party or any leader. It was merely an interest in the fundamental principles of fairness and decency.

The Minister then said again that the Polish Government had no desire to deprive any of its citizens of the ballot but was merely repressing violence and subversive activities. He said that Poland could not be expected after twenty years of dictatorship and six years of German occupation to achieve western democracy in eighteen months. He said that while he was not too familiar with American history he recalled that we had had difficulties after the Civil War in reestablishing democratic government in the South. I replied to the Minister that I most earnestly asked him to believe that this was not a matter for adroit argument but was a matter of the most basic importance in estimating the American attitude toward Poland. We realized fully that Poland would have many difficulties in its internal politics and were willing to take a most tolerant view toward those difficulties. I said further that if the Polish Government had to err on one side or the other an error in the direction of repression would have the most serious consequences whereas an attitude of generosity and fairness on the part of the government toward the opposition would pay big dividends in good will and the increase in economic possibilities in the United States. In regard to our own experience in the South I pointed out to the Minister that Poland seemed in the way of repeating our errors of the carpetbagger era which had left lasting bitterness throughout a large section of the country.

I congratulated the Minister on his wisdom in working out with Mr. Clayton so prompt and satisfactory a solution of the Embassy’s currency problem and told him that the same attitude applied to other questions would make our relations with Poland much more satisfactory. The Minister said in reply that while he appreciated my kind words about himself, his attitude had been the same in Warsaw as it was in Washington and that it was Mr. Clayton’s approach which had rendered the matter a simple one to be solved by two intelligent businessmen. For obvious reasons I did not pursue this line further.

The Minister said that he hoped I was satisfied with the progress which he was making in his discussions with Mr. Clayton’s associates and when I said that I had been following the matter only in a general way he said that he hoped I could review the matter with Mr. Clayton and have another talk with him before he left this country.⁸⁹

Dean Acheson

88. In a memorandum to H. Freeman Matthews, Director of the Office of European Affairs, on December 16, Llewellyn E. Thompson, Chief of the Division of Eastern European Affairs, reviewed in brief the course of the Polish-American economic disscussions and concluded as follows: “The question of elections has not been raised in any of these conversations. It is clear that Mr. Minc is prepared to go a long way to satisfy us on these various problems in order to clear the way for additional credits from this country. It would seem to me that at some stage in these negotiations Mr. Clayton or Mr. Acheson should inform Mr. Minc of our concern at the indications we have received that the Polish Government does not intend to allow a free election. The elections are set for January 19 and we should make clear that we cannot consider any question of further credits until we know whether or not the Polish Government is going to keep its word…” (860C.50/12–1146)

    In a memorandum to Acting Secretary Acheson on December 17, Mr. Matthews emphasized the need of raising the election issue with Mr. Minc. Mr. Matthews’ memorandum read in part as follows: “It seems clear that the Poles are anxious to clear the way for further credits from this Government or from the International Bank. Regardless of how satisfactory any arrangements we may make with the Poles on such questions as compensation prove to be, any extension of credit to the Polish Government at this time could not fail to have important political repercussions in Poland in view of the fact that the Polish elections are set for January 19 and election campaigns are already in progress …. Since Mr. Minc is an influential member of the ruling clique, I believe that our failure to raise the subject with him during the current negotiations would be interpreted by the Polish Government as an indication that we were not seriously continuing our interest in carrying out the Yalta agreement. I, therefore, suggest that you impress upon him the great interest we have in the holding of free elections and our very great concern at alarming reports we have been receiving from Poland.” (860C.5034/12–1746)

89. No record has been found of any subsequent meeting between the Acting Secretary and Minc.