860C.014/3–347
Memorandum by the Polish Ambassador (Winiewicz)52
As far as the problem of the Polish Western frontier (Oder-Western Neisse Line) is concerned, may I call your attention to the following additional observations:
[Page 186]1) When the Western territories were taken over by the Polish Administration they were both ravaged and depopulated for several reasons:
- a)
- some of the most violent military operations took place in these areas;
- b)
- the retreating Germans executed on a vast scale the dismantling and deliberate destruction of the transportation system, factories, power plants, mine installations, bridges etc.
- c)
- Nazi authorities carried out a compulsory evacuation of a large part of the pre-war German population, this affecting mostly able-bodied men and in particular, skilled workmen;
- d)
- large numbers of those not embraced by the Nazi evacuation plan fled of their own accord and from fear before the advancing Soviet and Polish armies.
The result was that, at the time hostilities ceased, these territories were inhabited probably by not more than three million persons, including over one million of the native Polish population, and the economy was at a virtual standstill.
2) Due to the energetic administrative and economic measures undertaken by the Polish Government. 3.5 million Poles have been newly settled in this area, the majority of them repatriated from territories east of the so-called Curzon Line, established at Yalta as the eastern Polish border. Thus the number of Polish inhabitants of these territories by the end of 1946 was close to 5 million. During 1947 another 1,150,000 will be settled there.
In fulfillment of the Potsdam Agreement, and in accordance with decisions of the Allied Control Council in Berlin, 1.5 million Germans were transferred from Poland to Germany proper by the end of 1946. About 0.5 million are still awaiting repatriation, which was suspended during the period of intense cold, to spare them the hardships of travelling under winter conditions, particularly distressing in a war-shattered country.
3) The last production figures for the newly acquired western areas of Poland indicate that the present monthly rate, as compared with pre-war level, reached:
| in coal | 70% |
| in iron ore | 90% |
| in steel | 60% |
At the same time the Polish Administration succeeded in putting into operation in these areas 80% of the pre-war number of food-processing factories.
All these results were obtained at the cost of great efforts and large investments of capital. The achievements in all fields would have been [Page 187] even greater, if it were not for the after-effects of the war still interfering with reconstruction and rehabilitation.
4) It should be stressed that the changes in Poland’s frontiers, decided upon at Yalta and Potsdam, resulted in a shrinkage of Polish territory by about 20%. The density of population of post-war Poland (western territories included) was 200 per sq. mile, as indicated by the census of February 1946. This was higher than that of France, Greece, Spain, Yugoslavia, Ireland, Sweden, Norway and Finland. It has increased, however, considerably since the time the census was taken, due to repatriation of Poles from beyond the Curzon Line and of Polish displaced persons from the West. It will further increase during 1947, following the expected repatriation of 573,000 Poles from areas east of the Curzon Line and other parts of the Soviet Union.
5) The Polish nation having proved itself unquestionably capable of settling and rehabilitating the newly acquired lands, the preservation of the present Polish-German frontier will: render possible the settlement of the remaining Poles returning from the East, of Polish displaced persons and Polish soldiers demobilized in the West; stabilize economic conditions in Poland; enable Poland to raise her agricultural production to a level at which she will become once more, as before the war, a country exporting food, a fair amount of it going to Germany (never self-sufficient in that respect); speed up full recovery of Polish industry and mining, and export capacity, particularly in coal.
6) On the other hand, any attempt to readjust the present Oder-Neisse frontier would: wreck an already stabilized and integrated economic structure; result in enormous moral and material losses for Poland; necessitate new compulsory population movements, once more victimizing the Poles who have been already uprooted and displaced by the German occupants; increase the number of displaced persons in need of international assistance; finally, would be gravely detrimental to the whole economy of Europe, by severely affecting production, disrupting trade and exchange of goods, and bringing other harmful consequences.
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Ambassador Winiewicz delivered this memorandum to Under Secretary Acheson on March 3. Acheson’s memorandum of his conversation with Winiewicz, dated March 3, not printed, read in part as follows:
↩“The Ambassador said that he had prepared a paper on the question of Poland’s western frontier which he wished to present to the Department. He said he would like to have expressed these views to Secretary Marshall but he realized the pressure which the Secretary was under and he had therefore decided to present them in the form of a memorandum. He stated that he had prepared this personally and that it was therefore not an official statement of his government.
“The Ambassador stated that one of the principal points which he wished to make was the relationship between the territory which Poland had ceded in the east and the territory which Poland felt entitled to receive in the west. …” (860C.014/3–347)