Metadata language
Kamiński, Marek Kazimierz (1948–2020)
Contributor:Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences
Publisher:Instytut Historii PAN ; Wydawnictwo Neriton
Place of publishing: Date issued/created: Description:1st ed. as: Polska i Czechosłowacja w polityce Stanów Zjednoczonych i Wielkiej Brytanii 1945-1948. ; Bibliography p. 360-369. Index ; 2nd ed. ; 375, [1] p. ; 25 cm ; Summary in English.
Subject and Keywords:Poland - foreign relations - Great Britain - 1945-1970 ; Poland - foreign relations - United States - 1945-1970 ; Great Britain - foreign relations - Poland - 1945-1970 ; United States - foreign relations - Poland - 1945-1970 ; Czechoslovakia - foreign relations - United States - 1945-1970 ; Czechoslovakia - foreign relations - Great Britain - 1945-1970 ; Great Britain - foreign relations - Czechoslovakia - 1945-1970 ; United States - foreign relations - Czechoslovakia - 1945-1970 ; Soviet Union - foreign relations - 1945-1991
Abstract:
By the end of the Second World War, there began an era which had a decisive impact on the future of Poland and Czechoslovakia. Staying in London exile governments of both countries numbered among the members of victorious anti-Nazi coalition. Gradually, however, and as early as 1943, they began to lose their subjectivity, and became an object of manipulation on the international scene. The cause of this state of affairs was an increasingly important military role of the Soviet Union led by Stalin. The Soviet leader sought to subjugate the Central Eastern European countries by gradually installing in these countries communist-dominated regimes under Soviet influence. In fact, the tragedy of Poland and Czechoslovakia was that in the tandem of the Anglo-Saxon states the position of the United States was much stronger than that of the other partner. Great Britain was marginalized. Due to the lack of deeper interest on the part of the US in the problems of Central and Eastern Europe and conciliating attitude towards the USSR the weaker British partner was unable to drum up American support for its proposals. The future of Czechoslovakia could have been determined in favor of the Czechoslovak democratic forces as early as in May 1945 during the liberation of the country from Nazi occupation. The responsibility for not having used the armed forces to liquidate the German occupation in the territory of Bohemia and Moravia and for having enabled the Red Army to do so rests solely with the United States. As regards Poland, also in this sphere the Americans played a decisive role, in negative meaning for the Polish people, when they ejected at Yalta the possibility to establish the Emergency High Commission for Liberated Europe, one of the purposes of which was to supervise the elections in Poland. Only different distribution of forces between the United States and Great Britain would have offered a chance for effective opposition against the Soviet expansion in Central and Eastern Europe, since only the British understood the essence of the threat posed to Europe by the USSR. When the United States also comprehended, with a two-year delay, in what consisted the Soviet danger, the majority of Central and Eastern territories of the continent was already in the hands of Stalin. This state of affairs was caused not only by consistent long-term policy of Soviet expansionism, but also by lack of effective cooperation between the both Anglo-Saxon states. The underlying cause of uncoordinated actions by the United States and Great Britain was that the decisive voice was that of the United States, unable to correctly judge the importance of events taking place in Central and Eastern Europe for the future of international relations in global scale.
IH PAN, call no. II.11393 ; IH PAN, call no. II.11392 Podr. ; click here to follow the link
Language: Language of abstract: Rights:Creative Commons Attribution BY-ND 4.0 license
Terms of use:Copyright-protected material. [CC BY-ND 4.0] May be used within the scope specified in Creative Commons Attribution BY-ND 4.0 license, full text available at: ; -
Digitizing institution:Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences
Original in:Library of the Institute of History PAS
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