| dc.description.abstract | The main goal of this article is to show how important for the emigration authorities of the Polish state was the
issue of the shape of the borders of post-war Poland. Declaring the willingness to fight for independence, from the
earliest days of the war they thought not only about defeating the enemies but also about determining the future
borders of the Polish state in such a way as to ensure the best geopolitical position, protection against the
neighbours, and the best living conditions for the citizens. This stemmed from the belief that the development of
the post-war state would depend on its territorial resources. The territorial postulates formulated in the Polish
environments, both emigrant and in the country, were repeatedly presented to the political leaders of the anti-
Hitler coalition when they were planning the postwar world. The Poles demanded from the allies explanation of their
stand on the issue of the Polish borders, seeing in it an important part of the mobilization of the society to
survive under conditions of occupation and terror against all actions for independence. Polish postulates differed
in that they included various political projects but they all agreed concerning the essential preservation of the
eastern borders of the Polish Republic set out several years before in the Treaty of Riga.
The idea of Polish acquisitions at the expense of Germany, put forward since October 1939, was accepted by the
Western powers, though not without a variety of concerns and doubts with regard to their shape and extent; at the
same time, they were in favor of the Stalinist demands to keep the lands of the Polish Republic, annexed in 1939,
within the borders of the Soviet Union. The outline of the Soviet proposals of the political order in this part of
Europe as disclosed in Tehran was developed and strengthened at the Yalta conference and confirmed by the Potsdam
Agreement. Discussions which in 1945 were carried out between the political leaders of the anti-Hitler coalition on
Polish matters only obscured the dictate of the Stalinist concepts of ensuring the dominance of the Soviet state in
this part of Europe, worked out in Moscow during the war. The new territorial shape of Poland was regarded by the
governing forces as beneficial for economic development and conditions for the defence in the event of another war.
It was, however, paid for with the loss of national freedom and sovereignty, progressive Sovietization of all areas
of public and private life. | en |
