Polish enthusiasm for the Ukrainian cause has been decisively to the advantage of Ukraine. It’s a severe danger to exhaust it.
Ukraine’s president, Volodomyr Zelensky, has been getting some criticism about being “entitled” and petulant in his dealings with allies and those supporting his war effort.
When Zelensky lashed out at the last NATO summit, I honestly sympathized with him. But that’s because I think NATO has effectively pushed him into an absolutely impossible and untenable position. NATO held out the possibility of membership to Ukraine, but deferred the reality indefinitely. This gave time for Russia to use extraordinary means to oppose it. And Ukraine is bearing the absolutely catastrophic costs of a policy which effectively provoked but could not effectively deter. The only thing that could rationalize the sacrifices made by Ukrainians is a real security guarantee, and it’s just not coming. And if it’s not coming, then Zelensky himself is in dire straits politically.
Ukraine has made a big issue in recent months about its grain exports. Russia is blocking the normal sea routes, and Ukraine has sought an opening of the European market to its exports. This has been opposed by Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland.
Zelensky rebuked Poland in his speech to the U.N., saying, “It is alarming to see how some in Europe play out solidarity in a political theatre — making thriller from the grain. They may seem to play their own role but in fact, they are helping set the stage to a Moscow actor.”
Well, by the evening, Poland withdrew its ambassador from Kyiv and the tone dramatically shifted. “We are no longer transferring weapons to Ukraine, because we are now arming Poland with more modern weapons,” Polish prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki said. President Andrzej Duda compared Ukraine to a drowning person who threatens to pull its rescuers into the abyss.
One would note that Poland under the Law and Justice Party has been — by leagues — the most energetic advocate for the Ukrainian cause among European governments. PM Morawiecki made extraordinary interventions with German and French leaders at the beginning of the war to rally the continent to Ukraine’s cause. Poland has been a leader in accepting refugees, sending weapons, and working diplomatically for a more comprehensive anti-Russian posture from the West.
Politically, all this has been very tricky for the Polish government. The Poles genuinely see Russian aggression as a menace and fear that a resurgent Russia would test NATO boundaries. The Polish government, which had been hammered as a backward, ultra-reactionary populist menace since it came to power, also got an unusual amount of good press in America and Western Europe for supporting the Ukrainian cause.
But all politics is local, they say.
So what’s happening? A few things. Elections are coming up in Poland, and Law and Justice relies heavily on farmers. Like Western European farmers decades ago, they fear being undercut by cheaper exports from the East. Being a party of the right, Law and Justice also has constituents who are upset about the higher levels of Ukrainian immigration the government allowed before the war, and the amount of refugees accepted during it. At the same time, some Law and Justice supporters have benefitted from the influx of Ukrainians, which has provided a cheaper labor pool for domestic help and services.
Also, Ukrainian nationalism sometimes sits at odds with Polish nationalism. The Polish government rebuked Ukraine’s Parliament earlier this year for celebrating the birth of Stepan Bandera, a World War II–era Ukrainian nationalist seen as responsible for genocidal violence against Jews and Poles.
I have to say, while it’s not entirely surprising that the Polish government made a slight shift in rhetoric ahead of elections, I’m surprised that Zelensky has managed the relationship the way he has. Polish enthusiasm for the Ukrainian cause has been decisively to the advantage of Ukraine. It’s a severe danger to exhaust it.