Alliance of White Eagles
We shouldn’t try to create a NATO-bis without America. Strong transatlantic ties are crucial for the security of Poland and Europe.
.Despite the snow and cold, Pete Hegseth didn’t give up his morning run along the banks of the Vistula River. Afterwards, it was time for talks with Polish politicians, followed by a press conference. The US Secretary of Defence praised Poland as a ‘model ally,’ willing to invest both in its own defence and collective security. Hegseth also spoke warmly of the Polish Army. ‘[There is] no truer friend, no tougher foe, than the Polish soldier,’ he argued during his February visit to our country. His high opinion of us has certainly been reinforced by the experiences of recent years – the joint service of Americans and Poles in Iraq and Afghanistan and the hospitality shown to the 10,000 or so US soldiers stationed with us today. But the Polish American brotherhood of arms has a much longer history.
From Pulaski to Cooper
.‘I came here, where freedom is being defended, to serve it, and to live or die for it,’ Casimir Pulaski wrote to George Washington in 1777, the third year of the American War of Independence. In his native Poland, Pulaski was celebrated for his victories over the Russians; however, overseas, he is still known as the ‘Father of the American Cavalry.’ At the Battle of Brandywine, he saved the life of George Washington. Two years later, he was mortally wounded in Savannah. He is one of the few foreigners awarded honorary US citizenship.
Another Pole who distinguished himself in that war was Tadeusz Kościuszko. His fortification work was instrumental in the American victory over the British at the Battle of Saratoga. ‘He is as pure a son of liberty as I have ever known,’ wrote a future US president, Thomas Jefferson. It was in the name of the same ideals that Kościuszko fought on his own soil against the Russians and Prussians. There, however, despite his initial successes, he had to succumb to the superiority of his enemies. Poland disappeared from the map of Europe for decades, divided between neighbouring powers.
Our hope for freedom came with the outbreak of the First World War. In those days, Ignacy Jan Paderewski successfully campaigned for the Polish cause in the USA. This famous pianist, who performed at New York’s Carnegie Hall among other venues, managed to reach President Thomas Woodrow Wilson himself. In January 1917, Wilson declared in the Senate that ‘there should be a united, independent and autonomous Poland.’ A year later, he reiterated and elaborated on this demand in the famous Fourteen Points, which set out a vision of a new, more just world.
Wilson’s plan soon found its reflection in the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, which ended the Great War. However, Poland’s newly regained independence still had to be defended. The greatest threat came from the east. It was posed by Bolshevik Russia, which sought to bring its bloody revolution to the world ‘over the corpse of white Poland.’ When the Red Army approached Warsaw and Lviv in the summer of 1920, the fate of the young state hung in the balance. Every bit of support, including from overseas, was invaluable in those dramatic moments. Between 1917 and 1919, more than 20,000 American volunteers of Polish origin joined the Polish military contingent in France, known as the Blue Army or Haller’s Army. After the First World War, the Hallers were transferred to Poland and played an important role in the battles against the Bolsheviks. Also making its mark in these battles was the Polish 7th Air Escadrille, known as the Kościuszko Squadron, made up partly of American volunteers. Among them, the most famous is undoubtedly Merian C. Cooper, a later co-creator of Hollywood’s King Kong and winner of an honorary Oscar. ‘It was good to fight for Poland!’ he said towards the end of his life.
Against the Axis of Evil
.The independent Republic of Poland was a thorn in the side of its two powerful neighbours, Germany and the Soviet Union. In the summer of 1939, Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin made a malicious pact that launched the Second World War. Attacked first by the Nazi Reich and soon by the USSR, Poland had no chance of putting up any effective resistance. The tragedy of those days was brilliantly documented by the American director and photographer Julien Bryan, probably the only foreign journalist working in bombarded Warsaw in September 1939. He was impressed by the heroic attitude of the city’s inhabitants. ‘Poles, if the Spartans had revived, they would have bowed their heads before you,’ he later proclaimed.
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 drew the United States into the war. Poles and Americans fought in it on the same, righteous side – in defence of freedom and humanity against the axis of evil that was trying to take over the world. Approximately one million Americans mobilised for service had Polish roots, for example, Edward Woznenski, who distinguished himself in the battles in Sicily and Normandy, and fighter ace Francis ‘Gabby’ Gabreski. Indeed, Americans and Poles fought together on many fronts. General George S. Patton even noted: ‘The Polish troops are the best-looking troops, including British and American, that I have ever seen.’
Unfortunately, the defeat of the Reich did not bring Poland the freedom it craved. After the Second World War, Central and Eastern Europe found itself in the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence. Given this circumstance, many Polish veterans settled in the West. Among those who moved to the United States were General Antoni Chruściel (‘Monter’) and Lieutenant Colonel Antoni Krzyczkowski. Both were disgracefully stripped of their Polish citizenship by the government in Warsaw.
The Voice of the Free World
.For years, the voice of the free world for Poles living under communism was Radio Free Europe and the Voice of America, US radio stations that broadcast in Polish and other languages. The domestic propaganda tried everything to discredit them – in vain. Similarly unsuccessful were communist posters depicting US President Ronald Reagan with a cowboy gun, supposedly leading a ‘crusade against Poland.’ Our compatriots instinctively knew the truth: America stood for freedom, democracy and opportunity, while the Soviet Union represented oppression and stagnation.
When the communist junta imposed martial law in Poland in December 1981 to halt the transition to freedom, Reagan spoke bluntly of the war declared by the communist government on its own people. In his Christmas speech, devoted largely to Poland, he sought to give comfort to a suffering society. He mentioned the spirit of solidarity ‘that no physical force can crush.’
Proven Allies
.And crushed it was not. The Polish yearning for freedom, the support of Pope John Paul II and Reagan’s challenge to the ‘Evil Empire’ led to the overthrow of the communist system in Europe at the end of the 1980s. For Poland, this opened the way to where civilisation has always reigned – the political, economic and military structures of the West. As early as the government of Prime Minister Jan Olszewski (1991-1992), it was made clear in ministerial declarations that Poland should aim to join NATO. This, however, wouldn’t have been possible without the determination of the American authorities. In April 1998, the US Senate approved the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization by a clear majority of 80 votes to 19. Poland’s membership in the world’s most powerful alliance was finalised a year later.
In 2023, Warsaw and Washington had the highest defence spending in NATO, according to calculations by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. This proves that both Poland and the US take their alliance commitments very seriously. In nominal terms, the United States has been the clear leader in military spending for years. It will be a long time before even the biggest EU countries get anywhere near that level, even with their best efforts. It is, therefore, irresponsible to propose any kind of competition for NATO in Europe. The real guarantor of security for the free world is the North Atlantic Alliance. Let’s make sure it stays that way.
