by Ambassador Timothy A. Chorba and Ambassador G. Philip Hughes
American Ambassadors Review, Spring 2019
Summary
Northeastern Europe is nervous—and for good reason. NATO’s northern flank—facing Russia and its normally compliant confederate Belarus across its eastern borders—faces a variety of challenges:
the menace of Vladimir Putin’s increasingly assertive, aggressive, possibly revanchist Russia;
anxieties about the reliability of NATO’s Article 5 collective security guarantee in the face of initial equivocation by President Donald Trump during his presidential campaign and early months in office, as well as Germany’s military weakness, conspicuous foot-dragging on achieving its NATO defense spending commitments and doubts, born both of history and current German policies, about its trustworthiness and intentions toward the region;
frictions with the European Union (EU)—centered on efforts to sanction Poland’s eclectic, right-of-center government for its refusal to accept a quota of Middle Eastern immigrants flooding Europe, in part thanks to German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s invitation, and its supposed deviations from EU democratic norms—all of which raise questions about the status of the EU’s newer members to the east relative to its original members in western Europe;
the vulnerability of its—and its NATO allies’—energy supplies, the more so thanks to the Nordsteam II pipeline project to funnel Russian natural gas directly to Germany via an under-the-Baltic pipeline promoted by Russia’s state-owned Gazprom, lucratively chaired by former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, and embraced by his successor, Chancellor Merkel—which has prompted efforts among NATO’s northeastern flank allies (particularly Poland) to develop alternative, diversified energy resources for central and eastern Europe;
Russia’s continued occupation—and, now, incorporation into Russian territory, of Ukraine’s former Crimean peninsula, illegally seized in 2014, and its occupation and on-again, off-again military activities in eastern Ukraine—which, from Tallinn, Vilnius or Warsaw, look ominous, if not portentous.
A Council of American Ambassadors delegation visited Estonia, Lithuania and Poland in late-September 2018. (This was the Council’s third visit to Poland—after earlier visits in 1990 and 2004—but its first delegation to Estonia and Lithuania.)
Though our visit was brief in each capital—slightly longer in Poland, given its much greater size and sensitive geographic position—we enjoyed high-level access and candid conversations with each nation’s senior leadership. We hope that our visit provided, in a small way, one more demonstration of U.S. interest in and concern for the region, especially in the face of its current anxieties. For our part, our mission visit left us with some very strong impressions.
Having come through the “growing pains” of their initial post-Communist decades, these societies of northeastern Europe are thriving. Notwithstanding media and EU criticism of the domestic politics and policies of Poland, they are authentic, competitive democracies that present a vivid contrast with both their dismal pasts under Russian Communism and the societal realities to their east.
Each of the nations we visited strongly exhibited the same preoccupations and priorities.
Russian Threats and NATO
All three are extremely anxious about Russian threats to their security and independence, particularly in light of Russian President Putin’s often-belligerent posturing.
All three rely profoundly on NATO for their physical security—the bedrock of their freedom and economic security—and are solicitous to fulfill—or even over-fulfill—their obligations to meet NATO’s targets for defense spending as a proportion of GDP.
That said, it’s apparent that, for these NATO allies, “NATO” means the United States. If the United States and its security guarantee is “there” for them, then, as far as they’re concerned, NATO will be “there” to defend them. However, if the U.S. security commitment is weak, lacking or absent, these allies do not believe that the rest of NATO combined would be adequate to ensure their security.
For this reason, it is vital that the U.S. security commitment remain resolute; that U.S. leaders avoid, deliberately or inadvertently, sending signals that place our commitment to NATO members’ indivisible security in doubt and that the United States does as much as possible to strengthen NATO’s security posture in this region—perhaps NATO’s most geographically exposed flank. In the eyes of these nations’ leaders, anything less is an invitation to Russian probing and testing and, ultimately, to aggression.
U.S. Troop Presence
In consequence, all three nations’ leaders evinced to us strong interest in U.S. troop presence in this region—the nearer, the better. Our interlocutors in Estonia and Lithuania would have liked—and apparently would welcome—permanent U.S. troop presence in their territories, though they appreciated that this was not “in the cards.”
For the present, therefore, NATO’s Enhanced Forward Presence for the Baltic region—with Britain assuming leadership for the NATO troop contingents rotated through Estonia; Canada leading the NATO members’ contingents rotating through Latvia; Germany leading the NATO contingents rotating through Lithuania and the United States leading those rotated through Poland—is considered enough by these Baltic partners. They seem to realize that it is better than the alternative, is the most that’s practically achievable at present and concretely engages four NATO partners—the United States, the United Kingdom, German and Canada—in their security.
Those with whom we spoke obviously recognized the sensitivities surrounding a permanent U.S./NATO troop presence in this region: that is, Russia’s likely strong reaction against any permanent U.S. troop presence, particularly in the Baltics, on principle; as well as the strategic and logistical complications of supporting any such presence such that, in actual operations, it wouldn’t become a cut-off “hostage.” Obviously, the size of any such presence would also be a sensitive point.
For our Baltic interlocutors, a permanent U.S. troop presence in Poland—which Poland’s current Law and Justice-led government has offered to host and support by providing basing infrastructure—would be “close enough” for their reassurance.
That said, geography in this region poses significant strategic perils for NATO: specifically, the Russian enclave in Kaliningrad (with its capacity for anti-access/area denial for NATO reinforcement of the Baltics and Poland) and the Suwalki gap between Kaliningrad and the Belarusian border that is the Polish-Lithuanian border (which, if cut, would isolate the Baltic states from land re-supply/reinforcement from continental Europe).
Energy Security against Russia
Each government with which we met evinced grave concern about Russian mischief with European energy supplies and grave misgivings about the implications of the Nordstream II project. This under-the-Baltic pipeline will deepen western Europe’s dependence on Russian national gas while increasing Russia’s potential for more complete energy blackmail of the Ukraine, as it will cut Ukraine’s pipeline transit revenues and substantially free Russia from concerns about satisfying gas customers to the west as it manipulates gas supplies to Ukraine. The Baltic governments we visited and Poland want this project stopped—but have lacked the clout, with Germany or within NATO and the EU, to bring this about.
In the course of our discussions, we were briefed on several examples of Russian “meddling” with the development of energy projects in adjacent countries and even in one NATO member state (Hungary) that strongly indicate that geostrategic—not merely commercial—interests motivate and dominate Russia’s energy initiatives in this region.
The European Union
All these governments are strongly committed to their membership in the European Union—seeing in this both the economic lifeline that parallels NATO’s security lifeline and a definitive statement of their commitment to, and integration in, the system of Western political and social values that distinguishes them from the East and positions them to play their constructive part in a wider international community.
That said, in Poland—and to a lesser degree, with the more “get along, go along” governments in the Baltic states—there is real concern about the development of a two-tiered membership structure in the European Union, and, potentially, in NATO—one in which Germany and France, backed up by Italy, the Benelux states and a few others, “call the shots” and everyone else is expected to “fall in line.” For small Baltic nations with populations ranging from 1.4 to less than 2 million inhabitants, relatively tiny economies and vulnerable geography, this may not seem to be such a bad deal. But for the largest nation in central Europe—Poland—whose 38 million inhabitants occupy strategically vital geography, enjoy a vibrant, relentlessly growing economy and exhibit a famously stubborn, fiercely independent streak—this doesn’t go down so well. A part of the upshot is the (until recently) escalating tensions between Poland and Brussels over Poland’s Law and Justice government’s domestic judicial reforms and policies.
It is apparent to these three governments that even the threat of the UK’s “Brexit” from the EU has really left unfazed Brussels’ and the bloc’s basic decision-making pre-dispositions. So they find themselves, in a way, “willingly trapped” in a community that they cannot do without and in which they very much want to be in but that they are almost powerless to reform and that they fear may, at any moment, make one or another—or all—of them scapegoats for the latest “politically correct” Brussels fad or campaign against those who fail to “toe the line.”
Poland’s Controversies
In sharp contrast to the furor then raging in U.S. and western European media over Poland’s Law and Justice government’s reforms of its judiciary and a law (subsequently amended) to criminalize references that impute responsibility to Nazi-occupied Poland for the Nazis holocaust crimes, we encountered a surprising degree of understanding and forbearance among our Baltic interlocutors for Poland’s situation and its government’s reform efforts.
Only the Deputy Chair of the Estonian parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee and a pair of scholars at Estonia’s International Center for Defense and Security think tank repeated the by-then-canonical mainstream media and EU critiques of Poland’s reforms.
In contrast, senior officials of Lithuania’s Foreign Ministry, meeting with us as a group, acknowledged that Poland’s judiciary needed to be reformed and sympathized with Poland’s efforts to reduce the influence of former Communists in its post-liberation government, but they also acknowledged that Poland had done a poor job of explaining and communicating about its reform efforts.
Our mission concluded that:
This region merits heightened U.S. and NATO security attention, commitment and vigilance.
Extreme care needs to be taken, especially in word and deed, to reinforce, and not weaken, the U.S./NATO/Western commitment to these allies.
The dependence of NATO defense of the Baltics on reinforcement—particularly of critical air defense assets—on receipt of “strategic warning” needs to be reassessed in light of Russia’s growing anti-access/area denial capabilities and its possible deployment of Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty-prohibited 9M729 or SSC-8 land-based cruise missiles to its Kaliningrad enclave.
It is in both U.S. security and economic interests—as we are now the world’s foremost, single energy producer—to take Russia’s geostrategic energy threat to NATO Europe seriously and, as a priority, to work with these governments—and other NATO allies, Germany chief among them—to reduce, not enhance Russia’s energy leverage over the Alliance’s security.
U.S. policy toward the European Union—reflexively supportive throughout the Cold War and afterward as part of the European bulwark against Russian Communist expansion—needs a “tune up” in light of the new realities of the EU’s greatly expanded membership and our own economic self-interest.
A measure of patience and independent judgment—as well as a calculation of our own interests—is in order in assessing and reacting to the domestic national decisions/policies adopted by some newer members of NATO/the EU, such as Poland. Following, lemming-like, the mainstream media ‘narrative’ and the nostrums of Brussels’ unelected EU bureaucrats may not provide a true, clear and balanced picture of these developments, their rationale and their consequences.
Report
In late September 2018, a delegation of the Council of American Ambassadors visited Tallinn, Estonia (September 23–25), Vilnius, Lithuania (September 25–26) and Warsaw and Krakow, Poland (September 27–29). In each capital, we were briefed by the U.S. Embassy country team and were received by senior officials of the government and, in one case, a Member of the European Parliament.
Estonia: Juri Luik, Minister of Defense; Rainer Sak, Secretary General, Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Vaino Reinart, Deputy Secretary General, Ministry of Foreign Affairs;
Keit Pentus-Rosimannus, Deputy Chair, Foreign Affairs Committee, Estonian Parliament; as well as the Director and staff of the International Center for Defense and Security (ICDS) and the Estonian Center for Eastern Partnership.
Lithuania: Raimundas Karoblis, Minister of Defense; Darius Skusevicius, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, and his team; and scholar Dalia Bankauskaite.
Poland: Dr. Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Chairman, Law and Justice Party; Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki; Minister Antoni Macierewicz, the Deputy Leader of the Law and Justice Party and former Defense Minister; Piotr Naimski, Secretary for Strategic Energy Infrastructure in the Chancery of the Prime Minister; Deputy Minister of Defense Tomasz Szatkowski; Under Secretary Bartosz Cichocki of the Foreign Ministry; and Professor Ryszard Legutko, Member of the European Parliament.
Estonia
As the victim of a paralyzing Russian cyber-attack in 2007 (over the removal, from a prominent to a remote spot, of a Soviet war memorial), our Estonian interlocutors impressed upon us:
Their security anxieties in the face of rising Russian assertiveness under Putin[U4] ;
Their dependence on NATO for their security and the priority they place on meeting their defense spending commitments in line with NATO’s agreed-upon guidelines;
Their appreciation for the post-Crimea-invasion NATO initiative for rotational Enhanced Forward Presence under UK command;
Their wish for a permanent U.S. troop presence “in the neighborhood”—if not in Estonia itself (which logistically would be too taxing and too provocative toward Russia), then as nearby as possible;
Criticism of the Trump Administration’s dislike for multilateral trade agreements and its propensity to raise tariffs or impose economic sanctions on short notice, as well as its general skepticism of the World Trade Organization (WTO);
Pride in the vibrant economy Estonia has developed since its liberation from the Soviet Union, with a digital technology focus that has spawned many successful companies developing and exploiting distinct technological niches;
Estonia’s consequent ability to host NATO’s “center of excellence” in cyber security and cyber warfare—since Estonia has been the only NATO member thus far victimized by an identifiable major Russian cyber-attack.
Our discussion with the Tallinn-based ICDS underscored how critical air defense is to Estonia’s and NATO’s ability to mount any kind of viable defense of its (and the other Baltic states’) territory. Yet Estonia’s (and the Baltics’) air defense infrastructure is very thin—almost completely lacking—and defense plans are based on reinforcement from western Europe in advance of the outbreak of any conflict. However Russia’s growing anti-access/area denial capabilities make this a doubtful presumption. This seemed to us a conspicuous vulnerability crying out for attention.
Estonia is obviously proud to host the EU’s Center for Eastern Partnerships, the mechanism through which the EU works to both strengthen the civil societies of the former Soviet republics of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine and to deepen relations with each of them. Results to date have been mixed; the closer the “Eastern Partners” governments are to Russia, the more difficult is the work, and the more limited and confined the progress.
Lithuania
Our Vilnius meetings began with Defense Minister Karoblis presenting Lithuania’s defense challenges and priorities, contributions and obligations to NATO, participation in NATO out-of-area operations, etc. The Minister became highly animated at a question about Russia’s challenge to NATO’s energy security—in the process sharing with us one of the most startling revelations of the trip. (Minister Karolbis had previously served as Minister of Energy.)
We learned that Russia is building a nuclear power reactor in western Belarus, approximately 20 km from the Lithuanian border and, consequently, quite close to the capital of Vilnius, with the agreement of the government of Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko. The Russians were boasting that it would be both the quickest and cheapest construction of a nuclear power reactor to date—but neither Russia nor Belarus would share any technical data or permit any outside inspections of the construction by Lithuania or the EU, despite repeated requests. Lithuania acknowledges, of course, that the construction of a nuclear power plant in Belarus is a sovereign matter, and Belarus is free to accept the Russian construction if it wishes. However, against the backdrop of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in what is now Ukraine, Lithuania—and, evidently, the EU—consider it reasonable to at least ascertain that the plant is being built and will be operated to the latest and safest engineering standards.
Curiously, there is at present, we were told, no evident need or demand in Belarus—particularly in western Belarus, in the plant’s vicinity—for the volume of electricity the plant would produce. Rather, the siting and construction of the plant was intended to position Russia (and its Belarus client) to pre-empt Lithuanian/Baltic efforts at greater energy independence—e.g., in cooperation with Poland—by offering electricity supplies at below-market, implicitly subsidized prices as a lower-cost alternative to any other energy import scheme. This represents further evidence of Russia’s mischief with eastern/central European energy supplies and markets.
Our meetings served as a reminder of another crucial vulnerability in NATO’s northeastern flank: the narrow stretch of the Polish-Lithuanian border between Belarus and Kaliningrad known as the Suwalki gap. In the event of conflict, keeping this stretch of border open will be a major challenge—for the overland supply-reinforcement of the Baltic states, while closing it off is assuredly a major, early Russian objective.
The one surprising detail to emerge from our meeting with Vice Foreign Minister Skusevicius and his team—which otherwise trod already well-covered ground—was the equanimity with which his team met questions about Poland’s judicial reforms and other controversial legislation. While acknowledging that these controversies had become a major discussion point within the EU, the Lithuanians evinced conspicuous sympathy for the Polish government’s predicament. We were told, frankly, that Poland’s judiciary needed to be reformed, and that it was understandable/unsurprising that Poland’s Law and Justice government would take steps to reduce the role of former Communist nomenklatura and collaborators in free Poland’s government, economy and civic life. Unfortunately, Poland had done a poor job of explaining its reforms and communicating about it policies—facts that only helped prolong the controversies within the EU.
Poland
Major areas of our discussions with Polish authorities included Poland’s defense; its determination to achieve energy independence; the aftereffects of “Post Communism”; judicial reform; relations with the European Union, and with Germany in particular and the 2010 Smolensk aircraft crash (which killed Poland’s President and much of Poland’s leadership).
One overarching observation stood out from our meetings: the Polish leadership is profoundly conscious of the brutality and destruction that history and its two dominant neighbors have visited upon Poland for centuries, most recently including the invasions from the west and then the east that triggered World War II in Europe, the Katyn Forest massacre, the leveling of Warsaw, the annihilation of its Jewish population, Poland’s massive wartime civilian death toll and the 40-year Russian occupation and domination by a post-war, Russian-imposed Communist regime.
We were impressed by the high regard in which the Polish government holds the United States and the pro-America affection that it manifests. That warmth and respect for the United States stand in marked contrast to sentiments all too often expressed in western Europe. During our visit to Poland, we observed the striking profundity of Polish religious observation, specifically Catholicism.
Defense
Poland views the bilateral defense relationship with the United States as crucial to its security. Its desire to have U.S. ground forces permanently stationed as a forward presence in Poland dominates conversations concerning the bilateral relationship. The proximity of Putin’s Russia, coupled with Poland’s tragic history of invasion and dismemberment, impel Poland to seek a permanent U.S. military presence as some degree of deterrence and protection from its aggressive eastern neighbor.
Poland spends 2 percent of its annual GDP on defense, and its leadership is highly cognizant of the country’s need for military preparedness. Thirty percent of its defense spending is invested in U.S. military equipment. Poland has suffered one hundred military dead in Iraq and Afghanistan in support of the U.S. lead in those conflicts.
While rotating deployments of U.S. forces—most recently, the Tennessee Army National Guard, shortly before our visit—certainly are appreciated and valued, the Poles don’t consider them an adequate substitute for the deterrent that permanent basing of U.S. conventional forces would present. Poland doesn’t regard stationing a NATO contingent comprising European forces as sufficient for its defense needs, and it noted that such NATO deployment still needs to be complemented by air and maritime capabilities. The current presence of German conventional forces as part of a NATO battle group generated only muted Polish confidence.
Poland feels threatened by Russia’s Iskander short-range surface-to-surface missiles, and it noted that interceptor missiles are considerably more expensive than the Iskanders themselves. Poland is acquiring American-made air-launched JASSM missiles with a range of up to one thousand kilometers. Its key priorities include acquisition of long-range precision strike systems, air defense and cyber defense. U.S. constraints on technology transfer are limitations on these ambitions.
A recent Sino-Russian combined Baltic maritime exercise and those countries’ mid-September 2018 Vostok exercise in eastern Russia were of substantial concern to Polish defense planners. Although transient, the presence of Chinese warships in the Baltic Sea was a sobering development that had not attracted meaningful U.S. public attention.
Energy
Poland seeks energy independence from Russia, its threatening neighbor to the East. Eighty percent of Poland’s energy today is coal-based, and over the next quarter century, it will remain at least 50 percent dependent on coal. Liquid natural gas (LNG) terminals could address a third of Poland’s energy needs, and to that end, a long-term contract with Cheniere Energy was concluded about a month after our visit. Further development of Norwegian gas reserves and their transport to Poland by a yet-to-be-constructed pipeline would round off 100 percent of Poland’s energy requirements.
Nordstream II, the German-driven pipeline project to supply Germany with a second route for Russian natural gas, was characterized as contrary to EU solidarity, Poland’s interests and trans-Atlantic cooperation, as well as undermining NATO.
We learned that there is a projected annual 75 billion cubic-foot shortage of natural gas in Europe. Twenty-four existing liquified natural gas (LNG) terminals in Europe would be capable of importing LNG that the U.S., with its increasing exploitation of shale resources by fracking, would be capable of supplying. By contrast, Nordstream II’s annual capacity will be 55 billion cubic feet. In essence, the situation pits commitment to U.S. LNG against dependence on Russian gas transported through Nordstream II. Poland strongly objects to German determination to push forward with construction of the Nordstream II pipeline and related facilities.
Poland wishes to “desynchronize” Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania from the post-Soviet energy system and instead join them to Poland and western Europe for their energy needs. For its part, Russia is planning a nuclear plant in Kaliningrad that could supply energy to the Baltic nations.
“Post-Communism”
The Law and Justice government’s impassioned position is that the overthrow of Communist rule in the early 1990s was to a substantial degree only illusory. While the formal name and trappings of Communism were suppressed, in fact a very substantial number of Communist Party functionaries in the Communist-era government remained in key positions. The situation was one of “old wine in new bottles.” Essentially, “post-Communism” Poland inherited a mutation of the Communist apparatus, while a full-fledged democracy would have required creation of a new state apparatus. As a result of this residue from a totalitarian era, economic criminality had acted as a disincentive to investment.
Consequently, although 29 years have passed since the collapse of Communist rule and Soviet domination in Poland, the country still lags behind the West. With the exception of the judiciary, as discussed below, many “post-Communist” influences are being eroded since the 2015 election of Poland’s first majority right-of-center government led by the Law and Justice Party. While state enterprises are the driving engine of today’s Polish economy, a wave of Polish capitalism would be very desirable, and greater investment by American multinationals would be welcomed.
Judicial Reform
While, as noted above, the Polish government generally has eliminated “post-Communist” influences in the state apparatus, its effort to reform the judiciary has triggered strong resistance from its domestic political opposition. This has led to negative publicity outside the country and vehement objections by the EU, which characterizes this reform effort as anti-democratic and illegal. It appears that an essentially domestic Polish matter has transmuted into an EU-level concern. This may be the consequence of the role of EU Council President Donald Tusk, the Polish Prime Minister whose government was ousted by the Law and Justice Party’s 2015 victory, possibly further stoked by Germany.
The Polish government’s position is that with 50,000 judges in the country, the judiciary long has been widely criticized as bloated, inefficient and untrustworthy. Little known is that about a third of the judges at the higher levels of the judiciary are holdovers from the Communist era, and that some who remain on the bench were involved in sentencing anti-Communist activists to prison terms. Astonishingly, there remain Communist-era holdover judges who were not trained as lawyers, but instead merely pursued a one-year course in judicial bureaucracy before being appointed. Blatant judicial conflicts of interest have remained unaddressed, and judicial participation in the opposition’s political activities and public rallies has been documented.
The Polish government’s position is that it doesn’t wish to retain at the apex of the judicial pyramid judges who were installed during the Communist regime. To that end, it has implemented mechanisms, including age limitations, to eliminate them. We were informed that President de Gaulle had effected similar action in France in 1959, and that when East Germany was integrated with West Germany, the former East German judicial apparatus was sanitized and its judges were discharged. While delayed as the result of concessions in the 1990s when formal Communist rule was disbanded, similar action in Poland now was necessary to democratic rule.
We encountered a comment by a U.S. Embassy officer that the USG is concerned that this process “could be abused” and that it threatens “the sanctity of judgments.” (It should be noted that in the U.S. judicial system, there is no observation of “sanctity” for judgments that are tainted by judicial conflict of interest and/or corruption.)
The European Union
We were concerned by the evident tension between the European Union and Poland. We were taken aback by the level of resentment within the Polish political leadership toward Germany.
With respect to the latter, sentiment was expressed that Germany, the leading European power, desires to thwart and dominate Poland, as well as to block its influence in eastern Europe. It was commented that the stronger Poland grows, the less palatable it is to Germany. We were told that about 90 percent of Poland’s broadcast media is German-owned. In the defense arena, Germany was described as a “free-rider on the U.S. and Poland.” It can be surmised that this manifest antipathy has antecedents in the unimaginable devastation that Poland suffered in World War II.
As for the European Union, Poland’s government and people deeply value—indeed, almost treasure—their membership in the European Union. Membership serves as an economic complement to Poland’s NATO membership; a symbol of having “arrived” as a functioning, Western-style market economy; an affirmation of Poland’s belonging to “the west”—and not “the east”—and an essential for the flourishing of its trading economy and for attracting foreign investment.
That said, it is apparent that Poland considers that it and its central European neighbors are treated as “second-class citizens” by the EU’s founding members in western Europe, particularly Germany and France. It clearly feels that the EU’s newer members to the east are expected to “follow the lead” of a sort of secular, “politically correct” EU consensus dominated by Germany and France and to “not make waves.” This kind of homogeneity and conformity does not make allowance for Poland’s deep cultural Catholicism, ardent patriotism long suppressed under Communism (after the Nazis tried to wipe the nation from the map) and the peculiar exigencies of trying to emerge fully from decades of Communist domination. So while Poland ardently wants to be a “good”—and permanent—member of the EU, it is obviously uncomfortable with aspects of its partnership with the EU and wishes either for a measure of EU reform or, at a minimum, greater recognition for the peculiar situation and particular conditions faced by the EU’s central European members.
Smolensk Air Disaster
Since Law and Justice Party Leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski’s brother, Polish President Lech Kaczynski, was killed in the Smolensk crash, it is understandably a major preoccupation, nearly a decade later, for Kaczynski and former Defense Minister Macierewicz. Despite the fact that Russia continues to retain the aircraft wreckage and its “black boxes” and refuses to let Polish investigators have access to examine the remains of their own crashed aircraft, Minister Macierewicz is convinced that he has forensic evidence demonstrating that the aircraft was destroyed by a bomb planted on board. At least, he insists, with such evidence, the Russians should permit Poland access to the wreckage to determine if this evidence can be confirmed.
Czestochowa
En route from Warsaw to our final stop in Krakow, we paid a late night visit to the shrine of Poland’s famous ‘Black Madonna’ icon venerated at the Jasna Gora Monastery in Czestochowa. Owing to an unplanned schedule delay, we arrived at 9:00 PM to the darkened monastery complex, expecting either to be turned away or to receive an abbreviated nocturnal tour of empty chapels and courtyards by a solitary priest/guide. What we witnessed was flabbergasting. Apart from the splendor if its brilliantly illuminated baroque interiors, the monastery was thronged with pilgrims, overflowing the church where Mass had just concluded and the adjoining chapel where the icon is displayed. Worshippers perched on stairways, queued up along corridors, gathered in outdoor courtyards, intent on passing the night in prayer at the shrine. Our priest/guide for the visit disabused us of our surmise that we had happened into the monastery on some major feast or solemnity. No, he said, this was just a typical Friday night at Czestochowa, where 4.3 million pilgrims visit annually (mostly drawn from Poland’s 38.4 million population). (By contrast, the Marian shrine in Lourdes, France – the most visited in Europe outside of Rome -- draws between 5 and 6 million pilgrims annually from all over Europe and around the world.) One member of our delegation enjoying lifelong familiarity with Poland reminded us of an old adage: “If you haven’t seen Czestochowa, you don’t understand Poland.” Our late-night visit to the shrine certainly afforded us a glimpse of a polish national, civic and religious culture without equivalent in increasingly secular and “post-national” western Europe.
Conclusion
Our delegation concluded that this had been one of the most instructive and enriching of the Council’s two dozen missions abroad. We enjoyed enviable access to the senior leaders of our host governments—particularly outstanding in Poland—and probed many subtleties of a complex and strategically vital but vulnerable region. As President Trump’s first overseas trip of his Presidency—to Poland—underscored, the security, stability and prosperity of this region—NATO’s northeastern flank—demand more attention and constant vigilance.
Comments