WARSAW | In recent weeks, Poland has seemed to be cozying up to Russia. New agreements and plenty of smiles and handshakes among officials during photo ops have indicated that Poland, led by newly elected Prime Minister Donald Tusk, hopes to improve relations with the giant to the east.
The new Polish government’s policy toward Russia comes after years in which relations between the two countries were reminiscent of the Cold War. Arguments over trade, energy, and other matters made dealings tense.
The new policy also comes as part of a broader foreign policy package that includes radically improving relations with Germany, strengthening Poland’s position within the European Union, and forwarding the spirit of partnership in relations with the United States.
The Russian piece of this package, however, does not entail a new set of strategic objectives. Russia’s newly gained confidence in the international arena is seen as a threat to Poland under Tusk just as much as it was under the deposed government of Jarosław Kaczynski, who lost re-election in October.
What has changed is the way of dealing with this perceived threat. Poland is now bringing in other players rather than confronting Russia alone.
As a demonstration of its new approach, Tusk’s government announced that it will withdraw its opposition to Russia’s bid to become a member of Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, which includes 30 member states committed to building democracies and market economies. Somewhat surprisingly, Russia quickly reciprocated by announcing that it will lift its ban on Polish meat imports, which was the main reason Poland vetoed a wide-ranging EU-Russia partnership agreement in November 2006.
Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski visited Moscow in January – just after taking office – and pledged to consult Russia on the proposed U.S. missile defense shield, part of which Poland would host. Russia vehemently opposes the system.
Poland reached an agreement with the United States soon after Sikorski arrived home, but only after Tusk’s government had involved Russia in the discussion.
The announcement that Tusk would also visit Moscow on 8 February gave the impression that a thaw in Poland’s relations with Russia was becoming reality. Yet the new Polish government was soon to discover that the road to détente with Russia was bumpier than expected.
DOMESTIC OUTCRY
The new Polish policy on Russia almost at once came under fire on the domestic front. Former prime minister Kaczynski, his twin brother President Lech Kaczyński, and former foreign minister Anna Fotyga haven’t missed an opportunity to criticize Tusk’s foreign policy.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski has accused Tusk of “neglecting Poland’s interests.” He has also demanded that Tusk meet representatives of the Russian opposition during his trip to Moscow.
Fotyga has called Tusk’s decision to visit Moscow before Washington a “symbolic reversal of vectors in foreign policy.” She has also criticized the government’s plans to consult Russia on the missile defense shield and urged Tusk’s government not to issue too difficult demands during negotiations with Washington.
These criticisms may have some resonance with the general public. The Kaczyńskis’ tough policy on Russia, including the veto of an EU partnership, was domestically the least controversial part of the brothers’ foreign policy agenda. Most Polish opinion-makers were convinced that the deterioration of mutual relations was the result of changes in Russia’s policy and sympathized with Polish politicians’ strong criticisms of Putin’s regime for its abuses of democracy and expansionist foreign policy.
Tusk’s government now finds itself in a situation where it has to avoid giving the impression that it is too soft, while at the same time demonstrating that it can deliver a breakthrough with Russia, which it has promised to voters.
The government’s new policy has also come under attack from an unexpected domestic source: liberal political commentators, whom one would never suspect of collusion with the Kaczyńskis. Sikorski’s visit to Moscow before Kiev and Tusk’s plan to follow in his footsteps gave rise to accusations that the government has embraced a “Russia First” policy, neglecting a strategic partnership with Ukraine.
These accusations have been fueled by the desperate plight of thousands of Ukrainians trying to get a visa to Poland in the aftermath of the Schengen expansion in December 2007 and the apparent lack of preparation on the part of Poland’s consular services to cope with the new visa regime.
Poland failed to sign an agreement on cross-border traffic when it should have months ago. The irony now is that the new government came to office just a month before the Schengen expansion and thus can hardly be blamed for the messy state of affairs. But this seems to be making little impression on the panic mongers on both sides of the Polish-Ukrainian border.
REELING IN RUSSIA
One of the key stumbling blocks in Polish-Russian relations in recent years has been the U.S. missile defense shield, which would include interceptors in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic that U.S. officials say would protect the United States and Europe against missiles launched from Iran and other “rogue” states.
Although the United States has said the system would not be meant to counter Russian power, the very act of placing a military installation in countries that not long ago were part of the Soviet empire is viewed by the Kremlin as an insult.
The shield remains very unpopular among Poles. According to a poll conducted by the Public Opinion Research Center CBOS in November, 57 percent of respondents opposed the placement of the shield in Poland, while only 24 percent supported it.
Despite public disapproval, Prime Minister Kaczyński’s government was determined to see the shield through in hopes that an American military installation on Polish soil would make Poland safer vis-à-vis Russia.
The shield was hotly debated during the election campaign, and Tusk’s victorious Civic Platform stated repeatedly after the election that the shield, as it had been proposed, would not improve Poland’s security. On the contrary, the shield would provoke Russia unnecessarily and place Poland in danger without any compensatory measures, such as strengthening Poland’s obsolete air defenses.
This could be achieved, Tusk said in January, by incorporating the missile defense shield into a broad NATO and European security system.
Tusk’s government sent strong signals to Washington that Poland would not be taken for granted anymore and that no agreement on the shield would be reached unless additional conditions increasing Poland’s security were met. This would include the request that Americans should continue dialogue with the Kremlin rather than leave it to the Poles to deal with Russia’s wrath.
As if to illustrate this problem, high-ranking Russian officials repeatedly warned that if the shield were built, Russia might aim its own rockets at Poland. In January, Dmitri Rogozin, Russia’s ambassador to NATO, gracefully reminded Poles that during the last world war, Poland lost one-third of its population. It’s hard to imagine a less veiled threat.
On 1 February, Polish and U.S. officials announced that they had agreed in principle to the missile defense system. Although he did not outline stipulations of the agreement, Sikorski said Poland’s security concerns had been met and would enable Poland to be a “stronger NATO ally.”
But Poland’s decisions to include Russia in the shield discussion and to demand security enhancements from the United States are unlikely to appease the Kremlin. It seems Russian officials’ ire could only have been subdued if Poland had abandoned the shield once and for all.
MAKING FRIENDS
It seems, then, that for all the recent Polish-Russian bonding, Tusk isn’t ready to risk other alliances to have Russia on his side. Instead, he is trying to include other powers – like the United States – in Poland’s temperamental relations with Russia.
Still, most powers have yet to come to the table in support of Poland as it deals with Russia. Until Poland can convince them to do so, the country will remain in a precarious spot.
In the long term, Poland’s position vis-à-vis Russia will depend on its ability to find new allies, this time within the EU. The new Lisbon Treaty gives the EU enhanced powers in foreign policy. The challenge for Poland is to persuade other member states to adopt a more united, critical, and assertive stand against Putin’s “divide and rule” policy toward Europe.
This will require a radical improvement of Poland’s relations with other EU members, especially Germany. Under former prime minister Kaczyński’s government, Polish-German relations hit rock bottom. Among other issues, Poland opposed the construction of a gas pipeline directly connecting Russia and Germany, deeming it a threat to Poland’s energy security.
Tusk’s government was thus thrust onto a difficult course of improving relations with Germany.
Poland is already trying to strengthen its relations with other new EU members situated near Russia. These states share with Poland the concern because Russia is in their backyards, much of their security hinges on a mollified Kremlin.
Tusk’s first foreign visit was to Vilnius. He has also met with the leaders of the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia to urge them to develop a common agenda related to the so-called eastern dimension of the European Neighborhood Policy, which seeks to diminish economic, security, and other divides among new and old EU members, as well as countries near the EU.
But there are more bridges to be built if Polish-Russian relations are to take a turn for the better – or at least for Poland’s long-term benefit.
At a time when Gazprom will soon assume control of energy supplies to the Balkans, Poland is not alone in its perception of Russia as a threat to European security. The time has come for Poland to get out of the firing line while encouraging others, including both NATO and EU members, to confront new Russian power.
Jacek Kucharczyk is research director of the
Institute of Public Affairs in Warsaw, a member of the Policy Association for an Open Society (PASOS).
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Transitions Online 2008