If Poland had become Germany's ally rather than its enemy

[michael mills]

Do you realize that Poland peacefully entered a personal union with Lithuania and those lands you mention belonged to Grand Dutchy of Lithuania?

That is the Polish nationalist view. Lithuanian nationalists have a different view, and I see no reason why the Polish nationalist version of history should be preferred to the Lithuanian nationalist version.

The southern part of Grand Dutchy of Lithuania was incorporated into Kingdom of Poland as a result of Union of Lublin, which was again peacefull.

That is the Polish nationalist view. Ukrainian nationalists have a different view, and I see no reason why the Polish nationalist version of history should be preferred to the Ukrainian nationalist version.

You also cannot forget that szlachta elected kings and they were often foreigners, pursuing their own territorial agendas.

The elected kings had very little power, and the actions of the Polish state were determined by the Szlachta. Whether the kings were Swedish or Saxon, in Poland that had to obey the Szlachta.

Yes, but they didn't do it to wipe the Moscow out of Russian people and make it Polish. The son of a Polish king was to convert and be made czar.

So what? The Muscovites were very primitive people, but they did not want to be ruled by Poles, as their successful rebellion showed.

You do understand there were Polish people living on those territories? I guess also the other nationalities living there would prefer to stay within Poland and be spared of the alternative - living in the Soviet Union. There was no Belarussian state that Poland was in war with and Poland had military alliance with Ukraine. Finally, the solution to Poland's eastern border that was adopted in 1921 is only one of the options that were considered. Pilsudski prefered to cede the eastern lands to allied Belarussian and Ukrainian states. (I don't know the details of disputes within Polish side nor what was actually possible to negotiate).

The Polish Government had a chance to create independent Belorussian and Ukrainian states on the territory it conquered from Soviet Russia. Instead it chose to annex those territories and try to polonise them by evicting Ukrainian peasants and settling ethnic Polish peasants in their place. That created the inter-ethnic hatred that burst into violence in 1943.

In the case of what you call "seizing territory from Germany" it's also hard to call Greater Poland and Pomerania German.

I would agree that the German Posen Province coulkd not be called ethnically German, since it had a clear Polish majority of about 75%. However, the province of West Prussia had a German majority of 60% before the First World War; with Danzig excluded, the population of the rest of West Prussia was equally divided between Poles and Germans.

The northern part of West Prussia was inhabited mainly by Poles and kaszubs, but in the south of the province there was a belt of territory with a clear German majority, stretching from German Pomerania to East Prussia, and containing towns with a German majority such as Thorn, Graudenz and Bromberg.

A settlement based on national self-determination would have seen the Posen Province go to the new Poland, while West Prussia remained with Germany. it should be noted that in the discussions between Pilsudski and the German emissary Count harry kessler in November 1918, the former agreed that the most desirable German-Polish settlement was for West Prussia to remain with Germany, with Poland's access to the sea being provided through a free port in Danzig harbour, linked to Polish territory by an extraterritorial road and railway. Unfortunately violent opposition by Endecja prevented that compromise solution.

Furthermore, there were three attempts by Polish terrorists to seize Upper Silesia by force, even though a majority of its inhabitants clearly wanted to remain with Germany.

You are saying that carving the Commonwealth 1772-1795 was not agression and expansion and Poland was not a victim?

I have never claimed that Poland was never a victim at any time in its history. However, the partitions of Poland were no worse than what the Polish rulers had themselves doen in the Past.

Furthermore, it was the Polish Szlachta who suffered most from the partitions, which were a result of their misrule. The ordinary people, the peasants, probably did not care whether their rulers were Polish Szlachta or Prussian, Russian or Austrian monarchs.

In fact, the 11 years from 1795 t0 1806, when most of ethnic Poland was incorporated in the Prussian kingdom, were probably the period when the common Polish people experienced the best, most progressive and efficient rule they had ever had until then, perhaps the best they have ever had until the present day. For some groups, eg the Jews, Prussian rule was far preferable to that of the Polish Szlachta.

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Michael,

I have consulted two old German atlases with maps covering relative ethnic and linguistic distribution in the Danzig Corridor and neighbouring areas of Germany and Poland.

The first is page 165 of Das Buch vom deutshen Volkstum published in 1935.

This contains a map showing the Danzig Corridor. It is shaded in three colours illustrating areas it claimed were "Pure or overwhelmingly German", "Mixed with a German majority" and "Mixed with a German minority". From this map I would estimate that it was possible at best to create a Danzig Corridor in which 40% of the route was in Polish majority areas.

The second is page 25 of Andrees Handatlas published in 1900.

This map shows that it was possible to create a Danzig Corridor in which about 95% of the route was through Polish majority areas. In addition, it shows the southern reaches of East Prussia, which remained in Germany under the Treaty of Versailles, as being majority Polish areas. It also shows a consolidated area populated by a majority of Slavic Wends south of Cottbus, well inside post-Versailles Germany. Both these Slavic majority areas have completely disappeared from the 1935 map. (There are other examples of inconsistencies between the two maps that favour the Germans, but I will stop at these.)

So, which is more accurate? The 1900 map was compiled when all of western Poland had been under German rule for over a century, whereas the 1935 map was made when it had been in Poland for 15 years. It is therefore inherently probable that the 1900 map is the more accurate. (However, even the 1900 map is only a German view and is not necessarily reflective of the true situation. After all, it was Germans, not Poles, who conducted the censuses upon which it was presumably based.)

So, why the inconsitencies? In 1900 the resurrection of Poland did not appear likely. Therefore there was no imperative to do other than present the simple facts. However, by 1935 the resurrected Poland had split East Prussia from the rest of the Reich and to justify the relinking of the two it would be necessary to prove that Poles were not a majority in the Danzig Corridor. This the 1935 map conveniently does, often in direct contradiction of the 1900 map. My feeling is that the 1935 map was probably an officially approved distortion of the reality in order to enlist German popular support for Nazi Lebensraum territorial ambitions. Reliance on the 1900 map would not have provided a very convincing case.

When reading the above, please note that nowhere does it present the Polish point of view. All the noted inconsistencies are of entirely German origin.

At worst, the German majority Corridor is a fiction. At best, it had no more historical depth than, say, Israeli West Bank settlements since the 1960s.

[michael mills]

I have not seen the two maps referred to by MajorT, so I cannot comment on them.

I have seen a map showing the percentage of Poles in the administrative districts of the eastern provinces of Germany in 1910 (East Prussia, West Prussia, Posen Province, Pomerania, Silesia), based on the census of that year. I believe that map was used by the Poles in the negotiations at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 to substantiate their claims to then German territory.

The map showed a band of territory in the south of West Prussia and the north of Posen Province, stretching from Pomerania to East Prussia, in which Poles constituted less than 50% of the population. That band contained the cities of Bromberg and Thorn, which had had large German populations since at least the 13th century (for example, Copernicus, who was born in Thorn, had a German mother, his father being a Pole who had migrated to Thorn from Krakow).

The above band of territory, although only a small part of the total area of the Province of West Prussia, was more thickly populated than the centre and north of the province (mainly inhabited by Poles and Kaszubs), and it was this territory, together with the solidly German city of Danzig and its environs, which accounted for the German majority of 60% in West Prussia as a whole.

The problem with maps such as the one I referred to above is that they do not show population density. Thus, most of the area of West Prussia is shown as having a Polish majority; however, that Polish-inhabited area, stretching south from the Baltic coast, was only lightly populated, whereas the area with a German majority was smaller but more thickly populated.

The following passage is from the book "The German Lebensraum" by Robert Dickinson, published by Penguin Books in 1943 (so obviously not a pro-German book). The introduction reads:

After 'debunking" the conception of Lebensraum as it is preached by German scholars and Nazi propagandists, its sounder propositions are used as a spring-board for a constructive contribution to the reconstruction of the States of Central Europe, which will be one of the major problems of the post-war settlement

The relevant passage about West Prussia reads (pp. 78-79):

According to the 1910 Census, the province of West Prussia had a population of a little less than one million. The north and central districts of this province were thinly peopled by Kossubes in the north, mainly by Poles and a few Kossubes in the centre, and mainly by Germans in the south, along the Netze valley to Thorn on the Vistula, which was more thickly peopled and included several towns................Throughout the whole area down to 1910 there was a slight German majority, actually 51 per cent (if Danzig be included, 60 per cent). This situation, based on the census of 1910, still held in 1919.

Accordingly, it is historically correct to call the Province of West Prussia, of which the city of Danzig was part, a predominantly German territory by ethnicity.

[LWD]

Do you realize that Poland peacefully entered a personal union with Lithuania and those lands you mention belonged to Grand Dutchy of Lithuania?

That is the Polish nationalist view. Lithuanian nationalists have a different view, and I see no reason why the Polish nationalist version of history should be preferred to the Lithuanian nationalist version.

What then is th eLithuanian view and which of the two are best supported? From what I remember reading it was part of a plan to protect the Lithuanians and Poles from the Teutonic knights. Which would support the "Polish" view.

The southern part of Grand Dutchy of Lithuania was incorporated into Kingdom of Poland as a result of Union of Lublin, which was again peacefull.

That is the Polish nationalist view. Ukrainian nationalists have a different view, and I see no reason why the Polish nationalist version of history should be preferred to the Ukrainian nationalist version.

Hardly helpful as with the first comment. Stating that there are multiple views and failing to describe or support them adds nothing.

... So what? The Muscovites were very primitive people, but they did not want to be ruled by Poles, as their successful rebellion showed.

This is relevant how? And why do you consider them "very primitive" for that matter.

... The Polish Government had a chance to create independent Belorussian and Ukrainian states on the territory it conquered from Soviet Russia.

Just how realistic is that? And how long could such states be expected to survive?

[CJK1990]

The relevant passage about West Prussia reads (pp. 78-79):

According to the 1910 Census, the province of West Prussia had a population of a little less than one million. The north and central districts of this province were thinly peopled by Kossubes in the north, mainly by Poles and a few Kossubes in the centre, and mainly by Germans in the south, along the Netze valley to Thorn on the Vistula, which was more thickly peopled and included several towns................Throughout the whole area down to 1910 there was a slight German majority, actually 51 per cent (if Danzig be included, 60 per cent). This situation, based on the census of 1910, still held in 1919.

Accordingly, it is historically correct to call the Province of West Prussia, of which the city of Danzig was part, a predominantly German territory by ethnicity.

The parts of West Prussia that were actually ceded to Poland were 43% German, not 51%. http://web.ku.edu/~eceurope/hist557/lec ... 11pic2.jpg Maybe 51% were if you count the parts of West Prussia that were retained by Germany.

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

This map shows % of Polish population ca. 1900 on territory of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth:

I circled areas with Polish majority (either more than 50% or relative majority with between 40 and 50%) with red lines, areas with 31 - 49% of Polish population with orange lines and areas with 20 - 30% with yellow lines:

(BTW - it seems that this map largely underestimates the % of Poles in southern Lithuania):
--------------------------- http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 2#p1218938 ---------------------------

Here similar maps:

1) 1880 - http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... ge1880.png

2) 1910 / 1919 / 1921 - http://www.comenius.mechanik.edu.pl/mniej/narod1.jpg *

* Taken from: http://www.comenius.mechanik.edu.pl/mniej/index.htm

3) 1931 - two similar maps for 1931:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... ci1931.png



Interesting article - "Description of lands inhabited by Poles", published in 1904 by Bolesław Koskowski:

http://pl.wikisource.org/wiki/Opis_ziem ... 3%B3w_I/II

Here the same article in "English" - Google translation:

http://translate.google.pl/translate?hl ... rmd%3Divns

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

From its birth in the 10th century, as a small polity in the Warta Basin, Poland has been a highly agressive and expansionist state, until the middle of the 17th Century.

Well, I don't see any expansionism maybe except for the times of Bolesław I Chrobry (early 11th century) and wars over Halych-Wolhynia in 14th century. When it comes to Polish-Lithuanian wars vs Russia (Muscovites) - they were started by Lithuania yet before it united with Poland, when Lithuanians conquered large part of Ruthenian territories. Later Moscow (and Russia) wanted to recapture these ethnically Ruthenian lands. Poland got involved into these Lithuanian-Muscovite wars after it united with Lithuania and Poland supported Lithuania in its wars:

Map of Polish borders and border changes 960 - 2010:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6tM5sI2wXg



Polish rulers until the partitions (to convince our readers that Poland wasn't ruled by "Szlachta"):

9th / 10th centuries Siemowit
early 10th century Lestek
mid 10th century Siemomysł

960 - 992 Mieszko I
992 - 1025 Bolesław I Chrobry
1025 - 1031 Mieszko II
1031 - 1032 Bezprym
1032 - 1034 Mieszko II
1034 - 1039 Bolesław Zapomniany
1039 - 1058 Kazimierz I Odnowiciel
1058 - 1079 Bolesław II Szczodry
1079 - 1102 Władysław Herman
1102 - 1107 Zbigniew
1107 - 1138 Bolesław III Krzywousty
1138 - 1146 Władysław II Wygnaniec
1146 - 1173 Bolesław IV Kędzierzawy
1173 - 1177 Mieszko III Stary

1177 - 1191 Kazimierz II Sprawiedliwy
1191 Mieszko III Stary
1191 - 1194 Kazimierz Sprawiedliwy
1194 - 1198 Leszek Biały
1198 - 1199 Mieszko III Stary
1199 Leszek Biały
1199 - 1202 Mieszko III Stary
1202 Władysław III Laskonogi
1202 - 1210 Leszek Biały
1210 - 1211 Mieszko IV Plątonogi
1211 - 1227 Leszek Biały

1227 - 1229 Władysław III Laskonogi
1229 - 1232 Konrad I Mazowiecki
1232 - 1238 Henryk I Brodaty
1238 - 1241 Henryk II Pobożny
1241 Bolesław V Rogatka
1241 - 1243 Konrad I Mazowiecki
1243 - 1279 Bolesław VI Wstydliwy
1279 - 1288 Leszek Czarny
1288 Bolesław VII Siemowitowicz
1288 - 1289 Henryk IV Prawy
1289 Bolesław VII Siemowitowicz
1289 Władysław I Łokietek
1289 - 1290 Henryk IV Prawy
1290 - 1291 Przemysł II

1291 - 1295 Wacław II
1295 - 1296 Przemysł II
1296 - 1305 Wacław II
1305 - 1306 Wacław III

1306 - 1333 Władysław I Łokietek
1333 - 1370 Kazimierz III Wielki

1370 - 1382 Ludwik Węgierski
1384 - 1399 Jadwiga Andegaweńska

1386 - 1434 Władysław II Jagiełło
1434 - 1444 Władysław III Warneńczyk
1445 - 1447 Bolesław IV Warszawski
1447 - 1492 Kazimierz IV Jagiellończyk
1492 - 1501 Jan I Olbracht
1501 - 1506 Aleksander Jagiellończyk
1506 - 1548 Zygmunt I Stary
1548 - 1572 Zygmunt II August

1573 - 1575 Henryk Walezy
1575 - 1586 Anna Jagiellonka
1576 - 1586 Stefan Batory

1587 - 1632 Zygmunt III Waza
1632 - 1648 Władysław IV Waza
1648 - 1668 Jan II Kazimierz

1669 - 1673 Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki
1674 - 1696 Jan III Sobieski

1697 - 1706 August II Mocny
1706 - 1709 Stanisław Leszczyński
1709 - 1733 August II Mocny
1733 - 1736 Stanisław Leszczyński
1733 - 1763 August III Sas

1764 - 1795 Stanisław August Poniatowski

[michael mills]

The parts of West Prussia that were actually ceded to Poland were 43% German, not 51%. http://web.ku.edu/~eceurope/hist557/lec ... 11pic2.jpg Maybe 51% were if you count the parts of West Prussia that were retained by Germany.

I advise looking a bit more closely at those statistics before quoting them

They show Thorn County as 55.2% German, Graudenz County as 70.1% German, and Bromberg County as 68.4% German. As I wrote, those counties formed a band of territory with an ethnic German majority, stretching along the southern part of West Prussia and the northern part of Posen Province, and linking Pomerania with East Prussia.

If the Polish-German border had been drawn strictly in accordance with national self-determination, then there would have no Polish Corridor separating East Prussia from the rest of Germany. Rather there would have been a "German Corridor" linking the German provinces of Pomerania and East Prussia, and separating a small Polish exclave, the northern part of the former province of West prussia, from the main Polish territory.

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

They show Thorn County as 55.2% German, Graudenz County as 70.1% German, and Bromberg County as 68.4% German. As I wrote, those counties formed a band of territory with an ethnic German majority, stretching along the southern part of West Prussia and the northern part of Posen Province, and linking Pomerania with East Prussia.

If the Polish-German border had been drawn strictly in accordance with national self-determination, then there would have no Polish Corridor separating East Prussia from the rest of Germany. Rather there would have been a "German Corridor" linking the German provinces of Pomerania and East Prussia, and separating a small Polish exclave, the northern part of the former province of West prussia, from the main Polish territory.

Of course there would still be a Polish Corridor (as the map I posted above shows), because between Toruń County and Bydgoszcz County on the left and Grudziądz County on the right there were also Chełmno (Kulm) County and Wąbrzeźno (Briesen) County, both of which had minority of German population with majority of Polish population:

Wąbrzeźno County is linked with Chełmno County so there would be no any separated Polish exclave. BTW - German majority of 55,2% in Torun County resulted from their majority in the town itself, not in the entire county.

ChełmnoWąbrzeźno.jpg (44.5 KiB) Viewed 2708 times

In Wyrzysk County (see the map) Germans had 50,9% in 1910 according to that data posted by CJK1990.

[Sid Guttridge]

Michael,

The districts you refer to are drawn up by German administrators. As you will be aware from Northern Ireland, these can be gerrymandered to suit the purposes of those drawing them up. I have no doubt that using the "right" boundaries one can contrive both a Polish and German majority corridor. Doubtless there were areas of the Ruhr, which received a large influx of Polish workers in the late 19th Century, that might be gerrymandered as Polish!

It is almost inevitable that German density in this area will be higher, because Germans (often recent immigrants) dominated trade, administration, the army, education, the professions, industry, the railways and pretty much anything that favoured urban living. The Poles, by contrast had difficulty making progress in these areas under Prussian/German rule because speaking fluent German was a decided advantage, or even compulsory, and they were therefore more prominent in rural occupations. Rural living is, by definition, more extensive than urban living.

My German 1900 map, drawn from German sources, shows a very narrow German majority west-east corridor between Brandenberg and East Prussia, cutting through the north-south Polish majority corridor, which, as I mentioned before, is only about 95% complete. However, this claimed German majority corridor was probably very recent to 1900 as it was after a century of state-sponsored Germanization in which ambitious Poles had to be fluent in German to enter higher education and the proffessions and in which Germans were settled in these areas as urbanization grew. Thus, if it existed at all, any German majority corridor was probably recently contrived in 1900 and probably had very little historical depth.

It would be very interesting to see the results of earlier German decennial censuses in the area. Anyone?

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

Even more maps:

http://www.slonsk.de/Slonsk/Abni/Dokume ... Europy.htm

http://www.ahistoria.pl/index.php/2010/ ... ukraincow/

[henryk]

Do you realize that Poland peacefully entered a personal union with Lithuania and those lands you mention belonged to Grand Dutchy of Lithuania?

That is the Polish nationalist view. Lithuanian nationalists have a different view, and I see no reason why the Polish nationalist version of history should be preferred to the Lithuanian nationalist version.

The southern part of Grand Dutchy of Lithuania was incorporated into Kingdom of Poland as a result of Union of Lublin, which was again peacefull.

That is the Polish nationalist view. Ukrainian nationalists have a different view, and I see no reason why the Polish nationalist version of history should be preferred to the Ukrainian nationalist version.

The BelaRus blame Russia / USSR and not Poland, for blows to BelaRus statehood:
http://www.belarusguide.com/as/archiv/w ... quote]From the 13th till the 16th century the territory of contemporary Belarus was the center of a medieval polyethnic state-Grand Duchy of Litva. The Grand Duchy of Litva which is sometimes called by historians Belarusan-Lithuanian state was one of the largest, most powerful and flourishing states in medieval Eastern Europe. The lands of contemporary Belarus, Lithuania, Ukraine and a part of Russia comprised this state. The large role of ethnic Belarusans in this state is proved by the fact that the state language in the Grand Duchy of Litva was Belarusan.

The period that started in the 15th century, when the crusaders' expansion was crushed in the west, and lasted until the middle of the 17th century, when Moscow launched its widescale aggression, is considered the Golden age in Belarusan history. In this period there was a wide growth of old and the foundation of many new cities and towns. There occurred significant evolutionary processes in the culture and economy of Belarusan people. A number of historic facts provide evidence for that. In 1517 the great Belarusan scholar from Polotsk Doctor Francisc Skaryna published the Bible in the Belarusan language. Thus the Belarusans became the third nation after Germans and Czechs that had a printed Bible in their native language. In 1588 the third edition of Grand Duchy Statute came out. It was a comprehensive and elaborate state code of laws that stood above the local legal norms. Written in the Belarusan language it was the only full code of laws in Europe since the Roman Law and until the Napoleonic Code adopted in 1804. The above historic facts prove the Grand Duchy of Litva to have been a major political and cultural center in Eastern Europe at that time.

In 1569 the Grand Duchy of Litva and the Polish Kingdom established a political union according to which the Litva-Poland confederation- Rzecz Pospolita-emerged. As a result of three divisions of Rzecz Pospolita in 1772, 1793 and 1795 between three empires - Russia, Austria and Prussia - the Belarusan lands were incorporated into the Russian Empire. So the third division of Rzecz Pospolita in 1795 practically checked the development of Belarusan statehood for more than 100 years.

But the Belarusans under the Russian rule did not want to lead slaves' lives. In 1794 on the territory of contemporary Poland, Belarus and Lithuania a national liberation uprising broke out. It was headed by Tadeusz Kosciuszko, a Belarusan nobleman by birth who received his military education in France (1770-1774), took part in the War of Independence in North America (1775-1783). The uprising was directed against Russia and Prussia that made the second division of Rzecz Pospolita and against the local reactionary aristocracy that had taken power in the lands. To support Russian and Prussian troops Austria entered the fighting against the rebels. Tadeusz Kosciuszko was injured in a battle, captured by tsarist troops and imprisoned in Petropavlovskaya Fortress in the Russian capital of that time - Sankt Petersburg. The uprising started in mid-spring and was brutally suppressed in mid-autumn 1794. The result of its suppression was the third division of Rzecz Pospolita in 1795. Nowadays a monument to Tadeusz Kosciuszko, the brave soldier, national hero of the U.S.A., honorable citizen of France, born on the territory of the contemporary Brest Region of Belarus can be seen in Lafayete Square opposite the White House in Washington.

During the Franco-Russian war of 1812 the Belarusan lands were the war arena of those two armies when the "Grand Armee" under Napoleon's command marched to Moscow and when it was in retreat. Of great significance for both armies was a battle near the Berezina river where French army was utterly defeated. During this war some divisions of the Russian Army fighting against Napoleon were manned by Belarusan soldiers. At the same time a lot of Belarusans, mainly the gentry and peasants, took part in the war on Napoleon's side which showed the will of Belarusans to overthrow the yoke of their slavemaster the Russian tsar. After Napoleon took the lands of Lithuania and Belarus he renewed the Grand Duchy of Litva but after the defeat of the Grand Armee the Russian rule on Belarusan lands was reestablished.

The displeasure of the Belarusan gentry with the divisions of Rzecz Pospolita and the breach of the Polish Constitution of 1815 by the Russian Empire led to the outbreak of a national liberation uprising in November 1830. It enveloped Poland, Lithuania, Western Belarus and Western Ukraine. This uprising, suppressed in October 1831, had the character of a conservative revolution and prevented a joint Prussian-Russian intervention into revolutionary France and Belgium.

An outstanding feature in the development of the Grand Duchy of Litva, later of Rzecz Pospolita, and in particular of the Belarusan lands proper was the peaceful coexistence of different religious communities - Orthodox that emerged here in the 11th century, Catholic that started in the 14th century, Hebrew in the 15th, Protestant in the 16th. In 1596 after the creation of Litva-Poland confederation at the decision of the Brest synod the Greek-Catholic or Uniate church was created. It became the national religion of Belarusans. The church was under the Pope and recognized Catholic dogmas but kept to Orthodox rites. But in 1839 the Uniate church was liquidated at the decision of the Russian government forced onto the Polotsk synod. The Russian tsarism was based on the Orthodox church and was against other religions, that's why the Uniate books were burned and the Uniates were forcibly convened into the Orthodox religion. At the same time the use of the Grand Duchy of Litva Statute on the territory of Belarus was banned. Soon the tsar's edict was issued that banned the name Belarus.

Starting from this moment the Belarusan lands began to lose their independence, and the majority of their national peculiarities. The Belarusan language was banned in the official sphere and Russian took its place. As a result of the Russian expansion to the west, Belarusan lands together with the peasants were given to Russian landlords. The senior positions in the local administration were taken by officials sent from the inner regions of Russia. The Russian Orthodox church that was the preeminent and supreme one in the Russian Empire started to persecute and push out other religious communities. Belarusan lands were settled by representatives of other nations. There came hard times for the Belarusan people.

The Russian emperors conducted the systematic liquidation of cultural and spiritual centers of the Belarusan nation, pursued the official policy of russification that included the banishment of, and property confiscation from the Belarusan officials and religious activists and replacing them with the Russian officials and Orthodox church clergy. Belarusans were mostly limited to receiving primary education in church schools. It was forbidden to send young Belarusans abroad to continue their education there. Thus Belarus became a Central European colony of Russia. Since the 19th century it was known as the North-Westem Region of the Russian Empire and the Belarusan people were assimilated into it by force. But despite the oppression the Belarusan people did not want to put up with the tsarist policy. In 1863 the young Belarusan patriot Kastus Kalinousky started a new stage of the liberation struggle of the Belarusans. The cause of the national liberation uprising of 1863-1864 led by Kastus Kalinousky in Belarus, Lithuania, and Poland was the strive of the progressive people of the western parts of the Russian Empire for national independence, liquidation of the feudal relations, for social and political changes. Kastus Kalinousky led the enslaved people against the colonial regime of the Russian tsarism and at the age of 26 was publicly executed by the gendarmes in March 1864 in Vilnia (Vilnius), which was at that time the political and cultural center of the Belarusan people.

But nevertheless under the pressure of numerous oppressed peoples that inhabited the Russian Empire at the beginning of the 20th century various political changes started. In 1905 the Belarusans got some rights for their cultural self-expression including the right to publish books and newspapers in the native language. Though the concessions of the tsarism were minor in fact, they breathed in a new life into the national rebirth of the Belarusans. But the quick renewal of the statehood became possible only after the fall of the Russian monarchy towards the end of World War I in February 1917, when the Belarusan national organizations became more active. In December 1917 the All-Belarusan Congress opened in Minsk. 1872 delegates from all the regions of Belarus, from all political and public organizations took part in it. The participants discussed the national problems of the Belarussian people and supported the creation of the new Belarusan state.

But after the 3d of May 1918 when Soviet Russia, Germany, and Austria signed the Brest peace treaty Belarus, without the agreement from the Executive Committee of the All-Belarusan Congress, became the subject of annexation by Germany. On the 25th of March 1918 during the German occupation the All-Belarusan Congress Executive Committee declared the creation of the Belarusan People's Republic (BPR). A temporary Constitution in the form of statute decrees was adopted. It guaranteed the right to vote, freedom of speech, of the press and of assembly, the right to the 8-hour working day and the right to strike. Unfortunately, the new Belarusan state was shortlived and was liquidated by Soviet Russia with the help of the Red Army in 1919, but some leaders of the BPR managed to emigrate to the West and establish a Belarusan government in exile.

The creation of the BPR made the Bolsheviks with Lenin at the head understand that the creation of the totalitarian regime on the territory of the former Russian Empire without taking into consideration the national interests of the peoples that it wanted to envelop would be next to impossible. So on the 1st of January 1919 on the initiative of Belarusans in the Russian Communist party of Bolsheviks to counterpoise the BPR the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (BSSR) was created. But the Russian Bolsheviks did not look upon Belarus from the point of view of providing the Belarusan people with the right to national self-determination and the creation of an independent state. They saw it as the buffer zone during the realization of the world communist revolution. To enlarge the sphere of influence the Lithuanian-Belarusan Soviet Socialist Republic was created in February 1919. But on the 31st of July 1920 because of the changed political conditions (the Polish army was advancing east) the BSSR was reestablished.

On the 18th of March 1921 according to the Riga peace treaty signed by Poland and Bolshevik Russia headed by Lenin, without the participation of Belarusan representatives Belarus was divided into two parts. The Westem part of Belarus (the Brest and Grodna regions of today's Belarus and the Bialystok region of today's Poland) was given to Poland. This part of Belarus was given back to the USSR in 1939 and became part of BSSR.

On the 30th of December 1922 the Communist governments of Belarus, Russia, Ukraine and Caucasus created the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics which included the major part of the former Russian Empire. Since that time on the territory of Belarus as well as in the whole of the Soviet Union a severe communist dictatorship had been established which existed till 1990 when the first more or less democratic elections were held in Belarus. Belarus as well as the other Soviet republics of the former USSR had gone through all the stages of the creation of mythical communism and suffered enormous cultural, spiritual and human losses. During the construction of communism there were destroyed practically all the churches And religious institutions, private property was liquidated a lot of industrious, enterprising, educated people were repressed. Now Kurapaty forest near Minsk reminds us of communist repressions in Belarus. In the 30s hundreds of thousands of innocent people were shot dead there. Stalin's repressions and the fascist occupation were severe blows to the genetic fund of Belarusans. Therefore the renaissance of the Belarusan nation that started only in the late 80s will take a lot of time.

During World War II from 1941 till 1945 the Belarus territory was completely occupied by the Nazi Germany troops. The Belarusan people didn't resign to the status of an enslaved nation and resisted Nazi occupants. There were over a thousand partisan detachments on the territory of Belarus. They paralyzed the communications as well as a great number of troops and thus made a great contribution to the victory over Nazism. The Nazis burned down a lot of villages and ruined many towns. In this war 25% of Belarusan population was lost. Numerous common graves all over Belarus remind us of the terrible tragedy of the last war. The apotheosis of this tragedy is to be seen in the memorial complex of Khatyn near Minsk. Before World War II the population of Belarus was 10 million and only 40 years later, by the end of the 80s it had reached the pre-war level.

A new stage in the history of Belarusan statehood began on the 27th of July 1990 when the BSSR Supreme Soviet adopted the Declaration "On the State Sovereignty of the BSSR". On the 25th of August 1991 the BSSR Supreme Soviet declared the political and economic independence of Belarus. On the filth of December 1991 The Supreme Soviet ratified the Agreement on the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States, signed on the 8th of December 1991 by the leaders of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine in Viskuli in Belavezha Forest. Simultaneously the Supreme Soviet denounced the treaty on the creation of the USSR. The final legal act that pronounced Belarus a new democratic state in Eastern Europe was the new Constitution of the Republic of Belarus adopted by the Supreme Soviet on the 15th of March 1994.

The city of Minsk is the capital of Belarus. It is an ancient city known from 1067. During its long history it was several times ruined by foreign invaders. When the Red Army soldiers and partisans liberated the city during World War II, 95% of Minsk lay in ruins. Only after many years the Belarusans managed to restore the city. Now Minsk has a population of 1.8 million. After the USSR's collapse Minsk became the Coordination Center of the CIS, the headquarters of the Executive Secretariat of the CIS. This fact strengthens the reputation of Belarus as a state of social stability and economic reliability.

Copyright(c)1994 by Vladimir Novik Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus[/quote]

[michael mills]

Domen121 wrote:

Of course there would still be a Polish Corridor (as the map I posted above shows), because between Toruń County and Bydgoszcz County on the left and Grudziądz County on the right there were also Chełmno (Kulm) County and Wąbrzeźno (Briesen) County, both of which had minority of German population with majority of Polish population:

Wąbrzeźno County is linked with Chełmno County so there would be no any separated Polish exclave. BTW - German majority of 55,2% in Torun County resulted from their majority in the town itself, not in the entire county.

It appears that Domen121 agrees that there was a bridge across the south of the Polish Corridor connecting German Pomerania with East Prussia, consisting of the following counties, from west to east: Zempelburg, Wirsitz, Kolmar, Bromberg, Thorn, Kulm, Briesen, Graudenz.

Let us look at the German population of that land-bridge, as a proportion of the total population before the First World war, according to the 1910 census.

County...........................................German population.............................total population

Zempelburg.........................................21,554..........................................30,541
Wirsitz..............................................34,235..........................................67,219
Kolmar..............................................34,004..........................................47,183
Bromberg.........................................105,504.........................................154,169
Thorn...............................................58,266.........................................105,544
Kulm................................................23,345...........................................50,069
Briesen.............................................24,007...........................................49,506

TOTAL...........................................363,807..........................................593,294

Proportion of total population that was German: 61.3%

Accordingly, the land bridge connecting German German Pomerania with East Prussia had had a clear German majority in 1910, and there is no reason to believe that that majority had been reduced by 1919.

Therefore, it was not an area with an "indisputably Polish " population, according to the principle of national self-determination laid down by President Wilson, and according to that principle should have been left with Germany rather than being awarded to the new Polish state.

If the principle of national self-determination had been followed impartially in the 1919 peace settlement, there would have been no "Polish Corridor". Rather there would have been a "German Corridor" connecting German Pomerania with East Prussia, and separating the main body of the Polish state from a Polish exclave lying to the north of the land-bridge and bordering on the Baltic. No doubt transit rights from the Polish exclave to Poland propoer could have been guaranteed by treaty.

It follows that the creation of the "Polish Corridor" separating East Prussia from the main part of Germany constituted an act of Polish expansionist aggression against Germany, supported by France and Britain.
.

[Sid Guttridge]

Michael,

1910 or, as Hitler preferred, 1918 are years convenient to the German nationalist point of view, in exactly the same way as a 2011 censuses of the West Bank would suit Israeli nationalists better than a 1967 census.

As pointed out before, by 1910 the "Corridor" had been subject to a state-sponsored century of colonization by ethnic Germans and a policy of deliberate Germanization of the local Slav populations.

For a picture of the traditional character of the area one needs to look at the whole series of German censuses in the 19th Century.

If there was a German majority in the Corridor in 1910, it appears to have been a recent development brought about by German state policy. Again, if that were the case, I cannot see any problem in the Poles reversing the process after 1918. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

It seems that Michael likes manipulating statistical data.

It appears that Domen121 agrees that there was a bridge across the south of the Polish Corridor connecting German Pomerania with East Prussia, consisting of the following counties, from west to east: Zempelburg, Wirsitz, Kolmar, Bromberg, Thorn, Kulm, Briesen, Graudenz.

Definitely no.

Because Wąbrzeźno (Briesen) and Chełmno (Kulm) counties had Polish majority according to the 1910 census.

et us look at the German population of that land-bridge, as a proportion of the total population before the First World war, according to the 1910 census.

County...........................................German population.............................total population

Zempelburg.........................................21,554..........................................30,541
Wirsitz..............................................34,235..........................................67,219
Kolmar..............................................34,004..........................................47,183
Bromberg.........................................105,504.........................................154,169
Thorn...............................................58,266.........................................105,544
Kulm................................................23,345...........................................50,069
Briesen.............................................24,007...........................................49,506

TOTAL...........................................363,807..........................................593,294

Proportion of total population that was German: 61.3%

But Briesen and Kulm didn't have German majority, they had Polish majority.

On the other hand, a Polish Corridor with Polish majority in every single county can be created:

County...........................................total population.............................German population

Działdowo.........................................24,709..........................................9,210
Brodnica..............................................62,142..........................................21,097
Wąbrzeźno.........................................49,506..........................................24,007
Chełmno..............................................50,069..........................................23,345
Świecie..............................................87,712..........................................42,233
Tuchola............................................33,951.........................................11,268
Starogard..............................................65,427...........................................17,165
Chojnice.............................................74,963...........................................30,326
Tczew.................................................64,321..........................................28,046
Kościerzyna..............................................52,980..........................................20,804
Kartuzy..............................................66,190..........................................14,170
Wejherowo.........................................71,560.........................................24,528

TOTAL...........................................703,530..........................................266,199

So percent of German population here is only 37,8%. Polish population is 62,2% in this Corridor.

As you can see not only this Corridor is larger and more populous than your Corridor, but also has larger superiority of Polish population over German population than your Corridor had of German over Polish population.

And - what's most important - this Corridor, contrary to yours, is coherent (every county within it has Polish majority - while in your Corridor two counties didn't have German majority, so in fact it wasn't a German Corridor).

Michael,

1910 or, as Hitler preferred, 1918 are years convenient to the German nationalist point of view, in exactly the same way as a 2011 censuses of the West Bank would suit Israeli nationalists better than a 1967 census.

As pointed out before, by 1910 the "Corridor" had been subject to a state-sponsored century of colonization by ethnic Germans and a policy of deliberate Germanization of the local Slav populations.

For a picture of the traditional character of the area one needs to look at the whole series of German censuses in the 19th Century.

If there was a German majority in the Corridor in 1910, it appears to have been a recent development brought about by German state policy. Again, if that were the case, I cannot see any problem in the Poles reversing the process after 1918. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

Everything what you wrote, MajorT, is true. But even despite that intensive Germanization and German colonization of this area, majority of population between Germany and East Prussia was still Polish.

Plus of course in their own nationalist census, German nationalists (using Michael's naming ) "prefered" to count people who could be classified as "inbetween" or "mixed" as Germans rather than non-Germans.

Just like in the census of 1931 Poles prefered to count those "inbetween" as Polish.

Not mentioning that in 1931 many people who could be counted Polish, prefered to be counted as Polish. Just like in 1910 it was more favorable to be listed in official documents as a German person, on the other hand.

This is all the beauty of late 19th century and early 20th century nationalism period censuses.