More in the pipeline
Last week's visit to Warsaw of Russian Foreign Minister Ivan Ivanov marked the first high-ranking visit by a Russian official to Poland for some years: apart from a high-profile visit by Boris Yeltsin in 1993, Warsaw has effectively been boycotted by Russian diplomacy since the fall of communism 10 years ago. Russia's attitude toward Poland, and other Central European countries is one of ambivalence: on the one hand, ostentatious ostracism and isolation of countries that had the temerity to break away from the Soviet Empire, but at the same time concerted efforts to ensure that they remain within the orbit of Russian influence.
Few would argue that relations between Poland and Russia in the last few years have been ideal, and in fact the recent history of those relations has been marked more by conflict than cooperation. Some of these conflicts revolve around symbolic issues, such as difficulties experienced by Poles in forcing the Russians to assist in establishing war graves in those areas where Polish soldiers and prisoners of war were executed by Stalin's NKVD troops in 1940. The Katyn Massacres hold huge moral and patriotic resonance for ordinary Poles, and the attitude of domestic and international politicians toward them is an important marker. It was no coincidence that the Polish side insisted that part of Ivanov's scheduled visit to Warsaw involved a visit to the Katyn Memorial in Warsaw's Powazkowski cemetery.
Recent years have seen sparks fly between the two countries over the Poles' expulsion of Russian diplomats accused of spying, which was followed by tit-for-tat expulsions of Polish diplomats from Moscow. In another spectacular incident, a visit by former Prime Minister Viktor Czernomyrdin to Warsaw was torpedoed by the beating up of Russian diplomats at a Warsaw railway station, an incident suspected later of having been engineered by the Russians themselves.
But exciting though these conflicts might be, there are deeper reasons for the frosty relations between Russia and Poland, all ultimately relating to the geopolitical balance of power in Europe and Poland's crucial position between Russia and Germany. Russia gave expression to this in her long-running campaign to prevent Poland, as well as the Czech Republic and Hungary, from joining NATO. Predictably, none of Russia's threats and warnings of such membership destabilizing Europe or Russia have come to pass. Yet they are being repeated in the light of increasing preparations for a second round of NATO expansion, perhaps to include countries like Lithuania and Slovakia, both of which Russia regards as being in its special sphere of influence. Poland has been actively supporting this further expansion, as well the need to establish closer military relations with Ukraine, precisely because it sees NATO as a vehicle for stability.
Having failed to pacify the Poles, the Russians have essentially decided to do without them. That is certainly one explanation of Russian tactics over the last couple of years over the now-famous Yamal gas pipeline from Russia to Western Europe. One aspect of the pipeline issue involves an attempt by the Russians to weaken Ukraine by seeking to persuade the Poles to agree to the construction of a branch of the pipeline through Poland to Slovakia, allowing Ukraine to be completely bypassed in supplying Russian gas to the West. A second, more immediate issue is the recent public decision by Russian President Vladimir Putin to go over the heads of the Poles and summarily cut a deal with Western European states meaning France and Germany on the direct supply of Russian gas to Europe, despite the fact that Poland lies in the middle of any pipeline route. As a final illustration of the degree to which the Russians are now treating the Poles with a cavalier attitude was the revelation last week that this new pipeline will also contain within it a fiber-optic telecommunications link that the Poles never knew existed and which threatens to entrench Russian-controlled telecoms companies as the lynchpins of Poland's communications infrastructure.
This attempted emasculation of Polish interests by Russia is a masterstroke, but it cannot fully succeed without the cooperation of politicians inside and outside of Poland. In the case of the latter, the Russians have effectively found willing allies in social-democratic politicians in the European Union, who are only too willing to do deals with the Russians over the heads of the troublesome Central Europeans, and at the expense of European relations with the United States. As far as politicians inside Poland are concerned, it is no coincidence that Ivanov spent much of his visit wooing current opposition Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) politicians, who have in the past publicly signaled their interest in moving into closer links with Russia.
It remains to be seen how the SLD will reorient policy toward Russia after it wins next year's elections. But for many of them, the prospect of a "grand deal" that will bring together Western European, Polish and Russian economic interests and therefore cement a Eurasian power bloc to rival the United States may seem a temptation too enticing to refuse.
Marek Matraszek is the Warsaw director of CEC Government Relations. He can be e-mailed at director@cec.com.pl
