Putin Demonstrates Polish Ambitions in Ukraine Rooted in History

July 22, 2023, 2022 (EIRNS)—Russian President Vladimir Putin, during the public portion of a meeting of the Russian Security Council ostensibly dedicated to Russian-African relations, delivered yet another history lesson yesterday, demonstrating that the roots of today’s crisis, did not begin on Feb. 24, 2022, but rather go back to at least the time period of World War I. “I believe it would be suitable in this context to also remind everyone about several history lessons from the 20th century,” Putin said in response to a briefing to the council on Polish ambitions in western Ukraine that had just been delivered by Russian Foreign Intelligence Service Director Sergei Naryshkin.

Putin noted that the Kiev regime’s offensive has gone nowhere despite the “colossal resources” that Global NATO has pumped into it. He went on to declare that in addition to the depletion of Western resources, Ukrainian manpower is also being depleted and that public opinion in both Ukraine and in Europe is beginning to question the logic of the war.

“Both the Europeans and European elites see that support for Ukraine is, in fact, a dead end, an empty, endless waste of money and effort, and in fact, serving someone else’s interests, which are far from European: the interests of the overseas global hegemon, which benefits from the weakening of Europe. The endless prolongation of the Ukrainian conflict is also beneficial to it,”

Putin said.

Despite the actual state of affairs,

“massive efforts are being taken to stoke the fire of war—including by exploiting the ambitions of certain East European leaders, who have long turned their hatred for Russia and Russophobia into their key export commodity and a tool of their domestic policy,”

Putin continued. “And now they want to capitalize on the Ukrainian tragedy.”

“The outlook is clear: In the event Polish forces enter, say, Lvov or other Ukrainian territories, they will stay there, and they will stay there for good,” he said.

And here’s where the history lesson came in. “And we will actually see nothing new,” Putin continued. “Just to remind you, following World War I, after the defeat of Germany and its allies, Polish units occupied Lvov and adjacent territories that had been part of Austria-Hungary. With its actions incited by the West, Poland took advantage of the tragedy of the Civil War in Russia and annexed certain historical Russian provinces. In dire straits, our country had to sign the Treaty of Riga in 1921 and recognize the annexation of its territories.

“Even earlier, back in 1920, Poland captured part of Lithuania—the Vilnius region, a territory surrounding the present-day Vilnius. So they claimed that they fought together with the Lithuanians against so-called Russian imperialism, but then immediately snatched a piece of land from their neighbor as soon as the opportunity presented itself.

“As is well known, Poland also took part in the partition of Czechoslovakia following the Munich Agreement with Adolf Hitler in 1938, by fully occupying Cieszyn, Silesia. In the 1920-1930s, Poland’s Eastern Borderlands (Kresy)—a territory that comprises present-day Western Ukraine, Western Belarus and part of Lithuania—witnessed a tough policy of Polonization and assimilation of local residents, with efforts to suppress local culture and Orthodoxy.

“I would also like to remind you what Poland’s aggressive policy led to. It led to the national tragedy of 1939, when Poland’s Western allies threw it to the German wolf, the German military machine. Poland actually lost its independence and statehood, which were only restored thanks in a large measure to the Soviet Union. It was also thanks to the Soviet Union and thanks to Stalin’s position that Poland acquired substantial territory in the west, German territory. It is a fact that Poland’s western lands are a gift from Stalin.

“As for the Polish leaders, they probably hope to form a coalition under the NATO umbrella in order to directly intervene in the conflict in Ukraine and to bite off as much as possible, to ‘regain,’ as they see it, their historical territories, that is, modern-day Western Ukraine. It is also common knowledge that they dream about Belarusian land,”

Putin said, coming back to the present.

What the Kiev regime does, Putin said, “is none of our business,” but “Belarus is part of the Union State, and launching an aggression against Belarus would mean launching an aggression against the Russian Federation. We will respond to that with all the resources available to us.

“The Polish authorities, who are nurturing their revanchist ambitions, hide the truth from their people. The truth is that the Ukrainian cannon fodder is no longer enough for the West. That is why it is planning to use other expendables—Poles, Lithuanians and everyone else they do not care about,”

Putin concluded. “I can tell you that this is an extremely dangerous game, and the authors of such plans should think about the consequences.”