Normally, the Polish government parties and the opposition use almost every rhetorical means to fight each other. No accusation is too absurd, no attack too loud. But there is now agreement in Warsaw on one issue: the reparation demands on Germany. It was only this week that the Warsaw City Council unanimously declared its support for the project – Koalicja Obywatelska, a declared opponent of the ruling right-wing populist PiS, has a strong majority there.
On September 1, the government submitted a comprehensive report, who put Germany’s reparations debt to Poland for the damage caused in World War II at 6.2 trillion złoty, around 1.3 trillion euros. Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau recently submitted a corresponding diplomatic note in Berlin.
Now the Archbishop of Katowice, Wiktor Skworc, urges politicians to moderate their tone. It is not good “to blame today’s Germans for the sins of their ancestors”. Such a “media and politically attractive generalization is a serious violation of the truth and a political mistake that blocks the way for cooperation and understanding,” he told the Polish news agency KAI.
Several opposition politicians initially accused the PiS of only campaigning with anti-German resentment. Almost 70 percent of the participants saw it too on a poll so. At the same time, the respondents found the demands justified. And 418 of the 460 deputies in the Polish Sejm also voted for a resolution, which demands these reparations. It states that Poland “never” received compensation for the human and material losses and also “never” received reparations.
That’s not true, says historian Krzysztof Ruchniewicz. He is a professor at the Willy Brandt Center at the University of Wroclaw and has taught in Germany for many years. He does not acknowledge the methods or the scientists who wrote the report. “It would have been a credit to research what the Soviet Union actually paid Poland.”
Civil society has achieved a lot
Because it is true that Poland, as the country that possibly suffered most in World War II, was never at the table when it came to war reparations. Neither at the end of World War II nor in the two-plus-four talks.
What annoys Ruchniewicz the most is that the report does not recognize anything that has been done in the past decades in terms of reconciliation and understanding – especially by civil society and the church, for example by Action Reconciliation or the Max Kolbe Works. In addition, there are state efforts such as the textbook commission, youth work and the foundation for German-Polish cooperation. There is a sense of responsibility and the will to understand each other. “We did it,” says Ruchniewicz, “and that’s a great achievement.”
“This reconciliation” his church wants to “continue to serve today with full responsibility and independence,” said Archbishop Skworc. The chairman of the Polish bishops’ conference, Archbishop Stanisław Gądecki, had previously advocated “redressing the injustice”. Skworc now said that the German and Polish archbishops should find a common position on this question. In no case should claims be made “in prosecutorial language that arouses negative emotions and resorts to a sense of hostility towards the perpetrator.”
In the border areas, people prefer to look at the good cooperation. During a meeting with the mayors of Silesian cities at the end of September, most of them seemed unimpressed by the discord between Warsaw and Berlin. “No one has any doubts about the crimes of the Nazis, but the PiS exploits that,” said the mayor of Wałbrzych, Roman Szełemej, at the talks in Wrocław.
“We’re sorry that government relations look like this,” adds his colleague Tomasz Kiliński from Nowa Ruda. “But we are working against it at our level.” In the case of town twinning, for example, personal relationships are more important than big politics.
“Cannot be redeemed with money”
Poland’s largest daily newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza reacted rather disturbed to the demands of the Polish government, spoke of one “imaginary Polish-German war” by party leader Jarosław Kaczyński, who probably hopes to address a “deep-rooted hatred” of Germans, particularly among the older generation. “Mr. Kaczyński, the war is taking place on the other side of the eastern border, not on the western border.”
The European politician Roża Thun, who belongs to the left-liberal Polska 2050 party, made a similar statement. In any case, the crimes “can’t be made up for with money at all,” she said this week on Deutschlandfunk. It is more important to spend money to arm Ukraine. “That means creating security, peace in our area today, but not tensions between Poland and Germany.”
The PiS, however, thinks it is a pretty good time to approach the Germans for such large sums. The top government claims that if Germany pays for its crimes, it would greatly improve relations between the two countries.
Historian Ruchniewicz advocates a “pragmatic solution”. For example, the support of former forced laborers or Shoa survivors. “Whether it’s medication or a place in a retirement home,” says Ruchniewicz. It would be important work to find out which victims have received little or no compensation. Ruchniewicz warns that the school books that have been created together over a long period of time should now also be used, and also with the work on Memorial and meeting place to commemorate the German crimes in Poland it must go ahead. The historian has another concrete suggestion: “German politicians should not only hold their Sunday speeches in Poland, but also in Germany and seek understanding there.”