Britain supports Polish independence

According to the British official chronology of the war, on 5 April 1917 the British government informed the Russian Provisional Government that it adhered to the principle of an independent and united Poland. This was a reply to the proclamation to the Poles issued by Prince Lvov’s government a week earlier. For the first time since the start of the war London officially supported the idea of Polish independence. Polish document collections print the British communication dated “April 1917”, without a day; the date of 5 April is given by the chronology.

The British position consisted of two texts. The Foreign Secretary, Arthur Balfour, telegraphed to the ambassador in Petrograd, George Buchanan, that the British government was glad to declare that it fully associated itself with the recognition of the principles of Polish independence and unity. Their realisation had, in his view, become possible thanks to the Provisional Government’s “liberal and statesmanlike” declaration. Buchanan passed this on to the Foreign Minister, Pavel Milyukov, in a note in which he wrote that the Provisional Government, inspired by a “fine and noble thought” that found a lively echo in the hearts of the Allies, had held out its hand to the Poles, its brothers, to heal their age-old wounds, and had promised a restored and united Poland independence and freedom. The ambassadors of France and Italy delivered similar notes to Milyukov. The French one spoke of the triumph of the principles of liberty that gave strength to the nations allied in the struggle against the German coalition.

Behind these courteous words lay caution. According to the Kraków daily Czas, which wrote about the notes at the beginning of May, the powers took note of the Russian position but were reserved about the military alliance between Poland and Russia announced in the proclamation. Until the outbreak of the February Revolution London had treated the Polish question as an internal matter for its ally and avoided declarations that might offend Petrograd. In the Entente’s reply to Wilson’s note in January 1917 the Allies had referred on the Polish question to the tsar’s order. Balfour himself was no supporter of an independent Poland. According to historians, as late as 1916 he opposed its creation and warned that an independent Polish state, separating Russia from Germany, might in a future war leave France without effective help from the east. Only the Russian proclamation relieved the British of the fear that by supporting the Poles they would harm the alliance. In March Roman Dmowski, then in London, had submitted to the Foreign Office a memorandum on rebuilding a strong Poland from all three partitions.

The Allies also wanted to show unity. On 14 April a joint note of the three powers was published in Paris. In it they stated that they shared the sentiments that had guided the Provisional Government in calling Poland to independence and unity, and that they felt at one with Russia in the intention of resurrecting Poland “in its entirety”. On 26 April in the House of Commons the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Andrew Bonar Law, asked about Poland by Herbert Asquith, repeated publicly that the government welcomed the Russian proclamation and that Britain’s efforts in this war would be directed towards helping Poland achieve unity on the principles set out in the Russian proclamation, under conditions that would make it strong and independent. He also expressed the hope that after the war the two countries would be bound by close ties of friendship.

The British declaration did not yet settle anything. It spoke of a principle, not of frontiers, and referred directly to the Russian formula, which bound Poland to Russia by an alliance and left the final word on the disputed territories to the Russian Constituent Assembly. It was nevertheless a breakthrough. The Polish question ceased to be an internal affair of Russia and became a war aim of the whole coalition, of which Western governments could from then on speak openly.