Treaty of Warsaw (1920)
Polish: Umowa warszawska Ukrainian: Варшавський договір | |
---|---|
Type | Bilateral political treaty (Military alliance) |
Signed | 21 April 1920 (24 April 1920) |
Location | Warsaw, Poland |
Effective | when signed |
Condition |
|
Expiration | Signing of the Peace of Riga |
Parties |
The Treaty of Warsaw (also the Polish-Ukrainian or Petliura-Piłsudski Alliance or Agreement) of April 1920 was a military-economical alliance between the
The alliance was signed during the
The treaty had no permanent impact.
Background
The Polish leader
At the end of June 1919, there was signed the Treaty of Versailles in which Germany "abrogated" from its treaties in Brest-Litovsk. The Ukrainian People's Republic, led by Petliura, suffered mounting attacks on its territory since early 1919, and by April 1920 most of Ukrainian territory was outside its control.[9]
In such conditions,
The treaty
The treaty was signed on 21 April in
A separate provision in the treaty prohibited both sides from concluding any international agreements against each other (Article IV).[13] Ethnic Poles within the Ukrainian border, and ethnic Ukrainians within the Polish border, were guaranteed the same rights within their states (Article V).[14] Unlike their Russian counterparts, whose lands were to be distributed among the peasants, Polish landlords in Ukraine were accorded special treatment[13] until a future legislation would be passed by Ukraine that would clarify the issue of Polish landed property in Ukraine (Article VI).[8] Further, an economic treaty was drafted, significantly tying Polish and Ukrainian economies; Ukraine was to grant significant concessions to the Poles and the Polish state.[4][8]
The treaty was followed by a formal military alliance signed by general
On the same day as the military alliance was signed (24 April), Poland and UPR forces began the Kiev Operation, aimed at securing the Ukrainian territory for Petliura's government thus creating a buffer for Poland that would separate it from Russia. Sixty-five thousand Polish and fifteen thousand Ukrainian soldiers[15] took part in the initial expedition. After winning the battle in the south, the Polish General Staff planned a speedy withdrawal of the 3rd Army and strengthening of the northern front in Belarus where Piłsudski expected the main battle with the Red Army to take place. The Polish southern flank was to be held by Polish-allied Ukrainian forces under a friendly government in Ukraine.[16]
Importance
For Piłsudski, this alliance gave his campaign for the
Aftermath
Both Piłsudski and Petliura were criticized by other factions within their governments and nations. Piłsudski faced stiff opposition from Dmowski's
On April 26, in his "Call to the People of Ukraine", Piłsudski assured that "the Polish army would only stay as long as necessary until a legal Ukrainian government took control over its own territory".
The alliance between Piłsudski and Petliura resulted in 15,000 allied Ukrainian troops supporting Poles at the beginning of the campaign,[27] increasing to 35,000 through recruitment and desertion from the Soviet side during the war.[27] This number, however, was much smaller than expected, and the late alliance with Poland failed to secure Ukraine's independence, as Petliura did not manage to gather any significant forces to help his Polish allies.[28]
On 7 May, during the course of the Kiev offensive, the Pilsudski-Petliura alliance took the city. Anna M. Cienciala writes: "However, the expected Ukrainian uprising against the Soviets did not take place. Ukraine was ravaged by war; also, most of the people were illiterate and had not developed their own national consciousness. Finally, they distrusted the Poles, who had formed a large part of the landowning class in Ukraine up to 1918."[5]
The divisions within the Ukrainian factions themselves, with many opposing Poles just as they opposed the Soviets, further reduced the recruitment to the pro-Polish Petliurist forces. In the end, Petliurist forces were unable to protect the Polish southern flank and stop the Soviets, as Piłsudski hoped; Poles at that time were falling back before the Soviet counteroffensive and were unable to protect Ukraine from the Soviets by themselves.[28]
The Soviets retook Kiev in June. Petliura's remaining Ukrainian troops were defeated by the Soviets in November 1920,
See also
Notes
- ^ Petr Kraljuk (October 1, 2016). "The Warsaw Treaty of 1920: the Ukrainian assessment". ZN.UA. Retrieved 2018-09-08.
- ^ "Although the Polish premier and many of his associates sincerely wanted peace, other important Polish leaders did not. Josef Pilsudski, chief of state and creator of Polish army, was foremost among the latter. Pilsudski hoped to build not merely a Polish nation state but a greater federation of peoples under the aegis of Poland which would replace Russia as the great power of Eastern Europe. Lithuania, Belorussia and Ukraine were all to be included. His plan called for a truncated and vastly reduced Russia, a plan which excluded negotiations prior to military victory."
Richard K Debo, Survival and Consolidation: The Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia, 1918-192, Google Print, p. 59, McGill-Queen's Press, 1992,ISBN 0-7735-0828-7. - ^ "Pilsudski's program for a federation of independent states centered on Poland; in opposing the imperial power of both Russia and Germany it was in many ways a throwback to the romantic Mazzinian nationalism of Young Poland in the early nineteenth century. But his slow consolidation of dictatorial power betrayed the democratic substance of those earlier visions of national revolution as the path to human liberation"
James H. Billington, Fire in the Minds of Men, p. 432, Transaction Publishers,ISBN 0-7658-0471-9 - ^ ISBN 0-7735-0828-7.
- ^ a b c d e THE REBIRTH OF POLAND. University of Kansas, lecture notes by professor Anna M. Cienciala, 2004. Last accessed on 2 June 2006.
- ^
- Zerkalo Nedeli (Mirror Weekly), May 22–28, 2004. Available online in Russian Archived 2006-01-16 at the Wayback Machine and in Ukrainian Archived 2007-03-10 at the Wayback Machine.)
Piłsudski is quoted to have said: "After the Polish independence we will see about Poland's size". (ibid) - ^ a b c d e f g Davies, White Eagle..., Polish edition, p.99-103
- ISBN 978-0-671-22625-1.
- ^ a b Kapelyushny, V. Treaty of Warsaw between the UNR Direktoria and Poland. Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine.
- ISBN 978-0-674-03718-2.
- ^ "Warsaw, Treaty of". www.encyclopediaofukraine.com. Retrieved 2019-09-16.
- ^ LCCN 63-23686
- ISBN 978-0-671-22625-1.
- ISBN 978-0-8020-8390-6.
- ^ "On collision course". Militera. Retrieved 8 September 2018.
- ^ a b "In September 1919 the armies of the Ukrainian Directory in Podolia found themselves in the "death triangle". (In reality, the Ukrainian forces were located near town of Liubar that is located near Volhynian-Podolian transition area and on the Volhynian part.) They were squeezed between the Red Russians of Lenin and Trotsky in the north-east, White Russians of Denikin in south-east and the Poles in the West. Death were looking into their eyes. And not only to the people but to the nascent Ukrainian state. Therefore, the chief ataman Petliura had no choice but to accept the union offered by Piłsudski, or, as an alternative, to capitulate to the Bolsheviks, as Volodymyr Vinnychenko or Mykhailo Hrushevsky did at the time or in a year or two. The decision was very hurtful. The Polish Szlachta was a historic enemy of the Ukrainian people. A fresh wound was bleeding, the West Ukrainian People's Republic, as the Pilsudchiks were suppressing the East Galicians at that very moment. However, Petliura agreed to peace and the union, accepting the Ukrainian-Polish border, the future Soviet-Polish one. It's also noteworthy that Piłsudski also obtained less territories than offered to him by Lenin, and, in addition, the war with immense Russia. The Dnieper Ukrainians then were abandoning their brothers, the Galicia Ukrainians, to their fate. However, Petliura wanted to use his last chance to preserve the statehood - in the union with the Poles. Attempted, however, without luck."
(in Russian) (in Ukrainian) Oleksa Pidlutskyi, Postati XX stolittia, (Figures of the 20th century),Kiev, February 3–9, 2001, in Russian Archived 2005-11-26 at the Wayback Machine and in Ukrainian Archived 2005-11-07 at the Wayback Machine. - ^ Zerkalo Nedeli, September 30 - October 6, 2006, available online in Russian Archived 2007-01-28 at the Wayback Machine and in Ukrainian[dead link].
- ^
- ^ Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine, "Red Ukrainian Galician Army."
- ISBN 5-7707-4048-5
- ^ ISBN 1-84176-668-2
- LCCN 63-23686
- ^ (in Polish), Włodzimierz Bączkowski, Włodzimierz Bączkowski - Czy prometeizm jest fikcją i fantazją?, Ośrodek Myśli Politycznej (quoting full text of "odezwa Józefa Piłsudskiego do mieszkańców Ukrainy"). Last accessed on 25 October 2006.
- ^ Tadeusz Machalski, then a captain, (the future military attache to Ankara) wrote in his diary: "Ukrainian people, who saw in their capital an alien general with the Polish army, instead of Petliura leading his own army, didn't view it as the act of liberation but as a variety of a new occupation. Therefore, the Ukrainians, instead of enthusiasm and joy, watched in gloomy silence and instead of rallying to arms to defend the freedom remained the passive spectators".
Oleksa Pidlutskyi, ibid - OL 7488070M. Archived from the originalon 2023-05-27.
- ^ a b Subtelny, O. (1988). Ukraine: A History. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. p. 375.
- ^ a b "95 years ago Petliura gave Pilsudski Western Ukraine". NEWS UA. 22.04.2015. Archived from the original on 9 September 2018. Retrieved 8 September 2018.
- ^ Davies, White Eagle..., Polish edition, p.263
- ISBN 978-83-01-13403-7.
- ^ Jan Jacek Bruski (August 2002). "Sojusznik Petlura". Wprost (in Polish). 1029 (2002–08–18). Retrieved 2006-09-28.
- ^
Timothy Snyder, Covert Polish missions across the Soviet Ukrainian border, 1928-1933 (p.55, p.56, p.57, p.58, p.59, in Cofini, Silvia Salvatici (a cura di), Rubbettino, 2005). Full text in PDF Archived 2012-02-14 at the Wayback Machine
) - ^ (in Russian)
(in Ukrainian)
Oleksa Pidlutskyi, Postati XX stolittia, (Figures of the 20th century), Kiev, February 3–9, 2001, in Russian Archived 2005-11-26 at the Wayback Machine and in Ukrainian Archived 2005-11-07 at the Wayback Machine.
External links
- (in Polish) Odezwa Piłsudskiego do Mieszkańców Ukrainy
- (in Ukrainian) Prof. Cheloukhine, S. Le Traite de Varsovie entre les Polonais et S. Petlura. 21.IV.1920. "Nova Ukrayina" Publishing. Prague, 1926.
- (in Ukrainian) Kapelyushny, V. Treaty of Warsaw between the UNR Direktoria and Poland (ВАРША́ВСЬКИЙ ДО́ГОВІР ДИРЕКТО́РІЇ УНР З ПО́ЛЬЩЕЮ). Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine.
- (in Ukrainian) Rukkas, A. Had Pilsudski bought Petlura? (Чи купував Пілсудський Петлюру?) Istorychna Pravda. 21 April 2020.
Further reading
- Korzeniewski, Bogusław; THE RAID ON KIEV IN POLISH PRESS PROPAGANDA. Humanistic Review (01/2006), [1]
- Review of The Ukrainian-Polish Defensive Alliance, 1919-1921: An Aspect of the Ukrainian Revolution by Michael Palij; Author(s) of Review: Anna M. Cienciala; The American Historical Review, Vol. 102, No. 2 (Apr., 1997), p. 484 ([2])
- Szajdak, Sebastian, Polsko-ukraiński sojusz polityczno-wojskowy w 1920 roku (The Polish-Ukrainian Political-Military Alliance of 1920), Warsaw, Rytm, 2006, ISBN 83-7399-132-8.