LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
POLAND AND RUSSIA SIR,—From the beginning of the Russo-Polish trouble until now The Spectator, almost alone among our weeklies of any standing, has not been afraid to pint out that the attitude of the Soviet Union towards Poland is quite inconsistent with the principles avowed by the United Nations and the declared intentions of Russia herself. In your last issue, however, there appear several statements which seem to indicate a change of policy. I refer to the paragraph on Russo-Polish problems on p. 278, and to John Moscow's article on p. 282.
From what is printed on p. 278 the impression is that since the be- ginning of the Warsaw rising the Russians have been co-operating with Britain and America in supplying arms to the Patriots. This is nonsense; no Russian co-operation was forthcoming before September 12th, and even then it was given with a grudge, e.g., supplies were dropped without parachutes! Britain and America should never have been requ'red to aid Warsaw with Russian armies never more than eight miles from the capital during the whole tragic rising.
John Moscow, on p. 282, says there is no reason to doubt Stalin sincerely wants a free and independent Poland. All the evidence points in exactly the opposite way. Every act of the Russians since entering Poland last January has been hostile to Poland and her people. Russia has imprisoned those who assisted the Red Army to advance, she has conscripted Polish citizens, she has imposed on the parts of Poland occu- pied by her a committee entirely unrepresentative of all but a minute per- centage of the people, she insults the legal Government and accuses it of Hitlerism, notwithstanding her own record of 1939-41, she has con- demned to death General Bar as being responsible for the Warsaw rising —a rising commenced under Soviet instructions. And today we learn she has taken prisoner two or three members of a former Polish Govern- ment on some trumped-up charge. Russia is trying to force Poland to declare war on her and so force her to quit the Allied camp, which done, Russia will have her way in Poland without great difficulty—that is until the Poles are strong enough to rise again to throw off the foreign yoke.
Russia's strongest western frontier is a strong, independent, friendly Poland. Poland is very willing to ally herself with Russia if that country will do her justice. The Polish Government have never, and I defy any- one to deny it, done anything to arouse Russian hostility. If anything, the Government has been too ready to compromise with the Soviet—and all in vain: Mr. Churchill's saying that we must support Russia in her claims on eastern Poland is too illogical, too horrible for words. It may be no exaggeration to say there would be no Soviet Union today but for Polish resistance in 1939 and Polish sabotage of German supplies to the Russian front after the German attack on Russia in 1941.
Sir, a nation an ally of ours is being exterminated; silence on such a subject may no longer be maintained, despite Churchill's statement. Had Britain and America acted in the Russo-Polish matter two years ago the situation of today would most probably never have arisen. Silence now is criminal. Incidentally I am prepared to substantiate the state- ments made in this letter.—Yours faithfully, 6, Midlothian Drive, Glasgow, S. r. RICHARD NEILSON.
[Our paragraph on supplies to Warsaw (p. 278) cannot properly be given the interpretation our correspondent, puts on it. What we wrote was "The controversy about supplies to the underground movement in Warsaw is ended. American planes have been carrying British supplies for the Poles with Russian co-operation." The clear implication is that the original Russian refusal to co-operate had been replaced by a more satisfactory attitude.—ED., The Spectator.]
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