Kingdom of Poland (1917–1918)

The Kingdom of Poland (, ), also known informally as the Regency Kingdom of Poland (), was a short-lived puppet state of the German Empire and polity that was proclaimed during World War I by it and Austria-Hungary on 5 November 1916 on the territories of formerly Russian-ruled Congress Poland held by the Central Powers as the Government General of Warsaw and which became active on 14 January 1917. It was subsequently transformed between 7 October 1918 and 22 November 1918 into the independent Second Polish Republic, the customary ceremonial founding date of the latter being set at 11 November 1918.

In spite of the initial total dependence of this client state on its sponsors, it ultimately served against their intentions in the aftermath of the Armistice of 11 November 1918 as the cornerstone proto-state of the nascent Second Polish Republic, the latter composed also of territories never intended by the Central Powers to be ceded to Poland, and therefore played a crucial role in the resurrection of Polish statehood.

Rationale

The decision to propose the restoration of Poland after a century of partitions was taken up by the German policymakers in an attempt to legitimize further imperial presence in the occupied territories and create a buffer state to prevent future wars with Russia. The plan was followed by the German propaganda pamphlet campaign delivered to the Poles in 1915, claiming that the German soldiers were arriving as liberators to free Poland from subjugation by the Russian Empire. However, the German High Command under Erich Ludendorff also wanted to annex around 30,000 square kilometers of the territory of former Congress Poland, and planned to evict up to 3 million Poles and Jews to make room for German colonists in the so-called Polish Border Strip plan. The German government used punitive threats to force Polish landowners living in the German-occupied Baltic states to relocate and sell their Baltic property to the Germans in exchange for entry to Poland. Parallel efforts were made to remove Poles from the Polish territories of the Prussian Partition.

Planning

Germany

thumb|upright|[[Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria|Archduke Charles Stephen (Karl Stephan) in 1917]]

With the onset of the war in 1914, for the purposes of securing Germany's eastern border against the Russian imperial army, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, the German chancellor, decided on the annexation of a specific strip of land from Congress Poland, known later on as the Polish Border Strip. In order to avoid adding the Polish population to the population of imperial Germany, it was proposed that the Poles would be ethnically cleansed to a proposed new Polish state further east, while the strip would be resettled with Germans.

German Emperor Wilhelm II conceived of creating a dependent Polish state from territory conquered from Russia. This new autonomous Kingdom of Poland would be ruled by a German prince and have its military, transportation, and economy controlled by Germany. Its army and railway network would be placed under Prussian command.

The borders of this "autonomous" Poland were to be changed in favour of Germany with the annexation of the so-called "Polish Border Strip", which would lead to the annexation of considerable parts of Polish territory that had been part of the Russian partition of Poland. By the end of 1916, Germany wanted to annex almost 30,000 square kilometres of Polish territory. These lands were to be settled by ethnic Germans, while the Polish and Jewish population was to be removed.

Such plans were also proposed by members of the German minority in Poland in the Łódź area, who protested the Act of 5th November, and in a letter to the German government demanded the annexation of western Poland by Germany and settlement of ethnic Germans in those areas.

German candidates for the throne were disputed between the royal houses of Saxony, Württemberg and Bavaria. Bavaria demanded that their Prince Leopold, the Supreme Commander of the German forces on the Eastern front, become the new monarch. An alternative candidate was the then King of Bavaria himself, Ludwig III. The claim of the Saxon House of Wettin's candidate Friedrich Christian, was based on three previous Saxon rulers - Electors Augustus the Strong and Frederick Augustus II and King Frederick Augustus I of Saxony - having ruled over Poland before. Candidates from smaller German houses were proposed; Hans Heinrich XV von Hochberg, Prince of Pless

Austria-Hungary

thumb|200px|Occupation of the Kingdom of Poland during [[World War I:]]

Austria-Hungary allowed the formation of a Polish quasi-government, the Supreme National Committee, and had three different ideas regarding Poland. One, the "Austro-Polish Solution", involved the creation of a Polish kingdom under the Emperor of Austria, who, among his other titles, was already King of Galicia and Lodomeria. German and Magyar (Hungarian) elements within the Habsburg monarchy opposed such a move for fear of creating a predominantly Slavic area. In contrast to Emperor Francis Joseph, Charles I of Austria, who had acceded to the Habsburg thrones in 1916, promoted the idea. Charles was supported by Archduke Wilhelm of Austria, who also backed another Austro-Slavist idea, that of creating an autonomous Grand Duchy of Ukraine within the Habsburg monarchy to counter the German project of Mitteleuropa. The other two ideas involved the division of former Congress Poland between Germany and Austria-Hungary, or between Austria-Hungary and a state built from Lithuania, Belarus and the remnants of Congress Poland to create a new version of the dissolved Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.

According to Polish historian Janusz Pajewski, "the Austrians had underestimated Germany's desire to determine Poland's fate". They did recognise, according to Prime Minister Karl von Stürgkh, that "Poles will remain Poles [...] even 150 years after Galicia was joined to Austria, Poles still didn't become Austrians".

Of the candidates for the new Polish throne, Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria () and his son Charles Albert were early contenders. Both resided in the Galician town of Saybusch (now Żywiec) and spoke Polish fluently. Charles Stephen's daughters were married to the Polish aristocrats Princes Olgierd of Czartoryski and Hieronim Mikołaj Radziwill.

By early 1916, the "Austro-Polish Solution" had become hypothetical. Erich von Falkenhayn, the German Chief of the General Staff, had rejected it in January, followed by Bethmann Hollweg in February. Bethmann Hollweg had been willing to see an Austrian candidate on the new Polish throne, so long as Germany retained control over the Polish economy, resources and army.

During the first year of the war, German and Austrian troops quickly conquered Russian Vistula Land, former Congress Poland, and in 1915 divided its administration between a German Governor General in Warsaw and an Austrian counterpart in Lublin. Candidates also came from the Polish aristocracy itself, namely Zdzisław Lubomirski, A draft constitution was proposed in 1917. After the intermission of the Temporary Committee of the Provisional Council of State (), the Central Powers introduced a provisional constitution, the patent, on 12 September 1917. The patent devised a constitutional monarchy with a bicameral parliament but without ministerial responsibility. Only schools and courts were transferred to Polish authorities, but after Polish protests, the German minority was given a separate school system. Pending the election of a King of Poland, a Regency Council () was installed as a provisional government. On 18 September, the following members of the Council were named: Aleksander Kakowski, Archbishop of Warsaw; aristocrat Prince Zdzisław Lubomirski who had served as mayor of Warsaw in 1916–1917 and Józef Ostrowski, a landowner and formerly the leading Polish politician in the Russian Duma.

West and North

Late in 1917, the German supreme command had proposed annexing a "border strip" to Germany, a policy earlier suggested by a letter to the German government by members of Poland's German minority, settled around Łódź. Such plans were agreed to in principle by the German government in March 1918 and in April gained support in the Prussian House of Lords, but were strongly opposed by General Beseler in a report to Emperor Wilhelm.

In July, Ludendorff specified his plans in a memorandum, proposing annexing a greatly enlarged "border strip" of 20,000 square kilometers. This approach resulted in the signing on 9 February of the initially secret First Treaty of Brest-Litovsk between the Central Powers and the new state of Ukraine, which ceded to the latter the province of Chełm separated from Congress Poland by Russia in 1913. When it became public, many in Poland regarded this as a "Fourth partition of Poland", prompting a "political general strike" in Warsaw on 14 February and the resignation of the Jan Kucharzewski administration later that month. Parts of the Polish auxiliary corps under Józef Haller protested by breaking through the Austro-Russian front line to Ukraine, where they united with Polish detachments which had left the Tsarist army. After a fierce battle with the German army at Kaniów in May, the remnants were interned, though Haller managed to escape to Moscow.

The Regency Council sought admission to the negotiation regarding the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with the Bolshevik government during travels to Berlin and Vienna in early 1918 but only gained German Chancellor Georg von Hertling's promise to admit the Polish government in an advisory capacity. This, however, was refused by the Bolshevik representatives, who denied the Polish government any legitimacy. On 23 October, the Regency Council installed the Świeżyński government, whom Beseler transferred the command over Polish forces (which by then included the Polish regiments of the Austro-Hungarian Army) to. On 4 November, the government was dismissed after an attempted coup d’état to depose the Regency Council, and was replaced by the provisional government of Władysław Wróblewski.

However, another Polish government based in Lublin arose to challenge the Regency's authority: on 6 November, Ignacy Daszyński proclaimed the "Polish People's Republic" (Tymczasowy Rząd Ludowy Republiki Polskiej - literally: "Temporary People's Government of the Polish Republic"), with Daszyński himself (a Socialist politician and formerly a member of the Austrian parliament) as Prime Minister and Colonel Edward Rydz-Śmigły as a military commander. Moderates in Warsaw, who now hoped for a return of General Piłsudski, who was still held in custody at Magdeburg, repudiated Lublin's declaration of the deposition of the Regency to be deposed and its plans for radical social reforms. Already in October, the Regency Council had requested Piłsudski's release, and after negotiations through Harry Graf Kessler, the General was allowed to return to Warsaw, where he arrived on 10 November. The following day, Germany signed the armistice and German troops in Warsaw were disarmed as they refused to fire on Polish insurgents. On the same day, the Daszyński government ceded all authority to Piłsudski and resigned, while the Regency Council transferred to him its military authority. On 14 November, the Council ceded the remainder of its authority to Józef Piłsudski and voted itself out of existence. On the same day, Piłsudski had issued in turn a decree reappointing the [Daszyński] Government, in spite of the continued existence of the Wróblewski provisional government. On 16 November 1918, Piłsudski sent a radio telegram to "Mr President of the United States, the Royal English Government, the Government of the French Republic, the Royal Italian Government, the Imperial Japanese Government, the Government of the German Republic, as well as the governments of all the warring or neutral states", notifying them about the establishment of an independent Polish State, named in the telegram as the Polish Republic.

On 17 November, both the newly designated prime minister, Daszyński and the provisional government of Wróblewski resigned in favour of the new Moraczewski government, finally ending the governmental diarchy. The transition to republican government was formally completed through the decree of 22 November 1918 on the supreme representational authority of the Polish Republic, which stipulated the assumption by Piłsudski of the interim office of chief of state.

References

Bibliography

Immanuel Geiss, Tzw., Polski Pas Graniczny 1914-1918, Warszawa, 1964.
Janusz Pajewski, Pierwsza Wojna Światowa 1914-1918, Wydawnictwa PWN, 2005.
Piotr Eberhardt, "Projekty aneksyjne Cesarstwa Niemieckiego wobec ziem polskich podczas I wojny światowej i Problematyka geopolityczna ziem polskich", Warszawa: PAN IGiPZ, 2008.
Hajo Holborn, A History of Modern Germany: 1840-1945, Princeton University Press, 1982.
Hein Eirch Goemans, War and punishment: the causes of war termination and the First World War, Princeton University Press, 2000.
Pro memoria. Prusak w Polsce, by Józef Rapacki, Wydawnictwo Tygodnika Ilustrowanego, Warszawa.