Friday, December 22, 2017

Germany May Be Trying to Destabalize Poland But No Worries

Following up on "Poland's Plan to Dominate Europe" and riffing off Alphaville's "Don’t skip from Brexit to Pol-exit without a little history" the crux of the matter is: Poland would like to be left alone for a change.
Fair trade with other countries in Europe would be nice but if it comes at the cost of soverignty they are going to say no.
There was a story in November that points up part of the problem:

From Radio Poland:

Officials in Warsaw have demanded explanations after the German defence minister suggested it was necessary to support the "resistance of the young generation" in Poland
The Polish defence minister has issued instructions to summon the German defence attaché in Warsaw over the statement, and Poland’s foreign minister described the remark as an unacceptable attempt by a German politician to meddle in Poland's internal affairs.

"On November 3, Defence Minister Antoni Macierewicz, in response to a statement by German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen, instructed Col. Tomasz Kowalik, Director of the [Polish defence ministry’s] Department of Military Foreign Affairs, to summon the German Defence Attache for explanations," the Polish defence ministry said in a statement.

Speaking to German broadcaster ZDF, von der Leyen on Thursday said her children had been studying in Poland as part of the European Union’s Erasmus student exchange programme at a time when there was a power shift in Warsaw. She added that it was important to support the "healthy, democratic resistance of the young generation" in Poland.

"Our task is to maintain the discourse, to argue with Poland and Hungary," von der Leyen also said, as quoted by Poland’s PAP state news agency.

Referring to von der Leyen’s words, Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski said her statement was a case of explicitly “admitting that the German side is interfering in political life in Poland."

Waszczykowski added: “For the last two years we have been hearing from German politicians that they are neutral and that whatever is being said in the local [German] media is just independent publications that the German authorities have no influence on."...MORE
In her Alphaville piece Ms Kaminska doesn't go into the immigration question or the natural gas geopolitics or the other people who wouldn't mind it if Poland became nothing more than a pastoral breadbasket for the volk to the west or the fine line Poland walks between Russia, Visegrád, the EU and the U.S./NATO.

But I might. 

In the meantime here are some Polish volleyball fans addressing the Germans at a match in January 2016:

Banner At Volleyball match. Poland - Germany "Protect Your women, not our democracy!"