Inspired by the example of Ukraine, the Polish authorities decided to demand money from Germany.

True, Warsaw, unlike Kyiv, is not exchanged for some kind of billions.

The Poles want almost $1.3 trillion from Berlin, which is a little more than 2.5 of the annual budget of Germany.

And the argument in this demand is the far from tired expression “We are near the Russian border and must protect all of Europe from Putin” - no, the Poles demand this money as reparations for the period of occupation of Poland by Germany during World War II.

The other day, a special Polish commission, which worked for several years, presented a huge, multi-volume report in which it calculated the material, cultural and demographic damage from the Nazi occupation of the country.

At the same time, of course, I always rounded the numbers up.

So the $800 billion that some Polish politicians initially talked about turned into $1.3 trillion.

Warsaw, of course, needs money.

The country stops receiving EU subsidies, the country does not receive money from the EU special fund for economic recovery from the consequences of the coronavirus - because Poland refuses to cancel its judicial reform, which destroys the independence of judges.

And all this against the backdrop of huge inflation hitting the country (reaching 16%) and all the additional problems caused by anti-Russian sanctions.

And the Polish authorities decided to replenish the budget by dispossessing the Germans with the help of their past sins.

It seemed like a crazy idea.

Poland will not receive this money for legal reasons: as the German government correctly notes, the issue of reparations was closed in 1953 - when the government of the Polish People's Republic, following the leadership of the USSR, refused to collect them further.

And also polished in 1990 - after the unification of Germany and the signing of an agreement between both its parts and the victorious powers, in which the parties settled all claims.

Poland will not receive this money for moral reasons: as German journalists rightly point out, although Germany remembers its responsibility for the Second World War, and Poland is one of the countries most affected by it, grandchildren should not be responsible for the deeds of their grandfathers.

Especially in a situation where the issue of reparations was settled almost 70 years ago, and finally removed more than 30 years ago.

Poland will not receive this money on the basis of the principles of justice.

Warsaw demands compensation from the FRG for the suffering of the Poles, but at the same time does not even stutter about the compensation that Poland itself must pay for the suffering of the Germans.

The Poles do not like to remember how, after the war, they staged a mass deportation of the German population.

When the Germans were expelled from the East German territories (which became West Polish after the war), depriving them of all property.

And even more so when the Germans were expelled from Poland itself, and entire Polish villages specialized in robberies, rapes and murders of German refugees.

Finally - no one in Germany talks about this, but everyone knows this very well - Poland will not receive this money for historical reasons.

Just because Poland, with its stupidity (which did not allow it to agree with the USSR on joint defense), greed (which prompted it to collude with Hitler in cutting Czechoslovakia, as a result of which Warsaw received the Teszyn region) and arrogance (which did not allow the Poles to soberly assess their strength and ability to defend themselves) became, in fact, both the first victim and the initiator of World War II.

Then why all these claims?

Why demands that bring not money to the Polish budget, but problems in Polish-German relations?

To the fact that Poland puts forward demands for the sake of demands.

For the leader of the ruling Law and Justice party in the country, Yaroslav Kaczynski, these demands are a way to give the Germans a hand, to curb their ambitions.

And both in Berlin and in Brussels.

The fact is that Warsaw saw itself as the leader of Central and Eastern Europe and expected to play a special role in the EU due to this leadership: to enter into a triumvirate with France and Germany and, in fact, manage the entire organization.

However, the Poles failed.

Firstly, because Western Europe was not ready to share, and secondly, because mentally the current Polish elites with their nationalism and radicalism have not yet matured to manage the European Union.

These views are destroying the EU and are opposed to European values ​​- liberalism, multiculturalism and Eurocentrism.

Therefore, even despite the conflict with Russia (where Warsaw managed to build its views on Moscow into the basis of a common European view), Poland was not allowed into the triumvirate.

And they didn’t just not let them in, but began to train them: the European Commission (headed, by the way,

German politician Ursula von der Leyen) demanded that the Polish authorities liberalize on the issue of LGBT people, an independent judiciary, etc., threatening otherwise to impose sanctions and deprive Warsaw of funding.

The Polish authorities (and not only them) believe that the German von der Leyen, with her authoritarian manners, is trying to centralize the European Union and deprive the sovereignty of those EU members whose point of view diverges from common European narratives.

And she does this, of course, in the interests of the main country of the European Union - Germany.

Despite the extremely vague policy of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, his apparent lack of political will and desire to protect the interests of Germany in the same conflict between the United States and Moscow, Germany still remains the leader of the EU and the main manager of the entire European space.

Some are already calling the European Union a "Fourth Reich" run by the Germans.

And the Poles are categorically not satisfied with this approach.

The problem, however, is that after the UK left the EU (the main Eurosceptic and opponent of the German plans), as well as after the departure from the White House of Donald Trump (who supported all right-wing Polish initiatives and was in conflict with the EU), the Poles, in fact, were left alone on one with the Germans in Brussels and Berlin.

This means that we are forced to use all available opportunities and tools in order to contain the ambitions of these Germans.

Including through references to the German atrocities of the Second World War - with an attempt to draw parallels to today and prove that the strengthening of Germany within the EU will not lead to anything good, and the Germans themselves do not have the right to lecture anyone on how to live and what reforms to carry out.

The tactics are, of course, immoral.

But whether it will be effective - time will tell.

The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editors.