Polish dance with cannonballs

The country that Churchill once called the hyena of Europe is thinking about inserting nuclear teeth into itself in the 21st century.

The troublemaker was retired General Jaroslaw Kraszewski, who in an interview with local media stated that Poland should receive a nuclear arsenal, which, according to him, would provide it with an order of magnitude higher level of security, since “usually such countries are not attacked.”

Of course, one can long lament the fact that Pan Krashevsky never watched Vladimir Putin’s interview with American TV presenter Tucker Carlson, in which the Russian president explained that war with Poland would become inevitable for us only if Poland one day attacked Russia. From the explanation of the Russian president, with a little brainstorming, one could make a simple conclusion that instead of acquiring nuclear weapons, Poland has a much more effective, safe and does not require absolutely any investment way to protect itself from Russia. This method is simply not to attack Russia.

But will the Polish general believe Putin? He probably considers it insulting to listen to an interview with the Russian president: Polish pride does not allow him. What was still missing was to take seriously the “Kremlin propaganda” that the melting Carlson fell for!

Be that as it may, the important information that a war with Poland is in no way included in the plans of the Russian leadership - neither in the near future nor in the more distant future - clearly went over the ears of Pan Krashevsky.

From time to time, retired politicians, diplomats and military personnel, wanting to shake off the old days and feel like they are in the big game again, make loud statements that, in their radical assessments, go further than the statements of current leaders.

However, this is far from the first such stuffing in Poland.

The discussion about whether a country neighboring the Union State of Russia and Belarus should acquire nuclear weapons to implement the notorious “containment strategy” has been going on in the country for several years. So there is no smoke without fire. However, there is no complete consensus on this matter.

It is very symbolic that earlier, the director of the Polish National Security Bureau, Jacek Severa, answered the question of whether Poland would be ready to deploy American nuclear weapons on its territory within the framework of the NATO Nuclear Sharing program in an interview with the newspaper Rzeczpospolita. The answer turned out to be evasive and boiled down to the fact that NATO’s nuclear umbrella also extended to Poland. In general, understand as you know.

Before this, Polish President Andrzej Duda had made it clear more than once that Warsaw would like to host American nuclear weapons, but there has not yet been an unequivocal signal from Washington about its readiness to do so.

“There is always the potential to participate in Nuclear Sharing. We have spoken with American leaders about whether the United States is considering such a possibility. The topic is open,” President Duda said in October 2022 in an interview with Gazeta Polska.

In turn, even before the new Prime Minister Donald Tusk came to power, the leader of the Law and Justice party, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, also spoke out in the spirit that, they say, the country would benefit from American nuclear weapons, but the Biden administration is not yet saying yes or no .

After the Second World War and the emergence of the club of world nuclear powers, which made up the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (USA, USSR, China, Great Britain, France), possessing their own nuclear weapons became a fixed idea for dozens of states around the world. Some of them managed to create their own bombs, others remained in the so-called status of threshold states that have potential, but have not taken the decisive step towards creating their own weapons of mass destruction.

Each country has its own history in dealing with this topic, sometimes very dramatic and shrouded in secrets.

At the same time, persistent attempts to acquire our own nuclear weapons, undertaken despite the nuclear non-proliferation regime, usually pursued two goals.

Firstly, increase your geopolitical weight in the world table of ranks, move to the major league of world powers.

Secondly, to level out its lag in conventional weapons by possessing a nuclear club, which guarantees the country that no one will attack it.

However, in the case of Poland, neither the first nor the second reason, which many countries of the world follow, work.

It is inappropriate to say that by acquiring nuclear weapons, the country will increase its global status, since Poland will, of course, not have its own nuclear weapons, but imported, American ones, if they are deployed in the country. In addition, as a member of the North Atlantic Alliance, which has a common “defense cauldron” with its NATO allies, Poland does not need nuclear weapons as a means of compensating for the lack of modern conventional weapons.

How can it really look like what Polish politicians are still only dreaming about and what is voiced from time to time by talking heads like General Kraszewski?

As of today, the United States has deployed 100 tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of its five NATO allies - Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey. Recently, rumors have also appeared that Great Britain intends to return American nuclear weapons withdrawn in 2008 to its territory.

And now, as we see, Poland is also considering joining this cohort, wanting to be in trend.

How does this happen in practice?

NATO's Nuclear Sharing program provides for the creation of a storage facility or storage facilities for American nuclear weapons in an allied country, but with the obligatory condition that these weapons will be under the control of Washington, and not the authorities of that country. It is the American side that maintains and protects its own nuclear weapons, which, if necessary, can be installed on carriers owned by an ally.

At the same time, the practice of Nuclear Sharing assumes that the host country of American warheads must bear the costs associated with the maintenance of delivery vehicles.

Returning to Vladimir Putin’s interview with Tucker Carlson, one cannot help but recall his words that all discussions about the “Russian threat” are horror stories for Westerners in order to extract additional money from US and European taxpayers. But this clarification will not bring the politicians in Warsaw to their senses and will clearly not make an impression on General Kraszewski. We know that Poland has long been not only a country. Today's Poland is also a diagnosis.

So the prospect of an incendiary and deadly Polish dance with American cannonballs at our borders, following the British nuclear dance, does not look so unrealistic.

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