MR CHURCHILL’S HOPES NOT REALIZED

Southland Times, Issue 25549, 18 December 1944, Page 5

MR CHURCHILL’S HOPES NOT REALIZED

NO AGREEMENT ON FRONTIERS OF POLAND (United Press Association—Telegraph Copyright) (Rec. 7 p.m.) . LONDON, December 16. An important statement on. the Polish question has been made in the House of Commons by Mr Churchill. “The hopes I thought it proper —indeed necessary—to express last October have failed,” he said. “When M. Mikolajczyk left Moscow my hope-was that he would return under a week or so with the authority of the Polish Government in London to .agree about the Polish frontier on the basis of the Curzon Line and its prolongation southward. “I had several times drawn M. Mikolajczyk’s attention to the dangers of delay. Had he been able to return after the most friendly conversations between him and M. Stalin and also the conversations he had with members of the Lublin National Liberation Committee with the assent of his colleagues, I believe the difficulties inherent in the formation of the Polish Government in harmony * with the Lublin Committee might well have been overcome.

“In that case he would at present be at the head of the Polish Government, on Polish soil recognized by all the United Nations and awaiting the advance of the Russian Army moving further into Poland as the country is delivered from the Germans. “M. Mikolajczyk was also assured of the friendship and friendly help of M. Stalin. M. Mikolajczyk and his colleagues are more qualified than .any other Polish leaders to fill the place of General Sikorski. The Poles after M. Mikolajczyk’s return from Moscow utterly failed to obtain agreement. The Polish Government was almost entirely reconstructed in a form which in some respects I am certainly unable to applaud. “Already I imagine the prospect of reconciliation between the Polish Government and the Lublin Committee has definitely receded, though they might perhaps advance again were M. Mikolajczyk able to speak with authority for the fortunes of the Polish nation.” “It is a source of grievance to me that all these forces could not have been joined together more speedily against the common foe. I cannot accept the view that the arrangements which are proposed about the frontier for the new Poland are not solid and satisfactory or would not give the Poles an abiding home. If those areas around Lwow and the surrounding regions southward known as the Curzon Line ‘A’ were joined to the Ukraine, Poland would gain in the north the whole of East Prussia west and south of Konigsberg, including the great port. of Danzig. Poland would gain this instead of the threatening artificial corridor built so laboriously after the last war. Poland would stretch freely along the Baltic on a front of more than 200 miles. Poland is free so far as Britain and Russia are concerned to extend westward at the expense of Germany. I cannot believe such, an offer could be rejected by Poland.” COMPENSATION OF POLAND Mr Churchill stated that the territorial compensation of Poland would, of course, have to be accompanied by the disentanglement of the populations in the west and south. The transference of several millions of people would have to be effected from east to west or the north, and the total expulsion of the Germans from the area to be I gained by Poland. Expulsion was the method which would be most satisfactory and lasting. There would be no mixture of population 'to cause endless trouble, as in Alsace-Lorraine. A clear sweep would be made. He was not alarmed by the prospect of the disentanglement of population nor by transference, which was more possible now than ever before through modern conditions. The disentanglement of populations between Greece and Turkey after the last war was successful and had produced splendid relations between those countries which had lasted ever since. It solved problems which had been the cause ot wars and rumours of wars. Nor did he see why there should not be room in Germany for the population of East Prussia and other territories. Sir or seven million Germans had been killed in this frightful war, into which they did not hesitate to plunge all Europe and the world. Another 10,000,000 or 12,000,000 prisoners or foreigners were used as slaves in Germany now, and he hoped they would be restored to their own homelands. Many more Germans would be killed in the fighting which would occupy the spring and summer and would involve the fiercest and largest battles of this war. CHANGE IN SITUATION Mr Churchill recalled that when these questions were first foreshadowed by him the British and American armies had not landed on the Continent, nor had the Russians advanced to the Vistula. The Poles in those days might have had some reason to ask where the Allies would have the power to deliver territory to Poland, but the situation had changed vastly. It seemed extremely unlikely that the evil, dreadful forces in Germany who began the war would have the power to resist the decision of the' conference at which the principal victorious Powers would be assembled. He had no doubt that the great Powers, if they agreed, could effect these transferences of population. Mr Churchill explained that he had been in great difficulty because the attitude of the United States had not been defined with the precision which the British Government had reached, but that had not altered his determination to speak in terms which he thought it his duty, with the assent of his colleagues, to use in addressing the House.

“We know, however, that the Government and people of the United States have set their hearts on a world organization to prevent the outbreak of future wars,” he said. “This world organization would be fatally ruptured by a quarrel between any of the three most powerful empires which compose the grand alliance of the United Nations. The President is aware of everything that has passed and what is in the mind of both the Russian and British Governments. The President had his Ambassador in Moscow, Mr Averill Harriman, in the capacity of observer and he was present at all, or nearly all our discussions.” RUSSIAN CLAIM SUPPORTED FRONTIERS ALONG CURZON LINE (8.0.W.) RUGBY, December 16. The justice of Russia’s claim to eastern frontiers along the Curzon Line was emphasized by Mr Churchill in his statement on the Polish question. He said: “Russian armies will probably in the next few months traverse large areas of Poland, driving the Germans before them. If fierce fighting breaks out between large sections of the Polish population and Russian troops, very great suffering, which still can be avoided, will inevitably occur and new and poisonous wounds inflicted on those who must dwell side by side in i

peace, confidence and good neighbourliness. “The Atlantic Charter asserts that there shall be no changes before the peace table except changes mutually agreed upon. It is in the profound future interest of the Polish nation that they should reach an agreement with the Soviet Union about their disputed frontier before the march of the Russian armies through the main’part of Poland takes place. “I must therefore say, speaking on behalf of the British Government in a way which will probably be held binding by our successors, that at the conference we shall adhere to 'the line I am now unfolding and I do not hesitate to proclaim that the Russians should be justly and rightly treated in being granted the claim they make to eastern frontiers along the Curzon Line.” REPERCUSSIONS IN AMERICA CRITICISM - OF U.S. GOVERNMENT (Rec. 7 p.m.) NEW YORK, Dec. 16. Among the many repercussions after Mr Churchill’s speech was a revival of the agitation for the establishment of a political joint chief of staff and a political combined chiefs of staff, states the Washington correspondent of The Herald Tribune. He pointed out that such organizations would iron out many of the most troublesome political problems before reaching the explosive state where they get out of hand and lead a public controversy. The New York Times in an editorial says: “There is certainly nothing sacred and unalterable about the existing Polish-Russian frontier. The most troublesome aspects of the situation is not the frontier question, but the Russians’ unwillingness to permit the question to be dealt with by the principal United Nations. Regretting this unwillingness, we still agree with Mr Churchill that no dispute can be permitted to arise between the principal Powers, endangering their unity in the great, unfinished task lying ahead. However, it is disappointing to have news of this kind announced solely from London and not froni Washington, and have our Government portrayed in a matter of such great importance as an inactive, ineffective bystander on the sidelines.” WASHINGTON TAKEN . BY SURPRISE Mr Churchill’s Statement On Polish Question (Rec. 7 p.m.) WASHINGTON, Dec. 16. The United States Under-Secretary of State, Mr Edward R. Stettinius, at a Press conference today promised* a frank statement soon on American policy towards British and Russian moves in Europe. Mr Stettinius declined to comment on Mr Churchill’s speech because, he said, he had not had time to analyse it. He added that the whole Polish question was tied up with Mr Churchill’s speech. The Associated Press of America says I that Mr Churchill’s statement caught Washington by surprise Senator Robert A. Taft, Republican (Ohio), said: “It looks like the end of the Atlantic Charter and the return to power and politics.” Senator Claude Pepper, Democrat (Florida), a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said: “These decisions on affairs which often prove to be a source of war cannot be settled by two nations. They should be settled by the United Nations with decent respect for the opinion of mankind in general. Any other settlement flies right into the face of the proposed world security organization.” ADVERSE EFFECT ON ALLIED UNITY “Big Issues In Balance” (Rec. 7 p.m.) LONDON, December 16. “It became clear as Mr Churchill spoke in the House of Commons that what we suspected for a long time is the case—the United Nations have drifted a long way from that fine accord they reached at Teheran,” says The Daily Mail in an editorial. “The Polish question is symptomatic of the state of affairs which is a direct result of that drift. We are still waiting to know where the United States stands in its relations to Poland, and that i* only one of the many big issues in the balance. “To allow the present drift to continue would be something akin to the betrayal of millions of fighting men of all the United Nations whose unity in action against the common enemy should be paralleled by equal unity around the council table. There has been an unfortunate tendency, in the excitement of the recent political upheavals to overlook the common enemy —Germany—which those fighting men can never ignore.”