Limited CP Victory - Politics and politicians in the Kingdom of Poland

[Karelian]

Pretext:

This thread is a part of my upcoming TL and Hearts of Iron 3-modding project about a world where PODs at the beginning of the century lead into a scenario where WW1 was considerably more limited, mostly central European affair with Eastern Front being the main battlefield. Major combatants where German and Austro-Hungarian Empires against the French Republic, Russian Empire and Serbia. The outcome - a revolution followed by armistice in Russia and a British-brokered peace treaty with France had left the nominally victorious but badly exhausted and bloodied German Empire in control of their northern client state, Kingdom of Finland, the Baltic provinces and the new kingdom of Lithuania.

The proclaimed Kingdom of Poland was another case. Austria-Hungary (that did considerably better military than in OTL) had occupied larger parts of Russian Poland than in OTL, and was in reliably good negotiation position when the status of former Russian Poland and surrounding territories was being decided amidst the postwar chaos in Eastern Europe.

So, what would actually happen next? For starters I find the German chances to actually implement the Polish Border Strip plans to be too unrealistic to succeed considering their volatile domestic situation after a long and bitter war. On the other hand, Karl I of Austria-Hungary is most likely still interested in the prospect of an Austro-Polish solution - but he has even more trouble at home, even though I'd say that without the OTL defeats of the k.u.k. Armee the Hapsburg realm is going to limp through the postwar chaos, even though the need for reforms keeps growing as years go by.

And what about the Poles themselves? Which politicians and political forces would rule the domestic politics of the new Kingdom by mid-1930s?

 

[BlondieBC]

You have to decide who is calling the shots in Poland. Germany or A-H.

If we assume A-H and that A-H is not falling apart at the end of the war, we get the Hapsburg family who will be acceptable to the Poles. The Poles will get the Krakow area from A-H, but not Poland. With Russia still strong (White victory?), the Poles will fear the Russians and stay in the the German/A-H sphere of influence. It looks like you stopped near the Bug River, so the demographics are good for Poland (not so many other types of Slavs as OTL). Generally stable.

You should get Jewish outward migration, since even in a CP win, the Poles will resent the Jews helping the Germans demetalize Poland and otherwise strip for supplies. Ludendorff books is good on the subject. I think you may also see some Polish in migrations replacing the leaving urban Jews, replacing the leaving Russians/other slavs and replacing the war losses. The longer the war, the greater this effect will be.

If we go with the German in control, it will be uglier. You are right the border strip will not fly unless you have German slide into permanent military dictatorship. With the Polish Party and the Catholic party it is a non starter. However, the military probably does something stupid to make long-term relations harder to manage. In my TL, I give one take which is two small pointless border annexations near Vistula and Grodno done by the Prussian parliament to bypass the German parliament. The Kaiser/military will likely try some stupid stunt before handing over control back to the civilian government - stripping assets, taking private title to land, kaiser taking all the Russian noble estates and giving to senior officers, speeches to demean and enrage the poles, etc.

IOTL, the initial attempt to form a Polish army failed. The Kaiser will put a catholic German King on the throne or try a personal union. This will go over badly and require German troops to enforce. The only saving grace will be if the Germans leave, the Poles know the Russians return. We probably end up with some type of client state of Germany with limited autonomy and lots of German/Polish friction. It will be stable until the next war starts, when the Poles will try to improve their situation. I guess the best example would be an Ireland after WW1 where the UK tried to hold by force. So think perhaps Northern Ireland of OTL. A part of the UK, but very easy to accidently provoke violence. It is stable as long as the German Reichstag is will to fund the occupation troops, which of course will have some other name.

 

[Alex Richards]

Actually, it would be worse than Northern Ireland. Far worse.

Up to the troubles you had a small (about 20-30% across Ulster, with majorities in places such as Newry and most of Tyrone) nationalist minority wanting union with Ireland, but participating in democratic elections, while the unionist majority was content. The Police was very biased towards unionists, but also made up pretty much entirely of locals, the army had minimal involvement and people spoke the same language and had a lot more in common culturally with London than in this situation.

Here we have either a Polish Kingdom under, in all likelyhood, Archduke Charles-Stephen of Austria (he actually spoke Polish so if Emperor Karl abandons his plans for a Polish union he's the logical choice) where the Poles are well treated but the German minority has a seperate school system and are given a few other perks, or we have a Poland under effective German Military occupation.

Nothing is going to make the Poles think better of the Russians more than the sight of Germans marching down the streets of Warsaw. While we'll probably have a small minority actually being violent, the general public will be ambevilent to hostile towards the Germans. Poland basically becomes Northern Ireland of the 70s from the off, and is likely to get worse if control is too tight.

 

[yourworstnightmare]

In any CP victory scenario Poland would mean headache. For the Central Powers there just isn't a good Polish solution. A Kingdom of Poland under a Habsburg would probably be in serious negotiations over Galizia. Would the Poles be satisfied? Perhaps the nobility would be that, somewhat... but the question of the Poles living outside the Polish borders would come up, and if the CP installed king want any credibility in Poland, he need to raise these questions. And Germany would not be amused.

 

[Clandango]

The northern Ssnip had been moved by the Russians to Lithuanian authority and I imaging hat the Germans wanted to annex it as well. The Junkers would also want at least a sliver a hundred miles wides near Pos so it could be depopulated, allowing them to isolate their own Polish population from agitation and keep them as cheap labour.

 

[Karelian]

Thanks for all the replies so far

If we assume A-H and that A-H is not falling apart at the end of the war, we get the Hapsburg family who will be acceptable to the Poles. The Poles will get the Krakow area from A-H, but not Poland. With Russia still strong (White victory?), the Poles will fear the Russians and stay in the the German/A-H sphere of influence. It looks like you stopped near the Bug River, so the demographics are good for Poland (not so many other types of Slavs as OTL). Generally stable.

Austria-Hungary sounds good for my modding purposes then, I'll go with a TL where their initial offensive from Galicia captured most of Polish territories, while German forces focused on Lithuania and Baltic coast. And as for Russia, it is a democratic republic led by Duma where Social-Revolutionaries have reigned supreme since the first post-revolution elections together with their RSDLP allies. So basically a single revolution was followed by a truce with Germany and Austria-Hungary, after which the country suffered from a (much shorter and less messy than in OTL) Civil War with reactionary generals and their White armies against reformed Interim Government (SRs and their allies).

In any CP victory scenario Poland would mean headache. For the Central Powers there just isn't a good Polish solution. A Kingdom of Poland under a Habsburg would probably be in serious negotiations over Galizia. Would the Poles be satisfied? Perhaps the nobility would be that, somewhat... but the question of the Poles living outside the Polish borders would come up, and if the CP installed king want any credibility in Poland, he need to raise these questions. And Germany would not be amused.

All true - and while it's a tragedy for people living in this TL, it's good material for my mod.

Here we have either a Polish Kingdom under, in all likelyhood, Archduke Charles-Stephen of Austria (he actually spoke Polish so if Emperor Karl abandons his plans for a Polish union he's the logical choice) where the Poles are well treated but the German minority has a seperate school system and are given a few other perks, or we have a Poland under effective German Military occupation.

Yeah, Karl has too much on his plate already to be bothered with Poland if he can get his cousin to the throne instead. With more reasonable German leadership and much stronger Hapsburg negotiation position this might actually be somewhat feasible, as long as the Polish military remains under German control.

The northern Ssnip had been moved by the Russians to Lithuanian authority and I imaging hat the Germans wanted to annex it as well. The Junkers would also want at least a sliver a hundred miles wides near Pos so it could be depopulated, allowing them to isolate their own Polish population from agitation and keep them as cheap labour.

They surely wanted to, but I don't think they'd be in a position to do so.
There's interesting discussion about this topic here:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=234697

 

[Faeelin]

I wonder how much support even a Habsburg king would have. OTL German attempts to recruit a Polish Legion failed spectacularly because the Germans pretty much looted the country and it was clear Poland would be a puppet state.

It depends on Germany, but even German liberals thought Poland's (and Eastern Europe in general) natural role was to provide raw materials (and maybe labor. But not too much labor; don't want them to steal our jobs and women) for Germany. So, maybe some sort of one way common market. Lots of German control of industry.

This Poland is a lot more ethnically homogeneous than OTL's, too. Hrm.

 

[Clandango]

Thanks for all the replies so far
They surely wanted to, but I don't think they'd be in a position to do so.
There's interesting discussion about this topic here:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=234697

Indeed. No doubt they would still want snips along the border though and deport the population. Depends on who they are trying to appease as they often seemed to want to give Polish territory to their neighbors. Then again Poland often ruled over vast amounts of non-Poles.

 

[Karelian]

I wonder how much support even a Habsburg king would have. OTL German attempts to recruit a Polish Legion failed spectacularly because the Germans pretty much looted the country and it was clear Poland would be a puppet state.

I think it is the same story than with the rest of Hapsburg realms - their rule would be tolerated, at least for the time being, since direct German rule would be even worse.

And the war ended nearly 20 years ago, the Kingdom is the only Poland the new generation has ever known. As grim as it sounds, even culturally autonomous puppet state would be somewhat of an improvement over the last days of oppressed Kraj Nadwiślański and the last prewar Russification measures. And the Austrian partition was in many ways the least worst place for Poles and Polish culture before the war.

It depends on Germany, but even German liberals thought Poland's (and Eastern Europe in general) natural role was to provide raw materials (and maybe labor. But not too much labor; don't want them to steal our jobs and women) for Germany. So, maybe some sort of one way common market. Lots of German control of industry.

Which is why I'd like to see much stronger Austrian influence to balance things out - they'd want their share of Polish raw materials as well, after all. And this in turn would create a nice source of friction between the former allies, allowing Poles a limited possibility to play Berlin and Vienna against one another.

And just as Poles have grumpily accepted the current status quo and close ties with Vienna, the Hapsburgs are steadily getting more and more distracted with their internal situation while German demands to have more say in Polish affairs are getting louder...

This Poland is a lot more ethnically homogeneous than OTL's, too. Hrm.

And it has nice minorities to worry after behind every border.

 

[BlondieBC]

I wonder how much support even a Habsburg king would have. OTL German attempts to recruit a Polish Legion failed spectacularly because the Germans pretty much looted the country and it was clear Poland would be a puppet state.

It depends on Germany, but even German liberals thought Poland's (and Eastern Europe in general) natural role was to provide raw materials (and maybe labor. But not too much labor; don't want them to steal our jobs and women) for Germany. So, maybe some sort of one way common market. Lots of German control of industry.

This Poland is a lot more ethnically homogeneous than OTL's, too. Hrm.

Pretty good. The Hapsburg Crown Prince fought with Poles through 1920, and suffered years of Gestapo torture instead sign a statement he was a German heritage. His mother was a Polish Noble, so was his wife. He had been raised in the Polish culture since childhood. His father started the process, and is acceptable.

It is important to not put too much hindsight into TL. The Poles were divided on who was best to ally with early in the war. It ebbed and flowed with who was winning. The Germans did have a massacre of one town and Russia burned 2 million buildings to the ground and the food crops. Germany did loot the company after the burning using Jews. The Belgium example is better know and similar except for the using Jews part. Germany did massive infrastructure (RR and canal) projects and worked to improve food production. It is a mixed bag with no pure good, no pure evil. Much of how Poles feel now related to post 1918 activities and the majority to post 1938 activities. In an ATL, these disappear.

At least for the first few decades after WW1, Europe has a labor shortage. Roughly speaking 1/6 of working age men were killed, 1/6 were wounded. All countries will need additional labor, and this is why I think we will see net Polish immigration to Poland. And we see outflows of Jews due to helping Germans loot the country. And we see an outflow of other Slavs during the war as Russia retreats. Many will not return, especially if not Polish.

Germany did plan a common market. Germany did plan to own much of the industry, probably saying it was reparations from Russia. The new Hapsburg leaders will try to protect Poland, and they will have some successes.

The largest variable is Russia. If Russia insists on maintaining a claim to its old Polish lands, this will drive Poland to become more German over time. If Russia is smarter and renounces its claims to Poland and the Poles believe this, then issues like Posen and German minorities in Poland will become a lot more important.

 

[Karelian]

Now, the Polish domestic politics and society in general. Hapsburg rule would IMO mean that old landed nobility would retain more power than in OTL, while the position of Church would also be central as a unifying force. Polish right-wing nationalism will also have plenty of targets to choose from since the rump state in the middle of Greater Poland would have population-based claims to all directions. I really need to study war-era Polish politics in greater detail before stating anything above these vague outlines.

And the Russo-Polish relations are an interesting question as well:
The Poles will mostly remember the Russians from their earlier oppression campaigns and from the scorched earth tactics of war years - on the other hand the legacy of Soviet invasion of Poland won't be there to haunt their relations on this TL. Meanwhile Russian society and foreign policy in this TL is strongly shaped by the agrarian populist ideals of their most influential political force, the Social-Revolutionaries, and their eagerness to export their political model abroad are much lower than OTL Bolshevik views of an inevitable world revolution.

RSDLP and their hardliner factions (many OTL Bolsheviks are in this bunch) alongside with Bund are different cases, though. Even though they don't control the resources and foreign policy of the Russian state, they are still able to offer limited support to their Polish comrades, along with a place where to operate and spread propaganda from.