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Józef Beck | |
|---|---|
 Beck before 1939 | |
| Minister of Foreign Affairs | |
| In office 2 November 1932 – 30 September 1939 | |
| President | Ignacy Mościcki |
| Prime Minister | Aleksander Prystor Janusz Jędrzejewicz Leon Kozłowski Walery Sławek Marian Kościałkowski Felicjan Sławoj Składkowski |
| Preceded by | August Zaleski |
| Succeeded by | August Zaleski |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1894-10-04)4 October 1894 |
| Died | 5 June 1944(1944-06-05) (aged 49) |
| Signature |  |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |
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| Branch/service |  Polish Legions Polish Army |
| Years of service |
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| Rank |
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| Battles/wars | |
Józef Beck (Polish:[ˈjuzɛvˈbɛk]ⓘ; 4 October 1894 – 5 June 1944) was a Polish statesman who served theSecond Republic of Poland as a diplomat and military officer. A close associate ofJózef Piłsudski, Beck is most famous for being Polish foreign minister in the 1930s and for largely setting Polish foreign policy.[1]
He tried to fulfill Piłsudski's dream of making Poland the leader of a regional coalition, but he was widely disliked and distrusted by other governments.[2][3] He was involved in territorial disputes withLithuania andCzechoslovakia. With his nation caught between two large hostile powers (Germany and theSoviet Union), Beck sometimes pursued accommodation with them and sometimes defied them. He attempted to take advantage of their mutual antagonism but then formed an alliance with theUnited Kingdom andFrance. Both declared war on Germany after its invasion of Poland in 1939. After the Soviet Union alsoinvaded Poland, Beck and the rest of his government evacuated toRomania.
Beck was born into aCalvinist (Protestant) family whose forebears had emigrated fromFlanders to Poland in the 16th century, during the rule of Polish KingStephen Báthory. WhenWorld War I started, Beck was a student at a college of engineering.[4] After the outbreak of the war, Beck was a member of the clandestinePolish Military Organization (Polska Organizacja Wojskowa, orPOW), founded in October 1914 by Piłsudski. Joining in 1914[5] Beck served until 1917 in the First Brigade of thePolish Legions and was an aide to Piłsudski. When the brigade was interned, Beck escaped.
After Poland had regained its independence, Beck was assigned as a commander of an artillery battery and assigned to the General Staff. Beck served as militaryattaché to France between 1922 and 1923.[5] The French disliked Beck to the point of spreading lies about him, such that he was a Soviet agent.[2] He helped to carry out theMay 1926 military coup d'état, which brought Piłsudski tode facto governmental power.[2]
In 1926–1930, Beck served as chief of staff to Poland'sMinister of Military Affairs, and in 1930–1932, he served as Vice Prime Minister and Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs.[2] Groomed by Piłsudski to implement Poland'sforeign policy, he in 1932 took office asMinister of Foreign Affairs,[4][5][6] a post that he would hold until the outbreak ofWorld War II.[7]
Beck had been dealt a weak hand. The historianDavid G. Williamson argues that Poland with 35 million people had a large population but a thin industrial base. Furthermore, its army of 283,000 men was ill-equipped, short of artillery and poorly trained and relied heavily on cavalry because it lacked enough mechanisation.[8] Finally it faced long borders with two powerful dictatorships, Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Soviet Union. HistorianRichard Overy wrote that of all the new states in Europe:
Poland was almost certainly the most disliked and her Foreign Minister the most distrusted. Poland's pursuit of an independent line left her bereft of any close friends by the end of 1938.... The Western powers saw Poland as a greedy revisionist power, illiberal, anti-Semitic, pro-German; Beck was a 'menace', arrogant and treacherous.[3]
In his international diplomacy, Beck sought to maintain a fine balance in Poland's relations with its two powerful neighbours. In July 1932, he concluded theSoviet–Polish Non-Aggression Pact and, in January 1934, theGerman–Polish declaration of non-aggression.[6][9]
Beck complained that while Poland and Czechoslovakia were legally bound by treaty to respect the rights of their respective German minorities, the Polish minorities in Germany and the Soviet Union were not so protected.[10] In addition, Beck resented that countries, such as Germany, used theMinorities Treaty to exert pressure and become involved in the internal affairs of Poland.[11] In September 1934, Beck renounced the Minorities Treaty after the Soviet Union had been admitted to theLeague of Nations.[12]
After Piłsudski's death in May 1935, a power-sharing agreement was entered into by the various Piłsudskiite factions, led by General (later Marshal)Edward Rydz-Śmigły, PresidentIgnacy Mościcki and Beck himself. The three individuals effectively dominated theSanation government and collectively ruled Poland until the outbreak of the Second World War. Beck had a more-or-less free hand in formulating Poland's foreign policy.[6] The stability of the ruling group was weakened because of personal conflicts, and none of the three men managed to assert his dominance in the late 1930s completely. Theoligarchy from 1935 to 1939 is often described by historians as a "dictatorship without a dictator".
Beck was hostile to theLeague of Nations and did not think it could help Poland.[citation needed] France wanted some arrangement with Poland but distrusted Beck and so he looked in new directions.[13] He explored the possibility of realising Piłsudski's concept ofMiędzymorze ("Between-seas"), a federation of central and eastern European countries stretching from theBaltic Sea to theBlack Sea, indeed in later variants from theArctic Ocean to theMediterranean. Such a coalition between Germany in the west and the Soviet Union in the east might have been strong enough to deter both from military intervention. Beck realised that for the immediate future there was no realistic chance of building such a force and so he was prepared to settle in 1937–1938 for a diplomatic bloc referred to as a "Third Europe", led by Poland, which might become the nucleus of aMiędzymorze federation. Beck's "Third Europe" diplomatic concept comprised a bloc made up of Poland,Italy,Yugoslavia,Hungary andRomania.[14]
His efforts failed for several reasons:[15]
From 1935 to 1939, Beck supported German claims against Czechoslovakia by citing purported mistreatment of Polish minorities in Czechoslovakia. In January 1938, he demanded publicly that the Poles living in Czechoslovakia be granted the rights enjoyed by the Germans.[16] In 1937, Beck had also begun a diplomatic offensive in favour of Slovak independence.[17] He supported Hitler's position in theMunich agreement in 1938. Within days, Poland invaded and seizedTeschen, an industrial district of Czechoslovakia with 240,000 people, where ethnic Poles formed only 35%.[17][18]
In 1937, Hitler continued to assure Beck that Germany had no claims onDanzig,[19] but at the start of 1939, Hitler changed his earlier position and now laid claim to Danzig, adding that military force would not be used.[20]
Beck played a decisive role in early 1939 by staunchly refusing Hitler's demands to subordinate Poland and to turn it into a Germanpuppet state. Hitler demanded for Poland to give away strategic territories to Germany and to join theAnti-Comintern Pact, which was directed against theSoviet Union. Beck rejected Hitler's demands for annexation of thePolish Corridor, which would have cut off Polish access to the sea and its main trade route, effectively making the Polish economy dependent on Germany. He also rejected demands for an extraterritorial rail and highway corridor that was to run toEast Prussia and the Free City of Danzig, in exchange for vague promises regarding trade and annexation of territories inhabited by Ukrainians and Belarusians in the Soviet Union after a future war. While Hitler had been planning to annex Polish territory for several years, he finally decided to go ahead with his plans for war by early September 1939.[21][22]
Beck was surprised whenBritain, looking for a pretext to confront Germany, announced at the end of March 1939 that it would defend Poland from German attack.[citation needed]France also offered its support, but both countries knew there was very little they could do if Germany invaded Poland.[vague][23]
In April 1939, Beck was in London to negotiate the terms of theAnglo-Polish alliance.[24] Beck famously voiced his refusal of German demands in a speech on 5 May 1939:[25]
Peace is a precious and a desirable thing. Our generation, bloodied in wars, certainly deserves peace. But peace, like almost all things of this world, has its price, a high but a measurable one. We in Poland do not know the concept of peace at any price. There is only one thing in the lives of men, nations and countries that is without price. That thing is honor.
Similarly, Beck refused a request from the Soviets to allow Soviet forces to enter the country, which was made during talks in which the Polish side did not take part. A third proposal soon followed, once again elaborated by Britain, which promised support to the Polish government if the country's borders were endangered. This time around, Beck accepted it.[26][27] According toJoseph E. Davies, the Polish government underestimated German military power.[28]
As a result, Hitler's diplomatic efforts shifted to the Soviet Union and secured the German-Soviet alliance in August 1939. Known as theMolotov–Ribbentrop Pact, it secured Soviet support in a war, a heavy flow of Soviet food and oil and an agreement to partition Poland and the Baltic states. By now, many observers realised that war between Germany and Poland had become imminent.[29]
Following the invasion of Poland by Germany on 1 September 1939, the start ofWorld War II, Beck called on Poland's allies, France and Britain, to enter the war to support Poland. In spite of the agreement between them, France and Britain did little to help Poland directly, though both declared war two days after the German invasion.[30]
After the Soviet Union attacked Poland from the east on 17 September 1939, Beck withdrew toRomania, together with the rest of thePolish government.[4] In Romania, he was interned by the authorities at a hotel inBrașov. It was there that he wrote a volume of memoirs,Ostatni raport (Final Report).
Melchior Wańkowicz, a popular Polish journalist, met Beck in the autumn of 1939 during his internment in Romania. This is how he described the meeting:[31]
Beck was locked in a golden cage of a luxurious hotel in Brașov, where he and his entourage occupied one floor. He was closely guarded: whenever he went out, hordes of Allied, German and Romanian agents followed him (...) I met him at 5 in the afternoon, and our conversation continued until almost two in the morning, with a dinner break. Beck emphasized achievements of the last month of his post: a military treaty with England, Hungarian refusal to let German troops pass through their territory,droit de residence anddroit de passage, granted by Romanian government. Beck believes in a solid coalition, and that we would sit at a negotiating table as partners, while Czechs would remain outside. He does not care about the fact thatLloyd George stated that Poland did not deserve help as a reactionary country. He is not bothered by the fact thatLord Halifax wants to recreate theCurzon Line. Instead, he points out that when British king gave a speech on the radio, only English, French and Polish anthems were played (...) Since I cannot tolerate this kind of wishful thinking, I ask him whether he had ever seriously considered German attack. He keeps saying that he had met Hitler several times, that Hitler backs out of discussions, that he can easily be talked into different things, that he was influenced by von Ribbentrop.
Beck died inSingureni, Romania,[32] on 5 June 1944, after developingtuberculosis.[33] Beck was survived by his sonAndrzej Beck, who was active in the Polish community in the United States until his death in 2011.[34]
In May 1991, Beck's remains were repatriated to Poland and interred at Warsaw'sPowązki Military Cemetery.
