From the WSJ Opinion Archives
AFTER THE WAR
Bush in Krakow
America and Poland: a beautiful relationship.
It was a new experience for me to be patronized by a Canadian university professor. It happened on a recent television program about Poland's forthcoming role in the stabilization of Iraq. I had already seen all the insults in the European press after our GROM commandoes helped to capture the Iraqi port of Umm Kasr: "vassals," "America's mercenaries" "America's Trojan donkey." Now this TV strategist was sneering that the Polish "mackerel" had presumed to invite a proper country like Germany to send troops to Iraq under Polish command. I wish I had had the presence of mind to ask him that if Poles are mackerel, what kind of fish best describes Canada--which has a military a third the size of the Polish armed forces?
As Poland welcomes President Bush to Krakow, Poles are proud of more than their service in Iraq. Skeptics like my Canadian friend to the contrary, peacekeeping operations happen to be something of a Polish specialty.
Over the past several decades, Polish soldiers have served on many U.N. missions--in Haiti, Sinai, Namibia, Cambodia, Lebanon, the Golan Heights and Bosnia. (We even maintained a military post in the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas for 40 years.) As deputy defense minister, I personally sent off a battalion to Croatia in 1992, and it helped to achieve success. Croatia is now a democracy and a candidate to join the European Union and NATO; its Karlovac brewery, which was on the frontline when I visited it, now sells its excellent product in the U.S.
There may be reasons for our popularity as peacekeepers. Coming from a country that has endured more than its fair share of occupation, dictatorship and poverty, Poles find it easier to establish trust with victims of conflict than soldiers from former colonial powers. Our absence of a superiority complex, our knack for improvisation and a reputation as freedom fighters also help.
In the Balkans, Polish units usually depart with expressions of gratitude from all communities, whether they're Muslim, Orthodox or Catholic. These days, Iraq-bound peacekeeping soldiers from the faraway Philippines and Fiji are said to have specifically asked to serve in the Polish sector in Iraq, partly thanks to good experiences of serving together in the past.
If things turn nasty in Iraq, Britain's experience of counterinsurgency in Ulster will be invaluable to the coalition forces there. But if things go well, the Polish way of gaining hearts and minds may prove more useful.
Poland's political conduct during the diplomatic debates over postwar Iraq has also been astute. The chances that Germany would change tack and send troops were never high. But Poland's diplomacy has helped to internationalize the mission: The Polish presence encourages countries that did not take part in the fighting to contribute to the occupation force. Muslim countries that would find it awkward to send troops under U.S. or British command may find serving in the Polish sector more palatable. Most importantly, by helping to get NATO members to agree to use the alliance's assets to plan the layout of our sector, Poland gave France and Germany a face-saving chance to soften their opposition to the U.S. operation in Iraq.
So there are many reasons why President Bush is dropping in on Krakow during his first trip to continental Europe since September 11. The Polish press is also expecting Mr. Bush to thank Poland for helping to smuggle CIA personnel out of Baghdad during the first Gulf War in 1991, and for representing U.S. diplomatic interests in the country for the past decade, at considerable risk to our diplomats.
Above all, though, the visit to Krakow is not only about Poland, but about Europe. The war in Iraq has spawned a new correlation of forces and new alliances. It marks the end of the post-Cold War period in which, to use a Marxist phrase, the "superstructure" of Cold War institutions, procedures and mentalities persisted, despite the disappearance of the "base," the Soviet threat.
One such institution, which developed under the umbrella of American protection during the Cold War, was the European Union. Poland certainly hopes to join this grouping, where 70% of its exports go, and which can help it modernize its dilapidated infrastructure. On the other hand, ever since our allies left us to fight Hitler alone in 1939, we have been skeptical of European security guarantees. While we integrate with the EU, we want to base our security on the alliance with the U.S.
Poland, like other Central European countries, would therefore like the EU to continue to develop in harmony with the U.S. Joining NATO (to which most EU members belong) was supposed to be the end of our geopolitical dilemmas--not the beginning of new ones. The new democracies want to be both good Europeans and good Atlanticists. They will resist any attempts by the EU's central powers, France and Germany, to coax them into an anti-American project--particularly if it implies a preference for Mr. Putin's increasingly authoritarian Russia over the United States.
Poles believe that with wise statesmanship, Europe can acquire greater influence not by opposing the U.S., but by cooperating with America in endeavors that are in Europe's best interest, such as the democratization of the Arab world. If Europe's political coherence and military forces were to grow in harmony with America's strategic aims, we could restore the West's sense of common mission.
Unusual as it may seem, this vision is shared by Poles of most political parties and ideologies. There is enough here, in short, to merit talk of a closer alliance between Poland and the U.S.
We know our army is a fraction the size of the American one, but then so is everybody else's. We know our economy is still recovering from half a century of communism. But it isn't economic support that the U.S. needs. Poland shares America's values, Poland shares America's geopolitical goals. With the Polish air force soon to fly F-16s, and some U.S. military bases moving East, cooperation over Iraq may prove to have been the beginning of, as they say in the movies, a beautiful relationship.
Mr. Sikorski, Poland's former deputy minister for defense and for foreign affairs, is executive director of the American Enterprise Institute's New Atlantic Initiative, www.aei.org/nai.
