War of Ideas

Abstract

Polish exiles with federalist sympathies did not doubt that their aspirations for a united Europe were shared by their compatriots at home. If their assumption was correct, then the decision of the first post- Communist government in Poland in 1989 to apply for an association with the European Communities and ultimately to become a member of the European Union (EU) is readily explicable. On the other hand, compulsory membership in the Soviet-dominated Council of Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA or COMECON), and the absence of real independence under the aegis of the Kremlin, could conceivably have led to an outburst of national feeling once the communist rulers were toppled. In those circumstances would Poland have wished to circumscribe its newly achieved independence by joining another association of states, one based in Brussels rather than Moscow? On occasion the exiles showed themselves to be aware of this possibility and used what influence they had, through their journals and through conversations with visitors from their homelands, to avoid this outcome. While continuing to guard against what they considered to be a remote possibility, the exiles remained convinced that their compatriots were in tune with their own views about the desirability of a federal or confederal Europe. Sceptics might argue that confident claims to be representative were self-serving, rested on no hard evidence, and were designed to increase the exiles’ standing in western forums, adding that the exiles’ many journals were read mainly by members of the exile communities, not by the people behind the Iron Curtain.