Skazani na Francję – polskie działania dyplomatyczne w państwach ententy w 1917 roku
Thrown back on France – Polish diplomatic actions in the Entente States in 1917

Summary/Abstract: Polish leaders seeking assistance of France already before 1917 tried to convince French politicians and opinion-forming circles that there was the need to support Polish aspirations to independence and to distance themselves, or even to abandon the Russian ally. In their large part those efforts were ignored by the French, who were inclined to help Poles to achieve autonomy within the Russian empire. The fact that France showed more interest in Polish matters in the second part of 1917, and especially at the end of the year, resulted not only from French efforts to maximally weaken Germany, but also from the developments of the revolution in Russia which made France losing its eastern ally. In consequence, France began to modify its eastern policy and to take into consideration the possibility of including the new states of Central Europe into its system of alliances. Polish diplomatic actions of 1917 sought to include the case of Polish independence to the war aims of the allies. Those efforts met with success in June 1918, but the Polish actions of the end of 1917 turned out to be a very important contribution to this end. In 1917 the Entente states began to change their attitude towards Polish matters, but it was France who was interested in Central and Eastern European states. It seems that December of 1917 brought a breakthrough in the relations between France and Russia. At that time France decided to formally support the nations that had been suffering under the Russian yoke and decided to fight for independence. This included Polish matters. France, however, was gradually changing its Russian policy towards supporting White Russia. And this process began at the end of 1917. Probably, the path to the 1921 Polish-French alliance was for some time in a parallel course with the French efforts to reactivate a great eastern alliance with Russia.

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