In 1794 the Polish military leader Tadeusz Kościuszko (who had earlier fought in the American War of Independence) led an uprising against the Russian Empire.
He and his fighters knew that it wasn’t just Poland’s freedom that was at stake. Had the insurgents won their battles, Russia herself and her other colonies would have had to become freer, if not exactly free. Moreover, the Damocles sword of an ever-looming Russian invasion would have stopped hanging over Europe’s head.
It was then that the Poles coined the proud slogan “For our freedom and yours”. Since then the slogan has been repeated whenever an enslaved nation rose against Russian tyranny. These days, every Russian and Pole knows it – these words are permanently emblazoned in the minds of every victim of Russia, including freedom-loving Russians.
For example, in 1968 eight dissidents unfurled that slogan in Red Square when protesting against the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. They were thrown into concentration camps, and not all of them survived. However, they heroically accepted their fate because they knew Goethe was right when saying: “Of freedom and of life he only is deserving who every day must conquer them anew.”
Poland’s history of always being partitioned, carved, re-carved, subjugated and freed, with Russia invariably involved, has made both the letter and the spirit of that noble slogan about “our freedom and yours” an essential part of the national consciousness.
That’s why the Poles are the staunchest supporters of the Ukraine’s fight against Russian fascism (this though historically the relations between the two nations can’t exactly be described as cordial). They, unlike some Western politicians one could mention, know that the Ukrainians are dying not only for their own independence but also Europe’s.
Such is the context of an appeal issued to President Trump by the founders of the Polish Solidarity union and former political prisoners of the communist regime. Amazingly, not a single British paper I read has seen fit to mention this important document (the translation is mine, so please don’t shoot – I’m doing my best):
“Dear Mr President,
“It was with concern and disgust that we watched your encounter with Vladimir Zelensky, president of the Ukraine. We regard as offensive your insistence on respect and gratitude for the material aid provided by the United States in support of the Ukraine’s struggle against Russia. Gratitude is due instead to the heroic Ukrainian soldiers spilling their blood in defence of the free world’s values.
“It is they who for over 11 years have been dying at the frontline to uphold such values and defend the independence of their nation attacked by Putin’s Russia.
“We do not understand how the leader of the country embodying the free world can fail to see this.
“Our concern was also raised by the tone of the exchange in the Oval Office that resembled the atmosphere we remember only too well from interrogations at Security Services and hearings in communist courts. Then, at the behest of the omnipotent communist political police, the prosecutors and judges would also explain to us that they held all the cards while we held none. They too demanded we cease our activities because thousands of innocent people would suffer as a consequence.
“They took away our liberties and civil rights because we refused to cooperate with the authorities and express our gratitude to them. We are shocked that this is exactly how you treated Vladimir Zelensky.
“The history of the 20th century shows that, each time the United States tried to steer clear of democratic values and her European allies, she exposed herself to danger as a result. President Wilson understood that, which is why he decided to take the United States into the First World War in 1917. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt understood that too, which is why, after the attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941, he decided that the war defending America should be waged not only in the Pacific Ocean, but also in Europe, in alliance with the countries attacked by the Third Reich.
“We remember that the collapse of the Soviet empire would have been impossible without President Reagan and America’s financial commitments. President Reagan was aware of the suffering of the millions of people enslaved in Soviet Russia and the countries she had conquered, including the people who sacrificed their liberty in defence of democratic values. Reagan’s greatness, in addition to everything else, lay in the way he unequivocally described the USSR as an “evil empire” and called for resolute resistance to it. We emerged victorious, and today a statue of Ronald Reagan stands in Warsaw, outside the US Embassy.
“Mr President, material aid – military and financial – cannot be weighed against the blood shed for the freedom and independence of the Ukraine, Europe and the entire free world. A human life is priceless, and its value cannot be measured in money. Gratitude is due to those who are sacrificing their blood for liberty. This is obvious to us, Solidarity people and former political prisoners of the communist regime in the service of Soviet Russia.
“We are calling on the United States to honour the guarantees issued together with Great Britain in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum undertaking in no uncertain terms to protect the integrity of the Ukraine’s borders in exchange for her relinquishing nuclear weapons. These guarantees are unconditional: they contain not a single word about treating such aid as an economic transaction.
[SIGNED]
“Lech Wałęsa, former political prisoner, Solidarity leader, and President of the Polish Republic, along with 37 former political prisoners in communist Poland.”
The document is hardly a masterpiece of the epistolary genre, but it says things that every decent person knows are true, a category that evidently doesn’t include Trump and his MAGA zealots.
If he were still alive, Tadeusz Kościuszko would happily sign this appeal – even though he’d know it would fall on deaf ears.
If I were anyone of significance I too would sign it.