Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950, Central and Eastern Europe; The Soviet Union, Volume IV

611.48/11–2750

Department of State Policy Statement ¹

secret

[ Washington ,] November 27, 1950.

Poland

a. objectives

The long-range objective of US policy toward Poland is its liberation from Soviet-Communist control and the establishment of conditions of peace and international security permitting the Polish people an independent national existence, so that they may freely create a genuinely democratic state, order their internal affairs and determine relations with other states without fear of external interference. An immediate aim is to keep the Polish people aware of US policy and strength, as well as our continuing concern for their welfare and future in order that the spirit of the non-Communist masses may be sustained under the present oppressive burdens of the police state. Recognizing the importance of having observers on the ground at this critical time, we seek to maintain a diplomatic mission in Poland in spite of increasing harassments unless the regime makes it intolerable from every standpoint to remain.

It is the purpose of our economic policy, in cooperation with the states of western Europe, wherever feasible to prevent the Polish economy from contributing to Soviet military potential, although allowing at the same time for a certain amount of trade development between Poland and western Europe on a selective basis calculated to benefit the economy of the ERP countries.

b. policies

Poland at present is effectively controlled by the USSR through the United Polish Workers’ Party (PZPR), the presence of Soviet troops on Polish soil and the appointment of Soviet agents headed by Marshal Konstantin K. Rokossovsky, to key positions in the Government, Party, and armed forces.² Poland is becoming progressively incorporated as a de facto component into the Soviet empire and Warsaw is being gradually converted from the capital of a sovereign state to a pro-consular, administrative center. Our policy toward Poland is therefore viewed more and more as an aspect of US relations with the Soviet bloc as a whole.

The majority of Poles are anti-Communist, fearful of the USSR and friendly toward the US. Most of them hope for ultimate US intervention to help Poland regain independence. Numerous elements would require but little encouragement to take rash action against the regime. We are contantly endeavoring, by whatever means practicable, to demonstrate our sympathy for the Polish people and at the same time to register the disapproval of the free world for the methods and practices of the Soviet-dominated police regime. Efforts are made to help strengthen hope and to keep alive the spirit of independence and devotion to freedom but to avoid at this time stimulating overt resistance, which would be costly and futile.

We attempt to encourage nationalist opposition to Soviet domination, and, if possible, disaffection toward Moscow even within the Polish Government itself. There is evidence of such disaffection not only among the Socialists, whose long-established party was forcibly absorbed by the Communists in 1948, but also within the Communist leadership and ranks, where a sizable element distrusts Soviet tutelage.

We consider that one of the strongest remaining forces opposed to Sovietization is the Roman Catholic Church, which embraces 95 percent of the 24 million Poles. To date the Government has harried the clergy unremittingly by means of an adroit propaganda impugning their patriotism and political attitude, but has postponed a frontal attack on the church. Meanwhile the hierarchy, forced onto the defensive, is pursuing a circumspect course to preserve the existing privileges of religion, particularly in the education of youth. To this end, on April 14, 1950, it signed for tactical reasons a compromise with the Government, promising nominal support of the program of national reconstruction and opposition to “anti-State” activities. The result was a slight easing for the time being of state pressure against the church. The many-sided struggle for the allegiance of youth goes forward, however, and if Soviet domination of Poland is prolonged there may be real danger that the younger generation’s understanding of and spiritual ties with the West, traditionally perpetuated in large measure by the church, will be destroyed. Although Embassy contacts with the Polish clergy have been reduced to a minimum, our policy is to assist the efforts of the church in whatever way feasible to maintain opposition to Communism.

The influence of Polish émigrés on political attitudes in the homeland, which declined with the end of the war, has been still further reduced as a result of disagreements among the exiled leaders. Polish émigrés are presently split into the following principal groups: (1) the “London Government”; (2) the Polish Political Council, formed in London on December 4, 1949; and (3) the Polish National Democratic Committee, formed by Mikolajczyk in Washington on May 2, 1950.³ The two latter groups, like the National Committees generally, work in close relationship with the National Committee for a Free Europe. We look with favor upon any efforts of the three groups to unite; not, however, as a government in exile, but rather as a representative center of Polish thought and action abroad, capable of encouraging democratic resistance in Poland and otherwise carrying on the struggle from abroad to restore freedom and independence in the homeland.

An important part of US policy is the attempt to counteract in the broad sense the constant and violent anti-US propaganda to which their government-monopolized press, radio, and film exposes the Poles. Perhaps our best means is the Voice of America, which has a large Polish audience. Supplementing this is our Polish language Wireless Bulletin, which, though limited in circulation, is sufficiently effective to provoke the Polish Government to recurrent criticism and interference in its distribution.⁴ Our policy through these media is to make available to the Poles information about important world developments so as to offset the distortion and exclusion of such news by their own Government; and, by treatment of the actual situation within Poland, to let the Polish people know the consequences of developments there and our interest in and concern for their hardships under Soviet domination.

A special problem in our relations with both the present regime and the Polish people arises from US policy toward Germany. Poland’s deep-seated fear of Germany, due to past German aggressions and the recent war-time occupation, makes Poles tend to fear that the US, in its preoccupation with Soviet aggressiveness, may permit the reemergence of a militaristic and eastward-expanding Germany at whose hands Poland would be first to suffer. Communist propaganda incessantly and skillfully exploits this fear.

The problem is particularly complicated by the Polish-German frontier question. The US agreed at Yalta to support a revision of Germany’s eastern frontiers in favor of Poland,⁵ and in the Potsdam Agreement we consented to the provisional establishment of the Oder-Neisse Line, placing a large part of eastern Germany under Polish administration and providing for the orderly transfer of its German inhabitants, pending final delimitation of the border at the peace settlement.⁶ Subsequently, however, we have emphasized our view of the tentative character of this arrangement. The US view was put forward by Secretary Byrnes at Stuttgart in 1946⁷ and was reaffirmed and further clarified by Secretary Marshall’s statement, during the 1947 meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers in Moscow, that the needs of both the Polish and the German people and of Europe as a whole should be taken into consideration in finally establishing the boundary.⁸

This US position disturbs the Poles, since almost all of them, irrespective of politics, strongly favor the permanent annexation of the former German territories up to the Oder-Neisse Line. The same view is held by the majority of the Polish emigrés and several million Americans of Polish descent. Among the major powers, the USSR alone supports the Polish position on this question; but the suspicion is widespread within Poland that the Kremlin would not hesitate to shift the border in Germany’s favor if this would further Soviet aims in Germany. For the time being, however, Communist propaganda in Poland is exploiting to the utmost the ostensibly definitive Soviet guarantee of Poland’s “Recovered Territories”, which was reaffirmed on July 6, 1950, through an agreement between Poland and the Soviet-controlled government of eastern Germany, purporting to “finalize” the Oder-Neisse Line as the permanent frontier between the two states.⁹ The regime also, of course, takes every propaganda advantage of US policy on this question.

The Polish Government exercises almost exclusive control over the economy of Poland which is steadily being shaped on the Soviet model to serve the long-range objectives developed by the Kremlin for the Soviet-satellite area.

In these circumstances our economic policy toward Poland is designed to support major US foreign policy objectives in Europe, particularly the limitation of eastern Europe’s war potential and the recovery and development of the economies of western Europe. Thus in applying to Poland the export controls introduced in March 1948, our objectives are to prevent the export of goods to Poland that would markedly strengthen Polish or Soviet military potential, and at the same time to assure the supplies of commodities required by ERP countries. It is borne in mind that Poland is an important producer of coal and essential foodstuffs, and its exports of these products are economically beneficial to countries of western Europe. We therefore favor the expansion of trade between Poland and western Europe on a selective basis but seek the voluntary agreement of western European countries, for security reasons, to maintain export restrictions similar to ours. This facet of our economic policy towards Poland reflects our basic policy on east-west trade, under which the United States favors expansion of this trade insofar as it serves to improve the relative economic advantages of western Europe over countries in the Soviet bloc.¹⁰

Since the lifting of controls on the export of technology shortly after the war, there have been no restrictions by the United States on the export of technical data, other than information classified by the US Government, to Poland or elsewhere. While the Department of Commerce has established a voluntary procedure by which exporters can obtain an opinion of that Department on the desirability of exporting information, such voluntary controls have limited value, and consideration is currently being given to mandatory controls on the more important types of data. The objective of the United States is to prevent the acquisition by Poland or other Soviet-dominated areas of technical data which would increase their war potential.

In 1942 and again in 1946, we sought and received assurances from the Polish Government that it would not adopt measures prejudicial to the objectives of the proposed Charter for an International Trade Organization. Since then, Polish representatives have attended the United Nations Conferences on Trade and Employment at Geneva as observers and at Havana as delegates; however, Poland did not sign the Havana Charter for an ITO. Moreover, Poland’s recent actions in withdrawing from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the International Monetary Fund and the Food and Agricultural Organization, charging that these organizations were instruments of US policy, indicate that Poland is slavishly following the Soviet Union in its hostile attitude toward international agencies which are not considered to serve Soviet purposes.¹¹

Poland’s foreign trade is conducted almost entirely within the framework of bilateral quota and clearing agreements, which appear to discriminate in favor of eastern Europe. There is little likelihood that Poland will abandon this policy, particularly in view of the growing integration of the Polish economy with that of the Soviet bloc. While present indications are that Poland does intend to maintain commercial relations with the west, it appears certain that only those relations will be fostered which promote the attainment of self-sufficiency in the Soviet bloc and increase its military-economic potential.

The 1931 Treaty, of Friendship, Commerce and Consular Rights between Poland and the US¹² provides for, among other things, most favored nation treatment with respect to imports from and exports to both nations. In connection with restriction of exports from the US under our March 1948 export regulations, Poland has charged the US with trade discrimination in violation of the principles of the UN Charter but violation of the 1931 Treaty has not yet been charged. The question of abrogating this treaty, which may be terminated upon six months’ notice, is being studied.

We continue to seek a solution of the problem of reaching a settlement with Poland on the issue of compensation to US nationals for the loss of their property through nationalization. However, obtaining settlements on this issue must be considered secondary to our major political and economic objectives, such as national security and east-west trade, under ERP. We therefore cannot yield to the Polish view that the settlement of this question depends upon favorable US action on export licenses and financial assistance.

We have not ceased to press for settlement of the Polish lend-lease account on the basis we have proposed—payment by the Polish Government of 125 million zlotys for use by the US mission in Poland in final discharge of Polish financial obligations under the Lend-Lease Agreement.¹³ Our proposal also provides for the retention of US title to lend-lease arms and implements of war and for a mutual waiver of maritime claims arising since the outbreak of the war. The Polish Government has demanded certain export licenses as a condition for concluding a lend-lease settlement which, as in the case of the nationalization agreement, we do not find acceptable as a basis for negotiations.

Polish merchant vessels are government-owned and, therefore, under present US policies receive sovereign immunity in US ports, an advantage not accorded to privately-owned merchant vessels of other nations. The Department has for several years been studying the possibilities of denying such immunity to state-owned merchant vessels engaged in regular commercial traffic but a decision has not yet been reached.

Our civil aviation policy with respect to the USSR and its satellites is (1) to prevent the sale of aircraft and associated equipment to these countries and (2) within certain limits to contain the civil air operations of the USSR and its satellites. An exchange of civil air services with a satellite state, on a reciprocal and short-term basis, would be sought by US and friendly states only if it can be clearly determined that a fully realizable balance of advantages would result. Only such minimum facilities would be agreed to as were necessary for satellite operations outside their territories, or to secure adequate facilities for non-satellite air services in satellite territories. This policy is being implemented through the cooperation of other friendly states on a “common front” basis.¹⁴

We regard Poland as a member of ICAO as a result of the ratification of the Chicago Convention¹⁵ by the Polish Government in exile in London. The present Polish Government, however, has not participated in any of the plenary sessions of ICAO and is delinquent in its dues. We have rejected offers of the present Polish Government to become a member of ICAO since in the view of both the US and ICAO Poland is already a member.

Communist ideology continues to have strong appeal to Polish labor. It is the policy of the US to dispel the myth of the unique advantages to labor under the Soviet system by bringing the facts to light, especially as regards forced labor, lack of trade union rights and personal freedom, and comparatively low wages, long hours and other burdens of workers under Soviet domination.

c. relations with other states

The USSR regards Poland as a critical security area and stations a large Red Army garrison there. Its purpose ostensibly is to safeguard lines of communication with Germany, but Soviet forces have also been used to help the Polish security forces eradicate underground resistance groups. Moscow has recently intervened to improve the political reliability of the Polish armed forces and to extend Soviet control over the regime by sending Soviet Marshal Rokossovsky to Warsaw as Minister of Defense in the Polish Government and as a member of the Politburo in the Communist Party. Under his direction the Communist program of purging and indoctrinating the officer corps has been reinvigorated, and all but one or two of the few remaining top staff and command positions have been taken out of Polish hands and filled with Soviet officers. Rokossovsky’s assumption of these various duties has been accompanied by an acceleration of the purge of nationalist elements from the Communist Party leadership and an intensified drive to nationalize small industries and collectivize farms.

In the economic sphere Moscow is transforming Poland into an industrial workshop equipped to serve long-range Soviet policy in the satellite region as a whole. A principal purpose of the Soviet-inspired six-year plan is thus to bring about the rapid industrialization of Poland in the interests of integrating Polish production with Soviet designs in Europe. A Soviet loan to Poland of $450,000,000 in 1948, supplemented by another one of $100,000,000 pledged in June 1950, provides for the supplying of a large steel mill and other industrial equipment to Poland by the USSR. There is a steady increase in the proportion of Poland’s foreign trade that goes to the USSR and the Soviet satellite area.

Poland is integrated politically with the other states of the Soviet orbit in eastern Europe (excepting Albania) by a network of mutual aid pacts, reinforced by agreements for cultural and economic collaboration. Poland’s closest satellite ties have developed with Czechoslovakia, since the communization of that country following the coup of February 1948. Under Soviet prompting, the Warsaw and Prague regimes have shelved the traditional territorial dispute over Teschen and have initiated far-reaching plans for economic collaboration, including joint development of some industrial projects in the Silesian area, and Czechoslovak use of the Oder River and port of Stettin. Agreements concluded in June 1950 by both Poland and Czechoslovakia with the Soviet-sponsored Government of Eastern Germany appear to indicate a Kremlin purpose to link the German satellite, as well, with the two western Slav states in a closer economic working unit within the larger satellite bloc.

With respect to Yugoslavia, the Polish Government has identified itself with the Cominform campaign against Tito and has denounced its mutual assistance and trade pacts with Tito’s Government. Both Governments withdrew their Ambassadors in June, 1950. Conversely, Poland has fostered closer economic relations with Albania and is making a substantial economic contribution to the latter satellite.

Ties with the Vatican, for Catholic Poland traditionally close, were formally broken by the Communist regime in September 1945, through denunciation of the Concordat of 1925. There appears at present to be little basis on which a compromise with the Holy See could be reached. The Government meanwhile has developed a propaganda campaign vilifying the Vatican in an effort to weaken the Church in Poland by discrediting its connections with international Catholicism. Particularly since the Pope’s letter to the German bishops in March 1948, the Warsaw regime has bent every effort to convince the Polish people that the Papacy is pro-German.

British relations with Poland, like those of the US, are determined in large part by UK policy toward the USSR. Like our own, the official British view of the Communist regime in Warsaw and of the tactics it has employed to liquidate political opposition has been forcefully expressed on several occasions to the Soviet Government as the third signatory of the Yalta and Potsdam Agreements, as well as to the Polish Government. In the economic field, however, the UK has offered Poland minor credits and facilities in placing Polish orders for capital goods in the UK, and in January 1949 it concluded a five year trade agreement with Poland calling for an annual exchange of goods valued at about $130,000,000.

Poland’s relations with France have steadily deteriorated from an initially friendly status at the end of the war. The proximity of both countries to Germany, and their similar sufferings under German occupation in World War II, encouraged the re-establishment of normal relations based on a certain identity of views regarding the future of the German state. However, following the elimination of the Communists from the French Government, the participation of France in the ERP, and its decisions regarding Western Germany, relations between Warsaw and Paris worsened. Poland’s request for a treaty of alliance was met by French insistence upon a proviso that mutual assistance under the treaty should become operative only after consultation with the three great powers. The Poles did not wish to subject the pact to prior US and UK approval, and the matter ended in a stalemate. Meanwhile, since 1948, Polish propaganda has increasingly treated France as a satellite of “imperialist” America; and French diplomatic representatives in Poland have borne the initial brunt of the Warsaw regime’s drive against alleged western espionage. As a result of exacerbated political relations, Franco-Polish cultural cooperation, traditionally considerable, has dwindled to insignificance. Negotiations for a renewal of the annual trade agreement between France and Poland were broken off in January 1950, but were resumed in August. The absence of an agreement during the first eight months of the year, however, resulted in a severe decline in trade between the two countries.

Germany is increasingly a focal point of Polish foreign policy. US, British and French policies in Germany are vigorously attacked as fostering German revisionism and reconstructing German military power. At the same time, relations with the Soviet occupied zone of Germany are expanding rapidly under Moscow’s pressure. The signature (June 1950) of an agreement to fix the frontier permanently at the Oder-Neisse Line has been accompanied by pacts expanding Polish trade with eastern Germany and providing for cultural and technical collaboration.

Poland has been active in UN affairs. On political issues its delegates have almost invariably voted with those of the USSR. Poland has taken the lead for the eastern European bloc in introducing the Spanish question into UN discussions and in pressing for measures hostile to the Franco regime. It has also expressed special concern in the UN about the problem of Germany. Poland is a member of the UN Special Committee on the Balkans but, like the USSR, has refused to occupy its seat. The Poles maintain a permanent resident delegation to the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) in Geneva. Up to 1949 their ECE representatives, though consistently voting with the USSR and following the Soviet lead in debate, showed a less uncompromising approach than the Soviet representatives and an apparent desire to use the ECE as one means of maintaining economic contacts with the west. These tendencies appear to be diminishing with the gradual replacement of technicians by orthodox Communists on the Polish ECE delegation. During the 1950 meeting, the Polish delegate was even more aggressive than the Soviet delegate in attacking US economic programs in western Europe and western European export control policies.¹⁶ In recent months Poland has withdrawn from the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, and the World Health Organization, charging that these agencies were dominated by the US and had discriminated against Poland. As was to be expected from a component of the Soviet empire, Poland supported without reservation the position of the USSR on the question of Chinese representation, and its delegates withdrew on this issue from the various meetings of UN organizations in which it was represented.

d. policy evaluation

US policy toward Poland, since it is an integral part of our long-range policy directed against Soviet-Communist imperialism, can hardly hope to achieve conspicuous success during the present stage of unhampered Soviet dominance in eastern Europe. Our main hope for the time being will probably have to be based, as hitherto, on the conservation to the greatest possible degree of American and western ties with the Polish people, and on supporting by all feasible means their will to be free. The strong stand of the US and the UN in the Korean crisis appears to have contributed to this end.

Our diplomatic mission in Warsaw is an important factor in encouraging the Polish people, disseminating information about the US and gathering vital intelligence. These functions have been rendered increasingly difficult since 1949 by a marked accentuation of secret police surveillance, particularly affecting the office of our Military Attaché, and by police intimidation of Embassy patrons and USIS visitors, which has restricted our contacts with Poles. Nevertheless, it is highly desirable that we avoid any situation that would necessitate the withdrawal of our mission at a time when every endeavor should be made to keep observers in this important area as long as possible. A voluntary reduction of the staff has been undertaken during 1950, of such dimensions as not to eliminate its most important functions, primarily with the aim of forestalling what appeared to be the intention of the Polish Government to force us to cut staff below the limits of efficiency.¹⁷ It is recognized, of course, that no matter what pains we take to avoid any action which might lead to a closing of the Embassy, a decision on the maintenance of diplomatic relations is essentially not ours to make. It is clear that the Communists are determined to attentuate diplomatic relations to a minimum, and with the progressive de facto absorption of Poland into the Soviet empire our Embassy in Warsaw and the Polish Embassy here increasingly tend to become little more than consular establishments. The possibility exists that our mission may eventually be forced out completely. In that case reliance for information on Polish affairs would be chiefly placed on peripheral reporting, and arrangements to cover the satellite areas by this means are now being made.

Our information activities in Poland are encountering growing opposition from the Government, which is some indication of their effectiveness. It is evident that the Polish Government regards USIS in Warsaw as one of the most undesirable sections of the Embassy and it is to be anticipated that increased efforts will be made by that Government further to restrict, if not to terminate altogether, the operations of our Information Service in Poland. In the latter event, serious attention should be given to appropriate reprisals, which, however, should be taken only as a last resort in view of the importance to US objectives of the principle of freedom of information. The termination of the USIS in Poland would leave us with the Voice of America as our only useful direct medium of contact with the Polish people. There is danger that even this contact may be partly jeopardized, since attempts at jamming our Polish language broadcasts have already begun. Nevertheless, it appears certain that a large proportion of our broadcasts will continue to reach Polish listeners, and it is therefore essential that the Voice of America be made ready now to serve in an increasingly vital capacity, by expanding the Polish language services. As a supplemental medium, Radio Free Europe, with the assistance of the National Committee for a Free Europe,¹⁸ has inaugurated Polish broadcasts which it is hoped will be effective, hard-hitting programs utilizing certain types of material not permissible to the Voice of America.

In the economic sphere our policy has produced results in that our export licensing regulations have deprived Poland of considerable United States capital equipment not readily obtainable elsewhere and required by the ambitious industrialization program of the Polish Government. On the other hand, Poland has been able to obtain certain strategic goods from western European sources, notably Switzerland and Sweden. Our policy has also resulted in stimulating indigenous production and eastern European integration, which in the long run will reduce Poland’s dependence on the west.

There are disquieting indications that we have not entirely succeeded in convincing our Polish friends, in the face of ceaseless anti-US propaganda by their Government, that our policy toward Germany takes adequate account of the ultimate interests of Poland and other smaller nations neighboring on Germany. Only the careful development of our German policy in the course of the years ahead, and our success in bringing a peaceful, prosperous Germany back into the family of western European nations, is likely to check this fear on the part of the Poles.

1. Department of State Policy Statements were concise documents summarizing the current United States policy toward a country or region, the relations of that country or region with other countries, and the issues and trends in that country or region. The Statements provided information and guidance for officers in missions abroad. The Statements were generally prepared by ad hoc working groups in the responsible geographic offices of the Department of State and were referred to appropriate diplomatic posts abroad for comment and criticism. The Statements were periodically revised.
2. Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovskiy, Marshal of the Soviet Union; from November 1949, Marshal of Poland, Polish Minister of National Defense, and member of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party.
3. Regarding the Polish émigré groups under reference here, see the memorandum of conversation by Salter, May 5, p. 347.
4. Regarding Polish Government criticism of the distribution of Wireless Bulletin items in Poland, see telegram 645, May 5, from Warsaw, p. 1031.
5. Tripartite agreements regarding Poland were included in Part VI of the Report of the Crimea Conference, February 11, 1945, Foreign Relations, 1945, The Conferences at Malta and Yalta, pp. 973–974.
6. Tripartite agreements regarding Poland were included in Part IX of the Report of the Conference of Berlin, August 2, 1945, Foreign Relations, 1945, The Conference of Berlin (Potsdam), vol. ii, pp. 1508–1509.
7. For the text of the address by Secretary of State James F. Byrnes on United States policy regarding Germany under reference here, made in Stuttgart, September 6, 1946, see A Decade of American Foreign Policy: Basic Documents, 1941–49 (S. Doc. 123, 81st Cong., 1st sess.), p. 522 or Germany 1947–49: The Story in Documents (Department of State Publication 3556), p. 3.
8. For the text of the statement by Secretary of State George C. Marshall on the Polish-German frontier, made at a Council of Foreign Ministers meeting in Moscow, April 9, 1947, see A Decade of American Foreign Policy, p. 346 or Germany 1947–49, p. 146.
9. On June 7, 1950, following discussions in Warsaw, Polish and East German representatives announced a declaration confirming the Oder-Neisse line as the definitive frontier between the two countries. The declaration was implemented by an agreement signed by Polish and East German representatives at Zgorzelec (Görlitz), Poland, on July 6, 1950. For the text of the agreement, see 319 United Nations Treaty Series 104–109 or Documents on Germany, 1944–1970 (Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, 92d Cong., 1st sess.), p. 179. On June 8, 1950, a Department of State spokesman informed the press that the United States did not recognize the Polish-East German agreement and pointed out that Germany’s eastern boundary could be finally determined only when a peace treaty was drawn up (Department of State Wireless Bulletin No. 134, June 8, 1950, p. 3). For additional documentation on the attitude of the United States with respect to the Polish-East German boundary agreement, see pp. 942 ff.
10. For documentation on United States policy with respect to trade with Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, see pp. 65 ff.
11. Poland announced its withdrawal from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and from the International Monetary Fund on March 14, 1950, from the Food and Agriculture Organization on April 25, 1950, and from the World Health Organization on August 15, 1950. In statements issued to the press on March 16 and April 27, 1950 (Department of State Bulletin, March 27, 1950, p. 497 and May 15, 1950, p. 777), the Department of State refuted Polish accusations against the IBRD, the IMF, and FAO and concluded that Polish withdrawal from those institutions was an example of Poland’s adherence to the Soviet policy of restricting contacts by Eastern European satellites with the rest of the world.
12. Signed in Washington, June 15, 1931; Department of State Treaty Series No. 862, or 48 Stat. 1507.
13. The United States proposal, renewed in a note of March 13, 1950, from the Secretary of State to the Polish Ambassador, not printed, proposed payment of $110,000 only for post V–J Day (September 2, 1945) lend-lease aid out of a total of $12.5 million worth of lend-lease assistance rendered to Poland by the United States (748.56/3–1350).
14. For documentation on United States civil aviation policy toward Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, see pp. 1 ff.
15. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) was established under the Convention on International Civil Aviation concluded in Chicago on December 7, 1944, and came into being in April 1947.
16. For a report on the 1950 meetings of the Economic Commission for Europe, see telegram 709, June 9, from Geneva, p. 143.
17. In the course of his press conference on June 7, 1950, Secretary of State Acheson stated that the United States had ordered a reduction of one-third in the American diplomatic staff in Poland. The Secretary explained that the reduction was not made as a result of any demand by the Polish Government but was carried out by the United States after a careful review of the whole situation and the determination that the staff could not perform effectively its functions and that a reduction was in order (memorandum of the Secretary of State’s Press and Radio News Conference, June 7, 1950: News Division Files).
18. For documentation on Radio Free Europe, see pp. 261 ff.