It’s impossible for any objective observer nowadays to deny the sudden downturn in Polish-Ukrainian relations since late July after Zelensky’s senior advisor Mikhail Podolyak just predicted that their ties will be characterized by reinvigorated competition after the NATO-Russian proxy war ends. Here’s what TASS reported that he told his country’s Dom TV channel over the weekend, which leaves no doubt that the recent grain dispute poisoned their partnership:
“Poland is the closest partner and friend we have these days. And, generally, it will remain this way until the end of the war. After it’s over, of course, we will have a competitive relationship, of course, we will compete for various markets, consumers, and so on. And, of course, we will clearly adopt pro-Ukrainian positions, protect these interests, fiercely defend them.”
This sequence of events was set into motion after Poland declared that it’ll continue banning the import of Ukrainian grain upon the expiry of the European Commission’s (EC) temporary agreement in mid-September. After that, Kiev complained, Warsaw said that it should appreciate Polish support, each side summoned the other’s ambassadors, their leaders tweeted about this spat, and then the Polish Deputy Foreign Minister said that reconciliation is impossible till Ukraine recognizes the Volhynia genocide.
The underlying issue is that these countries have contradictory national interests on sensitive issues like agricultural cooperation and historical memory but entered into a “marriage of convenience” since the start of Russia’s special operation in Ukraine. Poland immediately rushed to Ukraine’s aid with the aim of restoring its long-lost regional hegemony, though it hid these intentions from Kiev by not attaching any clear strings to its support, which it said was given solely out of “solidarity”.
At the same time, Poland began to slyly take control of Western Ukraine through the means explained in the preceding hyperlinked analysis, which was done with Kiev’s tacit approval since it naively thought that this would facilitate their plans for creating a de facto confederation with privileged rights for Ukraine. The reality is that Poland wanted to remain the “senior partner” exactly as it’s historically been during those times when Warsaw controlled large swathes of what’s currently Ukrainian territory.
This hegemonic motivation accounts for why Warsaw unilaterally banned most of its “junior partner’s” agricultural products earlier this spring and just reaffirmed that it’ll keep this policy in place after the EC’s temporary agreement expires next month. Kiev hitherto never expected that this would happen, which is why it was caught off guard and furiously complained, though to no avail. By the time Poland flexed its national interests at Ukraine’s expense, it was too late for the latter to do anything tangible about it.
Nevertheless, Ukraine is a proud country just like Poland is, which is why it eventually escalated this spat by summoning its neighbor’s ambassador to chastise him for publicly declaring that their country should be more grateful. It was already humiliating enough to them that Poland removed all prior ambiguity about it being the “senior partner” in their de facto confederation via its unilateral ban, but painting all Ukrainians as ungrateful was unacceptable from their perspective and prompted a sharp riposte.
Poland was as surprised by this unexpected display of sovereignty as Ukraine was by Poland temporarily banning most of its agricultural products a few months back, which is why Prime Minister Morawiecki condemned the summoning of his country’s ambassador by Kiev. In his tweet, he explicitly referenced Polish national interests when writing that “We will always defend Poland’s good name, its security, and the interest of no other country will ever prevail over the interest of the Republic of Poland.”
This in turn established the precedent for Podolyak to flex Ukraine’s own national interests in his earlier cited prediction, which was also partially influenced by the Polish Deputy Foreign Minister bringing up the World War II-era genocide of Poles in Volhynia. About that, Poland could probably have coerced significant concessions from Kiev on this issue at the beginning of Russia’s special operation and the resultant start of its “marriage of convenience” with Ukraine had it attached related strings to its aid.
By declining to do so in order to keep up the pretense of “solidarity” and thus disguise its regional hegemonic intentions while slyly taking control of Western Ukraine, Warsaw missed an unprecedented opportunity to settle this issue on its terms. Just like it’s now too late for Ukraine to do anything tangible about Poland flexing its national interests at Kiev’s expense on agricultural issues, it’s too late for Poland to do anything tangible about Kiev flexing its national interests on historical memory over Volhynia.
As was previously written, the underlying issue between Poland and Ukraine is that they have contradictory national interests on sensitive issues, which is natural for any pair of partners but is becoming problematic for those two right now since they were each operating under false assumptions. Poland thought that Ukraine would agree to being its “junior partner” out of gratitude while Ukraine didn’t expect Poland to openly act as a hegemon after slamming Russia for allegedly behaving this way.
Each took for granted that the other would concede on their respective national interests to an extent in pursuit of what they thought their leaders had agreed was the so-called “greater good” of accelerating their de facto confederation plans. This assumption had no chance of materializing after nationalism exploded in their societies since February 2022 and its variant of “negative nationalism”, or basing one’s identity on what they are not, began to stoke mutual suspicions of the other’s intentions with time.
Had NATO’s proxy war on Russia and associated sanctions swiftly led to that targeted Great Power’s collapse as planned, then the aforesaid trends probably wouldn’t have infected their societies to the point of derailing their mutual plans. Instead, this campaign decisively failed and led to the protracted conflict that’s largely characterized by the “race of logistics”/“war of attrition” that Russia is winning, thus exacerbating nationalist trends and catalyzing the current Polish-Ukrainian diplomatic crisis.
Seeing as how both sides are now officially prioritizing their national interests, and recalling that these are contradictory on sensitive issues like agricultural cooperation and historical memory, the future of their relations doesn’t look as rosy as before. In hindsight, positive impressions of their partnership were really just an illusion since Poland wants hegemony over Ukraine while Ukraine wants privileges from Poland, hence why they’re now fiercely competing over whose envisaged post-conflict model will prevail.
