Chapter 574: The Russian-Polish Conflict
Chapter 561: Russian-Polish Conflict
The election for the Polish throne was just around the corner, and the Polish republicans, who were not willing to lose their power in this way, started their own actions.
Warsaw, the prime minister’s residence within the Dombrowski called a meeting of the top of the republican faction. If anyone pays attention and observes, they will realize that the people attending the meeting are mostly government officials, while there are only a few military generals.
There was no way around it. The Polish independence movement was, after all, a success spawned by outside forces, and the military personnel leading the uprising were almost all trained by the Great Powers, with limited forces truly belonging to the revolutionary party.
If only this is not a big deal, the revolutionaries have established a legitimate government, and it is not a big problem to bring these people together.
Unfortunately, the Polish government was heavily influenced by French ideas and took it for granted that the military should be at the disposal of the government, and the military was given a very low status in the government’s power structure.
In times of peace this is of course fine, the army does not interfere in politics, as is the case in normal countries. The tragedy is that Poland is not a normal country, and although it is independent, the threat of war is always present.
In this case, the best option is for the country to revolve around the army and do its best to develop it, e.g.: the Kingdom of Prussia, next door, is a good example to learn from.
Obviously, the low-eyed revolutionaries didn’t think that much, and got carried away once they were in power.
In the view of the government’s top brass, the army, full of backgrounds of the Great Powers, was unreliable, and it was taken for granted that they would have to replace all the military top brass with their own people.
The military is a place that honors the strong, and without a proven track record, how can it gain the support of everyone?
The Polish government’s approach was naturally met with resistance from the military, and relations between the two sides got very bad. No one bought the top generals appointed by the government, and many times they were hollowed out.
This kind of behavior was seen by the Polish government as a sign of warlordization, and for this reason the government also began to create a new army based on the Revolutionary Party’s armed forces, which was completely at its disposal.
The army was a gold swallowing beast, and the creation of a new army naturally crowded out the military expenditures of the original forces, which undoubtedly exacerbated the conflict between the two sides.
Since the government was so obnoxious, of course they had to get rid of them. It so happened that at this time the Prussians extended an olive branch, and the two sides hit it off under the impetus of interests, and many people in the Polish army just fell to the Kingdom of Prussia.
Prime Minister Dombrowski: “Gentlemen, the current situation in the country is very bad, the king’s election is next month, if we don’t take action, the great Poland will be annexed by Prussia.
What ideas you all have, now speak freely. Today we must find a way out for Poland, and we must never let the ambitions of the Prussians succeed.”
The Berlin government’s desire to annex Poland could not be kept secret at all, and any secret was no longer a secret as long as there were more people involved.
All these years the Polish government has been struggling to get rid of Prussian influence. It’s just that they didn’t have enough means, and many times they made a mess of things.
Foreign Minister W. V. Vulubrevskiy: “The Foreign Ministry has been in contact with the European countries, and the current situation is not very optimistic.
Napoleon III has just died, France is still in the process of handing over power, and now the government in Paris is engaged in a war without smoke. There is no problem in supporting us diplomatically, direct military intervention is unlikely.
The diplomatic oops that came out not long ago, we offended Austria severely. The Vienna government does not want to see Prussia annex Poland, and likewise does not want to see us continue to dominate Poland.
If the Prussians are willing to spend a lot of money, there is a chance that both France and Austria will be neutralized. The only good news is that the British will support us; they don’t want to see continued annexation of the continent.”
There is no mention of the remaining countries, and that’s because none of the others have the strength to interfere. The Russian Empire, which had the strength to intervene, favored everyone as enemies.
As politicians don’t care about teaming up with the enemy, but the political consequences need to be considered as well. The political repercussions of hooking up with the Russians were too bad for them to afford. Even the likelihood of the Tsarist government intervening and helping would be even greater.
Finance Minister Badlevsky: “The support of the British may not be useful, the sea is their world, but the European continent is not their turn to make decisions.
Unless one of France and Austria also support us, if the Prussians force their hand, we will not be able to resist.
Knowing that the group of warlords in the country have long been hooked up with them, we will lose badly once we use force.”
The Kingdom of Poland’s home base is not thick, after so many years of hard work, the army of the Republican line is only two infantry divisions and one cavalry division, occupying 30% of the total Polish army.
After a few moments of hesitant effort, Prime Minister Dąbrowski made a decision, “Then let William I not be elected; as long as the elected king is someone else, the Prussian plan cannot continue.
I don’t believe that the Prussians will dare to send troops to annex us directly, and it is impossible for any European country to be indifferent to such a thing.
Especially those small countries, if they don’t want to be annexed one day, they must support us at this time. One family or two may be inconspicuous, but if they all join together, the Prussians will be overwhelmed.”
Finance Minister Badlevsky shook his head, “Your Excellency the Prime Minister, this is difficult to do. Wilhelm I has a very high approval rating in parliament, far more than his rivals.
Even if we support the others, we will not be able to gain an advantage in the election. Unless extraordinary means are used to interfere with this election.
Except that the consequences of doing so would also be severe, and after this precedent is set, the future democratic process in Poland will be greatly affected, and we will be nailed to the pillar of historical shame.”
Prime Minister Dąbrowski sighed, “Alas! The situation is difficult, and it’s too late to care about that much now. The most important thing right now is to preserve Poland first, the democratic process is a matter for the future.
Poland’s independence is not easy, this is the result of the sacrifices of countless comrades, we absolutely can not let the current achievements be destroyed.
Compared to the big picture, our personal honor or disgrace is not important, I believe that history will give a fair evaluation.”
This was the best option to stop the Prussians from annexing Poland, and as long as the king wasn’t Wilhelm I, the Coalition of Monarchs couldn’t go ahead.
In the legalistic world of Europe, anyone who broke the rules had to pay for it, and Prussia was not yet strong enough to ignore them.
Prime Minister Dombrowski already had some regrets, if he had known that the situation would develop to the present situation, he should have elected the king when the Kingdom of Poland was first established.
At that time, the governments were against the election of William I. It was entirely possible to hold the election after excluding him. If there had been a king of Poland, there would not have been so much trouble.
Power moves people, and with a king the prime minister can’t be so monolithic. Dombrowski did not resist the Prussian temptation to take for granted that he could manage the situation.
In a way, the original decision was not necessarily wrong. Just because Prussia couldn’t annex Poland doesn’t mean that Prussia couldn’t team up with someone else to divide it up.
If the Kingdom of Poland had fought for itself and worked hard to develop its national strength and demonstrated a certain amount of power right after independence, then the Berlin government would still need them as an ally and there wouldn’t have been so much shit going on.
But in reality, Poland has been infighting since independence. The Polish government, which had no experience in governing, made policies as a matter of course, resulting in a series of jokes.
It can be seen from the economic development, since the independence of the Kingdom of Poland, it has always carried out post-war recovery, and so far it has not recovered to the pre-war level, and certain regions have also experienced negative economic growth.
Industry was even more of a joke, as Poland inherited a portion of Russian industry during its independence. After these industries fell into the hands of the Polish government, not only did not move forward, but was tossed to death.
The economy was failing and the military was floundering. The domestic army was artificially divided into two, each other is also very hostile, the battlefield does not stab each other in the back, that are patriotic fervor.
Against this background, the Kingdom of Poland was simply not qualified to be Prussia’s ally. Wanting to consolidate its strength and win the next war, the Berlin government had no choice but to play Poland’s attention.
The final result was nothing but a question of partition, or annexation. In short, the Polish tragedy was doomed from the beginning, and the incompetence of the government led to the present disaster.
The room fell silent, and the breathing and heartbeats of the crowd could be faintly heard, the atmosphere was tense.
“His Excellency the Prime Minister, something big is wrong.”
A voice came from outside the door, pulling the crowd out of their contemplation.
Prime Minister Dombrovsky glared at the visitor in dissatisfaction, how could a meeting place be trespassed, it was too unruly.
He had already made a note in his mind that if it wasn’t a big deal, he would have to teach this unruly fellow a good lesson, “Speak, the sky hasn’t fallen yet.”
The young man nervously replied, “Yesterday afternoon, our defenders in the Kiev area and the Russians had a fierce clash, and a gunfight broke out, causing eight deaths and twelve injuries to our side.”
After saying this, he hurriedly handed the telegram to Prime Minister Dombrovsky.
Russian-Polish border clashes occur from time to time, but the deaths are still rare, usually the two sides will restrain each other, usually a fight is even finished, and rarely use guns.
The telegram only described the causes and consequences of the conflict, there is no other description, Prime Minister Dombrovsky’s face immediately gloomy.
House leakage, this time the outbreak of the Russian-Polish conflict, this is definitely not a good thing for the Polish government, a poorly handled they will have to roll.
Put the telegram tends to table on one side, Dongbrovsky prime minister angrily a slap on the table, angrily said: “Simply too deceitful, is the Russians so anxious to provoke a war!”
The others also circulated the telegram one after another, and everyone realized the seriousness of the problem. This conflict was entirely premeditated and planned by the Russians.
(End of chapter)