Military aspects in Polish-Czechoslovak confederation plans during World War II

Janusz Zuziak
2020 Scientific Journal of the Military University of Land Forces  
The defeat of Poland in September 1939 prompted General Władysław Sikorski, appointed Commander-in-Chief and Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland, to take steps to implement his earlier concept of a close relationship between Poland and Czechoslovakia. The aim of the project undertaken in Sikorski's talks with Edward Beneš was to create a strong entity capable of countering the German and Soviet threats in the future. The implementation of such a plan, assuming the future expansion of the
more » ... ion to include other countries in the region, would provide a real opportunity to change the then geopolitical system in Central and Eastern Europe. The Sikorski-Beneš talks took place from the autumn of 1939 to the spring of 1943, when the Czechoslovak side adopted the pro-Soviet option in its policy and, in practice, withdrew from joint preparatory work to establish the Confederation Union. One of the main areas taken up during the Polish-Czechoslovak talks was the issue of shared defense policy. It is most broadly presented in two documents: in the Principles of the Constitutional Act of the Polish-Czechoslovak Confederation prepared by the Polish side and in the Czechoslovak Basic Principles of the Czechoslovak-Polish Confederation.
doi:10.5604/01.3001.0014.5876 fatcat:dzfsfl2ainbntpaar2cwfd2oqa