German-Polish relations at an all time low

German-Polish relations at an all time low

When Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and their two cabinets meet in Berlin for intergovernmental consultations on Monday, the intention is that talks will focus above all on present-day problems and future solutions, especially in relation to Russia’s war in Ukraine, NATO’s eastern flank, migration, security and infrastructure.

But the heavy burden of the past will be the ever-present elephant in the room.

The right-wing conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, which ruled Poland from 2015 to 2023, put reparations for damage caused by Nazi Germany’s occupation of Poland during World War II right at the heart of its policies toward Germany.

In 2022, Poland’s PiS-led government demanded war reparations from Germany to the tune of 6.2 trillion Zloty (approximately €1.5 trillion or $1.7 trillion). 

Nawrocki renewed war reparations demands

Although PiS lost the parliamentary election in October 2023 and had to make way for a coalition led by Donald Tusk, its candidate, Karol Nawrocki, won the presidential election in early summer.

He also said that the future of the partnership between Poland and Germany depended on a solution to this question. President Nawrocki repeated these demands during his inaugural visit to Berlin just over two weeks later. 

A humanitarian gesture is needed

Although the pro-European center-left government led by Donald Tusk shares the German view that legally speaking, the question of war reparations is closed, both Warsaw and Berlin are very aware that without a humanitarian gesture to surviving Polish victims of German aggression during World War II, there can be no breakthrough in German-Polish relations.

Before the last round of German-Polish intergovernmental consultations in July 2024, the media reported that the German government had offered €200 million in support for approximately 60,000 surviving Polish victims — an offer Warsaw rejected as insufficient.

Since then, there has been no solution in sight.

“A breakthrough requires a gesture of compensation that, while not finally drawing a line under the past, would be positively received by Poland, or at least Poland’s ruling coalition,” said Piotr Buras, head of the Warsaw office of the European Council on Foreign Relations.

Hopes of a reboot quickly dashed

Any hopes of a fresh start in German-Polish relations after Friedrich Merz and his party won the German general election in February were quickly dashed.

While Merz kept his electoral promise to visit both Paris and Warsaw straight after his appointment as chancellor on May 7, and Tusk spoke of a “new opening” in German-Polish relations, the positive mood quickly dissipated with Germany’s unilateral decision to introduce checks on its border with Poland.

When German police began turning back irregular migrants at the border, the pressure on Tusk grew, forcing him to introduce border checks on the Polish side, too.

These checks continue to make life difficult for many commuters, businesses and carriers on both sides of the border.

‘Tusk is a German agent’

The right wing in Poland views Germany as its main opponent and never misses an opportunity to criticise its western neighbour.

Shots fired as PiS’s eurosceptic leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski has decried Donald Tusk in the Polish parliament as a “German agent.”

Kaczynski sees the European Union — which he says is dominated by Germany — as the greatest threat to Poland’s sovereignty. “The Germans want to take away our state,” he told a party conference in October. 

Years of Germany-bashing have left a mark on Polish society. The German-Polish Barometer, a survey of Poles and Germans that has been conducted at regular intervals since 2000, shows that Polish attitudes to Germans have hit an all-time low. 

In the most recent survey, just a third of Poles expressed a positive attitude toward Germans, while those who expressed a dislike of Germans stood at 25% — the highest level in years. 

Driving ‘with the handbrake on’

The anti-German atmosphere in Poland severely restricts Tusk’s room to maneuver when it comes to his policy toward Germany.

He avoids bilateral projects with Berlin, seeks broader international formats and gives preference to other partners, including the countries of northern Europe and the Baltic Sea region.

German political scientist Kai-Olaf Lang says that in its policy toward Berlin, Poland is driving “with the handbrake on.”

What are the prospects for a security partnership?

Experts say that a security partnership — a logical consequence of the war in Ukraine — is the project most likely to revive German-Polish cooperation.

There are already positive examples of such cooperation. Two German patriot air defense systems will be in operation in eastern Poland until December. They are protecting Jasionka airbase near Rzeszow, which serves as a hub for arms transfers to Ukraine.

German fighter jets are also involved in monitoring Polish airspace. A Polish advisor who asked to remain anonymous told DW that Poland has an interest in Germany’s military, the Bundeswehr, growing stronger.

What progress can be expected?

As the Polish daily newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza reported on Monday, both governments are expected to undertake to work together on the production of drones and long-range missiles.

It also reported, however, that negotiators on both sides did not find a solution to the issue of compensation for Polish war victims.  

According to the ONET news website, Germany will return to Poland the archive of the Teutonic Order, a set of 73 documents that were looted by the German occupiers in Warsaw during World War II.

The artifacts to be returned will also include a fourteenth-century sculpture of the head of St. James the Elder, which was stolen from Malbork castle, the order’s former headquarters in northern Poland, after the war.

Warsaw has long demanded the return of countless cultural assets that were looted by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland.  

New self-confidence

The Polish government will arrive in Berlin on Monday with a new self-confidence that stems above all from Poland’s economic success and its role as a frontline state.

The old balance of power — where Germany was seen as the teacher and Poland the apprentice — is a thing of the past, a Polish advisor told EU News, adding that the success of Monday’s intergovernmental consultations hinges on whether the Germans understand this.