WI The Poles win win decisively in the 1920 Russo-Polish War?

They start looking for powerful friends because Moscow wants that back.

That kind of victory would very likely end up being a vfery bad thing for all concerned. First of all, a Polish client state in Ukraine is not likely going to be a happy place. Especially not if the Polish government decided these were all stolen lands subject to repolonisation, but even the bog-standard identity politics and anti-Communist repersssion that are bound to follow will make it painful. A lot of the people who favoured an independent Ukraine were left-wing, a lot of the people who were right-wing fdelt Russian. It'l be a clusterfuck.

Poland just does not have the resources for empirebuilding. They will not treat Ukraine like a food bank with an overdraft, but that's not going to count in their favour. They will require it to pay a large share of its defense, which will overtax the country.

Germany has beef with Poland and this will just bring Berlin and Moscow even closer. A Soviet invasion of Ukraine would be supported by Germany, probably not militarily, but in any other way they can get away with.

Would Britain or France be willing to support Poland in defending its territorial gains? You could rationalise it, but I doubt the voters would go for it. Which means you have Poland, overstretched and undercapitalised, stuck between a vengeful USSR and a hostile Germany. Your best-case scenario is them somehow managing to build an anti-Soviet, non-German-aligned Central/Eastern European intermarum alliance. Good luck with that, it would make a cool TL. All others, as far as I can see, involve dictatorship, war, and defeat.

Edit: this could get especially bad if it reinforces the "Russians are pussies" fallacy. After WWI and the Russian Civil War, a lot of people thought they could draw conclusions about Russia as a whole and assumed that, basically, one good kick would bring down the unnatural and rotten structure. If even the POles could just graeb whatever they wanted and get away with it, even more people will come to underestimate the USSR militarily. Someone is bound to get a nasty surprise sooner or later oin that case, and I suspect rather sooner.
 
Your best-case scenario is them somehow managing to build an anti-Soviet, non-German-aligned Central/Eastern European intermarum alliance. Good luck with that, it would make a cool TL. All others, as far as I can see, involve dictatorship, war, and defeat.

Although it would be an interesting TL, I'm already committed to a Timeline at the moment (the one in my signature)
 
Well, IMO Poland establishing such a client state is highly unlikely, because if it'd be small (no Kiev, and certainly nothing east and south of it), then it's not worth it for Poland (which is pretty much what happened in OTL), and Russia is very unlikely to give up the real prize, which is Kiev, Krivyi Rih, Yekaterinoslav (Dnipropetrovsk), Odessa. Anything farther east is impossible unless the Ukrainians themselves start fighting for it.

Especially not if the Polish government decided these were all stolen lands subject to repolonisation

That is not going to happen. They were stupid, not insane. In my opinion at least France would still be interested in an alliance with Poland, because it was pretty much the only semi-viable option as an "Ersatz-Russia"
 
Edit: this could get especially bad if it reinforces the "Russians are pussies" fallacy. After WWI and the Russian Civil War, a lot of people thought they could draw conclusions about Russia as a whole and assumed that, basically, one good kick would bring down the unnatural and rotten structure. If even the POles could just graeb whatever they wanted and get away with it, even more people will come to underestimate the USSR militarily. Someone is bound to get a nasty surprise sooner or later oin that case, and I suspect rather sooner.

The OTL Polish-Soviet War reinforced that fallacy enough as it was.
 
Originally posted by Snake Featherston

Except that Poland didn't *want* a client state in Ukraine. Their goals were to push their borders further east, not anything more or anything less.

No, Piłsudski wanted Ukraine as an ally/client. He had his idea of the Intermare as an anti-Russian/Bolshevik federation (later alliance). OTOH, Polish nationalists led by Dmowski wanted Poland almost as big as the old Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was.
 
If we assume the Poles win decisively, I think we can also accept the establishment of a Ukrainian client state. It may not have the borders the Ukrainian People's Republic claimed (as Poland claims some of that land), but it'll be something.

In cases like this, you either accept the POD or you don't. ctesiphon claims that any client state won't have Kiev and most of Ukraine. I think the words "win decisively" indicates that it would. And Snake is simply wrong that Poland didn't want a Ukrainian client state. They did. It's just that they also wanted control over land that the Ukrainians thought should be theirs (notably Galicia) - which is what I think Snake meant by saying the Poles simply wanted to push their borders east. The two goals are not incompatible. I don't see evidence that had POland decisively won the war, that lands of the Ukraine east of the Zburch River wouldn't be given to the Symon Petlura's Ukraine as per the Treaty of Warsaw.

In the short term, the Soviets won't start another war. They are simply exhausted. Being decisively beaten by the Poles mean the Soviets need to regroup and reform. Because they will be missing major portions of Ukrainian agriculture, Kiev, and possibly the proto-indutrial region of the Donbas, the Soviets are much weaker.

So what are the consequences?

1) Poland is a major power in Eastern Europe through its expanded territory and Ukrainian ally. Pilsudski might become successful in forging some kind of Eastern European alliance with either Hungary or Romania. Pilsudski is unlikely to create his great Miedzymorze (Intermarum) alliance as there are still too many border disputes (especially with Hungary), but it will have more diplomatic heft.

2) France's diplomatic position improves, as it'll have stronger allies in the East.

3) Ukraine will have long term political instability as the losses to its Polish ally will be unpopular. Poland may be able to prop up a friendly government for a while, but we are going to see a lot of instability especially int he 1930s.

4) The Soviets will need to concentrate industrial growth in Siberia and Central Asia. Some other area will be starved to death as Stalin seizes food from peasants to feed the growing urban proletariat - perhaps in the Kuban.

5) If we assume Hitler still comes to power, he'll have to be more careful in Eastern Europe. The ability of Poland to possibly interfere is much greater since Poland itself will be stronger, and it might have allies like Ukraine and someone else. We could see Poland being more involved in local political initiatives. For example, it might be party to any Munich-like Agreement. If so, it might demand Teschen if Germany gets the Sudetenland, but it could then commit itself to defending the rest of Czechoslovakia. If so, war might begin if Germany attempts to occupy the rest of the country later; or Hitler may forgo that entirely rather than risk premature war.

6) Ukraine won't industrialize as fast as the Soviets, but it also won't kill off millions of its own people in an artificial famine. It will have some degree of industry. It may also be the country of choice for White Russian exiles which might provide it with some additional elites (they might be politically excluded as Russians, but they could still invest and form businesses).

How things develop will really determine on what happens in the Ukraine. If it collapses into civil strife, Poland will return to being isolated. If it stays intact, the British and French likely don't need to make overtures to the Soviets to keep Hitler boxed in. It's possible Hitler and Stalin might "ally" earlier on, but it'll obvious that any attack on Poland will start a general war in Europe (which Hitler did not plan on IOTL, he thought the war would be limited in 1939, and that he could start the "real war" in 1942). Stalin certainly won't want to do that. To be honest, I see everything from war starting early to war not happening at all.
 

MSZ

Banned
Well, IMO Poland establishing such a client state is highly unlikely, because if it'd be small (no Kiev, and certainly nothing east and south of it), then it's not worth it for Poland (which is pretty much what happened in OTL), and Russia is very unlikely to give up the real prize, which is Kiev, Krivyi Rih, Yekaterinoslav (Dnipropetrovsk), Odessa. Anything farther east is impossible unless the Ukrainians themselves start fighting for it.

Seeing that OTL Lenin was willing to give up everything west of the Dnepr (which would include Kiev and Odessa), a "more decessive" Polish victory would probably imply Pelura establishing a stable government in Kiev in 1920, and then pushing east - making his "Free Ukraine" in the OTL Ukrainian SRR borders. Now i doubt such a state would be a Polish puppet - it would simply be to vast for that. More likely, this Ukraine would simply be a Polish-allied undemocratic regime with Petlura in power, its political scene divided between whether to keep the alliance going to protect it against the Russians, or to ally with the Russians (or Germans) to get East Galicia.

If Ukraine remains at Poland's side, you would see a different partition of 1939, since I doubt even all of Ukraine could balance out the disproportion between Poland and Germany, and its existence would not change overall German politics, unless the Nazis make some kind of a different ideology, since Ukraine is free of Jewish Bolshevism and all that. If Ukraine goes against Poland, there will be blood spilled between them, with a German intervension bringing us to yet another partition, while a Soviet intervension could make all kind of different alliances of opportunity.
 
Blackfox5 said:
In cases like this, you either accept the POD or you don't. ctesiphon claims that any client state won't have Kiev and most of Ukraine. I think the words "win decisively" indicates that it would.

I didn't claim that. Ukraine was an extremely important area for the Russian Empire. It had (still has) the best soil, a lot of industry compared with other areas (I won't claim it was the industrial heartland of Russia because I don't have the data, but my guts tell me it was). It had the most important port (Odessa). No regime in the Kremlin will give it up unless absolutely forced to, and when I read "decisive Polish victory" I assumed the Poles reoccupy Kiev and reach Dnipro in the North, because, frankly, I don't think they were capable of anything more without mass participation from the Ukrainians themselves. This participation is not going to happen as Semen Petlura was considered a Polish pawn. The OP didn't describe the borders of such a state, and I merely said that it's highly unlikely that it'd get borders that would actually change anything (that is, southern Right Bank Ukraine). It's not impossible, like left bank, just really unlikely. Less than that pretty much only adds some more vitriol to Russo-Polish relations

MSZ said:
Seeing that OTL Lenin was willing to give up everything west of the Dnepr (which would include Kiev and Odessa)

I always thought of this as roughly the pre-1772 borders. I doubt it included the southern Right Bank. Marchlewski said Russia could cede Lithuania and Belarus, but didn't mention Ukraine. And, IIRC, it was in 1919, so it's very likely he wasn't serious, and planned to attack Poland as soon as possible.

I also should add that if such a state was created, it's likely that it would also have some of OTL Polish Volhynia, as it had only a small Polish majority and other than Kovel (important rail hub), it wasn't really of much interest to the Poles.
 
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