Studnicki-Gizbert, Władysław

Studnicki began his political life as a member of the socialist movement. In 1902, he joined the National Democratic Party (Stronnictwo Narodowo-Demokratyczne) in Lemberg (Lwów/Lviv). Just a few years later, he left the “national democracy” movement in protest against its anti-German, pro-Russian policies. Studnicki explained why he had taken this step in an article published in 1907 entitled “Chorzy na Prusków” (“The Prussian Disease”). In it, he claimed that the Poles living in the eastern provinces of the German Empire were afflicted with a morbid aversion to all things “Prussian”. The “Prussian disease”, engendered and nurtured by “political charlatans” from among their own ranks, hindered Poles from recognising and accepting the positive achievements of Prussian rule, he said. Studnicki’s criticism had no impact, however. The Prussian-German policy of applying pressure and imposing restrictive measures had long since led to precisely the situation that it was meant to prevent: the formation of a modern, institutionally broad Polish society which unequivocally distanced itself from everything “German” and which would later form the core of the reconstructed Polish state in 1918.

In the years that immediately followed the First World War, Studnicki joined the Austro-Polish movement led by Piłsudski and called for the creation of a Polish state allied with Austria and Hungary as a “triumvirate”, the territory of which would be expanded mainly at cost to Russia. During the course of the First World War, Studnicki changed sides again. In May 1916, he submitted a plan for the formation of an independent Polish state to Hans von Beseler, the head of the German occupying administration. The borders of this new state would run along the Düna (Daugava/Dźwina) and Beresina rivers in the east, while the western border correspond to that of the Polish Empire in 1815. As a result, the regions of Posen, Bromberg and Upper Silesia would remain under Prussian control. In December 1916, thanks to the support of von Beseler, Studnicki was called to serve on the 25-member “Provisional Council of State” in Warsaw. 

According to the Polish historian Marek Kornat, Studnicki was a “conceptualist”, not a practical politician. His vision was that of a “strong Poland between Germany and Russia”, which looked towards Germany for orientation and which clearly distanced itself from Russia. However – as conceded by the historian of eastern Europe Gotthold Rhode – this was a thoroughly unpopular approach, for which there was no support within Poland, particularly in the territories formerly governed by Prussia.

In the Second Polish Republic, Studnicki first worked in Warsaw as advisor to the trade and industry ministry, as well as to the ministry of foreign affairs, and then as a lecturer in Wilno (Vilnius). Following the conclusion of the German-Polish non-aggression pact on 26 January 1934, Studnicki again made the case for a closer union between Poland and the German Reich. In his book, “System polityczny Europy a Polska” (1935), which was also published in Germany under the title “Polen im politischen System Europas”, he called for the cession of the German parts of Bohemia to the German Reich, the return of the Czech area of the town of Těšín (Cieszyn/Teschen) to Poland, the annexation of Slovakia and the Soviet-controlled territory in the Carpathians to Hungary, and the establishment of a direct Polish-Hungarian border. 

The book, which reads like an early template for the Munich Agreement of September 1938, reflects the attitudes that prevailed from the time of the First World War, which were held not only by Studnicki, but by many European politicians at the time. However, Hitler’s foreign policy goal was not a revision of the “Versailles system”, but a radical new order in the European east in line with the principles of National Socialist racial ideology. Many of Hitler’s contemporaries, including Studnicki, were unable or unwilling to recognise this fact. 

Another book by Studnicki, “Sprawa polsko-żydowska” (“The Polish-Jewish Matter”), was published in 1935. In it, as the historian Joanna Michlic points out, he described the Jews as “parasites on the healthy Polish tree”. He called for the creation of a Polish protectorate in Palestine and the gradual expulsion of the Polish Jews (100,000 per year).

In September 1938, following an invitation from Rudolf Hess, Studnicki attended the Nuremberg Rally held by the NSDAP, met Adolf Hitler and had a long conversation with foreign minister von Ribbentrop.

Following the occupation of Czechoslovakia by the Wehrmacht in March 1939, Studnicki criticised the German course of action, while at the same time calling for the Polish government to join the German Reich against Soviet Russia instead of rejecting Hitler’s demands and turning to England and France for support. Otherwise, he said, there was a risk that Poland would fall within Moscow’s orbit of control. 

The historian Marek Kornat writes that for several years, as a result of this “prophecy”, Studnicki has been “cast in the light of a perceived saviour of the fatherland” in Poland by right-leaning politicians and commentators. “They are attempting historical revisionism, trying to turn him into a tool for reassessing the nature of Polish society in the past. However, this approach will lead nowhere.” 

Kornat continues that Studnicki was unwilling to accept that Hitler was not planning to go to war for Europe as Studnicki imagined it, but rather to conquer “Lebensraum” (“space to live”) in the east. Kornat writes that Poland had no further place in this “Europe” as envisioned by Hitler. “Studnicki failed to understand the fundamental nature of German totalitarianism. To him, Hitler’s Germany was no different from that of the Wilhelmine Empire.” 

There was also something tragic about the role that Studnicki ultimately attempted to play during the Second World War. Failing entirely to grasp the true nature of the worldview and political goals of the Nazi regime, he attempted to persuade Hitler to change his policies in occupied Poland. Neither incarceration in Germany nor internment in the notorious “Pawiak” prison in Warsaw could dissuade Studnicki from trying to realise his goal, which included the ludicrous notion of offering Hitler to create new Polish army units to fight alongside the German Reich against Soviet Russia. It is no surprise, therefore, that Studnicki finally described the Warsaw Uprising as a fundamental error.

The result: in communist Poland, Studnicki was regarded as a “collaborator” and his books were banned. There is no doubt that this has only served to increase the level of interest in him over the past few decades (as with other individuals who played a role during the inter-war years), particularly among right-wing nationalists in Poland. However, framing Studnicki as a forgotten pioneer who paved the way for closer German-Polish relations fails to take into account the degree of importance he had in real life, as well as the questionable role that he played in Poland before and after 1939. 

 

Bernd Krebs, May 2024

 

Bibliography

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Joanna Beata Michlic: Poland’s Threatening Others: The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present, Lincoln 2006.

Gotthold Rhode: Geschichte Polens. Ein Überblick, Darmstadt 1980.

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