04. ledna, 2026 Kaja Puto
From my first trip to the Ukrainian border after full-scale war broke out, I mainly remember the adrenaline. I was buzzing with emotions while speeding along the A4 highway in my car, although I’m usually very critical of such wrongdoings. At the border crossing I saw images that I had considered impossible: Polish border guards addressing Ukrainians with empathy, cross-border towns and villages, very sceptical of their neighbours on a day-to-day basis, adorned with yellow and blue crêpe paper, finally – volunteer drivers who were queuing to offer rides to the refugee groups.
I wasn’t alone with these emotions. Their abundance translated into the aid that the Poles extended to the Ukrainian refugees on a massive scale. According to Statistics Poland (Główny Urząd Statystyczny, GUS), some form of help – money, a ride or hosting someone – was declared by 70.2% of the population. Researchers from the Collegium Civitas’ Institute of Sociology later identified very different motivations behind it: we helped because that was the right thing to do, because other people helped, because we wanted to feel better, because we wanted to benefit from it, because, finally, we understood that the Ukrainians were fighting for us, and if they lost, we would be next.
A lot has changed since then. News from Ukraine stopped being clickable, more and more often you hear about war-weariness and how the Ukrainian refugees are mostly resented. The full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the swell of emotion it gave rise to, has left a permanent mark on the Poles.
First of all, it’s a feeling of agency we haven’t experienced in a long time. Part of the public recalls the 4 June, 1989 democratic parliamentary elections in this way. Earlier on there had been a few historical events such as the victory of the Polish-Soviet War or the Greater Poland uprising. However, the wind of change rarely blows for us from a favourable direction, and even more rarely are we able to successfully set sail to the wind. Community deliriums are usually intertwined with suffering. They are preceded by lost wars and uprisings, and recently, during peace time – events such as the Smolensk air disaster or the death of John Paul II.
This time we reacted actively and with agency, perhaps also inspired by the Ukrainian will to fight that was accompanied by effective war propaganda – a woman taking down drones with jars of pickled tomatoes, a farmer towing away a tank with his tractor, a babushka handing the Russian soldiers sunflower seeds, so that something useful would grow out of their corpses. The Ukrainian grass roots power has enabled it to brave the subsequent months of war. It is present everywhere the country doesn’t work well – supplying soldiers with equipment, fighting against Russian disinformation, clearing up war debris. At the start of the war, the Poles experienced something similar, albeit on a much smaller scale.
That has changed the neurotic Polish identity. Being a Pole is not only about suffering any more – preferably for millions – but also about helping, working together, hosting. This constructive vibe came back in September 2024, when southwestern Poland was affected by floods. Journalistic comments from left to right resonated with pride: we have overcome another crisis together. A comforting conclusion in contemporary times described by the historian Adam Tooze as the ‘polycrisis.’
The feeling of internal power has translated into an increase of assertiveness in thinking about international relations. Before 2022, Poland was divided in this regard, as were many peripheral countries – the liberals (globalists) were uncritically taking the point of view of the hegemonic West, the right (localists) saw Europe as an enemy and acted in defiance. At the same time, as opposed to their Western partners, both sides saw the danger arising from Russia. After the invasion both sides wanted to say ‘I told you so.’
Of course, this willingness arose not only in Poland, but also in other countries of the region, e.g. the Baltic states, but first and foremost, in Ukraine. The famous ‘I don’t need a ride, I need ammunition’ quote by the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy made its way into the diplomacy hall of fame. Although his attitude is nowadays being considered restitutionary among European elites, the Western mainstream accepted the Eastern European point of view regarding security. In August 2022 the German chancellor Olaf Scholz proclaimed that ‘the centre of Europe is moving eastwards’, which was later echoed by many politicians and commentators. That’s why we feel like we’re in the centre of global affairs.
Secondly, in 2022 the Poles understood that peace is not eternal, whereas war is possible. Although the one in Ukraine has been ongoing since 2014, it hasn’t really aroused general interest due to its local character. The full-scale invasion proved that the Kremlin is poised to move past successive red lines, and so it’s not entirely impossible that Russia will attack one of the NATO states. After 2022 it redoubled its hybrid attacks on NATO’s eastern flank, including Poland. Reports about jamming the GPS signal on the Baltic, mysterious fires of buildings and vehicles, cyberattacks on critical infrastructure (recently on purification plants and water pipes) have become a regular staple of the Polish news services.
The atmosphere is further fuelled by Kremlin propagandists (‘Do the Poles want to be next?’, ‘Moscow would show no hesitation in wiping out Polish cities’, said Vladimir Solovyov), and recently also Donald Trump, whose withdrawal from Europe makes Poland, which is dependent militarily on the United States, anxious.
The feeling of danger brought back cultural codes from the times that had shaped our image of war – which is World War II. They influence our understanding of current events. The memory of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact made even the biggest Germanophiles start to look at Germany with more caution. The memory of how the Soviets behaved saved us from believing in disinformation regarding Russian war crimes. The memory of being betrayed by our allies strengthens the belief that we should be arming ourselves.
A majority consensus has been reached in Poland about the need to increase the military budget, even though it already gets close to 5% GDP and is the biggest in all of NATO. According to public opinion research, further investments in the army are supported by 70-80% of the Poles, including the far-right Konfederacja (Confederacy), who has been flirting with Russian narratives and Razem (Together), who are close to the ideas of pacifism and modern left-wing populism similar to the Spanish Podemos or the Greek Syriza. Distinct voices are politically marginal – although it may yet change.
The rising feeling of danger somewhat weakened political polarisation, at least regarding security issues. Liberal parties, including the currently leading Platforma Obywatelska (Civic Platform) have started to talk about the army or migration in the language of the Right. Liberal prime minister Donald Tusk and right-wing president Andrzej Duda happened to exchange pleasantries. ‘The government and the president need to work together’, they declared a few times, which hasn’t happened in Poland since the EU accession efforts. However, it doesn’t prevent them from accusing each other’s parties of aiding the Russian agenda.
Finally, the Ukrainian war refugee surge helped the Polish society become aware that it had stopped being monoethnic. It’s a process that started over a decade ago, when a big migration of former Soviet Union citizens, especially Ukrainians, commenced. A few years later you could find more and more people from different parts of the world in Poland, for example from India, the Philippines or Colombia. According to various assessments there are about 2.5 million foreigners in the country, 6.7% of workers with social insurance.
A broader social debate on this subject has been hindered for a long time because of the twin-track politics run by the right-wing government of Prawo i Sprawiedliwość (Law and Justice, 2015-2023). Their representatives were turning the public against migrants coming to the EU, presenting themselves as a power that would save Poland from multiculturalism on the one hand, while on the other quietly liberalising migration rules, thus supplying Poland with a workforce from all around the world. For a lot of Poles these rules have remained invisible.
It changed with the Ukrainian war refugee surge, although the Ukrainian diaspora was already the biggest one in Poland antebellum, and a part of it emigrated because of the war. The Polish solidarity AD 2022 resulted in numerous direct contacts between the Poles and Ukrainians – we started to meet each other at work, schools and even homes. We have been exposed to the Ukrainian language in TV adverts, at offices and on hotlines and there have been more migrant voices in the public debate – that is Ukrainian journalists, experts and artists.
Modern Poland doesn’t exist without Ukrainians any more – even taking into consideration that the unusual affection for the Ukrainians from the beginning of the war dissipated greatly. It was replaced by weariness and anxiety (about competing for medical resources, the job market, Tinder), fuelled by Russian disinformation and local politicians. Poles – as shown by research from the University of Warsaw – accuse the refugees of entitlement, ingratitude and Soviet mentality, although the majority still approves of taking them in.
This difficult acceptance of the new Polish multiculturalism isn’t accompanied by a deeper self-reflection about the role of Poland during the Ukrainian War of Independence: actively fighting against it – during the partitions of Poland, first and foremost in Austria-Hungary, as well as during the interwar Second Polish Republic. It hasn’t left a significant mark in Polish historical memory, as the latter became dominated by the Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia: an ethnic cleansing of Poles inspired by Ukrainian nationalists during World War II. This wound – along with the unfulfilled expectations of an apology from the Ukrainian side – has made it difficult for a lot of Poles to build trust towards their neighbours.
While talking to Ukrainians you might often hear that ‘there’s no going back to the life before the war’. While during the last three years the Poles haven’t shared even a fraction of their neighbours’ every day war experience, they might agree with that sentence. Another short period of peace in our region has come to an end.
First published in May 2025. Translated from Polish by Marta Zielińska.
The article was written in the framework of the project Reflections of the War in Ukraine in Visegrad Countries. The project is co-financed by the governments of Czechia, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia through Visegrad Grants from the International Visegrad Fund. The mission of the fund is to advance ideas for sustainable regional cooperation in Central Europe.
SPECIÁLNÍ ČÍSLO/SPECIAL EDITION