How was Poland compensated after World War 2

Hi everyone

Apart from being compensated with the recovered territories from Germany after ww2 which really wasn't compensation considering the soviets took more land then they gave.Was there any other compensation that Poland were given?

Well ... what kind of compensation are you expecting for a country like Polnad that has lost the war ?
And no doubt Poland was a main loser of the ww2.

Money ,Help with rebuilding cities stuff like that.

Have you ever heard of the International Compensation Fund? I haven't. You expect the World Bank to have helped? They prospered from the war and are glad for the profits. Compensated by whom? Germany paid for reparations after the war.

i'm just curious czarnkow, who do you feel was responsible for this "compensation" you speak of?

Mainly the Soviets but considering they installed a Communist regime for the best of 40 years i highly doubt they compensated Poland in anyway or intend to in anytime soon.

The Axis powers lost the war. Last time anyone checked, Poland was not in the axis and had the fourth largest Allied army. Strangely, the Soviet Union's role as an early axis power is rarely mentioned nowadays.


The OP must have meant war reparations. At the Potsdam Conference it was agreed by everyone but Poland, since she seized to exist as an idependent state and decisions for Poland were made in Moscow, that People's Poland is to receive 15% of reparations paid to the Soviet Union.

So what ?
50 years under Soviet boot was all we have gain as our "compensation".

Reparations and compensation. Why?

The people who caused the war are dead, the Nazi party and the Soviet Union have gone. Why should people pay for what their ancestors did?

Not every German was a Nazi, not every Russian wanted to be communist.

The English want compensation from the French for the Norman Invasion in 1066.

Note, the last statement is not true, its sarcasm.

Steve is spot on APU. Why is it that a solution for some issues was available through the auspices of the League of Nations in 1921 after WWI but not sth analogous after WWII? Had the emphasis shifted to a more penal-based approach? (Nuremberg etc). I've only heard of Potsdam so maybe 1Jola could spell out more provisions.

Look at Teheran and Yalta. They were more focussed on how to reshape Poland and cared little for reparations. Very sad!

@Czarnkow1940, I wonder, before you start a thread like this, do you make some research by yourself, or you just want to make a pool about pf users knowledge? On another thread you've wrote that you are living in Krakow. Go to university library there and you will find plenty of relevant historic books about the subject. Then, enlighten us...

I can throw you some fragmentary stuff but in the end what would be the value of this?
The subject you are asking is both highly subjective and rather wide. It is highly unlikely that you will find valid and exhausting answer here.

Wait, so Poland won the war?

Some nations will not agree with the general message of your post.
For instance Greece, and obviously, Israel that didn' t even exist during WW2. Imagine that trick!

Ofc they won (the war against Nazi Germany)
The war against Soviet Union is an other matter

Yes, their war finished in 1989.

The Nazi's tried to wipe Poland off the map in 1939, Poland is still here and the Nazi's and the Soviet Union are gone so I guess Poland beat the Nazi's and Soviets too.

Greece existed during WW2.Greece was the only occupied state which gave the Germans all the gold in national bank as a loan.(It was called obligatory loan by occupation forces).One of the biggest thefts.

Strange because I don't remember there being a second republic after '39. The state was annihilated.

That's where your wrong, the state still existed in London and underground (this is where the Soviet argument is absurd) it was under occupation but most Poles respected the words of the underground a bit more then the Nazi's don't you think?

It wasn't until the Soviets came with the commies that the public acknowledged the the Lublin ppl as heads of state. Ofc some continued the struggle but it ended in the 50's.

The underground state had a lethal blow after the Warsaw uprising and the arrests of important politicians AND after losing their support by the allies.

There were few years when Stalin recognized Polish gov. in London (since agreement on 30.07.1941, after Germans invade USSR), of course he did that until USSR take upper hand on east front. Agreement was one-sided broken by USSR on 25.04.1943.

Anyway that short period of cooperation had some highlights, actions against Poles in USSR were stoped to some extent, and Stalin agreed to let go some of Poles (including those who were kept in Gulags and prisons), and let them to create Anders Army. According to different sources thanks to that agreement about 41000 of soldiers and 74000 of civilians were let go from Gulags (Poles, Ukrainians, Belarusians and Jews). Those people flew from USSR via Iran, part of them stayed in Anders Army. Those soldiers fought against Germans in Africa and later in Italy, for example in battle on Monte Cassino. Anyway, after Stalin broke agreement, he started to create his own Polish army under communist leadership.

Did Poland lost the war? Yes, one of the two invaders won. But Poles had to cooperate with one of them to survive. I've read somewhere, that added up Polish forces were fourth largest army in WWII in Europe, bigger than France forces. But due to disperse (east front, west front, Africa, Middle East) political power of Polish authorities was small. At least Poland didn't become one of the USSR republics.

They were allowed to kick out lots of Germans (some of whom had lived there for centuries... or rather the family/community).

The lovely soviets built a lovely phallic symbol in warsaw to remind Poland how they'd been 'cultured'.

Apr 30, 10, 01:00 - Thread attached on merging:
WHAT KIND OF COMPENSATION DID POLES GET AFTER WW2?

I'd like to get this straightened out once and for all. I don't know too many details concerning this as I grew up in Canada. Did Polish people who lost family members and property at the hands of Germans get any monetary compensation? I'm lead to believe that Jews probably got the most.

Discuss.

I am not aware of anyone getting any compensation.
it was just **** happens and move on.

That's a communist propaganda term...


Poland was lucky that it received German lands at all. Stalin could have as well decided to leave Germany as is and still annex the eastern Polish territories - simply ignoring Churchill and Roosevelt and their ideas.

in Theory Poland won
In practice Poland lost
That's how it goes mate


Quite true, he maybe didn't want Poles to be all over furious? ;p
"Hell I have given them more then hell, let's give them a little soda maybe they calm down?"


Some say it thanks for the Warsaw uprising, like Stalin didn't want Poland to join SU (the thinking of countless uprisings were enough to make a serious headache)

Also it would be more Liberated if it was her own country at least ;)
In some weird commie-puppet-controlled by Kremlin-style

As Piłsudski said it: The next war won't be about borders. It will be about existence
So in that term Poland won :)

In that case they were all winners because they all exist now ;)

It was about Poland ;p
Also Nazi Germany&and Soviet Union doesn't exist so you got that one wrong

neither does the second republic or the peoples republic anymore ;) and germans and russians still exist but they could hardly be conceded winners or losers.

How was Poland compensated after World War 2?

By having a progressive, Communist government put in charge of caring for the Polish people's needs.

Don't have time to go through all of this BUT Poles who were murdered by Germans or lost property and personal possessions were not compensated monetarily? Nobody got anything??!! How the hell did Jews get personally compensated? No wonder modern day Poles hate their neighbours.

Nobody except Jewish and some Nazis concentration camps' prisoners got anything - in FSU and former Eastern Bloc countries at least. Germany has not enough resources even now to compensate it.