If not for the events of 2020 in Belarus and the Russian special operation in Ukraine, Washington would have governed Poland in a completely different way, Olga Lazorkina, analyst at the Belarusian Institute of Strategic Research, Candidate of Historical Sciences, says.
How true are the claims of some Polish experts that Washington controls Warsaw's politics and Berlin controls the economy, will the Law and Justice party be able to maintain its ruling status after the October 15 parliamentary elections, and will the trend to reduce support for Ukraine continue?
We very much underestimate the role of Poland. Allegedly, Poland is a state that is completely dependent on Washington's decisions, but this is far from the case, the interlocutor of Sputnik is convinced. Poland has its own history of relations with the United States, and it is not as unambiguous as it is commonly thought, the analyst notes.
"The history of relations between the United States and Warsaw, which we see today, is largely developing under the pressure of external circumstances ... If it were not the special military operation and the 2020 events in Belarus, we would have seen a completely different management of Poland by Washington. 2020 in Belarus gave Poland, and then our neighbors, an opportunity to force the United States to move in a different direction, it was a chance to have the great powers by the throat on the basis of values. There has never been such an opportunity to use values against their own allies. This works on the example of Lithuania, which suddenly, unexpectedly for everyone, began to talk to China from the point of view and from the position of a great power, when Taiwan's representative office was opened and the whole scandal flared up," Lazorkina says.
If we talk about the upcoming parliamentary elections in Poland over the weekend, then Law and Justice is still in the lead in polls, but it is somewhat premature to say that such a result is guaranteed, the expert believes.
"There may be surprises. After all, the image and ratings of the party are very much damaged by corruption scandals. A certain tilt towards Tusk has occurred, but how much influence he himself have among the elites… But it is already clear today that PiS will no longer have such premium positions as it had at the last election," Lazorkina says.