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1920-1939 - The Curzon Line

It was still impossible in the autumn of 1921 to make any final or definite statement with regard to the boundaries of Poland; as regards Lithuania the situation remained unsettled, and it was only in Oct. that a decision favorable to Poland in respect to Upper Silesia resulted from the award of the League of Nations.

Working on the principle of national rights it was attempted at the Peace Conference to make the boundaries of Poland conform to ethnographic divisions. A commission was appointed, under M. Cambon, which was to deal with the Polish question and submit drafted proposals to the Supreme Council. The first report of the commission concerned the western boundaries, the proposals being as follows: The larger part of Posen and Upper Silesia should be transferred to Poland, leaving Germany the western, predominantly German-speaking districts of both territories." According to the German census of 1910 the Poles formed about 65% of the population in the two areas ceded to Poland. In addition Poland was to be given the central and eastern zones of the province of West Prussia, including both banks of the lower Vistula and Danzig, though the latter was distinctly German. The settlement in the case of the district of Allenstein, that is to say the southern zone of East Prussia, was to be referred to a plebiscite.

These proposals were not accepted without modification, as it was urged by Mr. Lloyd George that they were terms to which the Germans would never agree. In the first place a modification was made with regard to the territory around Marienwerder on the East bank of the Vistula. Instead of being transferred to Poland outright this territory was to be subjected to a plebiscite. More important, however, was the change introduced in the matter of Danzig. It was decided that Danzig and the small adjacent district were to form a free city under the protection of the League of Nations. Poland received the right of freely using all the waterways, docks and wharfs and was to have the control and administration of the Vistula river. Later a third modification was made with regard to Upper Silesia, when it was decided that in thisterritory too there should be a plebiscite. The results of the plebiscite in the Marienwerder and Allenstein districts were in favor of Germany, a result which was largely due to the number of Germans who were imported into the territory. The plebiscite in Upper Silesia was likewise in favour of Germany as a whole, though in many districts there was an immense Polish majority.

The southern boundary of Poland was that of Galicta. In the N.E. the boundary between Poland and Lithuania was still unsettled in 1921 and the Poles were still in possession of Vilna, the capital of Lithuania.

With regard to the eastern boundary between Poland and Russia nothing definite could be settled at the Peace Conference as there was no recognized Russian Government with which to carry on negotiations. In order to facilitate the work of the Warsaw Government in organizing local administration in the part of Russian Poland which was certain to be ceded by Russia, a provisional eastern boundary was proposed which would include all the territory which might be regarded as having "an indisputably Polish ethnic majority." All the territories to the West of this line were to belong unconditionally to Poland, while the territories to the East were to be settled by future negotiations with Russia.

Roughly speaking this provisional boundary corresponded to the old boundary of the Governments of the Vistula. This provisional boundary since became known as the "Curzon Line." When the Poles appealed, in the summer of 1920, for help against the Bolsheviks an attempt was made by the British Government to secure peace. Lord Curzon, acting on behalf of the Government, proposed the acceptance of this line as the basis of the peace terms. The Poles being unwilling to sacrifice lands which were inhabited by an incontestably Polish population would not agree to this settlement and were later, at the Treaty of Riga on Oct. 12 1920, able to conclude peace with the Bolsheviks on more advantageous terms.