The Polish government has established contact with Ukrainian opposition leaders to propose the deployment of a peacekeeping force in the west of the country. The proposal is not without ulterior motives. Indeed, during the interwar period, Poland had occupied Western Ukraine to protect it from Bolshevism. She then annexed these territories in agreement with the USSR.

A month ago, Polish officials laid claim to the enclave of Kaliningrad, which has never belonged to Poland [1] .

It was during Poland’s occupation of Western Ukraine that the banderites were formed. In 1934, Stepan Bandera organised, on behalf of the German Gestapo of which he was already a member, the assassination of Polish Interior Minister Bronisław Pieracki, who had cracked down on Ukrainian terrorists on the basis of collective responsibility.

Poland’s initiative opens the door for Hungary and Romania to lay claim on other parts of Ukrainia.

These countries should be reminded that dispatching forces in a “peacekeeping” capacity would not necessarily trigger the application of NATO’s Article 5 on collective defense, i.e. the Alliance would not automatically mobilize its other members should those forces get in harm’s way.