Four Polands, One International System

In the eyes of the French and Anglo-Saxon Peacemakers at the end of World War One, the Polish file present specific issues. The three parts of the restored state, to whom we will adjoin the Polonia of the French emigration, seem to make it difficult to find homogeneity among the country and the people. In these conditions, how to build an organised governmental machine and, most urgently, a united army which would be able to respond to the Soviet threat ? The Allied and Associated Powers have different answers but one single statement when it comes to Poland : « a nation struggling to become a state, with perhaps a greater number of more difficult problems than have ever faced up any other nation at any one time » (Hoover Archives, Hugh Gibson collection)