The Stefan Batory Foundation has published a detailed analysis of Polish aid to Ukraine, including in this report both political contexts and the contribution of Ukrainians to the Polish economy. The results will surprise many, and will outrage some in Poland. Oleksiy Panych, PhD, Senior Research Fellow at the Ukrainian Humanities Publishing House ‘Dukh i Litera,’ writes.
Several theses from this report:
- Polish aid to Ukraine was considerable, but Polish politicians, by playing with statistics, manipulatively exaggerated its volume by approximately twice the real amount;
- unlike other countries that helped Ukraine, Poland, and only Poland, quickly began to demand “gratitude” from Ukraine in the form of economic and political concessions, including in the area of historical memory;
- the Polish “tendency to exaggerate the scale of aid and to present bills for it almost daily, combined with a wave of expectations of Ukrainian gratitude,” artificially created among Poles an illusion of chronic Ukrainian “ingratitude” and undermined their trust in the policy of aiding Ukraine;
- as a result, although displays of gratitude on the Ukrainian side “have become routine political correctness toward Poland,” Ukraine increasingly relies less on Polish aid (“gratitude is not a collar”);
- and yet, in parallel with aid, Poland has earned and continues to earn a great deal from this war, including a boom in arms exports;
- moreover, the contribution of Ukrainian refugees to Poland’s GDP in 2022–2024 is practically equal to the volume of Polish aid to Ukraine over that period – in other words, Ukrainian refugees have already worked off (!) all the aid provided to Ukraine by Poland;
- the significant contribution of Ukrainian refugees to the Polish economy, Poland’s positive trade balance in trade with Ukraine, record Polish arms exports, and modest Polish aid to Ukraine – all of this indicates that in fact it is Ukraine that has made a significant contribution to the well-being and economy of Poland.
Time to ask: so who should be grateful to whom?
Although in reality, aid should not turn into a political bill at all.
However, for some (a considerable?) part of Polish politicians and Polish society – it already has.
