The lands Germany ceded to Poland after World War I included more than one million ethnic Germans for whom the change meant a sharp reversal of roles. The Polish government now confronted a German minority in a region where power relationships had been the other way around for more than a century. Orphans of Versailles examines the complex psychological and political situation of Germans consigned to Poland, their treatment by the Polish government and society, their diverse strategies for survival, their place in international relations, and the impact of National Socialism. Not a one-sided study of victimization, this book treats the contributions of both the Polish state and the German minority to the conflict that culminated in their mutual destruction. Based largely on research in European archives, it sheds new light on a key aspect of German-Polish relations, one that was long overshadowed by concern over the German revanchist threat and the hostility that subsequently dominated the German-Polish relationship. Thanks to the new political situation in central Europe, however, this topic can finally be addressed evenhandedly.

The authors describe these exceptionally eventful one hundred years in a clear and straightforward way, subjecting them to critical analysis. The book is written in a flowing style, easy to understand for non-experts as well. Prof. Jerzy Eisler The United States played an instrumental role in Poland's going down a difficult road - first to independence in 1918 and then to freedom and gull sovereignty in 1989. (...). This book is exceptional: it covers a wide time span, it was written by distinguished experts and practitioners, and it encourages raising diverse questions. Dr. Krzysztof Szczepanik ISBN 978–83-65390-80-6 ISBN 978–83-66213-34-0

A model of policy analysis, Arms Transfers under Nixon provides a lucid and lively demonstration of how the Nixon administration combined skillful diplomacy and the adroit use of arms transfers to bring about a remarkable series of American foreign policy achievements. The Middle East provides the most dramatic example. Here, the Arab-Israeli military balance was stabilized, Egypt was persuaded and enabled to forsake its heavy dependence upon the Soviet Union, conditions favorable to peace negotiations were arranged, and important interim agreements were brokered by the United States. In the Persian Gulf, the promotion of Iran and Saudi Arabia as effective guarantors of regional stability in the wake of British withdrawal, and maintaining the pro-Western orientation of these governments, are shown to have been essential to crucial United States and Western interests. The dramatic reversal with the collapse of the Shah's government is assessed, as are the causes of that post-Nixon debacle. The battles that accompanied the administration's initiatives -- battles with hostile nations, with allies, with the Congress, and even within the administration -- and the diplomatic and political moves by which opposition was overcome provide the stuff of an exciting and instructive narrative.

Professor Wandycz has written the first monograph in the English language on the turbulent diplomatic and military relations between Poland and Soviet Russia during the critical years 1917-1921. Soviet Russia, rules in 1917 by the newly triumphant Bolsheviks, faced Poland, a nation that had just recovered independence after more than a century of oppression. The Bolsheviks feared their revolution would fail if confined to Russia alone; Poland lay directly in their path to the West and international conquest. The resulting controversy, ending with the Treaty of Riga in 1921, spans one of the most complicated and crucial periods in the long and tulmultuous history of Russian-Polish relations. Although this conflict of 1917-1921 was part of the immediate international struggle of revolution and counterrevolution, centuries of antagonism and war were characteristic of the earlier relations between the two countries. The current dispute went far deeper than a Communist-nonCommunist clash; the entire balance of power in Eastern Europe was at stake. Pilsudski's great plan was to push Russia back to its seventeenth-century borders, thus creating an important and powerful Poland. For the Bolsheviks, a successful march on Warsaw might initiate the destruction of the Versailles settlement and the European post-war system. Using recently published documents and Russian, Polish, English, and American archives, the author presents an objective and sophisticated picture of the complicated Soviet-Polish relations in this period. He is careful to examine these affairs in the light of the historical background of the two nations, for although many of these relations were newly esetablished, few were entirely divorced from the past. The first chapter dips back in time for a brief outline of the social and political events behind the deep antagonism of the two nations. Included is an examination of the basic disharmony between their civilizations, caused by the philosophical differences in their respective religions, Polish Catholicism and Greek Orthodoxy. Chapter Two introduces political figures and theories and the development in the half century preceding the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. The nine remaining chapters are devoted to the struggles between the two countries over the territorial, ideological, and socio-political problems that dominated their relations. The Peace Treaty of Riga, signed in March 1921, proved to be only a stalemate, the negative effects of which were more pronounced for Poland than Russia. As Mr. Wandycz concludes, " The former lost the chance of becoming a real power; the plans of the latter were merely delayed." -- from dust jacket.