9th May 2022, in Warsaw, while laying flowers on the graves of Soviet soldiers killed during World War II in fights for the liberation of Poland, Sergei Andreyev, Ambassador of the Russian Federation, was attacked and poured with some blood-like liquid.  Mixed Polish-Ukrainian group, associated with George Soros’ organizations, admitted to the attack, but historical experience shows that it is not the only one possible clue of this case.  And trails lead to London.

Waiting for war

7th June 1927, at 8.55am on a platform of the Central Railway Station in Warsaw arrived a train. Soviet ambassador in the UK, Arkadij Rozengolc, just expelled from London, was returning to Moscow and this was his hour-long waiting for a change.  In accordance with the diplomatic protocol he was accompanied by Pyotr Voykov, Minister Plenipotentiary of the Soviet Union to the Polish Republic.  The diplomats talked about the increasingly tense international situation.  Great Britain has just severed diplomatic relations with the Soviets, failing to obtain from them expected trade privileges. Officially, the Soviet embassy was accused of espionage, and the British press launched a massive international campaign against “Agents of Moscow” and Reds Under Every Bed.  It was commonly expected that the Poles would follow the British, being till then geopolitically subordinated to London.  The new Polish-Bolshevik war seemed to be the natural beginning of another Western intervention in the East.  The story was supposed to accelerate – and it was to start at the Warsaw train station.

The Lone Gunman…?

A young man, not bullied by anyone, suddenly approached Voykov and Rozengolc. After saying a few words he reached for the gun.  As if out of spite, there were no Polish policemen nearby.  Shots were fired. Volkov, an old revolutionist (a Menshevik, by the way) responded with fire himself, but after couple minutes dropped mortally wounded, right under the feet of the officers running with significant delay.  He died after an hour in the hospital without regaining consciousness.  The arrested gunman did not resist, introducing himself as Boris Kowerda, not even 20 years old.  Under the investigation, he maintained that acted in cooperation only with other White Russian immigrants who were driven solely by the will to fight Bolshevism.  Thus, trial of the conspirators was turned into an anti-Soviet propaganda show, fostered by widespread rumours about the alleged Voykov’s involvement in the murder of the Tsarist family (what many years later was finally falsified by historians).  Kowerda aroused widespread sympathy, but despite the defence of leading Polish lawyers, was sentenced to life imprisonment, then changed to 15 years in prison (of which served 10).  The young Russian successfully attracted the attention of Polish and international public opinion, while on the real political level, much more important things were happening.

How to provoke the Russians

To explain what happened between Warsaw and London, it should be remembered that a year earlier, on 12th May 1926, as a result of military coup in Poland was established military dictatorship of Marechal Józef Piłsudski, winner of the war with the Bolsheviks in 1920, considered a great supporter of Great Britain’s policy and a staunch enemy of Russia. But despite of that nothing seemed to be going as the English wanted. Voykov was assassinated just after Piłsudski directly refused to march on Kyiv again.  “I have not become a winner in one war with the Bolsheviks, to suffer defeat in the next” – he said brutally in one of the interviews.  Hence, when the Poles, surprisingly, did not want to attack Moscow – maybe the Russians could be persuaded to attack Poland?

In 1927, Poland still had unregulated border relations with Germany, just waiting to regain Silesia, Gdańsk and Pomerania.  Of course, the Poles would fight alone, or possibly together with our Romanian allies, because the diplomatic tension between the Anglo-Saxons and the Soviets had completely different goals than “liberating the peoples of Russia from Communism”.  It was just a business, worth billions of pounds and dollars.  This war was about to break out just because someone in the West needed it.  And it was really close, that Pyotr Voykov, and in some sense Boris Kowerda just become only first victims of this conflict.  The fact that it happened otherwise is due only to the strong nerves, powerful will and geopolitical vision of two people: Joseph Stalin and Józef Piłsudski.

Voykov’s body was solemnly buried near the Kremlin Wall, and his name in a mourning frame can still be read today on a marble plaque in the building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. The Poles apologised to Moscow, and the perpetrator himself, as mentioned, received a sentence, perhaps not the highest, but a severe one.  The other circumstances of the case, including the possible international ties of the assassins and their likely principals, have not been investigated, at least not officially.  The Soviet side welcomed the condolences and although the press in the East speculated about the White Poles’ March no further provocations took place.

Perfidious Albion

Britons kept the Polish dog but had to bark themselves. In December 1929, UK and the Soviets resumed diplomatic relations, what resulted in a series of mutually beneficial economic agreements.  Perhaps a little less favourable than London had expected two years earlier, but not all diplomatic actions have to be 100% successful.  But the lesson was also understood in Warsaw.  The next few years were the period of Marshal Piłsudski’s secret diplomacy, thanks to which not only the Polish-Soviet non-aggression pact was finally signed in 1932, but also a system of informal communication with Stalin was created.  Of course, after Piłsudski’s death in 1935, all this was wasted, and as a result, Poland, succumbing to subsequent British provocations, fell under the Nazi Germany aggression.  But this is a different story.

Considering facts – we have no evidence of who put the weapon in Kowerda’s hand. However, is it so difficult to guess who also today, after 95 years, is again interested in starting a diplomatic and then an armed conflict between Warsaw and Moscow?  Are the interests behind provocations such as the one on Victory Day not clear enough?

Unfortunately, this time we do not have Piłsudski, and Stalin cannot be relied on either. We have to deal with ourselves.