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According to this Reuters article, Poland is demanding approximately $1.3 trillion in reparations from Germany. If it wasn't Reuters, I would think this is just what many here call "Russian propaganda".

Other then in this question I am not asking about the reasons for demanding reparations, but about the time this demand has been made. I personally can't think of a less suitable moment for such demands. All NATO and EU countries including Germany are now united in their solidarity towards Eastern European countries like Poland, but at the same time, Poland making that demand is definitely not good for its relations with Germany. By solidarity I mean West European countries including German moving their troops and military equipment to Eastern European countries.

Why now? Why has Poland not made this demand a year or more ago? Or why not wait at least until the current conflict is over to make this demand?

While the government of Poland have mentioned that they want to demand reparations before, this seems to be the first time they demanding explicitly some amount of money. Is it just bad timing?

convert
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    Pretty related https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75162/what-are-the-pros-and-cons-of-demanding-1-3-trillion-in-reparation-from-germany – the gods from engineering Sep 04 '22 at 21:47
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    "All NATO and EU countries including Germany are now united in their solidarity to east European countries like Poland" → Wait, what? Where did you get this idea from? EU right now may be "united" (heavy quotes there) in their solidarity to Ukraine in particular, but have been pestering and even sanctioning Poland because of their policies for years (and still are!). Same goes for Hungary. If anything, it's East-European countries like Poland who are now showing more solidarity towards EU than before the war. – walen Sep 05 '22 at 09:49
  • Certainly not because the Polish government expects to get $1.3 trillion anytime soon. – NoDataDumpNoContribution Sep 05 '22 at 19:30
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    The premise of the question "now" is wrong; Poland has been talking about that again and again. See for example https://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/polen-zweiter-weltkrieg-regierungspolitiker-wollen-von-deutschland-reparationen-a-1161085.html (in German) from 2017. Of course they don't push too hard; you can't really reopen the reparations question without reopening the question about the former German territories east of the Oder, an noone wants that. – Guntram Blohm Sep 05 '22 at 20:05
  • @GuntramBlohm your comment could be an answer. – FluidCode Sep 06 '22 at 13:46
  • @GuntramBlohm Unfortunately the sorce is paywalled. – convert Sep 11 '22 at 12:30
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    @convert that might depend on your geolocation, it isn't for me. But searching google for "polen deutschland reparationen" and restricting the date range to 2017 finds a lot more results, like https://www.dw.com/de/polen-pocht-auf-reparationen/a-40310276 and https://www.zeit.de/gesellschaft/zeitgeschehen/2017-08/zweiter-weltkrieg-polen-fordert-reparationszahlungen-aus-deutschland-pis-jaroslaw-kaczynski – Guntram Blohm Sep 11 '22 at 12:34
  • @GuntramBlohm Zeit article is also paywalled, but the DW article saing that poland wanted to demand reparations but no concrete demands were made. Posibly I mised something in that article? – convert Sep 11 '22 at 12:42
  • No you didn't; the specific amount is new, while the general demands aren't. They generally made the news a few times, got ignored, and forgotten two weeks later. – Guntram Blohm Sep 11 '22 at 12:53
  • @GuntramBlohm And thats what my question was about: concrete demand at this concrete moment. – convert Sep 11 '22 at 14:39
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    Based on a (subjective, of course) extrapolation of that the Poles on the streets think, it's remnants (or the upcoming) of the wishful imperial thinking with Warsaw in the centre. –  Sep 28 '22 at 22:46
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    I don't see why this is a duplicate. Voting to reopen. – Allure Oct 11 '22 at 15:56
  • @Rick Smith So what exactly is wrong about this question? – convert Jan 20 '23 at 14:23
  • @Joe W Also would like to know the reason for downvote. – convert Jan 20 '23 at 14:32
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    Voted to close. The question is based on false assumptions that Poland hasn't made similar demands before and is too broad and speculative. – sfxedit Jan 20 '23 at 19:16
  • @convert - This question focuses only on the "now" part of reparations, but that answer appears at https://politics.stackexchange.com/a/75168/26455. "It's about an internal political campaign to rebuild support for the ruling party." That angle was given in the answer to this question by Fizz. Adding the line about Leopard tanks didn't change the question in any significant way. It is still a duplicate because the other question had an answer to this question two days before this question was asked. – Rick Smith Jan 20 '23 at 21:13
  • @Rick Smith It was not so much about Leopard tanks, but disagreement between Poland and Germany. The answer to the other question answering why Poland demand reparations, but not why exactly now. All the reasons mentioned in that answer were also valide in the past. – convert Jan 20 '23 at 21:40
  • @sfxedit At least officially have never heared about such demands befor. What is exactly broad and speculative in this question? – convert Jan 20 '23 at 21:55
  • @convert - It's right there in the linked article that says they have been asking for money since 2015 and have just been increasing the amount every time a demand is made - Poland's new estimate tops the $850 billion estimate by a ruling party lawmaker from 2019. The ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party has repeated calls for compensation several times since it took power in 2015 .... – sfxedit Jan 21 '23 at 05:34
  • @Rick Smith Don´t see why it´s a duplicate, posibly off topic, but defenetly not a duplicate. However, how can I improve the question so you posibly decide to take back the downvote? – convert Jan 21 '23 at 12:50
  • @convert - See the Politics Meta post, Should a question be marked as a duplicate if there's already an applicable answer on a different question?, and my answer that includes the quote "Questions may be duplicates if they have the same (potential) answers. This includes not only word-for-word duplicates, but also the same idea expressed in different words." As I explained, there is an answer to this question in the earlier post. – Rick Smith Jan 21 '23 at 16:06
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    There have been 10 edits since this question was closed, each time reviewed and left closed. Please consider opening a question on Politics Meta, to allow for a more complete discussion about the closure of this question. – Rick Smith Jan 21 '23 at 16:15
  • @Rick Smith Disagree that this is duplicate and I am not the only one. Thought that curent events could be an explanation and make the question on topic again. Unfortunately since this question has answers, I can´t delete it editing is the only way to improve it and posibly get rid of some downvotes. – convert Jan 21 '23 at 18:04
  • Could the downvoters explain their reasons? – convert Jan 27 '23 at 15:14
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    Please stop editing the question to push it into the review queue; it doesn't seem the closure reason has been resolved. The question has been left closed in reciew at least a dozen times now. Feel free to solicit help on our meta site if you think the question can be made on topic but you're not sure how to get there. – JJJ Jan 27 '23 at 21:08
  • @JJJ Unfortunatelly it´s the only way to get any atention and posibly get rid of some downvotes. I could agree that the question is off topic, but not a duplicate. Also since it has upvoted answers, I can´t delete it. Since I can´t delete it don´t know what else to do with the question. – convert Jan 27 '23 at 21:57
  • If you want it deleted you can always raise a moderator flag and ask them to do that. – Joe W Jan 28 '23 at 15:52
  • @Joe W But as it has aswers it can´t be deleted, already asked moderator for some other question. – convert Jan 28 '23 at 15:54
  • And moderators have the ability to delete questions regardless of the status of answers being on the question. I have asked moderators on stack exchange to delete a question with upvoted answers and they have done it for me. Moderators have a lot of power that normal users don't and that includes being able to delete pretty much anything. – Joe W Jan 28 '23 at 15:58
  • @Joe W But like I said moderator refused it for some other question. Also wondering if eve he would agree about posible consequences for me. – convert Jan 28 '23 at 16:01
  • Because they denied your request on a different question you are not even going to try for this question? You seem perfectly happy to have this question sent to the review queue 14 times and drawing more attention to it but not to raise a simple flag when you claim you want to delete it but cant? – Joe W Jan 28 '23 at 16:04
  • @Joe W To be honest, was thinking that the improvements were at least good enough to get rid of some downvotes. For downvoted question sending them to review queue is the only way to get any atention. – convert Jan 28 '23 at 16:11
  • Your question has enough downvotes that it won't be seen on the front page and people are likely only encountering it through the repoen vote queue. And when they start seeing it appear there over and over again for trivial edits it is likely to attract more downvotes and not revert existing ones. – Joe W Jan 28 '23 at 16:13
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    This question is being discussed in Politics Meta. – Rick Smith Jan 29 '23 at 19:26

2 Answers2

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To quote from the very article you link to, according to critics/oppn the timing seems related to PiS' eroding popularity at a time of economic difficulties, as well apparently another way to criticize Berlin for not doing enough for Ukraine.

The ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party has repeated calls for compensation several times since it took power in 2015, but Poland hasn't officially demanded reparations. [...]

The combative stance towards Germany, often used by PiS to mobilize its constituency, has strained relations with Berlin. It intensified after Russia invaded Ukraine amid criticism of Berlin's dependence on Russian gas and its slowness in helping Kyiv.

Donald Tusk, leader of Poland's biggest opposition party Civic Platform, said on Thursday that Kaczynski's announcement was "not about reparations".

"It's about an internal political campaign to rebuild support for the ruling party," he said.

PiS is still leading in most opinion polls but its edge over Civic Platform has narrowed in recent months amid criticism of its handling of surging inflation and an economic slowdown.

According to another article in Politico this is still not an official request by the gov't of Poland.

Kaczyński’s demand is still not official government policy, and Warsaw hasn’t issued any formal request to Berlin.

Otherwise it goes over the same points, adding that Germany is extremely unlikely to pay as they rejected a similar call from Greece, apparently considering all debts settled by the 1990 treaty that reunified Germany.

One might guess that some EU-level disagreements about Poland's internal policies (rule-of-law etc.) might also have something to do with PiS' combative attitude against Germany on this, in general. On the latter issue, as of beginning of Aug, the EU was still not releasing "€35 billion in loans and grants from its pandemic recovery fund" to Poland, over those disputes. And as a matter of timing...

The [Polish] parliamentary report [...] was commissioned five years ago but [its] publication was repeatedly delayed. [...]

In a keynote speech in Prague earlier this week, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, had signalled a more confrontational stance over Poland’s crackdown on judicial independence, saying EU funds should be tied to the maintenance of rule-of-law standards.

Of course, PiS' would probably not agree with characterizations like the above.

the gods from engineering
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All NATO and EU countries including Germany are now united in their solidarity to east European countries like Poland,

It's not perceived in Poland this way. Western companies are reluctant to leave Russia, Germany waits forward to go back to gas deals with Russia. Plus blocking EU funds for Poland.

Of course the situation is more complex than this and the concerns about judicial system in Poland need to be addressed, but still below meme got quite popular in Poland.

enter image description here

NoDataDumpNoContribution
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Tadeusz Kopec
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    There's a hint of an answer here, but I suspect that more context would have to be added than just saying that a vaguely related meme explains the signal for signal (threat for threat, maybe) exchange. Especially given that the the OP may be unaware of the current difference between a demand and a thinly veiled threat of a potential future demand. (This answer also refers to certain higher caliber guns in the game than those exposed by the OP, but not in the body of the answer, and glosses over the difference between Germany and the EU.) – Jirka Hanika Sep 05 '22 at 08:58