Poland unveils plan to become major military power
Poland has unveiled a new national plan that ensures it has a stronger army than any of its neighbours.
'Our army must be able to repel any threat,' Donald Tusk, the prime minister, said on Friday as he announced the 'Piast Doctrine', named after the country's founding dynasty.
Mr Tusk said the plan would have three central aims: for Poland to have 'the strongest army in the region, the strongest economy in the region and a strong position in the European Union.'
'We are ready to build the strongest army in this part of the world. We do this together, regardless of our views,' he added.
The prime minister did not define what he meant by strongest army or economy, and it was not clear if he meant that Warsaw should be militarily stronger than Russia, with whom it shares a 130-mile border.
'There is a certain level of strategic ambiguity about what they [Poland] want – they will let the Russians speculate' said Natalie Vogel, a research fellow at the IWP Center for Intermarium Studies.
Poland, which spends 4.7 per cent of its GDP on defence, already has Nato's third largest military after a rapid rearmament programme that doubled the size of the armed forces in just a decade.
Mr Tusk said the new doctrine would cement the country's pro-West orientation.
'Putting the crown on his head, Boleslaw the Brave announced that the kingdom of Poland was becoming part of the West – the West as a political community, a community of values, a community of religion,' Mr Tusk told the crowd at a ceremony in Gniezno marking the 1,000th anniversary of the coronation of the first Polish king.
'This choice, constantly renewed, sometimes questioned by our enemies, sometimes questioned by some in Poland, requires constant effort – and it is still, and will always be, relevant,' he added.
Ms Vogel said the Polish prime minister's words were 'a high level of psychological warfare, to demonstrate that they are the Europeans that are able to defend the Nato eastern flank including the Baltic state against Russian invasion'.
She added that this 'toughened up' language was also intended to combat the threat from the Right-wing opposition Law & Justice party ahead of this year's presidential election.
Mr Tusk's call on Friday for Poland to become an economic powerhouse came on the same day the Warsaw stock exchange's WIG index topped 100,000 points for the first time, a symbolic milestone reflecting the country's sustained growth.
Polish households have earned more than Spanish ones since 2023, and some economic predictions show they are due to overtake British households by 2030.
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