Poland looks to be going ahead with plans to build a canal across the Vistula spit, providing the country with easy shipping access to the Baltic Sea. The move would allow Poland to assert its total independence from Russia.
As I outlined in the latest episode of the Jack Buckby Report, the move would give Poland the strategic, economic, and national security benefits required to move forward as a modern and thriving European nation.
Russia has been putting pressure on the European Union to stop the project going ahead, suggesting damage could be done to the ecology of the region. However, the “threat from the east” cited by Poland’s Maritime Affairs Minister Marek Gróbarczyk has proven to be a more pressing matter for the Polish government. The plans are going ahead, despite EU officials warning on 1st March that Poland should refrain from any further construction of the canal until the European Commission approves the project.
The move is almost certain to cause new tensions between Poland and the European Union, as the union battles an increasing presence of nationalists on the continent. With the European elections just a matter of months away, and an expected increase in the number of Euro-sceptic and nationalistic MEPs elected to Brussels, the European Union’s leaders will be seriously considering what move is taken next.
A combination of troublesome Brexit negotiations, feuds with Hungary and Poland refusing to play by the rules, could be prove to be a disaster for the EU. The more the EU fights Poland, the more they develop a reputation for bullying – and what country wants to remain a member of a union with leaders who don’t appreciate or understand individual matters of national security? If Poland needs to take decisions that benefit its national security, then the European Union better listen.
The Vistula Canal is just the start, and the EU would be wise to back down.