"IT SURPASSES OUR COMPREHENSION". POST-WAR POLAND IN FOREIGN PRESS OF THE 40s

This paper presents a depiction of Poland in the aftermath of the war, based on reports from foreign journalists and observers published in American, English, and Swedish newspapers and magazines1. Unlike the Polish press, foreign observers who were able to penetrate behind the Iron Curtain provided descriptions of Poland in the 1940s as it was perceived at the time. The state they revealed was far from being politically independent and free. It was ruled according to totalitarian standards that were in stark contrast to the concept of democracyas understood by the West