THE PRESS DISPUTE OF POLES AND UKRAINIANS AROUND THE ISSUE OF SABOTAGE AND PACIFICATION IN 1930 IN THE LVIV PRESS AND ITS CON-SEQUENCES FOR POLISH-UKRAINIAN RELATIONS AND THE SECURITY OF THE SECOND POLISH REPUBLIC

Abstract

Media always constituted the tool for conducting operations about propaganda character. Frequently, particularly in extreme situations, they were also used to lead hot wars to promote determined political opinions or rightness. On account of the intense influence of media on societies, all such battles affected the state security system. If the dispute had character exclusively regional, effects of the press war were curbed; if the press dispute exceeded national borders, its consequences were definitely greater – from damaging the authority to international stigmatizing. The Polish-Ukrainian media dispute, which exploded around coercive action, taken concerning sabotage conducted by Ukrainian nationalists in the summer months of 1930 in Eastern Małopolska, had enormous meaning for the security system of the Second Polish Republic. In the first phase, it had a significant influence on worsening, and this way not best already, of Polish-Ukrainian relations in the Polish state. In the second phase, after triggering the defamatory campaign off at the Polish address on the international arena, it resulted in the League of Nations accepting nine complaints against Poland under pressure from public opinion and part of the influential politicians. It took effect with the annual proceeding of the matter what damaged the authority of Poland in the international arena as well as strengthened the adverse image of the Republic in many countries.