Conquerors of Seas and Oceans

This book examines the vision of maritime and colonial expansion developed by the Maritime and Colonial League, Poland's second largest mass organization in the interwar period. It focuses on how the League aspired to transform Poland from a land into a maritime nation, from backward and marginal to modern and central; to create 'a new, pioneering type of Pole, conqueror of seas and oceans, mosquitos and malaria (...) building bridges, taming waterfalls and carrying high the banner in the name of Poland" (Michal Pankiewicz in Morze, September 1936). Through active presence in the colonial world and by exercising power over it, Poland was to overcome its internal problems and become a modern power with global presence, on equal terms with its Western European neighbors.