Poland’s road to NATO

As Agnieszka Łaszczuk reports, Poland needed about 10 years after the collapse of communism to become a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

On 12 March, 1999, Poland as well as the Czech Republic and Hungary, became members of the Western military alliance, officially moving away from the Russian sphere of influence.

“We are joining NATO. We are coming back to where our place is, because the alliance is a joint strength in the name of joint values,” said Poland’s then-President Aleksander Kwaśniewski, after he signed the ratification documents of Poland's membership of the Alliance at a NATO summit in Washington in 1997.