Sikorski — Paris, autumn 1939

Władysław Sikorski, 58, is a Polish general politically marginalised since 1928 by the colonels' regime (Sanacja). A former Prime Minister (1922-1923), Minister of War (1924-1925), he had spent his intellectual exile in Paris in the 1930s publishing works of military doctrine — The Future War (1934), in which he anticipates mechanised warfare and the decisive role of air power. Mobilised in September 1939, he has been given no operational command: Rydz-Śmigły and Beck regarded him as an opponent.

With the Soviet invasion on 17 September, Sikorski makes his way to Paris via Romania and Yugoslavia. President Ignacy Mościcki, interned in Romania, has — under the Polish Constitution of 1935 — the power to name his successor from abroad. So as not to hand power to Bolesław Wieniawa-Długoszowski (a Sanacja figure), he designates Władysław Raczkiewicz, a non-aligned moderate, who takes the oath at the Polish embassy in Paris on 30 September 1939.

Raczkiewicz at once appoints Sikorski Prime Minister and Minister for Military Affairs. On 7 November 1939, Sikorski also becomes Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Armed Forces. Sikorski inherits some 85,000 Polish soldiers escaped to Romania and Hungary who must be repatriated to France, diplomatic relations to be rebuilt with Paris and London, and an explosive Soviet question: recognise the Soviet occupation of eastern Poland, or not?