Transformacja strategiczna obronności III Rzeczypospolitej

One of the most important and urgent challenges for Poland after 1989 was to create a national strategy and shape relevant independent defence policy. The author describes the first stage of the activity of the state in this area, i.e. the nineties of the last century as a period of standing out in strategic independence and building this independence after 40 years of strategic incapacitation within the Warsaw Pact. Three basic strategic documents of that time are thoroughly analysed: 1. Defence doctrine of 1990 – as a still „shy” attempt of independence, 2. Security policy and defence strategy of 1992, the main idea of which can be described as a strategic turn towards the West, 3. Defence strategy of 2000, which is a synthesis of national defence dimension in the conditions of NATO membership. This analysis shows the way that Poland has paved from a strategic incapacitation within the Warsaw Pact framework, through strategic independence of the nineties to the strategy of equal membership within a democratic alliance at the threshold of the 21st century.