Józef Hieronim Retinger
- Nationality
- Poland
- Date of Birth
- 1888
- Date of Death
- 1960
- Political
Preference
Józef Retinger was a Polish diplomat, political adviser, activist and writer. Born in Kraków, Poland, then Austria-Hungary, Retinger was politically active during World War I on behalf of the Polish independence movement.
During the Second World War, Retinger became the principal adviser to the Prime Minister of Poland’s exiled government, Władysław Sikorski. He was a driving force behind the idea of creating a post-war Polish-Czechoslovak confederation, and wanted to expand it into a Central European confederation. He was also an early adapter where it came to embracing economic cooperation as a precondition for social and political stability in a post-war European order, and made a great deal of trying to convince his exiled colleagues from other governments of this too. Early on in the war, for that matter, he had conversations with Marcel-Henri Jaspar and Paul-Henri Spaak – who were enthusiastic about the idea of post-war economic cooperation – though not in a purely continental framework.
When the Polish international position deteriorated over the course of 1941 and 1942 due to the Russian participation in the war, Retinger was at the center of creating an inter-allied consultation mechanism with the Comité des Ministrès des Affaires Étrangères des Gouvernements allies, which met a dozen times between 1942 and 1943. Eventually, the plans for an Eastern European federation did not succeed, as it was sacrificed on the altar of Great Power politics when Roosevelt and Churchill did not back the plan out of fear for Soviet opposition.
After Sikorski’s tragic death in 1943, Retinger obtained approval from the new Prime Minister to parachute into occupied Poland in 1944. There, he met with resistance and underground leaders to fund their efforts.
After World War II, Retinger was a strong advocate of European unification. He helped found the European Movement International, a lobbying association to coordinate different agencies and organisations with the goal of integrating Europe, as well as the Council of Europe. He also founded the European League for Economic Cooperation (ELEC) in 1946. In doing so he could draw on his wartime contacts with people like Paul van Zeeland, Pieter Kerstens and Paul-Henri Spaak, as well as Winston Churchill.
As secretary of the International Committee of the Movements for European Unity he was closely involved with the organization of the Congress of Europe in The Hague in 1948. Retinger also initiated the Bilderberg Meetings, an annual conference established in 1954 to foster dialogue between Europe and North America.