Adam Rapacki (24 December 1909 – 10 October 1970) was a leading Polish Communist politician and diplomat from 1947 to 1968. He started in the socialist movement but in 1948 joined the Central Committee of the new Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR), and became a member of its Politburo. It had very close ties to the Kremlin. He is best known for his 1957 proposal for the creation of nuclear-free zones in Europe; it was never adopted. He maintained good relations with East Germany while warning against West German expansionism. Piotr Wandycz finds that he was well educated, cosmopolitan, pragmatic, liberal and ambitious, and imbued with a sense of patriotism and belief in cooperation with the left in Western Europe. Biography Rapacki was born by Marian Rapacki and Maria Rapacka in Lemberg, Austria-Hungary (modern Lviv, Ukraine) on 24 December 1909. Due the start of World War I, he and his parents moved to Piotrków Trybunalski, and to Warsaw in 1919. During his early life in the city, he attended gymnasium from 1920 to 1929, and the SGH Warsaw School of Economics from 1929 to 1931. In 1931, he joined the Union of Independent Socialist Youth, a Socialist group operating in Warsaw. After graduating university in 1932, he joined the 28th Infantry Division, and continuing his career in the Union, he shortly became a member of its council. He often took part in fights with the National Radical Camp and demonstrations. Recruited to the army on the 24 August 1939, he fought in the invasion of Poland by Germany as a second lieutenant and the leader of a platoon in the 36th Infantry Regiment of the Academic League. He was taken into captivity on the 22 September near the Modlin Fortress and spent the rest of World War II in prisoner-of-war camps. Rapacki engaged in many rebellious activities, such as writing anti-Nazi books and secret newspapers, joined leftist groups and learnt Russian. Freed in April 1945, he returned to Poland in July. He joined the Polish Socialist Party in August 1945 and moved to Warsaw in January 1946. In August, along with a group of Polish socialists, he entered the party's Central Committee. He joined the preparation for the upcoming elections to the Legislative Sejm, and during the 1947 Polish legislative election, he was appointed an envoy. He was appointed Minister of Shipping on 16 April, 1947. From 11 January to