page_title: Territorial evolution of Poland
section_title: Polish-Soviet border changes
hierarchical_section_title: Territorial evolution of Poland / Communist and modern Poland since 1945 / 1945 / Polish-Soviet border changes
caption_attribution_description: Poland 1945
context_page_description: Poland is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north. The total area of Poland is 312,679 square kilometres, making it the 69th largest country in the world and the ninth largest in Europe.
  From a nucleus between the Odra and Vistula rivers on the North-Central European Plain, Poland has at its largest extent expanded as far as the Baltic, the Dnieper, the Black Sea and the Carpathians, while in periods of weakness it has shrunk drastically or even ceased to exist.
context_section_description: On August 16, 1945, a border agreement between Poland and the USSR was signed. The western portion of the Byelorussian SSR was granted to Poland. The Belastok Voblast was divided into Soviet Brest Voblast, Hrodna Voblast and Polish Białystok Voivodeship.
  As a result, Poland lost about 178,000 square kilometres (69,000 square miles) of its pre-war territory in the east, but gained some 101,000 square kilometres (39,000 square miles) in the west and north.
caption: Border adjustment between Poland and the USSR on 16 August 1945.
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