Krajowa Rada Narodowa in Polish (translated as State National Council or Homeland National Council, abbreviated to KRN) was a parliament-like political body created during the later stages of World War II in German-occupied Warsaw, Poland. It was intended as a communist-controlled center of authority, challenging organs of the Polish Underground State. The existence of the KRN was later accepted by the Soviet Union and the council became to a large extent subjugated and controlled by the Soviets.
The KRN was established on the night of 31 December 1943 on the initiative of the Polish communist party, the Polish Workers' Party (PPR), then led by Władysław Gomułka. It was the implementation of the party's Central Committee decision of 7 November 1943. The council was declared to be the "actual political representation of the Polish nation, empowered to act on behalf of the nation and manage its affairs until the time of Poland's liberation from the occupation". From the beginning, the KRN viewed the prewar Sanation government and the contemporary Polish government in exile as illegitimate, based on the "elitist-totalitarian" April Constitution, "whose legality had never been recognized by the nation", and as representative of narrow reactionary interests. The new government formation would be based on the "worker-peasant alliance" and on the alliance with the Soviet Union. The Armia Ludowa was established as the KRN's armed force. The exile government and the Polish Underground State, especially the Armia Krajowa command, were worried by this development and by the progressing social radicalization in Poland by Soviet strings. They accelerated the formation of the already planned Council of National Unity (Rada Jedności Narodowej, RJN), their own parliament, created on 9 January 1944.
