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Crisis In Poland: US, USSR Involved

By VVAW

Poland recently went through a mammouth strike wave that has resulted in many changes in Polish life and government. But many people have been left in the dark by the U.S. media reporting of the events, causes and consequences of this "unrest."

First, to understand what is happening, people should throw away all their preconceptions about Poland. While it is a member of the Soviet Block, it is dominated culturally and economically by the West. (For example, 15 of 20 films recently showing in Warsaw were Western films. The Poles have also accumulated a debt of $20 billion to the West, more than the entire third world indebtedness to the entire Soviet Block.) The Polish government was very unenthusiastic about the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Catholic Church is very strong. 90% of the farmland belongs to single peasant households rather than massive state farms. Finally, three times in the has fallen in Poland as a result of worker unrest.

The cause of the present crisis in Poland was a severe economic crisis. Food shortages were so sever that visitors bringing food for relatives would be hurried through customs without delay and people were using envelopes of letters they'd received for writing letter. The reason for the crisis is that Polish debts to the West were coming due with the enormous sum of $7.6 billion scheduled for repayment this year. And due to the world economic slowdown, the demand for Polish goods has dropped badly in the world markers.

The spark for the strike wave was the government's attempt to end rationing of meat and the distribution of meat through work places; instead, the government wanted to sell meat through the higher-priced commercial shops. Strikes in protest spread all over the country. Then, in August, a militant, 60-year-old woman worker was fired at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk. Thousands of workers struck and took over the shipyard, a center for Poland's large and internationally important ship-building industry. Just as they settled their strike, eight other workplaces informed them that they were on sympathy strikes and the Gdansk workers declared their first strike over-and immediately began a second strike together with the other 8 factories. Within 2 days there were 40 more factories and several days later, there were 200. Their demands (besides pay hikes, earlier retirement, etc) now included demands for new independent trade unions, freedom for political prisoners, limitations on censorship and an access to the media for the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church got its first chance to go on TV in postwar Polish history and repaid the Gdansk workers by urging they be moderate and go back to work. Catholic spokesmen also demanded that the Church be given more representation in parliament and other Catholic Church leaders began pressing their right of moral censorship over the media.

In spite of this "help" from the Church, the government was forced to give in on nearly every issue, including releasing the country's three known political prisoners. Gierek, head of the government, had a convenient heart attack and was replaced as Communist party chief by the former security chief. Interestingly enough, Kania, the new chief, had been in charge of relations with the Catholic Church and was very friendly with them. Rumor in Warsaw was that Kania defeated his nearest rival, Olszowsky as a result of a Church veto. Another interesting rumor says that the head of Gdansk was an Olszowsky prot?g? and that he provoked the Gdansk strike to bring down Gierek.

The main fear in Poland was that the Russians would intervene and in one thing most of the Communist Party, the army and the people seemed united: if Russians invade the Poles will fight (which is probably why the Russians have held off their invasion). To the credit of the Polish government, there was no armed to prevent any incidents and behaved much better than, for instance, in similar situations in South Korea.

The American government's response has been mostly hypocritical or ignorant. The Polish desk at the U.S. State Department even said that please for economic aid to Poland from Polish-American organizations were "preposterous" and that "Poland is an enemy of the West." Then he went on vacation in the middle of the crisis.

But since when do the bankers in New York and London give $20 billion to an enemy? The Carter administration later floated an explanation to a friendly columnist, claiming that by pretending not to care the U.S. would make Soviet intervention less likely! Well, no one ever said the U.S. State Department was very smart. Meanwhile, NATO has emphasized time and again that they would do nothing in the event of a Soviet invasion.

As for the U.S. press they did give some support to the strikers (even though sympathy strikes, strikes by government workers and seizure of workplaces are all totally illegal in the U.S.—and even with legal strikes the National Guard has been called in on many occasions)> Still, Western support has been often lukewarm; seldom were lists of the workers' demands reprinted, and the press kept repeating that, if the workers got out of hand, the Soviets might intervene ( so often did they repeat this that one suspects the wish was father to the thought). After all, chronic worker unrest can impede loan repayments, and it was the attends by the governments to squeeze funds to pay the bankers that caused the whole mess in the first place.

The future will be interesting. The soviets have been forced to fork over a large loan, including hard currency (which, because they are always hurting for it, must put them in a good mood). Now will come negotiations for rescheduling and easing the Polish debt repayments. If the Poles win easier terms this could be quite a victory for all small countries being bankrupted by the bankers—and many U.S. cities too (if Poland can win better repayment terms, why not Chicago or New York)? Poland is not the only country in the situation of having to pay back Western bankers during the economic slowdown and the whole world will be watching to see how it turns out.

And will the USSR invade to impose their version of "order"? While they are clearly reluctant to do so, they have made it clear that they will not tolerate certain changes in Polish society. They've launched many press attacks on the Polish workers' movement. While this is a gross violation of Poland's national sovereignty, it is also the so-called "Brezhnev doctrine" that the USSR has the right to intervene in any socialist country to protect "socialism."

It remains to be seen whether the Poles will overstep the line the Soviets have drawn, or whether the Soviets will take advantage of some weakness to intervene. So far the threat of invasion has accomplished some of what an invasion would accomplish. The largest meeting of the Warsaw Pact gave Kania and the Polish government some time to get things under control but it is well understood that, if they don't, the Soviets will come in—and Western bankers will dance in the streets.