DCI BRIEFING NOTE: POLAND

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP84B00049R000400910006-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 25, 2006
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: December 18, 1981
• Content Type: REPORT

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CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
NATIONAL FOREIGN ASSESSMENT CENTER
18 December 1981
Information as of 1230
DCI BRIEFING NOTE: POLAND
We have little information about popular reaction to
Wednesday's killings or about the status of strikes today. The
US Consul in Krakow has unconfirmed reports that miners at the
Wujeck mine, where 7 were killed on Wednesday, took three
hostages and retreated underground where provisions are stored.
The miners have announced that they will fight "until
victorious." The army, according to rumors in Warsaw, is
refusing to carry out any further orders at the coal mine.
Pravda today ran more sharp criticism of the US position on
Poland, claiming that US leaders had lost "equilibrium" and
forgotten that Poland is a member of the Warsaw Pact, not NATO.
TASS international service, in Russian, is now carrying an even
more sharply worded retort to President Reagan's remarks
yesterday. The corrmunique ridiculed the President's claim that
Solidarity sympathizers were Polish "freedom fighters." It
charged that the US government had given "direct instructions" to
counterrevolutionaries to prepare an armed uprising. It called
the US proposal for negotiations in Poland "a demand to grant
complete freedom" to counterrevolutionaries and claimed that the
administration is counting on famine to place pressure on the
Polish regime. The corrrnunique also indirectly criticized the
role of the Vatican by saying that the US government wished to
use it "for whipping up of the anti-Polish campaign." The TASS
surrmary to North America, however, highlighted the less polemical
statements, reminding the West that the post-Afghanistan economic
boycott had been a failure.
TASS also reported in English, after a full day's delay, the
deaths of miners in Silesia and placed the full blame on the
strikers, including some "outsiders," who attacked the security
forces. It is still not clear whether this report has been
replayed within the USSR. Soviet domestic media have tried to
picture the Polish internal situation as improving, though it did
report the demonstrations and casualties in Gdansk yesterday
after some delay.
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A close adviser to Jaruzelski yesterday gave a US Embassy
officer an inside look at the thinking that is guiding Poland's
military rulers. His presentation strongly suggests that the
military has no plans for seeking a political resolution to the
crisis.
In his presentation, the adviser (Wieslaw Gornicki) played
down the significance of Solidarity, saying its influence had
been overestimated. He admitted that it would not be easy to
regain the confidence of interned intellectuals without giving
any reasons for wh the military rulers thought their arrests
were necessary.
When asked how the regime hoped to win over the population
by repression, Gornicki said he believed Poland's "silent
majority" will accept or grudgingly admit the need for
compulsion. He said that force has historically served communism
and that compulsion may again work in Poland to reduce
absenteeism and thus improve productivity. This analysis ignores
the fact that the drop in productivity over the past year is due
much more to the lack of raw materials and energy than to
absenteeism and that Polish workers, although in the factories,
will respond to the harsh measures by slowdowns or sabotage, so-
called "Italian strikes."
Gornicki's claim, repeated several times, that Jaruzelski
will continue reforms rings hollow. The needed reforms rely
heavily on popular good will and will fail miserably if they are
imposed from above.
Gornicki denied that there was Soviet pressure to introduce
martial law, even disingenuously asserting that Moscow was not
consulted. He, however, specifically pointed to Soviet fears of
"encirclement" and that Poland is a crucial area for Soviet
communism, suggesting that the Soviet position was central in the
Polish regime's thinking.
Moscow may well have applied considerable pressure on Warsaw
to deny charges of Soviet instigation circulating in the press
yesterday. The Kremlin may also be annoyed by the statements to
US officials by Polish Foreign Minister Czyrek and other Polish
officials strongly implying Russian pressure.
The Soviets have assiduously sought to deny their own
involvement in Polish affairs while criticizing Washington for
its interference. Gornicki's comments that Jaruzelski is still
genuinely committed to renewal, if they are not only for Western
consumption, would also disturb the Soviet leadership, which
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surely feels that Poland must emasculate Solidarity and reassert
unchallenged party control.
0
In a crude effort to exert pressure on the US government,
Gornicki said that the authorities had found "explosive"
documents in their search of Solidarity headquarters in Warsaw
that demonstrate "deep foreign involvement" in the union. He
said the authorities did not want to publish these letters in
order to avoid further "conflagration" which could threaten
European security. He said that it was his sincere hope that all
countries, especially the US, would not be tempted to seek
"little propaganda victories" but consider instead long-range
historical transformations.
Military Highlights
There is no evidence of Soviet mobilization of reservists in
the Moscow area. Our attache there reports no activity at the
Moscow draft board and normal activity at major offices in the
city this morning.
A Soviet naval infantry detachment from the Baltic Fleet has
been located in northwest Poland since 10 December. The unit ma
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be there to protect the Soviet naval base in Swinoujscie. unit
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