AVAILABLE TRANSCRIPTIONS OF BROADCASTS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01070R000100550001-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 13
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 13, 2007
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: February 4, 1983
• Content Type: MEMO

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4 February 1983
SUBJECT: Available Transcriptions of Broadcasts
We have on file the following transcriptions oladcasts. If
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28 December, 8:00 PM, C-SPAN, PRESS CONFERENCE: Ambassador
Zdzislaw Rurarz,former Polish Ambassador to Japan.
20 January, 4:10 PM, WMCA Radio (NY), THE BOB GRANT SHOW,
Interview with Admiral Bobby Inman.
29 January, 9:05 AN, WNUR Radio (MA), ON THE AGENDA, Interview
with John Loftus, author of "The Belarus Secret"
STAT
STAT
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RADIO N REPORTS, INC.
4701 WILLARD AVENUE, CHEW CHASE, MARYLAND 20815 656-4068
Press Conference:
Ambassador Zdzislaw Rurarz
DATE December 28, 1982 8:00 P.M. CITY Washington, DC
WILLIAM GILL: If any of you didn't get the press
release or the Ambassador's statement, we have some, I believe,
both at the door and up here. So you can come up and get it.
I am William Gill, a friend of the Ambassador's. And on
Saturday morning I picked up the Washington Post and I found a
two-paragraph notice on the run-over page for the story on Poland
that morning that ex-Ambassador Rurarz, now in the U.S., receives
death sentence in absentia. I immediately thought that something
ought to be done to at least write a little insurance policy,
perhaps, on the Ambassador's life. And so I called him, and we
got our friends at the Council for the Defense of Freedom, and
they agreed to cooperate with us in this press conference this
morning.
The Ambassador has a statement to make, and then it will
be open to questions.
AMBASSADOR ZDZISLAW RURARZ: Ladies and gentlemen, Mr.
Gill. On December 17, 1982, the military tribunal in Warsaw
passed.on me a death sentence in absentia for allegedly
committing high treason. The real treason, of course, is the
treason that General Jaruzelski and his junta committed against
Poland and our people when they proclaimed martial law a year ago
and proceeded to suppress the free trade union movement
Solidarity.
Actually, what Jaruzelski's junta did was to declare war
against the Polish people, a war that the world knows was
instigated by the Soviet Union. At the time this war was
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declared against Poland, I was representing the Polish People's
Republic in the capacity of its ambassador to Japan. I decided
to discontinue my service to that government and seek political
asylum in the United States because I could not participate in
the war against my own nation. This is what the junta calls
treason and this is why they have now sentenced me to death.
I do not take this sentence lightly. There have been
many examples over the years of death sentences being carried out
in other countries against exiles from communism. The murder of
Leon Trotsky in Mexico was not the first such example, and there
have been many since.
The assassination attempt in Rome last year on Pope John
Paul II may well have been the result of a secret death sentence
pronounced against him by the Soviet KGB, the criminal
conspiracy that suppresses the Russian people, as well as the
people of Poland and of all other countries under Soviet control.
Certainly, the evidence unearthed thus far by the Italian
authorities strongly indicates a close connection between the
Turkish assassin Agca and the Bulgarian arm of the KGB. Indeed,
according to the article published in the Washington Post on
Sunday, Italian judicial sources now say, and I quote from The
Post, the story of Bulgarian participation in the attack came
from Agca, who is serving a life sentence in a central Italian
prison for shooting the Pope.
As an officer of the Polish People's Republic, I hoped
for years that the communist system could be reformed and that
eventually the KGB would be forced to loosen its iron grip on the
Russian people and on the peoples of the other countries under
Soviet domination. But when the Jaruzelski regime, at the behest
of the U.S.S.R., declared war on my country and on my people last
December, I concluded that it is impossible to reform the
communist system. The events in Poland since then have confirmed
that this conclusion was correct.
The lifting of martial law in Poland this past week is a
mirage concocted by the junta and their KGB bosses to fool the
West. Both Poland and the Soviet Union are in desperate need of
more trade, of more foreign exchange to rescue their faltering
economies and sustain the Soviet military buildup.
I spent most of my career in the international trade
arena, and I know how important, indeed how absolutely necessary
trade with the West is to the communist bloc. Without it, quite
simply, they could not sustain their economies, and they
certainly could not continue to support the Soviet armament
drive.
The death sentence passed on me that I made the right
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decision -- proves that I made the right decision when I asked
for political asylum in the United States a year ago. That
sentence will not deter me in my efforts to unmask the true image
of the U.S.S.R. and of the traitorous junta it has imposed upon
Poland. In fact, I pledge to my fellow Poles that I will work
all the harder to help them reveal to the world the true charac-
ter of the terrorist regime which the Soviet Union has clamped
upon them.
The shame that General Jaruzelski and his junta has
inflicted on our Polish soldiers must be washed away. And it is
my firm belief that in time it will be washed away.
Poland is not lost. Freedom will live again in Poland.
But if the West weakens in its resolve to support the Polish
people against their oppressors, the restoration of freedom can
only be delayed.
I fervently hope, as virtually all Poles hope, that the
West, with the leadership of the United States, will not waver in
supporting the natural aspirations of our people.
Thank you for your attention.
GILL: Open the questions.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, we noticed the security agents
around the room. Are these your private agents, or is the
government supplying these for you?
RURARZ: Well, it is the government which is supplying
me with the security.
MAN: Are these Secret Service agents, or what security
arm do they come from?
RURARZ: Well, I don't know. From governmental
agencies, I believe.
MAN: Well, the Department of Agriculture? The National
Park Service? What agency? Would one of them like to respond?
RURARZ: Well, I think you are familiar what agencies
are doing the job of this kind. Well, I am not familiar with
certain intimate organizations of your Secret Service.
MAN: Maybe Mr. Gill can help us, if these gentlemen
don't want to...
GILL: I'd like to get on to more a serious subject than
who the agents are. I don't think that's what we came for.
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MAN: Mr. Ambassador, you referred to the -- you
referred to the possible sentence on the Pope passed by the KGB.
Do you think that it was just the KGB that was behind, or does it
have to go higher than Mr. Andropov himself at that time to
decide upon the murder of the Pope?
RURARZ: Well, I have never had any slightest doubt.
When I for the first time learned about the attempt on the Pope's
life in Tokyo, I immediately was led to believe that the Soviets
were behind.
And when it comes to the Bulgarian connection, I think
it would be of interest to you if I would reveal the following
story, which could indirectly answer your question. Last year,
in January, before going to Japan, I was making a tour of Africa.
And inter alia, I visited also Nigeria, Lagos. And I went to a
friend of mine, Polish Ambassador Vitold Rurarsh (?), whose name
is a bit similar to mine, who was living in the embassy compound.
And he told me that a few days before I came, his embassy was
robbed by some thieves. And when he complained to the Bulgarian
Ambassador about the act, the Bulgarian Ambassador provided him
immediately with the gun. And he was even showing me that nine
millimeter Browning gun.
I later even spoke to this Ambassador Alexandrov, who is
the brother of Vice Premier, Bulgarian Vice Premier Ukanov (?).
So that the very fact that the Bulgarian ambassadors are freely
distributing the guns is something, I believe. I was
[unintelligible] ambassador. And believe me, I neither had the
gun nor I was distributing them.
So that I believe that this Bulgarian connection and all
these assassinations attempt, and so on, are certainly decided on
the political level. I believe that it was the Politburo in the
U.S.S.R. which decided to kill the Polish Pope. And it was
almost carried out.
MAN: You've been in this country now for a year. Does
it surprise you that the American press has downplayed this
story, have put it generally on the inside pages? Do you
think...
RURARZ: Well, I think that many people here still want
to believe that the Soviets are something different than they
are. I, myself, can say I know the Soviets. I have been more
than 50 times in the U.S.S.R. I speak as fluently Russian as
Polish. I was in the Soviet [unintelligible] think tank. I have
very intimate knowledge of various Soviet strategies and tactics.
And I do not have any slightest doubt that the Soviet intentions
are the worst ones.
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This, by the way, led me also to the defection. Not
only the very declaration of the martial law in Poland, but I was
thinking about joining the forces with the West sometime ago
before, because I was very much aware of what the Soviets are
preparing against the West.
And may I say at this juncture that I, myself, in the
past was high-ranking military intelligence officer, and I was
quite aware of what the war preparations by the Soviets against
the West are.
Still, however, many people here believe that there is
something to the contrary.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, what do you think the U.S. should
do about the sanctions?
RURARZ: Against whom, by the way?
MAN: Against Poland.
RURARZ: Well, I think that they should continue,
because there should be no rewarding of certain acts as those
committed against the Polish nation. And if at that time the
United States would withdraw certain sanctions, it will be a
wrong signal to the Polish nation.
By the way, the Polish nation is the only nation right
now which is supporting the sanctions against itself. But we
will survive even those sanctions. However, the people will not
waver in their resistance to Jaruzelski and to the Soviet
domination.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, a two-part question. Number one,
do you have any close family still in Poland? And number two, do
you have any trepidations or concern about reprisals taken
against them in order to get to you?
RURARZ: Yes. I have the close family. I have the
mother, mother-in-law, brother, brother-in-law, and two sisters.
I do not have any contact with them. And I must say that I am
prepared for the acts of this sort you have in mind. Or probably
they have been already taken. I don't have the contact.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, what future role do you see for
Lech Walesa and the Solidarity trade union movement?
RURARZ: Well, I think I should repeat what many of you
maybe have not known about that what I was saying upon my
defection. Right after Solidarity was created in Poland, due to
my connections, I was told by one of the Politburo members -- I
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still would not like to reveal his name because he's still the
Politburo member -- that the Soviets did not agree to the
establishment of Solidarity, and they agreed only under two
conditions: that either very soon the Polish government would
have a total control over this Solidarity movement and the other
democratic organizations, or it would be obliged to do away at
the proper moment. Since the control was out of the question, so
the only solution was to suppress the existence of Solidarity and
of other democratic organizations.
What was done? And as I declared before the
congressional commission a year ago, I, myself, received, as the
Ambassador in Tokyo, in March, after the so-called Bydgoszcz
provocation, the cable, urgent cable from Warsaw stating to me
that if the general strike materializes because of this Bydgoszcz
preparation, there will be the state of war in Poland.
And afterwards, when I was in June in Poland, of the
last year, there were very mixed signals. But I knew that the
preparations for the state of war were going on.
And by the way, and I don't think the Soviets have
changed their mind. Solidarity was dissolved and will continue
to be dissolved. Certainly it will exist in the underground.
What is the role and the future of Lech Walesa? I am
very much concerned about his future. Even during the so-called
Gierek era, which was a golden age in Poland, many of the trade
union activists, those who were active in December 1970 and
January 1971 in the strikes, mysteriously died. Many of them.
Walesa could be -- I wouldn't like to speculate -- also a victim
like that. That is no joke.
MAN: In your statement, you talk about death sentences
being carried out in other countries against exiles from
communism. Has there been any threats since you've been here on
your life?
RURARZ: Well, there are the efforts to locate me. And
certainly I must be prepared at -- they would like to make a
point of that. Because otherwise any of their followers, like
me, could be even encouraged if the verdicts of this kind are
somehow unsuccessful. So that there certainly will be the
efforts to make good the verdict. There is no doubt about that.
But we shall see how it will work.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, would you elaborate on your
comment about Walesa? You're very much concerned about him.
What do you mean by that?
RURARZ: Well, he could not only be arrested or
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detained in any ways, as recently the case was, but there are
thousands of ways of doing away with a person physically.
May I just say that you know Walesa's name because he
was famous in Gdansk. But another man who was not less famous,
it was Jurczich (?), who is still under detention. His children
mysteriously jumped through the window and fell to their deaths.
That was that.
And the Bishop Kluze (?) of Gdansk, who is the friend of
Walesa, was recently driving the car, Polish-made Fiat 125, and
the brakes were mysterously blocked and he [unintelligible]
deaths.
Well, I wouldn't like to speculate. I wish Walesa all
Here is the picture when Walesa came to Japan. Contrary
to the instructions of my government, I made a big reception for
him. And he's here, and my wife and me. So that I somehow have
a personal approach to...
MAN: What is the other photo?
RURARZ: The other photo is with the Pope, also in
Tokyo. And he was congratulate me, by the way, last year on my
51st birthday.
So that I am very much concerned. There is, as I said,
no jokes in that system. I know it only too well.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, the Italian government has warned
that they will try to protect the integrity of their territory
against the operations, covert operations of Bulgarian
intelligence. Would it be helpful to you and to Ambassador
Spasowski (?), who's also under a death sentence, if the United
States Government would issue a warning to the Polish government
that it would not tolerate or would be prepared to react if they
should try to do here what the Bulgarians were doing in Italy?
RURARZ: Well, I cannot suggest anything to the U.S.
Government. I am very much grateful...
RURARZ: Well, I think that this is not only the
challenge against me, but against the host country as well.
Because if somebody is trying to carry out his would-be laws in
another country, it is some sort of the act of aggression against
other countries -- against other country and against its laws. I
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understand this. Whether the same is understood by the
government of the host country, it is of course not for me to
speculate on that.
MAN: Did you ever receive any official information that
the Russians would actually invade Poland? Were they on the
verge of invading Poland?
RURARZ: Well, I have heard that information. In early
in December of 1980, there was a meeting in Moscow of Warsaw Pact
countries in which also participated the ministers of national
defenses of Warsaw Pact countries and some ministers from the
so-called KGBs or their equivalents. And at that time, the
discussion of military Soviet intervention in Poland took place.
And as far as I know -- and I knew this from very reliable
sources -- Andropov, who at that time was the head of the Soviet
KGB, ws the first one to recommend the military intervention
against Poland. And Yipichev (?), a political commissar of the
Red Army, was the second one. Honecker of Eastern Germany was
the third one. Brezhnev, at that time, was hesitating.
And therefore, what I cannot forgive Jaruzelski is that
he -- well, I don't know whether he yielded to the Soviet
pressure. Maybe he, himself, rather wanted that kind of state of
war which he introduced. But I believe that for the Soviets, in
case of the organized resistance by the Polish Army, the price
could be too high, and they were hesitating.
And afterwards, when I was in Moscow law year, also in
June, I knew, in Moscow and in Warsaw, that the Soviets actually
had three staffs prepared for the intervention in Poland. One
was in Wulf (?), near the Polish frontier. The second one was in
Legnica in western-southern Poland, where there is the
headquarters of the Soviet Army Group North, so-called. And the
third one was in Warsaw.
But the Soviets could not, could not muster enough force
to intervene in Poland at that time. They believed that, as far
as I know, that the suppression of the Polish Army and of the
resistance movement would involve at least one million soldiers
of the Red Army, and they didn't have that many [unintelligible]
at that time.
So that they were pressing Jaruzelski to do this dirty
job what he did.
MAN: The Italian Minister of Defense said that the
attempt on the Pope's life was an alternative to the invasion of
Poland. Do you agree with that? Do you think that's plausible?
RURARZ: I think so. I think so. The very fact that
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the Pope visited Poland in 1979 and he somehow mobilized morally
the Poles. The Poles, for the first time in the postwar period,
saw how strong they were. There were millions of them, extremely
well-disciplined.
Besides, the Pope conveyed the message to them that if
any changes -- and the change, by the way, was already around
the corner in Poland -- should be peaceful. And this very fact
somehow influenced this course of events in Poland.
And they were afraid -- I mean the Soviets -- that the
Pope has remained the spiritual leader of that movement in
Poland, of Solidarity and of other, due to his moral influence in
Poland and his international stature, that he was the shield
protecting that Polish democratization movement or process, as
we're calling that. So elimination of the Pope could have been
interpreted by many of the Poles that the situation was reversed,
that now they are somehow left without a spiritual leader.
So that the assassination of the Pope, I think, was
something which was worth of risking for the Soviets. And they
were very close, by the way, to the success of that attempt.
MAN: ...Mr. Walesa's visit to Tokyo. I wonder if you
had an opportunity to warn Mr. Walesa about possible martial law.
RURARZ: Yes. I spoke with him eyeball-to-eyeball. I
have even the picture, not along with me. And I told him whether
he was prepared for the worst.
He told me, "Yes. I was prepared -- I am prepared for
the worst. But I will continue to stay this way." And he did.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, if you believe the attempted
assassination was a death sentence pronounced by the KGB, by
extension you must be blaming Mr. Andropov.
RURARZ: Yes. Certainly yes. The special services of
the Eastern countries are extremely disciplined, extremely
centralized, and there cannot be any initiative on someone's
hand. There must be the decision of the highest authorities.
And I have not slightest doubt that this was that.
And may I say at this moment that the war waged by the
U.S.S.R. against Poland is, of course, having a long history.
And whatever the Soviets could do to eliminate certain of eminent
Poles, they were doing, starting with Kattin (?) and ending with
the Pope, and I don't know with whom else.
MAN: Would you disagree, then, with the New York Times
editorial of last Saturday which said that this may have been
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done by private parties in Bulgaria...
RURARZ: No.
MAN: ...or by an ambiguous signal that was
misunderstood by somebody?
RURARZ: I rule out that absolutely as a possibility. I
RURARZ: I have the intimate knowledge of how these
things are being done. Everything is being meticulously
prepared. Everything is being meticulously discussed, and then
so on. And then afterwards, all the instructions and all the
orders are very, very well prepared.
No, no, no. It is a different kind of business over
MAN: Do you have any further comments on the effects of
American sanctions on Polish trade and what the effects might be
if those were lifted?
RURARZ: Well, the Polish trade is now in a very poor
shape. And right now, the share of the Western countries in
Poland's total trade fell to one-fourth only, whereas a couple
years ago it was -- the share was half of Poland's total trade.
And without fresh credits and rescheduling on favorable terms,
Poland certainly will be unable to catch up with previous growth,
and the difficulties will continue.
By the way, the profile of that credit, and even the
terms on which the debt is rescheduled, suggests that Poland can
be repaying the debt over maybe 25 years, between three and four
billion dollars a year; whereas the hard-currency earnings this
year will be only for about five billion dollars. So you can
easily imagine what the situation is.
And it was believed that probably the Soviets and the
other Eastern European countries would come to the rescue of
Poland, but this is really not the case. So that all this brunt
is being borne by the Polish nation. And, of course, this is
creating a very tense situation. And this economic situation
will be fueling the crisis in Poland for a long, long time. So
we have to expect another series of explosions in Poland.
MAN: Have you perceived any modification in the Pope's
behavior since he was shot?
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RURARZ: Well, I have the impression that he's weaker,
quite simply, physically. I don't think that he has recovered in
full, and I have the impression that probably not only the events
in Poland have, in a sense, depressed him, but very likely he's
physically weaker.
So that it has been not without effect, this even
unsuccessful attempt.
MAN: Mr. Ambassador, what have you been doing for the
last year to earn your living? What are your plans for the
future?
RURARZ: Well, I am addressing various audiences, giving
various interviews, staying close to the events in Poland, in the
sense that reading a lot the Polish newspapers and so on, writing
a book. Maybe one day it will be on the print. And that's that.
And what I will be doing in the near future, well, I'm an
economist by training. What I should like to do is to teach
economics and to participate in some research concerning the
communist economies.
MAN: Do you think that the Catholic Church in Poland
has become more conciliatory toward the government in the last
six months or so than it was earlier? And if so, why might this
be the case?
RURARZ: Yes. Well, I think that the Catholic Church is
a very vast term in Poland because you have over 95, I believe,
percent of the Polish population, which is more than 36 million,
who are the Catholics. And you have 35,000 Polish priests and
several bishops and the [unintelligible], as we call.
Certainly the church is facing an agonizing dilemma,
because many people in Poland, especially, the young, are itching
for an activist resistance. The church has a long view and
believes, or at least some in the church believe that for the
time being it would be probably better to continue with the
passive resistance and to wait for the better times, because
otherwise it could be a terrible bloodshed. And since in the
last war we were facing the extinction of the Polish nation, and
so that they are afraid that it could be repeated once again by
the Soviets.
[Cassete turned]
RURARZ: ...taking a rather more moderate stand than
many Poles do.
For how long this will last, I don't know. Because many
people in Poland are, I believe, itching for more active
resistance to what is happening right now in the country.
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MAN: Do you think that some economic reforms, some
liberalization in the economy is like -- you know, Yugoslavia-
like model is possible now in Poland?
RURARZ: No. Out of the question. I very closely
follow the results of the would-be reform.
First of all, that reform came at the worst possible
moment. That's the first thing.
Secondly, it's very, very much ambiguous.
Thirdly, because of some other factors, like, for
instance, the lack of any dialogue with the nation, the
indebtedness of Poland, and, by the way, because of running many
of the industries by the military people, who don't have any
slightest idea about anything except of this purely military
business, so that is heading for an absolute disaster.
And right now there is a big inflation in Poland. The
production was -- I mean the downtrend in production was
temporarily halted. However, the statistics are not very much
reliable. I believe they are overblown. And besides, this was
the fact of, let's say, militarization and compulsory work, and
so on, of the economy. So that the first effect certainly was,
especially in mining industries. But it's now running out of
steam, and you will not repeat the same next year. And by the
way, even the plans of extracting the coal and so on are not
supposed to be increased. So that this is that.
And for the next year, another round of difficulties is
in course for Poland. I mean first of all in the standard of
living, further inflation, budgetary deficit, and very likely
stagnating growth, so that -- besides, may I say at this time
that the so-called Hungarian reform cannot be followed in Poland.
I know very well the Hungarian reform. The Hungarians were
preparing for three years their reform, and for 12 years they
have been running it. So all together, 15 years. They are even
not in the halfway of their reform. And besides, the results are
not as encouraging as many people believe. Right now the
stagnation is very widespread in the Hungarian economy, and so
on.
So that Jaruzelski has not that much time. And besides,
even he should be not very much encouraged by the Hungarian
results.
MAN: Thank you.
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