POPE'S THREAT TO QUIT OVER POLAND REPORTED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000505140061-1
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 3, 2011
• Sequence Number: 61
• Publication Date: September 15, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2011/05/03: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505140061-1
ARTICLE APPEARED
ON PAGE
WASHINGTON TIMES
15 SEPTEMBER 1982
Pope's threat to quit.
over Poland report.
By John McKelway
WASHINGTON TIMES STAFF
NBC news says that Pope John
Paul II, in a private letter to Soviet
President Leonid Brezhnev, threat-
ened to resign and stand "shoulder
to shoulder" with the people of
Poland if Russia invaded Poland in
1980.
The assertion is contained in a
special report scheduled for broad-
cast Sept. 21. The program, a doc-
umentary called "The Man Who Shot
the Pope," also suggests that the
pope was later targeted for assassi-
nation with the assistance of, the
Soviet and Bulgarian intelligence
agencies. In this month's Reader's
Digest, an article by Clare Sterling
states that the assassination attempt
on the pope was in retaliation for
church, he was stilla Pole, and deeply
affected by developments in Poland.
And if the Russians moved against
Poland, he would lay down the crown
of St. Peter and return to his home-
land to stand shoulder to shoulder
with his people."
Kalb goes on to say that the envoy
"finally persuaded the Russians to
gamble on coexistence with Solidar-
ity rather than run the risk of an
open confrontation with the pope"
Kalb does name a source for the
story of the role the special envoy
played - American-born Msgr.
Hilary Franco. Monsignor Ftanco,
pictured in the program, says: "I do
believe that, even though the pope
belongs to the world, he's humanly
a man who loves his own country.
And 1 am sure that the pope... would
have tried... everything possible to
stop an invasion of his homeland:That remark is described by Kalb
the pontiff's support of Solidarity, in the program as "public confirma.
the free labor union now banned by tion of the papal envoy's role" The
the Polish government. monsignor is said to be a "Vatican
Sterling, who attended yesterday's insider" by Kalb.
preview of the program, said she The documentary, which runs an
had worked as a consultant on the hour and at times resembles a
NBC show travelogue, attempts to trace con-
A spokesman for the Vatican's nections between Mehmet Ali Agca,
apostolic delegation locatedbere in the Turkish gunman convicted in
Washington; called the story of the the May 1981 shooting of the pope
letter, reportedly sent by the-pope to organized crime elements in
to Brezhnev by a secret envoy, Thrkey, the Bulgarian secret serv-
"something out of a novel:' He would ice and the Soviet KGB.
neither confirm nor deny the report "A Soviet connection is strongly
and refused to identify himself. But suggested, but it cannot be proved, 11
he described the report as a "strong says Kalb. "It seems safe to con.
statement, and I'm surprised by it:' clude," he adds, that the guman had
The program is narrated by NBC been "drawn into the clandestine
reporter Marvin Kalb..... network of the Bulgarian secret
In the program, Kalb says at one police and, by extension, the Soviet
point: "NBC News has learned that KGB.
in early August (1980), as the crisis
escalated, the pope sent an envoy to Agca, convicted of murdering
the Kremlin whom-we are pledged Turkish newspaper editor Abdi
not to identify. He delivered an Ipecki, mysteriously escaped from
extraordinary handwritten letter, in a maximum security prison in'1hr-
Russian, from the pope to Soviet key and then appears to have been
leader Brezhnev. It said that though i financed from some unkown source
the pope was head of a universal' throughout his travels from prison
to Rome and the attempted assassi-
nation NBC quotes Vladimir Sakha-
rov, a former KGB agent who
defected, as saying that information
held by the Bulgarians would also
be known by the KGB.
The pope, since the shooting, has
lost his spirit and his "sense of fire
and mission," the documentary
concludes.
Approved For Release 2011/05/03: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505140061-1