POLAND: THE RESISTANCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00845R000200910001-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 17, 2010
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: January 4, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/17 :CIA-RDP90-008458000200910001-5
ART I CL~: APPEA_R.ED
O;d PAGE
heavy snowfall covered Poland last
week, but could not bury a Christmas i
of black despair. The crowded churches
rang more with sorrow than joy, and Arch- ~
bishop Jozef Glemp spoke out for "the
families who havebeen harmed, disappoint-
ed, imprisoned, slandered without good j
reason." In many homes, Christmas dinner
was a leftover memory of past happy feasts,
and the place that Poles traditionally leave
at the table for a wandering stranger was
reserved this year in honor of imprisoned
workers. The candles that twinkled from
windows served not asdecorations-but as
silent symbols of resistance. j
The government of Gen. Wojciech Jaru- i
zelski continued its mailed-fist purge of Pol-
ish reform and Polish reformers. The first
massive military sweep sent thousands of
workers, intellectuals and priests to freez- '.
i
It persists against
tjie crackdown--with
sacpport from Reagan,
who also lays down
a challenge to Moscow
ing makeshift detention camps. In Gdansk, ~
birthplace of Solidarity and a seedbed of I
resistance, tear-gas attacks broke up street I
marches by as many as 40,000 workers and
students. Last week the government forces
concentrated on clearing out the biggest
remaining pockets ofprotest.Buttheresist-
ancelived on in workers who only pretend- j
ed to work, in farmers who held back their
produce-and in the hearts of all.who ever ~
made common cause with Solidarity. It
added up to a tide that might not overflow
into the streets-but could well drown the
struggling economy. "When the country
was first sealed off, people were scazed and
passive," said Andrzej Swaetek, a spokes-
man for Solidarity in Copenhagen. "But
when they shook their first fear, they started
to create resistance." And, he added: "Poles
are very good at resistance."
In Washington Ronald Reagan delivered
NEWSWEII;
l+ JANUARY 1982
window and asked Americans to light can- ,
dies as well to signal that "the light of i
freedom is not going to be extingu:~hed." ~
Without waiting for support from the
European allies, Reagan put such direct
heat on Jaruzelski as he readily c:~uld. He
suspended Polish fishing rights in Ameri-
can waters, terminated Poland's civil-avi-
ation privileges in Amer.'can skies alld cut
off Polish access to the Export-Import
Bank. Government-sponsored food aid to
Poland from the United States will be re-
stored,Reagan said, only if independ-
entagencies such as the Red Cross are
permitted to distribute the food in
Poland. Poland can expect more U.S.
economic aid if it relaxes its grip, he
added-and even tougher measures if
it doesn't. "If the outrages in Poland
do not cease," the President declared,
"we cannot and will not conduct busi-
ness asusual with the perpetrators
and those who aid and abet them.
Makz no mistake: their crime will
cost them dearly."
Showdown: Reagan's tough words
were also pointedly addressed to the
Soviet Union. In a letter to Leonid
Brezhnev, Reagan asserted-as he
paraphrased it in his speech-that "if
this [Polish] repression continues,
the United States will have no choice
but to take further concrete political
and economic measures affecting our
relationship." By holding Moscow
directly responsible for Poland's tur-
moil, Reagan publicly escalated the
crisis in the Soviet bloc to a super-
powershowdown over the "freedoms
that the Polish people cherish."
Though the President issued no im-
mediate sanctions against the Soviet
Union, White House advisers said
Moscow should not regard Reagan's
long ago stood at our threshold." He denied
persistent reports of many more deaths than
the seven admitted by the government, in-
sisted that prisoners were being held in hu-
maneconditions and stressed that "there is
room for self-managing and really inde-
pendent trade unions"-although he said
nothing about Solidarity leader Lech Wa-
lesa, who was held incommunicado for the
second straight week. "Dear countrymen; '
Jaruzelski said, "I cannot today wish you a
merry and prosperous Christmas. This
year's holiday is modest. But it is safe.
JOHN BRECHER with JORGEN PEDERSF.N
in Warsaw, DOUGLAS ST 12~GLIiV in Bonn,
SCOTT SULLIYAN in Paris, JOH!S wALCOTr
in Washington, SETH btYDAKS in London,
DANIELA PETROPF in Rome and burmu reports
words as rhetoric but as a portent of ? j
reprisals to come. li
Brezhnev quickly answered Rea-
gan's letter with one of his own. The
contents of the letter were not disclosed,
but publicly Moscow denied Reagan's
charges of Soviet interference in ?Poland,
characterizing .them as "slander." Then I
Pravda came back with an extraordtna
a Christmas message to Americans that was ht or tat: a word article claiming to !
heavily weighted with indignation over a etat a -ear a ort--co a name:
"Polish Government [that] wages war edsox- edcap-to overt row t e un-
against its own people." In a husky voice, ganan, zec os ova an o is ommu-
Reagan told of his emotional meeting with ms regimes.
Romuald Spasowski, the Polish ambassa- '-~ aw; Jaruzelski himself replied
dor who had defected to the United States a directly to his critics for the first time, insist-
few days earlier (page l6). At Spasowski's ~~g in a conciliatory Christmas Eve speech
request, Reagan ordered a candle lit for that martial law is "decidedly a lesser evil
Poland on Christmas Eve in a White House than the fratricidal conflict which not sn '
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/17 :CIA-RDP90-008458000200910001-5