U.S. REPORTS SIGNS OF SOVIET ACTIVITY ON POLAND'S EAST AND WEST BORDERS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000302640102-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 102
• Publication Date: September 20, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
I Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302640102-7
NEW YORK TIMES
ARTICLE APAgEARED
ON PAGE
20 SEPTEMBER 1980
U.S. Reports Signs of Soviet Activity
On Poland's East and West Borders
By BERNARD GWERTZMAN
Special co The New York Times ?
WASHINGTON, Sept. 19? The United Throughout the Polish crisis officials
States said today that it had noted signs
of "increased military activity" by the
Soviet Union along Poland's western and
eastern borders, raising concern among
some officials about Soviet motives.
While the officials cautioned that the
data so far was tentative, the increase in
Soviet communications traffic and the
movement of forces near the Polish bor-
ders were unsettling to several officials
who only a week ago were reporting no in-i
dications of unusual Soviet movements.
"We have noted signs of increased mili-I
tary activity by Soviet forces," said John'
H. Trattner, the State Department
spokesman. "We are monitoring Soviet
troop activity very closely. I cannot give
you a detailed analysis."
A senior Administration official said: I
"We don't want to build up a war scare. It
is simply that the situation is sufficiently
ambiguous to make some Europeans con-
cerned."
Increased Aid for Poland
Formally, the Soviet leaders have wel-
comed the actions of the new Polish lead-
er, Stanislaw Kania, and have agreed to
increase economic aid to Poland.
When a crisis atmosphere existed in
Poland during the recent widespread
strikes, American officials were relieved
that Soviet forces in the western Soviet
Union and in East Germany were doing
nothing near the Polish frontiers that
could be seen as provocative.
There are perhaps 20 Soviet divisions in
East Germany and 20 in the western part I
of the Soviet Union, the officia)s said. I
Some units were involved in Warsaw
Pact exercises in East Germany and the
adjacent Baltic Sea area from Sept. 4 to
12, but the current activity is apparently
unrelated to the maneuvers.
The officials said that the Soviet ac-
tivity was worrying Western European
governments more than the ? United
States, which has not raised the matter
with the Soviet Union. A Pentagon official
said the Defense Intelligence Agency was
more concerned than the Central rntelli-
gente Agency or e ta e pa men
Warning to Polish Workers
Some State Department officials
speculated that the Russians might be
trying to warn the Polish workers and
Government not to assume that Moscow
would accept whatever happened in Po-
land. . ? , ?
_ Secretary of State Edmund S. Muskiel
said in a recent interview that the Rus-
sians had been restrained in the PolishJ
crisis, theorizing that it was because of '
the worldwide reaction to the Soviet mill-
tary intervention in Afghanistan last
December. - I
Soviet troops were sent into action in
East Berlin in 1953, in Hungary in 1956
and in Czechoslovakia in 1968 to reassert
Soviet dominance.. .
here wondered whether the Russians
might move into Poland. It has generally
been assumed here that the Soviet Union
would intervene only in the most extreme
circumstances, because to do so would
have a chilling effect on the West and
would probably help unify the Western al-
liance at a time when Moscow is seeking
to weaken Western European links to the
United States.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302640102-7