The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB

Moscow was far from reassured. Since the unexpectedly successful introduction of martial law, many of its previous doubts about Jaruzelski had resurfaced. A KGB agent in Jaruzelski’s entourage described him as “the offspring of rich Polish landowners” with little sympathy for working people: “His tendency is pro-Western and he surrounds himself with generals who are descendants of Polish landowners and are anti-Soviet in inclination.” The agent (presumably something of an anti-Semite) also reported that Jaruzelski was in contact with “a representative of Polish Zionism”: “One should examine whether he himself is not a Zionist.” By contrast, Jaruzelski “virtually ignored” the advice of the Soviet ambassador.⁹⁵

The reports of both the KGB mission and the Soviet embassy during 1982 repeatedly condemned Jaruzelski’s tolerance of men with revisionist tendencies in the Polish leadership, chief among them Mieczysław Rakowski, whose allegedly defeatist attitude to anti-Socialist forces aroused deep suspicion in Moscow. Rakowski was reported to have told the Council of Ministers in June, “The PUWP is sick. Martial law made it possible to overcome the peak of the opposition, but there is no noticeable change for the better in the attitude of broad layers of the population.” The strength of the Catholic Church meant that a policy of confrontation would be mere “adventurism.”⁹⁶ A report by Rakowski on June 22 concluded that there were “100,000 hostile teachers” in Polish schools, but that it was impossible to sack them all.⁹⁷ Jaruzelski was alleged to have told Milewski, “I know that Rakowski is a swine, but I still need him.” In a telegram to Brezhnev on June 29, however, Aristov argued that keeping Rakowski and other like-minded individuals in the Polish leadership was “not simply a tactical move, but a strategic line for Jaruzelski, who shares their position on a number of problems”: “It is therefore very important at the present stage to continue to exert influence on Comrade W. Jaruzelski.”⁹⁸

Pavlov and Aristov continued to press for more arrests and trials of counter-revolutionaries. At a meeting with Kiszczak on July 7, Pavlov denounced the policy of the interior ministry and the SB as “weak and indecisive.” Kiszczak replied that there were 40,000 Solidarity activists, and it was impossible to prosecute them all.⁹⁹ Four days later Aristov brought Jaruzelski a personal message from Brezhnev and repeated the Soviet demand for more prosecutions. Jaruzelski argued that to try Wałęsa would be impossible because of the international as well as Polish outcry it would produce, and that a trial of leading opposition figures which excluded Wałęsa would lack credibility.¹⁰⁰ The Polish decision in December to suspend (though not yet formally end) martial law caused predictable dismay in Moscow. When pressed by Aristov to keep it in force, however, Jaruzelski delivered something of a lecture, which was duly reported to Moscow:

We cannot continue martial law as if we were living in a bunker; we want to pursue a dialogue with the people… Glemp’s latest statements are such that they could even be printed in Trybuna Ludu [the Party newspaper]. He appeals for calm, restraint and realism… We are, of course, playing a game with the Catholic Church; our aim is to neutralize its harmful influence on the population. The aims of the Church and my aims are still different. However, at this stage we must exploit our common interest in stabilizing the situation in order to strengthen Socialism and the positions of the Party.¹⁰¹

Jaruzelski’s attitude to Moscow had become visibly less deferential since operation X a year earlier. The KGB mission reported that he had declared on one occasion, “The Soviet comrades are mistaken if they think that the Polish section of the CPSU Central Committee will make Polish policy as in the days of Gierek. This will not happen. [Those] days are over.”¹⁰² Jaruzelski was, initially, favorably impressed by the signs of a new, less hectoring style in the Soviet leadership after Brezhnev’s death. He told Kiszczak after a meeting in Moscow with Andropov, Brezhnev’s successor, in December 1982: