Polish Jewish relations Witold Pilecki was a common man who lived in uncommon times. He was a victim of Communism, Fascism, Socialism, and Emperialism
Jedwabne czyli pogrzeb Polski (1/2)
"Jedwabne Jaja" czyli pogrzeb Polski (2/2)
A real hero - Witold Pilecki - A Volunteer for Auschwitz
Katyn Andrzej Wajda Film (english version)
"Katyn", directed by Wajda, is the first Polish film on the Katyn crime and the so-called Katyn lie.
The movie uses stories from an authentic diary of major Adam Solski found during the exhumation in 1943 to tell the fate of four fictional officers and their families.
Wajda's father, lt. Jakub Wajda, then 43, was among the Polish officers taken prisoner by the Soviet army and killed by a shot to the back of the head in the Katyn forest.
In March 1940 Soviet leader Josef Stalin ordered the executions of 22,000 Polish army and police officers, intellectuals and clergy. The killings took place in the spring of the same year in the Katyn Forest. The victims, mostly from POW camps in Kozielsk, Starobielsk and Ostaszkow, were shot in the back of the head. The Nazis discovered the mass graves during their march on Moscow in the fall of 1941, but Soviet propaganda blamed the deaths on Adolf Hitler and punished anyone speaking the truth with harsh prison terms. In 1990, Moscow admitted that dictator Josef Stalin's secret police were responsible.
Irena Sendler
why the story was not know in US?
Irena Sendler-Polish woman who helped save the lives of 2,500 Jewish children during World War II.Mother of the Holocaust Children. ZEGOTA - Council for Aid to Jews in Occupied Poland (1942-1945)....
Marian Rejewski, Jerzy Rozycki, Henryk Zygalski and other cryptoanalysts from BS4, broke into Kriegsmarine code in November 1932. The Polish-made replicas of the apparatus (the Enigma-"doubles to t...
Friday, January 29, 2010
Jedwabne czyli pogrzeb Polski (1/2)
Jedwabne czyli pogrzeb Polski (1/2)
"Jedwabne Jaja" czyli pogrzeb Polski (2/2)
"Jedwabne Jaja" czyli pogrzeb Polski (2/2)
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Hubal 4/13
Hubal 4/13
Po kapitulacji Warszawy 27 września, przed oddziałem Dobrzańskiego stanął wybór ewakuacja do Francji przez Węgry lub Rumunię, rozwiązanie lub kontynuacja walki. Około 50 żołnierzy z Dobrzańskim na...
Po kapitulacji Warszawy 27 września, przed oddziałem Dobrzańskiego stanął wybór ewakuacja do Francji przez Węgry lub Rumunię, rozwiązanie lub kontynuacja walki. Około 50 żołnierzy z Dobrzańskim na czele podjęło decyzję marszu na południe. 1 października przekroczyli Wisłę w okolicach Dęblina i kontynuowali marsz w kierunku Gór Świętokrzyskich. Tego samego dnia oddział stoczył pierwszą potyczkę z Niemcami i postanowił schronić się na Kielecczyźnie do czasu ofensywy alianckiej na Zachodzie, której spodziewano się na wiosnę 1940 roku.
Category: Education
Po kapitulacji Warszawy 27 września, przed oddziałem Dobrzańskiego stanął wybór ewakuacja do Francji przez Węgry lub Rumunię, rozwiązanie lub kontynuacja walki. Około 50 żołnierzy z Dobrzańskim na...
Po kapitulacji Warszawy 27 września, przed oddziałem Dobrzańskiego stanął wybór ewakuacja do Francji przez Węgry lub Rumunię, rozwiązanie lub kontynuacja walki. Około 50 żołnierzy z Dobrzańskim na czele podjęło decyzję marszu na południe. 1 października przekroczyli Wisłę w okolicach Dęblina i kontynuowali marsz w kierunku Gór Świętokrzyskich. Tego samego dnia oddział stoczył pierwszą potyczkę z Niemcami i postanowił schronić się na Kielecczyźnie do czasu ofensywy alianckiej na Zachodzie, której spodziewano się na wiosnę 1940 roku.
Category: Education
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Stanisław Michalkiewicz w Radiu Maryja - 20.01.2010 r
Stanisław Michalkiewicz w Radiu Maryja - 20.01.2010 r
Friday, January 15, 2010
SAY NO TO BLACKWATER TO BE SEND TO HAITI Will "Black Water" make an appearance in Haiti?
SAY NO TO BLACKWATER TO BE SEND TO HAITI Will "Black Water" make an appearance in Haiti?
Blackwater Iraq shooting charges dismissed
17 people killed
A U.S. federal judge has dismissed all charges against five Blackwater Worldwide security guards charged in a Baghdad shooting that killed 17 Iraqis.
District Judge Ricardo Urbina said the prosecutors ignored the advice of Justice Department officials and improperly built their case on sworn statements that had been given under a promise of immunity.
Blackwater contractors were hired to guard U.S. State Department diplomats in Iraq. Prosecutors say the guards fired on unarmed civilians at a busy intersection in 2007. Witnesses said the shooting was unprovoked, but Blackwater said its guards were ambushed by insurgents while responding to a car bombing.
After the shooting the guards gave statements to State Department investigators in which they admitted firing their weapons. That admission was crucial because forensic scientists could not match bullets from the shooting scene to specific weapons.
In exchange, the State Department promised the statements would not be used in a criminal case. The deal meant prosecutors had to build their case without them. Urbina said the Justice Department failed to do so.
Statements misused, judge finds
Prosecutors read those statements, reviewed them in the investigation and used them to question witnesses and get search warrants, Urbina found. Key witnesses also reviewed the statements and the grand jury heard evidence tainted by those statements, the judge said.
Urbina said the government's explanations for its actions were "contradictory, unbelievable and lacking in credibility."
The five guards had pleaded not guilty to manslaughter and weapons charges. A sixth guard turned on his former colleagues and pleaded guilty to killing one Iraqi and wounding another. It's unclear whether Urbina's ruling will allow him to get out of his plea deal.
"We're obviously disappointed by the decision," Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said. "We're still in the process of reviewing the opinion and considering our options." Prosecutors can appeal the 90-page ruling.
An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore
Dear President Obama,
Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they've always heard is true -- that all politicians are alike. I simply can't believe you're about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn't so.
It is not your job to do what the generals tell you to do. We are a civilian-run government. WE tell the Joint Chiefs what to do, not the other way around. That's the way General Washington insisted it must be. That's what President Truman told General MacArthur when MacArthur wanted to invade China. "You're fired!," said Truman, and that was that. And you should have fired Gen. McChrystal when he went to the press to preempt you, telling the press what YOU had to do. Let me be blunt: We love our kids in the armed services, but we f*#&in' hate these generals, from Westmoreland in Vietnam to, yes, even Colin Powell for lying to the UN with his made-up drawings of WMD (he has since sought redemption).
So now you feel backed into a corner. 30 years ago this past Thursday (Thanksgiving) the Soviet generals had a cool idea -- "Let's invade Afghanistan!" Well, that turned out to be the final nail in the USSR coffin.
There's a reason they don't call Afghanistan the "Garden State" ...
The men from Blackwater USA arrived in New Orleans right after Katrina hit.
The company known for its private security work guarding senior US diplomats in Iraq beat the federal government and most aid organizations to the scene in another devastated Gulf. About 150 heavily armed Blackwater troops dressed in full battle gear spread out into the chaos of New Orleans. Officially, the company boasted of its forces "join[ing] the hurricane relief effort." But its men on the ground told a different story.
Some patrolled the streets in SUVs with tinted windows and the Blackwater logo splashed on the back; others sped around the French Quarter in an unmarked car with no license plates. They congregated on the corner of St. James and Bourbon in front of a bar called 711, where Blackwater was establishing a makeshift headquarters. From the balcony above the bar, several Blackwater guys cleared out what had apparently been someone's apartment. They threw mattresses, clothes, shoes and other household items from the balcony to the street below. They draped an American flag from the balcony's railing. More than a dozen troops from the 82nd Airborne Division stood in formation on the street watching the action.
Armed men shuffled in and out of the building as a handful told stories of their past experiences in Iraq. "I worked the security detail of both Bremer and Negroponte," said one of the Blackwater guys, referring to the former head of the US occupation, L. Paul Bremer, and former US Ambassador to Iraq John Negroponte. Another complained, while talking on his cell phone, that he was getting only $350 a day plus his per diem. "When they told me New Orleans, I said, 'What country is that in?'" he said. He wore his company ID around his neck in a case with the phrase Operation Iraqi Freedom printed on it.
In an hourlong conversation I had with four Blackwater men, they characterized their work in New Orleans as "securing neighborhoods" and "confronting criminals." They all carried automatic assault weapons and had guns strapped to their legs. Their flak jackets were covered with pouches for extra ammunition.
When asked what authority they were operating under, one guy said, "We're on contract with the Department of Homeland Security." Then, pointing to one of his comrades, he said, "He was even deputized by the governor of the state of Louisiana. We can make arrests and use lethal force if we deem it necessary." The man then held up the gold Louisiana law enforcement badge he wore around his neck. Blackwater spokesperson Anne Duke also said the company has a letter from Louisiana officials authorizing its forces to carry loaded weapons.
"This vigilantism demonstrates the utter breakdown of the government," says Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights. "These private security forces have behaved brutally, with impunity, in Iraq. To have them now on the streets of New Orleans is frightening and possibly illegal."
Blackwater is not alone. As business leaders and government officials talk openly of changing the demographics of what was one of the most culturally vibrant of America's cities, mercenaries from companies like DynCorp, Intercon, American Security Group, Blackhawk, Wackenhut and an Israeli company called Instinctive Shooting International (ISI) are fanning out to guard private businesses and homes, as well as government projects and institutions. Within two weeks of the hurricane, the number of private security companies registered in Louisiana jumped from 185 to 235. Some, like Blackwater, are under federal contract. Others have been hired by the wealthy elite, like F. Patrick Quinn III, who brought in private security to guard his $3 million private estate and his luxury hotels, which are under consideration for a lucrative federal contract to house FEMA workers.
A possibly deadly incident involving Quinn's hired guns underscores the dangers of private forces policing American streets. On his second night in New Orleans, Quinn's security chief, Michael Montgomery, who said he worked for an Alabama company called Bodyguard and Tactical Security (BATS), was with a heavily armed security detail en route to pick up one of Quinn's associates and escort him through the chaotic city. Montgomery told me they came under fire from "black gangbangers" on an overpass near the poor Ninth Ward neighborhood. "At the time, I was on the phone with my business partner," he recalls. "I dropped the phone and returned fire."
Montgomery says he and his men were armed with AR-15s and Glocks and that they unleashed a barrage of bullets in the general direction of the alleged shooters on the overpass. "After that, all I heard was moaning and screaming, and the shooting stopped. That was it. Enough said."
Then, Montgomery says, "the Army showed up, yelling at us and thinking we were the enemy. We explained to them that we were security. I told them what had happened and they didn't even care. They just left." Five minutes later, Montgomery says, Louisiana state troopers arrived on the scene, inquired about the incident and then asked him for directions on "how they could get out of the city." Montgomery says that no one ever asked him for any details of the incident and no report was ever made. "One thing about security," Montgomery says, "is that we all coordinate with each other--one family." That co-ordination doesn't include the offices of the Secretaries of State in Louisiana and Alabama, which have no record of a BATS company.
A few miles away from the French Quarter, another wealthy New Orleans businessman, James Reiss, who serves in Mayor Ray Nagin's administration as chairman of the city's Regional Transit Authority, brought in some heavy guns to guard the elite gated community of Audubon Place: Israeli mercenaries dressed in black and armed with M-16s. Two Israelis patrolling the gates outside Audubon told me they had served as professional soldiers in the Israeli military, and one boasted of having participated in the invasion of Lebanon. "We have been fighting the Palestinians all day, every day, our whole lives," one of them tells me. "Here in New Orleans, we are not guarding from terrorists." Then, tapping on his machine gun, he says, "Most Americans, when they see these things, that's enough to scare them."
The men work for ISI, which describes its employees as "veterans of the Israeli special task forces from the following Israeli government bodies: Israel Defense Force (IDF), Israel National Police Counter Terrorism units, Instructors of Israel National Police Counter Terrorism units, General Security Service (GSS or 'Shin Beit'), Other restricted intelligence agencies." The company was formed in 1993. Its website profile says: "Our up-to-date services meet the challenging needs for Homeland Security preparedness and overseas combat procedures and readiness. ISI is currently an approved vendor by the US Government to supply Homeland Security services."
Unlike ISI or BATS, Blackwater is operating under a federal contract to provide 164 armed guards for FEMA reconstruction projects in Louisiana. That contract was announced just days after Homeland Security Department spokesperson Russ Knocke told the Washington Post he knew of no federal plans to hire Blackwater or other private security firms. "We believe we've got the right mix of personnel in law enforcement for the federal government to meet the demands of public safety," he said. Before the contract was announced, the Blackwater men told me, they were already on contract with DHS and that they were sleeping in camps organized by the federal agency.
One might ask, given the enormous presence in New Orleans of National Guard, US Army, US Border Patrol, local police from around the country and practically every other government agency with badges, why private security companies are needed, particularly to guard federal projects. "It strikes me…that that may not be the best use of money," said Illinois Senator Barack Obama.
Blackwater's success in procuring federal contracts could well be explained by major-league contributions and family connections to the GOP. According to election records, Blackwater's CEO and co-founder, billionaire Erik Prince, has given tens of thousands to Republicans, including more than $80,000 to the Republican National Committee the month before Bush's victory in 2000. This past June, he gave $2,100 to Senator Rick Santorum's re-election campaign. He has also given to House majority leader Tom DeLay and a slew of other Republican candidates, including Bush/Cheney in 2004. As a young man, Prince interned with President George H.W. Bush, though he complained at the time that he "saw a lot of things I didn't agree with--homosexual groups being invited in, the budget agreement, the Clean Air Act, those kind of bills. I think the Administration has been indifferent to a lot of conservative concerns."
Prince, a staunch right-wing Christian, comes from a powerful Michigan Republican family, and his father, Edgar, was a close friend of former Republican presidential candidate and antichoice leader Gary Bauer. In 1988 the elder Prince helped Bauer start the Family Research Council. Erik Prince's sister, Betsy, once chaired the Michigan Republican Party and is married to Dick DeVos, whose father, billionaire Richard DeVos, is co-founder of the major Republican benefactor Amway. Dick DeVos is also a big-time contributor to the Republican Party and will likely be the GOP candidate for Michigan governor in 2006. Another Blackwater founder, president Gary Jackson, is also a major contributor to Republican campaigns.
After the killing of four Blackwater mercenaries in Falluja in March 2004, Erik Prince hired the Alexander Strategy Group, a PR firm with close ties to GOPers like DeLay. By mid-November the company was reporting 600 percent growth. In February 2005 the company hired Ambassador Cofer Black, former coordinator for counterterrorism at the State Department and former director of the CIA's Counterterrorism Center, as vice chairman. Just as the hurricane was hitting, Blackwater's parent company, the Prince Group, named Joseph Schmitz, who had just resigned as the Pentagon's Inspector General, as the group's chief operating officer and general counsel.
While juicing up the firm's political connections, Prince has been advocating greater use of private security in international operations, arguing at a symposium at the National Defense Industrial Association earlier this year that firms like his are more efficient than the military. In May Blackwater's Jackson testified before Congress in an effort to gain lucrative Homeland Security contracts to train 2,000 new Border Patrol agents, saying Blackwater understands "the value to the government of one-stop shopping." With President Bush using the Katrina disaster to try to repeal Posse Comitatus (the ban on using US troops in domestic law enforcement) and Blackwater and other security firms clearly initiating a push to install their paramilitaries on US soil, the war is coming home in yet another ominous way. As one Blackwater mercenary said, "This is a trend.
Blackwater Iraq shooting charges dismissed
17 people killed
A U.S. federal judge has dismissed all charges against five Blackwater Worldwide security guards charged in a Baghdad shooting that killed 17 Iraqis.
District Judge Ricardo Urbina said the prosecutors ignored the advice of Justice Department officials and improperly built their case on sworn statements that had been given under a promise of immunity.
Blackwater contractors were hired to guard U.S. State Department diplomats in Iraq. Prosecutors say the guards fired on unarmed civilians at a busy intersection in 2007. Witnesses said the shooting was unprovoked, but Blackwater said its guards were ambushed by insurgents while responding to a car bombing.
After the shooting the guards gave statements to State Department investigators in which they admitted firing their weapons. That admission was crucial because forensic scientists could not match bullets from the shooting scene to specific weapons.
In exchange, the State Department promised the statements would not be used in a criminal case. The deal meant prosecutors had to build their case without them. Urbina said the Justice Department failed to do so.
Statements misused, judge finds
Prosecutors read those statements, reviewed them in the investigation and used them to question witnesses and get search warrants, Urbina found. Key witnesses also reviewed the statements and the grand jury heard evidence tainted by those statements, the judge said.
Urbina said the government's explanations for its actions were "contradictory, unbelievable and lacking in credibility."
The five guards had pleaded not guilty to manslaughter and weapons charges. A sixth guard turned on his former colleagues and pleaded guilty to killing one Iraqi and wounding another. It's unclear whether Urbina's ruling will allow him to get out of his plea deal.
"We're obviously disappointed by the decision," Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said. "We're still in the process of reviewing the opinion and considering our options." Prosecutors can appeal the 90-page ruling.
An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore
Dear President Obama,
Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they've always heard is true -- that all politicians are alike. I simply can't believe you're about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn't so.
It is not your job to do what the generals tell you to do. We are a civilian-run government. WE tell the Joint Chiefs what to do, not the other way around. That's the way General Washington insisted it must be. That's what President Truman told General MacArthur when MacArthur wanted to invade China. "You're fired!," said Truman, and that was that. And you should have fired Gen. McChrystal when he went to the press to preempt you, telling the press what YOU had to do. Let me be blunt: We love our kids in the armed services, but we f*#&in' hate these generals, from Westmoreland in Vietnam to, yes, even Colin Powell for lying to the UN with his made-up drawings of WMD (he has since sought redemption).
So now you feel backed into a corner. 30 years ago this past Thursday (Thanksgiving) the Soviet generals had a cool idea -- "Let's invade Afghanistan!" Well, that turned out to be the final nail in the USSR coffin.
There's a reason they don't call Afghanistan the "Garden State" ...
The men from Blackwater USA arrived in New Orleans right after Katrina hit.
The company known for its private security work guarding senior US diplomats in Iraq beat the federal government and most aid organizations to the scene in another devastated Gulf. About 150 heavily armed Blackwater troops dressed in full battle gear spread out into the chaos of New Orleans. Officially, the company boasted of its forces "join[ing] the hurricane relief effort." But its men on the ground told a different story.
Some patrolled the streets in SUVs with tinted windows and the Blackwater logo splashed on the back; others sped around the French Quarter in an unmarked car with no license plates. They congregated on the corner of St. James and Bourbon in front of a bar called 711, where Blackwater was establishing a makeshift headquarters. From the balcony above the bar, several Blackwater guys cleared out what had apparently been someone's apartment. They threw mattresses, clothes, shoes and other household items from the balcony to the street below. They draped an American flag from the balcony's railing. More than a dozen troops from the 82nd Airborne Division stood in formation on the street watching the action.
Armed men shuffled in and out of the building as a handful told stories of their past experiences in Iraq. "I worked the security detail of both Bremer and Negroponte," said one of the Blackwater guys, referring to the former head of the US occupation, L. Paul Bremer, and former US Ambassador to Iraq John Negroponte. Another complained, while talking on his cell phone, that he was getting only $350 a day plus his per diem. "When they told me New Orleans, I said, 'What country is that in?'" he said. He wore his company ID around his neck in a case with the phrase Operation Iraqi Freedom printed on it.
In an hourlong conversation I had with four Blackwater men, they characterized their work in New Orleans as "securing neighborhoods" and "confronting criminals." They all carried automatic assault weapons and had guns strapped to their legs. Their flak jackets were covered with pouches for extra ammunition.
When asked what authority they were operating under, one guy said, "We're on contract with the Department of Homeland Security." Then, pointing to one of his comrades, he said, "He was even deputized by the governor of the state of Louisiana. We can make arrests and use lethal force if we deem it necessary." The man then held up the gold Louisiana law enforcement badge he wore around his neck. Blackwater spokesperson Anne Duke also said the company has a letter from Louisiana officials authorizing its forces to carry loaded weapons.
"This vigilantism demonstrates the utter breakdown of the government," says Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights. "These private security forces have behaved brutally, with impunity, in Iraq. To have them now on the streets of New Orleans is frightening and possibly illegal."
Blackwater is not alone. As business leaders and government officials talk openly of changing the demographics of what was one of the most culturally vibrant of America's cities, mercenaries from companies like DynCorp, Intercon, American Security Group, Blackhawk, Wackenhut and an Israeli company called Instinctive Shooting International (ISI) are fanning out to guard private businesses and homes, as well as government projects and institutions. Within two weeks of the hurricane, the number of private security companies registered in Louisiana jumped from 185 to 235. Some, like Blackwater, are under federal contract. Others have been hired by the wealthy elite, like F. Patrick Quinn III, who brought in private security to guard his $3 million private estate and his luxury hotels, which are under consideration for a lucrative federal contract to house FEMA workers.
A possibly deadly incident involving Quinn's hired guns underscores the dangers of private forces policing American streets. On his second night in New Orleans, Quinn's security chief, Michael Montgomery, who said he worked for an Alabama company called Bodyguard and Tactical Security (BATS), was with a heavily armed security detail en route to pick up one of Quinn's associates and escort him through the chaotic city. Montgomery told me they came under fire from "black gangbangers" on an overpass near the poor Ninth Ward neighborhood. "At the time, I was on the phone with my business partner," he recalls. "I dropped the phone and returned fire."
Montgomery says he and his men were armed with AR-15s and Glocks and that they unleashed a barrage of bullets in the general direction of the alleged shooters on the overpass. "After that, all I heard was moaning and screaming, and the shooting stopped. That was it. Enough said."
Then, Montgomery says, "the Army showed up, yelling at us and thinking we were the enemy. We explained to them that we were security. I told them what had happened and they didn't even care. They just left." Five minutes later, Montgomery says, Louisiana state troopers arrived on the scene, inquired about the incident and then asked him for directions on "how they could get out of the city." Montgomery says that no one ever asked him for any details of the incident and no report was ever made. "One thing about security," Montgomery says, "is that we all coordinate with each other--one family." That co-ordination doesn't include the offices of the Secretaries of State in Louisiana and Alabama, which have no record of a BATS company.
A few miles away from the French Quarter, another wealthy New Orleans businessman, James Reiss, who serves in Mayor Ray Nagin's administration as chairman of the city's Regional Transit Authority, brought in some heavy guns to guard the elite gated community of Audubon Place: Israeli mercenaries dressed in black and armed with M-16s. Two Israelis patrolling the gates outside Audubon told me they had served as professional soldiers in the Israeli military, and one boasted of having participated in the invasion of Lebanon. "We have been fighting the Palestinians all day, every day, our whole lives," one of them tells me. "Here in New Orleans, we are not guarding from terrorists." Then, tapping on his machine gun, he says, "Most Americans, when they see these things, that's enough to scare them."
The men work for ISI, which describes its employees as "veterans of the Israeli special task forces from the following Israeli government bodies: Israel Defense Force (IDF), Israel National Police Counter Terrorism units, Instructors of Israel National Police Counter Terrorism units, General Security Service (GSS or 'Shin Beit'), Other restricted intelligence agencies." The company was formed in 1993. Its website profile says: "Our up-to-date services meet the challenging needs for Homeland Security preparedness and overseas combat procedures and readiness. ISI is currently an approved vendor by the US Government to supply Homeland Security services."
Unlike ISI or BATS, Blackwater is operating under a federal contract to provide 164 armed guards for FEMA reconstruction projects in Louisiana. That contract was announced just days after Homeland Security Department spokesperson Russ Knocke told the Washington Post he knew of no federal plans to hire Blackwater or other private security firms. "We believe we've got the right mix of personnel in law enforcement for the federal government to meet the demands of public safety," he said. Before the contract was announced, the Blackwater men told me, they were already on contract with DHS and that they were sleeping in camps organized by the federal agency.
One might ask, given the enormous presence in New Orleans of National Guard, US Army, US Border Patrol, local police from around the country and practically every other government agency with badges, why private security companies are needed, particularly to guard federal projects. "It strikes me…that that may not be the best use of money," said Illinois Senator Barack Obama.
Blackwater's success in procuring federal contracts could well be explained by major-league contributions and family connections to the GOP. According to election records, Blackwater's CEO and co-founder, billionaire Erik Prince, has given tens of thousands to Republicans, including more than $80,000 to the Republican National Committee the month before Bush's victory in 2000. This past June, he gave $2,100 to Senator Rick Santorum's re-election campaign. He has also given to House majority leader Tom DeLay and a slew of other Republican candidates, including Bush/Cheney in 2004. As a young man, Prince interned with President George H.W. Bush, though he complained at the time that he "saw a lot of things I didn't agree with--homosexual groups being invited in, the budget agreement, the Clean Air Act, those kind of bills. I think the Administration has been indifferent to a lot of conservative concerns."
Prince, a staunch right-wing Christian, comes from a powerful Michigan Republican family, and his father, Edgar, was a close friend of former Republican presidential candidate and antichoice leader Gary Bauer. In 1988 the elder Prince helped Bauer start the Family Research Council. Erik Prince's sister, Betsy, once chaired the Michigan Republican Party and is married to Dick DeVos, whose father, billionaire Richard DeVos, is co-founder of the major Republican benefactor Amway. Dick DeVos is also a big-time contributor to the Republican Party and will likely be the GOP candidate for Michigan governor in 2006. Another Blackwater founder, president Gary Jackson, is also a major contributor to Republican campaigns.
After the killing of four Blackwater mercenaries in Falluja in March 2004, Erik Prince hired the Alexander Strategy Group, a PR firm with close ties to GOPers like DeLay. By mid-November the company was reporting 600 percent growth. In February 2005 the company hired Ambassador Cofer Black, former coordinator for counterterrorism at the State Department and former director of the CIA's Counterterrorism Center, as vice chairman. Just as the hurricane was hitting, Blackwater's parent company, the Prince Group, named Joseph Schmitz, who had just resigned as the Pentagon's Inspector General, as the group's chief operating officer and general counsel.
While juicing up the firm's political connections, Prince has been advocating greater use of private security in international operations, arguing at a symposium at the National Defense Industrial Association earlier this year that firms like his are more efficient than the military. In May Blackwater's Jackson testified before Congress in an effort to gain lucrative Homeland Security contracts to train 2,000 new Border Patrol agents, saying Blackwater understands "the value to the government of one-stop shopping." With President Bush using the Katrina disaster to try to repeal Posse Comitatus (the ban on using US troops in domestic law enforcement) and Blackwater and other security firms clearly initiating a push to install their paramilitaries on US soil, the war is coming home in yet another ominous way. As one Blackwater mercenary said, "This is a trend.
Poland stands alone in refusing swine flu vaccines
Poland stands alone in refusing swine flu vaccines
Woman Disabled by THIS YEARS FLU SHOT (10 days AFTER vaccination )
Polish patients wait to see doctors at a local clinic in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland, Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2010. Poland has refused to buy swine flu vaccines out of safety fears, the only country known to take such a stance, and only one leading Polish official, Janusz Kochanowski, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, many Poles feel the government has been vindicated: countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss with unused doses now set to expire. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski) (Czarek Sokolowski - AP)
Photo taken in May 2009, of Janusz Kochanowski, Poland's ombudsman for civil rights. Poland has refused to buy swine flu vaccines out of safety fears, the only country known to take such a stance, and only one leading Polish official, Janusz Kochanowski, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, Wednesday Jan. 13, 2010, many Poles feel the government has been vindicated: countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss with unused doses now set to expire. (AP Photo) (Str - AP)
Polish patients wait to see doctors at a local clinic in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland, Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2010. Poland has refused to buy swine flu vaccines out of safety fears, the only country known to take such a stance, and only one leading Polish official, Janusz Kochanowski, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, many Poles feel the government has been vindicated: countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss with unused doses now set to expire. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski) (Czarek Sokolowski - AP)
WARSAW, Poland -- The decision seemed fraught with risk: a government refusing to import swine flu vaccines amid worldwide warnings of a spreading epidemic.
But Poland did just that, becoming the only country worldwide known to reject the vaccines over safety fears and distrust in the drug companies producing them - concerns international health experts reject as unfounded.
Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, many Poles feel their government has been vindicated: Countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss from unused doses now set to expire. But Poland's government didn't spend a cent fighting the epidemic.
All along, the decision by Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Health Minister Ewa Kopacz met with broad support. Even with 145 swine flu deaths in Poland to date, many Poles view the rejection of the vaccines as a laudable gesture of defiance against pharmaceutical companies, sentiment shaped by a strengthening anti-vaccine movement and conspiracy theories about the vaccines circulating on the Internet.
"I had the impression that the information about swine flu was manipulated in order to create a panic," said Barbara Lazniewska, a 38-year-old architect who was among the many Poles to applaud the government's stance.
Poles take pride in having a strong independent streak and many respect the government for defying the EU, the World Health Organization and other international groups that urged countries to implement vaccination programs - advice that smacked to some of meddling in internal affairs.
The prime minister described Poland as a country with the rare "courage" to refuse a vaccine that he believes has not undergone sufficient testing.
"We are making this decision only in the interest of the Polish patient and the taxpayer," Tusk insisted in December. "We will not take part because it's not honest and it's not safe for the patient."
The anti-vaccine movement argues it is untested or contains risky ingredients, like the preservative thimerosal. However, there is little difference in the swine flu vaccine's formulation from the regular flu vaccine, which is available in Poland, and all evidence so far suggests it is safe and effective. The WHO says more than 150 million people have been vaccinated in more than 40 countries and that no unusual or dangerous side effects have been seen.
"The saving grace for Poland is that this swine flu pandemic is so far very mild. It would be a big scandal if this were a virus that would cause many deaths," said Andrew McMichael, an immunologist and the director of the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine at Oxford.
Other conspiracy theories claim the drug companies making the vaccine secretly lobbied the WHO to declare swine flu a global epidemic to fatten their own pockets, a theory unproven but which some Europeans seem inclined to believe. Even the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe recently recommended that the EU investigate WHO's swine flu pandemic declaration to see if the body acted under undue influence.
In an e-mailed statement, WHO said its members "guard against the influence of any vested interests" but declined any other comment on the allegations, saying the group's flu chief, Dr. Keiji Fukuda, will address them during a news conference Thursday.
WHO spokeswoman Karen Mah said the organization has no reports of other countries rejecting the vaccine outright. Some countries, however, haven't launched vaccine programs because they lack the money.
Poland's approach contrasts sharply with steps taken by countries such as the United States - where President Barack Obama and his family got swine flu shots to set an example - and European countries like Austria and Sweden that stockpiled enough for their entire populations.
Other eastern EU members have also embraced inoculation, with Hungary and Romania even producing their own domestic vaccines against H1N1, the official name of the current swine flu strain. Romania has seen a burst of interest in vaccines in recent days following the death from swine flu of a well known TV actor, 37-year-old Toni Tecuceanu, on Jan. 5. Over the weekend, 13,000 people got vaccinated in Bucharest alone, the Health Ministry said Monday - vastly more than previous weekends that saw a few dozen at most ask for the jab.
But no well-known Pole has died, and flu fears failed to take root in the country of 38 million people.
Only one leading official, Janusz Kochanowski, the ombudsman for civil rights, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. He vowed to sue the health minister for a symbolic 1 zloty (35 U.S. cents/25 euro cents) for what he describes as a human rights offense: unnecessarily risking the health of the population by refusing to make vaccines available or take any other steps to fight the spread of swine flu.
Kochanowski came down with swine flu himself over the Christmas holidays, a turn of bad luck he viewed as deeply ironic. During a recent interview in his office he sneezed into a tissue from time to time, and his voice was raspy as he strongly denounced the government.
"In a normal country the media would attack a government that doesn't want to buy vaccines and which doesn't give citizens the right to choose. It's a basic right," Kochanowski told The Associated Press. "The constitution obliges the government to counteract and prevent epidemics. But rather than attacking the government, the media are attacking me."
Though there have been no recent opinion surveys on the matter, Kochanowski and several doctors say there is abundant anecdotal evidence showing that most Poles support the government's approach.
"Unfortunately most people are on the side of the government," Kochanowski said.
Kochanowski says he worries that the government's luck in dodging massive problems with swine flu will only encourage it to ignore future epidemics as well.
"This flu will pass, but there is a new flu every year and the government should prepare every year. However, this government is not only not preparing, but it's making a special point of not being prepared and then claims glory," he said.
In Poland, doctors are deeply divided on the matter, but some are clearly critical of the government.
"It should be the patient's rights to choose - that would be democracy in health care," said Maria Ciesielska, a family doctor whose disapproval only intensified when her 7-year-old son was laid up for a week with swine flu in November. "Even Hippocrates said it's not ethical to not offer a cure if you know that one exists."
Woman Disabled by THIS YEARS FLU SHOT (10 days AFTER vaccination )
Polish patients wait to see doctors at a local clinic in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland, Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2010. Poland has refused to buy swine flu vaccines out of safety fears, the only country known to take such a stance, and only one leading Polish official, Janusz Kochanowski, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, many Poles feel the government has been vindicated: countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss with unused doses now set to expire. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski) (Czarek Sokolowski - AP)
Photo taken in May 2009, of Janusz Kochanowski, Poland's ombudsman for civil rights. Poland has refused to buy swine flu vaccines out of safety fears, the only country known to take such a stance, and only one leading Polish official, Janusz Kochanowski, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, Wednesday Jan. 13, 2010, many Poles feel the government has been vindicated: countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss with unused doses now set to expire. (AP Photo) (Str - AP)
Polish patients wait to see doctors at a local clinic in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland, Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2010. Poland has refused to buy swine flu vaccines out of safety fears, the only country known to take such a stance, and only one leading Polish official, Janusz Kochanowski, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, many Poles feel the government has been vindicated: countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss with unused doses now set to expire. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski) (Czarek Sokolowski - AP)
WARSAW, Poland -- The decision seemed fraught with risk: a government refusing to import swine flu vaccines amid worldwide warnings of a spreading epidemic.
But Poland did just that, becoming the only country worldwide known to reject the vaccines over safety fears and distrust in the drug companies producing them - concerns international health experts reject as unfounded.
Now that the current outbreak appears to have peaked in much of Europe, many Poles feel their government has been vindicated: Countries with large stockpiles often saw low public interest in the vaccines and face financial loss from unused doses now set to expire. But Poland's government didn't spend a cent fighting the epidemic.
All along, the decision by Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Health Minister Ewa Kopacz met with broad support. Even with 145 swine flu deaths in Poland to date, many Poles view the rejection of the vaccines as a laudable gesture of defiance against pharmaceutical companies, sentiment shaped by a strengthening anti-vaccine movement and conspiracy theories about the vaccines circulating on the Internet.
"I had the impression that the information about swine flu was manipulated in order to create a panic," said Barbara Lazniewska, a 38-year-old architect who was among the many Poles to applaud the government's stance.
Poles take pride in having a strong independent streak and many respect the government for defying the EU, the World Health Organization and other international groups that urged countries to implement vaccination programs - advice that smacked to some of meddling in internal affairs.
The prime minister described Poland as a country with the rare "courage" to refuse a vaccine that he believes has not undergone sufficient testing.
"We are making this decision only in the interest of the Polish patient and the taxpayer," Tusk insisted in December. "We will not take part because it's not honest and it's not safe for the patient."
The anti-vaccine movement argues it is untested or contains risky ingredients, like the preservative thimerosal. However, there is little difference in the swine flu vaccine's formulation from the regular flu vaccine, which is available in Poland, and all evidence so far suggests it is safe and effective. The WHO says more than 150 million people have been vaccinated in more than 40 countries and that no unusual or dangerous side effects have been seen.
"The saving grace for Poland is that this swine flu pandemic is so far very mild. It would be a big scandal if this were a virus that would cause many deaths," said Andrew McMichael, an immunologist and the director of the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine at Oxford.
Other conspiracy theories claim the drug companies making the vaccine secretly lobbied the WHO to declare swine flu a global epidemic to fatten their own pockets, a theory unproven but which some Europeans seem inclined to believe. Even the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe recently recommended that the EU investigate WHO's swine flu pandemic declaration to see if the body acted under undue influence.
In an e-mailed statement, WHO said its members "guard against the influence of any vested interests" but declined any other comment on the allegations, saying the group's flu chief, Dr. Keiji Fukuda, will address them during a news conference Thursday.
WHO spokeswoman Karen Mah said the organization has no reports of other countries rejecting the vaccine outright. Some countries, however, haven't launched vaccine programs because they lack the money.
Poland's approach contrasts sharply with steps taken by countries such as the United States - where President Barack Obama and his family got swine flu shots to set an example - and European countries like Austria and Sweden that stockpiled enough for their entire populations.
Other eastern EU members have also embraced inoculation, with Hungary and Romania even producing their own domestic vaccines against H1N1, the official name of the current swine flu strain. Romania has seen a burst of interest in vaccines in recent days following the death from swine flu of a well known TV actor, 37-year-old Toni Tecuceanu, on Jan. 5. Over the weekend, 13,000 people got vaccinated in Bucharest alone, the Health Ministry said Monday - vastly more than previous weekends that saw a few dozen at most ask for the jab.
But no well-known Pole has died, and flu fears failed to take root in the country of 38 million people.
Only one leading official, Janusz Kochanowski, the ombudsman for civil rights, has waged a prominent public fight against the government over vaccines, condemning its stance as irrational and irresponsible. He vowed to sue the health minister for a symbolic 1 zloty (35 U.S. cents/25 euro cents) for what he describes as a human rights offense: unnecessarily risking the health of the population by refusing to make vaccines available or take any other steps to fight the spread of swine flu.
Kochanowski came down with swine flu himself over the Christmas holidays, a turn of bad luck he viewed as deeply ironic. During a recent interview in his office he sneezed into a tissue from time to time, and his voice was raspy as he strongly denounced the government.
"In a normal country the media would attack a government that doesn't want to buy vaccines and which doesn't give citizens the right to choose. It's a basic right," Kochanowski told The Associated Press. "The constitution obliges the government to counteract and prevent epidemics. But rather than attacking the government, the media are attacking me."
Though there have been no recent opinion surveys on the matter, Kochanowski and several doctors say there is abundant anecdotal evidence showing that most Poles support the government's approach.
"Unfortunately most people are on the side of the government," Kochanowski said.
Kochanowski says he worries that the government's luck in dodging massive problems with swine flu will only encourage it to ignore future epidemics as well.
"This flu will pass, but there is a new flu every year and the government should prepare every year. However, this government is not only not preparing, but it's making a special point of not being prepared and then claims glory," he said.
In Poland, doctors are deeply divided on the matter, but some are clearly critical of the government.
"It should be the patient's rights to choose - that would be democracy in health care," said Maria Ciesielska, a family doctor whose disapproval only intensified when her 7-year-old son was laid up for a week with swine flu in November. "Even Hippocrates said it's not ethical to not offer a cure if you know that one exists."
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Agent Bolek By Professor Marek Jan Chodakiewicz from Washington DC
Agent Bolek By Professor Marek Jan Chodakiewicz from Washington DC
Pod Prąd - Cenckiewicz i Gontarczyk 1/4
Published in the Intelligencer: Journal of U.S. Intelligence Studies, vol. 17, no. 2 (Fall 2009): 108-110
Three important books have recently been published about Lech Wałęsa, world famous “Solidarity” leader and, later, President of Poland. Paweł Zyzak’s impishly shocking Lech Wałęsa - idea i historia. Biografia polityczna legendarnego przywódcy "Solidarności" do 1988 roku [Lech Wałęsa: Ideology and history: A political biography of the legendary leader of „Solidarity” until 1988] (Cracow: Arcana, 2009) is an irreverent attempt to demolish the legend. The work is mammoth and laboriously annotated with a plethora of primary sources cited. However, its most iconoclastic parts, concerning Wałęsa’s private life with the allegations of irreligiousness, rowdiness, and an illegitimate child, are based on oral interviews with sometimes anonymous sources who grew up with the feature Nobel Peace Prize winner in a small village in Pomerania. Some of the anonymous sources have voluntarily revealed themselves since, thus lending more credibility to their allegations. Yet, equally controversial part of Zyzak’s book, regarding the 1970s and 1980s, is heavily indebted to the research of two very serious scholars, Sławomir Cenckiewicz and Piotr Gontarczyk, who specialize in unmasking the secrets of the Communist secret police.
Cenckiewicz and Gontarczyk first published their magisterial SB a Lech Wałęsa: Przyczynek do biografii [The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa: A Contribution to His Biography] (Gdańsk, Warsaw, and Cracow: IPN, 2008). This tome contains about 300 pages of astute analysis and as many pages of declassified top secret documents. Soon after, Cenckiewicz abridged their work as Sprawa Lecha Wałęsy [The case of Lech Wałęsa] (Poznań: Zysk i ska, 2008). The former is an exhaustive scholarly monograph intended mainly for historians. The latter work is aimed at the popular reader. The reason why Cenckiewicz appears as its sole author has to do with the combustive controversy which erupted following the publication of the earlier work. Following hysterical attacks on the authors by mostly post-Communist and liberal apologists of Lech Wałęsa, Cenckiewicz demonstratively quit a top post at Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), the main depository of the former Communist secret police archives. Gontarczyk retained his job at the IPN but now keeps a low profile.
What’s the uproar all about? The authors show unequivocally that between 1970 and 1976 Lech Wałęsa was registered by the Communist secret police as its Secret Collaborator (tajny współpracownik -- TW). His codename was “Bolek,” a dimunitive from Boleslaus. Most documents concerning “Bolek” were destroyed. However, the remaining materials strongly suggest that he was most active between December 1970 and December 1972. His activity coincided with the anti-Communist strikes and riots on the Baltic Sea board in general, and Gdańsk in particular, and their aftermath. Wałęsa had been on the strike committee in December 1970. Almost immediately he was recruited to denounce his anti-Communist friends. He accepted financial remuneration for his deeds. After a while, however, Wałęsa became disenchanted with both the political situation in the Polish People’s Republic and collaboration with the secret police. He quit informing. The secret police de-registered him accordingly. From the empirical point of view this process has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt in The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa and The Case of Lech Wałęsa.
The Security Service (Służba Bezpieczeństwa -- SB) attempted to recruit Wałęsa once again when he became active in the dissident Free Trade Unions (Wolne Związki Zawodowe – WZZ) in 1977. But he refused. Meanwhile, he also confessed about his previous unsavory activities to his friends of the WZZ. He promised them not to have any contacts with the secret police anymore. In fact, his dissident superiors explicitly forbade him to agree to talk. Yet, Wałęsa continued to meet with the SB men occasionally at their request, which created a precedent. He got used to his interrogators. He got used to a peculiar game. He would take advantage of it on a larger scale when, at the behest of the WZZ leader Bogdan Borusewicz, Wałęsa took over the leadership of the strike at the Gdańsk shipyard in August 1980. What resulted, of course, was a Polish national liberation movement masking as Independent, Self-Governed Trade Union “Solidarity”.
From its inception, Wałęsa was a moderate, centrist figure. He always played his cards coyly. He frequently deceived both his friends and enemies. And he was a superb self-promoter. In the power struggles that ensued within “Solidarity”, its leader crushed the weak and discarded the superfluous. His populism was unmatched. When necessary, he played the card of radicalism. And then he would promptly backtrack. Almost invariably his games would culminate in a compromise with the stronger party. For example, at the request of the Communist management, Wałęsa terminated the August strike prematurely, agreeing only to accept a pay raise, and abandoning the postulate of a free trade union. Only a determined surge by Anna Walentynowicz and Alina Pieńkowska saved the strike. The women bodily blocked the dockers from leaving, shamed them, and appealed to their sense of solidarity with the workers from other enterprises who had struck in support of their shipyard friends but now were being abandoned. The dockers listened and continued until they forced the Communists to allow them to establish “Solidarity.” Wałęsa became the head of the union.
For some, his centrism, moderation, and propensity to compromise were the signs of anti-radicalism, retarding the progress of the liberation movement, and, indeed, kow-towing to the Communists. Meanwhile, Wałęsa attempted to be everything for everyone. A rightist one evening, he supported the left the following morning. And then he would invariably stress his centrism. Many were confused by his pragmatism devoid of any ideas. But, according to him, it expedited the cause of “Solidarity.” Others took a less charitable view. They saw his actions as either a rotten compromise or dictatorial inclinations or even secret police covert work (agentura).
Here both the insufficient number of documents and a strange stonewalling by the leader of “Solidarity” allow for a number of interpretations. The brief for the prosecution is that Wałęsa was possibly an agent. The brief for the defense is that he was not at all. An impartial judge, basing himself on available documents, can conclude that, in the 1980s, Wałęsa skirted dangerously close to treason but that was just a tactical game to stay politically relevant and support “Solidarity.”
For example, after the Communist imposed marital law and arrested him in December 1981, Wałęsa, talking in his customary disjointed manner (and a transcript is extant), bragged to his secret police goalies that he had gotten rid of the “extremists” in the “Solidarity” leadership. Tactically, he ascribed to himself those characteristics and attitudes that the Communists wanted to see in him at the time. He negotiated with General Wojciech Jaruzelski as an underling. He even signed his public plea to the general as “Lance corporal Wałęsa.” He says now that he was playing a game. This is obvious.
The problem is that the Communists dictated the rules. To remain on the political scene, Wałęsa had to continuously make himself valuable to them. But he had to stop short of selling himself out. If he had, he would have been rejected by “Solidarity” supporters and his utility for the regime would have disappeared. The objective was to avoid becoming superfluous. So Wałęsa talked with the secret police; he stayed in the game. He accepted the Communist false wooing and broken promises; but he kept dating them without giving in. Until 1989, however, the leader of “Solidarity” refrained from fully consuming the union.
The aforementioned mechanisms are laid bare in both The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa and The Case of Lech Wałęsa. Therefore one should resolutely reject the charge that he was a secret police agent after 1976. So-called Communist support for Wałęsa against his rivals in the leadership of „Solidarity” served mostly the interests of the Warsaw regime. The Communists plainly viewed him as less dangerous than some of his “Solidarity” peers. Thus, the secret police undercut them in clandestine operations.
Of course, if the utility of Wałęsa had ended, the Communists would have either retired or disappeared him. But because he stayed in the game as a centrist, he was a lesser evil to them. Still, the SB considered him an enemy throughout because he did not sell out “Solidarity” and did not join the official, Communist-controlled unions. Instead, in 1989, Wałęsa made an unequal political deal with them. He resolved to become their junior partner in a Communist-led regime which emerged from openly falsified elections, where only 35% of the seats were open for democratic contest and the rest guaranteed to the Communists. Widely touted as a “free election”, in a long run, the vote was a victory for the Moscow-backed regime which, thus, was able to transition to post-Communism.
If that sounds complicated, Wałęsa’s affairs became positively Byzantine after 1989. Having quarreled with „Solidarity” leftists and liberals, Wałęsa feigned a right-wing shift to be elected the President of Poland. Once in office, he jettisoned the right and banked on the post-Communists, members of the Security Service and military intelligence in particular. Among some of the more astounding aberrations, as the documents discovered by Cenckiewicz and Gontarczyk prove, is the caper where the Communist secret police officers, who had persecuted Wałęsa as his case handlers in the 1980s, weaseled their way into the President’s good graces to become his personal bodyguards. Later, the same officers purged the secret police archives from the documents regarding Wałęsa’s stint as a snitch in the early 1970s to cover up his past. The operation was halted by the civilian post-Communists who appointed new Poland’s rightist secret servicemen to protect the archives from Wałęsa’s ex-SB minions. Perhaps it would be best to characterize the new secret servicemen as law-abiding professionals who happened to be conservative in distinction to the cynical old hands trained by the KGB.
In any event, after 1989, as far as the case of “Bolek,” law was routinely violated, documents falsified, materials destroyed, and opponents persecuted. Further, in 1992, a nefarious kabala under Wałęsa’s tutelage overthrew a center-right government who, in legally fulfilling an act of the parliament, revealed the names of the former Communist secret police agents still in power at that time, including “Bolek”. The presidential coup was probably the moral nadir of post-Communist Poland.
The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa and The Case of Lech Wałęsa amply document the history of deception, theft, and destruction of the documents of treason. The perpetrators aimed at preserving the angelic myth of the first leader of “Solidarity” and the first democratically elected President of post-Communist Poland. This is a disservice to freedom and democracy which are predicated on openness and transparency. Wałęsa’s great contributions to the nation’s independence are beyond any doubt. An apology for the sins of his youth would have solved the case a long time ago and silenced his detractors. The coverup has been foolish and served mostly the interests of the post-Communists who are vitally interested in hiding their own past. They have been shrewdly hiding behind Wałęsa. However, soon scholars like Gontarczyk and Cenckiewicz will put the spotlight on them. Poland is in the process of coming to grips with its totalitarian past and nothing can reverse the tide.
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
Washington, DC, 31 July 2009
www.iwp.edu
Piotr Gontarczyk and Sławomir Cenckiewicz, SB a Lech Wałęsa: Przyczynek do biografii (Gdańsk, Warszawa i Kraków: IPN, 2008).
Sławomir Cenckiewicz, Sprawa Lecha Wałęsy (Poznań: Zysk i ska, 2008)
Paweł Zyzak, Lech Wałęsa - idea i historia. Biografia polityczna legendarnego przywódcy "Solidarności" do 1988 roku (Cracow: Arcana, 2009).
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
Academic Dean and Professor of History, The Kościuszko Chair in Polish Studies
Professional Experience
- Former assistant professor of history of the Kosciuszko Chair in Polish Studies at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia
- Former visiting professor of history, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles
Dr. Chodakiewicz is the current holder of the Kosciuszko Chair of Polish Studies, which is now here at IWP. He has authored numerous works in both English and Polish. While at the University of Virginia , he edited the Kosciuszko Chair's bulletin: Nihil Novi.
Nihil Novi #1
Nihil Novi #2
Nihil Novi #3
In addition to popular and scholarly articles, his publications include The Massacre in Jedwabne, July 10, 1941: Before, During, After (2005), Between Nazis and Soviets: Occupation Politics in Poland, 1939-1947 (2004) and After the Holocaust: Polish-Jewish Conflict in the Wake of World War Two (2003).
Dr. Chodakiewicz co-edited Poland's Transformation: A Work in Progress (2003) and Spanish Carlism and Polish Nationalism: Borderlands of Europe in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (2003).
He translated and edited the correspondence of the Ulam family of Lwów to the mathematician Stanislaw Ulam at Harvard from 1936 until after the Second World War. In 2003 Dr. Chodakiewicz won Poland's Jozef Mackiewicz Literary Award for his Ejszyszki: The Background of Events, and Epilogue of Polish-Jewish Relations in the Eastern Borderlands, 1944-45. In 2004 he co-edited a selection of Ronald Reagan's speeches published as My Vision of America in Polish.
Education
•B.A., 1988, San Francisco State University
•M.A.,1990, MPhil,1992, Columbia University
•Ph.D., 2001, Columbia University
Honors and Awards
•Richard Hofstadter Fellowship (1989-1994), Columbia University
•The Office of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland Research Grant (2001)
•The Earhart Foundation Fellowship Research Grant (2004)
•Presidential Appointee, United States Holocaust Memorial Council (2005-2010)
Pod Prąd - Cenckiewicz i Gontarczyk 1/4
Published in the Intelligencer: Journal of U.S. Intelligence Studies, vol. 17, no. 2 (Fall 2009): 108-110
Three important books have recently been published about Lech Wałęsa, world famous “Solidarity” leader and, later, President of Poland. Paweł Zyzak’s impishly shocking Lech Wałęsa - idea i historia. Biografia polityczna legendarnego przywódcy "Solidarności" do 1988 roku [Lech Wałęsa: Ideology and history: A political biography of the legendary leader of „Solidarity” until 1988] (Cracow: Arcana, 2009) is an irreverent attempt to demolish the legend. The work is mammoth and laboriously annotated with a plethora of primary sources cited. However, its most iconoclastic parts, concerning Wałęsa’s private life with the allegations of irreligiousness, rowdiness, and an illegitimate child, are based on oral interviews with sometimes anonymous sources who grew up with the feature Nobel Peace Prize winner in a small village in Pomerania. Some of the anonymous sources have voluntarily revealed themselves since, thus lending more credibility to their allegations. Yet, equally controversial part of Zyzak’s book, regarding the 1970s and 1980s, is heavily indebted to the research of two very serious scholars, Sławomir Cenckiewicz and Piotr Gontarczyk, who specialize in unmasking the secrets of the Communist secret police.
Cenckiewicz and Gontarczyk first published their magisterial SB a Lech Wałęsa: Przyczynek do biografii [The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa: A Contribution to His Biography] (Gdańsk, Warsaw, and Cracow: IPN, 2008). This tome contains about 300 pages of astute analysis and as many pages of declassified top secret documents. Soon after, Cenckiewicz abridged their work as Sprawa Lecha Wałęsy [The case of Lech Wałęsa] (Poznań: Zysk i ska, 2008). The former is an exhaustive scholarly monograph intended mainly for historians. The latter work is aimed at the popular reader. The reason why Cenckiewicz appears as its sole author has to do with the combustive controversy which erupted following the publication of the earlier work. Following hysterical attacks on the authors by mostly post-Communist and liberal apologists of Lech Wałęsa, Cenckiewicz demonstratively quit a top post at Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), the main depository of the former Communist secret police archives. Gontarczyk retained his job at the IPN but now keeps a low profile.
What’s the uproar all about? The authors show unequivocally that between 1970 and 1976 Lech Wałęsa was registered by the Communist secret police as its Secret Collaborator (tajny współpracownik -- TW). His codename was “Bolek,” a dimunitive from Boleslaus. Most documents concerning “Bolek” were destroyed. However, the remaining materials strongly suggest that he was most active between December 1970 and December 1972. His activity coincided with the anti-Communist strikes and riots on the Baltic Sea board in general, and Gdańsk in particular, and their aftermath. Wałęsa had been on the strike committee in December 1970. Almost immediately he was recruited to denounce his anti-Communist friends. He accepted financial remuneration for his deeds. After a while, however, Wałęsa became disenchanted with both the political situation in the Polish People’s Republic and collaboration with the secret police. He quit informing. The secret police de-registered him accordingly. From the empirical point of view this process has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt in The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa and The Case of Lech Wałęsa.
The Security Service (Służba Bezpieczeństwa -- SB) attempted to recruit Wałęsa once again when he became active in the dissident Free Trade Unions (Wolne Związki Zawodowe – WZZ) in 1977. But he refused. Meanwhile, he also confessed about his previous unsavory activities to his friends of the WZZ. He promised them not to have any contacts with the secret police anymore. In fact, his dissident superiors explicitly forbade him to agree to talk. Yet, Wałęsa continued to meet with the SB men occasionally at their request, which created a precedent. He got used to his interrogators. He got used to a peculiar game. He would take advantage of it on a larger scale when, at the behest of the WZZ leader Bogdan Borusewicz, Wałęsa took over the leadership of the strike at the Gdańsk shipyard in August 1980. What resulted, of course, was a Polish national liberation movement masking as Independent, Self-Governed Trade Union “Solidarity”.
From its inception, Wałęsa was a moderate, centrist figure. He always played his cards coyly. He frequently deceived both his friends and enemies. And he was a superb self-promoter. In the power struggles that ensued within “Solidarity”, its leader crushed the weak and discarded the superfluous. His populism was unmatched. When necessary, he played the card of radicalism. And then he would promptly backtrack. Almost invariably his games would culminate in a compromise with the stronger party. For example, at the request of the Communist management, Wałęsa terminated the August strike prematurely, agreeing only to accept a pay raise, and abandoning the postulate of a free trade union. Only a determined surge by Anna Walentynowicz and Alina Pieńkowska saved the strike. The women bodily blocked the dockers from leaving, shamed them, and appealed to their sense of solidarity with the workers from other enterprises who had struck in support of their shipyard friends but now were being abandoned. The dockers listened and continued until they forced the Communists to allow them to establish “Solidarity.” Wałęsa became the head of the union.
For some, his centrism, moderation, and propensity to compromise were the signs of anti-radicalism, retarding the progress of the liberation movement, and, indeed, kow-towing to the Communists. Meanwhile, Wałęsa attempted to be everything for everyone. A rightist one evening, he supported the left the following morning. And then he would invariably stress his centrism. Many were confused by his pragmatism devoid of any ideas. But, according to him, it expedited the cause of “Solidarity.” Others took a less charitable view. They saw his actions as either a rotten compromise or dictatorial inclinations or even secret police covert work (agentura).
Here both the insufficient number of documents and a strange stonewalling by the leader of “Solidarity” allow for a number of interpretations. The brief for the prosecution is that Wałęsa was possibly an agent. The brief for the defense is that he was not at all. An impartial judge, basing himself on available documents, can conclude that, in the 1980s, Wałęsa skirted dangerously close to treason but that was just a tactical game to stay politically relevant and support “Solidarity.”
For example, after the Communist imposed marital law and arrested him in December 1981, Wałęsa, talking in his customary disjointed manner (and a transcript is extant), bragged to his secret police goalies that he had gotten rid of the “extremists” in the “Solidarity” leadership. Tactically, he ascribed to himself those characteristics and attitudes that the Communists wanted to see in him at the time. He negotiated with General Wojciech Jaruzelski as an underling. He even signed his public plea to the general as “Lance corporal Wałęsa.” He says now that he was playing a game. This is obvious.
The problem is that the Communists dictated the rules. To remain on the political scene, Wałęsa had to continuously make himself valuable to them. But he had to stop short of selling himself out. If he had, he would have been rejected by “Solidarity” supporters and his utility for the regime would have disappeared. The objective was to avoid becoming superfluous. So Wałęsa talked with the secret police; he stayed in the game. He accepted the Communist false wooing and broken promises; but he kept dating them without giving in. Until 1989, however, the leader of “Solidarity” refrained from fully consuming the union.
The aforementioned mechanisms are laid bare in both The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa and The Case of Lech Wałęsa. Therefore one should resolutely reject the charge that he was a secret police agent after 1976. So-called Communist support for Wałęsa against his rivals in the leadership of „Solidarity” served mostly the interests of the Warsaw regime. The Communists plainly viewed him as less dangerous than some of his “Solidarity” peers. Thus, the secret police undercut them in clandestine operations.
Of course, if the utility of Wałęsa had ended, the Communists would have either retired or disappeared him. But because he stayed in the game as a centrist, he was a lesser evil to them. Still, the SB considered him an enemy throughout because he did not sell out “Solidarity” and did not join the official, Communist-controlled unions. Instead, in 1989, Wałęsa made an unequal political deal with them. He resolved to become their junior partner in a Communist-led regime which emerged from openly falsified elections, where only 35% of the seats were open for democratic contest and the rest guaranteed to the Communists. Widely touted as a “free election”, in a long run, the vote was a victory for the Moscow-backed regime which, thus, was able to transition to post-Communism.
If that sounds complicated, Wałęsa’s affairs became positively Byzantine after 1989. Having quarreled with „Solidarity” leftists and liberals, Wałęsa feigned a right-wing shift to be elected the President of Poland. Once in office, he jettisoned the right and banked on the post-Communists, members of the Security Service and military intelligence in particular. Among some of the more astounding aberrations, as the documents discovered by Cenckiewicz and Gontarczyk prove, is the caper where the Communist secret police officers, who had persecuted Wałęsa as his case handlers in the 1980s, weaseled their way into the President’s good graces to become his personal bodyguards. Later, the same officers purged the secret police archives from the documents regarding Wałęsa’s stint as a snitch in the early 1970s to cover up his past. The operation was halted by the civilian post-Communists who appointed new Poland’s rightist secret servicemen to protect the archives from Wałęsa’s ex-SB minions. Perhaps it would be best to characterize the new secret servicemen as law-abiding professionals who happened to be conservative in distinction to the cynical old hands trained by the KGB.
In any event, after 1989, as far as the case of “Bolek,” law was routinely violated, documents falsified, materials destroyed, and opponents persecuted. Further, in 1992, a nefarious kabala under Wałęsa’s tutelage overthrew a center-right government who, in legally fulfilling an act of the parliament, revealed the names of the former Communist secret police agents still in power at that time, including “Bolek”. The presidential coup was probably the moral nadir of post-Communist Poland.
The Security Service and Lech Wałęsa and The Case of Lech Wałęsa amply document the history of deception, theft, and destruction of the documents of treason. The perpetrators aimed at preserving the angelic myth of the first leader of “Solidarity” and the first democratically elected President of post-Communist Poland. This is a disservice to freedom and democracy which are predicated on openness and transparency. Wałęsa’s great contributions to the nation’s independence are beyond any doubt. An apology for the sins of his youth would have solved the case a long time ago and silenced his detractors. The coverup has been foolish and served mostly the interests of the post-Communists who are vitally interested in hiding their own past. They have been shrewdly hiding behind Wałęsa. However, soon scholars like Gontarczyk and Cenckiewicz will put the spotlight on them. Poland is in the process of coming to grips with its totalitarian past and nothing can reverse the tide.
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
Washington, DC, 31 July 2009
www.iwp.edu
Piotr Gontarczyk and Sławomir Cenckiewicz, SB a Lech Wałęsa: Przyczynek do biografii (Gdańsk, Warszawa i Kraków: IPN, 2008).
Sławomir Cenckiewicz, Sprawa Lecha Wałęsy (Poznań: Zysk i ska, 2008)
Paweł Zyzak, Lech Wałęsa - idea i historia. Biografia polityczna legendarnego przywódcy "Solidarności" do 1988 roku (Cracow: Arcana, 2009).
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
Academic Dean and Professor of History, The Kościuszko Chair in Polish Studies
Professional Experience
- Former assistant professor of history of the Kosciuszko Chair in Polish Studies at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia
- Former visiting professor of history, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles
Dr. Chodakiewicz is the current holder of the Kosciuszko Chair of Polish Studies, which is now here at IWP. He has authored numerous works in both English and Polish. While at the University of Virginia , he edited the Kosciuszko Chair's bulletin: Nihil Novi.
Nihil Novi #1
Nihil Novi #2
Nihil Novi #3
In addition to popular and scholarly articles, his publications include The Massacre in Jedwabne, July 10, 1941: Before, During, After (2005), Between Nazis and Soviets: Occupation Politics in Poland, 1939-1947 (2004) and After the Holocaust: Polish-Jewish Conflict in the Wake of World War Two (2003).
Dr. Chodakiewicz co-edited Poland's Transformation: A Work in Progress (2003) and Spanish Carlism and Polish Nationalism: Borderlands of Europe in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (2003).
He translated and edited the correspondence of the Ulam family of Lwów to the mathematician Stanislaw Ulam at Harvard from 1936 until after the Second World War. In 2003 Dr. Chodakiewicz won Poland's Jozef Mackiewicz Literary Award for his Ejszyszki: The Background of Events, and Epilogue of Polish-Jewish Relations in the Eastern Borderlands, 1944-45. In 2004 he co-edited a selection of Ronald Reagan's speeches published as My Vision of America in Polish.
Education
•B.A., 1988, San Francisco State University
•M.A.,1990, MPhil,1992, Columbia University
•Ph.D., 2001, Columbia University
Honors and Awards
•Richard Hofstadter Fellowship (1989-1994), Columbia University
•The Office of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland Research Grant (2001)
•The Earhart Foundation Fellowship Research Grant (2004)
•Presidential Appointee, United States Holocaust Memorial Council (2005-2010)
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