CPSU, Letter to the Polish United Workers’ Party Central Committee. June 12, 1981
Original Source: TASS, 12 June 1981.
Dear comrades! The Central Committee of the CPSU addresses this letter to you … deeply worried about the destinies of socialism in Poland, about Poland as a free independent state.
Our letter is motivated by our comradely interest in the affairs of the party of Polish communists, the entire fraternal Polish people and socialist Poland…. Soviet and Polish communists stood shoulder to shoulder in the battle against Nazism, were together throughout all the post-war years. Our party and the Soviet people helped their Polish comrades build a new life, and we cannot be but alarmed that a mortal danger is threatening today the revolutionary gains of the Polish people.
We will say it frankly: Some trends in the development of the Polish People’s Republic, especially in the field of ideological and economic policy of its former leadership, were a source of our concern for… a number of years. In full conformity with the spirit of the relations which have taken shape between the CPSU and PUWP, the Polish leaders were told about this in the course of talks at summit level and other meetings. Regrettably, these friendly warnings, just as the sharply critical pronouncements within the PUWP itself, were not taken into consideration and were even ignored. As a result a deep crisis has broken out in Poland, which has encompassed the entire political and economic life of the country.
We met with full understanding the change in the leadership of the PUWP, the striving to rectify the crude mistakes connected with the violation of the laws of building socialism and to restore the confidence of the masses … in the party and to strengthen socialist democracy. From the very first days of the crisis we considered it important that the party should resolutely repulse the attempts by the enemies of socialism, to take advantage of the difficulties, which have arisen in their far-reaching aims.
But this was not done. Endless concessions to the anti-socialist forces and their solicitations have brought about a situation in which the PUWP was retreating step by step under the onslaught of the internal counter-revolution, which relies on the support of imperialist subversive centers from abroad.
Today the situation is not just dangerous. It has brought the country to the critical point. It is impossible to assess it otherwise. The enemies of socialist Poland are not making any particular effort to conceal their intentions. They are engaged in a struggle for power, and are already capturing it. They are gaining control of one position after another. The counter-revolution uses as its strike force the extremist wing of Solidarity, drawing by deception the workers who joined that trade union association into a criminal conspiracy against the people’s power. The wave of anti-communism and anti-Sovietism is mounting. The imperialist forces are making ever more brazen attempts to interfere in Polish affairs.
The extremely serious danger which is hanging over socialism in Poland is a threat also to the very existence of the independent Polish state. If the worst were to happen and the enemies of socialism seized power, were Poland deprived of defense by the socialist community, the greedy hands of the imperialists would immediately reach out to it, and who could then guarantee the independence, sovereignty and borders of Poland as a state? Nobody….
We would like to make special mention of the fact that in recent months counter-revolutionary forces have been actively spreading all sorts of anti-Soviet fabrications aimed at eliminating the fruit of the work done by our parties, at reviving nationalistic, anti-Soviet sentiments among various sections of… Polish society. These slanderers and liars stop at nothing. They are even trying to assure that the Soviet Union “plunders” Poland. And this is being said notwithstanding the fact that the Soviet Union gave and continues giving enormous additional material aid to Poland at this difficult time…. This is being said about a country, which by its supplies of oil, gas, ore and cotton at prices from 30 to 50 percent lower than world prices, actually nourishes the main branches of Polish industry.
Esteemed comrades! In addressing this letter to you, we proceed not only from our concern about the situation in fraternal Poland, about the conditions and prospects for further Soviet-Polish cooperation. We are no less concerned, in common with the other fraternal parties, about the fact that the offensive by the hostile antisocialist forces in the Polish People’s Republic threatens the interests of the whole of our community, its cohesion, integrity and security of borders. Yes, our common security. The imperialist reaction, which supports and encourages the Polish counter-revolutionaries, does not conceal its hopes to sharply change … the balance of forces in Europe and in the world in their favor.
The crisis in Poland is actively used by imperialism to slander the socialist system, the ideals and principles of socialism, and is used for fresh attacks against the international communist movement.
So, a historical responsibility rests on the PUWP not only for the destiny of its homeland, its independence and progress, and for the cause of socialism in Poland. You, comrades, shoulder enormous responsibility also for the common interests of the socialist community.
We hold that there is still the possibility to prevent the worst, to prevent a national catastrophe. There are many honest and staunch communists in the PUWP who are ready to struggle for the ideals of Marxism-Leninism, for an independent Poland. There are many people in Poland, who are dedicated to the cause of socialism. The working class… even those who were drawn by deception into the machinations of the enemy, will in the long run follow the party.
The point is to mobilize all the healthy forces of society to repulse the class enemy, to struggle against the counter-revolution. And this requires in the first place revolutionary determination of the party itself, its activists and leadership. Yes, leadership. Time is not waiting. The party can and must find the strength in itself to change the course of events and… before the 9th Congress of the PUWP direct them into the necessary channel.
We would like to be confident that the Central Committee of the party of communists of fraternal Poland will prove to be equal to its historical responsibility.
We want to assure you, dear comrades, that in these difficult days, as was always the case in the past, the Central Committee of the CPSU, all Soviet communists and the entire Soviet people sympathize with your struggle. Our stand was clearly expressed by the statement by Comrade L. 1. Brezhnev at the 26th Congress of the CPSU: “We will not abandon fraternal, socialist Poland in its hour of need, we will stand by it!”
Source: Foreign Broadcast Information Service, Daily Report (12 June 1981), F1-F4 (excerpts).