Moscow Cracks the Whip

By Stephen Smith

The new unions may be pushing their luck too far

It was, reported Tass, "a friendly working visit at the invitation of the [Communist Party] Central Committee and the Soviet government." Indeed, Party Chief Leonid Brezhnev was all smiles as he greeted his Polish counterpart, Stanislaw Kania, at Moscow's Vnukovo Airport last week. But the joviality was strictly for the cameras. Kania and Prime Minister Jozef Pinkowski had been summoned to the Kremlin for a down-to-earth strategy discussion of how the Warsaw government was going to deal with the demands of Solidarnosc (Solidarity), the umbrella organization for Poland's new independent unions. Angrily rejecting a Warsaw court's decision to incorporate a statement of Communist Party supremacy into Solidarity's charter, union members were threatening new strikes that could bring the labor movement into a fateful confrontation with Kania's government.

Brezhnev's summons was ominously reminiscent of the 1968 Czechoslovak crisis. Twelve years ago, Brezhnev "invited" Prague's party boss Alexander Dubcek to explain what the Soviet Politburo regarded as his excessively flexible internal policies. Then as now, tame Soviet satellites in the East bloc rhetorically denounced liberalization as the work of counterrevolutionary forces. Three weeks after Dubcek and the Soviets reached an apparent compromise, 200,000 Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia.

Kania, to be sure, is no Dubcek. And with 85,000 Soviet troops bogged down in Afghanistan, the Kremlin at this stage seems unlikely to attempt a potentially bloody military intervention in Poland that would shatter the last fragments of detente with the West. Still, the clear implication of the Moscow meeting was that the Polish regime better get the upstart unions under control--or else. "I imagine that Kania and Pinkowski were left in no doubt that the danger of invasion has increased," said a foreign ministry expert in Bonn. "The combination of union defiance and inner-party turmoil is horrifying to the Soviets."

East Germany, which has been the Soviet Union's snarling surrogate all through the Polish turbulence, was rhetorically more truculent than ever last week. In a slap at the unions and their supporters, Party Boss Erich Honecker charged that "antisocialist forces are undertaking subversive activities" in Poland. Vowed he: "We promise help to genuine Polish patriots in their efforts to stabilize the situation." Next day, East Germany imposed tight restrictions on trips to and from Poland, ending eight years of visa-free travel between the two countries.

Solidarity had raised Soviet hackles when it proclaimed Nov. 12 "a day of strike alert." This amounted to a threat of selective strikes unless progress is made on eleven union demands, most notably a rewording of its charter. Two weeks ago a Warsaw district court granted Solidarity's request for legal recognition, apparently ending a monthlong impasse caused by the union's refusal to stipulate in its charter the "leading role" of the Communist Party. But then the court unilaterally amended the charter to include the clause on party supremacy.

Outraged by the legal legerdemain, militant union members urged a strong response, even another general strike. This drastic course was opposed by most members of Solidarity's coordinating committee, which convened last week in Gdansk, the shipbuilding city where the strikes began in August. Committee members favored a court appeal of the charter language, while continuing to press the government on other demands. Said Attorney Sila Nowicki, one of the union's legal advisers: "If we declare a general strike, it's like pulling out a pistol. The government has not threatened us. In fact, they've treated us with respect."

Solidarity's leaders summoned Pinkowski to Gdansk, but later consented to meet with him in Warsaw. After the daylong session last Friday, the government promised a decision on the charter wording by Nov. 10-- two days before the "strike alert." The authorities also agreed in principle to let the union start its own newspaper and to give it access to television.

The dispute over strategy underscored a growing division between moderates and militants in Solidarity. The militants have held the upper hand so far, thanks to the prestige of the Gdansk contingent. Lech Walesa, the union leader, usually pushes for a moderate approach, but then quickly switches sides if the militants are adamant. Says one union insider: "He's ready to compromise, but he's afraid to lose his grip on the workers."

Solidarity's militants seem oblivious to the danger that they may be risking Soviet intervention by pushing Kania's government to the wall. They also appear unimpressed by arguments that the strike threats, if carried out, could lead Poland to the brink of economic disaster, as statistics suggest. The ministry of mining reported that 1980 coal production will be 10 million metric tons less than the 200 million mined last year; even with the diversion of some exportable tonnage to domestic uses, there will be electricity cut backs this winter. In recent weeks Poland has suffered from shortages of such staples as potatoes, sugar, flour and butter.

All of which means that Kania's government may find it virtually impossible to carry out the basic reforms it promised the workers. "It makes sense to insist that the government fulfill its pledges, especially the economic ones," says a Kremlinologist in Bonn. "But squeezing too hard can be explosive. The union's present tactics amount to an open invitation to a crackdown."

-- By Stephen Smith.

Reported by Barry Kalb/ Warsaw

With reporting by Barry Kalb

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