The Polish Revolution: Solidarity [Paperback]

Not just a chronological presentation of revolutionary events in Poland during 1979-82 by a witness, but rather a comprehensive analysis.

Behind the scenes of former Soviet block's communist regimes combined with deep understanding of mass phychology of the peoples under their rule, rarely shown by Westerners.

Living in a post Soviet state, I would stress that many problems addressed in the book haven't lost their actuality during 20 years passed...

This is an eye-witness account of the rise and fall of the independent, self-governing, free trades union Solidarity (Solidarnosc), which started in August 1980 and ended when Martial Law was declared 15 months later in December 1981.

'The Polish Revolution: Solidarity', was first published in 1983, and this updated edition was published 1999 to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Collapse of Communism in Europe.

Nevertheless, it contains very few revisions, so that, for example, on page 343 the author states bleakly: "It is therefore probable that those tensions will not be reduced, and we shall, sooner or later, face a nuclear war."

This, indeed, is how the world looked in 1983. The old guard was still in the Kremlin. In the US, Ronald Reagan was rearming. And cruise missiles faced each other in Europe. So, just because a nuclear war didn't break out, doesn't mean that it couldn't have happened.

Moreover, two years earlier, it looked to many outside observers that the rise of Solidarity in Poland would not only herald a Soviet invasion, but might well spark off a nuclear war, too.

An appreciation of this chilling historical context adds dramatically to the tension of this gripping narrative, and to the bravery of almost everybody involved in the Solidarity movement - from Lech Walesa in the Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk, to Czeslaw Opolski and his defiant colleagues in the Rzeszow Commune.

Timothy Garton Ash is a journalist and a historian, but in 'The Polish Revolution' he is also a participant because he writes about Solidarity from the Polish perspective; perhaps because he had recently married his Polish wife, but also because he sees Solidarity for what it is: a genuine attempt to win economic and political rights for the people of Poland. Meanwhile, on the outside, we only saw it as an episode in the cruel Cold War, as a conflict between East and West. It wasn't like that in Poland in 1980-81.

The amazing rise of Solidarity - by the following April 30% of the members of the ruling Communist Party had also joined its ranks - was due in no small measure to its electric organisation. Timothy Garton Ash describes this phenomenon as a 'telerevolution', because by using everything at hand - including telexes, faxes, phones and radio stations - lightning strikes could be swiftly declared and uniformally followed not only in Warsaw and Gdansk, but also in the remotest parts of the country.

Consequently, Solidarity was a truly national movement, but it was undermined by its failure to accept that it was in a state of war with the Communist authorities long before the official 'State of War' was declared on the night of December 13th, 1981. Crucially, it was completely unprepared for the imposition of Martial Law. Moreover, the army severed its nationwide communications in just a few hours, effectively isolating its members from each other, and also cutting off Solidarity from the world outside.

Back in 1983, it was difficult to predict a hopeful future for Poland - or for the world. But one of Timothy Garton Ash's predictions did come true. He said that the people of Poland would not forget Solidarity and that there would be another upheaval in Poland. Blessedly, he was there to report it, too.

This is quite possibly one of the best, and certainly one of the most inspirational, books I've read in a long time. Originally published in 1983 and widely acknowledged as one of the most important books written on post-war European history, it is the definitive work covering the Solidarity era. Timothy Garton Ash was one of the few Western journalists who was based in Poland throughout the early 1980s and, as such, he was perfectly placed to provide a day-by-day, eyewitness account of the world-changing events unfolding before his eyes. The fascinating, inspiring narrative is combined with well informed political and historical analysis that perfectly set the momentous events he was witnessing in the context of the Cold War world in which they were taking place.

In the Preface and Introduction, Garton Ash manages to concertina decades of Polish history into a few dozen pages. Concise, yet thorough, this historical background is crucial to the reader's understanding of the events that were to follow. No society in eastern Europe was less likely to accept socialism than Poland argues Ash. Stalin himself had recognised this when he said that introducing socialism to Poland was like putting a saddle on a cow and this fundamental incompatibility was the most basic cause of the events of 1980. "For thirty five years Poland's socialist authorities had tried to break Poland and mould it to communism. It was always probable they would fail."

The main body of the book covers the period from August 1980 to the military takeover in December 1981 and here the author paints a vividly lifelike picture of the characters involved and the events as they happen, not just at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk, but right across the whole country. Chapter 3, recalling the author's time spent at the Rzeszow Commune, where a group of workers and peasants formed what became known as 'Rural Solidarity', is particularly interesting. Solidarity is, in the West, often associated with urban insurrection but opposition to the socialist regime was just as strong - if not stronger - in rural areas. The rural peasants and workers had their own demands too. Ownership and inheritance of property should be guaranteed. There should be free elections at a local level. The people responsible for the ruin of the economy should be made to answer for it by confiscation of their estate. Bureaucracy must be reduced. The state must cease hindering the practice of religion and the building of churches. Schoolchildren should be free to choose which language they study. The teaching of Marxist theory as fact in schools should cease immediately and, by 1982, all school history text books should tell the truth. Combined with Solidarity's original "21 Demands", these revolutionary ideas posed an existential threat to the privileged, left-wing nomenklatura who ran Poland. It's easy to see how, facing either a Soviet invasion to restore 'socialist harmony' or being overthrown by their own people, the bankrupt communist regime brought in the army and brutally crushed the revolution. Chapter 9 "War" explains what happened when, as Garton Ash puts it, "the Polish Army invaded its own country".

In the chapters following the crushing of the revolution, Garton Ash becomes quite pessimistic about the future. He considers it almost inevitable that there will be a nuclear war in Europe [remember he's writing this in 1983 at the height of the Cold War] as he concludes the communist governments of eastern Europe are irrevocably opposed to, and incapable of, any meaningful reform. Thankfully, as we now know, this wasn't to be the case and the events that started in the Lenin Shipyard in 1980 would eventually lead to the collapse of communism across eastern Europe a few years later in 1989.

Garton Ash's analysis of the months following the failed revolution is superb. Fair and balanced, it points out that the Polish Revolution refused to be pigeon-holed into any existing political ideology. Western Leftists, conservatives, peace campaigners and economists of the left and right were, to varying degrees, left embarrassed and confused by the workers' struggle. The workers themselves though no longer cared what anyone thought. They had experienced what one worker in Poznan described as "a revolution of the soul". They were now impervious to the lies the communists told them. They would be disobedient, uncooperative and insolent towards the regime. From now on, despite their revolution having been suppressed and despite the ever present threat of arrest, imprisonment or deportation to the Soviet gulag, they would now live as if they lived in a free country. They would live, speak, write and act truthfully in the full knowledge that a society built entirely on lies will eventually collapse. And, eight years later, collapse it did.