The introduction of drastic price increases in the summer of 1976 led to a wave of brutally suppressed protests. It was the beginning of the end of Edward Gierek.
"You have to go to these factories, you have to tell them how we hate them, how we despise them, how we spit on them," says Edward Gierek, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party.
It's June 25, 1976; Gierek's words are listened to by the first secretaries of the provincial committees of the party. Importantly, and underlining the dread of the situation, they are not in Warsaw. The party leader talks to the rulers of forty-nine provinces via telephone lines. The comrades are to sit on the spot and guard their "principalities", because the party mountain is afraid that the protests may spill over the whole country.
The Myth of the Second Poland
On this day, June 25, 1976, the myth of the Second Poland, the tenth economic power in the world, collapses. For many Poles, this day also means the end of faith in socialism, and for most - the end of the myth of the Host. This also applies to party activists, which was particularly dangerous for Gierek at the time.
"It does not seem possible that Gierek mentally could ever recover. The blow was too strong ” - writes in his Political Journals Mieczysław F. Rakowski, editor-in-chief of the Polityka weekly and member of the Central Committee. Rakowski is considered a man close to the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party and until recently was an enthusiast of his policy. Even louder and more clearly in the building of the Central Committee, the discussions about the imminent departure of Prime Minister Piotr Jaroszewicz.
Even louder and more clearly in the building of the Central Committee, the discussions about the imminent departure of Prime Minister Piotr Jaroszewicz.
The protests begin in the morning of June 25, 1976, when workers of Zakłady Metalowe im. General "Walter" in Radom announce a strike and the company's director's attempt to extinguish it ends in a fiasco. In this situation, a large group of workers - soon it will be around six thousand people - gathers in front of the building of the Provincial Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party.
They demand to talk to the head of the provincial party structures, but Janusz Prokopiak does not intend to discuss with the crowd, he demands that a delegation be selected. He sends one of the KW secretaries to the workers, but they acknowledge his speech with whistles, and shortly afterwards a small group of protesters bursts into the building.
They meet Prokopiak and he finally decides to speak to the assembled people, and then by telephone he presents their request to reverse the price increase to Jan Szydlak, secretary of the Central Committee and member of the Politburo.
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Protests in Radom and Ursus
Meanwhile, the workers, impatient with the lack of answers, begin to plunder and destroy the "palace of power" in Radom. They are infuriated by food that is not available for sale in a party cafeteria, and they throw furniture, carpets, and TV sets and documents on the pavement.
In the early afternoon, the crowd gathered in front of the building of the Provincial Committee already numbers about 20,000 people, and to Radom are attracted by Motorized Odwody Milicja Obywatelska from Warsaw, Łódź, Kielce and Lublin, as well as students of the Military Police Academy in Szczytno . In the evening, after violent fighting in the streets, the authorities manage to get the situation under control , but protests also break out in other cities, mainly in Ursus and Płock.
The text is an excerpt from Piotr Gajdziński's book “Czas Gierka. The era of socialist decadence ”, which has just been released by the Bellona publishing house.
In Ursus, the fights are no less violent than in Radom. In the morning, the demonstrators sat on the railroad tracks, blocking the passage of trains on the Warsaw-Poznań and Warsaw-Łódź lines; They even manage to stop the train to Paris, and get the railroad tracks open and one of the locomotives derailed.
Hours later, when a large proportion of the demonstrators had dispersed home, an attack by ZOMO units. The situation is brought under control and the policemen catch the fugitives and put them in arrest.
In Płock, the demonstration of employees of Mazovian Refinery and Petrochemical Plants, later joined by workers from the Harvesting Machinery Factory, is more peaceful, although here too the windows in the building of the Provincial Committee are broken and cars with sound devices are destroyed. Edward Gierek is furious. I feel personally hurt by this rebellion, even offended.
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"I won't forget it"
So much so that he utters words that he has not used so far, not only in public, but also in private conversations:"Tell those Radomers that I don't give a shit about them all and I don't give a shit about all their actions too! > - he shouts to Janusz Prokopiak, 1st secretary of the Provincial Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party in Radom. - You made such a riot and you want to be gentle on it? They're bullies, I won't forget them. ”
The fury of the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party is even greater as the meeting of the heads of all communist parties of the Soviet camp is to begin in Berlin on the evening of the same day. A great feast in which the communists from Western Europe will also take part.
In recent years, Edward Gierek could almost be considered a savior of world socialism in this group.
In recent years, Edward Gierek could almost be considered a savior of world socialism in this group. It seemed that Poland was developing faster than other countries of the Soviet camp , and the nation that has so far been considered wayward in this group - at least some of Stalin's pupils must have known the words of the generalissimo that "communism fits Poles like a cow's saddle" - has been tamed.
Many Moscow acolytes were enviously looking at Warsaw, which draws its full handfuls from international relaxation, and Gierek has so far been welcomed in European capitals with openness and celebrity inaccessible to most of them.
Read also:What did Edward Gierek do in retirement?
"Iron hand"
Who else among the rulers of socialist countries could enjoy the personal friendship and admiration of German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and be hosted by him at a private dinner and the sympathy of French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, descendant of a wealthy noble family with whom they went hunting?
In this group of communist governors of Moscow, those "people without qualities", red plebeians, whose power was based on Soviet bayonets, it had its significance.
Present in Berlin:János Kádár, the leader of Hungary, Gustáv Husák, the ruler of Czechoslovakia, the Bulgarian Teodor Zhivkov, Erich Honecker holding eastern Germans in an iron grip, and the ruler of the Soviet empire, Leonid Brezhnev himself, can feel quiet satisfaction. The latter is all the more so because Moscow warned "dear Polish comrades" against introducing increases.
Gierek was convinced that the nation loved him, that he trusted his fate to him.
But neither Gierek nor Piotr Jaroszewicz, who headed the government, wanted to hear any warnings. "Sztygar", as after Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, president of the Polish Writers' Union, Gierek was called among the party activists of the highest rank, is convinced that the nation loves him, that he trusted him with his fate . Jaroszewicz looks at the world with a slightly sober eye and knows that failure to implement the "pricing operation" will destroy the already very unstable market equilibrium, thus leading to price increases, regardless of any warnings and recent Polish experiences six years ago.
He is also convinced of his economic genius, and he also considers himself an outstanding specialist in management. "He introduced corporal rule, took away the initiative of the people, suppressed all democratic reforms - assessed in September 1976 Mieczysław F. Rakowski. - It seemed to him that when he put everything under his "iron hand", Poland would develop wonderfully, because he, Jaroszewicz, knew what was good for the country ".
Source:
The text is an excerpt from Piotr Gajdziński's book “Czas Gierka. The era of socialist decadence ”, which has just been released by the Bellona publishing house.