- 1 - Lecture 20 The Stalinist Years 1949-1956 1. Introduction Stalinism cannot be regarded as unchanging. Moreover, Stalinism changed considerably after death of Stalin in 1953. 2. Chronology of the Cold War a. First Cold War Origins 1945-1947 Course 1947-1953 Reasons for its end b. First thaw 1954-1957 c. Second Cold War 1957-1961 d. Second Thaw 1961-64 e. Third (not very) Cold War 1964-1970 f. Third Thaw 1970-1981 g. Fourth Cold War 1981-1985 h. End of communism: nature of revolution of 1989-1991. 3. Characteristics of Stalinism - 2 - One can define Stalinism in Eastern Europe as the combination of the totalitarian reshaping of the societies involved coupled with the extension of the political control of the Soviet Union in a region she felt vital to her security. A subordinate aspect of the phenomenon was that it took place in a period of mounting international tension in which the overriding conflict was that between the communist and the western camps. A few dates will give the relevant international background: 1. June 1947 Marshall aid refused 2. September 1947 Cominform set up 3. February 1948 Setting up of Western Union 4. February 1948 Berlin blockade 5. January 1949 Establishment of Comecon 6. April 1949 Establishment of Nato 7. June 1950 Korean War breaks out 3. Specific Features of the Stalinist Period in Poland 1. Dependence on Russia a. Political decisions Not clear how these made. Jakub Berman as eminence grace b. Security Services - 3 - These were headed by Władysław Radkiewicz The role of Jews in the security services has aroused considerable controversy. In his Europe: A History, Norman Davies writes that in Poland, ‘Popular knowledge...has always insisted that the notorious communist Security Office (UB) contained a disproportionate number of Jews (or rather ex-Jews) and that their crimes were heinous’. He goes on to concede that ‘few hard facts were ever published and , but claims that this point of view has become ‘all the more convincing’ because of recent ‘disclosures’ have ‘broken the taboo’ and are particularly credible, since ‘they were made by a Jewish investigator on evidence supplied by Jewish participants...The study deals with the district of Upper Silesia, and, in particular, with the town of Gliwice (Gleiwitz)’. Following its author, John Sacks, Davies claims that ‘ in 1945 every single commander and three-quarters of the local agents of the UB were of Jewish origin; that ex-Nazi camps and prisons were refilled with totally innocent civilians, especially Germans; and that torture, starvation, sadistic beatings, and murder were routine’. (Europe: A History, pp.1022). However, Sack’s book An Eye for an Eye: The Untold Story of Jewish Revenge Against Germans in 1945 is quite irresponsible and is little more than an extended interview with Lola Potok, one of the Jews in the UB. In it, he produces no documentary evidence to justify his claims, which have been used to argue, in Davies’ words, that ‘in this light, it is difficult to justify the widespread practice whereby the murderers, the victims, and the bystanders of wartime Poland were each neatly identified with specific ethnic groups’. - 4 - Andrzej Paczkowski in Warsaw is doing pioneer research on this subject. He and Lech Głuchowski have made an assessment of the nationality of UB functionaries, making use of a confidential study prepared by the Ministry of Internal Affairs in 1978. According to this study, between 1944 and 1945, there was a total of 287 functionaries who held leadership positions in the UB. The number of those listed as having ‘Jewish nationality’ totalled 75. This meant that Jews made up 26.3 per cent of the UB leadership, while the figure for Poles was 66.9 per cent. The remaining 6.9 per cent were Russians, Belorussians and Ukrainians. The proportion of Jews at lower levels of the organization was considerably less. In another document, Stanisław Radkiewicz informed Bolesław Bierut that the Security Office in November 1945 employed 25,600 personnel and that 438 (or 1.7 per cent) of them were Jews. Furthermore, the rapid increase in the number of UB functionaries that took place in 1945 occurred in a political framework which placed the political orientation and class origins of the candidate above almost all other considerations. To quote Paczkowski and Głuchowski: The great majority of candidates actually consisted of young - and very young - political transients, with no professional experience and mixed reasons, if not questionable motives, for joining the UB. There was a constant movement of lower-level cadres in and out of the UB between 1945 and 1946. At this time, approximately 25,000 employees left the UB: about the same number that were employed by the UB at the end of 1946. The majority had been released from the UB for drunkenness, theft, abuse, or for a lack of discipline. 1 Dependence on Russian advisers. According to Józef Światło, the whole security apparatus controlled by chief Soviet adviser to Radkiewicz, Gen Lalin c. Army - 5 - Marian Spychalski, one of Gomułka’s associates replaced by Edward Ochab as Vice- minister of Defense. In November 1949 Stalin ‘made available’ Marshal Konstantitn Rokossovsky, a former commander of Red Army in Poland. General Żymierski forced to retire. The army was now made dependent on the Soviet Union. This was seen in its political training, in the oath of loyalty all officers had to take to the USSR and in the fact that nearly all key appointments were held by Soviet officers. Polish officers could only be promoted if they knew Russia or had been to a soviet military academy. There were also purges of offices who has served in the Polish armed forces in the west. d. Economic situation Trade links with Russia with Russia were now tightened, particularly after the rejection of Marshall aid. Under the new condition, Polish industry to produce for the Soviet market. In addition, according to an agreement of August 1945, Poland was to deliver approximately 12 million tons of coal annually at a price $1.25 per ton. This at a time when Denmark and Sweden were prepared to offer $12 and later $16 dollars per ton The Soviet quota was later halved, but the Poles were still compelled to sell their coal for $14 per ton, when they could have received $18-19 per ton from the Western Europeans. The Poles were similarly compelled to sell sugar to the Soviet Union at below world market prices. The price of sugar was set at $1 per kg at a time when the Swedes were offering $2.82. 1 Letter to the Times Literary Supplement, around January 1997. - 6 - e. .Soviet political model followed Thus the constitution of July 1952 was largely modeled on the Soviet constitution. f. Propaganda This constantly stressed the leading role of the USSR. A common formula was the ‘socialist countries with the Soviet Union at the head’. 2.Purges of party 1. The purge of the ‘Nationalist deviation’ Background - early 1948 quarrel between Tito and the Russians. June 1948 Tito expelled from Cominform. This led to the purge of the PPR’s first secretary, Władysław Gomułka. He had opposed establishment of the Cominform, was sympathetic towards Tito and had strong views on the importance of following a specific ‘Polish road to socialism.’ His fall from power took place in stages. In June 1948, the PPR Central Committee forced him to take sick leave. At the meeting of 31 August - 3 September 1948 he was stripped of his position of Secretary-General of the PPR and four of his followers reduced from full to alternate members of CC - 7 - After the unification of PPS and the PPR a new line - more hostile to nationalism was adopted. In these circumstances, Gomułka attempted to save himself by a direct letter to Stalin written on 14 December 1948, in which he argued that the accusations on ‘Polish nationalism’ had been brought against him by his Jewish comrades, who lacked a sense of national identity and appealed to Stalin’s increasingly paranoid antisemitism. The letter has recently come to light and I will quote some of its most crucial passages: All members of the Politburo are aware of my position on the matter of the party’s personnel policy, as it relates to the Jewish comrades. I actually gave it expression on more that one occasion at meetings of the Buro, and in individual conversations with Buro members. Personnel appointments to the higher echelons of the state and party apparatus, under the nationalities angle, creates, in my own opinion, a serious barrier hindering the expansion of our base, especially among the intelligentsia, as well as in the countryside, and also to a certain degree in the working class. It is indeed possible to make even me responsible for the high percentage of Jewish elements in the leadership of the state and party apparatus, but the main culprit for creating the state of affairs falls, above all, on the Jewish comrades. As the party General Secretary, I did not find among them, not only understanding and support for my position on the matter of personnel policy, which the party ought to cultivate; but, on the contrary, the systematic practice of their personnel policy revealed that they do not agree with my position. It is in fact not true that only a serious deficit of Polish party cadres precludes the authorization of a personnel policy that is different from the present one. Cadres will never increase as long as the party does not create the appropriate conditions for it; for example, as long as it does not put forward for responsible positions the most competent comrades from that group, which it commands.