452- POLSKA LUDOWA
Soviet model, and from 1949 to 1956 were directly subordinated to Soviet com-
mand. Since 1955, they contributed an integral element of the Warsaw Pact. (See
Diagram H.) They were divided into four services — Air Force, Air Defence, Navy,
and Army — and their land forces were divided into two separate groups, one des-
ignated to home defence, the other to a strategic operational reserve. They con-
tained a strong Frontier Defence Force (WOP) and an elite Internal Security
Corps (WSW). According to the law of 21 November 1967, they were subject in
the first instance to the Defence Committee of the Council of Ministers, and in
times of emergency could call on the universal conscription of men between 18
and 50, and of women between 18 and 40. In peacetime, they rely partly on the
professional cadres and partly on compulsory, two-year national service. Their
nominal establishment (1977) stood at 15 army divisions, including one air-borne
and one amphibious assault division = 3,800 tanks and 4,200 other armoured
vehicles: 4 surface-to-surface missile brigades; an air-force of 55 squadrons with
745 combat aircraft, largely assigned to the interceptor role: a small navy of 25
warships, largely missile-carrying FPB and MTBs; and a total of 404,000 men plus
605,000 reservists. As demonstrated in the gigantic parade mounted in Warsaw
for the Thirtieth Anniversary of the People's Republic on 22 July 1974, their
equipment contained a formidable arsenal of Soviet-made guns, tanks, rockets,
and missiles. Their spirit was intensely patriotic, their training was rigorous, and,
with over 70 per cent of the officer corps possessing higher degrees, their techni-
cal proficiency considerable. Even so, their real capacity remained an unknown
quantity. The minor civil war of 1945-7 and the inglorious invasion of
Czechoslovakia in 1968 constituted their only active engagements in thirty years.
In October 1956, there had been clear signs that the Polish Army would have
resisted Soviet intervention. In 1968 and again in 1970, there were hints that it
would not give unconditional support to political adventures emanating from the
civil Militia or from the Party factions. There had been many rumours that the
General Staff had been making strenuous efforts to keep control of the army's
political departments in its own hands. In the circumstances, the political
influence of the armed forces was largely hidden from view. Their ability to act
independently, against the will of the Party leadership or against the common pol-
icy of the Warsaw Pact, could only be imagined.^55
The educational system received high priority;and quantitative statistics were
impressive. The over-all percentages of children, students, and adults attending
courses of learning was higher than in Western countries. On the other hand,
material conditions were often rudimentary: and teaching methods were
authoritarian. Progressive education in the Western sense was unknown. Pupils
were trained rather than educated, and were frequently alienated by the exhor-
tatory tone of many teachers, by compulsory Russian lessons, and by excessive
doses of political propaganda. There were some 88 institutions of higher learn-
ing compared with 32 in 1937/8.^56
Cultural life was closely controlled. Great advances had been made in the
provision of facilities for mass culture — in libraries, theatres, concert halls, cin-