490 SOLIDARNOSC
national life, enjoying a level of respect and personal authority unrivalled
among his contemporaries. He had been the guarantor of the modus Vivendi
between the rulers and the ruled which, despite interruptions, had generally held
good since 1956. As a professed patron of Solidarity, he reinforced the view that
Walesa's movement posed no violent threat to the social or political order. After
his death, anxieties inevitably increased. His successor, Jozef Glemp (b. 1929)
the Bishop of Warmia was a man of far smaller presence, who would vacillate
ever more unsteadily between the demands of the regime and the pleas of his
flock.
In the autumn, the political climate deteriorated. Negotiations between
Solidarity and the Government were making no real progress. Attempts to form
a three-side council of national reconciliation supported by the ruling Party, by
the Church, and by Solidarity, came to nothing. An impasse was visibly
approaching and recriminations were mounting. Party spokesmen blamed
Solidarity for making impossible demands, whilst Solidarity spokesmen blamed
the Party for reneging on its promises. Most alarmingly, the police took action
to prevent Solidarity from operating in selected sectors of industry. A persistent
strike in the city of Radom were surrounded by rumours of police brutality.
These only became intelligible when word spread that Radom was the unpubli-
cized centre of Poland's secret arms industry. Despite its disarray, the
Communist movement had no intention of letting Solidarity penetrate the inner
strongholds of the Warsaw Pact's infrastructure. The limit had been reached.
During these months, many outside observers lost sight of the tell-tale signs
of vital changes within the PZPR which should have given ample warning of the
shock to come. But in retrospect, it is easy to see that the military conspirators
were clearing the ground for action. In October, General Jaruzelski assumed the
supreme position of Party Secretary, replacing the ineffective Stanislaw Kania
but taking care to express his adherence to the continuing programme of
Odnowa or 'Party Renewal', which Kania had launched. In October, Jaruzelski
sent thousands of small army patrols into the countryside, ostensibly to help
with the distribution of food, but equally to collect local information and to
spread the image of the Army as the people's friend. In November and early
December, as Jaruzelski tightened his grip, the official media, enthusiastically
led by the daily television news (DTV), rose to a crescendo in its crude attempts
to discredit the Solidarity leaders and if possible to goad them into an open act
of rebellion. On 4 December, they obtained what they wanted. A secret micro-
phone placed by the security services in a meeting between Waif sa and the strike
leaders at Radom picked up an outburst which, when suitably doctored,
sounded like a call for a general rising. The Radom tapes were manipulated. But
they could be used as 'evidence'. After that, it was only a matter of days before
the snatch squads completed their training, the troops were put into position,
and the generals received their orders.
Which only leaves the intriguing question of what precisely was meant by 'the
core of the Communist Establishment' which had planned the demarche, which