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Labor Action, 14 November 1949

 

Calm Before the Storm in Poland?

 

From Labor Action, Vol. 13 No. 46, 14 November 1949, p. 3.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.

 

That the period of “calm” is coming to an end in Poland is indicated by a news dispatch appearing in the New York Times of October 30, 1940. According to the New York Times’ reporter stationed in Warsaw, Edward A. Morrow, “A purge of minor officials that may have major repercussions in the political life of Poland is now occurring, reliable sources stated today.”

Morrow indicates that a Polish Trial “à la Rajk” is being prepared to discredit the Western powers and eliminate those who were not wholeheartedly in favor of the merger of the Stalinist and Stalinist-controlled “Socialist Party.” Morrow confirms Rudzienski’s analysis by pointing out that no major political figures have been arrested, and “that the Polish government as yet never has found it necessary to play its tunes as stridently as other ‘people’s democracies’ have.” In a word, Stalin has been afraid to provoke a major Polish explosion.

That he is also afraid that the period of calm is ending may be indicated by his unprecedented step in appointing a Russian general to openly head Poland’s armed forces (see page 1).

 
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