Mieczyslaw Rakowski, the Deputy Premier who has emerged as a trusted
associate of General Wojciech Jaruzelski's, is one of the country's
ablest and most prominent figures, yet remains one of the most
enigmatic. In his 24-year career as editor in chief of the weekly
newspaper Polityka, Rakowski, 55, projected the image of that rarest of
Communists: a candid advocate of political and economic reform. He was
also a link to the West, a charming, multilingual bon vivant who always
found time for foreign visitors, especially journalists. Now, to the surprise of many Westerners who knew him well in the past,
Rakowski has become an ardent defender of the repression that began on
Dec. 13. Is he a patriot who truly believes the crackdown will save his
country from chaos? An idealist turned pragmatist who hopes to preserve
some of the reforms won before the declaration of martial law? Or is he
just an opportunist enjoying his place at the fulcrum of power? Those
who know him well agree upon only one point: Rakowski is a survivor. When the generals wanted to explain their crackdown to the West Germans,
Rakowski was naturally the man they sent to Bonn. Martial law, he said,
was necessary to prevent the outbreak within “a matter of weeks” of a
civil war that would have provoked a Soviet invasion. Stern Publisher
Henri Nannen, who has known Rakowski for twelve years, considered his
explanation sincere, and an American diplomat described him as a “man
of integrity.” In contrast, a respected West German analyst notes that
Rakowski has a “weakness for ambition” and “always knows which way the
wind blows.” One British expert points out that ultimately, Rakowski
was always a loyal Communist. The son of a Polish doctor who was shot by invading German troops in
1939, Rakowski emerged from the war a fervent Communist and, for a
while, a committed Stalinist.
Rakowski's taste for reform developed in 1956, when Wladyslaw Gomulka
became head of the Polish Communist Party, promising greater freedom
and economic progress. Under Rakowski's editorship, Polityka refused to
join a campaign against the Catholic Church in 1966. In 1968 Rakowski,
who was by then a deputy member of the Central Committee, not only
refused to support an anti-Semitic purge but protected the Jews who
worked for him. Rakowski became the regime's bridge to Poland's disaffected
intellectuals, and he talked with seeming frankness to journalists
about Poland's problems. He once told TIME: “Political reform is
absolutely essential for Poland if it is to overcome its problems.” But Journalist Rakowski wanted to do more than talk and write about his
country; he wanted to be in on the action. His opportunity came last
February, when Jaruzelski appointed him to negotiate with Solidarity.
It was then, ironically, that Rakowski's reputation as a liberal began
to fade. Perhaps naively, he thought Solidarity could be fashioned into
a benign check on the government, but without power of its own.
Rakowski became increasingly impatient with Solidarity's demands, and
at one point last summer publicly accused the union of “unprecedented
arrogance.”
