By Douglas MacEachin, Jeannine O'Grody

"Douglas MacEachin has supplied a invaluable insider?’s account of the functionality of the U.S. intelligence neighborhood in an incredible episode of the chilly battle. it's a major addition to the literature on intelligence analysis." ?—Jeffrey T. Richelson, writer of The Wizards of Langley: contained in the CIA?’s Directorate of technology and know-how. "Douglas MacEachin?’s research of using intelligence throughout the Polish predicament of 1980?–81 deals an extraordinary perception into how intelligence affects on policymaking. This e-book is a precious contribution to our knowing of the occasions top as much as the 1981 martial law." ?—Andrew A. Michta, Rhodes university regardless of the U.S. government?’s refined intelligence services, policymakers many times looked to be stuck off safeguard while significant crises happened throughout the chilly warfare. have been those surprises the results of insufficient info, or relatively the use made up of the knowledge on hand? In looking a solution to this question, former CIA analyst Douglas MacEachin rigorously examines the predicament in Poland in the course of 1980?–81 to figure out what details the U.S. executive had approximately Soviet arrangements for army intervention and the Polish regime?’s plans for martial legislations, and what avoided that info from being successfully hired. Drawing on his adventure in intelligence reporting on the time, in addition to on lately declassified U.S. files and fabrics from Soviet, Polish, and different japanese eu files, MacEachin contrasts what was once recognized then with what's identified now, and seeks to provide an explanation for why, regardless of the proof to be had to them, U.S. policymakers didn't take the specter of a crackdown heavily adequate to avoid it. It was once the frame of mind of these who processed the data, no longer the inability or accuracy of knowledge, that used to be the basic challenge, MacEachin argues. by means of highlighting this cognitive predicament, his research issues the best way towards constructing practices to beat it sooner or later.

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9 Judgments on the willingness and ability of the Polish leadership to use its own forces to reassert party authority formed the linchpin of the CIA’s assessments of likely Soviet courses of action. The CIA postulated that if the Poles were willing (and able) to use coercive force, the Soviets could opt for sending in a few divisions to provide backup—as a reserve force and as an intimidating presence. The prevailing view in the CIA, however, continued to be that the Polish leadership would not or could not make this commitment.

This was composed of two representatives from each of the diverse striking enterprises in Gdansk and the nearby cities of Gdynia and Sopot. Its meeting site was a large hall at the Lenin Shipyard. On the weekend of 16–17 August, the MKS issued a communiqué describing its purpose as the coordination of the actions and demands of workers at all striking enterprises. 8 By Monday morning, 18 August, the MKS had agreed upon and released a list of twenty-one demands. At the top of this list were: • • • • • • Free trade unions that would be independent of the party and employers, in accordance with the Convention of the International Labor Organization.

Intelligence and the Confrontation in Poland Although the regime had gone further than many Western observers had expected, Solidarity still showed no flexibility on its remaining demands for curtailing the internal security organs, which intelligence analysts had already considered as well beyond what could be accepted by the regime. And however constructive the regime concessions on the Narozniak affair might have been in pulling back from a zero sum confrontation, Western analysts expected that Moscow would see it as yet another indication of the Polish leadership’s inability or unwillingness to stem the erosion of party supremacy.

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