May 17, 2014
A very early Media Network covering what we could hear about the worrying developments in Warsaw. On December 12–13 1981, the Polish regime declared martial law, under which the army and ZOMO riot police were used to crush the Solidarity movement. The Soviet leaders insisted that Jaruzelski pacify the opposition with the forces at his disposal, without direct Soviet involvement or backup. Virtually all Solidarity leaders and many affiliated intellectuals were arrested or detained. The United States and other Western countries responded by imposing economic sanctions against Poland and the Soviet Union. With no Twitter, or even Internet at the time, one of the few ways of monitoring developments was to listen to Polish radio.