Postcard from Warsaw

Twenty-seven years ago this month, Poland's capital was a different place: instead of showcasing new boutiques and McDonald's, the streets of Warsaw were guarded by tanks and lined with small bonfires to warm the hands of military patrols. On Dec. 13, 1981, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, Poland's Prime Minister, imposed martial law, initiating a brutal 19-month crackdown on the pro-democracy Solidarity trade-union movement in which an estimated 90 people were killed and 10,000 detained. Now, in a case long postponed by political squeamishness and red tape, Jaruzelski and six other former top officials face charges of violating Poland's constitution and unlawfully enforcing "the deprivation of freedom through internment." If convicted, the 85-year-old general would face up to 10 years in prison.

Though the trial started in September, thanks to procedural delays, Jaruzelski finished reading his 200-page opening statement only in late November. In court he appears fragile but speaks firmly. His defense rests on the argument that with radicals threatening to take over the Solidarity movement and Moscow watching closely, he had no choice but to order the crackdown. Soviet troops put down a popular rebellion in Hungary in 1956 and destroyed a reformist Czech regime in 1968. Jaruzelski was acutely aware that Poland could suffer a similar fate. Martial law was a "dramatically difficult decision," but it "saved Poland from a looming catastrophe," he told the court.

Surprisingly, the leaders of the very movement Jaruzelski crushed agree--and have emerged among his staunchest defenders. Former activist Kazimierz Kutz, now a member of parliament, says Jaruzelski's actions allowed moderates on both sides to prevail, eventually leading to the Round Table talks that brought a peaceful end to Poland's communist regime in 1989. Even Lech Walesa, the legendary Solidarity leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner who was interned for almost a year in the clampdown, has said that Jaruzelski would have been considered a "great patriot" had he lived in different times and that the trial was a "mistake."

Not everyone feels the same. Speaker of the Senate Bogdan Borusewicz calls the takeover a "classic Latin-style military putsch" and says the trial may be Poland's last chance for justice. "Jaruzelski defended the communist system, not Poland," Borusewicz says. "He defended the communist dictatorship, not the state." Marek Krasko, a Warsaw accountant, remembers that as a 13-year-old, he welcomed martial law--because the schools were closed--until he saw his grandmother in tears at the prospect of civil war. "Martial law was a hard blow for Solidarity, and it pushed the country back," he says. "But on the other hand, without Jaruzelski, it all could have ended up in violence." A December 2007 survey showed that 44% of Poles believe the authorities had no choice but to crack down, while 45% condemn the decision.

Younger Poles tend to be more critical than adults who witnessed the events. "Opinions of those who remember the crackdown have changed over time," says Barbara Szacka, a sociology professor at Warsaw's Academy of Social Psychology. The generational split is visible at the trial. A dozen mostly elderly men go regularly to the courthouse, a monumental prewar edifice in downtown Warsaw, to show support for Jaruzelski, while young activists picket outside with banners reading WHEN WILL WE SEE JUSTICE?

In some ways it's surprising the trial is happening at all. Recent governments, largely made up of Solidarity moderates and holdovers from the communist era, were in no hurry to pursue the case; it wasn't until the right-wing Law and Justice party came to power in 2005 that prosecutors pushed to bring Jaruzelski to trial. Still, it's not clear when, if ever, the court will reach a decision. Some lawyers say the declaration of martial law was legal, and documentary evidence from the period is spotty at best. With Poles still divided, the judgment of General Jaruzelski may yet be left to history.