Former President Lech Wałęsa, the first chairman of the Solidarity trade union, talks to Marcin Mierzejewski.

The strike in the Gdańsk Shipyard began on Aug. 14 and could have well ended that very same day after the management agreed to meet some of the strikers' demands. What's the story with that backhoe that you mounted to persuade the shipyard workers to continue their strike?

Let's start from the very beginning. In the underground Free Trade Unions, we set the date and hour of the start of the strike. This was to be the 14th, probably at 6 a.m. And I, for some trivial reason, did not go there as agreed at 6, but around 9 or 10. Only today, as we open archival documents, it turns out that if I had tried to head for the shipyard on Aug. 14 according to plan at 6 a.m., I would have probably been stopped by the Security Service, which was already on my back with their surveillance. So providence tried to help us from the very beginning and it helped us effectively.

When the shipyard workers went on strike, and I had just arrived, the SB began to confer and they remembered that earlier in 1970, when the strike leaders were detained, shipyard workers arrived armed with pipes and clubs to break them out of jail. If I had been stopped, the same situation could have occurred because if the shipyard workers had learned that I didn't make it because I had been stopped, blood would have probably been spilled again. That's why Gdańsk was afraid of making an independent decision and they tried to secure such a decision from Warsaw. Warsaw debated the issue and by the time the decision was finally made there-to stop Wałęsa, I was on the other side of the shipyard wall.

On the other hand, when it comes to that backhoe that you mentioned, the thing was that there were many inexperienced people in the shipyard who, to make a long story short, were afraid, and the management already at the beginning of the strike-at around 9 or 10 a.m., as I said-began to prevail. Director Gniech, who was holding talks with workers, brought the situation under control by telling them to disperse and resume work. The strike had actually ended as there was no one any longer who was ready to oppose. Then, practically at the last second, Wałęsa appeared. Indeed, I climbed up on that backhoe and took the initiative right away. Because I had the greatest experience in organizing strikes, I carried on with the matter and did not let the management sidetrack me. That's the story behind the backhoe.

Have you ever wondered what would have happened if you had arrived a bit later or if the shipyard workers had obeyed the director instead of you? Would we still be living in a Europe divided by an Iron Curtain?

I still wonder about that-maybe things would be worse, or maybe they would be better. Nothing can be ruled out. It is due to providence that at a certain important moment in history that concrete situation developed just the way I wanted. What if someone else had been there instead of me? There's no way of knowing. Only God knows the answer to this question.

As you encouraged the shipyard workers not to finish their strike, did you guess back then what it would amount to? Did you expect that you would become head of an almost 10-million-strong movement that would definitively overcome communism in Europe and contribute to the collapse of the Soviet Union?

It wasn't quite like that. I wasn't really doing the encouraging, but rather took the initiative. With my earlier experiences from 1970, it was clear to me that initiative-of all things-determination and acting before your opponent were the most important things at the time. This made it possible for me to effectively lead the strike and, of course, full determination and dedication to the cause. If the leader doubts, the efforts of all the others are wasted.

Did I expect it? I had all the possible versions worked out. Of course, I wanted to win; otherwise I wouldn't have started. When we ended the strike back in '70 and lost it completely, I told myself as I was leaving the shipyard: God, give me a chance to come back here again and take up the fight! In the intervening 10 years, I watched people's behavior and examined the reasons why we had lost at the time. As a result, in August '80 I was convinced that this time we would go on.

I didn't know how it would end, for example because it was always possible that they could open fire on us again. That's why I tried to maintain the struggle in a way that would exclude such a scenario. In my talks with government officials, I used various arguments, saying that if the authorities opened fire on us, this would amount to sheer murder, banditry that they would be unable to explain to the world-which in reality would represent their defeat. I was saying like this to sow doubts in them at any price. The presence of foreign reporters in the shipyard was also important. Thanks to that, we had the "propaganda" part of the deal under control.

After the bloody crackdown on the strikers in December '70, in August '80 shipyard workers followed a different tactic: not to take to the streets with their demonstrations in order to avoid bullets.

That was obvious. By trial and error, we worked out a solution that called for a peaceful movement-later called Solidarity. After December [1970], it was clear that in a street confrontation, without a peaceful approach, we did not have a chance. They were better shooters and more ruthless, not to mention that they could ask for "fraternal assistance" [from the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries-ed]. Keep in mind that at the time 200,000 Soviet soldiers were stationed in Poland, with a further one million around the country's borders. Given the situation, any battle other than a battle of arguments could have ended very badly for us.

Today, 25 years after the establishment of Solidarity, do you feel primarily a trade union leader, politician and statesman or simply a worker?

I feel like a man who has been fated to live in a relay race of generations at a particular moment in time, a man who has tried in his ways to show that certain things are possible and to take part in the development of events. So at one time I was a trade union leader, then a politician and finally an ex-politician. The most important thing to me is that generally in Poland everything is working out the way I hoped. Sometimes I am more active in arranging these political puzzles, at other times-I'm less active. If everything continues to work out the way it has so far-which means not that bad-there's no place for me in politics, but if something were to go bad, then I'm ready to join the game again and take care of certain matters. When it comes to my background as a worker, I have always been and will remain one.

Isn't it a bit tiring that you are perceived as a "living legend" for so many years, a well-known figure and a household name around the world?

I don't pay attention to that; I don't have the time. I have other genuinely interesting things to do. They are what interests me.

You often lecture in the West, including the United States. What are the most frequent questions you are asked there?

This has varied with time. At first, there was greater interest in history. I was asked about Solidarity and specific events. Today it's slightly different: there is more talk about the future, the issues of globalization and how the European Union is supposed to look. Because I have limited opportunities to act in Poland at the moment, since I'm not exercising any official functions-I'm active abroad where I've been trying to show the world that our fight has put an end to a certain era-an era of divisions, borders and blocs.

Today these divisions and borders are out of sync with the current situation and needs, and that's why it's necessary to think of a new form of structural organization of the world and new programs. Institutions such as the United Nations or NATO are solutions from a bygone era that, to a large extent, do not suit the current situation. I try to discuss these things, showing elements that need to be improved and encouraging changes to certain structures.

In the U.S., which I visit the most often, I say that we must look for a new place today for the single superpower. When there were two superpowers in the past, they controlled and kept each in check. Now that only one remains, there is no consensus about what its role is supposed to be. This superpower is certainly very resourceful and does a good job defending its own interests. But the problem is that the States is a military and economic leader, without being a political leader, which is the tragedy of our times.

Solidarity is referred to as a great peaceful national uprising that ended with a definitive victory whose dimensions could not be easily predicted. Would you agree that certain specific national traits of Poles, including their determined drive toward freedom, played a major role in Solidarity's success?

In the beginning, when the communist system was imposed on us after the war, Poles had to develop a certain system of individual behaviors in defense against a system of enslavement. Actually, even earlier, they were forced to do so by historic conditions, when Poland found itself trapped between the Soviets and Germans. So, perhaps we should look back in time to as early as 1939. I think we wouldn't have survived without faith, without God. That's why, given the historical background and faith, the exceptional event that was Solidarity could only have taken place here.

It's also necessary to keep in mind the experiences of earlier protests against the communists-protests that were harshly stifled and ended in repression: in 1956, 1968, 1970 and 1976. By 1980 we knew that we would not win by force, that we needed a new approach. We had the awareness that if a real uprising had taken place, the Soviets would have burned us. The West, with which we talked as the opposition as early as the '70s, wanted to weaken communism, but at the same time it was afraid of it. It was afraid of nuclear weapons and the price that would have to be paid in the event of a conflict. That's why they helped us now and then, but did not believe in the possibility of victory.

But then the unpredictable occurred. A Pole was elected pope in 1978 and when he came to Poland a year later, the whole world watched in amazement what was happening here-in a communist country, almost the entire nation was taking part in pilgrimages. The pope himself was saying interesting things: "Do not fear," "May Your Spirit change the face of this land." The people listened to him and woke up, but this was not an incitement to war or fighting. It only meant: see how many of you there are. Then it turned out that even the Reds were no longer so self-confident. This was the breakthrough moment when Poland and Poles woke up. Without this awakening, the events of August would have been impossible.

How did the August strike, which was launched under the banner of economic demands, transform into a general political protest?

People who are involved in organizing a strike must behave like coaches. Take weightlifters: If the coach gives a young athlete a 200 kg weight to lift at their first training, then this is clearly an excessive strain and the athlete will never show up for the next training session, because the going will be too tough. The same was true when we started the strike: we had to lift weights according to our capabilities. I was behaving precisely like the coach: I knew that a good feel was needed as to whether I could add some more weight or not; whether it was necessary to back down at a certain moment and say for example "communism yes, distortions no." We did employ such things then as well because otherwise we wouldn't have won. This was a "wedge method" based on gradually prying things open.

Would you agree that the cooperation of workers with opposition intellectuals-something that was lacking in October '56 and March '68-was an important factor behind the success of the strike?

One of the first moves I made at the start of the strike was bringing Warsaw advisers Mazowiecki and Geremek to the shipyard, despite the total opposition of my entire presidium [within the strike committee-ed], which caused the first conflicts and misunderstandings. But I knew that this was the only right way to proceed. Later I got students from the Gdańsk University of Technology, for example, and representatives of other communities from outside the working community involved in the strike as well. I even brought these people into the presidium itself in order to make sure that these communities worked together, because this was how I understood the essence of the Solidarity movement. This was precisely to be our advantage in the game with the authorities, who had their method of dividing various social groups and playing that into their own hands. We managed to bring together various professions so that they could not ask, "Who do you actually represent?"

According to an account by Bogdan Borusewicz [fellow leader of the Solidarity movement - ed.], when the decision was made-at a secret meeting in a private apartment-to start the strike in the shipyard, you hesitated for a while saying that a baby had just been born into your family. Still, you went ahead with the strike.

I had these moments of hesitation because I knew that in order to do the work, family would have to take a backseat to everything else. That's why I wondered if I had prepared my wife and home well for this situation. I had to say clearly that I would stop being a husband and father because I had to take action. Moreover, I had to make both myself and my loved ones aware of the fact that in this work, I could easily be shot and killed, strangled or poisoned at any moment. My hesitation at the time involved not so much the very decision to lead the strike, but rather whether I had prepared everything and everyone for such a game, for complete dedication to the cause.

Is there a chance that a film about Lech Wałęsa will finally be made? You once signed an agreement with an American studio to sell the rights to such a film. De Niro was to play the lead...

There is a certain problem with this. You know in those times we spoke without speaking-between the lines. The most important things took place in hiding-hidden in plain sight rather than shown. How could this be shown on the screen now? I think many people in the West might not understand; it might not be comprehensible to them. There were proposals to illustrate this through some kind of fight, shooting and collecting weapons-but these things never happened! That's why such a film could be interesting to us, but not necessarily to the world. The most important moments of the strike cannot be shown in some spectacular way. How could we present the scene when the management organized "commandos," or a riot squad that was supposed to storm the shipyard to crack down on the strikers with clubs. I talked to the director, saying, "Aren't you ashamed of staging such a provocation and beating the people who are guarding the plant?!" There were many such dramatic situations during the strike, but these situations do not fit into the canons of American cinema; they don't make a good action movie at all.

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