Central European Civil-Military Relations and NATO Expansion - Chapter IV

Title: Central European Civil-Military relations and NATO expansion - Chapter IV

CHAPTER IV: REPUBLIC OF POLAND

Since 1989, reform of Poland's 1952 Constitution--gradually transforming Poland from communist to a democratic state--has undergone five stages of development. The process began in 1988 with an understanding reached between the government and the opposition within the framework of round-table talks. The Polish United Worker's Party's (PUWP) recognized political and trade union pluralism in return for the creation of a powerful new office of president. The second stage began with the communist party's overwhelming defeat during the June 1989 general parliamentary elections, in which 35 percent of the Sejm seats were contested and which also resulted in the 24 August 1989 election of Tadeusz Mazowiecki as Poland's first non-communist prime minister. The third stage commenced with the 9 December 1990 presidential elections which brought Lech Walesa to the presidency and the appointment of Jan Bielecki as the second non-communist prime minister in January 1991. The fourth stage commenced after the full Sejm and Senate democratic elections held on 27 October 1991, which resulted in the rule of Jan Olszewski and Hanna Suchochka as Poland's third and fourth non-communist prime ministers. The fifth stage started after the fall 1993 Sejm and Senate elections, with the return of the socialists, the appointment of Waldemar Pawlak as prime minister, and constitutional crisis in Poland.

During the same period, Poland initiated an extensive domestic defense reform--to ensure civilian command and control and extensive restructuring of the military and to return the armed forces to the people. As it did so, Poland also had to grapple with a rapidly changing threat environment. Before 1989, Polish military doctrine viewed the West, specifically NATO, as the primary threat. Until the 14 November 1990 Polish-German border treaty, Poland viewed Germany as a threat. Then until the August 1991 failed coup and resulting disintegration of the USSR in December, Poland viewed the Soviet Union as a threat. Since 1992 Poland has come full-circle; it is now attempting to develop an "all-round" defense strategy regarding primary threats arising from its unstable four eastern border states; Russia, Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine.

Stillborn Defense Reform

To achieve democratic civil-military relations, Poland must establish consensus and law on civilian (president, government, and Parliament) command and control of the defense ministry and military, the former Polish People's Army (PPA). Poland's reform has included amending the Constitution to formalize the round-table agreements to create a new office of the president, an office which for a long period lacked a constitutional basis. Poland still must clarify the lines of authority between the president and government (prime minister and civilian defense minister) and of the government's control of the military in peacetime and war. So far, this effort has failed.

In addition, the Polish reform had to refurbish the image of the military and return the armed forces to Polish society. Because of the extensive use of Polish armed forces in the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 and in suppressing strikers on the Baltic coast in December 1970 and in planning and implementing martial law in 1980-81,

the military's reputation was tarnished in the population's estimation as well as in its own eyes.

To refurbish its image, the reform had to remove Polish United Worker's Party (PUWP) influence from the defense establishment and ensure that Polish military forces are sufficient to guarantee the integrity and sovereignty of Poland. In this part of reform, Poland has been somewhat more successful.

First stage of constitutional reform (1988-June 1989). Not unlike 1918, Poland's new leadership inherited empty political 'traditions.' As Andrzej Korbonski has argued, when Poland reappeared after World War I (Poland disappeared from the map of Europe in 1795), Poland's political leadership inherited empty political traditions. Having been formed from three different empires--German, Austro-Hungarian, and Russian--and having no more than 60 percent of its population as Polish, Poland was neither a state nor a nation. As a result, the Polish military played different roles during the inter-war period; in the Constitutions of 1921 and 1935.

Many Poles perceived the system of government imposed by the Soviet Union and led by the Polish communist government since World War II as contrary to the interests of Poland and its citizens. Although the 1952 Constitution guaranteed democratic rights, as Norman Davies has noted: "all chance of effective democracy was nullified by the extra-constitutional 'leading role' of the Party and its National Front as the 'guardian of the state'...the People's 'Democracy' was a legal fiction. The reality lay in the Party's dictatorship over the people."

When Poland began serious reform, it became immediately apparent how hopelessly outdated was its 1952 Constitution. For example, Chapter 5, entitled "Supreme Organs of State Administration," gave Parliament the power to appoint the Council of Ministers--the prime minister, vice-premiers, and ministers--but did not provide for a president.

Only in April 1989, after two months of round-table negotiations, did the Mieczyslaw Rakowski government (which was formed in September 1988) and the Lech Walesa-led Solidarity Union agree to restore Poland's second chamber of Parliament--the Senate--which had been abolished in 1946--with 100 members chosen in open and free elections and to liberalize voting regulations for 35 percent of the 460-seat Sejm. In return, Solidarity agreed to institute an office of the president with broad powers for foreign and security policy

(see Table 2 below).

Table 2 - Polish Defense Reform, 1988-91

According to the round-table agreement, 299 of the Sejm's 460 seats were reserved for the PUWP and subservient parties and 161 seats (35 percent) for the opposition. The newly created 100-seat Senate was to serve as a higher deliberative body with veto power over the Sejm (though a two-thirds vote of the Sejm could override the Senate's veto) and, together with the Sejm, to elect the president for a six-year term.

During the communist period, the Polish Defense Council (KOK) had been responsible for shaping the general guidelines of Poland's defense capabilities but Poland had a pre-communist history with such an organ of government. After the May 1926 coup Marshal Pilsudski signed an executive order appointing a

Committee for the Defense of the State to streamline his govern-ment. In fact, the ultimate supragovernmental agency to manage Poland's defense against Hitler's Germany was the Defense Committee of the Republic (KOK) created by Presidential decree of 12 May 1936.

Established in 1958 by a Council of Ministers' Resolution and accorded increased powers after 1967, the KOK subordinated the defense and interior ministries to the PUWP.

During the Martial Law period, the KOK flexed its power as state administrator by ordering the militarization of many enterprises and mobilization of employees after 13 December 1981.

On 8 April 1989, a Constitutional amendment changed the Defense Council's role; it would no longer be a supragovernmental agency, but a collegial state organ, subordinate to the Parliament (the 460-seat Sejm and 100-seat Senate), working in the area of defense and national security and establishing general principles of national defense, including defense doctrine.

The KOK was now chaired by the President of the Republic, with the prime minister and the ministers of defense and foreign affairs as deputies. It also includes the head of the President's Office, the minister of finance, internal affairs, chief of the general staff and minister heading the office of the Council of Ministers.

The 21 February 1990 Polish defense doctrine, now outdated because of the Warsaw Pact's demise, emphasized that the Polish president and Parliament control Poland's Armed Forces:

(T)he Superior of the Armed Forces is the President of the Polish Republic. The Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces...in wartime is appointed by the Sejm. In the event of war an appropriate operational grouping remaining under national command and acting as part of the Combined Armed Forces...of the Warsaw Pact, is isolated from within the Armed Forces of the Polish Republic. The authorities of the Polish Republic...retain their influence on decisions affecting the use of that grouping in consonance with national interests.

Since 8 April 1989 Poland's president, not PUWP secretary, has acted as the de jure National Command Authority (NCA)

and chaired the Defense Council which became a collegial state organ subordinate to the parliament. Although the April 1989 arrangement initially did not change the de facto command situation because PUWP leader Wojciech Jaruzelski became Poland's president, the PUWP's power on the Defense Council was curtailed. (De facto control did change in December 1990 with Lech Walesa's election as president.) In sum, this period witnessed a number of amendments to the 1952 Constitution resulting from round-table agreements.

Second stage of reform (June 1989-December 1990). The second stage began with the June 1989 elections which resulted in a resounding communist defeat. Solidarity won all of the 161 Sejm seats (35 percent) and 99 of the 100 Senate seats up for election. The PUWP was further humiliated on 19 July when its presidential candidate, Wojciech Jaruzelski, received the absolute minimum number of votes in the Parliament to be elected. After the appointment of Tadeusz Mazowiecki as Poland's first non-communist prime minister in August, Poland's Parliament began to exert greater political influence and authority and the communist party began to disintegrate.

During December 1989 the new Sejm and Senate created separate constitutional committees to draft new versions of the entire charter. They also adopted on 29 December 1989 a Bill of Amendments to the Polish Constitution which restored the name "Republic of Poland" to the state and replaced the descriptive phrase "socialist state" with one describing Poland as a "democratic state." Many provisions of the 1952 Constitution were deleted; among them were those calling for protecting the achievements of socialism, concerning alliances and friendship and cooperation with the USSR, and the leading role of the PUWP.

Concerned about oversight of the military, Solidarity sympathizers also created a number of ad hoc oversight bodies to remove the communist party's influence and ensure government control over the defense ministry during 1989-1990. First, they created a 15-person Home Defense Committee to oversee the defense ministry. Chaired by the president, it included the prime minister, the ministers of interior, finance, and defense, and the speakers of the Sejm and Senate.

Second, they created a Sejm Commission for Defense which supervised legislation pertinent to the military. Each of the 20 Sejm Commission members, including many non-communists, had the right to enter any military installation on demand.

Third, in September 1989 the Poles created a ministry of national defense (MON) Social Consultative Council, composed of all the political forces represented in the Sejm. The Council maintained advisory capacity and inspection authority, and supervised the social conditions within the military and the program of civic education.

Fourth, on 11 December 1989 the Council of Ministers adopted a resolution establishing the Political Advisory Committee comprising seven to nine members of Parliament and a representative of the president. Members were appointed by the defense minister and subject to recall by the prime minister. The Political Advisory Committee examined issues and provided opinions and consultations on questions coming within the defense ministry's power. It was an advisory body without the authority to contradict the hierarchical command of the army.

Finally, on 3 April 1990 another significant step occurred when Bronislaw Komorowski and Janusz Onyszkiewicz--two Solidarity intellectuals--became Poland's first civilian deputy defense ministers, responsible for educational (formerly political) training within the armed forces and international military affairs respectively. This extremely important reform represented Poland's first attempt to provide direct civilian oversight over two sensitive areas of defense policy.

Between December 1989 and April 1990, Mazowiecki dismantled the Main Political Administration (MPA) and created a Central Education Board, which was to depoliticize the military. Deputy Defense Minister Komorowski took over the Central Education Board (renamed Department of Education) in April 1990, and assumed responsibility to depoliticize and supervise educational activities within the Polish Armed Forces. Onyszkiewicz retained responsibility for all defense ministry ties with the Warsaw Pact, which had maintained direct access to Polish forces through the then top secret Statute. He also had responsibility for all other developing international military bilateral and multilateral ties, including those with the Soviet NGF in Poland, Visegrad neighbors Hungary and Czechoslovakia, the WEU, and NATO.

Then on 7 July 1990 Prime Minister Mazowiecki replaced Defense Minister Florian Siwicki with Vice-Admiral Piotr Kolodziejczyk, an officer rumored to be unsympathetic to the USSR. Another important change occurred in October when General Zdzsislaw Stelmaszuk was appointed Chief of the General Staff. Stelmaszuk was the first Polish officer since World War II to hold the post who did not attend a Soviet staff college.

Claiming his "concern to prevent undesirable public sentiment [and to] promote democracy,"

President Jaruzelski, in the second year of his six-year term, notified the Sejm in September 1990, that he wanted to step down. Jaruzelski asked the Sejm to mandate presidential elections by universal vote, an act that required a change in Poland's Constitution.

The third stage (December 1990-October 1991). The third stage in Poland's reform commenced with the 9 December 1990 presidential elections which brought Solidarity leader Lech Walesa to power. Walesa immediately launched a new phase of reform to strengthen the position of the executive by transferring powers from the still predominantly communist Sejm to the president. Hence this stage was marked not just with increasing tensions between President Walesa and Jan Bielecki, who became Poland's second non-communist prime minister in January 1991, but also between both houses of Parliament. During this period conflicts between the constitutional committees of the communist-dominated Sejm and Solidarity-dominated Senate grew to the point that they broke off all contacts with each other.

First, Walesa announced he would replace the Defense Council (KOK) with a new organ, the National Security Council (NSC), which the Sejm finally accepted at the end of 1991.

Strikingly similar to the KOK, the president would be the Council's chairman, the prime minister his first deputy, and the foreign affairs and defense ministers would act as deputies. In addition, the ministers of interior and finance and head of the president's chancellery and office of prime minister were members.

To enhance Walesa's control, the President's Office now financed the NSC rather than the defense ministry.

The 13 February 1991 inaugural NSC session assessed the security needs of interior and defense and discussed Polish-Soviet relations, focusing on the Soviet troop withdrawal from Poland.

On 22 May 1991, then NSC director Lech Kaczynski noted that Walesa aimed to expand presidential and NSC powers by legislative means. Walesa sought the powers to appoint a commander in chief of the Armed Forces in times of war and to deploy Poland's Armed Forces not just during periods posed by a foreign threat.

Second, Walesa also created a National Security Bureau (BBN) to replace the Defense Council Secretariat. The National Security Bureau prepares analyses and forecasts of Poland's internal and external situation, as well as the new defense doctrine. In effect, the BBN, which employs between 75 and 85 people in four departments--military, defense systems, research, and legal and organizational

--replaced the defense ministry's oversight of such activities and enhanced presidential authority in these areas. Also to provide expert advice, Walesa created an advisory body under the NSC Secretary that included the Polish Army Chief of Staff, the Chief of the Office for State Protection, the commander of the Border Guard, and the under secretaries from the foreign affairs and finance ministries.

Third, with the apparent intention of enhancing the president's role in state affairs, Walesa reorganized the 200 people employed in the Office of the President into four secretariats and expanded its political department.

Tensions were also increasingly evident between the Sejm and Senate. In April 1991, the (Solidarity-dominated) Senate constitution committee presented its own draft constitution outlining an essentially presidential form of government. In September the Sejm committee presented its draft, which envisaged a parliamentary system with the President acting as an arbiter rather than as a chief executive.

Increasingly frustrated with the Sejm, which the communists still controlled with 65 percent of the seats, Walesa wanted to acquire a non-communist Parliamentary mandate for change and called for Sejm elections to be held two and a half years earlier than originally planned!

Though Walesa's efforts initially met resistance, he prevailed and Poland finally held elections on 27 October 1991.

During the failed Soviet coup in August 1991 Poland tested its emergency machinery. Though Walesa saw no need to convene the NSC during the crisis,

Jan Bielecki created a crisis cell to provide accurate information about unfolding events, increase cooperation between the government and President Walesa, and prepare responses to all possible contingencies.

Because Poland was the only Central European country then still hosting Soviet troops within its borders, Poland issued a relatively mild censure.

In an effort to expand presidential authority in security affairs, in February 1991 Lech Walesa announced plans to appoint a civilian defense minister in the future.

Lech Walesa and Jan Bielecki also announced a significant defense reform. They appointed Krzysztof Zabinski to set up an inter-ministerial reform commission comprised of four teams to: (1) transform the defense ministry into a civilian body of state administration; (2) restructure the armed forces; (3) rationalize the defense industry; and (4) establish parliamentary oversight organizations.

According to Prime Minister Bielecki, the reform's aims were to improve the army's image and credibility, to put the defense ministry under civilian control, and to make the armed forces a separate, apolitical organization.

On 11 March 1991 Deputy Defense Minister Onyszkiewicz outlined the defense reform concept to the inter-ministerial commission. To make the defense ministry into a civilian organ of state administration, a civilian needed to head the ministry, three civilian deputy ministers would handle administrative matters, and the Armed Forces would concentrate on combat readiness.

The president would appoint the military General Inspector/Chief of the General Staff (CoS) who reports directly to the defense minister. One intended result of the reform was that the separate administrative and command functions should stabilize the defense ministry, because the CoS would not necessarily change with each new government as would the defense minister. Another reform intention was to reduce the 3,000 career servicemen employed in headquarters to 1,500-2,000 and redistribute the excess to military units, thereby increasing the percentage of professionals in the forces.

The 22 April 1991 session of the inter-ministerial commission for reforms agreed that the Polish CoS--General Inspector of the Armed Forces--would become the supreme commander of the armed forces in wartime. In early June CoS Stelmaszuk announced the new organization of the general staff. In peacetime, the Polish CoS would have three deputies; a first deputy CoS for Strategic and Organizational Planning, a deputy CoS of the Inspectorate for Training, and a deputy CoS of the Inspectorate of Logistics. The General Staff consisted of 1,700 people, 1,200 career military and 500 civilians.

On 5 July 1991, Walesa announced that he would name Piotr Kolodziejczyk to become the new General Inspector of the Armed Forces.

According to the defense reform, the defense ministry would have the following three civilian deputy defense ministers: (1) a deputy minister for educational affairs (formerly for social relations and education), responsible for setting educational and cultural policy within the armed forces and for organizing cooperation with the military chaplains' service; (2) a deputy for defense policy and planning, responsible for developing defense policy and a long-range concept for developing the armed forces to deal with Poland's external threats; and (3) a deputy minister for armaments and military infrastructure, responsible for the defense industry and for delivery, repair, and upgrading of weaponry and material.

The end of the third stage witnessed Walesa and the Sejm locked in a struggle over election procedures for Poland's first totally-free Parliamentary elections scheduled for October 1991. Part of the bitter dispute involved designating the party affiliation of candidates; Walesa wanted Parliamentary candidates identified by name and party while Sejm communists objected to party identification. On 21 June 1991 the communist-controlled Sejm rejected the Solidarity-dominated Senate's amendments to the electoral procedures bill. When Walesa vetoed the Sejm's version, the Sejm overturned Walesa's veto one week later. In sum, the communist-controlled Sejm dug in its heels and still exerted influence.

In reality the legislative-executive confrontation involved the balance of power between the Sejm and president. The Sejm's 46-member Extraordinary Constitutional Committee had drafted a new Polish Constitution to be considered by the newly elected Parliament. Article 49 of its draft Constitution considered the Sejm the "supreme organ [empowered] to make laws, to appoint other State organs and to control their activities."

The freely-elected Senate draft Constitution supported a presidential form of government. Walesa saw the communist-dominated Sejm as an impediment to his power and wanted its members removed.

The fourth reform-stage (October 1991-September 1993). The fourth stage in Poland's reform commenced with the 27 October 1991 elections of the entire Sejm and Senate, which unfortunately resulted in an extremely fragmented government. Of the 69 political groups contesting the elections, 29 won representation in the 460-seat Sejm. The Democratic Union won 62 seats; Democratic Left Alliance (former communists), 60; Catholic Electoral Action, 49; Polish Peasant Party (former allies of communists), 48; Confederation for Independent Poland, 46; Center Alliance, 44; Liberal Democratic Congress, 37; Peasant Accord, 28; Solidarity Trade Union, 27; and Polish Friends of Beer Party, 16. Eleven parties won one seat each.

Now fully democratically elected, the new Parliament's coalition government led by Prime Minister Jan Olszewski brought new legitimate tensions between presidential and prime ministerial authority. These tensions were exacerbated by ambiguities resulting from the absence of a valid Constitution and by the new, fully legitimate, but heavily fragmented and weak coalition government seeking to exercise its authority (see Table 3 below).

Table 3 - Olszewski Defense Reform, 1992

The two draft constitutions prepared by the constitutional committees of the former Sejm and Senate were set aside and the new parliament was mandated to start the drafting process all over again. The crucial factor in adopting an interim constitution was the difficulty of constructing a working majority coalition in a parliament fragmented by 29 different parties with the need for a two-thirds majority of both houses of parliament for adoption.

In the absence of a new constitution, Walesa continued to press his executive powers to the limit. On 31 December 1991 Walesa published a decree that outlined the composition and functions of the National Security Council (NSC), which became the forum for exerting presidential control over defense and security policy. Chaired by President Walesa, the NSC's first deputy chairman was Prime Minister Olszewski, and two deputy chairmen being Defense Minister Jan Parys and National Security Bureau (BBN) Chief Jerzy Milewski. Other NSC members included the Sejm and Senate speakers, the foreign, interior and finance ministers, the chief of staff, and one of the secretaries of state in the president's chancellery. While the NSC was to consider matters relating to national security including defense, public security and order, and security of citizens; the BBN was tasked with identifying threats to national security and presenting solutions to eliminate them.

When Jan Parys became the first civilian defense minister in late December 1991, he fired the government's opening salvo challenging Walesa's authority as constitutional head of the Armed Forces. In a move apparently not coordinated with the president, on 31 December 1991 Parys announced major defense ministry house cleaning and reform adding that he would retire Piotr Kolodziejczyk rather than make him the new Inspector

General as Walesa had earlier announced.

In early February, Parys added that he would not appoint an Inspector General unless "Parliament amend[ed] the Constitution.

Parys then dismissed Deputy Defense Minister Komorowski and named Romuald Szeremietiew to replace him.

On 11 February Deputy Defense Minister Onyszkiewicz resigned

and Jan Parys named Radoslaw Sikorski to replace him.

As 1992 opened, it was clear that presidential authority over defense and security affairs was running on collision course with the government. Taking the offensive in January 1992, BBN director Jerzy Milewski argued that the president's authority over defense and security matters had to be expanded because the president was constitutionally responsible for these matters. Milewski added that while the civilian defense minister should be concerned with running the army, the president needed:

greater authority at the army command level...during peacetime...[to include] the shape of the armed forces, whether they are to be divisions or corps, how they are to be deployed, and what their combat parameters should be...[and] to expand the range of general officer positions directly appointed by the president.

These different views rapidly came to a head. The crisis arose over different interpretations of presidential and defense ministerial authority as well as over policy and personality differences. It ended with the resignation of the new (and first) civilian defense minister, exacerbated Polish civil-military relations, and brought the collapse of the new, though weak, government coalition. Though personality and policy differences existed between the president and government, the fact that Poland lacked a valid constitution significantly contributed to the crisis. The powers of the president, prime minister, and parliament need to be clarified and until such a constitution has been adopted, Polish defense reform can not be achieved.

Between 19-24 March 1992 the Sejm deliberated on the ways and means of preparing and adopting a new constitution; they finally decided that the Parliament's Constitutional Commission would first adopt the constitution which would then be ratified by national referendum.

Over a six-month period the president, the 56 parliamentary members (46 Sejm and 10 Senate) of the Constitutional Committee, or the Cabinet could submit drafts to the Parliament's Constitutional Commission.

The draft of the Small Constitution required a two-thirds vote of both houses of the National Parliament, followed by a national referendum.

Unfortunately before the Small Constitution's completion, the debate on relations between the Sejm and Senate, president and prime minister, and Sejm and president erupted into a political crisis when Defense Minister Parys alleged on 6 April 1992 that the president's office had been planning new martial law contingencies

and had illegally intervened in defense ministry affairs, and that President Walesa had sought the support of Silesian Military District Commander, General Tadeusz Wilecki by offering him General Stelmaszuk's position as Chief of Staff.

On 7 April Prime Minister Olszewski placed Parys on extended leave; and Romuald Szeremietiew became acting defense minister. On 25 April the Sejm established an eight-member commission to examine Jan Parys' allegations.

After the Sejm commission concluded that Parys' allegations about politicians involving the Army in party games were "unfounded and detrimental to the state's interests,"

Parys resigned. President Walesa then asked Parliament to replace Olszewski (on 26 May) and the Olszewski government fell.

On 5 June 1992 the Sejm voted 273 to 119 for Prime Minister Olszewski's resignation and 263 to 149 for Waldemar Pawlak to form a government. When Janusz Onyszkiewicz became acting defense minister, he replaced Radek Sikorski as deputy defense minister and pledged to "restore good cooperation with the presidential office and the foreign ministry."

This cooperation was made evident when Onyszkiewicz and Jerzy Milewski announced on 26 June that they would implement the 1991 defense ministry reform, which included the creation of the post of General Inspector of the Armed Forces.

After one month of failed attempts by Pawlak to form a coalition government, Hanna Suchocka became prime minister on 10 July. Suchocka retained Onyszkiewicz as defense minister and announced that the defense reform would continue; that the military command would be separated from the civilian administration and the general staff would be streamlined (see Table 4 below).

Onyszkiewicz noted that though the civilian defense ministry would employ civilians, that in the foreseeable future "most employees [would] be military personnel, but work as civilians; that is, they [would] have no power to issue orders for the armed forces."

Table 4 - Suchocka Defense Reform, 1992

Better relations between the president and government were reflected on 5 August when Walesa named General Tadeusz Wilecki as the new Chief of General Staff.

Then Wilecki transferred military district commanders to the General Staff and appointed his trusted colleagues to key posts in all the reorganized military districts; MG Tadeusz Bazydlo to the Pomeranian MD, MG Julian Lewinski to the Warsaw MD, MG Janusz Ornatowski to the Silesian MD, and MG Zenon Bryk to the new Krakow MD.

On 22 October 1992 Onyszkiewicz signed an order that restricted his activities to political management of the defense ministry and put the general staff in charge of strictly military matters. The defense ministry now had three departments headed by deputy ministers; training (Bronislaw Komorowski), strategy (Przemyslaw Grudzinski), and military infrastructure (Jan Kuriata). Military intelligence and military courts answered directly to the defense minister.

Though for the moment, the new government seemed to resolve the civil-military crisis, Onyszkiewicz' predecessor Romuald Szeremetiew criticized the 22 October 1992 reform, arguing that the Polish CoS had "enormous powers...[adding the CoS] has been granted additional powers by the president, so that he can now effectively bypass the defense minister in military matters."

During this period, significant advances also occurred on the Constitutional front. On 1 August the Sejm mustered a two-thirds vote to adopt a Small Constitution that introduced a provisional presidential-parliamentary system defining relations between the legislative and executive branches of government.

On 10 September the Senate voted not to reject the Small Constitution and on 17 November 1992 Walesa signed the "Constitutional Act on Mutual Relations Between the Legislative and the Executive of the Republic of Poland."

The so-called Small Constitution voided the often-amended 1952 Stalinist Constitution. The basic law set up a framework similar in many respects to the parliamentary model of Germany, although it gave the president many more powers. Elected in general elections (Article 29.2), the president has a veto requiring a two-thirds Sejm vote for override, has the right to approve all top military appointments and is the commander of the armed forces, and has authority to introduce martial law and declare a state of emergency (Articles 36.1 and 37.1).

The Small Constitution, though, divides executive powers between the president and the cabinet. After Sejm elections the president designates the prime minister, who appoints the government, which must get Sejm vote of confidence. The president cannot recall the government and the prime minister must consult with the president on the choice of foreign, interior, and defense ministers. The Cabinet is responsible only to the Sejm and only the Sejm can dismiss it.

In sum, Poland's adoption of the Small onstitution created new rules for dividing power between the legislative and executive, enhanced the powers of the Cabinet, and symbolically abrogated the 1952 Constitution.

When the Small Constitution came into effect on December 8, 1992, it was designed as a provisional measure until a full constitution could be written and then be enacted by the Parliament and ratified in a national referendum. The Sejm and Senate held elections in October 1992 to the joint Constitutional Committee of the Parliament comprising 46-Sejm deputies and 10 Senators representing all the major parties and began work on the constitution. Because of broad ideological differences within the committee, its leaders decided not to draft a new constitution themselves, but wait six months for drafts to be submitted to them. In December Walesa also submitted to the Sejm a draft of a 49-article Bill of Rights and Freedoms to be passed as a constitutional law.

By the Constitutional Committee's 30 April 1993 deadline, seven draft constitutions had been submitted.

The task was to synthesize them into a coherent whole. Unfortunately, before significant progress could be made on the Constitution, the Suchocka government lost a parliamentary vote of no confidence. On 28 May, President Walesa dissolved the parliament and empowered the government to act as caretaker until new elections could be held. As a result, all constitutional drafts had to be submitted to the new Constitutional Committee after the elections which were called for on 19 September.

During this period, civil-military issues continued to fester. On 26 February 1993 President Walesa asked the National Defense Committee (KOK) to examine amendments to the law on the common duty to defend Poland and to discuss plans to form a National Guard of 22,000 soldiers subordinate to the President by the year 2000. The formation would come from the 11,000-man special Vistula division under the control of the interior ministry. The bill on the law on defending Poland envisioned liquidating the KOK and establishing the National Security Council, which will be the president's advisory body, and sanctioned the division of the defense ministry into a civil and military department. The Sejm Defense Committee had earlier objected to the National Guard claiming that it could not control it.

The deep-seated issue, though, was that of the president's authority versus the government's authority to call-up armed forces.

On 26 March 1993 Defense Minister Onyszkiewicz told the Sejm Defense Committee that the restructuring of the Polish Army and the General Staff was complete and now "we are talking about adjusting the structure of troops deployment to new strategic concepts."

Elaborating, Onyszkiewicz said the ministry planned to redeploy its forces so 55 percent (rather than 75 percent) are in western Poland and 45 percent in the east by the end of 1995 despite the absence of suitable infrastructure there.

Onyszkiewicz also noted that during the next few years the Polish Army would be restructured along NATO lines; that the outdated army-division structure would be replaced by a division-brigade structure. Each division would comprise three brigades--two of them "empty" (filled only on mobilization) and the third fully manned capable of entering combat within 24 hours. Each brigade would consist of 2,000 to 5,000 men and would be equipped with the most modern equipment of Polish manufacture.

The pilot district for the structural reforms is the newly created Krakow Military District (MD), which is to have two assault-landing brigades; each of the other three MDs would have one rapid-response unit. The Krakow MD's Sixth Assault Commando Brigade would become the embryo of the so-called Rapid Deployment Forces.

During the first three months of 1993 the defense ministry and General Staff reorganization was completed. Separate financial and personnel services within the defense ministry and General Staff were abandoned and departments serving both were integrated. Defense Minister Onyszkiewicz noted that adding civilians to the defense ministry would be slow, that he needed expertise, that the military held most of the defense ministry executive posts, and "there are not many civilian counterpart experts."

Deputy defense minister for logistics and armaments Jan Kuriata set up his department, which is responsible for research and development, arms procurement, and maintenance of infrastructure, rather quickly. Kuriata noted it was difficult to set up this department and separate jurisdictions with the General Staff's Inspectorate for Logistics because "we were creating new structures not known to the defense ministry before."

NATO relations. Shortly after the second meeting of NACC Onyszkiewicz noted that Poland's "participation in peacekeeping operations is of fundamental importance for bringing military integration closer."

(Poland has maintained a 945-soldier peacekeeping battalion in Croatia since March 1992.) In a 28 May 1993 interview on Poland's prospects for joining NATO, Onyszkiewicz noted: "I believe that there are no doubts about that. The question is only when and what kind of process that would be."

The issue of Poland's joining NATO became a major issue when Boris Yeltsin visited Warsaw on 25-26 August 1993. The joint declaration agreed that the last Russian troops would leave Poland on 1 October (not 31 December) 1994. In fact, the closing ceremony, which bid farewell to the last Russian servicemen, occurred on 17 September,

coincided with the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939 and was two days before the Polish elections. In addition, at a press conference at the close of his visit, Yeltsin said that he understood Poland's desire to join NATO, that it was Poland's sovereign decision, and that taking part in the pan-European integration was not against the Russian interest.

Onyszkiewicz publicly noted that now as for Poland's admission to NATO "that the case is almost inevitable."

Prime Minister Hanna Suchocka added that "[A] decision on membership and a timetable for Poland's acceptance ought to be taken at the Winter NATO meeting [January 1994 Brussels Summit]...[adding that] if NATO fails to respond to these calls...this would be a failure of the effectiveness of the Western security system."

On 15 September Russia's ambassador to Poland Yuri Kashlev told reporters that Russia's stance on Polish membership in NATO had been "oversimplified and misunderstood...[that the Russian-Polish joint declaration refers to] eventual NATO membership in the larger process of European integration [and suggested that the Alliance would first evolve into CSCE's military arm]."

In letters to the heads of Western states (France, Germany, United Kingdom, and the United States), Yeltsin expressed anxiety over plans for NATO's expansion. This led to a great debate within the Alliance and to the 21 October meeting of NATO defense ministers at Travemunde, Germany where the issue of membership was deferred and the Partnership For Peace (PFP) program was endorsed for the forthcoming January 1994 NATO summit. Central Europeans initially interpreted PFP as a NATO effort to placate Russia.

During the October 1993 crisis in Russia, a Polish interagency team was set up; Defense Minister Onyszkiewicz claimed that "the situation is different now."

He compared the present situation to 1991, when Poland shared a common border with the Soviet Union, Soviet troops were on Polish soil, and Poland was threatened with a wave of refugees. In response to fragmentary accounts of Russia's new defense doctrine which claimed that Poland was bolstering its eastern border with troops, Onyszkiewicz denied that "Poland is reinforcing its eastern border by concentrating troops there" adding that evenly distributed forces made good sense defensively.

In referring to the forthcoming elections, Onyszkiewicz stressed that the Army was apolitical; that every serviceman had the right to run in the elections on the ticket of any party,

but outside of areas administered by the Army.

As the campaign heated up, there were numerous allegations that soldiers violated the election rules against campaigning in military units and garrisons. When Onyszkiewicz threatened to start disciplinary action, the Army backed down.

The fifth reform stage. Poland's most recent stage began with the 19 September 1993 Parliamentary election, which brought a bitter setback for the parties that descended from Solidarity and resulted in the return of former communists to power. Of the 460-seat Sejm, the Social Democratic Party (SDP), which was dominated by former communists, won a clear plurality of 20.5 percent and 171 seats; and a former satellite party of communists, the Polish Peasant Alliance (PPA) finished second with 15.4 percent and 132 seats. The Democratic Union (DU), the party of Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Bronislaw Geremek, Jacek Korun, and Hanna Suchocka ran a distant third with 10.6 percent of the vote and 74 Sejm seats.

On 26 October a coalition of the SDP-PPA parties, with 36 percent of the vote and 303 (66 percent) of the Sejm seats, chose Waldemar Pawlak of the PPA as prime minister.

One of the significant differences in Poland's 1991 and 1993 elections was the change in proportional representation. Poland's 1991 electoral system, with its low electoral threshold and large electoral districts, produced no less than 29 different parties in the Polish Sejm; none received more than 13 percent of the vote. In contrast, Poland's new 15 April 1993 electoral law established thresholds of 5 percent for single parties and 8 percent for coalitions. Hence, the new electoral law succeeded in producing a less politically fragmented Sejm in 1993, since only six parties or coalitions managed to win seats.

Poland's extreme proportional representation did produce a rapid succession of cabinets from December 1991 to September 1993; it had four premiers and governing coalitions. Protracted parliamentary infighting and prolonged executive vacancies were the rule, spelling institutional uncertainty. In contrast, the 1993 elections produced a coalition government of two (not six) parties. But the new electoral system also facilitated the return of former communists to power and left almost 35 percent of the voters (mostly right-of-center) with no representation in parliament. The new electoral system also further politicized and complicated the constitution-making process.

Soon after the election, the Parliament formed a new Constitutional Committee. It again consisted of 46 deputies and ten senators, the majority of whom had entered Parliament for the first time. At its first meeting the Constitutional Committee elected as chairman Aleksander Kwasniewski, one of the PUWP negotiators during the round-table talks in February-April 1989 and leader of the post-communist SDP. Soon after the Constitutional Committee started its work, right-wing leaders questioned its legitimacy and created an extraparliamentary Constitutional Committee of the Right. In sum, the electoral rules which were used to get a stable cabinet supported by a clear parliamentary majority were insufficient to create a broad-based constitutional assembly (see Table 5).

Table 5 - Pawlak Defense Reform, 1993

In January 1994, the Constitutional Committee decided to invite members of political parties, churches, unions, and other organizations to express their opinions. The selection process continued through February and the major parties of the right announced that they would not participate. On 31 January Walesa proposed that any group of 100,000 citizens should be able to submit a draft constitution and have a representative on the Constitutional Commission, but without voting rights. In an unprecedented act, the Sejm rejected Walesa's proposal (on 18 February) on first reading. Insulted Walesa left the Parliament and withdrew his draft constitution and representative from the Constitutional Committee. Kwasniewski claimed that Walesa's actions marked the opening of the presidential campaign.

To moderate the charged political atmosphere, on 25 March the Sejm changed the Constitutional Committee's mandate; it endorsed the idea that any group of 500,000 could present a constitutional draft and directed the Constitutional Committee to consider all seven drafts submitted to the 1989-1991 Parliament. When the Senate accepted these changes in early April, so did the President. Then Kwasniewski announced his intention to have the Parliament adopt the Constitution and submit it to public referendum by the end of Spring 1995, so that the Fall 1995 presidential elections could be held under the new law.

By 20-21 June 1994 six draft constitutions were presented to the Constitutional Committee. On 5 September, the "Solidarity" labor union submitted its own draft signed by nearly one million citizens. On 21-23 September the combined Sejm and Senate preliminarily accepted all seven drafts and sent them to the Constitutional Committee, which is to prepare a constitutional debate and then write a unified draft for Parliament's consideration. But problems immediately developed with Solidarity and with the Catholic Church. The presidential campaign also threatened the constitution-making process.

Under Article 61 of the Small Constitution, Pawlak is required to consult with Walesa regarding the appointment of the ministers of foreign affairs, defense, and interior. The coalition, however, had allowed Walesa to make these appointments on his own. Paradoxically, the results of the September 1993 election-- namely the reduction in the number of political parties, the triumph of the post-communist parties, the relative weakness of the center and the elimination of the right wing--have enabled Walesa to preserve his strong position.

When Prime Minister Waldemar Pawlak began building his government, the three "presidential" ministries of defense, foreign affairs and interior were slated to be assigned to candidates loyal to President Walesa. Defense went to Admiral Piotr Kolodziejczyk, who had already served as defense minister in Poland's first two Solidarity governments before civilians Jan Parys and Janusz Onyszkiewicz took over in December 1991 and 1992. Upon assuming office, Kolodziejczyk noted he was a "civilian minister and would...set an example of how a civilian minister of national defense should work."

He noted that the most urgent issue that the Sejm would have to deal with was the new law on general defense duties, which would result in a precise distribution of powers in controlling the state's defense matters.

Kolodziejczyk added that before he accepted his present position, Waldemar Pawlak committed to back him on this project as a condition of accepting the job.

On 8-9 November the entire national security leadership attended a meeting dealing with security and defense. Chief of Staff Tadeusz Wilecki noted that there was an urgent need to define the powers of the bodies that control the Army and to distinguish between the powers of the defense ministry and the General Staff. Defense Minister Kolodziejczyk noted that there was an urgent need to define by law the functioning of the defense ministry and create a clear demarcation between the powers of the General Staff and civilian components. He added that the Armed Forces could not be restructured without a guarantee of necessary resources, nor could Poland join NATO without adequate outlays to cover the costs to modernize the Army.

In testimony to the Sejm Defense Committee Kolodziejczyk noted that because relocating troops to the east would require "colossal expenses," it would be better to construct mobile forces.

At a 17 November press conference Kolodziejczyk announced three defense ministry changes: (1) Jerzy Milewski, head of the National Security Bureau, would assume a second hat and became first deputy defense minister, taking over the tasks of both Grudzinski and Komorowski (ceding the civilian Department of Education back to the military),

to "improve cooperation between the defense ministry and the Office of National Security, as well as between Belvedere and the government."

With Milewski holding both positions, Kolodziejczyk hoped to avoid duplicate functions in the Army and National Security Office.

(2) He would reduce the size of the defense ministry to make it more efficient. (3) He would transfer to the General Staff those areas of responsibility that have a bearing on the functioning of the armed forces. Not only would the General Staff now consist of four inspectorates: training, logistics, strategic planning, and organization/mobilization, it also would include special services (intelligence and counterintelligence).

Public concern about civilian control of the military remained evident when Jerzy Milewski defended the changes in the defense ministry claiming they would preserve civilian control over the armed forces. Milewski argued that the notion that the defense ministry was ceding control to the General Staff was untrue; that the changes were "corrections in the organizational structure" designed to more precisely define tasks and reduce the excessively large administration. He also added that the lack of civilian experts meant that the defense ministry departments would have to employ the military.

On the same day, Walesa, Pawlak, Kolodziejczyk, Wilecki and Milewski met to discuss coordinating actions between the president, prime minister, National Security Committee (KOK), Council of Ministers and defense ministry.

The problem was the need to clarify problems created by existing laws. While the Small Constitution (Article 34) claims the president exercises general leadership in Poland's internal and external security and defines the National Security Council (RBN) as his advisory body in security and defense, it does not define how he does this nor how the RBN relates to the KOK. In addition, the Law on the Popular Defense Obligation continues to include the National Defense Committee (KOK), a legacy of the communist period. Though the law states the KOK is the appropriate organ to discuss defense and security, it does not explain how this is to occur in practice.

Then on 26 November Walesa chaired a meeting of the National Defense Committee (KOK) which decided to reorganize itself into the National Security Council (RBN) to be the highest organ responsible for defense and security and headed by the president. Once the RBN starts functioning, a government Committee for Defense Affairs, headed by the prime minister, would be responsible to execute the RBN's decisions. Since this would require legislative changes, including constitutional provisions, the KOK asked the government to start the process.

By the end of January Kolodziejczyk was expressing frustration with "new problems which I can not understand at all"

regarding the evolution of security institutions. He argued that the Sejm needed to adopt appropriate constitutional and legal provisions to define the scope of the president's and prime minister's authority. Kolodziejczyk believed that it had been earlier agreed that the National Security Council would be the instrument where the president could influence the government's activities in the area of defense; and that the prime minister should form a Committee of Defense Affairs (from the government's representatives in the Security Council) to submit proposals to the Council of Ministers and develop legislation for the Parliament. In addition, it was necessary to amend the Small Constitution and the Law on General Duty of Defense of the Republic to very precisely divide powers between the civilian defense minister and the General Staff. Kolodziejczyk had hoped that the prepared bills would be submitted to the Sejm in January, but the reform stalled.

One of the issues that also tested presidential versus prime ministerial power was Pawlak's desire to introduce deputy ministers from the Polish Peasant Alliance and the Social Democratic Party to the three presidential ministries. The coalition government saw Kolodziejczyk's expansion of Milewski's duties as an attempt to prevent the coalition from gaining access and influence in the defense ministry.

Initially Kolodziejczyk threatened to resign if the coalition introduced a political deputy minister in his ministry.

As pressure increased, Kolodziejczyk noted that he was "open to the coalition's choice of vice minister [but] not a political commissar. I need a man who will be well briefed for the job in substantive terms."

In the end, a compromise was struck. The coalition put forth Danuta Waniek, an SDP Sejm deputy to be a deputy defense minister with responsibility to be the ministry's liaison with parliament.

Kolodziejczyk also had continued frustration with the Parliament. Though he had been promised increases in the defense budget, the Parliament instead decreased defense funding and mandated the ministry to spend 300 billion zlotys for Polish Irydia aircraft for the Army. The defense minister noted: "If the defense minister is supposed to bear constitutional responsibility for the Armed Forces' readiness....one must not tie his hands with decisions on where and how money should be spent because this way one will not succeed in making anything that would make sense...Under the situation that has emerged, I will submit a complaint before the Constitutional Tribunal."

Finally on 12 April 1994 the government decided to set up a Committee for Defense Affairs, chaired by the prime minister with defense minister as deputy, attached to the Council of Ministers (KSORM). Kolodziejczyk hoped that the committee would reform the Army command structures to bring them closer to European standards and to put in order the legal foundations for the functioning of the ministry and the Army.

To a closed cabinet session on 4 May, Kolodziejczyk presented a document--"Defense Problems and Military Aspects of the Polish Republic's Security Policies"--that described plans to create a military post of Supreme Commander who would bear constitutional responsibility for strictly military issues such as training, mobilization and operational planning (which was then under the defense minister's purview). The document presented two supervision options for consideration: either the commander would report to the president or the defense minister. The draft also envisioned creating a National Guard, but subordinate to the defense minister and not the president.

On 19 May Prime Minister Pawlak presided over the first session of the Council of Ministers Defense Affairs Committee (KSORM) to review Defense Minister Kolodziejczyk's document on basic defense problems. First, on the issue of organizational changes in the Army, it proposed that the three types of forces--land, naval, and air--would be subordinated to the chief of staff, whose title would be changed to General Inspector of the Armed Forces, who, in turn, would be subordinate to the defense minister. This would require no changes to the Small Constitution. Second, the session also agreed to set up a crisis group to monitor threats to national security. Kolodziejczyk noted that the greatest threat to Poland's security was the Russian troop concentration in the Kaliningrad salient. Third, Kolodziejczyk presented a report that assessed the technical condition of the Army as "dangerous" and called for greater budget commitments.

When the government cabinet began to debate the revisions to the military command structure on 24 May, President Walesa insisted successfully that the government first submit the reform plan to the National Defense Committee (KOK)--which he chairs and sees as the chief body for defense matters--before taking action. Walesa opposed subordinating the General Inspector of the Armed Forces to the defense minister, placing him in direct conflict with Kolodziejczyk.

The issue was so fractious that when the KOK met on 7 June, it was unable to reach agreement on which governmental body had constitutional authority over the chief of the General Staff.

A few days later, civil-military relations were further tarnished when defense ministry spokesman Colonel Wieslaw Rozbicki wrote in Gazeta Wyborcza that Poland should not have signed CFE because it weakened the country and that shifting the military information service WSI (intelligence and counterintelligence) from the ministry's civilian structures to the General Staff was good, because it was "better for national security if a civilian minister does not have full information provided by WSI."

Kolodziejczyk fired Rozbicki.

In mid-June 1994 Jerzy Milewski resigned his position as head of the National Security Bureau (BBN), though he retained his first deputy defense ministry portfolio, and President Walesa named Henryk Goryszewski to the post.

When the KOK met on 22 June, it recommended the document "Fundamental Problems of the Polish Defense System" to the Council of Ministers. This document was similar to Kolodziejczyk's earlier document with one significant exception; it omitted the contentious issue of to whom to subordinate the General Staff.

Open presidential-governmental and civil-military conflict erupted at a 30 September 1994 meeting of military cadres at Drawsko Pomorskie training grounds. Chief of Staff Wilecki, who supported President Walesa's position to have the General Staff subordinated to him rather than the defense minister,

allegedly refused to carry out the defense minister's orders at the training ground and President Walesa polled the general officers on Kolodziejczyk's competence.

When the issue was investigated by the Sejm defense committee, General Wilecki, when asked about carrying out orders of the civilian defense minister, said: "I always have, and will continue to do so." Kolodziejczyk countered, "I reject this statement. I will present to a special commission those cases in which General Wilecki did not carry out my orders." In response to the question whether President Walesa asked the generals at Drawsko to vote for or against Kolodziejczyk, Wilecki said: "I do not think there was a vote." Kolodziejczyk countered: "The president ordered a vote [on the question should the defense minister be dismissed]. All hands except two went up."

Later in a letter, Walesa admitted that after he asked the generals about reforms within the army at Drawsko, he decided to make personnel changes and ask Kolodziejczyk to resign.

In an interview after the incident, former Defense Minister Janusz Onyszkiewicz noted that the General Staff supports presidential control; that after the 1993 elections and parliament had been dissolved, that various orders that he issued as defense minister were "either blocked or slowed [by the General Staff]. It was stalling for time."

On the issue of Kolodziejczyk's possible resignation, Onyszkiewicz noted that the prime minister should reject it; if he did not, it would indicate that the armed forces had successfully exerted influence on the appointment of the defense minister and thus were politicized.

In other words, at Drawsko the Army appropriated the powers of parliament when they voted to recall the minister.

When Walesa asked Kolodziejczyk to tender his resignation, the defense minister, after talking with Prime Minister Pawlak and Sejm defense committee members, initially refused.

On 12 October Kolodziejczyk noted the importance of the issue at stake (civilian control over the Army), and that only after the investigation of the Drawsko case was completed, that he would resign.

Then on 27 October Foreign Minister Andrzej Olechowski resigned over charges that he had broken the law for receiving subsidiary income.

When Pawlak asked the Constitutional Court for a decision, Olechowski suspended his resignation.

At the same time the National Defense Committee (KOK) approved a bill for submission to the Sejm that attempted to clarify the conflict. According to the bill, the president would exercise authority through the defense minister in peacetime on political and administrative matters, but through the general staff on command matters in peacetime and through the commander-in-chief during war.

On 4 November the Sejm Defense Committee Chairman Jerzy Szmajdzinski announced that the Committee approved a report on the Drawsko affair (by a vote of 18 to 6) that criticized all of the sides involved in the dispute. It concluded that despite discrepancies in individual accounts, the generals at Drawsko had not disobeyed Kolodziejczyk, but they did criticize him and the ministry. Though the report also criticized some aspects of the functioning of the defense ministry and expressed concern about "autonomy of the military command structures," it did not see sufficient grounds for Kolodziejczyk's resignation.

The report criticized President Walesa for "violating civilian and democratic control over the military"

adding he should exercise control through the government and the defense minister. Former deputy defense minister and Sejm deputy Bronislaw Komorowski noted that the Drawsko affair "was very disquieting. It has not assumed the nature of a military coup, but this does not mean its seriousness should be underestimated."

During the next month the tug of war continued. On 8 November the president refused to meet with the defense minister claiming he had lost confidence in Kolodziejczyk.

Then when Kolodziejczyk proposed a list of candidates for military promotion (only the defense minister has the right to suggest candidates), Walesa rejected six of the candidates who were in the civilian defense ministry. Finally, on 10 November Walesa acting on a request from Prime Minister Pawlak dismissed Kolodziejczyk for failing to "implement KOK decisions" regarding normalizing the situation in the defense ministry.

and Jerzy Milewski became acting defense minister.

On 30 November the Sejm Defense Committee approved the defense budget for 1995. The committee stated that the planned 51.3 trillion zlotys ($4.2 billion) is higher by 1.7 percent in real terms than the 1994 budget. This was the first time since 1986 that defense budget outlays had actually increased. Though 100 billion zlotys were allocated for PFP, the committee added 500 billion more for implementing the program.

Tension between the president and parliament continued to escalate over budgetary issues and the evolving presidential campaign for elections in the fall of 1995. Tensions became so severe that Walesa began to threaten to dissolve the Parliament. In an effort to head this off, the PPA-SDP coalition attempted to seek a truce with the president (to get him to accept the budget in exchange for defense minister appointment) until after the presidential elections are held.

The 21 December 1994 meeting brought no agreement because just before the session Walesa vetoed the law on the budget. The coalition, feeling betrayed, then proposed to amend the Small Constitution in order to restrict the president's role in appointing ministers.

With 284 votes, the Sejm overturned Walesa's veto on wages; and then Walesa placed an appeal to the Constitutional Tribunal.

As 1995 opened, in what some saw as the opening of the presidential campaign, the presidential-governmental feud erupted to bring the country to total crisis. When Foreign Minister Olechowski resigned, Walesa demanded that Pawlak refuse his resignation and that he accept Walesa's nomination of Zbigniew Okonski to be defense minister. The coalition had put forward Longin Pastusiak, who had been a PUWP (communist) Sejm deputy during the Martial Law period. The coalition then began to unravel when SDP leader Kwasniewski announced on 6 January that it was necessary to restructure the government because of ineffectiveness of some ministers. When Pawlak met with Walesa on 16 January, the president agreed to accept Olechowski's resignation, but refused to accept Pastusiak for defense. Walesa expressed his view that the vacancies in these ministries were undermining state stability.

On 19 January 1995 Walesa went on the offensive in the Sejm. Arguing that "military people should run the military," Walesa supported draft legislation that would give greater power to the General Staff, reduce the role of the defense ministry, and subordinate military intelligence to the General Staff.

The ruling coalition and most of the opposition supported a command structure in which the General Staff would answer to the civilian defense ministry.

On the same day in a Sejm speech, acting defense minister Milewski discussed two major defense requirements: (1) to establish legal regulations for the defense ministry; and (2) to establish a model for drafting annual defense budgets that would create rational planning for Armed Forces development. Milewski presented three funding variants to the Sejm: (1) If the Sejm guaranteed 3.5 percent of GDP, the defense ministry could develop a force of 234,000; (2) If defense got 3 percent annually, manpower would be reduced to 200,000; and (3) if the budget was similar to 1995 (about 2.5 percent) the force would be 160,000. Milewski proposed gradually increasing the budget from 2.5 percent to 3 percent in the year 2000, which would allow an Army of 180,000 in times of peace and adequate reserves for mobilization if necessary.

Anticipating Walesa's move, on 20 January the Sejm passed a constitutional amendment that, in the event of a presidential dissolution order, would keep the Parliament in session until after new elections. (Poland had no sitting Parliament for several months following the 1993 no-confidence vote in Hanna Suchocka's government). Walesa then demanded that Pawlak appoint new defense and foreign ministers and warned that he would take "decisive steps to prevent the paralysis of government" if the new deadline were not met.

When Walesa relentlessly kept up the attack now claiming that he had lost confidence in Pawlak, the prime minister resigned. With the government collapse, the SDP-PPA coalition began efforts to form a new government.

The civil-military crisis resulted from Poland's failure to delegate authority between the president and government and of the Sejm Defense (Commission and Committee's) inability to exercise effective oversight.

It also demonstrated the inability of the civilian defense ministry to control the military;

hence, the chief of staff and general staff remain independent of the defense minister, and the Army remains popular and heavily politicized.

Poland has not yet developed a consensus on establishing its defense tenets, to include effective relations between military and civilian authorities. The manner in which the General Staff has played off the president and prime minister has effectively brought the military an independence not found anywhere else in Central Europe. In fact, even though the Sejm commission criticized Walesa for Drawsko, it remained silent when, after the Drawsko affair Walesa awarded bonuses to the three top generals who participated; Chief of Staff Wilecki, Deputy Chief of Staff Leon Komornicki, and Zdzislaw Ornatowski, commander of the Silesian MD.

True, parliament has exercised some control of the military through constrained defense budgets; but it has demonstrated little other supervision over its administration, particularly in failing to reform the law.

It is clear that a constitution, which effectively limits state institutions in existing law, is the necessary condition to establish proper control of the military in Poland. Also it is clear that the Polish military does not yet effectively cooperate with the civilian defense ministry and that the military is politicized. The new Polish Constitution must effectively define the apolitical role of the Army. None of this can be achieved until Poland acquires a new constitution, which is unlikely to occur before the end of 1995.