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0925 Simon Pgs 2/24/01 11:24 AM Page 39 Poland USS Clarkeprior to being turned over to Polish navy. Knapp) C. Gary Photos ( World Wide P/ A Prepares for the Alliance By J E F F R E Y S I M O N I n March 1999, Poland, Hungary, tential reflects its stability, which can and the Czech Republic joined be attributed to a remarkable transfor- NATO. Of these three new mem- mation in civil-military institutions. bers of the Atlantic Alliance, only More than any other former member of Poland enhances Allied military capa- the Warsaw Pact, the Polish Republic bilities. Poles are currently participating has been able to adapt to the NATO in Allied operations on the ground. The model for modern Western forces. 18th Air Assault Battalion is serving with the U.S.-led multinational brigade The NATO Standard in eastern Kosovo. In part, Poland’s po- Together, the Brussels Summit on the Partnership for Peace (PFP) program in 1994, the Study on NATO En- Jeffrey Simon is a senior fellow in the Institute for National Strategic Studies at largement released in 1995, the Madrid the National Defense University, and the author ofNATO Enlargement and Central Summit in 1997 which invited the Europe: A Study in Civil Military Relations. Summer 2000 / JFQ 39 Report Documentation Page Form Approved OMB No. 0704-0188 Public reporting burden for the collection of information is estimated to average 1 hour per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. 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Having emerged from the commu- Defense Budget: Estimated at $3.2 billion for 2000; the gross domestic nist period when the military was controlled product in 1999 was $157 billion ($7,400 per capita). by the Soviet High Command through the Manpower: With a population of 38,648,000, Poland has a total of Warsaw Pact and was often an instrument of 4,422,000 men between 18 and 32 years of age. Active military strength is oppression, post-communist civil communi- 217,290. Reserve forces number 406,000—army, 343,000; navy, 14,000; and air ties must perceive the military as being force, 49,000. under democratic control. In addition to in- Armed Forces: Poland has an army of 132,750 soldiers and 1,704 main stitutional and constitutional checks and balances, general staffs must be accountable battle tanks; a navy with 16,860 sailors and 3 submarines, 3 principal surface to civil officials. A legal framework and code combatants, 25 patrol/coastal craft, 24 mine warfare vessels, and naval aviation of conduct for professional soldiers and con- with 2,460 personnel and 28 combat scripts that would allow soldiers to dis- aircraft; and an air force with 46,200 obey illegal orders is also required. Fi- members and 267 combat aircraft. Raising Polish flag at nally, military training levels and Paramilitary Formations: A total NATO headquarters, equipment must also be sufficient to of 21,500 personnel serve in border March 1999. protect the state. This calls for adequate guard and police units. social support and a predictable stream of resources. Source: International Institute for Strate- gic Studies, The Military Balance, 2000–2001 Making the Journey (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the Interna- tional Institute for Strategic Studies, 2000). The transformation to a democratic state has been a continuous though fractious process of multi- stage development in Poland. It began in 1988 on the eve of the three new members and implemented collapse of the Soviet empire. After the enhancement of PFP, and the a decade of unrest, the communist Membership Action Plan (MAP) government reached an accommo- launched at the Washington Summit dation with the opposition. The of- in 1999, created coherent principles ficial Polish United Worker’s Party for enlarging the Alliance. NATO estab- recognized pluralism for political lished explicit conditions for member- sPfohFriPmp, MiinnAgcl Pud, deaimnndgo cAarcallttiiievcde p opopalriettriiacctaiiplo anitnsio,s tnpi teiurn-- Dusan Vranic) aeenrsftdua ltb rnlaidesweh ueondfi foicnues n. oIdnf e prrer teusWridnoe, njac tpi ewocwahs- tions, privatized economies, respect for Photos ( Jcaornutzreolls koif, twhhe oN qautiiocnkalyl Dwerefesntesde htciouonmntsra.o nOl rtoihfg ehtrht sset, aamnndidlai troadrrsdy ew raelnyrd ef odsrueembigsotnac nrraettliaaic-l Wide World Cdeofuenncseil —antodg ienthteerri owr imthi nbiosttrhi etsh—e P/ from the Communist Party and interoperability and political compati- A placed it under his own control. In bility with NATO. April 1989 the council was further To meet the civil-military criteria on defense budgets and extraordinary com- restructured from a supra-governmental four conditions appear necessary: missions investigating security violations. agency to a state organ subordinate to (cid:2) A clear division of authority between Committees need staff expertise and suffi- parliament, further distancing the mili- the president and government (prime minister cient information to support the review of tary from direct party control. and defense/interior minister). This must be defense programs and liaison with defense The overwhelming defeat of the established by a written constitution or and interior ministries and to develop bi- Communist Party in the general parlia- public law, designating who commands and partisan consensus. Similarly, intelligence mentary elections of June 1989 and controls the military, promotes officers in oversight committees should provide access peacetime, holds emergency powers in a cri- to opposition parties. choice of Tadeusz Mazowiecki as the sis, and has authority to declare war. Under- (cid:2) Peacetime government oversight of first noncommunist prime minister lining these formalities must be evidence of general staffs and commanders through civil- stimulated further reforms. Parliament respect and tolerance between the executive ian defense ministries.Defense ministry man- exerted greater authority after the elec- and legislative branches. agement should include preparation of the tions, and reformers controlled a third (cid:2) Parliamentary oversight of the military defense budget, access to intelligence, in- of the upper house (Sejm) and senate. through control of the defense budget. This au- volvement in strategic and defense planning An ad hoc group of Solidarity leaders thority should include defense, security, to include force structure development, and members of parliament formed and foreign affairs committees to provide arms acquisitions, deployments, personnel minority and opposition parties with infor- development, and military promotions. mation and allow consultation, particularly 40 JFQ / Summer 2000 0925 Simon Pgs 2/24/01 11:24 AM Page 41 Simon foiled efforts to draft a new constitu- Central Europe tion. Frustrated, Walesa pushed for parliamentary elections two and a half FINLAND years early. Elections in October 1991 Helsinki Oslo selected the nation’s third consecutive NORWAY Stockholm Tallinn noncommunist prime minister, Jan ESTONIA Olszewski, which presented another opportunity to revise the national security RUSSIA structure. As a result of these elections, SWEDEN LATVIA executive and legislative institutions Riga were fully democratic although glaring DENMARK Baltic Sea weaknesses remained: a heavily frag- Copenhagen LITHUANIA mented and weak coalition government RUSSIA Dn and the absence of a constitution. Vilnius Debate over a constitution sparked Gdansk Minsk a political showdown between parlia- Elbe POLAND ment and president. Ambiguity in au- BELARUS thority and differences in interpreta- GERMANY Berlin Poznan tion over command and control caused Lodz Warsaw the downfall of the Olszewski govern- Lubin ment, including the first civilian de- Prague Kiev fense minister, Jan Parys, who exacer- Krakow UKRAINE THE CZECH bated the confrontation by alleging Rhine Danube REPUBLIC BratisSlaLvaOVAKIA Dnestr tgheantc iWesa lteos ar uhlaed b bye emna prtliaanl nlainwg. cAo nSetijnm- Vienna MOLDOVA commission investigating the charges AUSTRIA Danube Budapest exonerated the president. HUNGARY ROMANIA Chisinau A new government under a noncommunist prime minister, Hanna Suchocka, brought hope of cooperation among the parliament, ministry, and oversight groups within the ministry of with his resignation and call for new president. In October 1992, the new defense. Bronislaw Komorowski and elections, the stage was set for further defense minister, Onyszkiewicz, imple- Janusz Onyszkiewicz, Solidarity civil- change. Votes cast in December 1990 mented an interministerial commission ians, became deputy defense ministers brought Solidarity leader Lech Walesa on defense ministry reform. In addi- and began to eliminate the Main Politi- to the presidency and the appointment tion, military courts and intelligence cal Administration (a Communist of Jan Bielecki as the second noncom- were subordinated to the civilian de- organ of control) from the military. munist prime minister, initiating a fense minister, who proposed further Civilians also took control of contact new round of military reforms with reform. The Onyszkiewicz initiatives with other countries and international power shifting from a partially com- encountered resistance, however. At- organizations, in part to ensure that munist parliament to the president. tempts to fuse civilian and military Moscow did not exercise command of Walesa chaired the defense council, budget and personnel activities and set providing reformers with de up an independent department for Walesa chaired the defense council, facto control of the military managing infrastructure and acquisi- and police. He also exercised tion were blocked by the general staff. providing reformers with de facto oversight of the defense min- Ministry efforts were further lim- control of the military and police istry through the National Se- ited by Walesa’s appointment of Gen- curity Bureau, responsible for eral Tadeusz Wilecki as chief of the Polish forces through the Warsaw Pact. developing military doctrine, conduct- general staff. Wilecki continued to ar- Meanwhile, Piotr Kolodziejczyk, an in- ing threat analyses, and drafting the rogate power by bringing his military dependent-minded admiral, became reorganization of both the defense district commanders under the general defense minister and General Zdzsislaw ministry and general staff. staff. As a result, that body effectively Stelmaszuk, who had not attended a As Walesa gained greater control, maintained autonomy by playing off Soviet staff college, became chief of the reform proved difficult to implement. civilian defense ministry oversight general staff. Tensions between the communist-dom- against the authority the generals gar- Even as Jaruzelski’s prestige fell inated Sejm on the one hand, and the nered from presidential support. Thus after the elections, noncommunists as- senate and president on the other, four parties struggled for control of the sumed positions of authority in civil- military: parliament, presidency, de- ian and military institutions. Then, fense ministry, and general staff. Summer 2000 / JFQ 41 0925 Simon Pgs 2/24/01 11:24 AM Page 42 (cid:2) JFQ FORUM the military, precipitating a constitutional crisis. Under the interim constitution the prime minister was required to consult with the president on select- ing a defense minister. Walesa forced the reappointment of his old ally, Kolodziejczyk. The admiral immedi- ately loosened control over the military. In November 1993 he reduced and consolidated the defense establishment and granted the general staff greater authority by transferring civilian departments back to the military, establishing new military directorates, and placing intelligence and counter- intelligence duties under the purview of senior officers. Kolodziejczyk’s initiatives were followed by the Drawsko affair, which threw fragile civil-military relations into further turmoil. At a September 1994 meeting of military cadres at Drawsko Pomoskie training grounds, Wilecki voiced support for Walesa’s po- sition to have the general staff func- tion directly under the president rather than report to the defense ministry. The remarks drew parliamentary atten- tion. A Sejm defense committee inves- tigation revealed tensions among a general staff supporting direct presidential control, a parliament deter- mined to play a supervisory role over the military, and a constitution that failed to distinguish a proper balance of power. The committee equivocated in its findings. Though it criticized the president for his behavior at Drawsko, it failed to react even after Walesa pre- Lech Walesa Photos sented awards to Wilecki and other top wGditahn wsko,r1k9e8rs3 .in P/Wide World mdtheienlrit t.u aDnryrda ewcromsmkionm eadna ndtd rtuehsrets Sbaeefjttmwer er eetnph oepr ati nrfluciari--- A ment and president. Kolodziejczyk resigned, contributing to the Pawlak government’s collapse. In November 1992 further consti- and foreign affairs. Inability to compro- The conflict between president tutional reform offered an opportunity mise blocked further progress. and parliament reached crisis propor- to clarify legislative and executive au- Elections were again crucial to tions. A civil-military quagmire re- thority. It failed because of continued transformation. The Sejm and senate sulted from not delineating the spe- ambiguity. Lack of consensus was evi- contests of September 1993 were a bit- cific authorities of the president and dent in seven drafts submitted to the ter setback for those political parties defense ministry and from the inabil- constitutional commission. The defense which emerged from the Solidarity ity of the Sejm to exercise effective committee of the Sejm, for example, movement, with the return of commu- oversight. It also reflected the failure of opposed presidential oversight of a na- nists who took control of parliament the civilian officials in the ministry to tional guard. There were also diverse and formed a coalition government. exercise control over senior officers on views on the role of the executive in ap- The appointment of Waldemar Pawlak the general staff. pointing ministers of defense, interior, as prime minister led to a renewed battle with the president for control of 42 JFQ / Summer 2000 0925 Simon Pgs 2/24/01 11:24 AM Page 43 Simon organization and control in a biparti- san manner. Land Forces Command was established with military districts subordinated to it rather than the general staff. In 1998 the general staff was restructured into a joint staff. With these final changes, Poland institution- alized civil control over the military prior to acceding to NATO. Unfinished Revolution Poland struggled for a consensus on the organization of a modern defense establishment. The demise of the Communist Party created a void. The control of the armed forces became the centerpiece of a constitutional contest for power. The way the general staff played the president against the prime and defense ministers brought the military an independence not found else- where in Central Europe. Thus the general staff gained enormous influence vis-à-vis civilian institutions. This independence was facilitated by Walesa’s desire to finally seize control from the wen, Jr.) ctoopm lmevuenlsi ostfs t hane dd ebfeyn isne smtaibniilsittryy .at the Do Since the passage of the Law on mes V. the Office of the Defense Minister and mera (Ja ain ng emw incoisntestriitaul tmioann, aegfefomrtesn at tr esospliodnifsyi-- Caremleyb rdaatyin agt PBoalnisjha mpany, Combat Ca bctgeaoilnnvit esybir onea nmnse debe nnoetv t awerser esmrieeganlhai nttti .vho Cefe l utyhpr srereue ngcsecti dnepseesrrnofaubtll l.sae tYmnaefdstf Vrucila,Bosnia. Co Signal rdeesluimlt iftr opmre stihdee nctoinalt inauutehdo irnitayb iilnit yt htoe 982d area of defense affairs. The capacity of the Sejm for oversight has shown remarkable improve- Elections intervened to shape the a deputy defense minister to deal with ment, but limitations persist. Since its defense revolution. After the inaugura- the budget and increased civilian over- beginnings in 1989–90, the Sejm de- tion of Aleksander Kwasniewski in sight. In addition, the chief of general fense committee has only slowly devel- December 1995 and the formation of a staff formally became a deputy minister. oped an expert staff. In particular, its socialist government under Prime Min- These changes wrested control from the chairman publicly recognized short- general staff and subordinated falls in supervising military intelli- Poland struggled for a consensus generals to the defense ministry. gence. He also acknowledged that al- The September 1997 return though the Supreme Chamber of on the organization of a modern of the Solidarity-led government Control has slightly improved its abil- defense establishment led by Jerzy Buzek and a new ity to monitor the defense budget, it form of cohabitation with a so- will take years before the Sejm can de- cialist president under a new con- velop the methods employed in ad- ister Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz, parlia- stitution redefined the powers of the vanced democracies. ment searched for a legislative solution president and administration. Both Despite limited support mecha- to the problems of civil-military con- branches tackled the issue of military nisms, legislators have exerted greater trol. The result was the enactment of influence. Parliament has exercised the Law on the Office of the Defense some control through constrained Minister in February 1996, which added budgets. In addition, the Sejm has Summer 2000 / JFQ 43 0925 Simon Pgs 2/24/01 11:25 AM Page 44 (cid:2) JFQ FORUM Each new member faces three challenges. The first is military integra- tion. If they succeed in this effort the Alliance will be strengthened and poised for further enlargement. But if these new members fail to meet force goal targets, and if NATO concludes that the first enlargement tranche has added consumers rather than produc- ers, the commitment to enlargement could be undercut and regional secu- Heisch) rity could be compromised. mera (Jason mbuuilcdhSi enacgno iansnsdu ,ien iosntfi ttmeugotirdoaentr intoihznaa ttii osis n n waositd i ets lioys Combat Ca saunpdp owrhteods eb yfo srocceise tcya nan fdu lgfoilvl eArnllmiaenncte, NATO training at Camp mpany, traeaskcsti osunc, ha nads mteererittionrgi aolu dt-eofef-nasreea, rcaopmid- Co White Eagle,Kosovo. Signal mitmTehnitrsd., even though PFP has been 982d critical in developing a sense of regional stability, NATO must not focus on new members. Moreover, the new demonstrated limited supervision over 1995 reversed a slide that had begun in members—beyond meeting force goal military administration. It began with 1986. While it represents a commit- targets and voicing support for the the Defense Reform Law in 1996 and ment of 2.08 percent of the gross do- partnership—must devote resources to rules on military rotation and term mestic product in 2000, there is an ap- the program. limits on general staff assignments and parent—albeit unrealized promise—to As a former partner, Poland is par- army reform. The increased oversight increase this level of spending to 3 per- ticularly helpful in dealing with such also has been evident in questions on cent. Moreover, compared with Hun- challenges. It can help other nations acquisition (such as helicopters, fighter garians and Czechs, Poles hold the more effectively implement PFP. Part- aircraft, and artillery) as well as person- armed forces in high esteem. Finally, ners should note the Polish experience nel policy and other reforms. Poland has developed institutions for in establishing a solid foundation for Despite initial limits, the defense intergovernmental security planning civil-military relations. ministry has shown significant struc- with a capacity to prioritize national tural and functional differentiation objectives. Fair and open elections, compro- since the interministerial commission. mise and restraint among competing The Way Ahead The reform concept and subsequent parties, constitutional experimentation actions appear to hit the mark. Efforts As an enlarged NATO becomes a and reform, and transparency in the po- to empower the ministry by providing reality, Poland and other new members litical process all contributed to forging accountability, subordinating and lim- must define their military role in Euro- new state structures for civil-military re- iting the functions of the general staff pean security. Their decisions are par- lations in Poland. By combining these to civilian authority, and reforming ticularly vital in light of criteria often elements with sensible defense reorgan- the armed forces through budgetary cited by the current members of the ization and a modicum of material and measures and acquisition practices Alliance in justifying enlargement, popular support, this new member of have been appropriate objectives. which include promoting stability the Alliance has demonstrated that the In addition, the nation has tackled through institutionalizing common NATO model is viable. JFQ the issue of preparedness. Personnel values, enhancing core tasks through have been cut and readiness problems strengthened territorial defense and have been evident in all services as well contributions to rapid reaction forces, as the Polish element of Implementa- and developing capabilities for out-of- tion Force (IFOR)/Stabilization Force area operations. (SFOR) in Bosnia. Contrasted with NATO will soon be able to meas- other countries in Central Europe, ure these objectives against evolving however, a defense budget increase in realities among new members. The ex- tent to which these newcomers realize their potentialities will greatly influence the future of the Alliance. 44 JFQ / Summer 2000