Last updated: February 2, 2022
Place
Ambassador Romuald Spasowski House
Photograph by Kim Williams, courtesy of District of Columbia Historic Preservation Office
"I have decided to make this statement, to stand up openly and to say that I will do everything possible to assist the Polish people in their hour of need. I have asked the government of the United States to give shelter and political asylum to me and my family." - Polish Ambassador to the United States - December 19, 1981.
Following communist-imposed martial law in Poland, Ambassador Romuald Spasowski applied for political asylum in the United States in December of 1981. He was immediately granted asylum, and became the highest ranking communist official to ever defect to the West. In the years following his defection, Spasowski served as a consultant to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush on U.S.-Polish relations. Spasowski’s defection directly shaped U.S. foreign policy during Poland's Solidarity crisis, and the resulting media campaign that emerged in the aftermath of the defection was global in scale.
Born in Warsaw in 1920, Spasowski, the son of a respected Polish writer and intellectual, was active in the communist party during his youth. After World War II, Spasowski began his diplomatic career in the service of the People’s Republic of Poland, the Soviet satellite state established in 1946. Romuald Spasowski served two terms as the Polish ambassador to the United States: the first from 1955 through 1961, and the second from 1978 through his defection in 1981.
After World War II the Polish government mismanaged the economy and alienated the working class. By 1980, the poverty experienced by the Polish people stood in ever-starker contrast to the privilege of Poland’s communist party elite. In August of that year, Polish workers began to strike in mines and shipyards along the Baltic coast, most notably at the Lenin Shipyards in Gdansk. While these strikes resembled earlier crises in 1956, 1970, and 1976, in which workers were reacting to food price increases, the Crisis of 1980 differed in that workers demanded expressly political as well as economic concessions. On August 31, 1980, Lech Walesa, an electrician active in the free trade union movement and lead representative for the striking workers, successfully negotiated with the party, leading to the Gdansk Accords. The agreement resulted in unprecedented political concessions, including independent trade unions, the right to strike without reprisals, the right to “freedom of expression,” pay increases, improved working conditions, Saturdays off, and Sunday Masses broadcast over loudspeakers. In mid-September of 1980, delegates from thirty regional Inter-Factory Strike Committees from throughout the country joined to establish a single, national union – the Independent Self-Governing Trade Union, referred to as “Solidarnose,” or Solidarity.
Throughout the crisis, the subtext of a possible Soviet-led military intervention dominated Polish-Soviet and intra-bloc relations, which led to the eventual imposition of martial law in Poland in December of 1981. Throughout that year, the Solidarity Movement continued to call for political and economic reforms. By the end of the year, however, it became clear that Walesa and his advisors were losing control of the movement. Localized strikes and work stoppages were occurring almost daily, and without any coordination with Solidarnose’s central leadership. In October 1981, the Poland's Communist Party elected General Wojcicch Jaruzelski as First Secretary of the Polish Communist Party. Upon gaining leadership, Jaruzelski began taking steps toward declaring martial law, including extending the period of military service for conscripts and dispersing military operational groups around the country. Jaruzelski declared martial law on December 13, 1981, ending the sixteen-month period of openness, liberalization, freedom, and fluidity known as the “Polish Crisis.”
Not long into his second tour in the United States, Spasowski found that the Polish Embassy was “no post of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs . . . but a Security espionage unit . . . ” of the KGB. Like her husband, Wanda Spasowski found the surveillance “suffocating.” The Spasowski’s insisted that the Polish Government acquire an official residence to replace the cramped suburban apartment that ambassadors had previously been required to use. Fortunately for the Ambassador and his wife, the Polish government authorized the purchase of a stately historic residence at 3101 Albemarle Street, N.W.
By the time Spasowski arrived in Washington in 1978, his loyalty to communism had begun to waiver. Once an ardent communist, the untimely death of his anti-communist son turned the ambassador towards the Polish Catholic Church. The rise of the Solidarity Movement, a movement which Spasowki saw as symbolizing the best hopes and aspirations of Poles, coincided with this spiritual progress. His spiritual transformation congealed with the election of Polish Pope John Paul II. Risking further suspicion from the Soviets, the Spasowski’s traveled to Rome and met with the pope in 1980. At the meeting, Spasowski revealed his growing doubts about communism, stating that, “I am sixty years old, I was a communist. Now, near the end, I have realized how very mistaken I was.”
As his loyalties continued to shift, the residence at 3101 Albemarle Street served as a refuge for the ambassador and his wife. Romuald Spasowski remarked that the “embassy had become alien to me.” The residence served as the setting for Spasowski’s efforts to bring material aid to the Polish working class, which further strained his relationship with the Soviet Embassy, and increased the level of suspicion focused on him. Spasowski also secretly met with the ambassadors of western European countries at the residence, to discuss the state of the Solidarity Movement and ways to aid the struggling Polish people. During this time Wanda Spasowski took on a large role since they allowed no one from the embassy into the residence.
Realizing that his life was in danger, Spasowski asked for diplomatic asylum for himself and his family. Over the next several hours, the Spasowskis, with the help of friends, packed up the ambassadorial residence. As they packed, District policemen, and then a host of FBI agents, came to stand guard until they were ready to be escorted from the residence to a safe house. By the time the Spasowskis finished packing what was theirs, it was nearly eight o’clock in the evening. By the evening of December 20, Spasowski was in front of news cameras, condemning the Jaruzelski government for declaring martial law, and for the arrest of Solidarity leader, Lech Walesa.
Ambassador Romuald Spasowski’s defection was a symbolic political act of international significance, and it provided the Reagan administration with a public relations victory at a time when the U.S. government was attempting to formulate a response to the Solidarity crisis and the imposition of martial law in Poland. In a December 22, 1981 meeting with President Reagan, Spasowski requested that the president ask the American people to place a lighted candle in the windows of their homes during Christmas as a sign of support for the Solidarity Movement. The following day, the president gave his annual Christmas Address to the American people. Citing a request that Spasowski had made during their meeting, Reagan urged Americans to place a lighted candle in their window as a small “beacon of solidarity” with the Polish people. "Once, earlier in this century, an evil influence threatened that the lights were going out all over the world. Let the light of millions of candles in American homes give notice that the light of freedom is not going to be extinguished."
This act grew into a broader American diplomatic initiative known as “Light a Candle for the People of Poland,” culminating in the production of the film, Let Poland Be Poland. The film was produced in 1982 by the U.S. International Communications Agency in coordination with the U. S. State Department. Featuring Spasowski, alongside celebrities Charlton Heston, Kirk Douglas, Bob Hope, Frank Sinatra, Glenda Jackson, Orson Welles, Max von Sydow, and Henry Fonda, as well as President Ronald Reagan, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and the leaders of West Germany, Belgium, Norway, and Denmark, the film was broadcast internationally, and was viewed by a combined television and radio audience of nearly 350 million people. In addition to serving as a poignant response to the events in Poland, the film also reflected a renewed focus on international broadcasting as a tool in the Reagan administration’s foreign policy.
The death sentence that had been levied against Spasowski in absentia by the Polish Communist Party following his defection was lifted in 1989 with the overthrow of the communist regime in that country. Spasowski’s Polish citizenship was restored by president Lech Walesa in 1993. The former Polish Ambassador died in 1995 at his home in Oakton, Virginia.
Following communist-imposed martial law in Poland, Ambassador Romuald Spasowski applied for political asylum in the United States in December of 1981. He was immediately granted asylum, and became the highest ranking communist official to ever defect to the West. In the years following his defection, Spasowski served as a consultant to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush on U.S.-Polish relations. Spasowski’s defection directly shaped U.S. foreign policy during Poland's Solidarity crisis, and the resulting media campaign that emerged in the aftermath of the defection was global in scale.
Born in Warsaw in 1920, Spasowski, the son of a respected Polish writer and intellectual, was active in the communist party during his youth. After World War II, Spasowski began his diplomatic career in the service of the People’s Republic of Poland, the Soviet satellite state established in 1946. Romuald Spasowski served two terms as the Polish ambassador to the United States: the first from 1955 through 1961, and the second from 1978 through his defection in 1981.
After World War II the Polish government mismanaged the economy and alienated the working class. By 1980, the poverty experienced by the Polish people stood in ever-starker contrast to the privilege of Poland’s communist party elite. In August of that year, Polish workers began to strike in mines and shipyards along the Baltic coast, most notably at the Lenin Shipyards in Gdansk. While these strikes resembled earlier crises in 1956, 1970, and 1976, in which workers were reacting to food price increases, the Crisis of 1980 differed in that workers demanded expressly political as well as economic concessions. On August 31, 1980, Lech Walesa, an electrician active in the free trade union movement and lead representative for the striking workers, successfully negotiated with the party, leading to the Gdansk Accords. The agreement resulted in unprecedented political concessions, including independent trade unions, the right to strike without reprisals, the right to “freedom of expression,” pay increases, improved working conditions, Saturdays off, and Sunday Masses broadcast over loudspeakers. In mid-September of 1980, delegates from thirty regional Inter-Factory Strike Committees from throughout the country joined to establish a single, national union – the Independent Self-Governing Trade Union, referred to as “Solidarnose,” or Solidarity.
Throughout the crisis, the subtext of a possible Soviet-led military intervention dominated Polish-Soviet and intra-bloc relations, which led to the eventual imposition of martial law in Poland in December of 1981. Throughout that year, the Solidarity Movement continued to call for political and economic reforms. By the end of the year, however, it became clear that Walesa and his advisors were losing control of the movement. Localized strikes and work stoppages were occurring almost daily, and without any coordination with Solidarnose’s central leadership. In October 1981, the Poland's Communist Party elected General Wojcicch Jaruzelski as First Secretary of the Polish Communist Party. Upon gaining leadership, Jaruzelski began taking steps toward declaring martial law, including extending the period of military service for conscripts and dispersing military operational groups around the country. Jaruzelski declared martial law on December 13, 1981, ending the sixteen-month period of openness, liberalization, freedom, and fluidity known as the “Polish Crisis.”
Not long into his second tour in the United States, Spasowski found that the Polish Embassy was “no post of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs . . . but a Security espionage unit . . . ” of the KGB. Like her husband, Wanda Spasowski found the surveillance “suffocating.” The Spasowski’s insisted that the Polish Government acquire an official residence to replace the cramped suburban apartment that ambassadors had previously been required to use. Fortunately for the Ambassador and his wife, the Polish government authorized the purchase of a stately historic residence at 3101 Albemarle Street, N.W.
By the time Spasowski arrived in Washington in 1978, his loyalty to communism had begun to waiver. Once an ardent communist, the untimely death of his anti-communist son turned the ambassador towards the Polish Catholic Church. The rise of the Solidarity Movement, a movement which Spasowki saw as symbolizing the best hopes and aspirations of Poles, coincided with this spiritual progress. His spiritual transformation congealed with the election of Polish Pope John Paul II. Risking further suspicion from the Soviets, the Spasowski’s traveled to Rome and met with the pope in 1980. At the meeting, Spasowski revealed his growing doubts about communism, stating that, “I am sixty years old, I was a communist. Now, near the end, I have realized how very mistaken I was.”
As his loyalties continued to shift, the residence at 3101 Albemarle Street served as a refuge for the ambassador and his wife. Romuald Spasowski remarked that the “embassy had become alien to me.” The residence served as the setting for Spasowski’s efforts to bring material aid to the Polish working class, which further strained his relationship with the Soviet Embassy, and increased the level of suspicion focused on him. Spasowski also secretly met with the ambassadors of western European countries at the residence, to discuss the state of the Solidarity Movement and ways to aid the struggling Polish people. During this time Wanda Spasowski took on a large role since they allowed no one from the embassy into the residence.
Realizing that his life was in danger, Spasowski asked for diplomatic asylum for himself and his family. Over the next several hours, the Spasowskis, with the help of friends, packed up the ambassadorial residence. As they packed, District policemen, and then a host of FBI agents, came to stand guard until they were ready to be escorted from the residence to a safe house. By the time the Spasowskis finished packing what was theirs, it was nearly eight o’clock in the evening. By the evening of December 20, Spasowski was in front of news cameras, condemning the Jaruzelski government for declaring martial law, and for the arrest of Solidarity leader, Lech Walesa.
Ambassador Romuald Spasowski’s defection was a symbolic political act of international significance, and it provided the Reagan administration with a public relations victory at a time when the U.S. government was attempting to formulate a response to the Solidarity crisis and the imposition of martial law in Poland. In a December 22, 1981 meeting with President Reagan, Spasowski requested that the president ask the American people to place a lighted candle in the windows of their homes during Christmas as a sign of support for the Solidarity Movement. The following day, the president gave his annual Christmas Address to the American people. Citing a request that Spasowski had made during their meeting, Reagan urged Americans to place a lighted candle in their window as a small “beacon of solidarity” with the Polish people. "Once, earlier in this century, an evil influence threatened that the lights were going out all over the world. Let the light of millions of candles in American homes give notice that the light of freedom is not going to be extinguished."
This act grew into a broader American diplomatic initiative known as “Light a Candle for the People of Poland,” culminating in the production of the film, Let Poland Be Poland. The film was produced in 1982 by the U.S. International Communications Agency in coordination with the U. S. State Department. Featuring Spasowski, alongside celebrities Charlton Heston, Kirk Douglas, Bob Hope, Frank Sinatra, Glenda Jackson, Orson Welles, Max von Sydow, and Henry Fonda, as well as President Ronald Reagan, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and the leaders of West Germany, Belgium, Norway, and Denmark, the film was broadcast internationally, and was viewed by a combined television and radio audience of nearly 350 million people. In addition to serving as a poignant response to the events in Poland, the film also reflected a renewed focus on international broadcasting as a tool in the Reagan administration’s foreign policy.
The death sentence that had been levied against Spasowski in absentia by the Polish Communist Party following his defection was lifted in 1989 with the overthrow of the communist regime in that country. Spasowski’s Polish citizenship was restored by president Lech Walesa in 1993. The former Polish Ambassador died in 1995 at his home in Oakton, Virginia.