Word: martially
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...this month, Poland's capital was a different place: instead of showcasing new boutiques and McDonald's, the streets of Warsaw were guarded by tanks and lined with small bonfires to warm the hands of military patrols. On Dec. 13, 1981, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, Poland's Prime Minister, imposed martial law, initiating a brutal 19-month crackdown on the pro-democracy Solidarity trade-union movement in which an estimated 90 people were killed and 10,000 detained. Now, in a case long postponed by political squeamishness and red tape, Jaruzelski and six other former top officials face charges of violating...
...take over the Solidarity movement and Moscow watching closely, he had no choice but to order the crackdown. Soviet troops put down a popular rebellion in Hungary in 1956 and destroyed a reformist Czech regime in 1968. Jaruzelski was acutely aware that Poland could suffer a similar fate. Martial law was a "dramatically difficult decision," but it "saved Poland from a looming catastrophe," he told the court...
...classic Latin-style military putsch" and says the trial may be Poland's last chance for justice. "Jaruzelski defended the communist system, not Poland," Borusewicz says. "He defended the communist dictatorship, not the state." Marek Krasko, a Warsaw accountant, remembers that as a 13-year-old, he welcomed martial law--because the schools were closed--until he saw his grandmother in tears at the prospect of civil war. "Martial law was a hard blow for Solidarity, and it pushed the country back," he says. "But on the other hand, without Jaruzelski, it all could have ended up in violence...
...hurry to pursue the case; it wasn't until the right-wing Law and Justice party came to power in 2005 that prosecutors pushed to bring Jaruzelski to trial. Still, it's not clear when, if ever, the court will reach a decision. Some lawyers say the declaration of martial law was legal, and documentary evidence from the period is spotty at best. With Poles still divided, the judgment of General Jaruzelski may yet be left to history...
...least, the 52-year-old Prime Minister has ruled out military intervention, hoping the police can restore order without the government's having to resort to martial law. Professor Thanos Dokos, head of the Athens-based think tank ELIAMEP, says that "even the thought of employing the Greek army to quell the civil disturbances ... is preposterous." Beyond the historical burden the armed forces carry in Greece, Dokos says "they are neither trained nor equipped for riot control...