Gdansk
There can be few better places to meet the hopes and horrors of the second half of the twentieth century than in this city. That tumultuous history is etched on the faces of passers-by: careworn elderly, shuffling slowly along with their weekly groceries, fashionably dressed young men and women, hurrying along talking into their mobile phones, young and old on their knees with their rosaries before the image of Mary in the city's Cathedral. We docked early this morning beside the monument that marks the outbreak of the Second World War, when the Poles tried briefly to resist the German seizure of a town that the Nazis claimed – not without historical justification – was as much German as it was Polish. Gdansk became Danzig again and a Second World War began to liberate Poland from Nazi tyranny. The irony of the war's conclusion was that Poland was retained under Soviet control. For the Russians, whose armies had played the major role in defeating Hitler, were determined that the repeated attacks on their homeland from the west that had characterized several centuries would be stopped once and for all. An Iron Curtain was lowered across Europe and it was defeated Germany that was rebuilt by Marshall Aid while east of the Iron Curtain the ruins of the Second World War took decades to clear.
All this makes the decision of the people of Gdansk to rebuild their old city exactly as it had been at the height of its prosperity in the seventeenth century the more poignant. With little external aid, the city was rebuilt as a symbol of past continuity and future promise. Today we visited this reconstructed old town and marveled at the determination of a people and the quality of their craftsmanship. We were also able to visit the Gdansk shipyards where Lech Walesa founded Solidarity in 1980. By sheer act of will, he transformed his union into a beacon of hope that the iron curtain could be lifted. A decade later, in December 1990, he took the oath of office as the first freely elected President of his country for fifty years. The Solidarity Monument (pictured) symbolizes this seismic decade: aspiring towers, with the anchors of the Gdansk shipyard affixed like crucifixes – for this was also the decade of the first Polish Pope – erupting miraculously from the ground. This evening, it was our great privilege to invite President Lech Walesa on board to address us and to answer questions. It goes without saying that he received a standing ovation.
There can be few better places to meet the hopes and horrors of the second half of the twentieth century than in this city. That tumultuous history is etched on the faces of passers-by: careworn elderly, shuffling slowly along with their weekly groceries, fashionably dressed young men and women, hurrying along talking into their mobile phones, young and old on their knees with their rosaries before the image of Mary in the city's Cathedral. We docked early this morning beside the monument that marks the outbreak of the Second World War, when the Poles tried briefly to resist the German seizure of a town that the Nazis claimed – not without historical justification – was as much German as it was Polish. Gdansk became Danzig again and a Second World War began to liberate Poland from Nazi tyranny. The irony of the war's conclusion was that Poland was retained under Soviet control. For the Russians, whose armies had played the major role in defeating Hitler, were determined that the repeated attacks on their homeland from the west that had characterized several centuries would be stopped once and for all. An Iron Curtain was lowered across Europe and it was defeated Germany that was rebuilt by Marshall Aid while east of the Iron Curtain the ruins of the Second World War took decades to clear.
All this makes the decision of the people of Gdansk to rebuild their old city exactly as it had been at the height of its prosperity in the seventeenth century the more poignant. With little external aid, the city was rebuilt as a symbol of past continuity and future promise. Today we visited this reconstructed old town and marveled at the determination of a people and the quality of their craftsmanship. We were also able to visit the Gdansk shipyards where Lech Walesa founded Solidarity in 1980. By sheer act of will, he transformed his union into a beacon of hope that the iron curtain could be lifted. A decade later, in December 1990, he took the oath of office as the first freely elected President of his country for fifty years. The Solidarity Monument (pictured) symbolizes this seismic decade: aspiring towers, with the anchors of the Gdansk shipyard affixed like crucifixes – for this was also the decade of the first Polish Pope – erupting miraculously from the ground. This evening, it was our great privilege to invite President Lech Walesa on board to address us and to answer questions. It goes without saying that he received a standing ovation.
