20 years ago I left a communist prison

20 YEARS AGO I LEFT A COMMUNIST PRISON

28 02 2010

DAVID M. DASTYCH
Journalist, media agency owner
Warsaw, Poland (EU)
Phone: +48-22-408 27 87
Cell Phone: +48 514 270 639
david.dastych@aster.pl
Skype: davids.media.agency (for Skype users)
My Blog: “David’s Den”
www.canadafreepress.com/davidsden/
www.canadafreepress.com

Warsaw, Poland
Sunday, February 28, 2010

DAVID M. DASTYCH, now 68 (a photo by Irena Elster, Paris)

Exclusive for CFP: Back to Freedom – 20 Years Ago

On February 28, 1990 – I left a Communist Prison

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/20492

By David Dastych Sunday, February 28, 2010

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BARCZEWO PRISON IN NORTH-EASTERN POLAND

[In Barczewo Prison was kept the war criminal, Gauleiter of Ostpreußen - Erich Koch. He
died in prison in 1986. With him the communists kept there the Solidarity and anti-communist
leaders: Adam Michnik, Władysław Frasyniuk and Leszek Moczulski in the early 1980s. [and
David M. Dastych and Professor Jozef Szaniawski, Col. R.Kuklinski’s friend and biographer,
in the late 1980s.]

The late Colonel Ryszard Kukliński (left) with his friend and biographer Professor Jozef
Szaniawski (we were kept in Barczewo Prison together)

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A BOOK ABOUT COL. R.KUKLINSKI BY JOZEF SZANIAWSKI - A MISSION OF
POLAND

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Exclusive for CFP: Back to Freedom – 20 Years Ago

On February 28, 1990 – I left a Communist prison

By David Dastych Sunday, February 28, 2010[In Barczewo Prison was kept the war criminal,
Gauleiter of Ostpreußen - Erich Koch. He died in prison in 1986. With him the communists
kept there the Solidarity and anti-communist leaders: Adam Michnik, Władysław Frasyniuk
and Leszek Moczulski in the early 1980s. [and David M. Dastych and Professor Jozef
Szaniawski, Col. R.Kuklinski’s friend and biographer, in the late 1980s.]

The main gate of the Barczewo Prison in Poland

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Warsaw-Poland-February 28: It is twenty years already since I left a Communist prison in
Barczewo [nicknamed “Barczewo-Hilton”] on Wednesday morning, the last day of
February1990. I knew I would be conditionally released, after my 8-year sentence was
reduced to 5 years by a Military Tribunal in Warsaw on January 2, 1990. But I didn’t know
exactly when I would be set free. On that ordinary weekday, my lawyer D. Krasowski, Esq.,
came to see me and he told me I would be called to a Military Tribunal hearing in Barczewo
Penitentiary. I wasn’t sure they would release me on that day. But the hearing lasted only 15
minutes, and I was told I was to be released on conditional terms immediately. Then, I had to
go to a prison wardrobe to dress up and to my cell in a Special Ward to pick up my things. I
asked for a permission to visit some of the co-prisoners to give them some things and to take
letters from them. Then I said good-bye to the “fellow-criminals” I knew and I collected some
cash from a depository, before leaving the prison for good.

It was a bright, sunny day and, at first, I went to a nearby chapel to meet a monk, who helped
me in my prison years. He wasn’t there, so I left some money in the chapel, I prayed briefly
and I went out to take my place in my lawyer’s car.

FREEDOM HAS ITS PRICE

There were no cell phones at that time in Poland. But I didn’t want to call my family from a
post office: my sudden come-back should be a surprise to them.

I asked the lawyer to keep me company in visiting the beautiful small town of Barczewo,
situated at a lake. When in prison, I never had a chance to see it, the only view from my cell
was of some trees and a high prison wall. That prison was located in a former monastery. I
took out my cash and I went to a store to buy a white shirt and a tie. To my great surprise,
they were quite expensive. For several years I had no idea how much Polish money was
worth, as there had been a big inflation.

After a peaceful regime change in Poland and a victory of “Solidarity” in the semi-free
elections of June 4,1989, I read a lot about the economy to get prepared for my later life.

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PRISON POETRY
Some time ago, in my cell, I wrote a little “poem” about the economic situation of Poland. In
a rough English translation it runs like this:

Our Poland Today

No money, no honey
But hopes and baloney,
No sugar, no meat
But an eternal Polish wit;
No vodka, no squash
But free computers “McIntosh”;
A heap of banknotes
But no real pay –
This is our Poland today.

Like it? It wasn’t the only piece of poetry I wrote in prison. I also wrote the lyrics to a song
about “Barczewo-Hilton” and a lot of epigrams like this one (translated from Russian):

Lech Walesa in Moscow

He came to us as a guest
To sing a requiem
For dead Communism
In the name of a living “Solidarity”

In the second half of 1989, I asked the Military Court in Warsaw to grant me permission to
correspond with family and friends in the United States. The permission was granted, a
unique case, as I was convicted…for spying for the C.I.A. But the regime was over and we
experienced more freedom in the special prison ward. To make some fun, I started to write
letters in Polish, English and Russian, translating the ones in the foreign languages myself.
The letters were then posted by my family. I wrote to my friend, Mr. Zygmunt “Ziggy”
Broniarek, then a Washington D.C. correspondent of the chief Comparty daily “Trybuna
Ludu.” Broniarek (still alive, over 80 now) promised me to pass some of my Russian letters to
Ms. Condoleezza Rice. I invented a Russian pen-name for myself “Lev Davidovich Zek” and
I pretended to be “an unknown Russian poet,” writing from a Siberian forced labor camp. I
penned mostly short epigrams, like this one:

Gorba…Gorba
You’re a Greek Zorba

or (more seriously)

I remember the Afghan mountains,

Flames and blood of children and widows,
Bombs and missiles of Russian soldiers;
Death all around…
But we aren’t the aggressors, are we?

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I am not sure Condi Rice received my “poems” as Ziggy promised to pass them to her. But a
chance to write letters to American friends gave me a “lift to heaven” and a lot of joy. On
August 1,1989, an American professor of law from Washington D.C. visited me in Barczewo
Prison and I handed him a report about my case and about the conditions in Polish prisons. In
1989, there were many strikes and even riots in prisons. In Barczewo Prison, the criminals
organized a strike and chose me as their “legal counsel.” That was too much for the Prison
Warden and, of course, he refused. I enjoyed some respect among the co-prisoners, mostly
ordinary criminals with long-time sentences, up to 25 years. The policy of that time was to put
dangerous criminals into the cells of “political” prisoners, or “enemies of the state” like me,
an alleged C.I.A. spy. I observed them carefully, as some of them were secret informers. I
learned from them some skills and a prison slang, and even I practiced karate with one young
bandit. When in Warsaw Central Jail, I helped some talented prisoners (painters, wood-
carvers etc.). They offered me their drawings, which I still keep at home (perhaps I should
scan some).

A COME BACK
As we drove back to Warsaw, my lawyer couldn’t drink alcohol but I had some cognac with
coffee that made me happy and jovial. Poor Mr. Krasowski had to listen to my prison stories,
jokes and songs.

We came to my family house in the late afternoon. My old Mother almost had a heart-attack
of joy! I had to stay with her and talk to her until she went to sleep. Then my Khmer girl-
friend came to see me with her two sons and we were all too happy. The whole night, I drank
Suntory Whiskey with my Japanese brother-in-law, Teruo, who was very curious about my
experience. He knew I was also made a “Japanese spy” by the secret police, which was a big
lie and provocation. My sister Halina made some good food, Polish and Japanese, and the
night passed quickly.

The next morning, on March 1, 1990, I woke up ready to perform my “normal” prison chores.
For some time yet, I couldn’t get accustomed to freedom. I went to a Police (militia) station to
register as a conditionally released “criminal” and then I visited a passport office and I asked
for a Polish passport, of which I was deprived for 14 years by the Communist special services.
It was a great fun: I had to fill in a passport form and I wrote with certain pride when and for
what for I was convicted. To my great surprise, I received my passport in just a few days.

FINDING A HOME
In 1988, when I was imprisoned, I divorced my wife to protect her and my two children –
Olaf (son) and Natalia (daughter). My wife, who was a journalist and editor-in-chief of a
women’s weekly paper, met Raisa, the wife of Mikhail Gorbachev, to ask for help. Nothing
happened then, of course. Only one foreign country, Israel, issued a note to the Polish Foreign
Ministry inquiring about me. The U.S. Government did nothing to protect me, therefore, later
on, in Brussels, I met a CIA diplomat to end my services for The Company. I didn’t ask for
money or protection or for anything else, as I worked on my own and it was a voluntary
service. I also wrote to the Prime Minister of Japan, dismissing an allegation that I served to
his intelligence agency (I was accused of that). He never replied but soon I got a well-paid job
with Asahi-TV as a co-producer of a documentary about the changes in Poland. I also wrote
for a big Japanese magazine about the economic reforms, led by Professor L. Balcerowicz.

But I had no permanent job, no housing (I left my large apartment to the former wife and
children). I used to stay with my old Father and with my girl-friend, traveling often and doing

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some business. Soon I registered my own small enterprise, called “Dastych Trading Co.” and
I made good use of the economic freedom in Poland to earn money.

CELEBRATING FREEDOM IN BERLIN

My first trip abroad, after a dozen or more years, was to Berlin, already united. I went there
by plane from Warsaw, incidentally meeting on board a former journalist colleague, the late
Mr. M. Rakowski, who was a Prime Minister of Poland in the 1980s, and then the last First
Secretary of the PUWP (the Communist party), which he “laid to rest.” We chatted in a
friendly fashion, and I learned that my letter from the Warsaw Central Prison never reached
him. In Berlin I had to go through the fallen Wall and I installed myself in one of the
expensive hotels. From there I phoned to family and friends all over the world, from Germany
to Australia and the U.S.A. and I wrote many letters to politicians, MPs and other people.
Later on the Chancellor of Germany Helmut Kohl sent me a thank-you note via the Embassy
with thanks for my part in the re-unification of Germany. Well, this part was a tiny one, as the
main thanks they owed was to Mikhail Gorbachev.

In Berlin I visited good restaurants, theaters and clubs, and also the places near the Wall,
where I was earlier on the Eastern side many times, since 1961, with no chance to cross over
to West Berlin. That was sad.

Later on I also went to Moscow, where nobody wanted to arrest me but friends accepted me
with typical Russian cordiality and a lot of vodka. I also became a travel-guide to tour Europe,
and then Asia on low cost. In the 1990s, I went to China to trade and this was a really good
choice. I was also in Israel, meeting my close friend, a nuclear physicist, the late Mr.
Shalheveth Freier (also a former intelligence operative). By following his advice, I started a
multi-year operation monitoring illegal trafficking in nuclear materials and weapons…But
that is a separate story to tell at another time.

Let me finish this article with a piece of poetry from prison. It’s about East Germany in 1989:

Go West Young Man

(East German style)

Here we go again
To the West on Freedom Train,
By Walesa we’ve been told
How to jump over the Wall;
Thanks to Poland, now we know
How to be brave and where to go;
Good-bye Genosse Honecker!
In the West we will live much better
And when all of us get invited
Germany will be re-united.
—[October 1989)

Oh. I have found some nice aphorisms yet (also from my prison notes):

Socialism is the road to Communism that means – to nowhere.

Capitalism is what remains on the bottom of socialism, after its reform.
The law of the Left is lawlessness; the law of the Right is dictatorship;The law of the Middle

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is – probably – a democracy.
The criminal code in socialism: a citizen has the right to be convicted.
Lech Walesa is a Polish variant of Julius Caesar: “Veni, vidi, arrange”
Three ways out of the economic crisis:
A liberal way – take care of yourself,
A socialist way – the state will help you if you help yourself,
A charitable way – free soup!
Generations pass by and prisons remain!
© David Dastych, 2010

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David Dastych Bio

David Dastych, 68 is a veteran journalist, writing for Polish and foreign media. He was also
a businessman and consultant to foreign business, one time an associate director of Japan
External Trade Organization (JETRO) in Poland. Now he owns and operates an international
media agency in Warsaw (David’s Media Agency), serving foreign authors and providing PR
services to business companies.

David can be reached at: davids@aster.pl

FROM: VIDEOFACT, NEW YORK, N.Y., U.S.A.

Our agents and double agents

http://www.coldwarproject.com/our_agents.htm

They made real contributions to our winning the Cold War. Some of them paid the
highest price for it.

“Farewell” – Col. Vladimir Vetrov

Col. Ryszard Kuklinski (died on February 11, 2004 in Tampa, Florida, U.S.A.)
Gen. Dmitri Polyakov
Adolf Tolkachev
Valery Martynov
Vladimir Potashov
Boris Yuzhin
Sergey Motorin
Vladimir Vasilyev
Sergey Vorontsov
Gennady Varenik
Sergey Fedorenko
Oleg Gordievsky (living in England)
Jerzy Pawlowski (died on January 11, 2005 in Warsaw, Poland)
Col. Oleg Penkovsky

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Istvan Belovai (living in Budapest, Hungary)
Gabor Rimner

Zoltan Halmi
Mariusz Dastych (David M.Dastych journalist, 68, Warsaw, Poland)
Bogdan Walewski (living in the U.S.A.)
Stanislaw Debowski
Col. Peter Popov
Anatoly N. Filatov
Aleksander N. Cherpanov
Michal Goleniewski

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