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1

Polska Droga do RIAD. Uniformizacja systemów komputerowych w RWPG, 1960–1970

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Sikora M.
Kwartalnik Historii Nauki i Techniki
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2019
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vol. 64
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issue 4
115–150
EN
In the first half of the 1950s, the authorities and the scientific community of the Polish People’s Republic noticed the growing importance of electronic computing. The freedom of Polish science and the research and development sector was hindered by limited access to western centers, as well as a trade embargo on computers and measuring and testing equipment. This deficit was compensated to a small extent by the scientific and technical contacts developing in the 1960s with the USSR and with other partners from the Comecon. Documentation obtained mostly in Western European countries and, to a lesser extent, in the USA by Polish intelligence served as an additional source of knowledge for the authorities of the Polish People’s Republic and the newly opened production centers. However, the greatest successes in acquiring know-how were achieved not through the use of illegal methods, but through official negotiations with Western partners. The culminating moment of the ‘democratic’ (free) development of the computer industry in the Polish People’s Republic was when the ELWRO company signed the contract with the British ICT (later ICL) company in 1967. Unfortunately, it coincided with the inauguration of talks by Moscow in the Eastern Bloc on the unification of computer systems, the socalled RIAD, during the Comecon forum. The interests of the computer industry of the USSR as a superpower and the Polish People’s Republic as its satellite were on a collision course for a while. The inside story of the accession of the Polish People’s Republic to the RIAD program was reconstructed as a result of analysis of documents created in the Polish institutions supervising the Polish computer industry in its first developmenal phase (preceding Edward Gierek’s 1970–1980 tenure and RIAD). To supplement and verify the above sources, the author also selectively used other archives, which in perspective can be very useful for understanding the factors behind the creation of RIAD and determining the role of Poland in this program.
2

„Terapia czarnorynkowa”. Pomoc wywiadu MSW dla branży f armaceutycznej i biotechnologicznej w PRL 1960–1990

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Sikora M.
Kwartalnik Historii Nauki i Techniki
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2017
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vol. 62
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issue 4
65–104
EN
Until now, studies on the PPR’s intelligence have been focused mainly on international rela-tions and the issue of defence. On the one hand, there were analyses of secret operations aimed at infiltration of political and military structures of NATO states and on the other, of attempts of secret exertion of influence on foreign agencies of the anti-systemic opposition (e.g. Solidarity) and, in wider sense, on the stance of the whole Polish community abroad. In general though, historians didn’t pay much attention to the intelligence’s activity in obtaining technological-exploitation documentation, samples, or utility models for the Polish science, industry, and, as a result, for the whole society. Still, judging only from the picture of scientific-technological department of the Ministry and its organisational evolution, we can say that it became a more and more important element of the PPR’s economy. In some fields of science, particularly in development and implementation, operations conducted on the territory of OECD countries by officers of the department generated considerable savings for the Polish State Treasury. An important addition to the assets of the PPR’s intelligence was co-operation and exchan¬ge of information with analogous services of other Comecon countries in the framework of socialist intelligence co-operation. This study concentrates on one of the most important, next to microelectronics and IT, aspects of activity of the Interior Ministry’s scientific-technological department. Intelligence channels supported consecutive governments of the PPR in avoiding high costs of licences and enabled access to solutions totally unavailable with foreign contractors. The subjects of operations were, inspired by the needs of the Institute of Pharmacy or chemistry industry, main¬ly antibiotics, vaccines, heart disease and immunologic drugs, as well as technologies used in transplantology. Other beneficiaries of those secret pursuits were also agriculture and animal husbandry, interested in GMO fertilizers, insecticides, or steroids for animals. Although the drowsy planned economy was not always able to manage innovative solutions, their illegal influx considerably improved PPR’s export balance and contributed to moder-nisation of some segments of chemical industry.
3
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Współpraca Departamentu I MSW z Hauptverwaltung Aufklärung MfS w zakresie tajnego pozyskiwania nowych technologii dla przemysłu PRL i NRD w latach 1975–1990

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Sikora M.
Pamięć i Sprawiedliwość
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2017
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issue 29
506-539
EN
The intelligence services of the Warsaw Pact and the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance member states cooperated from the moment the Iron Curtain fell over Central and Eastern Europe. As the specific branches of the intelligence expanded following the example of the KGB, information exchange encompassed an increasing range of issues. In the 1950s, following the example set by the USSR, the Polish and East German leaderships of the party and the state started to lay the foundations for the so-called scientific and technical intelligence (WNT), whose task was to provide the economy with innovative technologies, including ones subject to the trade embargo imposed by the capitalist countries. The first half of the 1970s brought dynamic development in the field of organisation and staff of the scientific and technological intelligence across COMECON, which can be seen both in the case of the Polish People’s Republic and the German Democratic Republic. Both countries tried to correlate the tasks of the scientific and technological intelligence (which was known as SWT – Sektor für Wissenschaft und Technik – in East Germany) with the national research and development goals set for the economy. As regards the general technology level, the GDR had advantage over all other COMECON countries, including the USSR, which also had impact on relations with Poland, which was much more underdeveloped. The author begins his tale by outlining the economic position of both countries and their joint projects in the areas of research and development and the industry. The author’s primary intention was to determine the chronology of clandestine contact between both scientific and technological intelligence services, show the thematic spectrum and the scale of information exchange, and to define the points of gravity of the cooperation. The analysis of archival documents created by Department I of the Ministry of Internal Affairs on one hand and by various divisions in the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit on the other makes it possible to determine that components of both countries’ intelligence active in the field of science and technology submitted analyses and informational materials to each other, particularly in the field of nuclear energy and the military complex of NATO countries, as early as the late 1950s. The cooperation deepened around the mid-1970s, where annual consultation between the managements of the WNT and the SWT combined with exchange of experience with regard to industrial espionage became a standard. With the passage of time, the interest of both services expanded into all key branches of the industry such as metallurgy and exploitation of natural deposits, polymer chemistry and biotechnology, and particularly microelectronics and information technology. In the 1980s, the cooperation reached its most advanced stage and encompassed mutual exchange of construction and technological documentation and designs, as well as samples of materials and chemical compounds obtained on the “black market” (i.e. through informers recruited in Western companies).
4
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Zakres zainteresowania radzieckiego cywilnego wywiadu naukowo-technicznego w okresie rządów Michaiła Gorbaczowa. Z perspektywy wymiany informacji wywiadowczej pomiędzy MSW PRL a KGB ZSRR

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Sikora M.
Przegląd Bezpieczeństwa Wewnętrznego
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2015
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vol. 7
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issue 12
66-87
PL
Już w latach 50. XX w. luka technologiczna pomiędzy państwami kapitalistycznymi a blokiem komunistycznym była ewidentna, na niekorzyść tego ostatniego. Wraz z odprężeniem w relacjach międzynarodowych w latach 70. kraje RWPG zdołały przyswoić część zachodnich technologii, zakupując licencje. Najważniejsze rozwiązania, zwłaszcza w zakresie elektronicznych systemów sterowania oraz chemii organicznej, były jednak nadal poddane przez zachodnioeuropejskie koncerny ścisłej ochronie. Transfer technologii hamowało dodatkowo zaostrzone u progu dekady lat 80. amerykańskie embargo na tzw. produkty podwójnego zastosowania. W niniejszym przyczynku autor wysuwa tezę, że ZSRR zmobilizował wywiady państw RWPG na rzecz masowego przenikania do zachodnich ośrodków naukowo-badawczych i produkcyjnych w celu zdobycia pożądanych z punktu widzenia gospodarki ZSRR (oraz pozostałych państw RWPG) technologii, i tym samym przełamania zachodnich restrykcji handlowych. Akcent został położony na stronę radziecką w celu sygnalnego wypełnienia luki obejmującej – z punktu widzenia badań nad wywiadem naukowo- -technicznym KGB ZSRR – drugą połowę lat 80. XX w. Analizą objęto przede wszystkim katalogi i opisy zadań przekazywanych przez KGB polskiemu MSW, a także raporty polskiego wywiadu ze spotkań roboczych z radzieckimi partnerami. Dzięki zachowanym w Archiwum IPN dokumentom można określić jakość i ilość przemycanych i wymienianych materiałów, a ponadto zidentyfikować kraje, instytucje i firmy, które znajdowały się w zainteresowaniu wywiadu ZSRR. Oprócz wiedzy dotyczącej samych technologii oba wywiady wymieniały się także doświadczeniem w zakresie pozyskiwania i obsługi agentów. Wśród najważniejszych konkluzji analizy należy wymienić: systematyczny wzrost ilości przekazywanych w obie strony informacji; pozornie zrównoważone zainteresowanie ZSRR technologiami cywilnymi i wojskowymi przy rzeczywistym transferze informacji do i z Polski zdominowanym przez zastosowania cywilne; przewagę technologii elektronicznych i informatycznych, a także biotechnologicznych i medycznych, przy mniejszym zainteresowaniu obu stron wymianą w zakresie przemysłu ciężkiego i energetyki.
EN
Technological gap in development between both sides of iron curtain became obvious already during the fifties of the twentieth century. Along with the détente-era communists countries managed to import some vital technological solutions by purchasing production-lines or signing license-agreements. However real high-tech, especially in such branches as automatic control or organic chemistry, was either protected by private companies interested in maintaining its export-monopoly, or embargoed as so called dual-use components, by western governments, inspired by USA especially since the beginning of the eighties. Main thesis of this paper claims that Moscow encouraged satellite-states to launch massive clandestine undertakings, in order to break those legal restrictions and acquire modern solutions for the economy of the Soviet Union and their own as well. The accent is put on the Russian partner, because the activity of the scientific-technical arm within KGB in the late eighties – comparing to the previous period – is still not enough examined by historians. Analysis involved lists of requested technologies and task-descriptions passed from KGB to Polish intelligence as well as Polish reports on debriefings with the representatives of the Russian partner. Insight in those files, stored in the Archive of IPN, enables to estimate profile and quantity of smuggled and exchanged material. Moreover we can point out targeted countries, state’s organizations or private companies. Both sides exchanged experience in recruiting, handling and paying agents, which is also discussed in the paper. Basic conclusions are as follows: the amount of the information being shared was growing systematically; theoretically the spectrum of Soviet interest in the area of science and technology was rather evenly distributed between the civil and military applications; however the information transfer to and from Poland was de facto predominantly of the civil nature; electronic and IT on one hand, biotechnology and medicine on the other hand dominated information-stream, making heavy industry and energetic a secondary field of activity
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