Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[REGNUM] The incident with the “aircraft” that crashed near Bydgoszcz last December provoked a political scandal these May days. The Minister of Defense is trying to shift the responsibility to the generals. However, the opposition and the retired military demand the resignation of the minister himself.
A serious conflict erupted between the civilian Minister of National Defense of Poland, Mariusz Blaszczak, and the Polish military, active and retired. The reason for it was the discovery at the end of April of this year in the forests near the city of Bydgoszcz (Kujawsko-Pomeranian Voivodeship) of the wreckage of an unknown "aircraft."
On April 27, Minister of Justice Zbigniew Ziobro announced the start of a prosecutor's investigation into the incident.
The next day, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki expressed confidence that "there are grounds to link the found remains of the object with the incident that occurred in December last year, when a rocket flew over the territory of Poland."
And on May 10, the head of government, answering a question about when he learned about the "aircraft," said that he was informed at the end of April.
Thus, an action-packed intrigue began to spin around the fall near Bydgoszcz, as the Polish Technical Institute of Aviation Forces now defines, “a Russian-made cruise missile X-55.”
CLAIMS RAINED DOWN ON THE MINISTER OF DEFENSE.
Why were the wreckage found only at the end of April, and, according to some sources, by accident, and what did the Polish army do to search for them? How did it happen that the Prime Minister of Poland learned about the incident only a few months later? Who is to blame for all this?
Blaszczak began to switch arrows to the military, namely to the head of the operational command of the Armed Forces, General Tomasz Petrovsky. According to the minister, "On December 16, the Air Operations Center, which is subordinate to the operational command, received information from the Ukrainian side about an object approaching Polish space, which could be a missile."
Polish and American planes were lifted into the air, the object itself was tracked by Polish ground-based radar stations. However, after its fall, the operational command, Blashchak said, not only did not report the incident to the minister and the Center for Government Information, but also did not take the necessary measures to detect the object, having stopped searching for it already on December 19.
"I will immediately inform the President of Poland, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and the Prime Minister about the results of the check," the minister stated. "I inform you that possible personnel or disciplinary decisions will be made after consultation with the President of Poland."
This interpretation of events caused sharp criticism from the Polish military, who saw it as an attempt to shift the blame to General Petrovsky. The Minister's words were indirectly disavowed by the current Chief of the General Staff of Poland, General Raimund Andrzejczak. When asked by radio station RMF FM when he reported the incident, the general said: "When did it happen?"
The retirees and the opposition turned out to be less restrained.
Former Minister of Defense, MP from the Civic Platform party, Tomasz Semoniak, announced the holding of a closed meeting of parliamentary commissions on defense and security.
"I have no doubt that General Andrzejczak is telling the truth," Semonyak emphasized. "I also have no doubt that the head of the operational command, General Piotrovsky, is a decent, reliable officer."
A member of the Defense Commission, Deputy Cezary Tomczyk, announced that he had filed a complaint with the prosecutor's office due to the fact that the Minister of Defense did not inform the Prime Minister about the situation.
"The matter is very serious, because for five months a missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead lay in the Polish forest ,” the parliamentarian stressed. And he added: “To speak today of our country under the rule of Law and Justice, that this state is made of plywood, would be a giant compliment for the government."
The former deputy head of the military counterintelligence service, Colonel Maciej Matyshchak, is sure that Blaszczak is responsible for breaking the chain of information. According to him, "this is a tragedy - today something can fall on someone's head, and the government does not protect us, in a normal country, the prime minister should immediately dismiss the minister of defense."
The former Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Armed Forces, General Miroslav Ruzhansky, called what is happening a trend of recent years, when "there is a marginalization of the military and an attitude towards them as “objects.” In his opinion, many active officers and generals are "depressed" by the policy of the Minister of Defense. “I would not like to call on the generals to raise a riot, but this cannot be left in this form," Ruzhansky said, adding that he was "interested in what position the president will take."
Good question. After all, earlier some Polish publications reported that Andrzej Duda was sympathetic to Andrzejczak and blocked Blaszczak's attempts to dismiss the general from the post of chief of the general staff. It can also be assumed that Andrzejczak himself, like most of the military, will defend General Petrovsky.
However, in this case, the ruling party will have to sacrifice one of its leading politicians, who was somehow even predicted to be the heirs of the current chairman of Law and Justice, Yaroslav Kaczynski. In the pre-election year, PiS had already "lost" the Minister of Agriculture Henryk Kowalczyk, who lost his post after the Ukrainian grain scandal unleashed.
Blaszczak's departure will be another and strong blow to the ruling party, which during the Ukrainian conflict has positioned itself as the "best defender" of Poland and the Poles than its predecessors. But Law and Justice cannot but take into account the moods of the Polish military, about which General Ruzhansky warns.
Whether they decide on rokosh (an officially permitted uprising against the king in the Commonwealth. - Approx. ed.), it is difficult to say. However, they may well warm up the political situation in the country.
May 12, 2023
Stanislav Stremidlovsky
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