In Nov. 1949, tough, bald-pated Wladyslaw Gomulka, once known as Poland's "Little Stalin," walked the plank. He was expelled from the Polish Communist Party for Titoist tendencies, and one of his former colleagues on the Politburo scornfully charged that lifelong Communist Gomulka had become "a symbol of reaction for the bourgeoisie and rich peasants." Nearly seven years later, in a characteristically Marxist twist of fate, 51-year-old Wladyslaw Gomulka's appeal to "reactionaries" turned out to be his political salvation.
Gomulka's real crime had been his demand that the U.S.S.R. respect Polish sovereignty...
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