The KGB: Eyes of the Kremlin

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role to play. Explains a U.S. intelligence official: "The chief of the KGB residency in Washington holds regular meetings with the heads of the satellite intelligence services based in Washington, and they often divide up intelligence tasks." Czechoslovakia, formerly a favored channel for disinformation, seems to have taken on the job of watching East bloc émigrés. East Germany is said to excel in electronic surveillance and detection equipment. Before martial law was imposed, Poland offered the best approach to influencing opinion in the West. In the U.S. alone, Poland reportedly can call on agents among some 200 trade representatives. Rumania has the crudest and largest secret police; some experts estimate that as many as one-third of all adults have served in the security service or cooperated with it. Bulgaria's secret police is especially valued for its loyalty. Explains an East European expert in London: "In Soviet eyes, the Bulgarian security service does not carry the same risk of defections as the Polish or Czechoslovak secret services—this is important in operations with a high risk of exposure."

Would the KGB have called on the Bulgarian security service to stage just such an operation in St. Peter's Square on May 13, 1981? The Kremlin certainly had a motive for wanting Pope John Paul II out of the way. Since his election in 1978, the Pontiff has shown particular concern for the plight of Communist bloc Catholics, and also set about improving ties with Eastern Orthodox churches in the region. Moscow has long been suspicious of any such religious activity, fearing that it might stir up nationalist sentiments, especially in the Baltic republics and the Western Ukraine. But what must have irked the Kremlin leadership even more was the Pontiffs strong support for Solidarity, the independent Polish trade union.

The assassination attempt came at a critical moment in Poland's 16 troubled months of reform. Polish Primate Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski, long a symbol of opposition to the Communist regime, lay dying. Solidarity leaders had begun to feel the pull of more militant supporters, especially after a March 1981 clash with police in Bydgoszcz. Even rank-and-file Communists had started to call for democratic changes in the party organization. By striking down Solidarity's pastor and main international patron, the Kremlin could, in one blow, have demoralized Polish society and shifted the shaky balance into the government's favor. Explains a Vatican official: "It was the same kind of drastic action that the Soviets took when they invaded Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968. They did that while the whole world was watching. What would it matter if they were exposed for killing the Pope?"

In the Andropov era, the KGB has apparently been careful not to soil its own hands with murders of revenge, political assassination and other "wet" (bloody) affairs. A plot against the Pope would have demanded extreme caution, since it conceivably could have endangered Andropov's political prospects and damaged the Kremlin's European peace offensive. Says Hélène Carrère d'Encausse: "If the West becomes convinced of Andropov's implication in this affair, it will not only diminish his international authority but shatter the modern, nonterrorist image that he has sought