The role of the Ukrainian issue as a motive that may have influenced the organisation of the assassination attempt on John Paul II (13 May 1981) was pointed out by historian Andrzej Grajewski in his book “Agca was not alone. Around the participation of communist special services in the assassination attempt on John Paul II” (Katowice 2015), written together with prosecutor Michał Skwara. There is an Italian edition as well (Katowice-Warszawa 2020).
It is worth returning to this thread in the situation of the ongoing war in Ukraine triggered by Russia’s imperialist aspirations. For contemporary history consists of many threads that intertwine with each other.
The book brings together the results of the investigation carried out by the Katowice branch of the [Polish] Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) in 2006-2014 concerning the assassination attempt on John Paul II. Among other things, documents were collected from institutions analogous to the IPN in former communist countries, including Ukraine. As a result, the investigation was discontinued, because no hard evidence was found as to who ordered the assassination. Nevertheless, material was collected which significantly broadened the knowledge about this dramatic event in St Peter’s Square.
Andrzej Grajewski, basing on the collected documents and at the same time having knowledge about the communist secret services, presented the assassination as “a consequence of the revival of religious life in the Soviet Union connected with the pontificate”.
The “Wojtyla” shock
The election of Karol Wojtyla as successor to Peter and his first visit to Poland in 1979 were a challenge “thrown to the very essence” of the communist system, i.e. the ideological domination of the state over the minds and consciences of the people. Poland was an important link in the Warsaw Pact, and Ukraine was an important internal member of the Union of Soviet Republics.
After the papal pilgrimage in 1979, Solidarity, a ten-million-strong social and labour movement, was established in Poland, signifying “a challenge to the monopoly of the Communist Party on a mass scale”. Under the influence of the Slavic Pope, the underground Greek Catholic Church became active in Ukraine and “put on the agenda the question of the revival of Ukrainian nationalism, which threatened Soviet statehood”.
Undoubtedly, “the Polish pope was a pioneer of the national rebirth of the peoples of Eastern Europe, […]” – emphasized Grajewski, adding that “in an ideological sense, the teaching of the Christian roots of the nations of Eastern Europe was an obvious challenge to communist ideology and domination”.
Fear of the Slavic Prophet
Broadcasts of the papal visit in 1979 and information about its consequences reached millions of people across Poland’s eastern and southern borders. Grajewski considers the topic of “Slavic brother nations” raised by the pope and their integral place in the European community to be crucial. The presentation of this issue provoked reactions from communists, who claimed that this was political interference by John Paul II in the affairs of other countries. Also concerned were Vatican diplomats who did not know the content of the speeches in advance, as they were written in Polish.
Grajewski also stressed the importance of John Paul II’s reference in his speech in Gniezno to the baptism of Kievan Rus’ in 988 and to the role of the Greek Catholic Church, in which the Pope took a great interest. The liquidation of this Church in Ukraine in 1946 was part of the policy of its Russification and the consolidation of the domination of the Orthodox Moscow Patriarchate on its territory. Until the pontificate of Polish Pope, the Holy See did not demand freedom for the Greek Catholic Church.
The religious-ideological message of the Slavic Pope fell on fertile ground. In the early 1980s, an estimated 742 priests were active in the underground in western Ukraine. Grajewski concludes as follows: “There was no milieu in the Soviet Union better organized, as numerous and with such strong external support from the Ukrainian diaspora and political emigration as the Greek Catholics, who, in addition, existed in one of the most sensitive areas of the Soviet empire”. The pontificate of John Paul II was seen as a catalyst for the activation of the “grec-catolics” who were regaining their religious and national identity.
Spiritual dismantling of the political system
After the end of the papal visit to Poland, correspondence was published between Greek Catholic Cardinal Josyf Slipyj and John Paul II on the preparations for the millennium celebrations of the Baptism of Kievan Rus. In March 1980, a synod of Greek Catholic bishops in exile was held at the Vatican and they elected Archbishop Myroslav Lubachivskyi to succeed the aged Cardinal Slipyj. These actions were also interpreted by the communists and special services as a “challenge to the sovereignty of the Soviet state” and a threat to the “integrity of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church”, as documents show, among others, the report of General Vitaliy Federchuk, head of the KGB in Ukraine.
Andrzej Grajewski stressed that the development of Ukrainian patriotism was seen by the Kremlin and the KGB as a danger to the entire Soviet system. It was feared that what Catholics call the “conversion of Russia” – which resounded in the apparitions at Fatima – could in fact lead to the dismantling of the Soviet system starting with Ukraine.
The Orthodox Patriarch of Moscow, Filaret, also warned the Soviet authorities against the Pope’s “negative” influence on Ukraine.
Decision on the coup at the highest levels of Soviet power
In the autumn of 1979, concrete decisions were made at the highest levels of Soviet power to counter the Vatican’s new Eastern policy. The KGB was to use “active measures”, which may or may not have meant preparing for the assassination of John Paul II. It could have been mainly about discrediting the Pope.
In any case, and without a doubt, the first years of John Paul II’s pontificate influenced “the Soviet leadership to define his activity on the international arena as a religious leader in terms of a mortal threat to the sustainability of the Soviet Union and the world communist system” – Grajewski points out. According to the historian, “the Soviet leaders used all means to end the pontificate of the Slavic pope as soon as possible”.
Andrzej Dobrzyński