‘Creeping coup’ possible in Poland as army reorganised

Slawomir Sierakowski looks at Antoni Macierewicz’s changes to Poland’s military and suggests he wants an army he can use against the people.

So far, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán and Polish Law and Justice (PiS) party chairman Jaroslaw Kaczynski’s “illiberal” counterrevolution has meant cracking down on the independent judiciary, public media, and — in the case of Orbán’s government — even private universities, such as Budapest’s Central European University.

But now it is apparent that even the military may be brought under the control of a single political party. In Poland, the PiS is carrying out a revolutionary reorganisation of the army, the likes of which have not been seen since the imposition of communist rule.