Nobel Peace Prize lureate and former president of Poland visits the University of Michigan to speak on the global impact of Russia's war on Ukraine. September, 2022.
Transcript:
[applause]
0:00:30.3 Speaker 1: The applause... You should leave the applause till the end.
[laughter]
0:00:38.9 Laurie McCauley: Good afternoon. [chuckle] Good afternoon, I'm Laurie McCauley, Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, and I'm here to welcome all of you to this amazing event. I have the pleasure today to welcome you on behalf of the University of Michigan Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia, the Copernicus Center for Polish Studies, the Weiser Diplomacy Center, Democracy & Debate Theme Semester, and the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy. I'd like to extend a special welcome to the Honorable Eileen Weiser who's with us today and to our Dean of LSA, Dean Anne Curzan. Thank you for joining us.
[applause]
0:01:34.9 LM: And thank you to this robust audience and all of you who are on our live stream today for joining us. The University of Michigan has a long and storied legacy of research and teaching about the history, culture, and politics of East Central Europe. This is embodied in the programs housed at the University of Michigan International Institute. The Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies was founded more than 60 years ago, and the Copernicus Center for Polish Studies will celebrate its 50th anniversary next year. The Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia has made its mark here since 2008, strengthening faculty and student research and scholarship on the region while also supporting democratic capacity building in East Central Europe.
0:02:37.1 LM: During the communist period, the University of Michigan served as a haven for dissident scholars, journalists, and writers, welcoming luminaries such as Nobel winning poets, Joseph Brodsky and Czeslaw Milosz, and historian Adam Michnik. We continue to honor these voices today with programs like the Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia fellowships that recently brought seven Ukrainian scholars here to conduct their research.
[applause]
0:03:20.1 Speaker 1: Thank you.
0:03:24.6 LM: This event today also shines a light on the interdisciplinary collaboration that is so emblematic of the University of Michigan. Our distinguished speaker is a Nobel Prize winner, a statesman and a symbol of how one individual can set in motion global change. The sponsors of today's presentation likewise are focused on educating and empowering the next generation of change makers through diplomacy, debate, and policy, whether in Michigan, Poland, or elsewhere across the globe. At this time, I invite Professor Geneviève Zubrzycki, our director of the Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia to introduce our distinguished guest. Professor?
[applause]
0:04:32.4 Geneviève Zubrzycki: Thank you so much Provost McCauley, and welcome everyone. It's a huge honor for us to host President Lech Wałęsa. We've been trying to get him to Ann Arbor for several years and the day has finally arrived. So thank you also for showing him so much love upon his arrival into the room, and here goes, my formal introduction. Well before the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was Solidarity, and Lech Wałęsa was a founding member and its leader. Solidarity began as a trade union representing workers during the Gdańsk shipyard strike in August 1980. Lech Wałęsa, an electrician at a shipyard, was quickly embraced by the workers as their leader, and he negotiated on their behalf with the communist regime obtaining a series of important concessions including the official recognition of Solidarity.
0:05:41.7 GZ: Within a year, Solidarity had 10 million members nationwide, representing one third of Poland's working population. In light of the immense popularity and growing threat the movement posed to the regime, Solidarity was banned and martial law was imposed on December 13th, 1981. Lech Wałęsa and many other dissidents were jailed and Solidarity went underground. It did not fade however, and the dedication of its leaders and support of the Polish population eventually paid off. In the winter months of 1989, the regime and the opposition enter into negotiations that led to the historic Round Table Agreement. And that agreement made possible the first semi-democratic elections in Eastern Europe, which took place on June 4th, 1989. On that day, Solidarity won a resounding victory, and the rest is history.
0:06:50.9 GZ: Communist regimes started to fall one after the other, Hungary in October, East Germany in November, Czechoslovakia and Romania in December, and so on. The building of democratic regimes and free market economies in Eastern Europe began. And in 1991, the Soviet Union was dismantled. Lech Wałęsa was a key figure, key in that historic transition, first as leader of Solidarność, of Solidarity, then as the Third Republic of Poland's first democratically-elected President, serving from 1990 until 1995. In that capacity, he steered not only the political and economic transition, but also oversaw the next round of free elections and set Poland on the path to NATO and EU accession.
0:07:48.9 GZ: President Wałęsa's historic role in the fight against authoritarianism has been recognized across the globe. In 1983, he received the Nobel Peace Prize. He also received the United States Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Knight Grand Cross of the British Order of Bath, and the French Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor. As we know, the fight for democracy is never over. But that fight is perhaps more important now than ever since the fall of communism in 1989, with the rise of populism and the erosion of democratic institutions in Europe and elsewhere across the world.
0:08:33.5 GZ: President Wałęsa continues to fight for democracy through his teaching and activism. And in recent years, he's been an outspoken defender of Poland's constitution, supporting the opposition to the current government's authoritarian tendencies. And you see that he wears those colors very proudly. As Ukraine is fighting for its freedom today, it is also fighting for democracy more broadly, as did Solidarity in the 1980s. The war in Ukraine is also a threat to peace and prosperity in Europe and beyond. And we want to recognize Poland's incredible solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people, supporting the war effort and welcoming over three million Ukrainian refugees.
[applause]
0:09:30.5 GZ: Mr. President, Panie Prezydencie, it's a great honor for the University of Michigan to have you here with us today. We're incredibly grateful for your willingness to share your legacy with our students, and we're eager to hear your reflections on the war in Ukraine and its global impact. And before I invite you to the podium, I need to give some instructions about questions, because Mr. President Wałęsa will be speaking for about 20 minutes, and what he wants most is to have a discussion with you. So when you entered the room, you should have received a note card. So we ask that you write your concise, concise question on one side of the note card and pass it down the aisle, give it to our staff people who are there.
0:10:25.4 GZ: Please raise your hands so you can see, or stand up please so you can... Please stand up. They will be circulating and collecting the note cards. And then we have two outstanding students from the UM's Ford School of Public Policy, Margo Steinhaus and Julia Fadanelli, who will compile questions and ask a representative sample under the guidance of my colleague, Professor John Ciorciari, Associate Dean of the Ford School. And now, please join me in offering a very warm welcome to President Lech Wałęsa.
[applause]
[foreign language]
0:11:30.8 Speaker 1: Right at the beginning, I will decide about time.
[foreign language]
0:11:37.8 S1: It's good to get the applause at the end, not necessarily at the beginning.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:11:46.6 S1: You have to earn your final round of applause.
[foreign language]
0:11:52.7 S1: I will give everything I have. Let's see.
[foreign language]
0:11:58.8 S1: Dear ladies and gentlemen.
[foreign language]
0:12:00.5 S1: Dear young people in particular.
[foreign language]
0:12:07.1 S1: I care very much.
[foreign language]
0:12:09.5 S1: I really care very much so that today's students succeed in life.
[foreign language]
0:12:17.9 S1: Because your success will sign off on my success.
[foreign language]
0:12:24.4 S1: As you know, I was... At some point, I was a leader of a movement that completely overturned the world order.
[foreign language]
0:12:46.5 S1: With the help of the United States and other countries, we succeeded in overturning the order in the world that was bad.
[foreign language]
0:12:58.0 S1: But we destroyed it in order to build a better world.
[foreign language]
0:13:06.3 S1: In the destruction part, Poland had the biggest participation.
[foreign language]
0:13:18.2 S1: But the building of the new one should rely above all else on the United States, and that's for the whole world.
[foreign language]
0:13:29.2 S1: Because you are the great world... The biggest world power.
[foreign language]
0:13:37.5 S1: So you also have a duty to continue this great fight.
[foreign language]
0:13:46.4 S1: In Europe, that obligation is shared by Germany.
[foreign language]
0:13:56.1 S1: I will talk about what I believe, what in my opinion is what you guys should be doing in the future.
[foreign language]
0:14:12.4 S1: For today as a revolutionary, my opinion is that nobody really leads the world.
[foreign language]
0:14:25.9 S1: And without good leadership, there will be no continuation of the right beginnings.
[foreign language]
0:14:36.0 S1: We managed to finish off the wrong actions of the Soviet Union.
[foreign language]
0:14:43.4 S1: The Warsaw Pact.
[foreign language]
0:14:46.9 S1: We participated in reuniting Germany.
[foreign language]
0:14:51.8 S1: But we succeeded above all else because...
[foreign language]
0:15:02.0 S1: Because what was happening then, the little countries, the whole world order then, it was all putting a break to the development of things in the world.
[foreign language]
0:15:19.1 S1: When I look at Europe, I think a lot of things were done successfully.
[foreign language]
0:15:28.5 S1: You know, Europe was responsible... Had been responsible for two World Wars.
[foreign language]
0:15:34.5 S1: A lot of revolutions.
[foreign language]
0:15:37.6 S1: And let's look at it, let's look at Europe today.
[foreign language]
0:15:44.0 S1: We have, practically speaking, managed to remove all country borders in Europe.
[foreign language]
0:15:52.9 S1: We have introduced Euro, the currency for all countries.
[foreign language]
0:16:00.8 S1: Having a good profession, good skills, anyone can work in any country.
[foreign language]
0:16:08.2 S1: And those are all great achievements.
[foreign language]
0:16:12.9 S1: But now we faced the wall.
[foreign language]
0:16:16.9 S1: It is impossible to do all those big things from now on. It seems hard.
[foreign language]
0:16:26.4 S1: The questions that we're now facing are all great questions.
[foreign language]
0:16:31.3 S1: The first one, the first question is...
[foreign language]
0:16:33.7 S1: It's a question for you.
[foreign language]
0:16:41.3 S1: What new foundation should be laid down for this new coming era?
[foreign language]
0:16:51.3 S1: Each country has a different foundation.
[foreign language]
0:16:56.0 S1: Different level of development.
[foreign language]
0:16:58.9 S1: Even religions are different.
[foreign language]
0:17:05.8 S1: Having such big divisions, it is very difficult to build something big again.
[foreign language]
0:17:18.2 S1: When I'm throwing around, at different meetings, throwing around this questions of what kind of foundations we should lay down?
[foreign language]
0:17:32.3 S1: There are two main proposals when it comes to these foundations.
[foreign language]
0:17:40.8 S1: About half of the world wants to build it based on freedom, on various kinds of freedom.
[foreign language]
0:17:49.2 S1: The free market.
[foreign language]
0:17:51.5 S1: And of course the laws that allow it to happen.
[foreign language]
0:17:58.4 S1: That's how half of the world wants to build it.
[foreign language]
0:18:04.1 S1: The other half responds...
[foreign language]
0:18:07.1 S1: No, it's not a good idea.
[foreign language]
0:18:09.0 S1: We have to first agree on the values that we will use to lead us.
[foreign language]
0:18:20.9 S1: And once we have these values, let's say Ten lay Commandments.
[foreign language]
0:18:28.0 S1: Then we can have the free market and the law.
[foreign language]
0:18:34.1 S1: And this division between these two is something that makes it very difficult to get out, to overcome that division.
[foreign language]
0:18:45.9 S1: If we manage to pass this, to pass this stage...
[foreign language]
0:18:53.1 S1: Then we are facing the second big problem.
[foreign language]
0:19:00.7 S1: And what should be the new economic system that we should propose for this new coming era?
[foreign language]
0:19:09.1 S1: As we know, there are two main big political system, economic system.
[foreign language]
0:19:16.9 S1: Communism and capitalism.
[foreign language]
0:19:22.9 S1: In theory, just on the surface, the communist system is better than capitalism.
[foreign language]
0:19:31.9 S1: But it is so good, it cannot be implemented anywhere.
[foreign language]
[laughter]
0:19:39.0 S1: It is just so naive that it's impossible to make it happen.
[foreign language]
0:19:45.2 S1: So, let's just not toy with it. Let's just throw it out.
[foreign language]
0:19:50.9 S1: So, what's left is capitalism.
[foreign language]
0:19:57.9 S1: But capitalism is based on rivalry, competition.
[foreign language]
0:20:05.5 S1: And the weaker ones in this rivalry, in this competition, the weaker ones become unemployed.
[foreign language]
0:20:15.7 S1: Someone called capitalism a rat race among nations.
[foreign language]
0:20:25.9 S1: But when we're building something bigger, that should be the end of a rat race.
[foreign language]
0:20:33.1 S1: And you know, the unemployed should be found and they should be put to work.
[foreign language]
0:20:40.3 S1: And that was the second problem.
[foreign language]
0:20:46.5 S1: And the third problem is how to cope with demagoguery, populism, lies, and fraud by the politician. And that's all on the global scale.
[foreign language]
0:21:02.6 S1: And we should remember that until the end of the 20th century...
[foreign language]
0:21:10.9 S1: We need to remember that in various nations, people had some sort of a God in their conscience at the back burner.
[foreign language]
0:21:23.8 S1: That God was called differently, but he was silently present in our conscience.
[foreign language]
0:21:32.0 S1: But we've left that stage.
[foreign language]
0:21:36.0 S1: We were afraid of communism and the Soviet union.
[foreign language]
0:21:40.1 S1: We managed to overcome that.
[foreign language]
0:21:47.0 S1: So now the question remains, how do we handle nations? How do we lead nations when they have no inner breaks, no inner inhibition?
[foreign language]
0:22:01.2 S1: And the way things happened...
[foreign language]
0:22:10.6 S1: And the way it happened is this, that the only power that can cope with all of these issues, because it is so powerful is the United States of America.
[foreign language]
0:22:24.2 S1: In earlier days, the role of the United States was relatively simple.
[foreign language]
0:22:30.8 S1: It was the empire of good.
[foreign language]
0:22:34.8 S1: It was always possible to count on the US.
[foreign language]
0:22:38.9 S1: The US was the military leader.
[foreign language]
0:22:44.3 S1: Economic and political leader.
[foreign language]
0:22:49.5 S1: Nowadays the United States mostly lead militarily.
[foreign language]
0:22:57.9 S1: We have to gain back the United States to lead the world again.
[foreign language]
0:23:05.6 S1: And this is not so difficult.
[foreign language]
0:23:09.6 S1: This doesn't have to be difficult, it will be a different kind of leadership.
[foreign language]
0:23:19.1 S1: We have to realize...
[foreign language]
0:23:23.2 S1: That the previous era of countries, individual states, individual political camps...
[foreign language]
0:23:32.5 S1: Because of the political... Because of the technological development...
[foreign language]
0:23:35.3 S1: That other era really had to fall.
[foreign language]
0:23:42.7 S1: The new era has appeared, and that's the era of intellect, information, and globalization.
[foreign language]
0:23:50.9 S1: And this requires new programs, new political structures.
[foreign language]
0:24:00.3 S1: And maybe you living in this big country, you may not necessarily notice this.
[foreign language]
0:24:07.3 S1: But let's look at Europe.
[foreign language]
0:24:13.2 S1: How Europe is changing, how Europe is building, rebuilding its...
[foreign language]
0:24:22.3 S1: So this was basically my introduction.
[foreign language]
0:24:28.4 S1: And now I would like to invite you to an open ended discussion so that we can think it over and create some sort of mutual understanding.
[foreign language]
0:24:45.2 S1: In the change of generation, in the transition of generation, this is where our biggest chance for the welfare, for affluence, for all the good stuff.
[foreign language]
0:24:58.2 S1: But we have to understand our times well enough.
[foreign language]
0:25:07.0 S1: It is clear that a lot of the existing structures in Europe, the country, this individual states, political parties, they do not fit to the requirements of the new times.
[foreign language]
0:25:29.9 S1: Let's look at political parties today, left wing parties very often have more right wing programs than the left wing parties and the other way around.
[foreign language]
0:25:42.0 S1: And let's look at the Christian parties.
[foreign language]
0:25:45.9 S1: They yell and scream, "Oh we're Christian parties."
[foreign language]
0:25:50.8 S1: But there isn't a single believer among them.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:25:55.3 S1: This is not what should be here.
[foreign language]
0:26:02.0 S1: The only thing that works and the only type of structure system that works in contemporary times...
[foreign language]
0:26:12.2 S1: Is the traffic rules.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:26:18.0 S1: Everything else looks like traffic wood if we removed all traffic signs and rules.
[foreign language]
0:26:26.7 S1: One era has fallen down, but the other has not come into existence in full yet.
[foreign language]
0:26:37.5 S1: Today we're in the transition.
[foreign language]
0:26:41.4 S1: One has fallen down, the other has not been created yet.
[foreign language]
0:26:49.6 S1: I call it, "The era of the word."
[foreign language]
0:26:55.3 S1: The era of all the necessary discussions of what the future order should look like?
[foreign language]
0:27:05.1 S1: And what the role of the United States in this should be?
[foreign language]
0:27:12.5 S1: It will not do itself.
[foreign language]
0:27:17.2 S1: Somebody has to prepare it all and somebody has to lead.
[foreign language]
0:27:23.6 S1: I would like to encourage you, to plead with you to lead...
[foreign language]
0:27:29.8 S1: Or just say in public, "We're giving up, we don't wanna lead."
[foreign language]
0:27:37.9 S1: And then just give your capabilities to Poland and we'll know what to do with them.
[laughter]
[applause]
[foreign language]
0:27:51.0 S1: If there are no willing participants for the discussion, I will go on with my monologue.
[foreign language]
0:28:00.8 S1: But the monologue doesn't have to be that interesting.
[foreign language]
0:28:06.3 S1: And I would like difficult questions.
[foreign language]
0:28:12.7 S1: Because when it's difficult, I wake up and ready to fight.
[foreign language]
0:28:17.8 S1: And when they are poor, easy questions, I tend to fall asleep because I'm old.
[foreign language]
0:28:26.7 S1: I'm almost 80 years old.
[foreign language]
0:28:31.0 S1: But at the same time, this is the company where we can find the best possible solutions, I'm sure.
[foreign language]
0:28:42.1 S1: And then I will simply appropriate the best ones.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:28:50.5 S1: And then I can go to another meeting room like this and show them how wise I have become.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:29:00.8 S1: So please give me some way of doing that.
[foreign language]
0:29:07.4 S1: And now, I'm sitting down.
[laughter]
[applause]
[background conversation]
0:29:29.9 LM: So we are collecting the questions and our students are at work.
[foreign language]
0:29:36.7 LM: But there won't be...
0:29:36.8 S1: Please, no censorship.
0:29:39.8 GZ: No censor... We know how you deal with censorship, so there won't be any censorship. I might, however, start with an easy question, and I hope you won't fall asleep. So I want to ask if... How you see the response in Poland to the war in Ukraine, and if you see this great solidarity of the Polish people with Ukraine as also one of the legacies of solidarity?
[foreign language]
0:30:30.9 S1: Dear ladies and gentlemen.
[foreign language]
0:30:34.6 S1: The question is simple, the answer is a little bit more difficult.
[foreign language]
0:30:40.4 S1: Solidarity was possible in those days...
[foreign language]
0:30:47.8 S1: Because the whole world was based on a common foundation.
[foreign language]
0:30:55.9 S1: It was communism, the existence of communism, the existence of the Soviet Union, this was the foundation.
[foreign language]
0:31:01.7 S1: Some people loved the Soviet Union, other people hated the Soviet Union, but this was the common denominator.
[foreign language]
0:31:12.2 S1: At the top, we had... We share... We had different interests.
[foreign language]
0:31:20.7 S1: When we destroyed this common denominator...
[foreign language]
0:31:25.1 S1: What was left is just having interests.
[foreign language]
0:31:29.6 S1: Business together. So today, the solidarity of that other type is impossible.
[foreign language]
0:31:39.4 S1: Unless you find the common foundation again.
[foreign language]
0:31:46.5 S1: But as for Ukraine and Russia...
[foreign language]
0:31:52.2 S1: We have to see the problem through a double lens.
[foreign language]
0:31:58.1 S1: The results of the Russian aggression...
[foreign language]
0:32:03.9 S1: Such as starving people, murdering people...
[foreign language]
0:32:10.7 S1: And from that perspective, we have to help them so that they survive.
[foreign language]
0:32:17.3 S1: But the cause, the causes are really more important.
[foreign language]
0:32:25.4 S1: It is... The cause is the bad political system in Russia.
[foreign language]
0:32:32.3 S1: It's not just Stalin or Putin.
[foreign language]
0:32:37.6 S1: It's the political system that makes it possible for people like them to show up.
[foreign language]
0:32:51.3 S1: If Russian leaders just had two political terms, five years each, not more...
[foreign language]
0:33:00.7 S1: They would not have built the kind of criminal system like they have.
[foreign language]
0:33:08.9 S1: Because people helping them would know that after 10 years it'll be over and there will be some reckoning.
[foreign language]
0:33:19.6 S1: So let us do everything we can, each individual here just to convince a few Russians...
[foreign language]
0:33:29.2 S1: They're also being murdered.
[foreign language]
0:33:33.5 S1: They are, you know, in this situation that nobody wants to talk to about.
[foreign language]
0:33:37.8 S1: They've got... They're boycotted everywhere.
[foreign language]
0:33:42.0 S1: And it's just because it's all caused by the political system.
[foreign language]
0:33:49.0 S1: And they will be thankful to us if we help them change that political system.
[foreign language]
0:34:00.4 S1: Because even if Ukraine conquers, wins over Russia today...
[foreign language]
0:34:09.3 S1: What we'll have will be what has always been, Russia will rise up again and there will be another Stalin or another Putin.
[foreign language]
0:34:20.2 S1: That's how it happened during Gorbachev.
[foreign language]
0:34:25.8 S1: Of course, we should not be surprised he was a great Russian patriot.
[foreign language]
0:34:31.3 S1: And he was working for the welfare benefit of Russia, and not for our welfare.
[foreign language]
0:34:41.4 S1: When he became the leader of the Soviet Union...
[foreign language]
0:34:46.9 S1: The wise politician...
[foreign language]
0:34:53.5 S1: Saw how things were, what the atmosphere was, how heated up it was in other communist countries.
[foreign language]
0:35:02.7 S1: He knew it was impossible to hold on to the Soviet Union.
[foreign language]
0:35:07.8 S1: So he let it go.
[foreign language]
0:35:11.3 S1: But he decided to save as much of Russia as possible.
[foreign language]
0:35:20.5 S1: That's why he proposed Perestroika and Glasnost.
[foreign language]
0:35:23.7 S1: And he was talking really nicely to us.
[foreign language]
0:35:29.5 S1: And he convinced all of us, and particularly America.
[foreign language]
0:35:34.7 S1: And America said...
[foreign language]
0:35:37.4 S1: Okay, Stalin was there.
[foreign language]
0:35:41.2 S1: Reznov was there, horrible...
[foreign language]
0:35:43.8 S1: Bandits, criminals...
[foreign language]
0:35:47.3 S1: But Gorbachev, he's a nice guy.
[foreign language]
0:35:51.3 S1: And we should not be creating problems for him.
[foreign language]
0:35:57.0 S1: And that's when we gave up some form of penalizing Russia...
[foreign language]
0:36:05.6 S1: For all the crimes involving millions of people that they did commit.
[foreign language]
0:36:15.2 S1: And Gorbachev knew that Russia would rise up again.
[foreign language]
0:36:22.8 S1: And he knew that in that Russian system a knew Stalin or Putin...
[foreign language]
0:36:28.0 S1: Wouldn't be here and he would try to rebuild the Soviet Union.
[foreign language]
0:36:36.8 S1: And that's why it was... At the beginning, Gorbachev was very uneven. Sometimes he would support Putin, sometimes he wouldn't.
[foreign language]
0:36:48.7 S1: So you should try to convince Russians.
[foreign language]
0:36:55.8 S1: For their happiness, for their safety, it is necessary that we should together...
[foreign language]
0:37:02.1 S1: The Russian system...
[foreign language]
0:37:03.8 S1: And in one direction for changes.
[foreign language]
0:37:13.7 S1: Also remember that Russia includes around 60 different nations that had been conquered the same way that Ukraine... That they're trying to conquer Ukraine today.
[foreign language]
0:37:31.0 S1: Russia would basically bring in, internalize weaker nations...
[foreign language]
0:37:41.6 S1: Nations were moved to other regions...
[foreign language]
0:37:48.0 S1: Leaders were murdered...
[foreign language]
0:37:54.2 S1: And we should try to... You should try to convince all those minority nations...
[foreign language]
0:38:04.2 S1: That they should gain back their space that they had had for centuries.
[foreign language]
0:38:12.8 S1: It's a long-term kind of action.
[foreign language]
0:38:18.9 S1: But this will cause that Russia will have no more than 50 million people.
[foreign language]
0:38:24.9 S1: For this idea that I have just announced...
[foreign language]
0:38:34.2 S1: Russia came up with a $5 million bounty on my head.
[foreign language]
0:38:41.8 S1: And since I have repeated it again in Ann Arbor, that's gonna be 10 million soon.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:38:50.7 S1: Next question.
0:38:50.8 GZ: Next question. So I'd like to invite one of the students, please, if you would, please stand.
0:38:58.3 Margo Steinhaus: I don't know if it is on. Oh, it is on. Okay. President Wałęsa.
[foreign language]
0:39:04.2 MS: Thank you so much for coming. My name is Margo Steinhaus, I am a second year Master Public Policy student at the Ford School of Public Policy, as well as a Weiser Diplomacy fellow. My question for you now that we've started to talk about Gorbachev, we lost a couple of really great legendary leaders like Gorbachev and Queen Elizabeth over the last two weeks, and they went through so much and experienced so many difficulties. What do you think are the greatest challenges leaders today face?
[foreign language]
0:39:51.2 S1: As I was saying to you...
[foreign language]
0:39:55.2 S1: That's what I've been repeating for the last 30 years.
[foreign language]
0:40:02.9 S1: You should do everything to make the United States gain back their leadership in the world...
[foreign language]
0:40:10.4 S1: But in a new style.
[foreign language]
0:40:13.5 S1: It's not about dollars.
[foreign language]
0:40:18.2 S1: It's not about doing all the work for the world.
[foreign language]
0:40:29.4 S1: You should prepare the programs and the cadres of people who would be capable of doing all that needs to be... All that good... All those good things that need to be done.
[foreign language]
0:40:44.9 S1: What would I do if I were your president?
[foreign language]
0:40:50.8 S1: I was proposing things in my time.
[foreign language]
0:40:55.8 S1: At the beginning of the revolution...
[foreign language]
0:41:00.5 S1: I was saying, "Please help me build the United states of all the European countries."
[foreign language]
0:41:11.5 S1: And since this was my idea, I was hoping Europe would elect me its President.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:41:20.6 S1: And then I was thinking about possibly building a federation between Europe then and your country, the United States.
[foreign language]
0:41:36.9 S1: Of course, because the federation itself would be my idea, I should be elected the president of it.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:41:44.7 S1: And then this is what I would say.
[foreign language]
0:41:48.5 S1: We have managed to deal with Russia in the meantime.
[foreign language]
0:41:54.1 S1: Now we've got China left.
[foreign language]
0:41:58.4 S1: And China doesn't really wanna talk directly to Europe that much.
[foreign language]
0:42:03.2 S1: And not really that much with the United States either.
[foreign language]
0:42:10.5 S1: But in our European and American Federation, they would like to talk.
[foreign language]
0:42:18.5 S1: Then I would invite China to the table.
[foreign language]
0:42:23.3 S1: And of course, as always, I start the discussion. I start speaking first.
[foreign language]
0:42:28.3 S1: And this is what I say to China...
[foreign language]
0:42:33.0 S1: That's the situation here.
[foreign language]
0:42:36.1 S1: Either we will kill you off...
[foreign language]
0:42:38.6 S1: Or you will kill us off.
[foreign language]
0:42:43.9 S1: So my proposal is, give in a little and we'll give in a little.
[foreign language]
0:42:49.7 S1: And we can then do globalization together.
[foreign language]
0:42:55.6 S1: My other proposal...
[foreign language]
0:43:00.4 S1: Was that the United States gather some experts, some wise people.
[foreign language]
0:43:07.2 S1: And then they would say to them, "Dear wise people...
[foreign language]
0:43:15.3 S1: Please do a list of issues that are too big to be handled by individual small countries."
[foreign language]
0:43:24.6 S1: For example, the pandemic is one such issue.
[foreign language]
0:43:27.9 S1: The Internet.
[foreign language]
0:43:29.4 S1: Things like flights across the globe.
[foreign language]
0:43:35.7 S1: Make a list like this.
[foreign language]
0:43:41.6 S1: When you're done with the list, then let us think which of these issues would fit the old order of small countries.
[foreign language]
0:43:52.1 S1: Which should be handled on a continent level...
[foreign language]
0:43:58.4 S1: And which ones have to be dealt with globally.
[foreign language]
0:44:02.8 S1: When you divide this into those three groups...
[foreign language]
0:44:06.9 S1: There will be one other problem left.
[foreign language]
0:44:15.9 S1: You will have to think about what kind of structures should be created, political structures, what kind of programs, so that we're ready to tackle all these important issues.
[foreign language]
0:44:31.5 S1: We are completely unprepared for those difficult issues.
[foreign language]
0:44:38.0 S1: The pandemic, what's gonna happen when there's gonna be the next pandemic?
[foreign language]
0:44:45.1 S1: Migrations?
[foreign language]
0:44:49.1 S1: When China and India are opened up, that's migration.
[foreign language]
0:45:00.9 S1: You have to listen to old Wałęsa as soon as possible and start preparing these solutions.
[foreign language]
0:45:09.6 S1: 'Cause we will be taken by surprise.
[foreign language]
0:45:13.1 S1: They will ruin us.
[foreign language]
0:45:17.4 S1: They will destroy our civilization.
[foreign language]
0:45:23.5 S1: Most likely, that kind of destruction of civilizations has happened a few times before on our Earth.
[foreign language]
0:45:30.6 S1: Some civilization actually built Egyptian pyramids.
[foreign language]
0:45:37.0 S1: We don't know exactly how it was all destroyed.
[foreign language]
0:45:45.6 S1: And we are reaching the same point.
[foreign language]
0:45:50.6 S1: The world is beautiful.
[foreign language]
0:45:55.5 S1: But we have to understand the times when we happen to live.
[foreign language]
0:46:03.5 S1: And we have to understand the role.
[foreign language]
0:46:08.4 S1: And we have to understand the leadership and the biggest role, the biggest potential for leadership is...
[foreign language]
0:46:17.0 S1: On the United States and in Europe it has to be Germany.
[foreign language]
0:46:21.0 S1: Of course I would prefer it to be Poland.
[foreign language]
0:46:25.5 S1: But I have no... I cannot afford it.
[foreign language]
0:46:30.8 S1: So you should be the ones who will continue the reforms.
[foreign language]
0:46:37.7 S1: And I will look from up above, down at you to see if you are succeeding.
[foreign language]
0:46:44.3 GZ: Thank you. Now, another question.
[foreign language]
0:46:49.3 S1: I will be... You're giving me difficult topics, so that's why I go on. I'll try to be a little... To take a little bit less time, shorter.
[foreign language]
0:47:00.5 S1: I'm like Fidel Castro, I need about four hours to explain what I mean.
[laughter]
0:47:08.6 GZ: We have a new question for you, Mr. President.
0:47:12.0 Julia Fontanelli: President Wałęsa thank you so much for being here with us in Ann Arbor. My name is Julia Fontanelli, I am a second year BA student in the Ford school, so I'm completing my fourth year in my undergraduate program here at The University of Michigan. And my first question...
[foreign language]
0:47:29.2 S1: On the political policy issue nowadays are all very difficult things, so you have my sympathy.
[laughter]
0:47:35.6 JF: Thank you. It is a challenge. So my question for you is, Poland has been very gracious to take in many, many Ukrainian refugees because of Russia's war on Ukraine. And I'm curious if you foresee a change in the sentiment of the Polish citizens in accepting Ukrainian refugees in the future and why or why not you may or may not see this change?
[foreign language]
0:48:11.4 S1: We have no choice.
[foreign language]
0:48:13.0 S1: We have to help.
[foreign language]
0:48:18.3 S1: Because we have to understand the whole problem.
[foreign language]
0:48:20.7 S1: Dear ladies and gentlemen...
[foreign language]
0:48:24.5 S1: Until the end of the 20th century...
[foreign language]
0:48:28.1 S1: All today's countries...
[foreign language]
0:48:32.9 S1: Were built in a similar fashion.
[foreign language]
0:48:37.9 S1: That is they were expanding by appropriating weaker nations.
[foreign language]
0:48:44.8 S1: And the United States, you know, the North and the South, remember?
[foreign language]
0:48:53.3 S1: But at the beginning of the 21st century...
[foreign language]
0:49:00.1 S1: There are two main concepts when it comes to increasing power territory.
[foreign language]
0:49:07.7 S1: One is democratic and based on freedom.
[foreign language]
0:49:13.8 S1: Joining the European union, joining NATO, joining the United nations...
[foreign language]
0:49:20.7 S1: And that's a peaceful one.
[foreign language]
0:49:24.3 S1: And the other, which is Russian/Chinese.
[foreign language]
0:49:27.5 S1: The old kind of regime, old style, tanks, heavy weaponry and go forward.
[foreign language]
0:49:40.6 S1: So now there is a question. The question arises, which one of them is going to win?
[foreign language]
0:49:46.4 S1: Which one we will allow to win?
[foreign language]
0:49:51.7 S1: Putin made a horrible mistake.
[foreign language]
0:49:55.5 S1: He mobilized the whole world...
[foreign language]
0:50:00.7 S1: Against himself.
[foreign language]
0:50:02.2 S1: When I was a president... When I was the president, I wanted to take care of Russia, to implement order to Russia.
[foreign language]
0:50:14.1 S1: And I was actually already carrying out discussions with various minorities in Russia, in the Soviet Union.
[foreign language]
0:50:21.4 S1: And I was trying to help them out to mobilize.
[foreign language]
0:50:26.0 S1: But the United States figured it out...
[foreign language]
0:50:33.3 S1: What I was into.
[foreign language]
0:50:34.8 S1: The Secretary Albright came to Warsaw.
[foreign language]
0:50:42.5 S1: She came to the Belvedere to the presidential palace to see me.
[foreign language]
0:50:47.5 S1: And she said, "Mr. President, not a step further in that direction."
[foreign language]
0:50:54.1 S1: And I was sort of protesting, "What do you mean?"
[foreign language]
0:51:00.8 S1: She put a map on the table.
[foreign language]
0:51:05.0 S1: And it had markings on it, pointing out where Russia had the worst possible imaginable weaponry.
[foreign language]
0:51:15.7 S1: And it turned out...
[foreign language]
0:51:21.1 S1: It turned out that the weaponry was not in the Russian territory itself...
[foreign language]
0:51:25.7 S1: But in the small republics. It was all hidden in the surrounding republics.
[foreign language]
0:51:33.9 S1: And the republics, people in the republics did not even know that they had it.
[foreign language]
0:51:43.1 S1: Just like Poland did not know that we had atomic rockets in our territory.
[foreign language]
0:51:54.4 S1: And today when we're discovering all these various places with weaponry...
[foreign language]
0:52:00.0 S1: You know, you can open a YouTube channel and you could see places where they gathered that weaponry.
[foreign language]
0:52:12.3 S1: I checked it out, whether Secretary Albright was telling the truth.
[foreign language]
0:52:18.5 S1: And I'm very grateful to her. She was a very, very smart woman that she got me out of these ideas.
[foreign language]
0:52:28.0 S1: Because I would've caused real disasters for the world.
[foreign language]
0:52:33.3 S1: And she was a strong wise woman.
[foreign language]
0:52:38.1 S1: She even managed to stop Wałęsa.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:52:41.5 S1: Next question.
0:52:46.2 GZ: Margo?
0:52:49.0 MS: We have another question from the audience.
[foreign language]
0:52:53.8 S1: It would be so much easier if you simply learned Polish.
[laughter]
0:53:00.5 MS: What was courage for you when you were leading the solidarity movement against the totalitarian communist state and what does courage mean to you today?
[foreign language]
0:53:27.0 S1: Really, it's relatively... A relatively simple thing.
[foreign language]
0:53:36.5 S1: Most of all both then and now, everybody fights against generals and the police...
[foreign language]
0:53:44.0 S1: With politicians...
[foreign language]
0:53:48.1 S1: But I was doing it differently.
[foreign language]
0:53:51.7 S1: I was fighting against the system.
[foreign language]
0:53:57.5 S1: I was telling them, "You guys are all such criminals because the system allows you to be."
[foreign language]
0:54:10.6 S1: Sometimes they would actually arrest me because they liked having a chat with me.
[foreign language]
0:54:18.4 S1: I was not afraid of anything.
[foreign language]
0:54:21.7 S1: I was just afraid of two things. God, a little bit, and my wife.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:54:32.0 S1: And I was trying to tell them, "You're gonna be better off in a different system."
[foreign language]
0:54:38.5 S1: You will make more money.
[foreign language]
0:54:42.0 S1: This is a bad... System is bad, you're not bad. The system is bad.
[foreign language]
0:54:51.6 S1: That's why I have more friends on the other side, the side that I was against then than I do among my former colleagues.
[foreign language]
0:55:04.5 S1: Because it turned out that they also wanted to change the system.
[foreign language]
0:55:09.2 S1: But they didn't believe it was possible.
[foreign language]
0:55:11.5 S1: It was true about Americans as well.
[foreign language]
0:55:19.0 S1: When I was still involved in my fight, the smarter the American that I talked to was the less he believed it was possible.
[foreign language]
0:55:29.0 S1: "The Soviets would never let you do it," they would say.
[foreign language]
0:55:33.4 S1: They were simply convinced it was not possible.
[foreign language]
0:55:38.3 S1: But then when the victory came...
[foreign language]
0:55:41.9 S1: Now, they're all grateful because that's what they wanted as well.
[foreign language]
0:55:46.8 S1: And it worked out.
[foreign language]
0:55:52.3 S1: So it is necessary to believe.
[foreign language]
0:55:56.2 S1: And to strive.
[foreign language]
0:56:00.9 S1: If I had your capabilities...
[foreign language]
0:56:03.3 S1: Your education...
[foreign language]
0:56:05.9 S1: Your dollars...
[foreign language]
0:56:08.7 S1: I would have 10 Nobel prizes.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:56:14.7 S1: Because I fight in this different way.
[foreign language]
0:56:21.2 S1: And today in Poland, we have managed to introduce the right kind of system.
[foreign language]
0:56:29.1 S1: We already have three branches of government.
[foreign language]
0:56:30.8 S1: A constitution.
[foreign language]
0:56:34.0 S1: Free press.
[foreign language]
0:56:38.8 S1: So we have managed to accomplish the system maybe not perfect, not ideal but a good one.
[foreign language]
0:56:45.9 S1: And today it is necessary to fight differently. I have...
[foreign language]
0:56:51.8 S1: Today my fight is against the people who are trying to destroy that system.
[foreign language]
0:57:00.7 S1: And that's why I keep wearing this sweat shirt.
[foreign language]
0:57:04.5 S1: And this is saying to them, "You're breaking the constitution."
[foreign language]
0:57:09.8 S1: "You're breaking what we have accomplished," and I wear it all around the world.
[foreign language]
0:57:15.0 S1: And I say that to Poland.
[foreign language]
0:57:18.4 S1: And what am I saying to you in wearing this shirt?
[foreign language]
0:57:24.4 S1: And I'm saying to you, "There is somewhere a really beautiful country, Poland."
[foreign language]
0:57:29.9 S1: And it resisted fascism.
[foreign language]
0:57:33.3 S1: It resisted communism.
[foreign language]
0:57:37.2 S1: And then it treated elections lightly. It didn't pay attention to how important it was... They were.
[foreign language]
0:57:45.0 S1: It allowed the demagogues and populists to hold power.
[foreign language]
0:57:50.8 S1: And now, it cannot handle it that well.
[foreign language]
0:57:56.2 S1: You also took elections lightly.
[chuckle]
[foreign language]
0:58:01.6 S1: You also had some difficult elections.
[foreign language]
0:58:06.1 S1: But I also sort of brought in some mess to you as well.
[foreign language]
0:58:15.8 S1: In Miami, I met Trump one day.
[foreign language]
0:58:22.2 S1: He was not president yet.
[foreign language]
0:58:23.6 S1: And he was asking me lot of questions and I told him everything.
[foreign language]
0:58:31.3 S1: And then I said to him, "Listen... "
[foreign language]
0:58:34.7 S1: "An electrician could become president so can you." And you know what? He believed me and he became one.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:58:44.0 S1: And then I was shocked.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
0:58:48.5 S1: Next question.
0:58:49.7 GZ: Question, Julia?
0:58:52.5 JF: Our next question is wondering how did you manage the transition from leading a Labor Party to then leading a sovereign nation?
[foreign language]
0:59:12.5 S1: Dear ladies and gentlemen, please believe me.
[foreign language]
0:59:17.5 S1: I did not want to be president.
[foreign language]
0:59:23.6 S1: But when I saw how unprepared we were.
[foreign language]
0:59:27.5 S1: That basically we were shocked, we were surprised by victory.
[foreign language]
0:59:33.1 S1: And my colleagues didn't handle it.
[foreign language]
0:59:37.0 S1: So then I was saying to myself.
[foreign language]
0:59:39.6 S1: Somehow I managed with the union, somehow.
[foreign language]
0:59:47.8 S1: So it's too bad I have to become president, maybe I'll manage to cope with that as well.
[foreign language]
0:59:54.0 S1: And it wasn't that bad, I was succeeding.
[foreign language]
0:59:58.2 S1: But I didn't get any help. The United States did not help me either.
[foreign language]
1:00:05.8 S1: Remember I was coming to the US.
[foreign language]
1:00:09.1 S1: And I was screaming...
[foreign language]
1:00:11.8 S1: "I need your generals."
[foreign language]
1:00:15.5 S1: "General Motors and General Electric."
[laughter]
[foreign language]
1:00:19.6 S1: And you just gave me some small corporals.
[foreign language]
1:00:25.6 S1: So I had the economic results of what was happening were too little, and I lost the elections.
[foreign language]
1:00:35.0 S1: And probably what I, you probably don't know what else I was trying to figure out.
[foreign language]
1:00:41.8 S1: At that point, I had this idea that Poland should be joining the European Union and NATO together with Ukraine and with Belarus.
[foreign language]
1:01:00.7 S1: And in secret, I was working on making that possible.
[foreign language]
1:01:06.8 S1: Again, I talked to diaspora communities in various countries, mostly in Canada, in Brasil.
[foreign language]
1:01:18.3 S1: And I was saying to them, "You guys need to get ready and when, and in my next term as president, I will announce it, and we will join together."
[foreign language]
1:01:33.3 S1: And at that point, I was getting pretty strong support for this idea in those areas.
[foreign language]
1:01:40.3 S1: And then we'll just join in together.
[foreign language]
1:01:43.7 S1: And then I lost the elections.
[foreign language]
1:01:47.4 S1: Everything has been falling down.
[foreign language]
1:01:50.8 S1: So I have some problems, some pangs of conscience.
[foreign language]
1:02:00.4 S1: If we had Ukraine in the NATO and in the EU today, we wouldn't have had the problem that we have today.
[foreign language]
1:02:10.2 S1: And I managed to handle the Soviet Union, it was of course with your help, with the United States's help.
[foreign language]
1:02:19.2 S1: But the joining... The other thing was less of a problem than that.
[foreign language]
1:02:23.9 S1: So that's one of my regrets.
[foreign language]
1:02:26.1 S1: That it is too bad, it's all because of your generals.
[laughter]
1:02:31.7 GZ: We have one more question, yes?
1:02:36.6 MS: We have another question from the audience. As someone who dealt with Mikhail Gorbachev personally, how do you think he should be remembered in the wake of his death?
[foreign language]
1:03:01.6 S1: Altogether, he played a very positive role.
[foreign language]
1:03:06.9 S1: We were friends.
[foreign language]
1:03:09.5 S1: Although we differed.
[foreign language]
1:03:14.4 S1: He believed that communism could be renovated, reformed.
[foreign language]
1:03:20.0 S1: I did not.
[foreign language]
1:03:22.8 S1: At the beginning when we were meeting.
[foreign language]
1:03:29.2 S1: And we would meet and speak together at various places.
[foreign language]
1:03:36.1 S1: When we would have dinner and drink a little bit.
[foreign language]
1:03:41.1 S1: I would always ask him two questions.
[foreign language]
1:03:46.6 S1: I was saying to him, "Listen, you're not president anymore, I'm not president anymore... "
[foreign language]
1:03:54.9 S1: "Did you... Do you feel you betrayed communists?"
[foreign language]
1:03:57.5 S1: "No."
[foreign language]
1:03:58.9 S1: "I believe in communism," he would say.
[foreign language]
1:04:02.2 S1: And the second question...
[foreign language]
1:04:05.5 S1: "Listen, you're a smart guy... "
[foreign language]
1:04:10.9 S1: "So you believed that it was possible to reform communism?"
[foreign language]
1:04:16.9 S1: And then he would get offended and not speak to me for half an hour.
[laughter]
[foreign language]
1:04:22.0 S1: Because either a traitor or a simpleton, somebody naïve.
[foreign language]
1:04:30.3 S1: But I really respect him.
[foreign language]
1:04:34.6 S1: Yes, he did believe in communism until the end.
[foreign language]
1:04:44.0 S1: And also I would like to take an opportunity and just add that we often do not choose not to mention President Clinton.
[foreign language]
1:05:01.4 S1: And do you remember that he was the one who made the ultimate decision that Poland and Hungary were allowed to join NATO and the European Union.
[foreign language]
1:05:14.7 S1: I knew a few presidents, starting with Carter.
[foreign language]
1:05:21.1 S1: And a lot of them spoke nice things, said nice things but they would never make a decision.
[foreign language]
1:05:31.1 S1: When during martial law, they would organize candles in windows.
[foreign language]
1:05:40.8 S1: But in terms of actual dollars, I would get 5% of what Gorbachev would get.
[foreign language]
1:05:50.8 S1: But Clinton, it was different, in Prague, when we were at this one meeting together.
[foreign language]
1:06:00.1 S1: And he was pushed and he made a decision that he would help Poland join these organizations.
[foreign language]
1:06:10.3 S1: That's why, big thank you to President Clinton.
[foreign language]
1:06:16.8 S1: He's probably even forgotten about this, 'cause I don't think he mentions that a lot.
[foreign language]
1:06:23.4 S1: Yeah, I remember this because I was pushing him, I was the one pushing him.
[foreign language]
1:06:29.2 S1: And I was not particularly diplomatic about it.
[foreign language]
1:06:33.5 S1: Just, I said to him in public...
[foreign language]
1:06:37.8 S1: And he basically had no choice, he just, he signed off on it.
[foreign language]
1:06:43.0 S1: And let it be known.
[foreign language]
1:06:47.2 S1: And if he has forgotten, I will try to remind him.
[foreign language]
1:06:52.5 S1: If you are in touch with him, say hello from me.
[laughter]
1:06:57.6 GZ: We have time for one last question. Julia.
[foreign language]
1:07:03.5 GZ: That's what Adam told me.
[foreign language]
1:07:11.0 S1: You're scaring me that it's the last question. The last question sounds scary.
[foreign language]
1:07:18.7 JF: I don't think it's a scary question. I think it's a good question for all of us to take away as we leave this room today, but what do you think is the best thing we as US citizens can do to help Ukraine and Ukrainians?
[foreign language]
1:07:47.8 S1: Two ideas.
[foreign language]
1:07:53.4 S1: Can try to convince Russians that for their benefit...
[foreign language]
1:08:00.6 S1: Russian people are really nice people, I like them a lot.
[foreign language]
1:08:05.5 S1: But they have a really awful system.
[foreign language]
1:08:13.3 S1: And this is the system that simply allow criminals like Putins...
[foreign language]
1:08:18.1 S1: Like Putin to do what he's done.
[foreign language]
1:08:22.8 S1: And if it works out, they will be thankful to us...
[foreign language]
1:08:27.4 S1: Because it's a beautiful, rich country.
[foreign language]
1:08:32.7 S1: But the system destroys its beauty and its riches.
[foreign language]
1:08:40.3 S1: As a Nobel prize, as a Nobel Peace Prize winner, I will never attack Russia.
[foreign language]
1:08:49.2 S1: But if Russia tries to invade Poland...
[foreign language]
1:08:54.8 S1: If they hit Warsaw or Gdansk...
[foreign language]
1:09:00.2 S1: I will hit back to Moscow.
[foreign language]
1:09:03.7 S1: The Old Testament idea...
[foreign language]
1:09:07.4 S1: Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.
[foreign language]
1:09:11.6 S1: So I will not be just careful defending myself like Ukraine does.
[foreign language]
1:09:17.2 S1: They do all the right things.
[foreign language]
1:09:20.8 S1: But Poland would do it differently.
[foreign language]
1:09:25.7 S1: And despite my age, I would be drafted, I would bear weapons.
[foreign language]
1:09:35.8 S1: Despite my Nobel Peace Prize...
[foreign language]
1:09:39.8 S1: I will never attack anybody, but I will not let anybody attack me.
[foreign language]
1:09:47.4 S1: And Putin knows that...
[foreign language]
1:09:49.8 S1: So let him be careful, let him be aware.
[foreign language]
1:09:55.9 S1: And since this was the last question...
[foreign language]
1:09:57.8 S1: Of course we have not exhausted all potential for discussion.
[foreign language]
1:10:04.8 S1: I'm counting on us having enough time for you to be able to invite me back.
[foreign language]
1:10:11.8 S1: And at the end, I am pleading with you...
[foreign language]
1:10:16.5 S1: Please realise...
[foreign language]
1:10:19.9 S1: That you are responsible for the whole world.
[foreign language]
1:10:25.3 S1: That this is your fate...
[foreign language]
1:10:27.8 S1: It's a God given role to lead the world.
[foreign language]
1:10:34.7 S1: Of course, this is leading in the new times.
[foreign language]
1:10:42.1 S1: And today, just talk, discuss things with various kinds of people, even people like me...
[foreign language]
1:10:51.2 S1: So that we could come up with some solutions, with some ideas and programs.
[foreign language]
1:10:58.9 S1: You can always count on me...
[foreign language]
1:11:03.9 S1: Until the coffin is closed, I will be at your beckoning.
[foreign language]
1:11:11.8 S1: And I am not gonna be late for my own funeral.
[foreign language]
1:11:15.8 S1: I wish you all the best.
[foreign language]
1:11:19.8 S1: I would love to have pictures with you.
[foreign language]
1:11:26.0 S1: Individually we can have pictures, but it has to be organized, so let Geneviève explain how it's gonna work.
[foreign language]
1:11:36.4 S1: Because at some point when people say to me, "Oh, I know you, I've talked to you, I've got a picture with you," that's why I'm doing it.
[foreign language]
1:11:45.5 S1: Because you are the rising stars and I'm the falling star.
1:11:51.9 GZ: So please, let's thank President Wałęsa.
[applause]
1:12:04.2 GZ: And...
1:12:08.9 S1: Oh, it's weaker than at the beginning. Go on.
[laughter]
1:12:12.8 GZ: And President Wałęsa is very generous and is offering to take pictures with you, but we need to have a line, one person at a time. And first, I would like to invite the staff members of the Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia and of the Ford School. And then everyone else, get your phones out and get ready. Thank you very much everyone for being here today.
[applause]