The Foreign Service Journal, November 2019

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | NOVEMBER 2019 53 After the Fall: Labor Unions in Europe Dan E. Turnquist Brussels, Belgium I was in Brussels serving as the labor counselor in what is now the European Union. I covered the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, which included most of the major unions in the non-communist world. Polish Solidarnosc also had its overseas office in Brussels. And I followed the World Federation of Trade Unions, con- trolled by the Soviets and headquartered in Prague, which also included communist-controlled unions in the West. Sitting at home watching the television news Nov. 9, I saw the daughter of a close friend dancing on top of the Berlin Wall as it came tumbling down. My friend had been very active in the fight against communism and had warned his daughter to be very careful in Berlin. We were all flabbergasted. None of us had anticipated that this would happen so quickly and completely. We had all sensed that the Eastern bloc was in trouble, but we were still surprised when it happened. The Cold War was a very hot war among the trade unions, with the Soviets pouring money into communist unions while the Social Democratic and Christian Democratic unions, includ- ing the AFL-CIO and its affiliates, fought back. This situation— which had existed for 40 years since the communists walked out of a Socialist Congress in Amsterdam, leaving it to the Social Democrats—suddenly collapsed after the fall of the wall. My job changed radically after that. People who wouldn’t give me the time of day before were now lined up at the mission, wondering if we Americans could help them now that their KGB paychecks were in jeopardy. The head of the Solidarnosc office, who was belittled because he was not one of the well-known principal leaders of Solidarnosc in Poland and whose offices were regularly ransacked by the KGB and Polish intelligence, suddenly became the head of Poland’s National Security Council. The world was being reordered. With the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union, we had to help Eastern Europe and the Newly Independent States set up employment offices, unemployment insurance systems and all the other trappings of capitalist, market economies. We had a whole series of meetings in Brussels as the Western countries tried to determine how to proceed in a coordinated fashion to cope with this new world. Playing a role in all of this was the most interesting and meaningful assignment in my 35 years in the U.S. Foreign Ser- vice. I worked long hours but had the satisfaction of knowing I was involved in earthshaking events. Dan E. Turnquist served in the Foreign Service from 1966 to 2001. He retired as a Minister Counselor and currently splits the year between Centennial, Wyoming, and Guadalajara, Mexico. A Berliner attacking the wall with a hammer and chisel.