Let it be said that there is nothing in the evidence to suggest Walesa was acting as an agent of the communist state during the period in which he gained his heroic reputation. The documents include a note allegedly signed by Walesa in which he promises not to divulge his cooperation with the secret police. But they purport only to confirm that, at what was presumably a moment of weakness, Walesa succumbed to police threats and blackmail, and from 1970 to 1976, informed on worker activists in Poland’s then-underground democratic opposition movement.

But it wasn’t until August 1980, after an outbreak of strikes against food-price hikes, that Walesa took his famous leap over the wall surrounding the Gdansk shipbuilding plant to lead a strike of the workers inside. After that, and with great skill, he led a labor union that became something more: the symbol of the national will that united 10 million Poles and was a voice for Poland’s aspirations for cultural, economic, and political freedom. In short, Walesa became the pivotal figure in the events that shook the entire Soviet bloc.

In those days, Walesa exhibited leadership, wit, and the capacity to work with a diverse team of advisors—characteristics that would decay as his arrogance grew during his five years as president, from 1990 to 1995, when he fell out with most of his former union colleagues.

But in 1980 and 1981, his shrewd instinct and willingness to enlist Poland’s best minds in the cause of freedom served the country well. Without Walesa as a unifying leader, Poland’s Solidarity might not have developed from a trade union into the mass phenomenon that could foster nearly a decade of fierce resistance and lead to the collapse of Poland’s one-party communist state. The Solidarity revolution was led largely by educated and skilled workers in alliance with intellectuals. But its bedrock was the lathe workers, the stevedores, the miners, and the railwaymen who could shut down the self-declared workers’ state. And it was Walesa, an electrician with a common touch, who could communicate with them in plainspoken Polish. It was Walesa who could give them focus. It was Walesa who commanded their loyalty and confidence. For these reasons, his historic role cannot be challenged.

I observed his skills and his occasional flights of unique thinking at close range as assistant to the president of the AFL-CIO trade union confederation, which provided crucial support to the Solidarity union. In 1981, I attended Solidarity’s first national conferences and tracked the movement’s growth. Then I watched its near-destruction when the communist government cracked down on the movement in December of that year, arresting many of its leaders, including Walesa, and ultimately banning Solidarity entirely. After that, I worked with a handful of Polish union leaders who were outside the country when martial law was declared—and thereby became unwilling temporary exiles—to build a network of assistance for the burgeoning underground movement.