**Naród Partyzancki | Mieczysław Moczar (1913–1986)**

Communist Poland's March 1968 antisemitic campaign greatly boosted the standing of Interior Minister Mieczysław Moczar, a national communist and the leader of the hardline  "Partisan faction" of the ruling PZPR. Moczar began a campaign to convince the rest of the party's leadership to support him as Polish leader Władysław Gomułka's successor.

On 14 July 1968, the 63 year old Gomułka was assassinated; the assassin's motive is unknown, but it is widely believed Moczar ordered the hit (actually, the assassin was a fame-seeker). The following day, a PZPR Congress elected Moczar General Secretary over the more moderate Edward Gierek, at the same time, Moczar's ally Tadeusz Pietrzak became minister of interior. 

Moczar's first actions as the leader of Poland were to have the assassin executed and to purge Gierek's faction and install members of the partisan faction across the Polish bureaucracy. The next month, Poland refused to take part in the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, souring Polish-Soviet relations and confirming Poland's status as an independent government a la Romania. 

Economically, Moczar continued Gomułka's policies of central planning and self-sufficiency. He avoided large-scale foreign borrowing, and Poland remained mostly closed to western political and cultural influence; rather, the Polish regime stressed Poland's Slavic brotherhood with the Soviet Union. 

The PZPR deepened its ties to the Catholic Church, increasingly shifting towards a form of Christian communism that focused on Christian principles of equality and social justice. In 1973, Poland followed Romania's lead by banning abortion and restricting birth control.

A controversial aspect of Moczar's leadership was the prohibition of minority languages such as German and Ukrainian, which were now forbidden to be used in public. Non-Polish minorities, including Russians, were increasingly marginalized, drawing complaints from international organizations. 

During the first years of the Moczar's rule, Poland's economy continued to grow and expand, but by the mid-1970s, it had stagnated for similar reasons as the economy of the Soviet Union. Solidarity did not form, but other opposition groups formed and began calling for reforms to the communist system. 

In 1979, Moczar and Pietrzak launched a major crackdown on dissent that saw 10,000 Poles killed, 37,000 imprisoned and 60,000 exiled to the West. This move replaced the OTL martial law; while the PRL remained unpopular with Poles at home and abroad, the opposition was weakened. 

As resources became increasingly scarce, Poland was forced to introduce rationing of essential goods, and to implement token reforms without abandoning national communist principles. On 1 November 1986, Moczar passed away and was succeeded by the elderly Teodor Kufel, who proved to be the last communist leader of Poland.

Naród Partyzancki | What if national communist Mieczysław Moczar became the leader of Poland in 1968?