title: Preface
abstract: It was June 2005 in Gdańsk, Poland.Aconferenceonthe sixtieth anniversary of the end of World WarIIwas taking place at the Faculty of History of the University of Gdańsk.Ip resented ap aper on the contacts between representativeso f the democratic opposition in Poland with Americand iplomats and journalists at the time of the Soviet-riggedpost-war elections of 1947.The script of the communist takeover was analogous to othercountries of East Central Europe.In the three years following the end of W