During World War II, and in the immediate post-war period, Soviet authorities trained Polish intelligence personnel in Kuybyshev (in 1991 renamed to Samara) in southwestern Russia. This setup continued following the establishment of the Soviet-controlled Polish intelligence community. By the 1960s, the Polish intelligence community was being led by the Ministry of Public Security, referred to by its Polish initials, SB. The SB’s elite operations officers, which staffed its First Department, were all trained in the Soviet Union and in a Soviet-controlled facility in Warsaw.

But in 1970, Poland’s reformist President, Edward Gierek, put in motion a plan to modernize the Polish intelligence services. Gierek’s goal was for Polish intelligence to catch up with the pace of technological development, especially in the emerging digital realm. He also wanted Polish spy organizations to be able to compete directly against rival agencies in Western Europe. The rapid establishment of the Intelligence Personnel Training Centre near Stare Kiejkuty was the centerpiece of Gierek’s intelligence reforms.

Construction began in 1971 and was mostly completed within two years. In 1973, the heavily guarded training facility, which had been disguised as a “holiday resort” in official government maps, welcomed its first students. Students were taught how to operate undercover in the West and how to recruit sources in countries like West Germany, France and the United Kingdom. They were taught about Western European lifestyles and had access to Western products, including soft drinks and vending machines, which were absent from Polish life.

Today the secretive facility is referred to as “the staff training center”, or “JW 2669”, with “JW” standing for “Jednostka Wojskowa”, or “Training Facility”. It has continued to function as a personnel training facility even after the major reform of the Polish intelligence community, which occurred in 2002. The reform resulted in the formation of two new agencies, with defined internal and external missions, which continue to exist today. They are the Internal Security Agency (ABW, pictured) and the Foreign Intelligence Agency (AW).

It is extremely rare for JW 2669 to be mentioned in the news. A major exception to the rule occurred between 2005 and 2008, when a number of intelligence whistleblowers alleged that the training facility had hosted so-called ‘black sites’ that were run by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The term ‘black sites’ refers to a global network of secret prisons that were established by the CIA and operated jointly with allied intelligence agencies around the world. The US used these facilities to detain and interrogate enemy detainees during the US-led ‘global war on terrorism’.