Western historians have interpreted Solidarity in two main ways. Minimalists view Solidarity simply as the culmination of workers' protests, begun in 1970, against the Party's repressive and incompetent management of the economy. As Tony Judt puts it: ‘They were not in themselves a harbinger of the downfall of communist power.’ Maximalists see Solidarity as the start of the Soviet Union's collapse. Martin Malia dedicates his study ‘To Solidarity which began the task of dismantling communism in 1980, eventually completed by Democratic Russia in 1991’.

Animated discussion of the Lublin events had taken place amongst the Free Trade Unionists on the Coast. But Anna Walentynowicz notes that ‘even we thought there was little prospect of doing the same. Shipyard workers were still too frightened. We anticipated at least two more years of misery before society at large would be ready to act.’ Wałęsa agreed: ‘I was haunted by the idea that August [1980] had come too soon, that we needed a year or two more of hard work to prepare.’ Despite their hesitations, an opportunity for immediate action was now presented.

Walentynowicz was summarily dismissed from the Gdańsk Shipyard on 9 August, just five months before she was due for retirement.