Almost half the officer corps before the Second Republic has been brutally murdered 71 years ago by the Soviets in one of the worst crimes of World War II. This is what we refer to the common term "Katyn Crime," applies to prisoners of war were shot in three camps: the Kozelsk in Katyn, Kharkov Starobelsk, Ostashkov in Kalinin (now Tver) and buried in Mednoye and political prisoners executed in graves in Belarus and Ukraine Bykovnia. Together, over 20 thousand. people. 17 September 1939 the Red Army marched into Polish to help a German ally in the bottoming of the Republic - countries that Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet Foreign Minister, has called "clumsy bastard of the Versailles Treaty" . The Soviets found themselves soldiers, officers and police officers. They were subjected to close surveillance. Ławrentij Beria, head of the NKVD, in early March 1940 for Stalin drew up a note which reads: "are avid enemies (Polish prisoners - editor. Author) Soviet power, full of hatred for the Soviet system (... .) Each one eagerly awaits the release to be able to actively join the fight against the Soviet power ". Verdict was. Soviet leaders decided to apply to the Poles "final solution".
From the beginning of April and May 1940 took a systematic and planned killing of officers. For safety pętano hands of convicts with barbed wire and shot in the back of the head. April 13, 1943 Radio Berlin gave a sensational message stating that "the locals pointed out the secret place of mass executions carried out by the Bolsheviks, and where the NKVD murdered Polish officers (...)" . Moment to disclose the crime was not random, of course, the result of political calculation. Goebbels, personally directing the action of propaganda, hoped that, to the clear signs of strengthening Polish-Soviet relations will be, playing card massacre, lead to rupture. What we know from history soon became a reality.
Katyn Wood was supposed to be the grave not only of thousands of Polish officers, but was obviously also its wider dimension. He was part of a joint plan of what Soviet communism with fellow German fascism, prepared in late 1939, it idea of \u200b\u200bannihilation of the Polish nation. After all, most of the murdered by Soviet soldiers are torturers were reserve officers. In civilian life - professors, scientists, doctors and teachers. The core of our Polish intelligentsia. Katyn is therefore also a symbol, hundreds of thousands of Poles murdered in the framework of the plan in the Soviet steppes, tajgach and camps.
The whole thing was not for the Polish authorities a complete surprise. The first news of the fate of the officers of Kozielsk delivered in June 1940, the "Musketeers" of the Polish underground organization of the nature of intelligence. but the messages were so disturbing that there were their credibility. Confirmation obtained in December 1941, when after the occupation by German troops Katyn succeeded, through a secret mission UAS, improvised on the spot to carry out an on-site. Still deluded, however, about the size of the crime, at least trying to find prisoners from Ostashkov and Starobelsk. Representatives of the Polish government has repeatedly intervened in this matter, and the responses gave even Stalin himself. Their absurdity have to be for people who know a little about the Soviet realities even ominously clear: 'fled to Manchuria, even (...); What do I keep them? Perhaps there in camps on the grounds that the Germans occupied, ran. "
Meanwhile, the Western world was silent in the name of pragmatic goals - one criminal, the Allies needed to fight each other. After the war the Soviets - and I consistently - blamed for the crimes of the Germans. During the hearing before the Nuremberg Tribunal General Rudenko, Chief Prosecutor of the Soviet, he accused the Germans of the aggression against Poland and the policy of extermination. Herman Goering jumped when he heard this handset, and a day later he said: "I did not think the Russians will be shameless enough to mention Poland . Russians did not manage to blame the Germans for the Katyn. As a result, the matter fell to the cause list. Winston Churchill in 1950, published memoirs wrote: "interested in winning government decided that the case should be omitted and the Katyn massacre was never explained."
Only 13 April 1990, the agency TASS announced the laconic information, which recognized that the massacres committed by the NKVD. Two years later, the Polish authorities have received a copy of many held in the Kremlin materials documenting the crime. But it is still sore point in Polish-Russian relations, Putin and the country does not lack for volunteers to undermine the authenticity and the nature of this crime, we Poles are still crimes are not explained until the end and not called by name - a crime of genocide.
I also recommend, track Andrew Kolakowski, "Katyn" , see below:
Marie A. Roman
[Fig. Archive]
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