[Horch]

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[Geek44]

Nice poster...although part of me wonders about the 'never forgiven' part.

[Aussie Dave]

It will take a long time for Poland to forgive the former Soviet Union for the massacre of so many Polish POW's.
(The actual number of victims was 21,857.)

What makes it worse is the soviet denial (until recent times.) that they were the ones who commited this unspeakable crime, that they too were vctims of the massacre and blamed it all on the germans.

The Soviets did a good job of supressing the truth and destoying the evidence in their own backyard but unfortunately for them other outside sources of evidence proving their guilt remained.

It was when confronted with the 'outside' evidence that forced the soviets to finally admit its role in the massacre.
Although Gorbachev did admit it was the NKVD who massacred the Polish POW's, he laid all blame on Stalin's secret police chief, Lavrenty Beria, and his deputy making Katyn look like a rogue secret police action rather than an official act of mass murder.
(The 1940 Execution Order was signed by Stalin and five other Politburo members.)

Quote

On 5 March 1940, Stalin signed their death warrant--an NKVD order condemning 21,857 prisoners to "the supreme penalty: shooting."
They had been condemned as "hardened and uncompromising enemies of Soviet authority."

The Katyn Controversy: Stalin's Killing Field


I can understand why its hard for the polish people to forgive such a crime, when those responsible won't fully admit their guilt and take responsiblity, while prefering to simply shift the blame away for their country's role in the massacre on to others.


Cheers,
Dave

[Geek44]

I certainly agree with everything Dave. I know I'm lucky. Nothing ike that has ever happened where I live or to 'my people'. It's easy for me to judge.
Thanks for the info too mate...I learned stuff.
Peace.

[Aussie Dave]

Thats just it Geek, there is no one that can be judged or held accountable now.

Stalin and the Politburo members that signed the Death Warrant are long gone.

We also know Stalin didn't limit his crimes against humanity soley on Non-Soviet individuals, his own citizens too had suffered terrible crimes against them, ordered by Stalin and his regime.

You can't hold any of the current russian states, their current leaders or their people responsible for the 1940 Mass Murder of Polish POW's that was ordered by six long dead monsters.
(They too had been victims of Stalin's brutal regime.)

Its easy to say the Polish should just forgive the Soviets for their leader's actions in 1940.
(Which I agree with, they should.)

But I would imagine with over 21,000 soldiers murdered that there are proverbly quite a few of their surviving family members still left that would know thieir 'loved one' was murdered in cold blood by soviet troops that might not feel as forgiving.
(Which is unfortunate but an understandable human response considering it's a crime that will go totally unpunnished.)


Cheers,
Dave

[Horch]

Aussie Dave said:

Thats just it Geek, there is no one that can be judged or held accountable now.

Stalin and the Politburo members that signed the Death Warrant are long gone.

We also know Stalin didn't limit his crimes against humanity soley on Non-Soviet individuals, his own citizens too had suffered terrible crimes against them, ordered by Stalin and his regime.

You can't hold any of the current russian states, their current leaders or their people responsible for the 1940 Mass Murder of Polish POW's that was ordered by six long dead monsters.
(They too had been victims of Stalin's brutal regime.)

Its easy to say the Polish should just forgive the Soviets for their leader's actions in 1940.
(Which I agree with, they should.)

But I would imagine with over 21,000 soldiers murdered that there are proverbly quite a few of their surviving family members still left that would know thieir 'loved one' was murdered in cold blood by soviet troops that might not feel as forgiving.
(Which is unfortunate but an understandable human response considering it's a crime that will go totally unpunnished.)


Cheers,
Dave

I agree with you Dave.Great post. But it should hold true with all those who have committed crimes against man kind during the war. One is no better than the other. Time to get over it and perhaps a lesson learned.

[Geek44]

Good points. For me, it seemed to make the difference that the Russian government had failed to aknowledge the incident which makes 'not forgiving' seem a little more reasonable to me. An aknowledgement might be the first step to 'letting the ghosts rest'. Your first post coincided with an article about a speech made recently by Paul Keating (a former Aussie Prime Minister) about magnanimity toward ones defeated enemies...a humiliated enemy remains an enemy. Love him or hate him...wise sentiments I believe. I remember also reading an article (or three) about the special Japanese unit that operated in Manchuria for nearly a decade...I forget the unit designation but they're quite infamous. They spent their time in China dissecting people and conducting all manner of barbarous 'experiments' on live humans. At wars end, they were captured by the Chinese and 're-educated' but not with punishment and execution as one might expect. These people were treated with respect and kindness. Upon their release by the Chinese government, every single one of them asked to be allowed to return to the towns and villages in which they had perpetrated their crimes in order to apologize to the survivors. In later life, many contributed their own money to help develop and aid these rural villages. An interesting comparison.

[Aussie Dave]

There is the denial factor, but IMO it would also be how, why and who became prisoners to begin with that would stick in minds of the Poles.

Quote

The victims were Polish officers, soldiers, and civilians captured by the Red Army after it invaded eastern Poland in September 1939.

Strictly speaking, even the Polish servicemen were not POWs.

The USSR had NOT declared war, and the Polish commander in chief had ordered his troops NOT to engage Soviet forces.
But there was little the Poles could do.

On 28 September, the USSR and Nazi Germany, allied since August, partitioned and then dissolved the Polish state.

They then began implementing parallel policies of suppressing all resistance and destroying the Polish elite in their respective areas.
The NKVD and the Gestapo coordinated their actions on many issues, including prisoner exchanges.

At Brest Litovsk, Soviet and German commanders held a joint victory parade before German forces withdrew westward behind a new demarcation line.

The Soviets helped the Nazis defeat Poland and were allied with Nazi Germany.
They had the gaul to lay the blame on their former ally Germany for the massacre after the germans discovered the Soviet's handy work in Katyn forest and exposed the massacre to the world.
The Soviets did manage to convince Britain and the US it was innocent and it was the germans who actually murdered them.

It was a lie that lasted more than 50 years, until hard conclusive evidence proving Soviet guilt forced some admission of guilt from them and eventually admit the full truth.

Quote

Some of those who died at Katyn included:
1 Admiral
2 Generals
24 Colonels
79 Lieutenant Colonels
258 Majors
654 Captains
17 Naval captains
3,420 NCOs
7 Chaplains

3 Landowners
43 Officials
131 Refugees
And a Prince


Also among the dead were:
20 University Professors
300 Physicians
several hundred Lawyers, Engineers, and Teachers
and more than 100 Writers and Journalists
as well as about 200 Pilots.

It was their social status that landed them in front of NKVD execution squads.
Most of the victims were reservists who had been mobilized when Germany invaded.

In all, the NKVD eliminated almost half the Polish officer corps. -- Part of Stalin's long-range effort to prevent the resurgence of an independent Poland.

Poland is a proud, independant nation and its people bravely fought for their country's freedom in WWII and this was nothing more than a murderous plot by Stalin to help crush any chance of an independent Poland rising so it would remain under Soviet control.
It did remain under Soviet control for a long time as we all know.
(Just another reason for Poles to resent the Soviets.)


Cheers,
Dave

[cyberia]

Aussie Dave said:

They had the gaul to lay the blame on their former ally Germany for the massacre after the germans discovered the Soviet's handy work in Katyn forest and exposed the massacre to the world.
The Soviets did manage to convince Britain and the US it was innocent and it was the germans who actually murdered them.

It was a lie that lasted more than 50 years, until hard conclusive evidence proving Soviet guilt forced some admission of guilt from them and eventually admit the full truth.

I'm not so sure the British and the American governments were all that convinced. Given the time line it may have been in the best interest of the three to allow the blame to be placed on a common enemy rather than an ally.

It could have been a public relations nightmare for Allied/Soviet mutual support in the war effort.

[Aussie Dave]

I believe the British and Americans in 1943 may have suspected the soviets were the culprits, but by 1944 the US President knew the truth.
"The enemy of my enemy is my friend" and to challenge Stalin's version of events would have split the Soviets from the Allies.

Quote

When Nazi occupation forces in April 1943 announced the discovery of several mass graves, propaganda minister Josef Goebbels hoped that international revulsion over the Soviet atrocity would drive a wedge into the Big Three coalition and buy Germany a breathing space, if not a victory, in its war against Russia.
(A headline in the May 1943 Newsweek read: "Poles vs. Reds: Allied Unity Put to Test Over Officer Dead.")

But Goebbels miscalculated.

Despite overwhelming evidence of Soviet responsibility, Moscow blamed the Germans, and for the rest of the war Washington and London officially accepted the Soviet countercharge.

When the Polish government-in-exile in London demanded an international inquiry, Stalin used this as a pretext to break relations.
The Western allies objected but eventually acquiesced.

Soon thereafter, the Soviet dictator assembled a group of Polish Communists that returned to Poland with the Red Army in 1944 and formed the nucleus of the postwar government.

Stalin's experience with the Katyn affair may have convinced him that the West, grateful for the Red Army's contribution to the Allied military effort, would find it hard to confront him over Poland after the war.

Does this sound like a 'Cover-Up'?

Quote

In 1944, President Roosevelt assigned Capt. George Earle, his special emissary to the Balkans, to compile information on Katyn.
Earle did so, using contacts in Bulgaria and Romania.

He too concluded that the Soviet Union was guilty.

FDR rejected Earle's conclusion, saying that he was convinced of Nazi Germany's responsibility.
The report was suppressed.

When Earle requested permission to publish his findings, the President gave him a written order to desist.
(Earle, who had been a Roosevelt family friend, spent the rest of the war in American Samoa.)

Cheers,
Dave

[cyberia]

I figured as much. Very interesting stuff Dave and a stellar post.