Katyn Forest Massacre Memorial - Krakow, Poland - Disaster Memorials on Waymarking.com

This website (visit link) has additional photos and informs us:

"This memorial cross commemorates the 21,768 victims of the Katyn Massacre which occurred in 1940, in the aftermath of the invasion of Poland which instigated the Second World War. Hitler`s armies invaded from the west on 1 September 1939 and, despite offering often heroic resistance, Poland`s armed forces were soon overwhelmed. Although deeply suspicious of each other, Hitler and Stalin had signed a non-aggression pact and on 17 September, the Red Army poured across Poland`s eastern borders. They advanced rapidly as the Polish military were under orders not to engage Soviet force and the country was overrun by 6 October.
The Soviet Secret Police (NKVD) rounded up Polish officers, soldiers, police, civilian officials and other categories of person deemed to be potentially subversive. Many were transported to camps where they were interrogated at length and their willingness to adopt a pro-Soviet attitude was determined. Many of those assessed to be hardened in their political views or `enemies of the state` were murdered. Thousands of these executions took place at Katyn, 20 kilometres west of Smolensk, during April and May of 1941. The victims were shot in a soundproofed cell, and thereafter placed in waiting trucks. Once the vehicles were full, convoys of trucks transported the bodies to the forest for burial.
In June 1941, despite the non-aggression treaty, Hitler mounted Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union and the world`s two most powerful nations became locked in the fiercest, most protracted and bloodiest fighting of the war.

In 1943, when the struggle was at its height, the mass graves were discovered in Katyn Forest by retreating German forces. The find was a massive propaganda coup for Hitler and the Nazis who were struggling to contain the apparently unlimited resources of the Red Army. On learning of the massacre, the Polish government in exile terminated diplomatic relations with Stalin`s government. The Soviet Union continued to deny responsibility until 1990, when it finally acknowledged and condemned the atrocity."

Disaster Date: 01/01/1940 Date of dedication: 01/01/1990 Memorial Sponsors: City of Krakow Disaster Type: Sociological Relevant Website: [Web Link] Parking Coordinates: Not Listed

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