Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Lysy (talk | contribs) at 20:54, 8 December 2005 (→Katyn and Holocaust). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Old talk

That bit at the end doesn't strike me as very NPOV... Tualha 05:34, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

"Soviet and American attempts to cover the massacre" Do you mean "cover" (to report about) or do you mean "cover up" (to hide)? --anon, 1 Jul 2004

cover up, which has since been corrected Krupo 04:28, Sep 6, 2004 (UTC)

It is not clear as to why Roosevelt would want to cover up the Soviet massacres. At first glance at the heading I thought the Communists and the American President had something in common. It's clear why one murderous leadership would want to put massacres they committed themselves into the shoes of a competing murderous regime. But, Roosevelt??? Whyerd 17:38, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

It indeed needs explanation. The problem was that there were approx 7 to 10 millions of ethnic Poles in the US at the time, large majority of them voted for him in the presidential elections. Roosevelt did not want to enrage his electorate. For similar reasons the agreements from Yalta were not publicised until after the war.

Other cause was that he was considering the case of Polish government in exile a problem of United Kingdom. He apparently believed that taking part in the Polish-Soviet dispute would only enrage uncle Jojo, while the US of A would win nothing if FDR decided to back Poland. ] 18:36, Sep 10, 2004 (UTC)

Doesn't it have more to do with not estranging such a vital ally? I seem to recall various times

when the US hesitated to criticize the USSR...and that always seemed to be the main reason.

The following was posted by User:Rogper in Katyn article. I believe it should be incorporated into this articla rather than geography-related Katyn. How to do this? ] 22:15, Oct 27, 2004 (UTC)

The Soviet regime attempted to cover the event, but some, mostly Polish descentances, started to investigate the thing further. This was the case with Roman Marini from Kraków, together with his two students, who in 1946 personally investigated the graves. Marini was later executed and the two other students disappeared after a positive attempt to flew from prison; their destiny is, however, unknown. In 1971, the danish descent musician Elisabeth Tramsen disappeared under mysterious circumstances, and the case has in fact not yet today found satisfaction or resolution. In the contemporary, her father Helge Tramsen started a movement to raise the opinion in Scandinavia, but his work gained not enough attention. In 1989, Stefan Niedzialak, the founder of Katyn foundation, was beaten to death.

Yes, maybe you have right; it suits perhaps better here. // Rogper 12:04, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

"On Christmas Eve of 1939, all priests of every confession, including Catholics, Orthodox, Jews, Protestants and Greek Catholics were removed from the camps and probably murdered separately."

Probably? This needs substantiation. 119 01:58, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

This has now been removed. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 23:39, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The Jan Masaryk connection

Some of the following could be incorporated in the main article if it can be checked (which came from a book read long ago):

The Germans took a number of experts from the countries they occupied to investigage the Katyn site. The Czech expert was later to do the post mortuum on Jan Masaryk.

Irving

What is the purpose of including the link to neo-Nazi writer Irving's book? He was controversial from the start, including his Sikorski-murder thesis. I'd suggest reading Prof. Richard Evans' report, in which some of Irving's early distortions are discussed. This man should not be counted upon the present an objective historical narrative. Also, what is the source of "On Christmas Eve of 1939, all clergy, including Roman and Greek Catholic, Orthodox, Jewish, and Protestant, were removed from the camps and probably murdered separately."? This should be deleted if no source is forthcoming.

Dear anon. Irving is controversial, yes. But I read his book about Sikorski and it contains some interesting facts about Sikorski's death and Katyn, and I used it for source of some information in both articles, thus I believe his books should remain in the references/external link section. If you can prove to me that some parts of the article(s) are wrong/disputed, I will happilly correct them. The fact that the author later became a controversial Neo-Nazi (there are several archive talk pages about that on his page...) does not automatically makes everything he wrote usless. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:12, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I don't know about this sentence, I didn't add it and I have no sources for or against it. However, according to Wiki policy, the sentences should not be deleted unless you have a source that proves it wrong (or it is obviously an error). Could you point out to me the Irving distortions regarding Katyn/Sikorski issue? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:14, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

As I said, Irving was controversial from the beginning. Evans points out the distortions in his Dresden book. Thus it is not the matter of me pointing out the mistakes, but rather people relying on a priori shaky source. It may happen that most of what Irving says in his book about post-Katyn repercussions is true, but until proven innocent, he must be presumed guilty. I will no longer delete the links, but I will contemplate putting some sort of short notice, saying that the writer is controversial.

Now about the priests. In "Katyn. Plenniki neobjavlennoj vojny. Dokumenty i materialy" (ed. Pikhoja, Gejsztor (sp?)), Moscow, 1999, we find several facts contradicting this sentence.

Document no. 179 (pp. 317ff) - the "Numerical data on POWs in Starobielsk camp for February 1, 1940" lists 16 priests.

So it is not true that all clergy was separated in 1939.

On p. 431 there is a note on chaplain Stanislaw Kontek (Kantek (sp?)), who on 24 Feb. 1940 was sent to Moscow from Ostashkov, then, in 1941(!), to Griazovets, where he was with other surviving priests - (sp?) Bednarczik, Dubrowka, Judycki, Kulikowski and Wzdenczny. Then he was in Totsk, Iran and Beirut.

So, again, it cannot be even stated that the priests were "killed separately".

(The Polish source is given: Ks. Kamil Kantak, Od Griazowca do Pahlewi (Fragment z pamietnika//"Marianum w Slurbie", nr. 5-6/71-72, Londyn Wrzesien-Grudzien, 1967, s. 82-84).

(It is thus also not true that only 395 people from Jukhnov survived.)

On p. 521 it is stated that among those sent to execution to Smolensk and Kharkov there were 18 chaplains and other clergymen.

According to the tables in appendices in all three camps there were military clergymen up to the execution.

Data for Kozielsk for 29.11.39/29.12.39/9.1.40/20.1.40/4.2.40/22.2.40/16.3.40/1.4.40: 7 1 1 1 1 1 1 8.

Ostashkov for 29.11.39/31.12.39/9.1.40/20.1.40/4.2.40/22.2.40/16.3.40: 0 11 11 5 5 5 5

Starobielsk for 29.11.39/31.12.39/9.1.40/20.1.40/4.2.40/23.2.40/16.3.40: 12 12 12 12 18 18 9

I will delete the passage. I will also edit the part about officers being put in three camps - it is based on widespread misconception that all the executed POWs were officers. --Polyphem 22:33, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

As an interesting side note, search for Stanislaw Kontek gave a result in the Katyn memorial list (http://www.electronicmuseum.ca/Poland-WW2/katyn_memorial_wall/kmw_K.html). Unless it is a coincidence (and I've seen such with Katyn lists), the list on that page must be based on reconstructed data rather than on the Soviet lists. The reconstructed lists are known to have such glitches.--Polyphem 01:44, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for the interestign sources, you may want to add them to the refence section. While I would approach any Soviet/Russian sources with extreme caution, I don't have any contrary references for this. I added word 'controversial' to the Sikorski's book elink. As far as I can tell, this book has little or no neo-Nazis sympathies and most if its facts are not that controversial; it was from the next decade that Irving works became controversial. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:46, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There is no reason to approach internal (formerly secret) Soviet data "with extreme caution". --Polyphem 11:37, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You simply should keep in mind who, when and why created them and not trust them blindly Wojsyl 18:38, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Which approach should be taken to _any_ documents. No documents present the absolute truth. Soviet internal documents are not better or worse than Nazi internal documents, British .... etc. etc. --Polyphem 19:46, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Irving's "mistakes"

Meanwhile, here are several indications that Irving is not to be trusted re: Katyn.

http://www.fpp.co.uk/Auschwitz/docs/controversies/barbers_story_2005.html

"Given that the former Soviet archives reveal that the principal NKVD officers who signed the death warrants and carried out the Katyn massacre were Jewish" - it's a bald-faced lie.

Is it? I don't have sources pro or against. Of course if Irving gives no sources, this is just an accusation and should not be put in our text - but unless you have sources giving another nationality, this cannot be called a lie (it is true that *some* NKVD officers were Jewish, after all, although I wouldn't give much credit to any Irving conspiracy's theoris regarding Jews). One way or another, those sentences are not included in our Wiki article and won't be unless sb can give proof they are correct, so I think this is a rather moot point in this discussion. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:57, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Some people in Katyn affair were Jewish. Only one from NKVD comes to mind now, though, L. Raikhman, who did not have any direct involement, but was preparing the Katyn case for Nuremberg. Most executioners were Slavic, and their names can be found in literature, e.g. in the book I mentioned and in "Katyn 1940-2000. Rasstrel. Sud'by zhivykh. Ekho Katyni.", Moscow, 2001. The troika specified in the shooting order, consisted of Merkulov (Russian), Kobulov (Armenian) and Bashtakov (Russian). (Nationalities are given accoring to "Kto rukovodil NKVD", http://www.memo.ru/history/NKVD/kto/biogr/index.htm).--Polyphem 11:36, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"If he had been captured by the Russians, he would have ended up with the 15,000 other Poles in the mass graves at Katyn." - there weren't 15,000 in Katyn.

Well, it depends if we mean Kozielsk (which was 4,500 according to our text) or other camps (over 20k total).

It doesn't depend on that. The language is clear "mass graves at Katyn". (Besides, there were 15,000 from all camps, not over 20k total).

And I am not sure if during the 60s when Irving wrote the book the exact figures where known,

The exact figure of bodies exhumed at Katyn by the Germans was known from 1943.

remember that it was only after 1990 that Russian admitted their crime

Not after, but in 1990.

and allowed investigations of site/archives. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:57, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

http://www.fpp.co.uk/History/General/Katyn/KatynHanged.html - all wrong, the only one sentences on Katyn charges was Duere/Diere, who in 1950s wrote that he was coerced. He wasn't hanged.

It looks like this is an article written by a Canadian professor, not Irving.

So what? He has it on his site as a source. That he accepts it as a fact is evident from http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/month/0199.html

And as I have no sources for pros or against it, I can hardly say how relevant it is to our discussion. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:57, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Too bad. I think the book "Katyn. Zbrodnia chroniona tajemnica panstwowa" may contain this information. I took my info from Jazhborovskaja, Jablokov, Parsadanova, "Katynskij sindrom v sovetsko-pol'skikh i rossijsko-pol'skikh otnoshenijakh" (J.S. Jażborowskaja, A.Ju. Jabłokow, W.S. Parsadanowa, Syndrom katyński w stosunkach polsko-radzieckich i polsko-rosyjskich).

http://www.focal.org/overflow/Goebbels.pdf - in the chapter on Katyn Irving distorts the number of victims in the forest. "By April 13 twelve thousand rotting corpses had been exhumed." If he can't get the very basics correct, who knows what errors he made in more advanced stuff? "Apr 16, 1943; the former NKVD officer Petr Soprunenko, who signed the Katyn death warrant, lives in Moscow as an old age pensioner (1994)." - according to the Katyn literature and "Kto rukovodil NKVD", Soprunenko died in 1992. So again the basic, verifiable fact is wrong. And he should have known that Soprunenko didn't sign the order.

--Polyphem 22:54, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I wrote about numbers above,

Me too. And I can add that Goebbels is a relatively recent book.

and as for Soprunenko, well, it is a mistake, but a rather small one. Still, I didn't read this book, I only read Sikorski's one.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:57, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

And a final note: of course Irving cannot be trusted. One can discuss how much truth there is in his books, but it is proved that at least parts of what he wrotes are mistakes/lies. I could myself add more examples of errors in his books. So we agree on this. However, this is OT - we should be concerned with factual info in the Katyn Massacre article here, not Irving mistakes, which are not relevant to this article. I took from his book some dates, Berlin Radio quote, Goebbels quote, Ivan Maisky quote, Churchill quotes, which I used to add info to sections 'Discovery' and 'Attempts to cover up the massacre' (see this for my changes, note that there were some minor changes by other users during this period). If you can show me that any of those statements are false, I'd be the first to delete them ASAP. However, we cannot say that since they are based on Irving book they are automatically false and all what he wrote is total fiction. Innocent until proven guilty is still a rule of thumb here. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 11:08, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hey, how about "I don't trust the Soviet sources" above? :-) Once discredited, the author can't be trusted. I have shown that he makes blatant mistakes in basic facts, sometimes driven by his ideology (as with the "Jewish NKVD" example). Such a source should be verified _before_ using it. --Polyphem 11:36, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I don't trust them, because see Recent Developments section - Russians (at least some of them) are still not willing to admit they did anything wrong. That aside, I don't demand all Soviet sources to be verified. As for Irving, as I wrote, if you think any part of my changes is wrong (or even controversial), please point that out. Otherwise, I see no reason why we should dispute the source. Irving wrote, for example, that the Second World War ended in 1945. Was this a lie as well? :> --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 23:39, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"I don't trust them, because see Recent Developments section - Russians (at least some of them) are still not willing to admit they did anything wrong." Blatant non sequitur :-)--Polyphem 00:35, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Savenkov's death toll

According to http://old.lenta.ru/news/2005/03/22/poland/ he gave only the death toll for the camps, slightly more high than that in Shelepin's letter. Together with the prisons this gives us about 22,000 victims.

According to link you gave Savenkov's death toll is 1803. And 22 (twenty two) of them are identified. : Nekto 13:31, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Some Soviet documents present a higher estimate for the camps - 15,131. E.g. this number can be found in 5.12.43 report of major Denisov. Although it is explicitly stated that all the people were from the three camps, it is not completely clear. It is possible that some Poles from other camps or prisons were killed together with the Poles from the three camps.--Polyphem 19:58, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One of the problems is the so-called Ukrainian list, or a list of people who were surely murdered in April and May of 1940, but barely anyone knows (that is except for the Russian historians and Military Prosecutors' Office) where were they buried or killed. The name comes from the fact that the majority of those listed there were last seen in various prisons across the Ukraine. Halibutt 10:54, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

Amazing evidence

It is amazing that there is so much more evidence for the Katyn massacre then for homicidal gassings in Auschwitz!

Hitler-Stalin Pact

Shouldn't the Hitler-Stalin Pact be mentioned in the Intro? -Ned

Why not: be bold. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 22:35, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Non-neutral

I feel this article needs to balance the POVs of Soviet as well as Nazi guilt. I have seen compelling arguments in favor of Nazi guilt but you'd never know that from this article, which treats the Soviet guilt POV as unchallenged fact. Everyking 21:54, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

What do you mean? I am not sure if I understand you - are you saying that Nazis did the massacre? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 22:30, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

I said that's a view that this article does not represent (well, there's one dismissive sentence about it). We should at least stamp a POV template at the top. Everyking 03:59, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Just like the article on Earth does not represent the view that the Earth is flat... Should we add a POV tag there as well? Halibutt 05:55, August 23, 2005 (UTC)

Oh, that's a nice analogy. Everyking 15:17, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. Halibutt 15:44, August 23, 2005 (UTC)

Can you elaborate - whose side is underrepresented, or what anti-something bias can you see? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 17:43, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Question: Is this massacre not simply standard Stalinist procedure? Stalin committed so many violent purges of his own people that, when Hitler's armies suddenly attacked Stalin in 1941, there were scarcely any Russian generals left to resist him. If the Nazi's had not been as bad as Stalin and would not have murdered "inferior" Slavic peasants and Jewish peoples during their attack, the captive peoples of Russia might have risen up against the Soviets and successfully overthrown Stalin instead. Why are you pro-Soviet apologists quibbling over the number of victims in the Katyn Forest Massacre? Stalin was a murdering, paranoid fanatic and a sociopath. It's a wonder there is anyone left in Russia alive. He didn't just have twenty thousand people from Poland executed. Stalin murdered millions of people! He had over five million people starved to death in the Ukraine alone! When did the Soviet army ever overrun any territory and there was not a massacre of innocent civilians afterward? Did any country or people ever say to the Soviets, "Hey. We don't know how to run our country. Please come in and show us how to do it"? Exactly. The very purpose of Soviet plans for world domination is to liquidate the intelligentsia (those who know how to run things, like the victims murdered and dumped at Katyn) after conquering the territory, in order to eliminate the very idea of any other system other than communism. -Ned. (Sept.) Maybe the Soviets should set up a program about world hunger: "How to have all your crops fail for seventy-five years in a row." My above point is this: the Katyn Forest Massacre didn't happen within a historic vacuum. After the Bolshevik Revolution, which was violent, the Soviets first massacred the people around Moscow who were related in any way to Czarist Russia. Then the Soviets massacred the people in the nearer provinces whom they thought might resist. Then the Soviets eliminated the people in the outer provinces who didn't like what they were doing. It was systematic. It took the Soviets decades to consolidate their power in Russia (while the West stood by). It is standard procedure for Communists to eliminate the enemies of their revolution. Within this context of historical methodology (no matter how violent or murderous it is), the Katyn Massacre should not really surprise anybody. It is what the Communists always do.-Ned. (Sept.)

You probably meant to say: "that's what dictatorships always do". The size of killing in Suviet Union is simply because the country was big and the killing tools were modern and eficient. mikka (t) 20:01, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

-- Quite frankly, I think most central/eastern europeans would closely sympathize with the poles on this loss although it is relatively small, if one may say that! The soviets, especially through Stalin, did murder millions of people indeed, of their own too. They also displaced large populations and re-colonized annexed territories to the point of identity loss for some smaller countries. The tragedy and scale of all that is hard to grasp from the relative comfort of the west. The interesting point though is how, according to the reporting from this year's May 9th celebrations for instance, Stalin is still favorably viewed by many russians and even their official position on the matter seemed somewhat ambiguous. R(sept.05)

I don't believe POV ranting has any place here. If you're not talking about how to improve this article then it doesn't belong. Everyking 02:44, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

This is a discussion page, isn't it? My comments are providing background information on Stalinist methodology: Stalin always did the same thing, for as long as he remained in power. He murdered masses of people everywhere, in everyplace that he was in control, to further Marxist-Leninist goals, and to gain power. Is this not true? Does this not have a historical bearing upon the Katyn Forest Massacre? Is it not relevant to the discussion?-Ned (Sept.)

As far as I know, the view that the Nazis perpetrated the massacre is not espoused by any major historians, governments, or organizations that have investigated the matter. The Russians themselves have admitted guilt, and produced quite detailed documents that would be hard to refute. There may be people who still think the Soviets are innocent in the matter, but I fear they are on not much less shaky ground than the alluded-to flat-earthers, or perhaps, to choose a more relevant analogy, Holocaust deniers. --Delirium 12:03, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

OK, now it has been improved, although I don't expect it to stay that way for long. I think it's a difficult question, and certainly not one I'm qualified to grapple with. But I can come up with a few thoughts about it. Clearly, in the West, Soviet guilt is pretty much unquestioned in mainstream history. When you come at it that way it looks like a question of the notability of the view, not the accuracy of the view—is the view of Nazi guilt notable enough to warrant this balanced treatment, and if so to what degree? But on the other hand, what is the view in, say, Russia? How do the competing views compare in terms of notability there? I'm guessing—I don't know this—that the view of Nazi guilt is probably a good bit common there, perhaps mainstream and in practical competition with the view of Soviet guilt. So I think it's a complex question that requires a lot of consideration. Everyking 09:15, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Featured status?

Ladies and gentlemen, this article is now FA on the Hebrew wiki. How about improving it to FA standard here as well? For now I added all the pics the Polish wiki article uses. What is lacking? Halibutt 13:07, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Survivors' Tales

There are also many tales, although the authenticity unknown, of many escaped POWs who claimed it was the Soviets, and the Polish believed them to be crazy. This would be nice to include as well. I'll see what I can come up with.

"Massacre", "Incident", "Execution" ?

I found this on someone's talk page tonight:

On Misplaced Pages: Soviet troops shooting Polish army officers is a massacre. US troops shooting Korean civilians is an incident.

I suggest we rename this page the "Katyn incident". If American troops can gun down unarmed civilans and it be called an "incident", to pacify American jingoists , I think it is only fair that we rename this massacre, involving military POWs an incident too. Travb 08:05, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

Well, firstly, I don't think we should hold this article hostage of any other article. If the No Gun Ri incident is known as such in English - that's fine with me, but it mustn't be the same with this article.

Having said that, I think that this article's title might indeed need some revision. What is the most popular name in English? In Polish it seems to be Zbrodnia katyńska, or the crime of Katyn in English.. Halibutt 08:35, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

I would vote for Katyn executions. Enough massacres. Judging by Halibutt's edits, the Poles were massacred here, there, and everywhere. --Ghirlandajo 09:16, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

I feel like execution somehow assumed some sort of guilt from the executed (maybe imagined by the executioners). I do not think it was the case, unless we will consider credible accusation that some prisoners somehow conspired with the Nazi. So I am personally for massacre. On the other hand the beginning of the third section Up to 99% of the remaining prisoners were subsequently murdered. People from Kozielsk were murdered in the usual mass murder site of Smolensk country, called Katyn forest; people from Starobielsk were murdered in the inner NKVD prison of Kharkov and the bodies were buried near Pyatikhatki; and police officers from Ostashkov were murdered... does not look NPOV. If some murders would be change to massacres, executions or killing it would increase the readability of the section without acquitting the perpetrators of the massacre. abakharev 10:32, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Fully agreed. Halibutt

If we accept this terminology, most of Stalinist repressions, or Purges as they are called in the west, should be renamed to massacres. We'll have to start thousands of massacre articles then. --Ghirlandajo 10:49, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Executions were but a final stage of the whole process, so I doubt it is the best idea to name the article that way. Unless of course we plan to expand the article significantly and divide it onto several sub-articles, much like Malmédy massacre and Malmédy massacre trial or Warsaw Uprising divided onto seven or so articles. And indeed, Poles were massacred in a plenty of places, Katyn is but one of them - though it was quite a notable example. Halibutt 09:24, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

BTW, Ghirlandajo, you still failed to explain your view at Talk:Ostashkov and failed to reply to my explanations and questions at your talk page and my RfA. Do you plan to do it any time? Halibutt 09:30, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

As I've said 20 times before, the camp was situated on Stolbnyi Island and not in the town of Ostashkov itself. The ignorance of Polish writers who call it "a village near Pskov" (although Ostashkov is farther from Pskov than Paris is from London) and ignore the existance of the Nilov Monastery, where the camp was actually housed, is not an excuse sufficient to add the data about this camp in any article pertaining to the monastery in question. --Ghirlandajo 10:19, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

You failed to mention the ignorance of the NKVD who called the camp the Ostashkov Special Camp. Halibutt 11:58, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

And what do you expect? That they would call it "the Nilov holy monastery camp"? Of course they named the camp after the nearest town. --Ghirlandajo 12:11, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

But still you prefer to keep the info on the camp under the name that was not used and erase it in the article on the name that is actually applied to it, both by the NKVD, modern historians and even the press... Anyway, the questions at Talk:Ostashkov are still open. Halibutt 13:37, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

While myself I would prefer the name "crime" as better describing the act of killing POVs, I'm afraid that in English language it's better known as a "massacre". Could anyone confirm this ? --Wojsyl 22:45, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

I don't think the original suggestion was in good faith. If User:Travb believes that the name No_Gun_Ri_incident is POV or a whitewash he should argue his case at that article's talk page instead of trying to rename this one. Two wrongs don't make a right.

As far as I know, "Katyn Massacre", or sometimes "Katyn Forest Massacre" is the usual name in English. It's used by Brittanica, The Columbia Encyclopedia and The UK Foreign Office , just to name a few. --BadSeed 01:41, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Execution and only Execution!It is mohr neutral.Wiki is not Goverment Propaganda site!!!

The number of executive

In Russian WIki its 11,000??

in German 14.552 Kriegsgefangene ermordet: Die größten Gruppen davon mit 4.421 in Kozielsk, 6.311 in Ostashkov und 3.982 in Starobielsk

Please sign your comments. I had a chance to remark before - Battle of Polonka I think it was - that Polish historians tend to inflate the figures of casualties by doubling or trebling the actual figure. So I wouldn't be surprized if that is the case here. I would also list Yury Mikhin's monograph Anti-Russian Slur among the sources. We should leave Halibutt worship his Polish booklets alone, or perhaps in company with Wojsyl and Piotrus. Links to prop webistes - www.cia.gov, www.fca.gov.uk - should be purged. Instead, there is an independant website - www.katyn.ru - proving that the whole affair was forged by CIA propaganda. I have no time for it now, but will probably return to the topic after reviewing the conduct of our Polish friends on History of Belarus. --Ghirlandajo 16:25, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

To answer your question, it depends on whether we count only the names on the NKVD list (14.552) or the so-called Ukrainian list as well. The latter lists also Polish officers last seen in various NKVD prisons and camps in the Ukraine who were murdered in smaller actions across the USSR. The latter includes some 8000 names, hence the higher figure. And why the Russian wiki mentions only 11,000 escapes me, especially that the NKVD order itself mentioned 26,700 people...

As to what Ghirlandajo writes above - it's a complete nonsense. Especially that the mass murder happened almost a decade before CIA was formed. Halibutt 17:04, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Halibutt, you should not consult Polish sources only. The Black Legend assigning the Nazi atrocities to Soviets was forged by the CIA and their Polish agents. --Ghirlandajo 07:50, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Right... Polish agents were faithfull agents of CIA even in 1941, long before it was created. Do you really believe that? As to consulting non-Polish sources, all say basically the same, be them Polish or non-Polish (even Russian sources usually agree). Check almost any of these links if you need non-Polish sources... Halibutt 10:22, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

NPOV

I recently NPOVed the header after Ghirlandajo's edits. Firts of all, the name he proposes ("katyn incident") is completely unknown to the world. It gives 203 links in Google, as opposed to 29,600 for "Katyn massacre" and additional 13,800 for "Katyn forest massacre". Which gives some 220:1 odds against the proposed version...

As to the view that the Germans were responsible, I believe we should at least cite some credible source or historian to mention that in the header. Holocaust denial is not mentioned in the header of the articles on Auschwitz concentration camp or The Holocaust, so I doubt we should mention it here. Especially that it is against established facts and mentioning it as an equally-valid view would be promotion of certain rare POV, not maintaining NPOV. But of course Ghirlandajo reverted my edits, so I doubt anything could be done... Halibutt 10:15, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

As a sidenote, now that Ghirlandajo's unsupported claims are promoted, I wonder whether we should add the {{totallydisputed}} tag, or simply the {{NPOV}} and {{dispute}} tags... Halibutt

I mentioned above how we need to determine the notability of the German guilt viewpoint. In the West, it is only marginally notable, but what about in Russia and some other countries? We need to know how much currency the view has there, too, to determine how much coverage it should get in this article. I agree that there should be good sources and citations. Those are good to have in any situation, and particularly when there's controversy. Everyking 10:27, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, as to the "German guilt" version I've seen only a couple of Russian newspaper articles and one webpage claiming that. Though perhaps there are some serious modern sources as well, I don't know that. Perhaps Ghirlandajo could provide such sources... Halibutt 10:37, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

My rapid Yandex search found 28000 entries for "катынь" and "подлость", including www.katyn.ru. You may want to check the online book claiming that the affair was falsified by Polish-US prop: http://www.libereya.ru/biblus/muhin/. I haven't looked into these entries closely, but there's an interesting picture at http://www.hrono.ru/sobyt/1900sob/1941katyn.html, which shows that the Katyn officers were executed the "Nazi way", when the shot is aimed in the skull rather than neck. As is well known, NKVD offciers executed people by shooting at their neck. --Ghirlandajo 10:53, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Don't you find it strange that you constantly accuse people of using Polish sources only, yet all you provide is links in Russian? Anyway, the links you provide indeed support the thesis that there is some belief for "western conspiracy" theory in Russia. However, none of the sites is able to negate the fact that the Russians finally admitted that it was the NKVD to commit the massacre. BTW, I find the book "Anti-Russian Cruelty" you provided especially notable. The blob goes as follows:

In order to unite Europe in the fight against the advancing Red Army, in 1943 Hitler ordered the graves with Polish officers shot by the Germans in 1941 near Smolensk, to be unearthed, and to announce to the world that they were allegedly killed in 1940 by the NKVD USSR by the orders of "Moscow Jews". The Polish exiled authorities, sitting in London and selling its allies, got caught by this hitlerite provocation and as a result during WWII additional millions of soldiers of USSR, UK, USA and Germany were killed. In order to denude the Russian allies and to give a nudge on the countries of the Western Europe and NATO, the scum of Central Committee of KPSU, Procurators' Office of the USSR and Academy of Sciences of the Russian Federation have reanimated the provocation in the 1980's. For students of law faculties and for all who consider Russia their Motherland.

Below goes the list of chapters:

• Preface;
• Nurnberg minutes
  • Poland under the szlachta yoke
  • Goebbels' cronies on Poland in the pre-war period and during WWII
  • Poland as a hyena of the battlefield
  • War Polish-style: advocacy of Poland
  • War Polish-style: liberation of Poland
  • Story of inquiry of guilt in agression
• Falsification of the Katyn case
  • Initial circumstances, motives and description of the Katyn crime
  • Falsification of the Katyn case by the Germans and Poles in 1943
  • Unveiling the Goebbels' falsification of the Katyn case in 1944
  • Falsification of the Katyn case between Goebbels and Gorbachov
  • Goebbels' version of the Katyn case as per 2002
  • Explanation of Goebbels' men from the CPUSSR falsificates

That speaks for itself, doesn't it. Halibutt 11:48, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

While I cannot comment on the book which I haven't (and won't) read, I just want to point out that the version of the events currently expounded in the article is by no means the only one. It is one of several explanations, and that's it. --Ghirlandajo 12:11, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Of course-they are people who wrote books about USA being taken over by space aliens.But such fabrications aren't in the USA article.I have nothing against adding a chapter on attempts to hide or downplay the atrocity by Soviet and Russian propaganda, though. --Molobo 12:42, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, the article on Earth does not claim that the Flat Earth phenomenon is an equally valid view. On the other hand the belief that the Soviets did not commit that attrocity seems to be well-established in Russia and as such is worth mentioning. Halibutt 13:24, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I believe it should be worded otherwise. We should mention that the version that the Soviets commited that atrocity was first expounded by Goebbels (I would call it Goebbels's version), later propagated by the CIA (a convenient link to their website follows), and finally taken up by the Polish editors of this Misplaced Pages. Then it will be clear enough. --Ghirlandajo 14:30, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

There is a limit to how far one can go in questioning well established historical facts. The overwhelming historical concensus right now is that the Soviets carried out the killings. Finding some obscure websites and publications which publish a contrary view does not mean that those views must be included in Misplaced Pages (compare Holocaust Denial). If Ghirlandajo persists in pushing his views, I fear we might have to take the same steps we would take against somebody who persistently edited the Auschwitz article to say that no Jews died there in its gas chambers (just to give an example). Balcer 17:30, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Balcer, your comment is a huge dissapointment for me. I was thinking that there was at least one Pole not brainwashed by Polish prop, but now I see this is not the case. Firstly, noone denies that the execution did happen. Who perpetrated it is a completely different question. As i said above, if this is encyclopedia and it presumes to be objective, then it should mention various points of view and not a single one. Misplaced Pages is free for everyone to edit, and every reasonable point of view should be mentioned therein. What I see now is that there is a point of view that the crimes was perpetrated by the Nazis and that its adherents have some evidence to back up their claims. When I used yandex search, it became clear to me that this point of view is quite popular (not in Poland, you may be sure). So I can't understand why there are editors who should be strongly opposed to take this point of view seriously and prefer not to mention it in the article which they seem to have privatized for themselves. --Ghirlandajo 20:08, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

It is because this point of view does not have any academic backing outside the Soviet Russia. --Wojsyl 20:21, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

reserve officers...during the ... War of 1939

??why reserve officers during the War ??It is better only officer

Attempts at denial

The actions of some editors attempting to edit the article to imply that the basic facts of the Katyń massacre are in dispute are reprehensible. There is a limit to how far the idea of NPOV can go, and it surely stops once attempts are made to deny basic historical facts accepted by overwhelming concensus. If these actions persist, they will seriously harm the credibility of Misplaced Pages, and may bring unwelcome attention to Misplaced Pages's reliability as a historical source from the media (which we have seen too much of recently, see John Seigenthaler Sr. Misplaced Pages biography controversy and latest Google news stories) Balcer 18:08, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

To quote Misplaced Pages:Neutral point of view:

We can certainly include long discussions that present our moral repugnance to such things; in doing so, we can maintain a healthy, consistent support for the neutral point of view by attributing the view to prominent representatives or to some group of people. Others will be able to make up their own minds and, being reasonable, surely come around to our view.

and:

the Misplaced Pages neutrality policy certainly does not state, or imply, that we must "give equal validity" to minority views. It does state that we must not take a stand on them qua encyclopedia writers; but that does not stop us from describing the majority views as such; from fairly explaining the strong arguments against the pseudoscientific theory; from describing the strong moral repugnance that many people feel toward some morally repugnant views; and so forth.

If the problem, on the other hand, is not with describing minority POVs (and determining how widespread a minority POV is can be a whole different can of worms), but rather with some editors trying insert their particular POV into articles, then it can be addressed through negotiations or, if all else fails, Misplaced Pages:Dispute resolution. Admittedly, it can be a time consuming and frustrating process, which is a well-known criticism of the "Misplaced Pages way". Ahasuerus 18:25, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

The point is: how small does the minority have to get before we lock its bizarre views out of Misplaced Pages? I am certain, for example, that you could find small groups in the US which believe that the US government is run by extraterrestials, but those views surely do not belong in a Misplaced Pages entry on US government. More to the point, most of our current articles related to the Holocaust do not present Holocaust Denial as an equally valid view, in fact they do not even mention it as the minority view (as articles on Belzec, Majdanek, Treblinka etc. do not state in the lead: A minority of people believes this never happened). Balcer 18:37, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

The size of the minority that holds dissenting views is undoubtedly relevant. As Misplaced Pages:Neutral point of view states:

views held only by a tiny minority of people should not be represented as though they are significant minority views, and perhaps should not be represented at all.

The trick, however, is determining just how tiny the minority is. Have there been any public opinion surveys in Russia?

As far as the comparison with the listed death camps goes, the difference here is that there is only one article that covers the Katyn massacre and there are many that cover the Holocaust. If you compare the amount of space dedicated to Holocaust denial and associated topics by Misplaced Pages, it accounts for a rather large part of the total Holocaust material here.

Having said that, there are different ways to cover minority opinions. You can have a separate article which lists minority arguments or you can have a section at the end of the main article or any number of other ways. But the important thing is that we are not doing original research and we are not taking sides here, we are simply trying to describe all the non-trivial POVs out there. If there is a significant minority POV that holds a different opinion, be it Katyn or Immanuel Velikovsky or Shaver Mystery, we don't want to take sides, we just describe them as fairly as we can. Ahasuerus 19:11, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I would have no problem with a section at the end dealing with attempts to deny the basic facts of the massacre, and other editors have already suggested this approach. I have a serious problem with some editors trying to question these facts in the lead, presenting the discretited view that the Germans have carried out the massacre as equally viable.

By the way, are you serious about using public opinion polls to determine what the content of Misplaced Pages should be? Let me quote George Carlin here: Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.Balcer 19:25, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Public opinion surveys are useful when there is no other way to determine how widespread a particular minority opinion is. For example, there are very few elected officials in the US who publicly use anti-semitic rhetoric these days, but carefully worded/parsed/weighed/etc public opinion surveys suggest that 12% to 17% of US citizens subscribe to some form of anti-semitism. Listing these results in Misplaced Pages (with links to Gallup et al) would be perfectly legitimate. Similarly, I am unaware of any governments or peer reviewed publications that still endorse the view that the Katyn massacre was committed by the Nazis, but if there is a non-trivial amount of public opinion support for the idea, then it should be noted. Ahasuerus 19:41, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm afraid an encyclopedic article is not quite about public opinion surveys but facts. This particular article is about a historical event: historic research counts, original research does not. --Wojsyl 20:01, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

The term "original research" as used by WP:NOR refers to original research by editors of Misplaced Pages, not to opinions held by the public. Since approximately 45% of adult Americans subscribe to the Young Earth hypothesis, we will describe it fairly and sympathetically, even though the scientific consensus is against it. Ahasuerus

Exactly so, but using public opinion to determine the factual accuracy of historic events is an original research performed by editors of Misplaced Pages, and not by the public. --Wojsyl 20:48, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

As to whether Misplaced Pages articles deal with facts or public opinion, well, Misplaced Pages editors do not decide what the facts are, they just record what other, pre-existing, sources state. Clearly, a preponderance of sources, including archival sources, official government publications and peer reviewed articles support the notion that the Soviets were the ones that carried out the killings, but there is also a minority opinion that believes otherwise. If there is evidence that it's a non-trivial minority (and the Internet makes it easy for a small but dedicated group to make its views appear more prominent than they would be otherwise), then we should include it in some form. Ahasuerus 20:33, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Katyn and Holocaust

To say the truth, I'm quite shocked at Balcer's comparison of Katyn and Holocaust. It seemed to me fairly certain that any attempt to compare the Holocaust with other killings should be considered offensive per se, as it results in belittling of the Holocaust's unique tragedy. No I see that there are people, at least in Poland, who are eager to compare the execution of several thousand officers with a wide-scale annihilation of the nation, including children, women, civilians. As awful as it is, such executions as the former were a fairly common thing under Stalin's criminal regime. If it was NKVD who perpetrated the crime, I don't see why Katyn should be distiniguished from similar and even more ghastly executions carried on by the same organization. We should keep in mind that the officers executed there were the same that prepared the projected Polish invasion of the Soviet Union in 1939. They were not angels, to say the least. Polish historians forget to mention that thousnads of Soviet POWs died from hunger in Pilsudski's concentration camps after they had been taken captive during the Polish-Soviet War. So I can't compare Katyn with Holocaust, sorry. I hope that Balcer will apologize for his inept and disgusting comment. --Ghirlandajo 20:22, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

The fact that NKVD murdered other people does not justify murdering Polish POVs. I'll not comment on your allegations about Polish plans to invade Soviet Union in 1939, pardon me. --Wojsyl 20:54, 8 December 2005 (UTC)