[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 51 (Friday, April 8, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2343-S2344]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
REMEMBERING KATYN
Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I rise today to commemorate the lives lost
in last year's plane crash near Smolensk that killed Polish President
Lech Kaczynski, his wife Maria, and 94 others who represented the
political, cultural, and religious leadership of Poland. Words alone
offer little solace before such awesome tragedy, which is one of the
reasons people must gather together before monuments and flowers to add
a tangible dimension to our shapeless grief. While eloquent remarks can
move the heart, we all know a smile, a gaze, or an embrace can often do
more to bring comfort to the sorrowful.
Katyn has become a tragedy in three acts--the crime, the coverup, and
now the crash. Surely it is fitting for us to meet, comfort each other,
and remember those who died. But what lies beyond our tears? Can good
come from this evil?
For the loved ones of those 96 souls who perished nearly a year ago,
they
[[Page S2344]]
must take comfort in knowing that the final act of their beloved was a
noble one--that of remembering those martyrs whom Stalin and his
henchmen sought to erase from Poland and, indeed, from history.
As Stanislaw Kot, Poland's wartime Ambassador to Moscow, said,
``People are not like steam; they cannot evaporate.'' He was right and
it is written, ``Your brother's blood cries out to me from the
ground!'' In a haunting twist of fate, a hungry wolf in the Russian
winter would scratch at the snow and uncover the hastily buried bones
of Poland's best and brightest. And the truth about this unspeakable
crime would one day be known.
We have come a long way--a very long way--from the time when this
atrocity was falsely presented as a Nazi crime and from the time when
the names of the dead could only be circulated in communist Poland in
the form of samizdat publications and whispered around kitchen tables.
Nevertheless, there is still more that must be done to set the record
straight. This involves insuring that all the evidence relating to the
execution sites, the executioners' identities, the motives for the
crime, and the fate of so many Polish families who vanished on the
Siberian steppe are publicly available. We must ensure that the
fullness of the truth is uncovered and shared for its own sake and for
closure. To that end, I welcome recent news of the Kremlin's release of
still more documents relating to the massacre.
Further, I believe that finally coming to terms with Katyn is a
necessary precondition for a durable Polish-Russian rapprochement,
which is itself good insurance for maintaining a Europe, whole, free,
and at peace.
Next week Presidents Komorowski and Medvedev will meet before the
mass graves at Katyn and, I trust, will continue a dialogue of healing
between two great nations that have suffered so much from the elevation
of an ideology over a people. I wish them well in their talks and
ongoing mission of reconciliation and believe that the only lasting
balm for this wound lies in the heart and not in a courtroom or even a
legislature.
This is not to say that charges or claims should not be pursued, but
to recognize that, in many cases, such actions will fall short and
offer little by way of consolation.
It would be most unfortunate for the memory of Katyn to be debased by
ideologues of any ilk who would usurp this sacred memory for partisan
projects. For too long the truth about Katyn was denied by those on the
left who turned a blind eye to the reality of communism and many on the
right seemed to view Katyn as just another issue to be exploited in the
struggle of ideologies. People and their memory are an end, in and of
themselves, and must never be used as a means to advance even a just
cause. The only decent relationship to them is that of love and
remembrance--our dignity and theirs demands nothing less.
My sincere hope is that Poland and Russia can do better than some
countries that have fought bitter diplomatic battles and enacted laws
to force or deny recognition of historic crimes. By honestly evaluating
a shared past of suffering, Poles and Russians have a real opportunity
to build a shared future of friendship and prosperity.
Poland is now free and her traditions support the forgiveness that
offers a path out of the valley of this shadow of death. In so many
ways, Poland is, and must remain, a light to those nearby who still
live in the darkness of oppression and lies.
As we continue to ponder the devastation of last year's catastrophe,
I would like to close by putting a couple faces on our sadness; those
of Mariusz Handzlik and Andrzej Przewoznik, who both died in last
year's crash.
Mariusz was a diplomat and father of three. He was well known and
well liked in Washington from the years he spent assigned to the
Embassy of Poland. In 2000, he played a fateful game of chess with
Polish war hero and Righteous Gentile Jan Karski who narrowly escaped
``liquidation'' at Katyn. Karski would die in a Washington hospital and
Handzlik in a gloomy Russian forest.
Andrzej was a historian, a husband, and father of two. He was the
principle organizer behind the conference I cohosted as Chairman of the
U.S. Helsinki Commission last year at the Library of Congress to mark
the 70th anniversary of the Katyn Forest Massacre. Andrzej hoped to
spend time at our National Archives sifting through the papers of the
Madden Committee and other relevant U.S. Government documents on Katyn.
The memories of Mariusz, Andrzej, and so many other truly exceptional
people on that doomed flight offer much by way of virtue and
accomplishment that will inspire Poles for generations to come. Let us
take comfort in the truth that is, at last, known and bask in the
warmth of heroic memories and do this together with our Polish friends
who are second to no one in their love of freedom.
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