In a drama closer to the plots of Cold War espionage fiction, the truth could hardly have been more important. That an aircraft carrying the Polish president could be lost in a misty Russian forest, en route to a ceremony marking one of the most sensitive events in the two countries’ history, was nothing short of a perfect storm of appalling misfortune.
Distrust between the two sides would have been hard enough to suppress in ordinary circumstances. In the shadow of the 1940 betrayal at Katyn, the destruction of Poland’s political and military elite has pitched uncomfortable fact against national pride – a gift to conspiracy theorists, only made more valuable if the professionalism of the inquiry is questioned too closely.
Overwhelming evidence that the crew defied multiple warnings in a bid to land at fog-enshrouded Smolensk, an attempt that bordered on recklessness, had left little margin for interpretation. The crucial outstanding question – why? – is among those answered by the final Russian inquiry report.
Within the pages of a novel, a sly twist in the denouement might have rendered the loss of President Kaczynski a little less meaningless and unnecessary, acquitted the crew, and heaped blame on the Russians. But Poland’s administration cannot allow pride and the desire for a more satisfying conclusion to allow another chunk of painful history at Katyn to be rewritten.
Source: Flight International
