Katyn: Stalin's Massacre and the Triumph of Truth

Twenty years ago, Allen Paul wrote the first post-communist account of one of the greatest but least-known tragedies of the 20th century: Stalin's annihilation of Poland's officer corps and massive deportation of so-called "bourgeoisie elements" to Siberia. Today, these brutal events are symbolized by one word, Katyń-a crime that still bitterly divides Poles and Russians. Paul's richly updated account covers Russian attempts to recant their admission of guilt for the murders in Katyń Forest and includes recently translated documents from Russian military archives, eyewitness accounts of two perpetrators, and secret official minutes published here for the first time that confirm that U.S. government cover-up of the crime continued long after the war ended.

Paul's masterful narrative recreates what daily life was like for three Polish families amid momentous events of World War II-from the treacherous Nazi-Soviet invasion in 1939 to a rigged election in 1947 that sealed Poland's doom. At the heart of the drama is the Poles' uncommon belief in "victory in defeat"-that their struggles made them strong and that freedom and independence, inevitably, would be regained.