Poland’s Tsuris

Not far from the site of the Plaszow concentration camp on the outskirts of Krakow a mural called the “History of Krakow” adorns an otherwise ugly street. The scenes depicted switch between tragedy and triumph, with panels depicting defeats at the hands of foreign forces and the Holocaust, but also the end of Communist rule and the election of native-son Karol Wojtyla as Pope John Paul II. I first saw the mural in the summer of 2010, just a few months after another Polish tragedy, the crash of a military aircraft carrying the Polish president, first lady, top military commander, and over 90 other top officials. Within the historical context of the mural, the tragedy seemed to be another black day in the country’s gloomy history.

The darkness of the crash has now returned to the Polish public discourse, with the shocking report this week by the newspaper Rzeczpospolita that chemical traces from explosives had been found at the crash site. In the immediate aftermath of the crash, many Poles speculated about possible sabotage on the part of the Russians, with whom the Poles have had icy relations. The suspicion of conspiracy stemmed from the circumstances of the crash, as the Polish dignitaries were on their way to visit Katyn, the site of an infamous massacre of 22,000 Polish military officers by the Soviets at the beginning of World War II. The Russian government typically tries to avoid drawing attention to the atrocity. Polish military officials, as well as the Russians, have repeatedly denied accusations of foul play and maintain that the crash was the result of weather and pilot error. After forceful government denials of this week’s Rzeczpospolita report, the newspaper retracted parts of its story, citing a lack of conclusive evidence.

Politics, predictably, have played a major role in the conspiracy discourse. The leader of the Polish opposition Law & Justice Party, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, is the twin brother of Lech Kaczynski, the Polish president who died in the crash. Despite the newspaper retractions, Kaczynski still said he believed the accusations of sabotage were true, according to The Atlantic’s Liam Nolan. Kaczynski lost in his bid to succeed his twin as president and maintains a desire to lead Poland, either as president or prime minister.

The government’s own bungled handling of the crash has only fed the flames of intrigue. In late September and early October two of the victims of the crash had to be reburied after their exhumations showed that they had been misidentified. On October 31, the government had to admit that the remains of Poland’s last president-in-exile (prior to the fall of the Wall) had been misidentified. Cover-ups have been suggested, and the best excuse the government can muster is mismanagement, never something to be admitted voluntarily.

The crash aftermath vacillates between tragic and tragicomic, though still a hot topic even two and half years afterwards. News from Poland in recent years has tended towards the positive given its remarkable economic and political development since 1989. But, as the Krakow mural points out, Poland is never far from its latest, or next, tragedy.