In April 1943, German forces in the Katyn Forest near Smolensk discovered mass graves containing thousands of Polish officers. The Soviet Union immediately blamed the Nazis, but the truth was more sinister. This episode takes you deep into the Katyn massacre ordered by Stalin and Lavrentiy Beria in 1940 — the execution of nearly 22,000 Polish prisoners of war, including officers, intelligentsia, and priests. We walk through the NKVD operation codenamed 'the liquidation of the Polish officers,' the cover-up that lasted decades, the 1990 admission by Mikhail Gorbachev, and the ongoing Russian denial under Vladimir Putin. We meet key figures like Beria, Stalin, and Polish survivors whose testimonies survived. We explore the forensic evidence, the falsified Soviet commissions, and the geopolitical tightrope of the Cold War. No fluff. Just the grim mechanics of a state crime that still echoes in Polish-Russian relations today. Names you'll hear: Katyn, Smolensk, NKVD, Lavrentiy Beria, Joseph Stalin, Władysław Sikorski, Mikhail Gorbachev, Vladimir Putin, and the site itself — the forest that held a secret for fifty years.
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