This Committee unanimously finds, beyond any question of reasonable doubt, that the Soviet NKVD (People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs) committed the mass murders of the Polish officers and intellectual leaders in the Katyn Forest near Smolensk, Russia.

The evidence, testimony, records, and exhibits recorded by this committee in the last nine months, will overwhelmingly show the people of the world that Russia is directly responsible for the Katyn massacre. Throughout our entire proceedings, there has not been a scintilla of proof or even any remote circumstantial evidence presented that could indict any other nation of this international crime.

It is an established fact that approximately 15,000 Polish POWs were interned in three Soviet camps: Kozielsk, Starobielsk [sic], and Ostashkov in the winter of 1939-1940. With the exception of 400 prisoners, these men have not been heard from, seen, or found since the spring of 1940. Following the discovery of the graves in 1943, when the Germans occupied this territory, they [the Germans] claimed there were 11,000 Poles buried at Katyn. The Russians recovered the territory from the Germans in September 1943, and likewise they stated that 11,000 Poles were buried in these mass graves.

The Germans originally claimed there were 10,000 bodies at Katyn but soon reduced the number to about 4,000.

Evidence heard by this committee repeatedly points to the certainty that only those prisoners interned at Kozielsk were massacred in the Katyn Forest. Testimony of the Polish Red Cross officials definitely established that 4,143 bodies were actually exhumed from the seven mass graves.

The total given by the Germans was 4,143; the PRC total was 4,243; the verified Polish total is 4,410; see note 284.

On the basis of further evidence, we are equally certain that the rest of the 15,000 Polish prisoners—those interned at Starobielsk and Ostashkov— were executed in a similar brutal manner. Those from Starobielsk were disposed of near Kharkov,

In 1991 the NKVD officer Syromiatnikov described the executions of Starobelsk prisoners in the NKVD jail at Kharkov and their burial site; see the introduction to Part II; Biographical Sketches.

and those from Ostashkov met a similar fate. Testimony was presented by several witnesses that the Ostashkov prisoners were placed on barges and drowned in the White Sea.

This was widely believed by Polish prisoners who survived, but lacks documentary confirmation. The Ostashkov victims were shot in the cellars of the NKVD jail in Kalinin/Tver and buried at Mednoe; see the Tokarev deposition, in the introduction to Part II.

Thus the committee believes that there are at least two other “Katyns” in Russia….

This committee unanimously recommends that the House of Representatives approve the committee's findings and adopt a resolution: 1. Requesting the president of the United States to forward the testimony and findings of the committee to the United States delegates at the United Nations. 2. Requesting further that the president of the United States issue instructions to the United States delegates to present the Katyn case to the General Assembly of the United Nations. 3. Requesting that appropriate steps be taken by the General Assembly to seek action before the International World Court of Justice against the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics for committing a crime at Katyn which was in violation of the general principles recognized by civilized nations. 4. Requesting the president of the United States to instruct the United States delegation to seek the establishment of an international commission which would investigate other mass murders and crimes against humanity.

These recommendations were later supplemented as follows: “If the United Nations cannot act, then the President of the United States should seek the assistance of an International Commission of nations other than Germany and Russia to sit as a Jury, hear the facts of the Katyn Forest Massacre, weigh the evidence, record its findings, and make such recommendations as it determines are required by justice”; Hearings, p. 9240, Amendment “b.” The U.S. president did not take the action requested.