Many of Poland’s top brass in the military died when the presidential plane crashed in Smolensk on Saturday.
Among the dead, along with President Lech Kaczynski and other prominent political figures were the army chief of staff, navy chief commander, and heads of the air and land forces, who all intended to pay tribute to over 20,000 Polish officers killed by the Soviet secret police NKVD in 1940 in Katyn.
“We, as soldiers are used to death. It is not foreign to us, but it is very hard, especially for those closest to [those killed.] We are doing everything we can now to stay in close contact with and support those closest to Gagor,” said Colonel Sylwester Michalski, press spokesperson for the General Staff after the plane crash.
The Polish army suffered a deep loss by losing its most prominent commanders including General Franciszek Gagor, Chief of the General Staff of the Polish Army, key member of the Polish Armed Forces preparation team for Poland’s accession to NATO and Poland’s candidate for the Commander-in-Chief of NATO; Gen. Andrzej Blasik, Commander of the Polish Air Force; Gen. Tadeusz Buk, Commander of the Polish Land Forces; Vice Admiral Andrzej Karweta, Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Navy, Polish representative at the Supreme Allied Command Atlantic (SACLANT) headquarters; Lieutenant General Bronislaw Kwiatkowski, Commander of the Polish Armed Forces Operational Command; Division General Wlodzimierz Potasinski, Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Special Forces; Brigadier General Kazimierz Gilarski, Commander of the Warsaw Garrison.
The military victims of the presidential plane’s crash also included Lieutenant Colonel Czeslaw Cywinski, head of the International Association of the Home Army’s Soldiers; Lieutenant Colonel Zbigniew Debski and Brigadier General Stanislaw Komornicki, both members of the Chapter for Granting Virtuti Militari Order, Poland’s highest military decoration; as well as Bishop Tadeusz Ploski, Military Ordinary of the Polish Armed Forces; Jan Osinski, Catholic army chaplain; Miron Chodakowski, Orthodox army chaplain; Adam Pilch, Evangelical army chaplain. (mg)