A dark day

I don't normally do foreign politics, other than the EU domination of England, but if there's another country and people in Europe I have a liking for it's Poland.

BBC.

Polish President Lech Kaczynski and scores of others have been killed in a plane crash in Russia.

Polish and Russian officials said no-one had survived after the plane apparently hit trees as it approached Smolensk's airport in thick fog.

Poland's army chief, central bank governor, MPs and leading historians were among more than 80 passengers.

They were flying in from Warsaw to mark 70 years since the Katyn massacre of thousands of Poles by Soviet forces. 

The BBC's Adam Easton, in Warsaw, says the crash is a catastrophe for the Polish people.

He says Prime Minister Donald Tusk was reportedly in tears when he was told.

Mr Tusk, who runs the day-to-day business of government, has called an emergency meeting of ministers.

A government spokesman said that according to the constitution there would be an early presidential election, and the speaker of the lower house of parliament, Bronislaw Komorowski, would become acting president.

I like the Poles, all my dealings with them have been positive, they are damned hard workers, bit moody when drunk, but not violent, generally very happy to have a job and be sending money home for their families. They were a stalwart ally during WW2 when their country was occupied and divided by both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, something many people forget that when WW2 started the Soviets and the Axis were allies (of convenience) and Poland was dismembered by both and never got her full territories back at the end of WW2, mostly because they were under Soviet occupation and the Soviets were our allies by then. There was also the Soviet betrayal over the Warsaw uprising where they waited outside the city whilst the Poles attempted to liberate themselves, refused to allow the Polish government in exile back and stood by whilst the Nazi's massacred the Polish resistance, before moving in.

So far it looks like a genuine accident, though considering the relationship between the two countries  it could not have been a worse place to happen especially considering that it was there to commemorate the Katyn Forest massacre of the Polish officer class by the Soviets in WW2.

The Poles have no reason to like or trust the Russians.

I suspect the conspiracy theorists are going to have a field day over this.