WALLENBERG – THE LAST VICTIM OFTHE KATYN MASSACRE

Dedicated to the memory of all who refused to let truth be buried.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

Raoul Wallenberg’s disappearance has haunted historians, diplomats, and human rights

advocates for generations. This article examines Hungarian sources suggesting that Wallenberg

may have been killed because he possessed documentation implicating the Soviet Union in the

1940 Katyn massacre.

As the daughter of Dr. Sándor Kopácsi, former Chief of Police of Budapest and a survivor of

Stalinist persecution, I grew up with documents and recollections that illuminated the political

machinery of the era. Some of this material informed my later research into Wallenberg and

Katyn.

This article is published in full for the historical record.

DOSSZIÉ 1 — WALLENBERG’S ARREST & THE RUSSIAN “ADMISSION”

Raoul Wallenberg was a Swedish diplomat stationed in Budapest who, working for the U.S. War

Refugee Board, saved thousands of Hungarian Jews from the Nazis in the final days of World

War II, and was last seen being taken into custody by the Russians on 17 January 1945.

Wallenberg’s fate remained a mystery for over 55 years until the end of 2000, when the Kremlin

commission investigating the case finally admitted that he had been shot in a KGB prison in

Moscow, declaring him and his driver, Vilmos Langfelder, innocent of all spying charges.

Yet this belated admission still provided no explanation of why or under what circumstances

they died.

Leonid Troshin, spokesperson for the Russian prosecutor-general’s office, stated that all

documents on the case had been “purged.” The Russian government maintains that the truth is

unknowable but that the repression of evidence suggests an execution on Stalin’s orders.

New evidence from Hungary offers a compelling reason.

Wallenberg had come into possession of documents proving Soviet responsibility for the Katyn

massacre — the 1940 execution of thousands of Polish officers. While the Soviets blamed

Germany, Stalin was determined to suppress all traces of the truth.

Wallenberg became one of those traces.

DOSSZIÉ 2 — THE KATYN MASSACRE

The secret protocol of the Hitler–Stalin Non-Aggression Pact (23 August 1939) divided Poland

between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939;

the Soviets invaded from the east on 17 September.

Between September and October 1939, nearly 15,000 Polish officers and cadets were captured

by the Soviets. Many were reservists who, in civilian life, were doctors, lawyers, engineers,

professors—Poland’s intellectual elite.

They were taken to:

• Kozielsk (southwest of Moscow)

• Ostashkov (between Moscow and Leningrad)

• Starobielsk (southeast of Kharkiv)

During the winter of 1939–40, the NKVD tried, unsuccessfully, to convert them to Stalinism. By

spring 1940, after being given food and false assurances of repatriation, the prisoners were

transported in groups of 100. Correspondence between them and their families suddenly ceased.

Most were executed and buried at three sites:

• Katyn (Kozielsk prisoners)

• Kalinin (Ostashkov group)

• Kharkiv (Starobielsk group)

These latter two sites were only confirmed in 1992.

After Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, the Polish government-in-exile asked

Stalin about the missing officers. He replied they had “escaped to Manchuria.”

In April 1943, Germany announced the discovery of mass graves at Katyn.

The Soviets reversed the accusation and blamed the Germans.

International forensic experts — Swiss, Polish, and Hungarian (including Professor Ferenc

Orsós) — confirmed the executions occurred in spring 1940, proving Soviet guilt.

Nevertheless, Britain and the United States, needing Stalin as an ally, publicly supported the

Soviet version.

DOSSZIÉ 3 — THE KATYN FILES IN HUNGARY

Béla Varga, Catholic priest and Speaker of the Hungarian Parliament (1945–47), was the first to

propose a link between Katyn and Wallenberg.

In a 1980 interview in Új Látóhatár he stated:

“Stalin ordered that anyone who knew the truth about Katyn must be eliminated.”

From autumn 1939 onward, nearly 200,000 Polish soldiers and civilians reached Hungary, where

they received protection and assistance. Approximately 55,000 escaped through Italy to France,

later forming the reconstituted Polish Army.

The Polish Home Army maintained vital connections with the government-in-exile through these

refugees.

In 1943, when news of Katyn broke, the Polish government-in-exile requested documentation.

Varga gathered forensic evidence, including expert analysis by Professor Orsós. Some

documents were smuggled to London; others he personally delivered to Switzerland.

The remaining documents — including the most sensitive — were stored in a Hitelbank vault in

Budapest, along with funds for future resistance efforts.

DOSSZIÉ 4 — THE WALLENBERG CONNECTION

After the German occupation of Hungary on 19 March 1944, Per Anger of the Swedish Legation

began issuing provisional passports to Jews with Swedish ties. The volume of requests exploded,

and reinforcements were needed.

Negotiations between the American War Refugee Board, the Swedish Foreign Ministry, and the

World Jewish Congress led to the appointment of Raoul Wallenberg.

He arrived in Budapest on 9 July 1944.

At the border, he saw freight cars packed with Jews being transported toward “labour camps.”

With Auschwitz transports disrupted by Allied bombing, many were diverted or forced into

death marches.

By August, as information about the extermination camps reached Hungary, Wallenberg

received full support from Regent Miklós Horthy.

Using American funding and Swedish diplomatic tools, he created Swedish Houses, flew the

Swedish flag over them, and issued certificates of protection to thousands.

Polish refugees — including officers and couriers — trusted no one more than Wallenberg.

It is highly likely they entrusted him with:

• documents exposing Soviet guilt for Katyn

• diplomatic materials showing Hungary’s assistance to Polish refugees

• evidence the Soviets wanted erased

This evidence would cost Wallenberg his life.

DOSSZIÉ 5 — MIKÓ ZOLTÁN, THE VAULTS & THE DOCUMENTS

Captain Zoltán Mikó, a Hungarian staff officer in the resistance, worked closely with

Wallenberg.

On Christmas Eve 1944, Wallenberg urgently asked Mikó to move the Legation’s valuables and

confidential papers to safer storage — the vault of the Hungarian National Bank.

Those documents included:

• diplomatic records

• correspondence between Hungary and Britain

• Polish underground intelligence

• Katyn-related materials

These vaults, used by multiple embassies, were believed secure.

When the Soviets seized Budapest, they blew open the vaults and confiscated everything.

Within days, Wallenberg, Varga, Mikó, and Lieutenant Miklós Bondor were arrested.

DOSSZIÉ 6 — ARRESTS & INTERROGATIONS

Varga was taken to a Soviet military prison in Kispest.

The NKVD interrogated him specifically about Katyn.

A sympathetic interpreter warned him:

“Stalin ordered that all who know about Katyn must be eliminated.”

Bondor, arrested on 13 February 1945, reported that the Gestapo questioned him about Mikó,

while the NKVD questioned him about Wallenberg.

When Bondor said Mikó only helped with food and supplies, the Soviets pressed:

“What do you know about the documents?”

Bondor did not know their content or location.

He was shown photographs of Polish officers — almost certainly Katyn victims.

On 9 July 1945, in Constanța, Romania, Mikó and Bondor were tried and sentenced to death for

“training spies.”

In the death cell, Mikó told Bondor the truth:

Wallenberg had been carrying documents relating to the Katyn massacre.

And Wallenberg believed the Americans would save him.

DOSSZIÉ 7 — PARALLELS BETWEEN TWO DISAPPEARANCES

The similarities between Wallenberg and Mikó are unmistakable:

• Both approached the Soviets voluntarily

• Both sought to save lives

• Both were greeted politely

• Both were later arrested without explanation

• Both disappeared within the Soviet system

Wallenberg left Budapest on 17 January 1945 to meet Marshal Malinovsky.

Mikó left in late January to negotiate a surrender that could spare Budapest from annihilation.

Both were imprisoned.

Both vanished.

Both cases were denied for decades.

Soviet detectives investigating Mikó’s home expressed genuine surprise that he had already

reported to Soviet command — evidence of an active investigation into the Wallenberg–Mikó

connection.

The Soviets admitted to holding Wallenberg only in the Gorbachev era; they denied holding

Mikó until 1990.

DOSSZIÉ 8 — THE LONG COVER-UP & THE QUESTION OF GENOCIDE

For 55 years, the Soviet Union presented four contradictory narratives about Wallenberg:

1. He was under Soviet control but not imprisoned.

2. The Soviets knew nothing about him.

3. He died of a heart attack in 1947.

4. He died, but details were unknown.

Even after Russia acknowledged guilt for Katyn in 1992, denial persisted — including a 1998

exhibition in Washington that again blamed Germany.

Polish attempts to obtain a genocide ruling were countered by Soviet allegations about supposed

Polish atrocities in 1919–21, widely viewed as a political distraction.

Why such secrecy?

Because Katyn was:

• a deliberate political mass murder

• the extermination of a nation’s leadership

• an act that fits the definition of genocide

In 1945, revealing the truth would have threatened the Soviet Union’s wartime legitimacy.

From the view of Stalin’s regime, eliminating anyone who might expose Katyn —

including Raoul Wallenberg — was necessary.

Thus Wallenberg became one of the last victims of the Katyn massacre.