Allies Respond to the Holocaust

August Landmesser

Take a moment and ponder the following stats from the U. S Take a moment and ponder the following stats from the U.S. National Holocaust Museum 6 million Jews 5.7 Million Soviet civilians(an additional 1.3 Soviet Jewish civilians are included in the 6 million figure for Jews) 3 million Soviet prisoners of war (including about 50,000 Jewish soldiers) 1.9 million Polish civilians (non Jewish) 312,000 Serb civilians Up to 250,000 people with disabilities 196,000 to 220,000 Roma 1,900 Jehovah’s Witnesses At Least 70,000 repeat criminal offenders and “asocials”

The Question of Jewish Refugees Summer of 1938, delegates from 32 countries met in France to discuss the “refugee problem.” Delegates expressed sympathy for the refugees Most countries however, including the United States and Britain, offered excused for not accepting more refugees. Many Americans worried that refugees would take jobs away from them and overburden social welfare programs Widespread anti-Semitic attitudes, also played a role in the failure to admit more Jewish refugees.

In 1939, the United States refused asylum to Jewish refugees on board the ship the St. Louis. The passengers were forced to return to Germany. Just prior to the start of the war, Britain briefly lifted some restriction and accepted almost 10,000 mostly Jewish children from Nazi Europe. The parents were not allowed to accompany the children, and many never saw their parents again.

Limited Action The Allies were most concerned with military strategy. So, even when reliable reports concerning the Jews started to surface, the Allies were slow to respond. By 1942, the Allies knew that Jews were being taken to death camps in Poland, but often kept this information classified. Over the next two years, both Britain and the United States considered bombing Auschwitz, but neither country ultimately took action.

War Refugee Board In 1944, President Roosevelt established the War Refugee Board, that worked with the Red Cross to save thousands of Eastern European Jews. Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg issued thousands of Swedish passports to Hungarian Jews, which saved them from being deported to Auschwitz

Liberation of the Concentration Camps The Allies only became fully aware of the size of the Nazi genocide program towards the end of the war, as Soviet and American troops began liberating the camps. Soviet forces were the first to liberate a major Nazi camp in Majdanek, Poland By January 1945, the Soviets had also liberated Auschwitz On April 11, 1945, U.S. forces freed more than 20,000 prisoners at Buchenwald

First Hand Account “The initial shock was experienced even before entering the camp. The first evidence of the horror to come was a string of about forty railway cars on a siding near the camp entrance. Each car was loaded with emaciated human corpses ... A row of small cement structures near the prison entrance contained a coal-fired crematorium, a gas chamber, and rooms piled high with naked and emaciated human corpses ... I saw a large number of dead inmates lying where they had fallen in the last few hours or days before our arrival.” —Lieutenant Colonel Felix Sparks, commander of the U.S. 45th Infantry Division

Impact of the Holocaust Two-Thirds of all European Jews are killed Many surviving Jews had nowhere to go in Europe Their homes, villages, and communities had been destroyed Nazis deliberately set out to destroy the Jews for no reason other than their religious and ethnic heritage. Today, the record of that slaughter is a vivid reminder of the monstrous results of racism and intolerance.

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA