The Nazi Holocaust: Part 9 The End of the Holocaust 9783110976519, 9783598215650

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THE NAZI HOLOCAUST

THE NAZI HOLOCAUST Historical Articles on the Destruction of European Jews

Edited by Michael R. Marrus Series ISBN 0-88736-266-4 1. Perspectives on the Holocaust ISBN 0-88736-252-4 2. The Origins of the Holocaust ISBN 0-88736-253-2 3. The "Final Solution": The Implementation of Mass Murder ISBN 0-88736-255-9 vol. 1 ISBN 0-88736-256-7 vol. 2 4. The "Final Solution" Outside Germany ISBN 0-88736-257-5 vol. 1 ISBN 0-88736-258-3 vol. 2 5. Public Opinion and Relations to the Jews in Nazi Europe ISBN 0-88736-259-1 vol. 1 ISBN 0-88736-254-0 vol. 2 6. The Victims of the Holocaust ISBN 0-88736-260-5 vol. 1 ISBN 0-88736-261-3 vol. 2 7. Jewish Resistance to the Holocaust ISBN 0-88736-262-1 8. Bystanders to the Holocaust ISBN 0-88736-263-X vol. 1 ISBN 0-88736-264-8 vol. 2 ISBN 0-88736-268-0 vol. 3 9. The End of the Holocaust ISBN 0-88736-265-6

THE NAZI HOLOCAUST Historical Articles on the Destruction of European Jews

9

The End

•

of the Holocaust

Edited with an Introduction by

Michael R. Marrus University of Toronto

Meckler Westport · London

Publisher's Note The articles and chapters which comprise this collection originally appeared in a wide variety of publications and are reproduced here in facsimile from the highest quality offprints and photocopies available. The reader will notice some occasional marginal shading and text-curl common to photocopying from tightly bound volumes. Every attempt has been made to correct or minimize this effect The publisher wishes to acknowledge all the individuals and institutions that provided permission to reprint from their publications. Special thanks are due to the Yad Vashem Institute, Jerusalem, the YTVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York, and the Leo Baeck Institute, New York, for their untiring assistance in providing materials from their publications and collections for use in this series. Library of Congress Cataloging-ln-Publication Data The End of the Holocaust / edited by Michael R. Μarrus. p. cm. — (The Nazi Holocaust; v. 9) Includes index. ISBN 0-88736-265-6 (alk. paper): $ 1. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945). 2. World War, 1939-1945 — Jews — Rescue. 3. War crime trials. I. Marrus, Michael Robert. Π. Series. D804.3.N39 vol. 9 940.53Ί8 s—dc20 [940.53Ί8] 89-12243 CIP British Library Cataloging in Publication Data The end of the Holocaust - (The Nazi Holocaust; v.9). 1. Jews, Genocide, 1939-1945 I. Marrus, Michael R. (Michael Robert) Π. Series 940.53Ί5Ό3924 ISBN 0-88736-265-6 ISBN 0-88736-266-4 set Copyright information for articles reproduced in this collection appears at the end of this volume. Introductions and selection copyright © 1989 Meckler Corporation. All rights reserved. No part of this material may be reproduced in any form by any means without prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in review. Meckler Corporation, 11 Ferry Lane West, Westport, CT 06880. Meckler Ltd., Grosvenor Gardens House, Grosvenor Gardens, London SW1W 0BS, U.K. Printed on acid free paper. Printed in the United States of America.

Contents Series Preface Introduction

vii ix

Part One: Ransom Negotiations Rescue by Negotiations? Jewish Attempts to Negotiate with the Nazis YEHUDA Β AUER The Official Jewish Leadership of Wartime Hungary RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM Between Apprehension and Indifference: Allied Attitudes to the Destruction of Hungarian Jewry J.S. CONWAY The Mission of Joel Brand YEHUDA Β AUER The Kästner Case: Aftermath of the Catastrophe W. Z. LAQUEUR The Negotiations between Saly Mayer and the Representatives of the S. S. in 1944-1945 YEHUDA BAUER

3 22

41 65 127

156

Part Two: Other Rescue Options The Rescue of European Jewry and Illegal Immigration to Palestine in 1940—Prospects and Reality: Berthold Storfer and the Mossad Le'Aliyah Bet DALIA OFER The Transnistria Affair and the Rescue Policy of the Zionist Leadership in Palestine, 1942-1943 DINAPORAT The Question of Bombing Auschwitz MARTIN GILBERT Why Auschwitz Was Never Bombed DAVID S.WYMAN The "Final Solution" in Its Last Stages LIVIA ROTHKIRCHEN Scandinavian Countries to the Rescue of Concentration Camp Prisoners LENIYAHIL

199

223 249 306 332 356

Raoul Wallenberg—His Mission and His Activities in Hungary LENIYAHIL

398

Part Three: The Death Marches and Liberation July 1944—The Crucial Month fa* the Remnants of Lithuanian Jewry DOV LEVIN The Death Marches in the Period of the Evacuation of the Camps SHMUEL KRAKOWSKI The Death-Marches, January—May, 1945 YEHUDA Β AUER The U.S. Army and the Jews: Policies toward the Displaced Persons after World War II LEONARD DINNERSTEIN Jewish Survivors in DP Camps and She'erith Hapletah YEHUDA BAUER Zionism, the Holocaust, and the Road to Israel YEHUDA Β AUER

447 476 491

512 526 539

Part Four: War Crimes Policy and Postwar Trials The Jewish Factor in British War Crimes Policy in 1942 JOHN P. FOX The International Military Tribunal and the Holocaust: Some Legal Reflections JACOB ROBINSON Nazi Crime Trials ADALBERT RÜCKERL The Deportation of the German Jews: Post-War German Trials of Nazi Criminals HENRY FRIEDLANDER The Judiciary and Nazi Crimes in Postwar Germany HENRY FRIEDLANDER Nazi Criminals in the United States: The Fedorenko Case HENRY FRIEDLANDER and Ε ARLEAN Μ. McCARRICK

583 608 621

635 665 683

Copyright Information

715

Index

719

Series Preface The Holocaust, the murder of close to six million Jews by the Nazis during the Second World War, stands as a dreadful monument to mankind's inhumanity to man. As such, it will continue to be pondered fee- as long as people care about the past and seek to use it as a guide to the present. In the last two decades, historical investigation of this massacre has been unusually productive, both in the sense of extending our understanding of what happened and in integrating the Holocaust into the general stream of historical consciousness. This series, a collection of English-language historical articles on the Holocaust reproduced in facsimile form, is intended to sample the rich variety of this literature, with particular emphasis cm the most recent currents of historical scholarship. However assessed, historians acknowledge a special aura about the Nazis* massacre of European Jewry, that has generally come to be recognized as one of the watershed events of recorded history. What was singular about this catastrophe was not only the gigantic scale of the killing, but also the systematic, machine-like effort to murder an entire people — including every available Jew — simply for the crime of being Jewish. In theory, no one was to escape — neither the old, nor die infirm, nor even tiny infants. Nothing quite like this had happened before, at least in modern times. By any standard, therefore, the Holocaust stands out While Jews had known periodic violence in their past, it seems in retrospect that the rise of radical anti-Jewish ideology, centered on race, set the stage for eventual mass murder. As well, Europeans became inured to death on a mass scale during the colossal bloodletting of the First World War. That conflict provided cover for the slaughter of many hundreds of thousands of Armenians in Turkey, a massacre that Hitler himself seems to have thought a precursor of what he would do in the conquest of the German Lebensraum, or living space, in conquered Europe. Still, the extermination of every living person on the basis of who they were, was something new. For both perpetrators and victims, therefore, decisions taken for what the Nazis called the "Final Solution" began a voyage into the unknown. As the Israeli historian Jacob Katz puts it: "This was an absolute novum, unassimilable in any vocabulary at the disposal of the generation that experienced iL" For more than a decade after the war, writing on the Holocaust may be seen in general as part of the process of mourning for the victims — dominated by die urge to bear witness to what had occurred, to commemorate those who had been murdered, and to convey a warning to those who had escaped. Given the horror and the unprecedented character of these events, it is not surprising that it has taken writers some time to present a coherent, balanced assessment. The early 1960s were a turning point The appearance of Raul Hilberg's monumental work. The Destruction of the European Jews, and the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem in 1961 stimulated debate and investigation. From Israel, the important periodical published by the Yad Vashem Institute [Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority], Yad Vashem Studies, made serious research

available to scholars in English. German and American scholars set to work. Numerous academic conferences and publications in the following decade, sometimes utilizing evidence from trials of war criminals then underway, extended knowledge considerably. As a result, we now have an immense volume of historical writing, a significant sample of which is presented in this series. A glance at the topics covered underscores the vast scale of this history. Investigators have traced the Nazi persecution of the Jews before the implementation of the "Final Solution," showing links both to Nazi ideology and antisemitic tradition. They have indicated how the Germans coordinated their anti-Jewish activities on a European-wide scale in the wake of their territorial conquests, drawing upon their own bureaucracy and those of their allies, enlisting collaborators and various helpers in defeated countries. They have also devoted attention to the victims — whether in East European ghettos or forests, in Central or Western Europe, or in the various concentration and death camps run by the SS. Finally, they have also written extensively on the bystanders — the countries arrayed against the Hitlerian Reich, neutrals, various Christian denominations, and the Jews outside Nazi-dominated Europe. The volumes in this series permit thereaderto sample the rich array of scholarship on the history of the Holocaust, and to assess some of the conflicting interpretations. They also testify to a deeper, more sophisticated, and more balanced appreciation than was possible in the immediate wake of these horrifying events. The literature offered here can be studied as historiography — scholars addressing problems of historical interpretation — or, on the deepest level, as a grappling with the most familiar but intractable of questions: How was such a thing possible? *

*

*

I want to express my warm appreciation to all those who helped me in the preparation of these volumes. My principal debt, of course, is to the scholars whose work isrepresentedin these pages. To them, and to the publications in which their essays first appeared, I am grateful not only for permission to reproduce their articles but also for their forbearance in dealing with a necessarily remote editor. I appreciate as well the assistance of the following, who commented on lists of articles that I assembled, helping to make this project an educational experience not only for my readers but also for myself: Yehuda Bauer, Rudolph Binion, Christopher Browning, Saul Friedländer, Henry Friedlander, Raul Hilberg, Jacques Komberg, Walter Laqueur, Franklin Littell, Hubert Locke, Zeev Mankowitz, Sybil Milton, George Mosse, and David Wyman. To be sure, I have sometimes been an obstreperous student, and I have not always accepted the advice that has been kindly proffered. I am alone responsible for the choices here, and for the lacunae that undoubtedly exist Special thanks go to Ralph Carlson, who persuaded me to undertake this project and who took charge of many technical aspects of iL Thanks also to Anthony Abbott of Meckler Corporation who saw the work through to completion. Finally, as so often in the past, I record my lasting debt to my wife, Carol Randi Marrus, without whom I would have been engulfed by this and other projects. Toronto, July 1989

Michael R. Marrus

Introduction Thefinalphase of the Holocaust poses particular problems for investigators. During the last year of the Reich the Nazis pressed forward with their murderous campaign, often accelerating the tempo of killing. Yet at the same time they sent signals to the West and to Jewish representatives, suggesting the possibility of bargaining for the lives of their victims. One of the most puzzling issues is the ransom negotiations, initiated earlier in the war but intensified in the terrible final months and weeks of conflict Attempting to guard against distortions that might be caused by hindsight, historians have tried to assess the validity of the assumptions made by Jews involved who undertook these contacts, as well as the authenticity of the German negotiating positions. A significant body of opinion holds that there was indeed a genuine prospect, in these discussions, of saving Jews—although significant differences exist, of course, when it comes to evaluating the scale of possibilities. Historians have also considered several other rescue options, such as the proposal to bomb the rail approaches to the camp of Auschwitz in order to save Hungarian Jews being murdered in 1944 and to strike a moral blow against the machinery of destruction. Actively considered, particularly by the British, such proposals were finally rejected by military authorities for a variety of reasons — some of them spurious, others the product of blinkered imaginations, and still others that make sense, given the established priorities of contemporary war planners. The ghastly forced marches of Jewsfromterritories abandoned by the Germans, together with the liberation of the camps, are additional areas of discussion. Finally, this section presents some articles on the postwar trials of the perpetrators, both by international tribunals immediately after the war and by other jurisdictions in the subsequent period. At issue here are the evolution of war crimes policies of the Allied powers and the mechanisms by which perpetrators have been brought to justice in a variety of jurisdictions.

Part One

Ransom Negotiations

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

3

Rescue by negotiations? Jewish attempts to negotiate with the Nazis YEHUDA BAUER

Was there a possibility of saving a part of European Jewry, or a significant number of European Jews, by negotiating with the Nazis? Let us try to put the question into a proper phenomenological context by putting it again, and differently: did a willingness exist on the part of Nazis to forego the murder of some Jews, or to let significant numbers of Jews go, and was this willingness conditional? If the latter, which Nazis were willing, under what conditions, and why? When did such willingness become apparent? Were the Allies, were the Jews (or some Jews) aware of such an attitude, if, indeed, it existed? Behind this problem lurks another with far-reaching implications: were opportunities lost to save Jews, and others as well? This essay will attempt to clarify some of these questions. I shall analyse only a part of the available historical evidence. Four incidents will be chosen: one, the Schacht negotiations with Rublee and the Intergovernmental Committee for Refugees in 1938-9; two, the Working Group negotiations with Dieter Wisliceny in Bratislava, in 1942-3; three, the Kasztner-Brand negotiations with Eichmann in Budapest in early 1944, and the subsequent mission of Brand to Istanbul in May-June of that year; four, the negotiations conducted by Saly Mayer in Switzerland with Himmler's emissary Kurt Becher, August 1944 to February 1945. The mass of material available to the historian on these subjects is great. M y research into the first case has been published in my recent book, My Brother's Keeper. I shall base my arguments primarily on this research with an occasional glance to the archives of the German Foreign Office. For the second case study I shall rely on the letters written by Rabbi Weissmandel and Gizi Fleischmann which are contained in Weissmandel's book, Min Hametzar, as well as on Wisliceny's own testimony and on German Foreign Office material. For cases three and four I will rely not only on published material, but

4

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST

especially on the Saly Mayer papers (which I discovered a few years ago) now located in New York, supplemented by official U.S. material now available at the Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York. As we begin to attack this very complex problem, it may be useful to emphasize that the Nazi policy of mass murder of the Jews - I suggest we discontinue the use of the word 'extermination,' a typical Nazi term - developed over a period of some eight years after the takeover in 1933. It seems fairly well established, as Helmut Krausnick has pointed out in his contribution to Buchheim's Anatomy of the SS State,' that the decision to kill the Jews rather than to expel them was taken not earlier than the period between December 1940 and March 1 9 4 1 . 1 would tend to fix the date around March 1941, because that is when the other orders concerning the treatment of the civilian population in the forthcoming Russian campaign were issued. Mass murder started with the killing operations in J u n e 1941. Prior to this, during the period 1933-8, promotion of emigration was the favoured policy, and from 1938 through 1940 the Nazis resorted to a policy offorced emigration and the theft of emigr6 property. This latter policy was paralleled by the attempt between October 1939 and April 1940 to establish a Jewish reservation in the Nisko area near Lublin, and thereafter by planning, from J u l y to the late autumn of 1940, for the expulsion of European Jews to Madagascar. It was in this second period, 1938-40, that the first incident took place. Austria was annexed in March 1938 and 200,000 more Jews consequently found themselves in the Nazi trap. The Roosevelt administration, trying to take the wind out of the sails of its liberal critics, finally determined to 'do something for the Jews.' The American government thus called a conference of over thirty nations at Evian, France, in J u l y 1938. Presidential initiative was limited, however, by restrictionist, isolationist, and even antisemitic sentiment rampant in the U.S., so that any relaxation of American immigration laws for the sake of admitting more Jews was quite out of the question. Had the administration tried to relax these laws, Congress might well have passed even more restrictive ones. Equally, any allocation of government funds for the resettlement of Jews anywhere else would have been politically unrealistic: no U S. funds were envisaged, for instance, for the ultimately abortive attempts to settle Jews in the Dominican Republic, in British Guiana, and in the Philippines. Nothing much was achieved at Evian except to establish a new body, the Intergovernmental Committee for Refugees (IGCR). This committee did not even have an administrative budget of its own, yet it was supposed to negotiate with Germany and other countries to ensure the ordered emigration and settlement of 'political refugees' - the use of the word 'Jews' was frowned

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS

5

Rescue by negotiations? upon in polite political circles. The IGCR was headed by George Rublee, an American lawyer. Our story begins when, during the Evian conference itself, a crude attempt was made (we do not quite know by what Nazi authority) to sell Austria's Jews to the West. This attempt, immortalized and needlessly embellished by Hans Habe in his novel The Missionwas not taken seriously by the delegates. Rublee nevertheless attempted to convince the Nazis that they should let the Jews leave with some capital in order to make their immigration attractive to the receiving countries. An internal disagreement then developed in Germany between those, such as Ribbentrop, who wanted to refuse Rublee's advances altogether, and those, like Hjalmar Schacht, who wanted to exploit the mass emigration of Jews for Germany's benefit. Schacht did not believe that the forced emigration of penniless Jews would do Germany any good. He therefore devised a plan which, in its revised version, proposed that 150,000 young German and Austrian Jews would be allowed to leave with one-fourth of German Jewry's capital, all in German goods. They would be followed by 250,000 children and middle-aged relatives after the 'pioneers' had made good. The 200,000 remaining, older people who could not emigrate, would be kept alive with the three-fourths of German Jewry's capital that would have been confiscated by the German State. This plan had the obvious added advantage of promoting German exports by sending abroad many German goods requiring spare parts and replacements. German industry would receive a boost, and the Jews would disappear. Schacht got Hitler's explicit approval for this plan on 2 January 1939. 3 Schacht coincidentally resigned his position as Reichsbank director on 20 January, but his line of policy was adopted by Goering. In the same month of January, however, the Nazis created the Central Office for Jewish"Emigration in order to force Jewish emigration by more brutal means. Emigrants were robbed of their property and then simply expelled. This too, was under Goering's overall supervision, but the actual execution was in the hands of Reinhard Heydrich and the ss. Available evidence indicates quite clearly that both policies had Hitler's approval and were intended to be pursued in a parallel fashion. The Nazi position was, or appeared to be, that if the Jews could be got rid of by bartering them to the rest of the world, this would be acceptable; if the rest of the world did not want them, they would be made penniless and expelled by force. The Schacht plan involved the establishment of a fund in the free world which would ensure the absorption of Jews into the countries of immigration either by mass settlement in some circumscribed territory, or by infiltration of existing economies. But the U.S. did not want the Jews to come to its shores.

6

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST

The Roosevelt administration had created the IGCR in order to find a solution that would win for U.S. policy the acclaim of liberals without changing the quota laws or sanctioning the immigration of Jews into its own country. This has been clearly shown by the recent works of Henry L. Feingold, Saul S. Friedman, and David S. Wyman.« The administration also balked at the prospect of increased imports from Germany. Moreover, Jewish efforts at massive fund-raising were feeble, largely because of the impact of the Depression; it was in any case clear that funds for resettling hundreds of thousands of people could not be collected by private agencies. The alternative would have been to ask the administration to provide a large part of these funds. But the Jewish leadership in the United States did not dare to press for money for, as we have noted, it would have been politically impossible for Roosevelt to respond positively. The British, it is true, in a change of policy in June 1939, suggested that governments provide funds for settling Jews. (Prior to that date they had opposed any idea of governmental support for Jewish emigration.) But the Americans still demurred. Their alternative was to force the Jews, despite all the difficulties, to provide the funds themselves. Consequently the so-called Co-ordinating Foundation, set up in June 1939 by Jewish leaders in the U.s. and Britain at the behest of Roosevelt, was invited to take action. Yet still no governments offered to take large numbers of Jews, and funds were no less hard to come by. The war broke out in September 1939 before anything serious could be achieved. It seems clear from the evidence that the Nazis were contemplating letting out those Jews over whom they had control - some 300,000 German Jews, 140,000 Austrian Jews, and an unspecified number of people defined as Jews by Nazi laws. To these were added, in March 1939, 115,000 Jews in Bohemia and Moravia. The fact, equally obvious, that this was only one prong of a two-pronged approach - the other being a policy of terror to force out the penniless Jews - does not subvert our conclusion. It must be admitted, of course, that these plans of Schacht and his successor in the negotiations, Goering's emissary Helmut Wohlthat, involved long-term projects. They counted on an ordered emigration lasting for at least four years in the initial stage, when the young German Jews would leave; the later emigration of adults would take longer. One might therefore infer that Hitler's approval for Schacht's plan was really disingenuous since he was already planning a war. This may be true, but we also know that Hitler was hoping until the very last moment to avoid a conflict with Britain, and that in 1939 he expected the war to be short. The Jewish problem would still have to be solved, as Lucy Davidowicz recently reminded us in The War against the Jews,

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

7

Rescue by negotiations? by the eventual disappearance of the Jews (verschwinden - another key word in Nazi policy). 5 If the Jews could disappear through a process of emigration by which Germany would gain an economic advantage, so much the better. T h e agreement of Hitler to the Schacht Plan appears therefore to be of considerable importance after all. It would indicate that the 'Jewish problem* was far from settled, at least to the extent that Hitler's mind was still not quite made up. His attitude, and that of his immediate entourage, was far from 'immutable* - the German word unwiderruflich conveys much more expressively the full weight of the cruel stupidity of this term. What then aborted the agreement? Undoubtedly it was a combination of factors, but the main one was that the Jewish question simply was not of any real importance to the West, and to Roosevelt in particular. T h e Jews had no power, no ability, as Coser would suggest, to influence the decisions of others. There was an economic crisis in the U.S. that had deepened in 1938, and mass immigration of Jews was unthinkable. T h e Daughters of the American Revolution and other patriotic and right-wing agencies had considerably more clout, as Friedman, Feingold, and Wyman have amply demonstrated. American Jews, moreover, had insufficient money. The total income of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), dispensing American Jewry's aid to Jews abroad, was $8 million for 1939. About $100 million dollars would have been needed to establish German Jews abroad in addition to the German goods representing the 25 per cent of German Jewish capital that the emigrants would be allowed to take out. T h e Nazis really believed their own propaganda, as recent works on Hitler and Himmler have made clear, and thought that they were dealing with a satanic force ruling the world of their opponents.6 They never believed that Jews could not find the funds necessary to secure the emigration of German Jewry. But all this speculation was superfluous. T h e war had broken out and it was too late. Still, it should be stressed that emigration of German, Austrian, Czech, and, under certain circumstances, even Polish Jews, did continue in 1940. T h e numbers were not unimpressive. This clearly indicates that German policy toward the Jews was pursuing parallel lines of emigration and destructive persecution for some time into the war. W e may reiterate, then, that emigration was made impossible, not by the Germans, but by the Allies who seemed to see in the Jews the spectre of 'enemy aliens.' No elaborate negotiations but only common decency would have been sufficient to assist the emigration of very large numbers of Jews to the West during 1940 and well into 1941. Many of these would probably have joined the large numbers of previous refugees who ultimately entered the ranks of Allied armies. More exasperating, no foreknowledge of mass murder,

8

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST

the plans for which did not yet exist, was required in 1940 to stir up such decency. One could merely peruse papers like the New York Times, or magazines like Fortune and Life, to find all the misery, oppression, starvation, and other effects of ghetto life in Eastern Europe graphically photographed and documented. The orders to stop Jewish emigration from Nazi-controlled territories were finally issued beginning in July 1941. By November of that year all exits, with a few exceptions, were closed. The order for the mass murder had already been given, it seems, by the previous March. Finally, the Jews were facing an 'immutable* decision. Or were they? There lived in Slovakia a young ultra-orthodox rabbi, a son-in-law of the great rabbi Shmuel David Halevi Ungar of Nitra, by the name of Michael Dov-Ber Weissmandel. When the deportation of Slovak Jews to Poland started with the expulsion of 16-year-old girls in March 1942, Weissmandel got in touch with his former arch-enemies in the Jewish community - the Zionists. It is interesting how in times of extreme crises the old leaders are often shoved aside and new ones capture the initiative. One of these, in her own way as unlikely as Weissmandel, was Gizi Fleischmann, leader of the Women's Zionist organization in Slovakia, hitherto a philanthropic ladies' group. She also represented the American Joint Distribution Committee and its welfare work in Slovakia. Coincidentally she and Weissmandel happened to be related. Weissmandel and Fleischmann approached the Nazi who was behind the deportations in Bratislava, Dieter Wisliceny, special police attach^ for Jewish questions to the German Embassy and an ss man. Parallel attempts were being made to bribe Slovak officials to stop the deportations, but it was increasingly clear that the key lay with Wisliceny. After three months of deportations an agreement was apparently reached in J u n e to pay Wisliceny a sum of $50,000. One half was paid up with great difficulty but it seemed to have an effect: there were no deportations in July and August. In September four more trainloads of Jews were deported to Poland. During that month the other half of the sum was finally collected and paid. The deportations then stopped for almost two years. Can we attribute this moratorium to the bribe? Weissmandel, furious and despairing, believed so; he accused the JDC and the Jewish world generally of being an accomplice to the murder of the last four trainloads of deported Jews. He charged that the second half of the money had not been paid in time despite appeals to the JDC to send it. He was certain that the $50,000, finally paid and delivered, averted the final destruction of Slovak Jewry for two more years. Historians until now have tended to discount his view and have attributed

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

9

Rescue by negotiations? the stoppage of the deportations to Slovak second thoughts and competing Nazi priorities of murder. By July 1942 the Jews of the Warsaw ghetto were being murdered en masse at Treblinka death camp: the Nazis, it is said, had no time for small-scale operations such as those from Slovakia. There is no contradiction, however, between WeissmandePs account and the German documentation, including Wisliceny's postwar testimony. Weissmandel remembered that the whole story began sometime in Tammuz 5702, June 1942, when he decided to approach Hochberg, a Jewish Gestapo agent with access to Wisliceny, with the offer of the above-mentioned bribe to stop the deportations. Weissmandcl told Höchberg he represented an imaginary world association of rabbis which had close relations with the JDC and could pay in foreign currency. After a short time, Hochberg came back and offered, in Wisliceny's name, the following terms: a cessation of deportations immediately as a sign of good will; the payment of half the bribe after two weeks; a further cessation of deportations for another seven weeks; and the final payment of the other half of the bribe after that. Deportations would then cease completely. T h e Jews, however, would have to see to it that the Slovaks were bribed as well and did not demand the further expulsion of Jews. German documents bear out the story. On 25 June Wisliceny and Hans Ludin (the German ambassador) met with the Slovak prime minister, Vojtich Tuka. The Germans completely surprised the Slovaks by saying that, since 35,000 Jews had been declared by the Slovaks to be economically vital to the country, no more deportations could take place at the moment. Wisliceny would have to go over the protection letters given by the Slovaks to those 'indispensible' Jews before proceeding any further. 7 Actually, nothing like 35,000 Jews had been protected; less than half that number would have been nearer the truth. Ludin, too,'reported to the German Foreign Office that, owing to Church resistance and bureaucratic graft, the deportations would have to be halted. In his postwar testimony, Wisliceny talked of $20,000 that reached him through Hochberg after negotiations in which Hochberg mentioned the name of the 'Joint' (JDC).8 Wisliceny recalled that this was in September 1942, not June, but the discrepancy may not be important since he had no documents to refresh his memory. He also recalled that he had reported to Ludin and to Eichmann, and had written a report which was finally submitted to Himmler: 'In this report I suggested negotiations with representatives of the "Joint," pointing to the intensive propaganda abroad that would ensue once the Final Solution became known.' He then said that he had managed to convince Eichmann to allow him to stop the deportations until the Church and others calmed down. This account makes little sense. Once a report had been submitted to

10

THE END OF THE H O L O C A U S T

Himmler, it was most unlikely that Eichmann would have given his consent to the cessation of deportations on his own. It would therefore seem that Himmler gave his agreement as well, and that he did so because of the prospect of negotiations with the JDC. Weissmandel put it more intriguingly after the war: 'Apart from the money, they wanted in this way to get in touch with Jews in the U.S., for some political reason that was more important to them than the extermination of Jews.*9 Weissmandel, continuing his account, observed that the deportations stopped as promised, and that after the first $25,000 was paid the seven weeks' respite was granted. After that, three more transports were sent to Poland, said Weissmandel, because no way was found to assemble $25,000 more. It was impossible to get this sum from abroad, and Hungarian Jews would not contribute for fear of getting involved with illegal manoeuvres. When, he continued, the other $25,000 was nevertheless collected and delivered, the deportations stopped again (though in actual fact one deportation did take place after the second payment), and were not renewed until 1944. There is no reason to doubt that additional factors, some of which I have already mentioned, were relevant: the protests of the Vatican, the summer offensive in Russia, the deportations from the Warsaw ghetto, and Slovak fears of retribution after the war. Yet I believe that a connection between the payments and the stoppage of the deportations is undeniable. Indeed, following up Weissmandel's intriguing testimony, the very paltriness of the sums involved seems to point to the possibility that financial considerations were secondary even though foreign currency was involved. The primary considerations may in fact have been political. W e shall return to possible political motives later. In November 1942, Weissmandel again approached Wisliceny, again through Hochberg, and asked what the price would be for a cessation of deportations throughout all of Europe. T h e question was formulated by Weissmandel himself, written on an old Underwood typewriter on Swiss writing paper and signed by an imaginary 'Ferdinand Roth' in the name of World Jewry. The reaction was quite surprising. Wisliceny took the letter to Berlin, and returned with the answer that the German side was in principle willing to discuss the matter. Negotiations began with the Slovak 'working group'; Gizi Fleischmann and Eng. Andr£ Steiner were involved. W e have a series of letters from Bratislava, dated from January to June 1943, enabling us to follow the process of these talks. The Germans finally demanded $2 million and further negotiations - this time with 'Joint' representatives. In return, deportations would stop from the whole of Europe except the Altreich (old Germany), Austria, and the Protectorate (Bohemia and

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

11

Rescue by negotiations? Moravia). Poland was left out of the discussions by Wisliceny altogether, though the 'working group' kept coming back to the problem of Polish Jews. O n io M a y , the Germans demanded a final answer to their offer within one month. T h e JDC representative in Switzerland, Saly Mayer, was well aware of the seriousness of the proposal but all his funds were in Swiss banks under rigid war-time controls - and were much less than $2 million. Even had he been able to acquire the sum, he would not have had a way to transfer it to Bratislava. Neither did the New York office of the JDC have the money. In any case, the New York centres of the JDC, the World Jewish Congress, and other agencies, all of whom received information of the offer, did not for a moment believe that it was serious. They did nothing about it. Nor did the Jewish Agency in Palestine, alerted by its representatives in Istanbul, who believed that the offer was serious, have either money or methods of transfer. Desultory talks took place until August 1943, and then Wisliceny told the Jews that the discussions would be, for the moment, halted. He reassured the Jewish negotiators that the Germans might return to them later. There is absolutely no trace of these talks in any German correspondence. Wisliceny did mention in his postwar testimony the 'Europa Plan' - the name by which Weissmandel and Fleischmann have called the proposals. He claimed that Eichmann submitted the plan to Himmler. Again, Wisliceny would hardly be the man to continue contacts with the Jews on his own so one must assume such contacts were indeed maintained at Himmler's behest. Moreover, the theory that the German proposals were serious appears more plausible against the background of German defeats in North Africa in November 1942 and at Stalingrad in February 1943. According to Weissmandel, Hochberg reported a discussion with Wisliceny in which it was implied that some Germans 'believe that it is within the power of World Jewry to influence the Allies to make peace with Germany in order to fight together against the enemy from the North.' 10 It seems obvious to me that the ss did not regard the $2 million dollars as anything but an opening gambit for something they really wanted. That objective will be further clarified if we proceed to consider the third incident. This is perhaps the best known of the four, but historical treatment of it has tended to be very uncritical. Hungary was occupied by the Nazis on 19 March 1944, and some 800,000 Jews were trapped. Eichmann, and his murder squad, the Sondereinsatzkommando, came in immediately. With enthusiastic help from Hungarian antisemites in positions of power, the process of marking, defining, and expropriating the Jews was very swift. Ghettoization began in April, and in May deportations to Auschwitz murder camp had already begun. The whole pro-

12

THE END OF THE H O L O C A U S T

cedure was executed with such dispatch that no organized resistance took place ät all. An ineffective and submissive Judenrat was set up, based on the prewar Jewish welfare society that was representative of the orthodox and 'neologue'* communities of Hungarian Jews and the Zionist Organization. This more or less reflected the relative strengths of different groups in Hungarian Jewry. However, a parallel organization of the adult labour wing of Hungarian Zionism, a section within a very small Zionist minority, came into existence as well. The leaders of this group were Otto Komoly, head of Hun· gary's Zionist organization, his deputy Reszoe Kasztner, and the man responsible for illegal operations of the Zionist group, an ex-communist activist of uncertain background, Joel Brand. As we are not at present concerned with the intricacies of those nightmarish events, I shall simplify." Kasztner, the man responsible for contacts with the Germans on behalf of the Zionist Rescue Committee, knew all the details of the 'Europa Plan* negotiations: Wisliceny had moved to Budapest as a member of Eichmann's murder gang, and had a letter of introduction from Weissmandel to the leader of Hungary's orthodox Jewry. Kasztner tried to exploit these contacts for all they were worth. The serious bargaining began with Wisliceny for the lives of Hungarian Jewry. Sums of money in Hungarian currency were paid, but there were no results. Eichmann very quickly removed Wisliceny from these negotiations and took over himself. For some reason he preferred to deal with Joel Brand, rather than with the more intelligent Kasztner, and on 25 April he presented his famous offer: a million Jewish lives for 10,000 trucks - which would not be used against the West - and an ill-defined quantity of goods such as coffee, tea, and cocoa. O n i g May, Brand arrived in Istanbul with this offer. He did not come alone but in the company of a most interesting figure, Bandi Grosz, alias Andreas Gyorgy, to whom we shall soon return. Brand submitted his plan to the Istanbul group of Jewish Agency emissaries who immediately informed the U.S. and British ambassadors in Turkey and the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem. We shall not follow the twists in Brand's dramatic story: his journey to Syria, his imprisonment by the British, and his long talk with Moshe Sharett, head of the Jewish Agency's Political Department. What is of great importance is that the British and U.S. governments were immediately informed. We must remember that this was 1944: a few months earlier, in January, Roosevelt had established the War Refugee Board (WRB) whose task it was to come to the aid of groups, mainly Jews, persecuted by the Nazis. The WRB could, it • T h e 'neologue' communities were traditional, not unlike those of the Conservative movement among American Jews today.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS

13

Rescue by negotiations? was assumed, be counted on in any realistic plan to save Jews. Deportations from Hungary to Auschwitz began, however, on 14 May - before Brand ever left Hungarian soil, a fact which weakened the argument to the WRB that Eichmann's proposals should be seriously considered. Did Britain and the U.S. in fact take Brand's mission seriously? They did, but only up to a point. It was obvious that one of the purposes of the German offer was to sow distrust between the West and the USSR. The crude intimation that the trucks would not be used in the West was sufficient. To eliminate the possibility of a misunderstanding, the West immediately informed the Soviet Union of the German offer, to which the Soviet deputy foreign minister, Andrei Vishinsky, replied on 18 June: the Soviet government 'does not consider it expedient or permissible to carry on any conversations whatever with the German government on the question touched upon.' The British government seemed genuinely alarmed that the Americans might seriously consider negotiating with the Germans for the release of Jews. 'There seems to be some danger,' an internal British government report stated on 31 May, 'that an indication that we might negotiate might lead to an offer to unload an even greater number of Jews on to our hands.' The British government indicated to the U.S. authorities on 5 June that the 'implied suggestion that we should accept responsibility for maintenance of an additional million of persons, is equivalent to asking the Allies to suspend essential military operations.' The concessions demanded by Germany, the British argued, seemed calculated to stave off Germany's defeat and were therefore unacceptable. Internal Cabinet Committee discussions in London, moreover, put the word 'rescue' of Jews in inverted commas: the implication was that the proposals were not serious. Any action on behalf of Jews, it was contended, 'would overlook the fact that German brutality has been directed very extensively, above all in Poland, against non-Jews.' These words, by the way, were written by Anthony Eden, who had signed the United Nations declaration of 17 December 1942 that had condemned the singling out of all European Jews for mass murder. 12 American reactions were more careful. On 9 June the acting secretary of state, Edward Stettinius, was informed by the director of the WRB that Roosevelt himself had 'agreed with our thought that we should keep the negotiations open if possible.' Eichmann's proposals might be 'the forerunner of other proposals.' Negotiations should continue 'in the hope that, meanwhile, the lives of many intended victims will be spared.' This paralleled the policy of the Jewish Agency. Sharett, director of the Agency's Political Department, asked for continued negotiations in order to gain time and lives, though he was aware that no trucks could be delivered to the Nazis. Specifically, the Agency wanted Brand to go back to Hungary with the message that Eich-

14

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST

mann's offer was being discussed and further negotiations would take place.' 3 The British, surprisingly enough, were in favour of Brand's release from Cairo where he had been detained, but for a number of reasons Brand did not return to Hungary. Let us now go back to Bandi Grosz. This gentleman, who to this day thrives in southern Germany, is of Jewish ancestry. He worked for the German Abwehr (military intelligence) before the occupation and was ordered to establish contacts with Allied services in Turkey, which he did. He also served the Hungarian military intelligence, and in 1943 he began working as well as a courier for the Zionist Rescue Committee in Budapest. When the Germans occupied Hungary the Abwehr unit in Budapest was liquidated by the ss; so Mr Grosz transferred his allegiance to that organization. Grosz was well known to the Allied outposts in Istanbul when he arrived there as Brand's companion. He stated the object of his mission at a trial in Israel in 1954 in the following terms: 'My own mission was the main one, Brand's was only a cover.' It consisted of an attempt, in the name of Otto Klages, chief SD commander in Hungary, to make contact with the Western Allies and try to arrange for a meeting between German and American officers to discuss whether a separate peace could be negotiated. Grosz claimed that Klages had told him to conduct this peace feeler very carefully. The best cover appeared to be Brand's offer, since the latter would become superfluous if a separate peace were achieved; the persecution of Jews would cease in either case.'4 Grosz's story was believed by the emissaries in Istanbul, as Ehud Avriel, one of their number, said at the Israeli trial.' 5 In fact, the British Foreign Office cabled its embassy in Madrid on 20 July: 'We have secret evidence that the Nazis are using Jews in order to make contact with British and American authorities as a cover for peace proposals with the obvious motive of dividing HMG and U.S. governments from the Soviet government.,'6 On 6 June, Reuben Reznik, the JDC representative in Ankara, who was attached to the U.S. ambassador there, wrote in a memo that, regarding Grosz (Gyorgy), 'the U.S. Military Intelligence, the American Consulate-General and other allied services have fuller details.' Grosz asked, said Reznik, that any negotiations should be conducted, not by Jewish organizations, but by a representative of the Allied governments. It was likely that a military putsch was being prepared in Germany, and that the Germans were intent on creating a favourable climate toward such an event in the West. In this connection there was a suggestion that Grosz (Gyorgy) may have brought some information regarding such a putsch. He was well known to the Allied secret services, and the peace feelers which he brought with him were taken seriously. Later,

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

15

Rescue by negotiations? when he was in Cairo, Grosz told the full story of his mission to his British interrogators.'7 Brand himself was aware of the importance of the Grosz proposals, of which he had at least some knowledge. The reports of the Agency emissaries in Istanbul in May and June 1944 leave no doubt about this. I would tend to conclude that Grosz was right: his was the main mission; but the sale of Jews -to the Allies would nevertheless have been a good ploy to start the process of negotiation going, and also a political card of real importance. After all, the Jews in the Nazi pseudo-religion fulfilled the role of the satanic force ruling the West and the non-Nazi world in general; if peace with the western Allies was to be obtained, some accommodation regarding the Jews might pave the way. It is by now fairly well established that Himmler had some prior knowl-. edge of the anti-Hitlerite underground, whose machinations culminated in the attempted putsch on 20 July 1944. Heinz Hoehne, in his book on the SS, provides some convincing evidence that Himmler in fact maintained contact with parts of the anti-Nazi conservative underground though he may not have known the details of the forthcoming assassination attempt.' 8 It is open to question whether other central figures in the SS were equally innocent of such knowledge. In any event, accounts such as that of Hoehne, and memoirs such as those of SS intelligence chief Walter Schellenberg or Felix Kersten, Himmler's masseur, suggest that after 1942 Himmler had been playing with the idea of saving Germany by making a separate peace with the West. If that were the case, the Brand-Grosz mission would seem consistent with its German background. Otherwise, the mission is inexplicable. This leads me into the fourth incident with which I shall deal: the Swiss negotiations. These were a direct consequence of the failed Brand-Grosz mission. The British and American governments did not want to close all doors to possible rescue attempts, largely for fear of public opinion after the war. This point was made, expressis verbis, in the discussions of the British Cabinet Committee on Refugees. It is also fair to say that the people in charge of the WRB wanted to do all they could to advance realistic rescue schemes within the framework of conditions imposed by the war. Suggestions were made regarding possible intermediaries. Two persons suggested by Kasztner, a British and an American citizen already accepted by the Germans, were rejected because of apprehension about strong Russian objections. In the end it was agreed, although with grudging and half-hearted British acquiescence, that Saly Mayer, the JDC representative in Switzerland and a Swiss citizen, should conduct the negotiations. Mayer was a very proper and strictly observant Jew, a respected businessman who was also a former presi-

16

THE END OF THE H O L O C A U S T

dent of the Swiss Jewish community. The WRB drew up instructions for him which were transmitted to Roswell D. McClelland, a former social worker with the Quakers, who served as the WRB representative at the U.s. embassy in Berne. These instructions, bearing the date 21 August and signed by the secretary of state, Cordell Hull, explained that the U.S. government 'cannot enter into or authorize ransom transactions of the nature indicated by German authorities. If it was felt that a meeting between Saly Mayer and the German authorities would result in gaining time, the Board has no objections to such a meeting ... Saly Mayer should participate as a Swiss citizen and not (repeat not) as representative of any American organization.' 19 What followed, from 21 August 1944, when Mayer met with Kurt Becher (Himmler's emissary) at the St Margarethen bridge near St Gallen, to February 1945, when contacts were broken off, is one of the more remarkable stories of that dark period. In a series of meetings during August and September 1944, Mayer managed to shift the discussion from goods and trucks to ransom money. T h e fact that he kept the talks strictly secret with no other Jewish representatives participating resulted in his incurring the wrath of the various Jewish group» who were desperately trying to help but were only getting in each other's way. Mayer far exceeded the terms of his brief. His reports to the man who was supposed to supervise him, McClelland, received the latter's full approval, and the relationship between the two men developed into a warm, personal friendship. But Mayer never told McClelland the full story. He not only talked money to th^. Germans, but even promised them quite definite sums. O f course, he never hinted to the Germans that he was not empowered to talk to them about goods or money. Nor did he reveal to them that on 8 August, prior even to the talks, he had been told by the Swiss chief of the alien police, Heinrich Rothmund, that the Swiss government would refuse entry to Jews who came as a result of a ransom deal. He never mentioned to McClelland either that he actually bought Swiss tractors and sent them to Germany in order to show the Germans that there was reason to continue the negotiations. T h e first result of the Swiss talks was the transfer to Switzerland of a trainload ofJews from Hungary, 318 in number, who were part of a group of some 1690 Jews that had been organized by Kasztner in Budapest in June 1944. The SS agreed to ship these Jews out of their empire, and with this act seemed to commit themselves to further negotiations. It also implied that they might ease the 'immutable' decision to murder all Jews. The release of the 318 had been made a precondition of the first meeting on 21 August. The second group, over 1300 in number, was released in December during the course of further negotiations. It should also be noted that, from the very first, Mayer

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

17

Rescue by negotiations? shifted the discussions from Hungarian Jewry alone to the overall problem of Jews in Europe, and in September began to broach the subject of non-Jewish slave labourers and camp victims as well. Becher, impressed by Mayer, cabled Himmler a very positive report, hinting that, since a good impression was being made on the Allies via Mayer, the negotiations should be kept up. O n 25 August, Himmler ordered the suspension of further deportations of Jews from Budapest; this seems to me to have been a direct result of this development. 10 T h e Nazi representatives next began to press Mayer for a meeting with someone who would have political plenary powers (mit allen politischen Vollmachten). Mayer, without money, without backing, but with an urgent desire to keep the discussions going, asked the Nazis to specify what they would want to buy with the money he would give them in Switzerland. A n ss emissary by the name of Herbert Kettlitz was sent to Switzerland to find the goods in the small, beleaguered, shortage-ridden country. It was obvious that he had no idea what he wanted, and that the real purpose of the Nazis was different: Becher wanted to meet an American with political authority. Mayer would have to produce McClelland if the negotiations were to continue. Becher's second in command, M a x Grueson, told the leader of Hungarian orthodoxy, Philip von Freudiger, that the purpose of the Germans was 'to urge the Jews who, it is notorious, control all operations in Britain and the U.S., to compel the Allies to stop the war against Germany. Germany would be ready to undertake a common action with the western powers against Russia.'" Becher himself was given the opportunity of proving to his boss, Himmler, that his contacts with Mayer did, in fact, lead to the U.S. O n 5 November, a unique event took place in the history of World W a r 11: SS-Colonel Kurt Becher, on direct instructions from Himmler, met in Zurich with Roswell D.- McClelland, attache to the U.S. embassy in Berne. A t that meeting Mayer demanded an end to the killing of all civilians, Jews and nonJews, intervention by the International Red Cross, and the exit of orphans to Switzerland" - the Swiss had finally agreed to that. In October and November 1944, Himmler gave first oral and then written instructions to stop the gassings at Auschwitz. It is impossible to determine the immediate motives for this decision: obviously the impending collapse of the eastern front, the growing desire to look for an alibi, and other factors all were involved. But when all is said and done it would appear that the Mayer negotiations played at least some part in Himmler's decision. T h e collapse of Nazidom, rather than leading to the order to stop the gassings, could well have produced the opposite reaction: the Jewish remnant might have been destroyed,

18

THE E N D O F THE H O L O C A U S T

quickly and radically, in order to eliminate all witnesses to Nazi crimes. M u r dering did not cease, of course: overwork, freezing, starvation, and indiscriminate shooting destroyed many thousands of human lives. But the gassings stopped. As I have already stated, we know today what M a y e r did not know until early 1945: Himmler himself was the force behind Becher and was personally guiding the negotiations. Himmler protected himself by obscuring the purpose of the negotiations, and by presenting them to Hitler and Ribbentrop as a deal which would bring Germany and the ss much needed materials in return for the release of some Jews. W e also know that Hitler himself had given his half-hearted agreement to such a course in July 1944. As Ribbentrop reported: ' T h e Fuehrer has decided, upon my suggestion, to accede to the wishes of the Hungarian government in the question of ofFers from abroad to ship Jews there.' (Der Fuehrer auf meinen Vorschlag entschieden hat, der ung. Regierung in der Frage der austaendischen Angebote fiter den Abtransport von Juden ins Ausland entgegenzukommen.)i3 Himmler's purpose was obviously different, but he had to show some real gains in money or goods before any further steps could be contemplated. O n 21 November however, a State Department cable arrived in which Edward Stettinius forbade any deal in which the WRB would agree to pay ransom, and refused Mayer's request to transfer $5 million to Switzerland for Mayer's use in the talks. M a y e r succeeded in bluffing his way through nevertheless, and Becher, in the mistaken belief that the money was forthcoming, advised Himmler to show good faith. Again, the progress of the negotiations explain some further SS 'gestures.' O n 6 December, the rest of the so-called Kasztner transport of about 1300 Jews was released from Bergen-Belsen and arrived in Switzerland. Also consider the following: Eichmann had started to deport Jews from Budapest by foot-marches to the Austrian border. During the month of November, tens of thousands of Jews were marched under the most frightful conditions; very many died. But at the end of November, an order was given to halt the foot-marches. It seems likely that the hope of achieving something in the M a y e r negotiations contributed to this SS decision. In early January, the opposition of Stettinius to the transfer of $5 million to M a y e r was finally overcome. T h e money was not paid to the Germans, but served only to goad the SS into further talks. T h e r e were now also parallel efforts through other intermediaries: the Swiss politician Jean-Marie Musy and, in Sweden, a Nazi by the name of Peter Kleist who tried to contact the Americans there. As the end of the war drew nearer, Himmler's efforts to arrive at a separate

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS

19

Rescue by negotiations? agreement with the West grew more and more frantic. Surviving fragments of Himmler's correspondence bear this out. On 15 January 1945, he finally asked: 'Who is it that the American government is really in contact with. Is it a Rabbi-Jew or is it the Jioint?(sic)' ( Wer ist derjenige mit dem die amerikanische Regierung wirklich in Verbindung ist. Ist es ein Rabbiner-Jude oder ist es die Jioint?).7* The SS leaders who survived the war all testified that Himmler tried to prevent the actual mass murder of the remaining Jews, an attitude towards which the Mayer negotiations probably contributed. As a consequence, some 150,000 or 200,000 Jews were liberated from the concentration camps when the war ended. Many more, of course, did not benefit from the decline in mass killings: they were tortured to death, marched to death, shot, or succumbed to the effects of starvation and disease. It would be wrong, furthermore, to depict Himmler as a late convert to humanity; but he did try to save his own skin. Incredibly, he seemed to think that the West might see in him a leader of some postwar Germany allied to it in its struggle against Russia. T o conclude then, however much this conclusion is at odds with conventional impressions, a willingness does appear to have existed on the part of the Nazis to let significant numbers of Jews go - for a political price. This willingness is naturally much more pronounced after El Alamein and Stalingrad, and it became positively urgent as the war approached its end. But even before the war itself, and certainly before the decision to murder all Jews was taken, some key Nazi figures were prepared to exchange Jews for political and economic advantage. Which Nazis were willing to let the Jews go? Paradoxically, the very people who executed Hitler's order to kill them: Himmler and a certain group of his closest associates - Schellenberg, Wolff, and Klages. Why were they willing? For the war period, this question can be answered quite easily. They believed the Nazi theory that the Jews, a demonic force, were running the world; in an attempt to strike a compromise with the West the European Jews in ss hands thus might be key hostages (Faustpfand), compelling the Western powers (under their Jewish dominance!) to come to terms with an ss-run Germany. This aim - trading the Jews for a political settlement - did not contravene the Nazi determination to get rid of the Jews, expressed by Himmler as late as April 1945 in his talks with the emissary of the World Jewish Congress from Sweden, Norbert Mazor. The ss leadership saw itself still loyal to Nazi ideology when it tried to stop the war and, at the same time, get rid of the Jews by expulsion. In fact, Himmler was consciously following a policy that had, in January 1939, received Hitler's explicit approval.

20

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST

Why not return to the Schacht-Goering line if Germany stood to benefit from it? Some Allied, and some Jewish, leaders were at various times aware that the expulsion option was serious, and, although nobody could foresee in 1939 that Jews left under Nazi rule were under so pervasive a sentence of death, everybody could see that they were faced with a single-minded persecution. Were the possibilities of saving Jews exploited? In 1939 the problem was how to save 600,000 German and Austrian Jews. An effort was needed but there was no incentive for the Western powers to make it. How many battalions, in Stalin's famous phrase, did the Jews have? They would have to support any anti-Nazi coalition anyway: they were in the bag, for the little they were worth. A humanitarian gesture toward them was all that could be expected - that gesture was made through Rublee - but when this gesture threatened to become a commitment to accept refugees, the problem was handed back to the Jews themselves. The Jewish organizations in 1939 were powerless. More than this, they had no understanding that the Schacht proposals were an alternative to, at best, more brutal expulsion. They were divided into warring factions and they had nowhere near the required funds. Nor were they equipped to raise even insufficient funds. T h e Allies saw the Jewish problem as a side-issue of the war. The Russians refused even to consider it. Britain was afraid that the Jews would be unloaded on her, or that the prosecution of the war might be affected. I would even claim, on the basis of the British documents I have seen, that a good deal of antisemitism, quite openly expressed in internal discussions, entered into the British stand. T h e Americans, for their part, wanted to help, especially after the establishment of the WRB. But they would have nothing to do with ransom negotiations, since they too were afraid of Russian reactions. During the war itself the Jews were quite ineffectual. They could not openly criticize the Allies. They had little money, and less influence. It was only tenacious and courageous individuals, such as Weissmandel, Kasztner, and Mayer, who grasped the awful situation and rescued - through bluff and pretence - as many Jews as they did, and more than could have been expected. There was a possibility of saving Jews by negotiations; no historian can say how many. A Hebrew saying goes: 'He who has saved one human life is likened to him who saved an entire world.' Many worlds were needlessly lost. T h e conclusion that negotiations might have secured the survival of very many Jews is inescapable; but to save them would have required other priorities, a change in thinking and purpose, on the part of the Western Powers

R A N S O M NEGOTIATIONS

21

Rescue by negotiations? and the public opinion that supported those governments. Given the context in which the leaders of the West operated, no such rescue was possible. This demonstrates how cheaply human life is valued in civilizations confident of their humanism.

ι Helmut Krausnick, 'Judenverfolgungen' in: Hans Buchheim, et al., Anatomie des • SS Staates, Ölten und Freiburg 1965, vol. 2, pp. 360 ff. 2 Hans Habe, The Mission, New York 1967 3 Yehuda Bauer, My Brother's Keeper, Philadelphia 1974, pp. 274-6 4 Henry L. Feingold, The Politics 0/Resau, New Brunswick, nj., 1970; Saul S. Friedman, No Haven for the Oppressed, Detroit 1973; David S. Wyman, Paper Walls, Amherst, Mass., 1968 5 Lucy S. Davidowicz, The War Against the Jews, Philadelphia 1975 6 Josep Ackermann, Himmler ah Ideologe, Goettingen 1970; Norman Rich, Hitler's War Aims, New York 1973; Alois Hilgruber, Die Endloesung und das deutsche Ostimperium, in Vierteljahresheflefuer Zeitgeschichte 1972, Heft 2, pp. 133-53; Joachim C. Fest, Hitler, New York 1975 7 Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews, Chicago 1961, p. 467 8 Wisliceny's testimony, 11/18/46, Trial Proceedings, Onlud 17/46, p. 132, quoted in Livia Rothkirchen, Churban Yahadut Slovakia, Jerusalem 1961, p. 243 9 M.B.D. Weissmandel, Min Hametzar, New York 1953, p. 45 10 Ibid., p. 66 11 For a detailed account see my Holocaust in Historical Perspective, Seattle 1978. 12 Public Record Office, j r (44) 18,5/31/44; 6/28/44; and UA Foreign Relations, 1944, vol. i, p. 1074 13 Ibid., p. 1047, p. 1061; and State Department paper 840.48 Refugees/6-944;

PRO-Jr(44), 7/1/44

14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Shalom Rosenfeld, ed., Tik Plili 124, Tel-Aviv 1956, pp. 76-89 Ibid. u.s. Foreign Relations, 1944, vol. 1, p. 537 See Bela Vago, 'The Intelligence Aspect of the Joel Brand Mission* in Yad Vashem Studies, vol. 10, Jerusalem, 1975 Heinz Hoehne, The Order ofthe Death's Head, London 1969, pp. 483-539 wrb cable 2867, w r b Archive, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York Randolph L. Braham, ed., The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry, New York 1963, docs. 214, 294, 295 Supra, n. 18 Interview with Roswell D. McClelland, 7/13/67 oho. Institute of Contemporary Jewry, Hebrew University; Rudolf Kasztner, Bericht, Munich, 1961, pp. 211-16 Braham, The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry, vol. 2, p. 700 Yad Vashem, 0-51/DN - 39/2119

22

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST THE OFFICIAL JEWISH LEADERSHIP OF WARTIME HUNGARY RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

As A POLITICAL scientist fascinated by historical studies in general, and by those of the Holocaust in particular, I am — as are all my colleagues at this symposium — keenly aware of the responsibility we share as chroniclers and scholars. I am fully cognizant of the fact that as historians we must, before making assessments, however tentative and qualified these may be, study and analyze the attitude and behavior of the historical figures — in this case those of the Jewish Council leaders — in the context of the time and place in which they played their parts. I am also aware that we must attempt to reconstruct the historical situation in which these leaders operated as faithfully and as exactly as available sources will permit. Having identified but some of the premises which scholars often take for granted, I must hasten to state that history and historians have not been kind to the leaders of Hungarian Jewry — and perhaps justifiably so. The thrust of their accusations was generally against Hungarian Jewish leaders who failed to: — Provide meaningful assistance to their oppressed and persecuted brethren in the neighboring Nazi-dominated countries; — Accurately inform the Jewish masses of Hungary of the realities of the Nazi persecutions and concentration-extermination camp system, even though they were aware of the program for the implementation of the Final Solution; — Take adequate precautionary measures for their own safety for, unlike the leaders of other Jewish communities of Europe, they had almost five yean to prepare for the possible ultimate catastrophe; and — Organize any collective resistance, or provide the kind of courageous leadership after the German occupation that the extraordinarily perilous conditions required.

This paper aims at exploring the validity of these accusations- by:

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

— Evaluating the functional-operational characteristics of the official wartime Hungarian Jewish leadership; — Analyzing the quality and effectiveness of the leadership under conditions of stress; and — Providing a typology of leadership in the context of HungarianJewish communal political life.

The most charitable historians and chroniclers of the Holocaust, and especially those deeply concerned with the extremely sensitive issues relating to the activities of the Jewish Councils and the resistance movements, decided, for linguistic and many other reasons, not to deal with Hungary. This is the case, for example, in Isaiah Trunk's monumental and valuable Judenrat,1 and Reuben Ainsztein's book: Jewish Resistance in Nazi Occupied Eastern Europe* Their indices contain no references to Hungary, nor to any of the leaders of the Hungarian Jewish Council. In his introduction, though, Ainsztein is rather caustic about the stance of the Hungarian Jews, wondering how a community that produced "such men of action as B61a Kun and Mätyäs Räkosi could not produce better leaders than it did in its greatest hour of need.. He is just as harsh and self-assured in placing the blame for the failure to resist on the part of the Hungarian Jewish community. He states : . . . to many Hungarian Jews who have survived, the responsibility for their failure as a community to fight back against the combined power of the Nazi machinery of genocide and Hungarian antiSemitism is in no doubt They place it squarely on the shoulders of their self-appointed leaders who formed the Jewish Council, and, in particular, on those of its chairman, Dr. Israel Kastner.*

This is as unequivocal an indictment of wartime Hungarian Jewish leadership as can be found in postwar general and Jewish historiography.

1

I. Trunk, Judenrat, The Jewish Councils in Eastern Europe Under Nazi Occupation, New York, 1972. 2 R. Ainsztein, Jewish Resistance in Nazi-Dominated Eastern Europe, New York, 1974. * Dr. Kasztner was actually one of the leaden of Vctad ha-Hazzalah and not on the Council.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST

24

THE OFFICIAL JEWISH LEADERSHIP OF WARTIME HUNGARY

Putting aside Ainsztein's obviously erroneous observation as to the self-appointment of the Council and its alleged leadership by Kasztner, many questions still remain open as to the caliber, character, and quality of Hungarian Jewish leadership during the Second World War. A complete response to these questions requires not only an understanding of the background and modus operandi of the various Jewish leaders, but also an intimate familiarity with the systemic components of the semi-Fascist Horthy regime, including its political culture, governmental structure, and socio-economic policies, which are clearly beyond the scope of this paper.3 Any discussion of leadership — and in this context we may define leadership as "the exercise of uncommon influence upon the followers of a particular community" — must begin with an evaluation of the power upon which it relies and of its operational characteristics. This premise is equally valid with respect to the assessment of a denominational leadership and to the evaluation of a national political elite. It is a truism to state that the Hungarian Jewish leaders — both central and local — did not have the power to make independent decisions. Before the German occupation of Hungary on March 19, 1944, they, as the leaders of all other officially recognized denominations, had a degree of authority over the communities which they administered. The nature and limits of this authority were stipulated by the Hungarian Royal Ministry of Cults and Public Education CMagyar kirälyi Valläs — es KözoUtatäsügyi Miniszterium)* and were exercised under its control. After the occupation, the Jewish leaders

3

Some of these elements are discussed by E. Mendelsohn in his "The East European Jewish Community and its Leadership During the Interwar Period," pp. 1-12 in this volume. * Within the Ministry, the denominations were under the direct jurisdiction of the Main Section for Cults (Valläsügyi föcsoport). In the case of the Jews, the Main Section for Cults exercised direct control over the Central Bureau of the Jews of Hungary (Magyarorszägi Izraelitäk Orszägos Irodäja), the umbrella organization of Hungarian Jewry, the eight major communal districts (közsegkerületek), the Central Bureau of the Autonomous Orthodox Jewish Community of Hungary (Magyarorszägi Autonom Orthodox Izraelita Hitfelekezet. Központi Irodäja), and over the two major educa-

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RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

were forced to operate first under the exclusive authority of the SS, and after a short while under the SS and the German-supported Hungarian government. Within the latter, control over the Jews was transferred from the Ministry of Cults and Public Education to the newly-established Jewish Section of the Ministry of the Interior (Belügyminisztirium) which was dominated by Läszlö Baky and Läszlö Endre, the two Secretaries of State who are universally recognized as among those primarily responsible for the destruction of Hungarian Jewry. It is also a truism that in Hungary, as in Nazi-dominated Europe in general, the Jewish leaders could not possibly have played a decisive role in determining the tempo, or the ultimate outcome, of the Nazis' Final Solution program. Consequently, ultimate responsibility for the destruction of Hungarian Jewry must be placed squarely and almost exclusively on the German and Hungarian authorities who exercised total power through their monopolistic control over the instruments of coercion, including the mass media, police, gendarmerie, and civil service. At this point, it may be superfluous to state that in contrast to the pre-occupation period, the traditional Hungarian Jewish leaders, acting as members of the Judenrat, exercised quite a bit of power. In fact, in one of their first appeals addressed to Hungarian Jewry, they reminded the community that they "had been given responsibility, as well as absolute power, to exercise control over spiritual and material needs, as well as the authority to exploit Jewish labor." 5

5

tional institutions of the community: the Ferenc Jözsef National Theological Institute (A Ferenc Jözsef Orszagos Rabbikipzö Intezet), and the National Jewish Teacher Training Institute (A ζ Orszägos Izraelia Tanitökepzö Intizet). The eight communal districts did not include the Jewish communities in the territories of Felvidek (Upper Province) and Kärpätalja (Carpatho-Ruthenia) which were reacquired from Czechoslovakia in 193839, Northern Transylvania which was reacquired from Romania in 1940, and D61vid£k (the BaSka and adjacent areas) which was reacquired from Yugoslavia in 1941. These were still in the process of administrative reorganization. Magyarorszdgi tiszti dm — es nivtdra ('Title and Name Register of Hungary"), Budapest, 1942, p. 559. R. L. Braham, "The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary: A Tentative Assessment," Yad Vashem Studies, Vol. X, Jerusalem, 1974, p. 96.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST THE OFFICIAL JEWISH LEADERSHIP OF WARTIME HUNGARY

In the light of multiple postwar accusations, the question of whether the Holocaust could have been avoided, or its impact mitigated, cannot be answered adequately without an objective evaluation of the quality and effectiveness of wartime Hungarian Jewish leadership. For unlike the leaders of most other European Jewish communities, the national leaders of Hungarian Jewry were fully aware of the realities of the Nazis' Final Solution program by the time the mass concentration and deportation program was launched in Hungary in May 1944, if not much earlier. One must agree with Professor Jacob Katz when he states that the Holocaust has to be conceived as an absolute novum, something new and unexpected, even by those well acquainted with the past history of Jewish suffering.* But are these perspicacious observations really applicable to the national leaders of Hungarian Jewry? The reactions of the Jewish Council of Budapest, unlike those of the Judenräte elsewhere, must be measured on a somewhat different scale. What was unknown and unimaginable to other Councils, was fully known and quite imaginable to the national Jewish leaders of Hungary. They were, according to the evidence available to us, the only ones who had prima facie evidence of the Nazis' extermination program before the mass deportations began.7 Moreover, the Jews of Hungary, while suffering the iniquities imposed by several major anti-Jewish laws, and mourning the loss of thousands who died in the labor service system,8 and at KamenetsPodolsk and Ujvid^k® (the two major massacres perpetrated before the German occupation), fared relatively well, at least for the first four and a half years of the war. During this long period of uneasy tranquility, the Jewish leaders, although they themselves witnessed the inferno engulfing Nazi-dominated Europe, failed to keep the governmental and political leaders, as well as the Jewish masses, fully in• J. Katz, "Was the Holocaust Predictable?" Commentary, May 1975, 41-48. 7 R. L. Braham, "What Did They Know and When?" The Politics of Genocide: The Destruction of the Jews of Hungary, New York, (forthcoming). 8 For details, consult R.L. Braham, The Hungarian Labor Service System, 1939-1945, Boulder, 1977. 0 R.L. Braham, "The Kamenets Podolsk and D61videk Massacres; Prelude to the Holocaust in Hungary," Yad Vashem Studies, Vol. IX, Jerusalem, 1973, pp. 133-156.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

formed, nor did they implement any of the meaningful precautionary measures suggested by the many Jewish refugees from the neighboring countries. Indeed, although the Jewish masses lived almost in the immediate vicinity of Auschwitz, they, as almost all other Hungarians, had no idea of the gas chambers and of the mass murders perpetrated in the German death camps. They, as their leaders, deluded themselves into believing that at any rate, what happened in Poland and elsewhere could not possibly happen in Hungary, where the destiny of the Jews had been intertwined with that of the Hungarian Christians for over a thousand years. The well-informed Jewish leaders failed to keep the Jewish masses abreast of what was transpiring in the neighboring countries and, good law-abiding citizens that they were, they heeded all the strict censorship regulations, and prohibited the use of the synagogues for such "propaganda" purposes. The causes behind the lack of adequate preparation for the possibility of a catastrophe befalling Hungarian Jews were many and variegated. Two major reasons were the long-standing inability of the various communities to transcend their traditional, and ostensibly irreconcilable, differences, and effect transcongregational unity; and the failure to adhere to the democratic process in the organization and administration of the Jewish communities in general, and of their central institutions in particular. The sudden occupation of Hungary by the Germans found the Jewish community as conflict-ridden and disunited as it had been since 1868, when it had tried for the first and last time to overcome its political and religious differences. Even after the "White Terror" (1919-1920),10 when some of the illusions of the former "Golden Era" (1867-1914)" were dissipated, few, if any, attempts were made 10

The terror of the counter-revolutionary murder squads which followed the overthrow of B61a Kun's dictatorship of the proletariat of March-August 1919, claimed thousands of lives, including many Jews. For details see D. Sulyok, A magyar tragedia ("The Hungarian Tragedy"), Newark, 1954, pp. 257-276. « The "Golden Era" of Hungarian Jewry is generally identified as the period extending from its emancipation in 1867-68 until World War I. During this period the Jews made great strides in industry, commerce, and the liberal professions.

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to end the constant bickering within and among the three major official or semi-official communities — the Neolog, 12 the Orthodox, 13 and the Status Quo14 — as well as the interminable quarrels with the quasiillegal and basically ineffective Zionist Organization.15 Aside from the bickering among the three established communities over the content and form of religious practices, Hungarian Jewry was also plagued by political conflicts between the assimilated-acculturated group and the Zionists; by the conflicting economic concerns of the rich and the poor; and by the rivalries among the larger and semi-autonomous congregations,1® compounded by the jealousy and personal animosity motivating many of the leaders of these communities in the pursuit of their narrow parochial aims. In terms of the typology of leadership developed by Carl J. Friedrich, the Hungarian Jewish leaders who dominated communal life were of the "maintaining" and "protecting" rather than the "initiat-

12

13

14

15

16

The Neolog community comprised the assimilationist strata of Hungarian Jewry, which tended to deviate from traditional Orthodox practices of Judaism; for example, they used choirs and organ music in the synagogues, permitted decorations in cemeteries, and emphasized some of the ethical and esthetic aspects in religious instruction. The Neologs were predominant in the central leadership, as well as in that of most communities of Trianon Hungary. The Orthodox section of Hungarian Jewry was the faction that insisted on strict adherence to traditional values and practices in Judaism. The Status quo or Status quo-ante section of Hungarian Jewry comprised the communities that refused to join either the so-called "congressional" Neolog or the Orthodox faction which had developed in the wake of the unsuccessful Congress of 1868. That Congress aimed at unifying Hungarian Jewry upon the initiative of Baron J. Eötvös, then the Minister of Cults and Public Education. For background information on the issue of Zionism, see R.L. Braham, "Zionism in Hungary," in the Encyclopedia of Zionism and Israel, Vol. I, New York, 1971, pp. 523-527. The bickering also continued in the Jewish Council, where the Neolog leaders insisted on strict obedience to the law and the fulfilment of all requirements, while the Orthodox and Zionist leaders occasionally took bolder positions. The dispute between the Neolog and Orthodox leaders was also noted by the Nazis. See: R. L. Braham, The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry; A Documentary Account, New York, 1963, Doc. No. 248.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

ing" type. They rarely, if ever, initiated any line of action that transcended the established system of values. Firmly committed to the values and principles of the traditional conservative-aristocratic system, and convinced that the Jewish interests were intimately intertwined with those of the Magyars, they never contemplated the use of independent political techniques for the advancement of Jewish interests per se. They proudly considered themselves "Magyars of the Jewish faith" (zsidovalldsu magyarok). Composed of rich, patriotic, and generally conservative elements, this leadership aimed at contributing to the maintenance of the established order by faithfully obeying the governmental directives and by fully associating itself with the values, beliefs, and interests of Hungarian society in general. At the same time, this leadership did everything in its power to protect the basic interests of the community, from which in return it expected not only acclaim, but, above all, voluntary subservience. Its authority was legitimate in terms of two of Max Weber's three major criteria: it enjoyed the sanctity of tradition, however brief and undemocratic in historical terms; and profited from the aura of legality provided by governmental and communal authorization. It was completely non-charismatic; none of the leaders was possessed of any exceptional personal qualities. While devoted to the welfare and continuing progress of the Jewish community, the leaders of Hungarian Jewry were neither inspirational nor highly intellectual. The central as well as the local communal organizations and institutions were, to a large extent, established and operated in an undemocratic fashion. Franchise was limited by property and other qualifications, with the practical result that the leadership was drawn almost exclusively from the wealthiest strata of the community and only a few professionals played an active role in the general intellectual and political life of the locality. Moreover, in Trianon Hungary proper, the leadership of the kehillot tended to comprise primarily the Hungarian patriotic, anti-Zionist, assimilationist elements. Because of their prominence in the communities, these leaders were routinely renominated and reelected; but while most of them rendered great service to the masses, there was very limited organic contact between them. Most of the Neolog and Orthodox leaders of the central organizations and institutions of Hungarian Jewry in Budapest belonged to

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the upper middle class, and some to the lower nobility.17 Reflecting their class background and status, they were basically conservative, and tended to identify with the political and socio-economic views, as well as the irredentist-nationalist aspirations of their Hungarian Christian counterparts. Conspicuously absent from this group were the totally assimilated Jewish industrial magnates. The group also failed to attract, or refused to admit, any leading artists, intellectuals, Zionist figures, women, or young people. Although they were guided by high moral standards as well as by the desire to advance the religious and social welfare of the Jewish community, the modus operandi of these national leaders tended to be highly formal and legalistic, in emulation of the behavior of their gentry counterparts. Unlike many of the Polish and Romanian national Jewish leaders, for example, they shunned using the political arena for the protection and advancement of Jewish interests per se, opposing with equal vehemence both the Zionists and the proponents of a Hungarian Jewish Party. Consequently, their response to the ever exacerbating anti-Jewish measures during the interwar period was apologetic in nature and isolated from the general struggle of European Jewry. Their loyalty to the Hungarian nation, as shown inter alia by their vigorous irredentist struggle for the rectification of the "injustices of Trianon," and their attachment to the gentry-aristocratic establishment, remained unshaken. Perhaps considering the great strides Hungarian Jewry had made during the "Golden Era" of liberalism, these leaders strove to safeguard those rights which the Jews still enjoyed in the wake of the major anti-Jewish laws; and to restore, if possible, the Interessengemeinschaft that characterized the prewar period. They tended to pursue these objectives, however, without abandoning the traditional operational techniques that were proving increasingly ineffective, if not clearly counter-productive. Having no experience in militant political struggles for exclusively Jewish causes, lacking direct contact with the masses of Hungarian Jewry whose intimate problems and spiritual world they did not adequately represent or understand, and voluntarily isolated from the concerns of world Jewry, these leaders emerged during the German occupation "

For the role of the ennobled Jews in Hungary, see: O. McCagg, Jewish Nobles and Geniuses in Modern Hungary, New York, 1972.

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RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

as singularly inept at providing the kind of leadership demanded by these extraordinarily perilous times.18 The weaknesses and strengths, trials and tribulations, perceptions and rationalizations of the traditional leaders of Hungarian Jewry in the Jewish Council19 can be illustrated by the position and attitude of Samu Stern, the then seventy-year-old President of the Council. At the time of the occupation, he was the President of both the Central Bureau of the Jews of Hungary and of the Jewish Community of Pest (Pesti Izraelita Hitközseg), the country's largest and most influential congregation. A Counselor of the Hungarian Royal Court {Magyar kirälyi udvari tandcsos), Stern was a very successful businessman enjoying an excellent relationship with the aristocratic-conservative elements of Hungarian society. Within the Jewish community, he was one of the most highly respected and well-liked leaders. Stern's generosity, combined with his ability to collect large amounts of money for Jewish causes, earned him universal esteem. He was the principal representative of, and one of the chief spokesmen for the Neolog, the assimilationist, and anti-Zionist stratum of Hungarian Jewry. Yet he remained conscious of his deep Jewish roots, and did everything legally possible to advance the cause and interests of the Jews of Hungary as he understood them. His tragedy and that of the Jewish Council resided at least partially in the fact that the aristocraticconservative Christian leadership of Hungary, with which he had a very positive relationship, was itself partly dispersed. With the arrest of the leading members of this class during the first days following the occupation, the Jewish community became totally isolated and an easy prey for the SS. The tragedy was compounded by the official Jewish leaders' insistence upon relying on traditional legal methods, such as the filing of appeals and petitions — methods which had proved highly effective during the pre-occupation semi-parliamentary 18

19

Some of the factors underlying the impotence of the traditional Hungarian Jewish leaders during the occupation were also noted by Munkäcsi, then Secretary General of the Jewish Community of Pest, and a leading official of the Jewish Council. See his Hogyan törtentl ("How did It Happen?"), Budapest, 1947, pp. 10 and 54-55. For details on the Jewish Council in general and its individual members see my: "The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary: A Tentative Assessment," pp. 69-109.

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era, but were totally inadequate for the extraordinarily perilous period of Nazi rule.20 Yet in many ways Stern showed great personal courage in dealing with the Moloch, and did everything possible to win that which was, to his mind, decisive — the race with time.21 In discussing his ascendance to the presidency of the Jewish Council, Stern claims that the Germans had not duped him and that he was aware of what they had done throughout occupied Europe. He also states: . . . I had heard enough about the methods of the Gestapo's illreputed Jewish Department [Eichmann's section in the Reich Security Main Office] to know that they always shunned sensation, disliked creating panic and fear, worked noiselessly, coolly and in the deepest secrecy, so that the listless, ignorant victims might go without an inkling of what awaited them even while the wagon was traveling with them towards death I knew their habits, deeds, and terrifying reputation...

He further asserts that the other members of the Council knew as much as he did when they consented to serve.22 Nevertheless, Stern accepted the role of leader of the Jewish Council, which technically had no legal basis since it was established under the orders of, and at the beginning at least was responsible exclusively to, the SS. He explains his decision as follows: . . . A prisoner at the mercy of his jailer is not in a position to object to the cell into which he is thrown... I had spent sixteen years at the head of the Jewish Community of P e s t . . . In my eyes it would have been cowardly, an unmanly and unjustifiably selfish flight on my part to let down my brethren in the faith during the very instant when they were in dire need of being led, when men having both experience and connections, ready to make sacrifices, might prove useful to a certain extent. What would Jewry abroad have thought of me if I had looked for some issue to escape doing my d u t y ? . . . I was aware that a race with time was on. It was 20

For example, during the middle of June 1944, when the bulk of the provincial Jewish community had already been deported and exterminated, Stern rejected a plan for the clandestine broadcast of "an appeal to the Hungarian Christian society." 21 See his " . . . Ά Race with time': A Statement," in: Hungarian-Jewish Studies, Vol. ΙΠ, pp. 1-47. « Ibid., p. 19.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

anticipated that the war would end within months in a complete defeat of Germany. I calculated though, that even these few months might prove too long a time for flight, that meanwhile other help might be required. I thought also of the possibility of claiming Governor Horthy's help for rescuing the Jews; that man whom I knew for two decades, whom I had assaulted with demands in Jewish affairs any time it had been necessary. I knew, as I had to, that in our state of utter helplessness only the Governor could be of help within the country, and no help could be forthcoming from the outside... 2 9 I . . . kept concentrating all my thoughts on the stringent necessity to delay, with the help of tactical moves, that supreme danger — the annihilation of Hungarian Jewry in its entirety. For an aged man as I was, with health already undermined by time, it would certainly have been an easier alternative to step aside and not take that onerous role of the Council upon my shoulders. But would not just stepping aside have been unscrupulous ? . . . It is not good for the flock to trade an experienced shepherd for an inexperienced one who just happened to be accepted in the midst of tempest.24

Stern soon proved to be unable to cope successfully with the grave problems which confronted the community. It should be pointed out, though, that most of them were beyond his control, and would surely have stymied men of much greater intellectual and leadership qualities. Stern's contacts with the Regent and the other strata of the traditional conservative-aristocratic leadership of Hungarian society were severed; the resources of the community had been almost totally exhausted within a short time; the new Hungarian authorities had completely abandoned their citizens of the Jewish faith who had so loyally served the nation in the past; the Nazis and their Hungarian hirelings were pressing on relentlessly with their Final Solution program. However, Stern still attempted everything in his power under the circumstances and given his own background, tradition, and experience, to save whatever he could until the arrival of the Soviet troops which was generally, if somewhat over-optimistically, considered imminent. The central Jewish Council had been conceived as a "representa23

Stern claims that during the deportation of provincial Jewry, Horthy was isolated and still inclined to believe his Minister of the Interior, A. Jaross, who misled him as to the realities of the deportations. Hungarian Jewish Studies, Vol. ΠΙ, p. 17. Also Petö's statement, ibid., p. 55. 2 * Ibid., pp. 6-7.

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tive" body, a kind of "unity" or "coalition" council. It included a number of members with whom the dominant Neolog leaders had not had intimate contact in the past, and after its reorganization late in April 1944, one member whom they regarded with great suspicion and distrust.25 For this reason, Stern and his two intimate Neolog friends — Ernö Petö and Käroly Wilhelm — acted as a triumvirate.2· The Council held formal meetings only rarely; on the other hand, the three had frequent discussions, to which they occasionally invited many of the administrative officials of the Council. The close cooperation among the three Neolog assimilationist traditional leaders of Hungarian Jewry, throughout their tenure on the Council, was based as much on mutual trust and long-standing personal friendship as it was on their collective distrust of some of the other Council members. It was strengthened by the dictates of the frequent emergencies which required speedy decisions that would have been more difficult for a larger deliberative body. The secrecy of the three, however, was maintained to the chagrin of several of their colleagues on the Council who not only mistrusted their judgment, but also resented the fact that the other Council members had to share responsibility for decisions which they had no part in making. The most prominent of these "rebels" were ΒέΙ& Berend and Lajos Stöckler. They tended to oppose the triumvirate on political, social, and religious grounds. Berend and Stöckler claim to have attempted to represent and defend the interests of the "small," "unprotected" Jews, such as the ones in the so-called Star Houses and in the Budapest ghetto, who did not share the "privileges" granted to exempted and converted Jews. They tended to look upon the members of the triumvirate as the elitist representatives, the propertied "upper classes."27 25

26

27

Hungarian Jewish Studies, Vol. m , pp. 21-22. See also my: "The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary," pp. 73-74, 102-109. For biographical and other information on Petö and Wilhelm, see ibid., pp. 74-75. The controversial role played by Berend on the Council is beyond the scope of this paper. For further details, see my: "The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary: A Tenative Assessment." See also Stöckler, "Gettö elött — gettö alatt" ("Before the Ghetto — During the Ghetto"), Uj tlet, Budapest, Jan. 22 and 30, Feb. 6, 13, and 20, March 6, and April 17, 1947.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

One of the primary functions that the SS envisioned for the Jewish Council was to lull the large Jewish masses into submission by providing them with a false sense of security. The Nazis were, of course, interested in avoiding an uprising on the style of the Warsaw ghetto, and shrewdly maneuvered the Council into actions calculated to assure a calm atmosphere in the Jewish communities.28 The Jews, individually and collectively, were frequently warned that only strict compliance with all the rules and regulations of the German and Hungarian Nazi authorities would "guarantee [their] civilian life within the permitted framework." The Council emphasized that Jews who fulfilled all their responsibilities would enjoy "the same treatment, food, and pay as the other workers," and would be protected. A similar stand was also adopted by members of the Rabbinate. Dr. Ferenc Havesi, the Neolog Chief Rabbi, urged the Jews to "pray to God for yourself, your family, your children, but primarily and above all, for your Hungarian homeland! Love of homeland, fulfilment of duty, and prayer should be your guiding light!"29 In his appeal of April 20, 1944, Dr. Ernö Boda, a Judenrat member, reminded the Jews that they were not only the People of the Book, but also that of the Law, and therefore "must abide by all, even the most severe measures, without any deliberation or pondering." The Council continued to call upon the Jews to "trust and believe," and show "unconditional understanding confidence," even after the deportations began on May 15, with the transport of approximately twelve thousand Jews per day.30 Unlike the Jewish Councils in many other parts of Nazi-occupied Europe, the central and the local Councils of Hungary were never confronted with the agony of selecting Jews for deportation and eventual extermination. This function was fulfilled speedily and effectively by the SS and their Hungarian hirelings. The Council's involuntary actions, however, largely contributed to the smoothness 28

The appeals of the Jewish Council were published in the A Magyar Zsidok Lapja ("The Bulletin of the Hungarian Jews"), the only paper permitted by the authorities. It was, of course, highly censored, and served primarily as a tool for the manipulation of the Jewish masses. 2» Ibid., April 13, 1944, 1. so R. L. Braham, "The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary," pp. 89, 97-98, and 107.

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with which the ghettoization and deportations were implemented. The desire to assure law and order was also one of the primary motives of the SS in their dealings with the Zionist leaders associated with the Va'ad ha-Hazzalah (Rescue Committee) of Budapest, with whom they had deceptively engaged in special "rescue" deals.31 Although these leaders were, at least subconsciously, increasingly aware of the function that was assigned to them, they were also helplessly ensnared. Power was in the hands of the Germans, who also enjoyed the enthusiastic support of the anti-Semitic elements of Hungary which placed the country's instruments of coercion at the Nazis' disposal. The Hungarians, unlike the Danes and the Western Europeans in general, were basically passive in attitude and many of them, intoxicated by the vicious anti-Semitic propaganda of the previous two decades, were eager to share in the wealth expropriated from the Jews: Under these conditions, the leaders of the Jewish Council tried to save whatever they could through dilatory tactics, and later by reestablishing contact with Admiral Horthy and some of the other traditional Hungarian figures. The Zionist leaders for their part followed the so-called "SS-line," within the framework of the "Europa Plan" launched in Bratislava in a vain attempt to buy off the Germans.32 Both approaches were equally futile from the point of view 31

The Rescue Committee of Budapest was established early in 1942, under the auspices of the Rescue Department of the Jewish Agency for Palestine. The Zionist-oriented Budapest Committee, chaired de facto by Rezsö Kasztner, was at first primarily concerned with rescuing and assisting the persecuted Jews of Poland and Slovakia. For this purpose, it maintained contact, through couriers, with its counterparts in Bratislava, Geneva, and IstanbuL After the occupation, its leadership, including Jod and Hansi Brand, became preoccupied with the possibility of rescuing Hungarian Jewry by dealing exclusively with the SS. Kasztner's controversial wartime activities became the object of a heated political and legal debate in Israel, where he had settled in 1946. Found guilty by a lower court, he was cleared posthumously — one year after his assassination in Tel Aviv in 1957 — by the Israeli Supreme Court. For his own version of his wartime role see: Der Bericht des jüdischen Rettungskomitees aus Budapest, 1942· 1945, ΧΠΙ, 1946 (mimeographed). The role played by the unofficial Committee in general, and by its self-appointed volunteer members in particular, is beyond the scope of this paper.

32

For a succinct description of the "Europa-Plan," see my: "The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary," p. 79.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

of the provincial Jews who, with the exception of some twenty thousand, were deported to Auschwitz within a very brief span. The ineffectiveness of the Jewish leadership was, to some extent, also influenced by the leaders' distorted perception of the Nazis' objectives in Hungary. For quite a while they deluded themselves into believing that the Germans would not apply the same draconic measures to solve the Jewish question in Hungary as they did elsewhere, based on: — The promises and declarations made by the SS officers during their first meetings with the Jewish leaders; — The fact that the Regent, who had earlier concurred with Källay's Jewish policy, was left at the helm; — The realization that the military situation of the Germans at the time of the occupation of Hungary was much worse than during the period of the "Solution to the Jewish Question" elsewhere in Europe; — The expectation that the Germans, aware of the unpopular character of the occupation, would want to pacify, rather than antagonize, the population; — The fact that, despite the plethora of anti-Jewish laws, the situation of the Jews in Hungary was better than it was elsewhere; — The expectation that proposals for a radical solution in Hungary would bring forth vocal political opposition in Parliament, as had been demonstrated during the adoption of the anti-Jewish laws in 1938-1942; and — The realization that the Red Army was already at the Carpathians.*9

The distorted viewpoint of the Jewish leaders was reinforced by the personal favors accorded to them, as well as their families, by the SS. This was actually a standard SS approach in all the Nazioccupied countries, not only towards Jewish leaders, but also towards local officials, to acquire their confidence and ensure their cooperation. In the case of the Jews, these favors consisted primarily of the exemption of the leaders and their immediate families

33

G. Gergely, Beszämolö a Magyarorszagi Zsidök Szövetsege Ideiglenes Ιηίέζδ Bizottsaga munkajaröl ("Report on the Work of the Provisional Executive Committee of the Association of the Jews of Hungary"), 1945, p. 5 (manuscript).

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from many of the anti-Jewish measures.34 However, these favors were usually ephemeral, for at the close of the ghettoization and deportation program in a particular area, the leaders themselves were usually also rounded up and subjected to the same treatment the others had incurred. This was obviously what the Nazis planned for Hungary as well, and in fact the scheme was implemented in the provinces, but Horthy's decision to put an end to the deportations on July 7, 1944 saved the leaders of the Central Council, as well as the other Jews of Budapest, from sharing the fate of their counterparts in most of the provincial ghettos. The most surprising element with regard to the Nazi policy in Hungary is that the Hungarian Jewish leaders, although quite well informed as to Nazi techniques, failed to act any differently from their counterparts elsewhere who did not have the benefit of this knowledge. For whatever reasons, it remains a historical fact that the wartime leaders of Hungarian Jewry, helpless and deprived of their traditional contacts, unwittingly and unwillingly did cooperate with the aggressors in the implementation of at least some preliminary aspects of the anti-Jewish drive, constantly rationalizing their actions as advantageous to the community under the given conditions. Because of their limited forces and eagerness to avoid unnecessarily antagonizing the local population in Hungary as elsewhere in the German sphere of influence, the Nazis utilized the Jews and local authorities in implementing many of the anti-Jewish measures. Although the Jewish leaders were motivated by the desire to maintain positive relations with the Germans, who at first had exclusive power over the Jews, and to gain time in order to save Jewish lives, they were the ones who, inter alia, lulled the masses into a false sense of security. They issued many of the internment summonses; requisitioned apartments; distributed the yellow badges; effectuated the sequestration of the Jews in special buildings; and surrendered large sums of money. Against their will and their intentions, they became the helpless instruments with which the Nazis implemented many of their sinister designs.3* 34

39

For examples of favors enjoyed by some of the leaders of Hungarian Jewry, see my: 'The Role of the Jewish Council in Hungary," pp. 78-84. In a highly sensational court case involving some leaders of the Judenrat in Bedzin, Poland, Chief Justice I. Olshan of the Supreme Court of

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39

RANDOLPH L. BRAHAM

Could the Jewish leaders have acted differently? What would have happened had they resigned from the Council? Just as Horthy thought on his return from Schloss Kiessheim, the traditional legitimist leaders of Jewry calculated that, by staying at the helm instead of escaping or resigning in a cowardly fashion, they could at least mitigate, if not totally avoid, their losses. Had they resigned en masse there is no doubt that the Nazis and their Hungarian hirelings would easily have found another, or even a third, set of Jewish leaders to replace them. Had they not implemented the orders relating to internments and the requisitioning of apartments, chances are good that the German and Hungarian units would have found a way to carry out these internments and requisitions more cruelly. On the other hand, while the resignation of Stern and his colleagues would certainly have incurred their immediate arrest and possible execution, the Jewish masses might thus have learned of the realities of the German occupation early. Also, they would perhaps not have followed the instructions of nonentities and Jewish quislings as obediently as they did those of the traditional leaders whom they trusted. It was exactly for this reason that the Germans insisted on retaining the old, traditional, and trusted leaders of the Jewish communities on the Jewish Councils. Conversely, it is safe to assume that had Stem and his associates refused to undertake the tasks assigned to them by the Germans, and by some miracle still survived the ordeal while hundreds of thousands of Jews were massacred, they would certainly have been condemned by other survivors for having held positions of power only while Israel declared on May 22, 1964, that "no matter how the Judenrat acted, it served the N a z i s . . . Even those who served the interests of the Jewish communities assisted the N a z i s . . . " The New York Times, May 23, 1964. In a document supplementing his testimony in the Eichmann trial, D i n claims that he and Dr. I. Latkoczy were entrusted by the Hungarian Independence Front (Magyar Fiiggetlensegi Front) in May 1944 to warn Stern that the Hungarian resistance movement considered the Jewish Council to be a collaborator, and that its members would be considered as war criminals. They allegedly advised Stern that the Council should cease all contacts with the SS Command, and should not issue any more summonses or telegrams requesting Jews to report for work or surrender money, inasmuch as all their efforts were useless, and the trains continued to roll towards Auschwitz. Police of Israel, Bureau 06, Document No. 367.

40

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST THE OFFICIAL JEWISH LEADERSHIP OF WARTIME HUNGARY

there was prestige and honor associated with them, and for having abandoned the community in its darkest hour, as some of the central and local leaders — including Zionists — had done. In spite of the obvious risks involved, the leaders of the Council decided to accept their onerous burden in the hope of mitigating, if not averting, the catastrophe looming over Hungarian Jewry. They had hoped to achieve this by dilatory tactics calculated to win "the race with time." As others almost everywhere else in Nazi-dominated Europe, they appear to have tried to come to terms with the oppressors in order to try to stymie their sinister objectives, and to save as many Jewish lives as possible under the extraordinarily perilous circumstances. They were indeed shortsighted in their naive optimism; they were obviously remiss in failing to prepare for a possible catastrophe; they were certainly devoid of any meaningful national Jewish consciousness; they were almost oblivious to the suffering of Jews elsewhere in Nazi-dominated Europe;36 and they were woefully inadequate in their leadership after the occupation. The currently available evidence, however, does not lend itself to the conclusion that the Jewish Council, as a whole, acted in willful violation of the best interests of Hungarian Jewry under the extraordinary conditions of Nazi rule.

36

One must note, in this context, that the Hungarian Jews were quite generous to the few thousand Jews who had found refuge in Hungary following their escape from the Third Reich and several Nazi-dominated countries, especially Poland and Slovakia. The Hungarian Jewish agencies primarily concerned with the refugees, as well as with the plight of the poorer stratum of Hungarian Jewry, were the Welfare Bureau of Hungarian Jews (Magyar Izraelitdk Pdrtfogo Irodaja — MIPI) and its fund-raising arm, the National Hungarian Jewish Assistance Campaign (Orszagos Magyar Zsido Akcio — OMZSA), established in 1938 and 1939 respectively.

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41

Between Apprehension and Indifference: Allied Attitudes to the Destruction of Hungarian Jewry by J. S. Conway

The German siezure of power in Hungary (19 March 1944) sealed the fate of the last surviving sizeable group of Jews—approximately one million — in Nazi-controlled Europe. The full story of this tragedy has yet to be told, but enough is known to show that the simplistic view expressed at Eichmann's trial has to be discarded in the interests of historical veracity. The truth is that a mixture of considerations, by no means all of them creditable, dominated all those involved, and affected their conduct. More recently, newly available documents in London and Geneva have thrown further light on the diplomatic moves of the British Government, which have so far received only passing attention. This evidence suggests that the criticisms which have been expressed about the attitudes of the authorities in Washington are equally applicable to those in London. On the politics of rescue, the British stance was, to say the least, equivocal.1 From the time of the German invasion in March 1944 onwards, Admiral Horthy's Hungarian Government greeted with, mixed feelings the German decision to implement their anti-Jewish measures on Hungarian soü. On the one hand, antisemitism was probably more endemic in Hungary than in Germany; the new Prime Minister, Sztojay, had once boasted that Hungary was the first nation to initiate legislation to exclude Jews from the Professor Conway teaches history at the University of British Columbia and is the author of The Nazi Persecution of the Churches (Weidenfield and Nicoison, London 1968).

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST spiritual and cultural life of the country. On the other hand, Hungarians realized that Germany's defeat was imminent. They resented the Nazi take-over of their country and, if only for selfish reasons, disliked Eichmann's long-prepared and swiftly executed extermination moves. As one observer remarked at the time: ' One cannot avoid the feeling that if the Allies were losing the war instead of winning it, Horthy would have followed the example of a rather more illustrious admiral and turned a blind eye to the proceedings.' 3 Individually, many Hungarians had shown sympathy to Jews, and the government had allowed many Polish Jews to escape to Hungary on the tactic understanding that once there they would take the steps necessary to conceal themselves. After the Normandy landings, and caught between the exigencies of the German occupation and the desire to preserve their future reputation, the Hungarian leaders vacillated. They did, however, recognize the advantages of responding positively, if fitfully, to the efforts made in various countries, both Allied and neutral, to prevent the Nazi-led holocaust from engulfing the whole Hungarian Jewish community. If fear of reprisals, rather than sympathy for the Jews, motivated the Regent's policy, it nevertheless significantly if only temporarily mitigated the persecution. The threat of subsequent reprisals was, by 1944, virtually the only means by which Jewish leaders in the West could exert pressure on behalf of their fellow Jews. Aware of the extermination of the Jews under Nazi control, these leaders were fully alive to the implications of the German seizure of power in Hungary. But the prospects of rescuing such a large number of Jews were heartbreakingly small. Despite a renewed Russian offensive on the eastern borders of Romania, and despite the existence of enclaves free from Nazi control in Yugoslavia, the physical task of extricating hundreds of thousands of homeless refugees was insuperable. The only possibility was through Romania, whose official attitude was extremely uncertain. The politically explosive issue of where such refugees could be sent, even if they could be brought out of Hungary, remained equally

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS unresolved. The Jewish leaders therefore concentrated their efforts on urging the Hungarian Government and people to thwart the Nazi plans. Accordingly, an international campaign warned the Hungarians of the extreme risk any implementation of deportation measures would engender and advised them to forestall the danger before the Nazis could act. On 21 March, only two days after the German troops entered Hungary, Dr Gerard Riegner, Secretary General of the World Jewish Congress, telegraphed to Sidney Silverman, M.P., President of the WJC, British Section, from Geneva. 4 Most anxious about destiny Hungarian Jewry the only important section European Jewry still in existence because of recent political developments stop suggesting world wide appeal of Anglo-Saxon personalities non-Jewish and Jewish including chiefs of Protestant Catholic Churches to Hungarian people warning them not to admit application of policy of extermination of Jews by Gorman butchers or Hungarian quislings and to help Jews by all possible means in order to prevent their falling into hands of Germans stop warning should insist upon fact that attitude Hungarian people towards Jews will be one of the most important tests of behaviour which allied nations will remember in peace settlement after war stop similar broadcasts should be made every night in Hungarian language during the next weeks.' 3 A similar message was despatched to the Jewish representatives in the United States. In Washington, this move found a ready response both in private and governmental circles. Prompted by the officials of the newlyestablished War Refugee Board, President Roosevelt now determined to reinforce his previous warnings on the subject of war crimes. On 1 November 1943, a Joint Declaration on War Crimes had been issued, proclaiming the intention of the Allies to return war criminals 1 to the scene of their crimes ' to be ' judged on the spot by the peoples whom they have outraged This declaration had been criticized for its failure to refer specifically to the atrocities inflicted upon the Jews. Under the impact of the news from Hungary, the White

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST House issued a statement calling for the condemnation of anti-Jewish persecution and exhorting the peoples of Europe, in Germanoccupied as well as in neutral countries, to rescue Jews. It would be a major tragedy if ' these innocent people, who have already survived a decade of Hitler's fury, should perish on the very eve of triumph over the barbarians \ 4 London's attitude was more ambivalent. British Government was on the one hand anxious not to disagree with the American authorities, nor to appear indifferent to the fate threatening the Hungarian Jews. On the other hand, the Foreign Office was markedly reluctant to undertake any policy involving further British commitments in the resettlement of rescued Jews. Nevertheless, after President Roosevelt's unilateral initiative and after Mr. Silverman had raised the matter in the House of Commons, the Foreign Secretary, Mr. Eden (30 March) 5 associated himself with the President's warnings to all ' Quisling officials ' that their treatment of Jews would have to be accounted for. The British authorities were more aware than the Americans of the implications of rescue for their policies in Palestine, which for 25 years had been a continuous source of trouble and anxiety. With many new dangers brought about by the extension of the war to the Middle East, Britain felt bound to resist strong pressures to modify the basis of her policy for Palestine as outlined in the White Paper on May 1939. This limited the number of Jewish immigrants to 75,000 over the following five years, after which time no Jews would be admitted unless the Palestinian Arabs acquiesced. This time-limit expired at the moment when the holocaust threatened to obliterate the Hungarian Jewish Community. At first the British Government hoped that it could continue to combine moral outrage at Nazi atrocities with a rigid refusal to permit their victims to enter Palestine. This attitude was increasingly attacked by Zionist sympathizers, as well as by leading churchmen in England and Scotland. β On the other hand, the British High Commissioner in Jerusalem, Sir Harold MacMichael, stressed

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS (1 March 1944) the necessity of keeping to the 75,000 total, particularly since 18,300 places had not yet been taken up. Preference should be given to refugees. ' But,' he continued, ' I had never for a moment contemplated the possibility of any further quota after 31 March n e x t . . . It would be a grave political mistake to appear to be continuing existing immigration system after that date on the same lines as heretofore.' 7 When a deputation led by Miss Eleanor Rathbone, m.p., pressed for more forceful action, a Foreign Office spokesman declared on 25 March, 'unofficially, and through the intervention of the International Red Cross, Bulgarian transit is being quietly facilitated, and both the British and American Embassies, in close and constant touch with the Jewish Agency in Istanbul, have good hopes of arranging the necessary shippings . . . Although the outlook for Jews in Hungary. may appear very sombre, it is too early to assess the amount of attention which the Germans, with the manifold calls on their manpower, may be able to divert to persecution, while the possibility of Hungarian resistance- is also an important factor.'» A few days later the British Minister to the Vatican, Mr. Osborne, was instructed to enlist the support of the Cardinal Secretary of State in a move to mobilize the Vatican's influence on behalf of Jews and political refugees in Hungary. The Pope, Osborne was able to reply on 4 April, had already taken action in Budapest and Bucharest." A month later, however, it became clear that neither the demands of the war effort, nor the opposition of Hungarian citizens, were seriously interfering with the German extermination plans. By the end of April, Eichmann had deported Jews from the parts of Hungary closest to the advancing Russians and had begun to dispatch them to Auschwitz; from May onwards approximately 12,000 people were being deported daily. While this was happening, an astounding proposal to exchange

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST Jews from the occupied countries in return for war supplies reached London from the High Commissioner's office in Jerusalem: ' As an alternative to complete annihilation of all Jews remaining in Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia and Poland, the Nazis are ready to evacuate 1,000.000 Jews from these countries to Spain and Portugal (though not, as they specifically stated, to Palestine). In return, they require delivery of 10,000 motor carriers and certain quantities of coffee, tea, cocoa and soap. As an earnest of good faith, they are prepared, once the offer has been accepted in principle, to release first batch of 5,000 to 10,000 Jews before receipt of corresponding consideration. They are also prepared to exchange Jews against German prisoners of war. If offer is rejected, they will proceed with their programme of whole-hearted liquidation.' 10 On 31 May a hastily assembled meeting of the War Cabinet's Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, consisting of the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, the Minister for Economic Warfare, and other representatives of the Foreign, the Home and the War Cabinet Offices, considered this proposal and reported to the full War Cabinet on the following day. The reaction was, as might be expected, almost totally negative. Any deals with the Nazi criminals were repugnant, especially through unknown intermediaries. Blackmail of this sort must not be encouraged, if only because it could lead ' to an offer to unload an even greater number of Jews on to our hands.' Worse, such a scheme might involve a major alteration in the course of military operations. Since large numbers of Jews could not be maintained in Spain for long, pressure would inevitably be brought to have them accommodated in Britain, where resources were already stretched to the limit. Above all, ' While there were strong objections on military grounds to the evacuation of large numbers of Jews through Spain and Portugal there would be equally strong objections to large evacuation into Turkey, since this would involve our being pressed to receive unmanageable numbers into Palestine, and

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS thereby introduce the dangerous complication that the immigration quota would be exceeded at a particularly critical time.' In short, as Mr. Anthony Eden told the War Cabinet ' it was clear that the proposal was simply designed to embarrass the Allied Governments in prosecution of the war . . . His Majesty's Government could not possibly accept it.' 1 1 On the other hand, it was also clear that the British Government could not possibly ignore it. For one thing, Joel Brand, who had brought the offer to Turkey, was a trusted member of the Hungarian Zionist organization and had first of all been in contact with the Jewish Agency in Istanbul. Hence the details of the offer were soon known to Jewish communities throughout the world. Secondly, in view of President Roosevelt's known sympathies and the energetic activities of the War Refugee Board, the likely reactions of the US Government had to be carefully considered. In America, it was noted, the scheme might secure sympathy beyond its merits, because the War Refugee Board, backed by Mr. Morgenthau, had committed itself to the * rescue' of the Jews, partly for electoral reasons. The pressures of the forthcoming election might induce the President to urge Britain to reconsider her policies in Palestine. Hence the British Government must not appear inflexible, and should demonstrate a measure of sympathy for the Jews, while emphasizing that Americans, if they wished to help, should overcome their State Department's reluctance to allow increased emigration to the United States. Much depended on a true assessment of the motives of the Nazi proposal. Were Himmler and his gang merely trying to earn themselves ' good conduct marks ' or were they attempting to drive a wedge between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, by claiming that equipment bartered for Jews would be used solely on the Eastern front? If this was the hidden German objective it could be more easily dismissed in view of Roosevelt's concern for inter-allied harmony. The Foreign Office therefore instructed the Ambassador in Washington to declare:

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST 'While refusing to deal with this scheme and the channels through which it has come, we realise the importance of not opposing a mere negative to any genuine proposals involving the rescue of any Jewish and other victims which merit serious consideration by the Allied governments . . . This would show that although we cannot enter into the monstrous bargain which the Gestapo propose, we are far from being indifferent to the sufferings of the Jews and have not shut the door to serious suggestions compatible with the successful prosecution of the war.' 1 2 On 12 June the Soviet Government was informed. Nevertheless, Joel Brand >fas to be invited to British-held Aleppo, where officials could obtain further information, while a special agent of the War Refugee Board, Ira Hirschmann, was sent to Turkey, although without any special instructions from the State Department. At best these manoeuvres were meant to gain time. Had the British known more about the situation in Budapest, they would undoubtedly have become even more wary. Eichmann clearly regarded the whole proposal as a mere diversion, and had no intention of countermanding his deportation plans, which were set into motion the day after Brand was dispatched to Istanbul. His collaborator, SS-Obersturmbannführer Becher had evolved an even more complex scheme. Anxious to provide himself with an excuse should Germany fail to achieve victory, he proposed to release some Jews. At the same time he was acquiring important Jewish properties which, he expected, would reconcile Berlin to the loss of a few victims. In fact, however, the German Foreign Ministry was not informed, let alone consulted, about these plans, and first read of them in the British press two months later. Nor were the Hungarians informed, lest they should take steps to prevent the theft of Jewish property. Joel Brand continued to believe that this ransom proposal was genuine although his principal backers in Budapest could have harboured no such illusions. They were trying to secure at least the implementation of a minimum scheme in order to save those cadres who could make the greatest future contri-

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS bution to the establishment of an independent Israel. To achieve this end, they had to collaborate with the Germans in preparing deportation lists for Auschwitz, and to keep their knowledge of the certainty of extermination from the deportees, and the world at large. 13 In Washington, despite the scepticism of the State Department, the officials of the War Refugee Board were resolved not to let this tiny spark of hope for Hungarian Jewry be extinguished. They were dismayed by the news that the British had carried Brand off captive to Cairo, where he was to be kept available to see if 4 anything reasonable can be extracted from the German offer \ u On 22 June the State Department, in a memorandum to the British Government, urged that ' It should be made clear to the Germans by actions as well as words that His Majesty's Government and United States Government will find temporary asylum for all Jewish or similar persons in imminent danger of death whom the Germans are willing to release \ 1 5 One action on which all American and Jewish groups could agree was that Brand should be returned to Hungary. But the British refused. In this they were strengthened by the clearlystated view of the Soviet Government that the Russians did not ' consider it permissible or expedient to carry on any conversation whatsoever with the German Government . . 19 A few days later Mr. Eden noted that * the plan for saving Jews in German or German occupied territories which reached us through Brand arrived in circumstances so suspect, and was worded in such a mixture of terrorist threats and blackmail that we should have been justified in rejecting it forthwith On the other hand, he felt, to dismiss the proposal entirely would be equally inadvisable. The Jewish leaders in the United States and the highest circles of the United States Government would be ' understandably enough — filled with emotional anxiety that we should not precipi-

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST täte the further horrors threatened Gestapo, or lay ourselves open to the of neglect of any means within our in existing circumstances, of saving stantial number of Jews from death \ 1 7

by the charge power, a subcertain

In these circumstances the Foreign Office recommended that the International Red Cross should visit the principal internment camps to report on conditions, and that Spain and Portugal should be urged to grant asylum to a number of Jews at Allied expense. The British Government, caught between its philanthropic intentions and its military commitments—now at their height after D-Day— as well as between the incompatible pressures of the Soviet and US Governments, between its Palestine policy and Jewish pleas for further immigration, decided to play for time. Two months earlier, in April 1944, two young Slovakian Jews, Fred Wetzler and Rudolf Vrba, had succeeded in escaping from Auschwitz and had informed the disbelieving Jewish communities in their homeland of the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination programmes. Knowing how these camps worked and the additional preparations being made, they realized that only drastic measures could prevent the Germans from applying ' the final solution ' to the remnants of European Jewry, particularly in Hungary. The first priority was, therefore, to raise the alarm in Budapest. Secondly, it was important to have their evidence accepted by the Allies through unimpeachably reliable sources. Rudolf Vrba therefore obtained an interview with a representative of the Papal Nunciature in Bratislava. His report profoundly impressed the Monsignor, who promised to transmit the information immediately to the Vatican. In mid-June, the Papal representative travelled from Bratislava to Berne with a fully detailed 60-page report on the, enormities being perpetrated in Auschwitz. Another copy of this report was brought to Switzerland by a courier of the Czech underground and delivered to the Czechoslovak Minister, Dr. Jaromir Kopacky, on 19 or 20 June. It was immediately made available to the World Jewish Congress, and to the Swiss press which published extensive extracts from Vrba's report.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS The public response to the first-hand accounts of inconceivable outrage was to have significant effects. The conspiracy of silence which the Germans and their collaborators had tried to maintain had finally and irrevocably broken down. No excuse remained now for an institution like the Vatican, which had preferred to disregard previous evidence, not to speak out. Such reticence could only be misinterpreted and condemned. The weapon of public disclosure was to be fully mobilized for the rescue of the remaining survivors. 18 In Geneva, the World Jewish Congress took immediate steps to co-ordinate support from other international organizations in that city. In particular the World Council of Churches (in process of formation), which had helped refugees from the first days of Nazi rule, was approached and its Refugee Aid Committee on 24 June issued a public press release addressing itself to the world-wide ecumenical fellowship: 'Reliable reports state that over 400,000 Hungarian Jews have already been deported under indescribably inhuman conditions and, if they have not perished en route, have been murdered in Auschwitz camp in Upper Silesia. Christians cannot remain silent in face of these atrocities'. 19 On the same day the General Secretary of the World Jewish Congress telegraphed a sixpage summary of the report to the British, United States and Czechoslovak Governments, and proposed some specific action to halt the slaughter. This could include reprisals against Germans in Allied countries, the bombing of Auschwitz-Birkenau and the main railway lines converging on it, the widest possible press and radio coverage of the atrocities and efforts to persuade the Holy See to condemn these crimes publicly. 20 Two days later (26 June) the British legation in Berne informed its Government: ' Received fresh reports from Hungary stating that nearly one half total of 800,000 Jews in Hungary have already been deported at a rate of 10,000 to 12,000 per diem. Most of these transports are sent to the death camp of Birkenau near Oswiecim in Upper Silesia where in the course of last year over 1,500,000 Jews from all over

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST Europe have been killed. We have detailed reports about the number and methods employed. The four crematoriums in Birkenau have a capacity for gassing and burning 60,000 per diem. In Budapest and surroundings there are still between 300,000 and 400,000 Jews left including those incorporated in labour service but no Jews are left in eastern and northern provinces . . . and the remaining Jews in and around Budapest have no hope to be spared . . .' 2 1 The perplexity of the British Government in this situation was succinctly expressed by the Prime Minister's minute to this telegram: ' Foreign Secretary: What can be done? What can be said? W.S.C.' 22 The public outcry aroused by leading Jewish circles and dignitaries of the Churches of England and Scotland, found expression in questions raised in the House of Commons on 5 July. Mr Eden's reply could offer no comfort; he deplored the fact that repeated Allied threats to punish the guilty had failed to persuade the Germans and their Hungarian accomplices to release or spare their victims, hence, 4 the principal hope of terminating this tragic state of affairs must remain the speedy victory of the Allied Nations.' The Foreign Secretary studiously abstained from mentioning the Jewish suggestions for the bombing of the crematoria or the rail-links to Auschwitz nor did he refer to Brand's still secret ransom offer. In his note to the Prime Minister, Eden expressed the Foreign Office view somewhat less equivocally. . . there is no point in "inflating the currency " by continually repeating that we propose to punish the guilty. Indeed one could make out a case in favour of the view that the declarations have had the effect of making the anti-Jewish atrocities worse. As regards military measures, such as bombing, I am ready to consider with Air Ministry what can be done. We are in fact bombing Budapest already.' 23 As for the ransom proposal, ' the offer, in fact, was not serious and, especially as coming through such insignificant or suspect channels, should on its merits have been contemptuously ignored. But we

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS have kept it in play in the hope of staving off disaster and seeing whether something acceptable might not emerge.' 24 Admiral Horthy's decision (6 July) to stop deportations from Hungary provided a temporary respite. This decision was influenced by public protests from neutral governments, including the unprecendented appeal of the Pope (25 June) in an open telegram, requesting Horthy to ' spare so many unfortunate people further sufferings.' 25 The King of Sweden, as well as the Swiss, Turkish and Spanish authorities, made similar representations, aptly described as a bombardment of Horthy's conscience, which was perhaps even more impressed by the contents of the telegrams which the British and US missions in Berne had sent home and which the Hungarian counter-intelligence had succeeded in deciphering. The Hungarian leaders therefore knew that the world was aware of their complicity, and that they could expect reprisals, including the bombing of Budapest. Moreover, the Hungarian Prime Minister, Sztojay, had warned the German ambassador that another intercepted telegram had listed 70 Germans and Hungarians who were to stand trial, a revelation which caused the Hungarians to take fright. Unaware of this sudden volte-face, the British Government continued to be pressed for action by representatives of the Jewish Agency, prominent British Jews and William Temple, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was eager to broadcast an appeal to Hungarian Christians and, brushing aside official objections, stated: 4 1 do not myself see what harm could be involved... but I am sure the only Christian attitude in face of this horror is to say, we will do what we can, however trifling. If the result were the saving of one Jew, it would be worth it . . .' 2 e Representations from the United States were even more forceful. The State Department was under heavy pressure from the War Refugee Board, and, as a Foreign Office official noted: 4 The Republican Party are angling unscrupulously for the hitherto Democratic Jewish vote. President Roosevelt and Mr Hull will fight with gloves off to keep it. We

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST on the ringside are already getting some stray knocks.' 2 7 A week later, an uncomprehending Foreign Office, irked by American attitudes, commented: . . the only reason why, at the outset, H.M. Government did not dismiss the Gestapo proposals with contempt was that the U.S. Government, particularly in election year, is desperately anxious to show that nothing, however fantastic, has been neglected which might lead to the rescue of Jews. And now, seeing the intense interest of the highest American circles, in particular Mr. Mergenthau, in all this question, it would probably prove very difficult to persuade the Americans to drop the whole thing . . . ' 2 8 Having persuaded itself that American interest in the rescue was purely electoral, the Foreign Office, to safeguard itself, thought it advisable to make any further negotiations dependent on Soviet agreement. A compromise was however put forward. Negotiations for the evacuation of a limited number of Jews might be encouraged through the Swiss Government, as Protecting Power, provided due safeguards were insisted upon. Churchill, seeing the true dimensions of the outrage, noted in a minute to the Foreign Secretary (11 July): * There is no doubt that this is probably the greatest and most horrible crime ever committed in the whole history of the world, and it has been done by scientific machinery by nominally civilised men in the name of a great State and one of the leading races of Europe . . . Declarations should be made in public, so that everyone connected with it will be hunted down and put to death.' 2 9 On 13 July Mr Eden, at a meeting of the War Cabinet's Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, reminded its members that ' our object had been to spin out the affair.' A flat refusal to consider the proposal was, however, open to two objections —the U.S. Government might seriously object, and either the Germans or the Jews might, to embarrass Britain, make the matter public. The best solution, it seemed, would be to

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS return Brand to Hungary, indicating that neither the British nor the Americans would be fooled by the suggestions he brought or the channels through which they were conveyed. The whole scheme was clearly a Gestapo intrigue and a cover for a separate peace proposal. The British Government must therefore refuse to have any dealings with the enemy on such a basis. At this moment the British Government was still unaware of the Hungarian decision to stop deportations. It is not quite clear when the news reached Washington, but on 20 July the State Department—presumably hoping to change British attitudes—disclosed details of the ransom offer, which the London Times published under the headline Ά Monstrous Offer—German Blackmail—Bartering Jews for Munitions 4 It has long been clear that, faced with the certainty of defeat, the German authorities would intensify all their efforts to blackmail, deceive and split the allies. In their latest effort, made known in London yesterday, they have reached a new level of fantasy and self-deception . . . The whole story is one of the most loathsome of the war . . . The British Government know what value to set on any German or German-sponsored offer . . . they know, as well as the Germans, what happens when one begins paying blackmail. The blackmailer increases his price. Such considerations provided their own answer to the proposed bargain.' 30 Despite this negative attitude, the Americans and Jewish authorities were undeterred. Almost simultaneously they received an apparently more realistic offer from a more authoritative source. On 25 July, the International Red Cross representative, Alfred Zollinger, had transmitted to the British and American governments a new and unexpected offer from Horthy himself. Hungary would be prepared to release * certain categories' of Jews, provided the Western allies accepted responsibility for their resettlement abroad. Jews in Hungary with valid visas for other countries, some 9,700 families and a further 1,000 children below the age of ten, a total of about 17,000 to 20,000 persons, would be allowed to leave. Unofficial reports of this offer had

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST already reached London on 18 July and, if true, would deserve far more serious consideration than the dubious Brand proposals. The number of Hungarian Jews holding valid visas for British territories, including Palestine, was thought to be quite manageable. On the other hand, the Foreign Office could foresee strong pressures to grant fresh visas in numbers far beyond transport possibilities. It also feared that, as a corollary to the Hungarian offer, demands for a greatly increased immigration into Palestine would have to be faced. Moreover, any attempt to raise objections or delay negotiations might be used by the Hungarians as an excuse to resume deportations, saddling the British Government with the responsibility for the death of thousands of Jews. The British predicament was aggravated by the news that Henry Morgenthau, the American Secretary of the Treasury, was coming to London to plead the case for an immediate acceptance of Horthy's proposal. To confuse matters still further, the International Red Cross reported that the first contingent of 40,000 Jews would be ready in ten days to leave Hungary for Palestine, via Constanza in Romania; an eventuality not only beyond Palestine's absorption capacity, but also threatening to reopen the White Paper debate about the whole future of the Mandate. a t The negotiations promised to be stormy. As expected, the Americans, failing to regard the transportation problems as insuperable, pressed for the immediate acceptance of Horthy's offer. President Roosevelt had already demonstrated his political courage by opening 4 temporary havens' in the United States to which refugees would be admitted. The United States was also prepared to accept financial responsibility for all Jews escaping from Hungary. In these circumstances, the humanitarian considerations were overwhelming. British doubts were not dissolved by these arguments. Since logistics made the American offer of ' temporary havens' such as that established at Oswego, New York, little more than symbolic, the main weight would still fall on British shoulders. In view of the known reluctance of some US circles to increase immigration quotas, the British demanded a definite American commitment to allow a substantial number of Jewish refugees into the

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS United States. The offer, it was argued, would be far more acceptable to both governments if the refugees could be placed in Latin America or in Portuguese Angola. Finally the British wanted the whole question referred to the Intergovernmental Committee on Political Refugees, after the Soviet Government had been duly informed. 32 Not surprisingly, the Americans were deeply perturbed and suspected only prevarication and delay. On the evidence of previous experience, referral to the Intergovernmental Committee was time-consuming and the idea of consulting Latin American governments would invite endless frustration. According to one of Mr Morgenthau's advisers, Mr Eden's arguments were 4 inhumanly political \ 3 3 Consequently, the Americans declared on 7 August that they were ready to 4 care for all Jews who are permitted to leave Hungary and who reach neutral or United Nations' territory', even if the British could not join them. Once more Churchill appeared somewhat dismayed at the attitude of the Foreign Office, whom he informed (6 August): 4 This seems to be a rather doubtful business. These unhappy families, mainly women and children, have purchased their lives with probably nine-tenths of their wealth. I should not like England to seem to be wanting to hunt them down. By all means tell the Russians anything that is necessary, but please do not let us prevent them from escaping. I cannot see how any suspicion of peace negotiations could be fixed on this miserable affair.' 34 When the War Cabinet Committee had met on 4 August to reconsider the whole proposal, none of the Ministers showed any enthusiasm. The Colonial Secretary protested that Palestine could not suddenly accept the 40,000 refugees proposed by the International Red Cross; the 800,000 mentioned by Brand would precipitate an immediate crisis. The International Red Cross had no right to send refugees to territories under British control. The War Office objected to the idea of sending refugees to Sicily which was already over-populated. Cyprus too could take no more refugees. Others continued to denounce the proposal as another Gestapo

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST plot. In short the Committee could not accept the American plan for joint action. If it were to do so it might tempt the USA to promise more than she could perform and then to compel Britain to retrieve the position. However, a rejection might expose the British Government to the obloquy of having obstructed the rescue of thousands of Jewish victims. 35 On 8 August, Mr Eden reported to the full War Cabinet that the Committee's inability to resolve a vexatious dilemma in which it could either '(a) refuse to accept the " Horthy offer" either jointly with the United States Government or separately and thus possibly arouse hostile public opinion here and in the United States; or (b) accept the " Horthy offer " and risk civil war in Palestine owing to an inroad of Jews from Hungary into the Levant.' 3 · In either case, British interests would suffer. The War Cabinet decided that any suspicion of inter-allied disharmony must be avoided, and that Admiral Horthy's offer should be jointly accepted. It was, however, pointed out that the US Government seemed unaware of the extent of the provisions made by Britain for refugees since the beginning of the war. Britain's capacity to accommodate further refugees was limited and she could not be expected to take more than her fair share of the burden. The United States Government must do the rest.37 A week later the Cabinet was informed that the Foreign Office had succeeded in gaining ' concessions ' from the Americans. In place of their original commitment to give asylum to all Jews leaving Hungary, the joint offer would now be limited to those categories designated in the Horthy proposal, involving at most between 60,000 and 70,000 people. The USA also agreed to accept any balance for which Britain could not provide accommodation. The fate in store for the remaining Jews in Hungary was, however, not mentioned. In fact, the equivocal expedients of the British Government were soon outdated by events in Budapest. The Hungarian decision to stop deportations and the subsequent * Horthy proposal' were undoubtedly prompted by the

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS realization of an imminent German defeat which also affected the SS. Himmler, formerly the chief architect of the Final Solution, now began to support underlings who, anxious to secure their position in the post-war world, were persuaded that a more lenient policy towards the surviving Jews could be combined with profitable ransom offers. They had however no intention of allowing Horthy's regime to gain the credit for a scheme which they insisted must be seen as a German initiative. The Germans therefore refused exit visas to the first train-load of 2,100 Jews bound for Constanza, for whom no ransom had been received, closing the Hungarian-Romanian border to forestall any independent move by Horthy's Government. While these negotiations were proceeding, the SS proposed that the remaining Jews should be kept as a labour reserve for German factories, thus reversing their April edict which envisaged the deportation of all Jews to Auschwitz. In pursuit of profitable deals, the SS had already allowed 46 members of the Manfred Weiss family to fly to Lisbon, in return for ' transferring' Hungary's largest industrial complex on Czepel Island near Budapest. In August. 318 Hungarian Jews, including several well-known Zionists, were released from Bergen-Belsen concentration camp and permitted to go to Switzerland. The price was allegedly five million Swiss francs. In November, despite the hitherto absolute prohibition of any contact with Nazi officials, a secret meeting took place, in Switzerland, between the Representative of the War Refugee Board, McClelland, and SS-Obersturmbannführer Becher. The Americans went so far as to promise to make available 20 million Swiss francs, to be spent on supplies as the SS saw fit.38 As a result, in December, two transports of 1,355 Jews from Bergen-Belsen arrived in Basle, the final and most successful issue of the ransom proposals. There is no indication that the British Government, let alone the Russians, were ever informed of these moves. By the end of the summer, the military situation had changed dramatically. The Western Allies were in command of most of France, Romania had sued for peace and Russian troops were poised to launch their offensive against the Hungarian plains. Early

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST in October, the Regent began negotiations for an armistice with the Russians. However, on 15 October a coup d'etat in Budapest removed the Regent from effective control and gave power to the rabidly pro-Nazi and antisemitic Ferenc Szalasi. Eichmann immediately returned to Budapest to revive plans for the liquidation of Hungarian Jewry. Twenty-seven thousand Jews were rounded up in Budapest and marched to the Austrian border, allegedly as labour battalions beyond the reach of the Red Army. The valiant efforts of the Swedish envoy, Raoul Wallenberg, the Papal Nuncio, the members of the Swiss delegation and the International Red Cross succeeded in rescuing a few Jews. Letters of safe-conduct issued by the Papal Nunciature, forged identity cards and baptismal certificates were used by parish priests; Swiss and Swedish passports were distributed, in effect granting the holders exemption from deportation and the wearing of the hated yellow star. Jews were hidden in Budapest's monasteries and nunneries, and during the autumn and winter of 1944 virtually every Catholic institution in the city sheltered Jews.30 In the chaotic conditions of collapse, any orderly evacuation was rendered impossible; it was a question of mere survival. Meanwhile the British Government persevered in its endeavours to find asylum for the refugees in countries other than Palestine. The Portuguese promised transit facilities. Brazil would take 500 children, the Irish and Spanish Governments were being pressed for offers. Lack of shipping had deterred Australia from giving a definite commitment, while New Zealand was unable to help, and Southern Rhodesia needed time to build refugee camps. South Africa had already accepted evacuees and Italian prisoners of war. India had accommodated half a million refugees of many nationalities, with Poles from the Soviet Union as the largest group among them. No reply was received from Canada. 40 In Palestine the sufferings of the Hungarian Jews were among the factors which encouraged the growth of extremist organizations like the Irgun Zwei Leumi. In November, agents of this group murdered Lord Moyne, the British Minister of State in Cairo, as an act of revenge. The War Cabinet thereupon considered the

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS advisability of suspending all Jewish immigration. but, on Churchill's recommendation, finally decided that such a move would encourage, rather than deter, violence. 41 But terrorism of this kind effectively supported those British officials who had pessimistically but accurately predicted the results of tampering with the 1939 White Paper. The consequent hardening of British attitudes and the decision of the Jews in Palestine to safeguard their future not by co-operation but by resistance to the Mandate aggravated the crisis over the future of Palestine. The fateful dilemmas posed in 1944 by the politics of rescue merely presaged the even more intractable predicaments confronting the British Government and people in the years ahead. In the circumstances of 1944, when the problems of winning the war and arranging the peace took precedence over everything else, the proposals for rescuing Jews in Hungary received scant notice. Effective action would have demanded a resolute determination which, as the evidence shows, inspired only a handful of dedicated individuals, whose failure to persuade the warring governments to succour the doomed victims of tyranny remains a sad comment on the aims for which the war was fought. Obstruction in London and Washington seemed to ignore the awful reality of Auschwitz. When in 1945 public opinion first grasped the full horror of the massacres, a wave of sympathy, mingled with remorse, swept the civilized world. Could more have been done? One view is t h a t ' the energy, resources and will committed to rescue never remotely matched the Nazi commitment to liquidation of the Jews.' 42 But in the circumstances of 1944, even if these qualities had been present, it is uncertain whether any rescue plans, other than that of achieving victory as soon as possible, would have been effective. The military situation, demanding the full deployment of Allied troops in France and Italy, ruled out uncertain expeditions to the Balkans. The proposition of dispatching airborne forces to link up with the Russian armies on the plains of Hungary was too far-fetched to be seriously considered. Whether special bombing missions against the concentration camp areas would have been effective remains an open question; experience

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST has shown that the Germans were able to make rapid repairs to damaged railway lines. The political obstacles were equally formidable. The failure of the July Plot underlined the ineffectiveness of the opposition within Germany. As for negotiating with Nazi representatives, the scepticism shown to such devious schemes as that outlined by Brand justified demands for more explicit assurances. Such negotiations invited leakages, with grave internal consequences and the danger of straining the already difficult relations with the USSR beyond breaking point. Nevertheless, the impression left by the examination of the records suggests that, by July 1944, the British in their clash with the Americans were merely attempting to extricate themselves from their unwelcome predicament. The arguments of political, strategic and logistical difficulties were undoubtedly real enough but no effort was made to extend more generous help to the survivors of Nazi terrorism. As late as August 1944, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, while grudgingly conceding that another 11,000 refugees could be admitted to Palestine, insisted that the original White Paper policy should be maintained. As an editorial writer of the Manchester Guardian observed: 4 Horthy has promised that all Jews with a permit for Palestine may go free, but there are 300,000 Jews in Hungary and only about 14,000 permits left for Palestine. Are we to leave it at that? If military or economic conditions are held to prevent the issue of more permits to Palestine (and this is highly questionable) the Allies must make alternative arrangements.' 43 In the event, no such arrangements were made. Only a tiny remnant of Jews escaped the Nazi clutches and these only with the sanction of the SS. At the end of the war, barely 219,000 Jews survived in Hungary. Huddled in the Budapest ghetto, starving and disease-ridden, deprived of heat and fuel, unable even to bury their dead —between 10,000 and 20,000 Jewish corpses littered the streets or the river banks—the remnant was at last rescued when the city surrendered to the Russian Army on 13 February 1945.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE The annihilation of Hungary's Jewry has been fully explored in Randolph L. Braham's The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry (New York, 1963). The efforts by the Vatican to save the doomed have been described in Jenö Levai's Hungarian Jewry and the Papacy (London, 1968) while similar attempts by Protestants have been documented in Albert Bereczky's study Hungarian Protestantism and the Persecution of the Jews (Budapest, 1946). Since the Eichmann trial, the Nazi offer to barter Jews against military supplies has been the subject of further scrutiny. Apart from A. Weissberg's Die Geschichte von Joel Brand (Cologne, 1956), the story has been told by Heinar Kipphardt and Joel Brand in Die Geschichte eines Geschäfts (Frankfurt, 1965) and Andreas Biss Der Stopp der Endlösung (Stuttgart, 1966). The American response to the Jewish agony has been scrutinized by A. D. Morse, While Six Million Died (London, 1968) and H. L. Feingold. The Politics of Rescue (New Brunswick, 1970). NOTES 1. The subj«ct is not referred to at all in the memoirs of Lord Avon, The Reckoning, nor in D. Dilks (ed.). The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan 1938—45 (London, 1971); nor in Sir L. Woodward, British Foreign Policy in the Second World War. Vol. I l l (London, 1971). 2. Manchester Guardian, editorial, quoted in tel. f r o m American Embassy. London t e War Refugee Board, Washington, 5 August 1944. W a r Refugee Board Papers, Box 33, F. D. Roosevelt Library. Hyde Park, New York. 3. Files of the General Secretory. World Jewish Congress. Geneva. 4. Hew York Times. 25 March 1944, quoted in H . L. Feingold. The Politics ot Rescue, p. 232. 5. Three months later, the Foreign Office felt it necessary to circularize a detailed statement of British efforts on behalf of refugees, since ' it has been found that the American W a r Refugee Board tends to give the impression that only Che United States Government takes the refugee problem seriously ': P R O . CAB 95/15. War Cabinet Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, 29 June 1944. t. See the official statements, reprinted in J . M. Snoek. The Grey Book (Assen, The Netherlands, 1969). pp. 254-256. 7. P R O F O 371 M2722, W/4344, tel. to the Secretary of State for Colonies. 1 Mnrch 1944. 8. FO 371/42723, W4566, Foreign Office minute, 21-25 March 1944. 9. F O 371/42723. W/4703/15/48 and W/5257/15/48 , 30 March and 4 April 1944. 10. CAB 95/15, High Commiüion in Jerusalem to Secretary of State f o r the Colonies, 26 May 1944. 11. Ibid.. and CAB 65/42, War Cabinet Minute* 71 (44). 1 June 1944. 12. F O 371/42758. F O tel. to Washington, 3 June 1944. 13. For f u r t h e r discussion of this issue, see G . H a i u n e r , Justice in Jerusalem (New York 1966), p. 340-341. 14. FO 371/42758, W/9644/109/9, F O tel. to Minister Resident in Cairo, 20 J u n e 1944. 15. CAB 95/15, tel. Lord Halifax to F O , 22 June 1944. 16. Ambassador Avercll H a n i m a n to US State Department, 19 June 1944, quoted in Feingold, op. cit., p. 274.

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST 17. CAB 95/15, note by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. 26 June 1944. IV. See W. Rings, Advokaten des Feindes (Vienna, 1966), pp. 140-148. 19. World Council of Churches, Geneva, archivei: Freudenberc papers: Documents, Hungary. A telegram to the same effect was sent to the Archbishop of Canterbury, FO 371/42807. 20. World Jewish Congress, Geneva, archives: General Secretary's files. 21 FO 371/42726, tel from Legation, Berne to FO, 26 June 1944 22. FO 371/42807, minute by Prime Minister Churchill. 29 June 1944 23 FO 371/42807, minute of Foreign Secretary to Prime Minister, 3 July 1944 24. CAB 95/15, tel. FO to Washington, 1 July 1944. 25. Text of Pope Pius XII's message and reply from the Regent, in J. Levai, Geheime Reichssache: Hungary Jewry and the Papacy (London, 1968), p. 26. 26. Letter from Archbishop of Canterbury, 28 June 1944 in FO 371/42807; see also letter to Prime Minister Churchill, 3 July 1944, -in F O 371/42808. The broadcast was made on 8 July. 27. FO 371/42807. minute 6 July 1944. 28. CAB 95/15, FO note to War Cabinet Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, 12 July 1944. 29. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War. Vol. VI, Triumph and Tragedy (London. 1954), p. 597. ' 341. The Times. 20 July 1944. Since the identical text appeared also in the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Herald, the German Foreign Ministry inferred that it had appeared on official instructions. However, the Germans also inferred that the British denial was only a camouflage to placate Soviet opposition to these moves, see Randolph L. Braham, The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry (New York, 1963), p. 631-633. 31. CAB 95/15, note by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. 3 August 1944. 32. Ibid. 33. Quoted in Feingold, op. cit., p. 268. 34. W. S. Churchill, op. cit.. p. 603. 35. CAB 95/15. War Cabinet Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, 4 August 1944. 36. CAB 66/53, War Cabinet Minutes W.P. (44) 434, 8 August 1944. 37. CAB 65/43, War Cabinet Minutes, W.M. 104 (44), 8 August 1944. 38. Feingold, op. cit., p. 279, and War Refugee Board Papers. Box 33. 39. The details are given in Levai, op. cit., pp. 99 ff. 40. CAB 95/15, War Cabinet Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees: Jews in Hungary; Note by the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, 20 October 1944. 41. CAB 65/44. War Cabinet Minutes, W.M. 149 (44), 13 November 1944. 42. Feingold, op. cit.. p. X. 43. Feingold, op. cit.. p. XI. 44. Quoted in Feingold, op. cit., p. 257. 45. Quoted iri tel. from American Embassy, London, to War Refugee Board, 5 August 1944, War Refugee Papers, Box 33.

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The Mission ofJoel Brand YEHUDA BAUER

ON 1 9 MAY 1 9 4 4 , A GERMAN COURIER PLANE LANDED AT

Istanbul. Among the passengers were Joel Brand, member of the underground Jewish Assistance and Rescue Committee at Budapest, 1 and Andor ("Bandi") Grosz (alias Andreas Gyorgy—and several other aliases), also a Hungarian J e w and a triple or quadruple espionage agent and smuggler. Brand was received by members of the Istanbul group of Jewish Agency rescue workers. He had no Turkish visa, and it was Grosz who bailed him out through his local contacts. 2 Reporting to the assembled group of Jewish Agency workers later that day, Brand told them of the mission he had been entrusted with by the head of the Nazi Sondereinsatzkommando who had come to Budapest to destroy Hungarian Jewry, Adolf Eichmann. Eichmann, Brand said, had offered to release one million Jews in exchange for goods, such as ten thousand trucks, eight hundred tons of coffee, two hundred tons each of cocoa, sugar, and tea, and two million bars of soap. The story of this famous "trucks for blood" offer is the subject of this chapter. Who was behind the Nazi offer? What were the motives of those who made it? Was it meant seriously? Would the Nazis actually have released Jews for some kind of payment? What was the reaction of the Allied powers to the

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand offer? What was the reaction of the official Jewish bodies? Was there any realistic chance of the offer being accepted? Nothing came of the offer as it stood—why? A first attempt will be made in this chapter to answer, partly at least, some of these questions. Beyond them lies a major historical and moral problem: could some, or many, European Jews have been saved through the instrumentality of the Brand proposals and, if so, how was that opportunity missed? Surprisingly, not much has been written as yet on this fantastic episode of the Holocaust. To be sure, all major studies mention it, but no detailed examination has appeared to date. 3 The material is there. The time has come, it seems, to try to evaluate the evidence. ANTECEDENTS

Who was Joel Brand? Born on 25 April 1906 at Naszod in Transylvania, he grew up at Erfurt in Germany, where his family had moved in 191 ο or 1 9 1 1 . He claims to have finished a technical school in 1923, and to have completed his Abitur, or matriculation examination.4 He joined the Communist party, and then traveled, quite possibly as a Comintern agent, to America. He appears to have spent some time in the major American cities. He traveled in the Pacific and the Far East, and spent some time in Latin America. He returned to Germany in about 1927, rejoining his father's firm.5 According to his cousin, Andreas Biss, Brand became a member of the Thuringian Communist party presidium. The Nazi's accession to power found him in a hospital with a wound inflicted in one of the bloody Nazi-Communist encounters. He was arrested and spent over a year in Nazi prisons. He himself claimed that because of his Hungarian passport (though Naszod had become Romanian in the meantime) he was finally released and expelled from Germany in July or August, 1934. 6

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According to Biss, Brand now found work at Biss's factory. As he was, however, not averse to heavy drinking and did not like hard work, he soon got into trouble and had to leave for Budapest (he was still a Hungarian citizen). At first he took employment in a branch of his father's firm in Hungary, but later he decided to immigrate to Palestine. He joined "Gordonia," a moderate left-wing Zionist youth movement and spent some time on a preparatory farm (hachsharah) in order to be entitled to a certificate of immigration to Palestine. In 1935 he married Haynalka (Hansi) Hartmann in what appears to have been at first a marriage of convenience, entered into in order to qualify for the hoped-for Palestine certificate. However, a family was founded, and Hansi Brand developed a shop making knitted gloves. Joel became the buying and selling agent. Joel Brand became active in the Zionist movement. He became a member of the executive committee of Ihud, the moderate left-wing party connected with the Mapai party in Palestine, and was active in fund-raising. In July—August 1 9 4 1 , 18,000 Jews, many of whom had been born in Hungary, were expelled by the Hungarian police into Poland, supposedly as "aliens." Of those, close to 16,000 were murdered by SS Obergruppenfuehrer Franz Jaeckeln's Einsatzgruppe troops at Kamenets Podolsk on 27 and 28 August 1 9 4 1 . 7 Among those expelled were Hansi Brand's sister and her husband. A coffeehouse acquaintance of Brand's, a Hungarian army intelligence officer, Lieutenant Joszi Krem, agreed to try to bring back Brand's relatives—in return for a handsome payment, of course.8 This first contact developed into an ever-expanding activity of saving Hungarian, and later Polish, Jews by bringing them into Hungary, which was until 1944 a relatively safe haven for the Jewish people being murdered by

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand the Nazis all over Europe. With the help of young leaders of Zionist youth movements, mostly people who came into Hungary after fleeing from Slovakia where the deportations to the Polish ghettos and death camps started in March 1942, Brand ran a very efficient organization smuggling Jews across into Hungary. He did so on behalf of Ihud and with the knowledge of the leader of the Hungarian Zionist organization, Otto Komoly. This is a good point at which to introduce the general background to Brand's work. In 1941, after the annexation of what were formerly parts of Romania, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia to Hungary, there were 725,007 Jews in the country; in addition, there were 61,548 converts to Christianity. Together with other people who were Jewish by Nazi definition, the total must have been somewhat above 800,000. In fact, however, the Jews of Hungary were a declining community, with a low birthrate and a high rate of conversion. In 1930, some 65 percent of the Jews belonged to the so-called neologue, or liberal community, which favored a policy of assimilation with the Magyar nation. Close to 30 percent belonged to the Orthodox group, which was actually no less identified with Hungary in speech and customs, except for the strict observance of Jewish religious tradition. The Orthodox element was strengthened in number by the annexations of 1938 to 1941. The Zionists were opposed by both these major movements; they were but a small minority among Hungarian Jews. With the annexation of parts of Transylvania by Hungary in 1940, the relatively stronger Zionist movement there strengthened the small Hungarian Zionist group somewhat. Dr. Rudolf (Reszoe) Kastner, a gifted journalist from Cluj, settled in Budapest and became the acknowledged leader of the Ihud group and, in effect, Komoly's deputy. 9 Discrimination against Hungarian Jews had been the

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policy of Hungary's authoritarian regime, headed by Admiral Miklos Horthy, since 1 9 1 9 . A racial definition of Jews and a numerus clausus in Hungarian universities (Jewish students could not count more than 6 percent of the study body) dated from 1920, though they were repealed in 1928. Two antisemitic laws of 1938 and 1 9 3 9 limited the percentage of Jews in most branches of the economy. In the following few years marriages between Jews and Christians were forbidden, the official status of the Jewish religion was denied, and labor battalions were set up for Jews instead of the usual military service. Even before Hungary's entry into the war in the wake of Germany's attack on the Soviet Union, 52,000 Jews were recruited into these battalions, where they were treated with brutality as, more or less, slave laborers. After June 1 9 4 1 , more were recruited, and some 40,000 sent to the Russian front, where only about 25 percent or less survived. The total number of Jewish men serving in these units has been estimated at up to 100,000, but there were probably fewer than that. The absence of most young men of military age from their communities during the deportation period in 1944 had a considerable influence on the reaction of the Jewish masses: no widespread resistance was possible without men aged 18—35. Brand himself was also threatened with recruitment into these labor battalions, but, like a large number of other young Jews, managed to cheat his way out of the service. 1 0 Attempts made to organize the rescue work on a more formal basis dated from December 1 9 4 1 , when Kästner tried to form a respectable aid and rescue committee with the participation of Liberals and Social Democrats, but he failed. Finally, in January 1943, the Assistance and Rescue Committee (called the "Va'adah" in the correspondence) was established in Budapest, with Komoly as

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Brand

chairman, Kästner at his deputy, and Samu (Shmuel) Springmann, Joel Brand, and a few others. A request from the Istanbul group of Jewish Agency emissaries to establish just such a group (February 1943) simply caused the Va'adah to announce its existence to the Jewish bodies in the free world. 1 1 In the meantime, Springmann, a jeweler by profession, had in October 1942 established a first contact with Istanbul. The courier was Andor ("Bandi") Grosz, who was an agent of the German Abwehr, the military intelligence organization under Admiral Canaris, which stood in opposition to the Hitler regime and was by that time looking for a way to a possible peace. At the same time, Grosz was also in contact with the Hungarian Military Intelligence, as we shall discuss in greater detail later on. Grosz agreed to serve the Va'adah as well, and began delivering letters between Istanbul and Budapest. 12 Brand was responsible for the smuggling of Polish Jews into Hungary; the numbers were limited, but a total of some 2,500 were apparently saved, 1 3 and this was mostly the work of Brand and his small group of youngsters from the Zionist youth movements. On 13 March 1944, members of the Abwehr in Budapest, who by that time had established direct contacts with the heads of the Va'adah, announced to them that Jewish matters would now pass from the ss to the army. What lay behind this misinformation, and whether it was intentional or not, has remained a mystery. The next day, however, the Va'adah members were told that the Germans were about to occupy Hungary, and this information reached Istanbul on the seventeenth. 14 On 19 March, the Germans marched in.

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In this early period one of the most puzzling problems is the relationship between the Abwehr, the Hungarian Intelligence, and the Va'adah. It must be remembered that in February 1944 Himmler abolished the Abwehr and merged it with his own foreign intelligence organization, the SD, headed by Walter Schellenberg. The Abwehr under Canaris had established its contacts abroad with the clear notion that Germany had lost the war. The SD leadership was well aware of the Abwehr views. But the Abwehr groups abroad had mostly deserted to the Allies; the Abwehr was bankrupt, and no longer much of an opponent even before February. It now seems clear, however, that Schellenberg and his immediate colleagues in fact shared the views of Canaris and his co-conspirators such as Colonel Hans Oster and Dr. Hans von Dehnanyi—Germany was lost and contacts with the Western Allies should be established. It seems that the only issue at stake in Budapest was that the group of Abwehr people there were unaware of the takeover of their organization by Himmler at the end of February, and that they held in their hands a trump card: contacts with Istanbul. The SD would naturally seek to take these contacts from them. The Abwehr group in Budapest was controlled from the Abwehrstelle IIIF in Vienna, and was headed by a Dr. Josef Schmidt. Other members of this group were Josef (Joszi) Winninger, alias Duftel (or Duft), reportedly of Jewish descent; Rudi Scholz; and a Dr. Rudolf Sedlaczek, a Viennese who was Schmidt's deputy. Some of these men were very unsavory characters, heavy drinkers and blackmailers. Their main contact man with Istanbul, Bandi Grosz, was also their chief contact with the Hungarians and the local Va'adah. When the ss entered Budapest on

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand 19 March, they were therefore most eager to put their hands on these people without destroying the existing ties the Abwehr had established. 15 During the last weeks before the German occupation, Brand had been the main liaison between the Va'adah and the Abwehr. Now, on 19 March, Winninger and one other man came to his "second home" at the Hotel Majestic in Budapest (he felt unsafe at his "real" home, and he was moving out in any case), and more or less forced him to take refuge with Rudi Scholz in order to escape the SS, who had however managed to arrest Grosz. Brand gave Winninger $8,000 in cash and a gold cigarette case, or according to another account, $20,000, ten to twelve thousand Swiss francs, and fifty to sixty gold coins at $20 each, none of which he saw again. These appear to have been the Va'adah's funds, and not, as Brand claims in his book, his own private property. 16 Grosz later joined him at the Scholz apartment. A few days after the occupation, Brand was released, and participated at a meeting of the Va'adah. It became clear that with the ss troops there had arrived a special commando under Adolf Eichmann to deal with the Jewish problem. Α Judenrat (Jewish Council) was being set up, and it was obvious that the Hungarian Jews would share the fate of Polish Jewry, unless something was done quickly. Kastner, in fact, says that this is what they were told by Winninger. 17 Could they resist by force? The Istanbul group had demanded of the Va'adah to prepare arms late in 1943. Istanbul also nominated a commander—Moshe (Miklos) Schweiger. Some arms were indeed collected; according to Brand, these amounted to 150 pistols, forty grenades, three rifles, and two machine guns, of which one was serviceable. 18 This was hardly enough to stage a rebellion

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with, and in any case Schweiger was arrested immediately upon the German conquest, and held at Mauthausen—he was freed by Kästner towards the end of the war. There seemed to be one viable alternative: to find an ss officer with whom one could discuss some kind of ransom plan. The idea was not as unlikely as it seemed at first; there had been a most important and significant precedent. In March 1942, the Nazis began deporting Slovak Jews to Poland and death. A group of Jewish leaders from all the various groups and parties, led by Rabbi Michael DovBer Weissmandel and by Mrs. Gizi Fleischmann, came into being, devoted to the idea of trying to save Jews by bribe and ransom. Weissmandel, the son-in-law of the acknowledged leader of ultra-Orthodoxy in Slovakia, Rabbi Shlomo David Halevi Ungar of Nitra, was the unlikely partner in this enterprise with his distant relative, Gizi Fleischmann, who was the head of the Women's Zionist Organization—actually, a ladies' benevolent society. Through the intermediary of a Jewish traitor they contacted Dieter Wisliceny, the SS expert on Jewish affairs attached to the German embassy at Bratislava. In June 1942, they agreed to pay $50,000 to the Nazis, in two equal parts, in return for a cessation of the deportations. The deportations ceased. The "working group," as the Weissmandel-Fleischmann leadership called itself, had difficulties in raising the second half of the payment. Some more transports were sent to Poland; the rest of the ransom was paid, and the deportations ceased, not to be renewed until the autumn of 1944. 1 9 It is not quite clear to what extent the cessation of the deportations was the result of the ransom payment or of other factors independent of it. W h a t is perfectly clear is that the "working group" believed that its policy had stopped the deportations. A further approach was therefore

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand made to Wisliceny in November 1942, and a ransom payment offered for the release of all European Jews. This proposal, which came to be known as the "Europa Plan," was to all appearances taken very seriously by the Nazis. Wisliceny went to Berlin to discuss the plan with his superiors—after the war he claimed that he had discussed it with Eichmann—and he came back to Bratislava demanding $2 million in foreign currency, to be paid up after talks on neutral territory. In return, the Nazis would desist from the deportation of West European and Balkan Jewry. These discussions dragged along until August 1943, because Jews in the free world to whom the "working group" turned for the money did not take the German proposal seriously. In any case, there was no money and, even if there were, there was no way of transferring it in contravention of Allied blockade procedures.20 What interests us here is: who stood behind these German proposals, and to what extent were the Germans serious? It seems quite clear that Wisliceny received his instructions ultimately from Himmler. It is also clear that it was not the $2 million that were central to the German proposal, but the fact that such money could only be paid as a result of some kind of negotiations. Was Himmler interested, in 1943, after the defeats of the German armies at El Alamein and Stalingrad, in contacts with the West through the Jews? Was he thinking of using his desperate Jewish hostages in an attempt to create such contacts? Kastner and Komoly were very well aware of all that had transpired in Bratislava. They were in constant touch with Weissmandel and Fleischmann. The "working group" on its part reacted to the occupation of Hungary by contacting Wisliceny—or possibly it was Wisliceny who initiated the contact—and gave the Nazi letters of introduction to three Hungarian Jewish groups: the Orthodox group unter Fülop von Freudiger, leader of an Ortho-

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dox Rescue Committee which had been established in 1943 and which, since November 1 9 4 3 , had a working agreement with the Komoly-Kastner group; the official Zionist leadership in Hungary; and the Baroness Edith Weiss. 2 1 The Va'adah members were looking for a way to contact Wisliceny. The Abwehr people, maneuvering for a place in the negotiations that would guarantee their own survival, offered to mediate—for a consideration. According to Brand, Winninger and Sedlaczek were to receive 1 percent each of the first bribe of $200,000 that would be offered to Wisliceny, and the whole Abwehr group would get another 1 0 percent. The Va'adah's stipulation was that the "status quo"—Nazi abstention from ghettoization and deportation—would be maintained in the meantime. 22 If the "status quo" were maintained, the ss would get the $ 2 million that the Slovak "working group" had originally discussed with Wisliceny. Obviously, the Va'adah was not so eager now to advance the meeting, because they thought that the ss would now stop their preparations for deportations in expectation of a meeting with the Jews. How much mistaken they were in this hope can be seen from the frantic pace with which Eichmann was pushing towards the destruction of Hungarian Jewry. Ex-Prime Minister Miklos Kallay had found refuge in the Turkish embassy in Budapest. A new government was formed under Dome Sztojay, former Hungarian ambassador in Berlin. Pro-Nazi Minister of the Interior Andor Jaross nominated two antisemitic extremists, Laszlo End re and Laszlo Baky, as secretaries in his ministry. Negotiations between Eichmann and these Hungarian Nazis were speeded up; on 29 March Jaross suggested the introduction of the yellow star to be worn by all Jews. A Judenrat was set up by Eichmann under Samu Stern, composed largely of docile, frightened men who thought that

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand if they only behaved quietly and obeyed the orders of the SS, nothing would happen to them. Wisliceny and Eichmann made speeches on 3 1 March to the Jewish leaders in this spirit. On 4 April, Endre prepared the order for the ghettoization of Jews in the provinces, and this was sent out to local authorities on the seventh, in full collaboration of course with Eichmann. In the meantime, a large number of orders were inflicted on the Judenrat and on the Jewish community generally: curfew, prohibition of travel, confiscation of banking accounts, confiscation of property. Complete submission by the Judenrat to all German commands aided in the process. On 15 April, ghettoization began in the Subcarpathian province of Hungary. There was no sign of any Hungarian resistance to this policy, and a great deal of support for it from the more nationalistic and pro-German elements. The Jews were isolated, cowed, friendless, and disoriented. The question has been asked whether Hungarian Jews knew about the destruction process that was by that time almost completed in large parts of Nazi-controlled Europe. The additional question has been asked why the Jewish leadership in Hungary, if it knew of the destruction process did not warn Hungarian Jewry, and did not encourage massive flight into Romania or attempts to hide in Hungary. It would seem that su^h questions are based on a misunderstanding of the situation. Hungarian Jewish leaders, including leaders of the neologue and Orthodox communities, certainly had full information of the Nazi war of murder against the Jews. This information had been there since 1942, if not earlier. It had not been confined to the leadership. Thousands of Slovak Jews had fled to Hungary in 1942, including Polish Jews who had managed to flee from Poland to Slovakia earlier on. Twentyfive hundred additional Polish Jews had entered Hungary between 1942 and 1944, had dispersed in Hungarian

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towns, and had lived among Hungarian Jews. The Allied radio broadcasts concerning the mass destruction of the Jews had been beamed, in Hungarian, to Hungary since the end of 1942, and been listened to all over the country. Thousands of Hungarian soldiers on leave from the eastern front had told their stories in their home towns. A few thousand Jewish labor battalion members had been released in 1943, and had told their harrowing stories in their homes—they too had seen the mass destruction in the east. To say that Hungarian Jewry had to rely on their leadership for information regarding the "Final Solution" is to misread the whole historical process. This mistake has at its root the confusion between "information" and "knowledge." The information was there all the time, including information regarding the ways in which the Nazis were misleading and fooling their victims. The point is that this information was rejected, people did not want to know, because knowledge would have caused pain and suffering, and there was seemingly no way out. In the Judenrat building itself, an office was established for contacts with the provincial communities, later ghettos. From this office, members of Zionist youth movements were sent out to warn the provincial Jews of impending destruction. Not only did their warnings go unheeded, but in many instances they were thrown out of the communities by the local leaderships for spreading panic. 23 It seems doubtful today, protestations to the contrary notwithstanding, whether the Jewish masses in Hungary were prepared to risk flight to Romania or to make attempts at hiding. Obviously, only those communities that were very near the Romanian border stood any chance at all for the first alternative, and the second was barred by the behavior of the Hungarian people. The absence of most young men who were doing their service with the labor battalions also played a part. But in the light of the

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand general situation it seems questionable whether the Jewish leadership and the Jewish people were psychologically capable of absorbing as knowledge what they had at their disposal as information: the fact of the Nazi desire to murder all of them. The Va'adah, it must be remembered, was acting within that somber framework. The date of the first meeting with Wisliceny, at Winningens house, is not quite established. From internal evidence it would appear to have taken place on about 29 March. 2 4 Kastner and Brand were met by Dr. Schmidt and Winninger of the Abwehr, Wisliceny of the Eichmann commando, and SS Hauptsturmfuehrer Erich Klausnitzer, who later turned out to be a member of the SD. This participation of the SD in the very first meeting is significant. The SD under Schellenbe'rg was represented in the new postoccupation setup in Budapest by SS Hauptsturmfuehrer Otto Clages (or Klages), 2 5 who was Eichmann's equal and in certain matters apparently superior. Both Eichmann and Klages were nominally under the Higher SS and Police Leader Dr. Otto Winkelmann, and in'political matters had to take into account the opinion of Dr. Edmund Veesenmayer, the German ambassador who now became the de facto governor of Hungary, and who also held an ss rank. Through Klages and Schellenberg, the contacts led to Himmler, just as they obviously led to the same place through Wisliceny and Eichmann. The two Va'adah representatives asked for a stop to executions of Hungarian Jews in Hungary; for an agreement not to ghettoize the Jews; not to deport them; and for permission for those of them having entrance permits to foreign countries, to emigrate. As to Wisliceny's answer, there are some discrepancies between Brand and Kastner, but they both agree that Wisliceny promised there would be no deportations, no ghettoization, and that emigration was possible, but only on a large scale. According to Kast-

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ner, Wisliceny promised that the "substance" of Hungarian Jewry would be preserved; when pressed, to define what he meant by that, he answered that he meant "the biological base," and did not elaborate any further. 26 On the monetary side, Wisliceny agreed to receive a down payment of $200,000, in Hungarian currency, but he warned that the total sum of $2 million might well be insufficient, and that he would have to take advice from Berlin on this point. According to Kästners report, the Jewish representatives declared that they could only get the required sum (presumably the overall payment, not the down payment) provided the Jewish organizations abroad accepted the German demand. 27 Neither Kästner nor Brand repeated this statement in the other testimonies they gave, but it stands to reason that that is what they said—how indeed could the money be obtained (in dollars!) unless there was contact abroad? If this is what they told Wisliceny, then the subsequent contacts between Eichmann and Brand are much easier explained. The testimonies of the participants diverge on what happened now. Kastner says that the money was raised by Samu Stern, and that only a first payment of 3 million pengö (out of 6.5 million, the equivalent of $200,000) could be mustered for the first subsequent meeting, at which Hermann Krumey and Otto Hunsche, two other Nazis of the Eichmann commando, appeared instead of Wisliceny. Brand repeats the same story in his book, but in his testimony to the British he says that they already paid Wisliceny an advance payment at the first meeting, and that he had a separate, second meeting with Wisliceny on 2 April, at which another part of the bribe was paid. Brand says that he asked the Nazis why they had not kept the promise not to establish ghettos, and that he submitted a memorandum on emigration. He does not mention that Kastner was present at the meeting. The fact that the

THE END OF THE HOLOC AUST The Mission of Joel Brand ghettoization did not start before 15 April seems to discredit Brand's first story, although it is the earliest full testimony we have. 28 The meeting with Krumey and Hunsche occurred, according to this source, on 9 April. A t the next meeting, with Krumey and Hunsche—on 21 April, according to Kastner—another 2.5 million pengö were paid; the Jews had been unable to pay the additional million. The Nazis were disgusted. Was this the way to keep a gentlemen's agreement? They stonewalled on the question of ghettoization and deportation. Emigration was possible, but only on a large scale. The outstanding million pengö were only paid in early May. The Abwehr people now informed Kastner and Brand that deportation had been decided upon, and that the only •hope for a stay of the execution was to prepare large sums of money. It was impossible to obtain a confirmation of this information from the Hungarians or the SS, but the lightning speed of the ghettoization was proof enough. The 21 April meeting was the end of phase one in the Brand story. 2 9 TRUCKS FOR BLOOD

What happened afterwards has been told a number of times, though again there are slight discrepancies. According to Brand, on 25 April Winninger arranged for Brand to be picked up and brought to Eichmann, at the lacter's demand. It seems that Eichmann offered him one million Jews—according to another version, all the European Jews—in return for goods, "for example—lorries. I could imagine one lorry for a hundred Jews, but that is only a suggested figure." Eichmann asked Brand what kind of Jews he wanted. Young men? Women? Children? Old people? Brand answered he wanted all of them, and when asked where he suggested to go to negotiate a deal of that sort, he answered that he preferred Istanbul, because

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it was there that the representation of Palestinian Jews could help him contact the Western Allies. "In reference to the vehicles, Eichmann also said they would be used on the Eastern Front, and not in the W e s t . " 3 0 A second meeting with Eichmann took place a few days later. Two important things happened there. First, Veesenmayer was present. In other words, whoever was behind the German offer was making sure he had the support, at least partly, of the Foreign Office, or at least that part of it which was allied to the SS, as Veesenmayer undoubtedly was. The other matter that becomes clear is that the Germans had no immediate, concrete proposal to make. The demand for trucks was at first not as definite as later literature was to make out. W h a t stood out immediately, however, was the crude attempt to indicate to the Western Allies that the ss did not want to fight against them; the offer was phrased so that the intention to try to cause a division among the anti-Nazi allies was obvious. Brand told his British interrogators that after this second meeting he discussed the Nazi proposal a number of times with Krumey, Eichmann's aide, who elaborated on the Germans' need for machines and machine tools, for raw materials, for leather and hides, and so on. A third meeting between Brand and Eichmann took place on 8 or ι ο May. 3 1 A t this meeting Eichmann, in a dramatic gesture, threw at Brand letters and monies that had been sent to the Va'adah from Switzerland and had been caught by the Nazis. A sum of $32,750 and very confidential and compromising letters were handed him, the letters apparently without having been opened first.32 The letters and the money were given to the SD by Grosz. How did Grosz come into their possession? Very simply. The batch had been brought from Switzerland to the Swedish Military Attache in Budapest, who could not find Brand, and decided to give the material to Grosz, whom

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand he knew to be in touch with Brand. The SD had gotten wind of the fact that the Swedes were looking for Grosz, had arrested him, and forced him to receive the letters and the money and hand both over to them. 33 Why did Eichmann and Klages hand over the material to Brand? Obviously, what was involved in Nazi eyes was more than some small illegal activities of the Va'adah; they had to convince Brand that they meant their offer seriously, if he was to succeed in his mission. Of course, being Nazis, they demanded 1 0 percent for Grosz—in actual fact Grosz only got a fraction of that, and the SD men pocketed the rest. Their whole behavior in this matter leaves open the possibility that they might have received an order from Berlin of how to handle the packet from Switzerland. The tone of the conversation, if one is to believe Brand, was fairly typical of Nazi attitudes. When Brand expressed doubts as to his ability to produce goods, Eichmann answered "that the international Jews control the world; they control every British and American official, so that they could lay their hands on anything they wanted." 3 4 When Brand was asked how long he expected to stay abroad and he answered, about two or three weeks, Eichmann said that he would lay down no definite time limits, but that the negotiations had to be concluded quickly. That was in line with what Wisliceny told Kastner on 25 April: the deportation of all Hungarian Jews had been decided upon, and Brand's mission was the only way of rescue. "Do everything that this journey does not end negatively, and try to achieve at least the partial satisfaction of the German demands; you may win some time by doing s o . " 3 5 That, at least, is the way Kästner has reported the conversation. Something similar may have been said—Wisliceny, like many other Nazis, was trying to prepare an alibi for himself—but Kastner was to accuse Brand of failing the Va'adah in his mission, and he may

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have embellished Wisliceny's utterance to prepare his readers for the argument that Hungarian Jews were killed because of the failure of Brand to return to Hungary. The handing over to the Va'adah of mail intercepted by the SD was repeated on 14 May, in a direct encounter between Klages and Brand. This time it was a matter of $50,000 and 270,000 Swiss francs, and of letters calling upon the Jews to get in touch with members of the Social Democratic and Liberal Hungarian underground. A horrified Brand thanked his stars that the SD had apparently again not opened the letters, and paid the demanded 1 7 . 5 percent of the money to Grosz. 3 6 A fourth and last meeting between Brand and Eichmann took place, apparently, on Tuesday, 1 6 May. 3 7 Present were Winkelmann and Veesenmayer, as well as Krumey, so that this was definitely a top-level meeting. The demand for trucks was put more firmly, and it was stated they should be properly winterized, and equipped with trailers and accessories. Again he was asked how long his mission would take him, and he replied a week or two, unless he had to go to Palestine. According to Brand, Eichmann replied, "Good. But be as quick as possible." At the second meeting Eichmann had declared that if an agreement in principle were reached, he would let a first batch of Jews out. In his talk with Ira Hirschmann on 22 June 1944 Brand stated that Eichmann had promised that "he would let out at first a certain number, ten, twenty, fifty thousand Jews, and for this reason alone it would have been a great thing." 3 8 In Brand's book, this became a promise to release 100,000 Jews as a first move and to blow up the gassing installations at Auschwitz. In his testimony at the "Kastner trial" and again in his testimony at the Eichmann trial he repeated these statements. 39 Eichmann himself gave a different version of what transpired. In the Sassen interview he stated that a "basic objective of

THE END O F THE H O L O C A U S T The Mission of Joel Brand Reichsfuehrer Himmler [was} to arrange if possible for a million Jews to go free in exchange for 10,000 winterized trucks, with trailers, for use against the Russians on the Eastern Front. . . . I said at the time 'when the winterized trucks with trailers are here, the liquidation machine in Auschwitz will be stopped.' " 4 0 In the light of the available evidence, one can assume that some kind of an offer was made to Brand that a token number of Jews would be released if the German offer were accepted in principle. Eichmann may have said that if the whole deal went through, he would have Auschwitz dismantled. It is not likely that he was going to do that—or say he would do that—on the strength of an agreement in principle alone. The Jews that were to be freed would not be allowed to go to Palestine, but to the West, via Spain. "The Germans did not wish to antagonize the Arabs by sending too many Jews to Palestine." 4 1 To sum up: in a number of discussions, Brand was offered the release of a large number of Jews against goods. A t first vague, the demand later crystallized into a desire for ten thousand trucks, quantities of other goods, and a crude message to the Allies that Germany was ready for cooperation with them against the Russians. W e must now turn to another aspect of the story: the elimination of the Abwehr by the SD. In this connection, the personality of Bandi Grosz becomes central. Grosz was born in 1905 in Bergeszaz in Hungary. In 1930, he was convicted of a customs offense, and got into further trouble with the law as a result of his attempts to escape from the consequences of his conviction. He became a carpet smuggler and was caught in 1934, but managed by various ruses to postpone punishment until 1941. In that year, he was sentenced to one and one-half years in prison, but again managed to postpone the execution of

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the sentence. In his flight from the law, he took refuge with the German Abwehr branch in Stuttgart, and did some economic espionage work for the Germans in Switzerland, in 1942. In June 1942 Grosz started to work for Richard Klatt (Kauders) of the German Air Force Intelligence in Sofia, who appears to have been in touch with the Soviets. Slowly disentangling himself from the Stuttgart Abwehr, Grosz began working for the Hungarian Military Intelligence from August 1942. Lieutenant Colonels Antal Merkly, Otto Hätz (the Hungarian military attache at Sofia and Istanbul), and Garzoly belonged to the anti-Nazi wing in the Hungarian army, which wanted to establish contacts with the Allies in order to disengage Hungary from her German alliance. Grosz undertook some smuggling missions to Sofia, working both for Klatt and for the Hungarians. He was to claim later that a number of German agents were expelled from Hungary due to his activity. Using two other agents as subcontractors, Grosz began, from October 1942 on, to transfer letters to Istanbul, and letters and money back to Budapest, for the Zionists. He was persuaded to do this by Shmuel (Samu) Springmann, who later became the treasurer of the Va'adah. From March 1943 on, the date of his own first visit to Istanbul, he became the main courier for the Zionists. In Istanbul, Grosz contacted British and American Intelligence officers (he was in touch with the Poles as well). These contacts were expanded during his trips to Istanbul in April and May 1943. From Teddy Kollek, who was then one of the Jewish Agency rescue workers in Istanbul, he received in May a letter from an American Intelligence officer by the name of Schwarz for Fritz Laufer in Budapest. Laufer—alias Schroeder, alias Ludwig Mayer—possibly a half-Jewish emigrant from Czechoslovakia, was under Klausnitzer, who served as head of Abwehrstelle in,

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand Prague. The fact that the United States Intelligence was in touch with the Abwehr at that stage would tend to fortify the assumption that Grosz, the courier, was of some importance to the Germans. Other German agents entered the picture as well: Popescu and Winninger, of the Budapest branch of Abwehrstelle IIIF, Vienna, among others. They, too, performed services for the Istanbul rescue team, but they were dependent on Grosz for their contacts with the Allies. Springmann in Budapest maintained contact with neutral couriers as well, but the Abwehr people, now working with and through Grosz, became central to the contacts maintained between the Va'adah and Istanbul. In Istanbul, only Menahem Bader of the rescue team suggested that the contact with the Germans be broken off. Ehud Avriel and Teddy Kollek, who were responsible for contacts between the team and the Allied Intelligence services, disagreed because they knew that their service friends needed the German Abwehr couriers. The Americans tried to plant a radio at the Hungarian Military Intelligence center, and entrusted the radio to Grosz, who gave it to Hätz in Budapest. But apparently Hätz either gave the game away to the Germans, or they got wind of it in some other way. However, Hätz apparently was received by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, chief of the Abwehr, and discovered that there was common ground between the political views of anti-Nazis in the intelligence services of Hungary and Germany. Springmann was released by the Va'adah from his tasks after a breakdown, and permitted to use a certificate for Palestine; he arrived in Istanbul in February 1944 accompanied by Grosz. Grosz now contacted his friends of the Allied services and expounded on the relationship between the Hungarians and the Abwehr. The Americans tried to introduce more radio sets to Hungary, first via Grosz and then via

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Hätz, who was in Istanbul at the time, but it appears that Hätz was afraid of being caught and nothing came of it. After Springmann's departure, Brand took over the task of maintaining contact with the various couriers and, mainly, with the Abwehr. He got to know Schmidt, Winninger, Scholz, and Sedlaczek, and thus became somewhat of a competitor to Grosz, with whom he had a longstanding acquaintance. By the time the Germans occupied Hungary, the smalltime crook and smuggler, Andor "Bandi" Grosz, had become an important liaison man of Hungarian, German, and Allied Intelligence services. 42 Unknown to him, the SS had taken over the Abwehr organization while he was in Istanbul on his next to last journey there, in February 1944. From later developments it becomes clear that Klausnitzer and Laufer of the Prague Abwehr were speedily integrated into the SD, whereas the Budapest branch of the Vienna Abwehr, under Schmidt, tried to maintain an independent position or, perhaps, tried to bargain for a significant position within the new setup. Their trump card was their courier contacts with Istanbul, and their anchorman was Bandi Grosz. After the occupation of Hungary, Grosz was arrested by Klausnitzer, and then handed over to the Schmidt group. It seems clear from his account that they tried to blackmail him to give them all the possible information about his contacts in Istanbul, apart of course from giving them access to the Zionist funds. Grosz returned to his Hungarian friends, Hätz, Lieutenant Bagyonyi, and a man by the name of Köves, in order to protect himself from the different German groups. There is no way of finding out the precise sequence of events leading to the arrest of the Budapest Abwehr group and the addition of Grosz to the Istanbul mission. There

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The tMission of Joel Brand are three accounts by Brand—in his interrogation by the British, and two separate ones in the Hebrew and German (and English) versions of his book—and one by Grosz in his interrogation by the British. They all diverge on points of substance as well as on points of detail. In addition, the account by Biss, Brand's cousin, in whose apartment the meetings of the Va'adah took place, and by Kastner, diverge from the other four accounts. Y e t a careful comparison between all these accounts points to some general conclusions. First, Grosz, who realized that the SD now ruled in the murky world of German Intelligence, and who had a grudge against the Abwehr in any case, did his best to compromise the Schmidt group and get them arrested, which in fact occurred around 7 May. Obviously, once Grosz had gone over to the SD, Klages, Klausnitzer, and Laufer no longer needed the Schmidt group. In order to justify their removal, Laufer needed some corroborative evidence, and he appears to have obtained it from Brand, who, too, had a grudge against the Abwehr people. Second, Grosz was very eager to accompany Brand on his mission to Istanbul, of which he had originally heard from Winninger.

Winninger

himself wanted

to

accompany

Brand, and that of course was another good reason for Grosz to want to get rid of him. Grosz managed to blackmail a reluctant Brand to put in a good word for him with Krumey, presumably for Eichmann, who at first rejected the idea. From the context of the testimonies it may be safely concluded that Eichmann was forced into taking Grosz by the SD, headed by Klages. The reason for this is not far to seek: Grosz's value lay in his contacts with the Allies. The innocent Brand could not be trusted with an intelligence mission on behalf of the SD, but Grosz, precisely because of his low character, could. The opportunity was too good to miss. Eichmann must have understood the

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nature of the Grosz mission, and that would explain his reluctance. But orders were orders, and Klages gave them. Grosz was added to the mission. There was one further obstacle. The Va'adah was less than happy with the idea of Brand going to Istanbul. The idea of Grosz accompanying him made them wince. 43 In addition, Kastner had his contacts with the Hungarians, and now that Grosz had become an agent of the SD only, it was Kastner who might betray the whole story of the Eichmann offer and the journey to Istanbul to the Hungarians. The ss were going to sell Jews for goods, and make contact with the Allies in Istanbul, whereas the Hungarians were to be left out in the cold. Kastner had to be prevented from making contact with them, if the mission was to produce results for the ss. Grosz, even Brand, may have indicated to the ss that Kastner was in their way. In any case, Kastner was arrested on 10 May, and put out of harm's way until Brand and Grosz were safely spirited 44

away. * The two emissaries went to Vienna on 17 May, but it was not easy to get exit permits. These were a matter for the German Foreign Office, and the ss was in some trouble with Ribbentrop. Contrary to legend, Nazi Germany was an unsuccessful totalitarian state, in that it constituted, in many of its aspects, a conglomeration of feudal fiefs engaged in continual internecine warfare, though lorded over by the unquestioned authority of a charismatic leader. In that context Veesenmayer could be in on the mission, while Veesenmayer's chief, Ribbentrop, might be opposed. In the end, visas were obtained to exit Germany and transit Bulgaria, but not to enter Turkey. The two were put on a plane all the same, and reached Istanbul, as we have seen, on the nineteenth. Brand had not asked the Germans for a visa, because he was sure that the Jewish Agency people would obtain one

THE END OF THE H O L O C A U S T The Mission of Joel Brand for him in Istanbul. He obviously had no conception at all of the absolute powerlessness of the Jewish people during the Holocaust. Influenced as he was by the fact that he had been living in a Nazi-controlled world, he had absorbed some of the assumptions on which the Nazis acted, and these included the idea of the control the Jews supposedly exercised over the Allied nations and, indeed, the whole world. By a tremendous effort, the Jewish Agency group had in fact obtained a Turkish entry permit, but it was issued in the name of Joel Brand, whereas Brand had come on a German passport issued for Eng. Eugen Band. The visa was useless. ISTANBUL

After arrival, and after the first long sessions with the rescue team, Brand wanted to go on to Palestine. There he would meet with the Agency leaders; but the Istanbul group—Chaim Barlas, Venia Pomerantz, Menahem Bader, Zeev Schind, Akiva Levinsky, Ehud Ueberall (Avriel)— persuaded him not to do so. Instead, they were going to see Laurence A . Steinhardt, the American ambassador at Ankara. Venia Pomerantz left on 22 May for Palestine to report to Shertok, head of the Agency's political department. O n 23 May, Brand and Barlas were to leave for Ankara. According to the story in Brand's book, they were told at the railway station that the Turkish police were looking for him because he had no valid visa for staying in the country. According to his testimony to the British, he went to the police station to apply for a travel permit to Ankara, and it was then discovered he had no visa. 45 What happened afterwards is again unclear in detail, because Brand's testimonies conflict. But his testimony to the British as well as a contemporary letter written by Bader to Pomerantz 4 6 enable us to reconstruct the situa-

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tion. From 23 May to 26 May, Brand was allowed to stay in the hotel under a mild kind of house arrest. He received guests and held discussions, but was confined to the hotel. The Turkish authorities had decided to expel both him and Grosz back to Hungary. They were apparently willing to provide them with transit visas to Bulgaria, but not more than that. On 25 May the Turks finally decided, despite interventions on the part of the Barlas group, to expel the two, but the expulsion was to take place three days later. There was apparently another Turkish decision on the twenty-sixth, this time at Cabinet level. Brand was under the impression that the British had intervened in order to demand this Turkish step; but it is unclear what actually motivated the Turks—it could well have been a desire to avoid complications that would compromise their neutrality. On the other hand, Grosz has said that it was the German ambassador, Franz von Papen, who demanded that the Turks expel them to Hungary. This may well have been the case, given the enmity between Ribbentrop and Himmler. 4 7 What happened next has become a major bone of contention, not only in historical interpretation, but in Jewish and Israeli politics. Brand was to claim that he was forced into agreeing to go to British-controlled Syria on his way to Palestine rather than return to Hungary as he demanded. After a series of contorted motions in Istanbul, Grosz, who Brand said was a Gestapo agent sent along as his watchdog, decided to hand himself over to the British on ι June. Brand had hoped to meet with Moshe Shertok (Sharett) in Istanbul, but Shertok cabled that he had not received a visa. The Istanbul Agency group had then forced him into agreeing to go to Syria himself on 5 June. They must have known that he would be arrested there by the British. He was, and that precluded his succeeding in his mission. Had he returned to Budapest, he might have

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The Mission of Joel Brand saved many Jewish lives. The awesome responsibility for this failure, he claimed, lay with the Jewish Agency, the left-oriented leadership of the Zionist movement, and the British. Two representatives of the Zionist Right and the Orthodox Agudat Israel, Eri Jabotinsky and Ya'akov Griffel, had warned him on the railway station in Ankara, on his way to the Syrian border, but Avriel, his companion and guide, had disregarded all the warnings. This version of what happened was first put over by a clever lawyer, Shmuel Tamir, in the so-called "Kastner trial" in 1954. At a time when the Right in Israeli politics was fighting its political battles with the Labor government, Tamir was clearly trying to discredit some of the major Labor figures as well as some of the minor ones by presenting them as willing or unwilling stooges of the British. The British, in Tamir's scenario, had seen to it that Shertok should not get his Turkish visa, and then had engineered the handing over of Brand to them, in order not to have to negotiate seriously regarding the Brand mission. They did not want to have a million Jews on their hands. They did not want to save J e w s . 4 8 Brand's books appeared after the trial, and there he repeated what he told Tamir: " I told Barlas that I do not want to travel (to Syria), but that I want to ask the German mission (in Istanbul) to return to Budapest." 4 9 Was there a British-Zionist conspiracy to prevent Brand from returning to Hungary? Were lives lost because he did not return? Fortunately we have some contemporary evidence to go on. On 27 May, Bader sent a private letter to Pomerantz in Palestine, in which he described the events of the past few days. He sent a second letter on 10 June, after Brand had left. On that same date, Shertok met with Brand in Aleppo, and wrote down what Brand told him. And on 22 June, Ira Hirschmann interviewed Brand at length in

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Cairo. What emerges from a comparison of these sources is a somewhat different story from the one described above. In his first letter, a shocked and desperate Bader wrote that on the following night (i.e., the twentyeighth/twenty-ninth, after the grace of three days had run out) "they will be led to the border." He had cabled to Budapest in the hope that perhaps they might succeed in preventing them being killed immediately on the border as Jews with German travel documents being returned to German-controlled territory. "With lightning speed the feeling is confirmed that we had from the beginning: that we are in the presence of people condemned to death." It was obvious, according to Bader, that Joel must have thought, how will you handle this tremendous burden of my mission, if you are incapable of obtaining for me a travel permit to Ankara? Brand handed over to Bader his personal testament. They were trying desperately to prevent Brand's expulsion to Hungary, and they had appealed to the British to let Brand go to Palestine, though they knew that meant "that Brand's family would be burnt at the stake." They had obtained a letter from the British asking the Turks to expel the two emissaries to Palestine rather than return them to Hungary, but the British had intentionally failed to state that the two were Jews, and the Turks replied that the two would not be permitted to go to British-controlled territory, but would be handed over to the Germans. When asked by the Agency representative, the British officer replied that "they would not give the two a letter confirming that they were Jews, they had their reasons for it, and the Jews had no business to find out what they were." Barlas then approached Steinhardt to persuade the British to grant the two the required letter, and in the end the British relented. But the Turkish police would not listen. Brand was going to be expelled to German territory. 50

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The Mission of Joel Brand In his second letter, Bader said that as they had to try to prevent Brand's murder in Budapest, they formulated a fictitious formal agreement between the Istanbul rescue team and Brand, bearing the date of 29 May, which Brand could show to Eichmann on his return. In effect, the document promised the Germans a ransom payment of one million Swiss francs a month in return for the cessation of deportation. In return for permitting the emigration of each thousand Jews to Palestine, the Germans would get $400,000; for each thousand Jews to Spain, one million francs. In return for permitting the supply of camps and ghettos, the Germans would receive the equivalent of the amounts sent, of the same goods, for themselves. German plenipotentiaries would be expected to meet with persons from the Allied side who were now on their way to Istanbul (Ira Hirschmann and Shertok were meant). Grosz, Bader said in the letter, was still trying to persuade the rescue team to send them both to Palestine, but it was now clear that both had to return to Budapest. They had another stay of the execution. On the night of 29/30 May, Bader spent many hours trying to convince Brand that he had to accept his fate and go back. " A t last, after hours of struggling, he accepted very quietly the decision that they had to return." On the thirtieth, therefore, Brand in his turn tried to persuade Grosz to return, because it was obvious to everyone that they could not send Brand without Grosz. Up until that time it was clear that the Turks were insisting on their return in any case. But on that day the Turks agreed to send them to Palestine. On the thirty-first the passports were sent to the British consulate for visas to Palestine. 51 The story up to that point is, as we see, quite different from the postwar version: the British strenuously resisted the idea of accepting the two in their territory; Brand had no wish to go back without a definite agreement regarding

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his mission, which could not be obtained in the absence of higher authorities from Istanbul; the Istanbul Agency group, on the other hand, did not wish to send Brand to Palestine in defiance of Turkish and British wishes, and thought that he had to accept the idea of returning to Budapest with just a flimsy piece of paper signed by the Istanbul group, in the hope of fooling the Nazis and perhaps alleviating the situation. Two further questions have to be answered. Did Brand know of the mass deportations that had started on 14 May, from the provinces of Hungary to Auschwitz? Yes, he knew. In his interrogation he stated that "he had received information that on Monday (14 May) mass deportations had recommenced." 52 In his later testimonies—in his book, at the Kastner trial—he even claimed to have known that twelve thousand people a day were being shipped to Auschwitz. He may possibly have received that information while in Istanbul, because the rescue team there received desperate pleas from Weissmandel in Slovakia, who saw the trains pass through Slovak territory and reported all the details to Istanbul and Switzerland. The only conclusion Brand could draw from all this was that the Nazis were not waiting for his return. In other words, if he did not come back with something very real in his hands, it was most unlikely that he could help stop the carnage. It would appear that that was a major consideration determining Brand's behavior. Indeed, when this factor is considered, his opposition to returning to Hungary empty-handed, or very nearly so, becomes perfectly understandable. Another factor, however, has to be considered as well. Shertok was trying to receive a visa to go to Turkey. The High Commissioner in Palestine, Sir Harold MacMichael, claimed he did everything in his power to obtain the visa for Shertok. In fact, in his report to London on 26 May,

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand he said that "Shertok is proceeding to Istanbul as soon as he can (i.e., probably within a few days) for an . . . elucidation of the facts and will report to Η. M. Ambassador, Angora." 5 3 The British embassy in Ankara could not obtain the required Turkish permit. According to Shertok, the High Commissioner cabled the embassy that if Shertok's visa were not received on 30 May, he would send Shertok nevertheless, without a visa. A place was prepared for Shertok on a courier plane leaving for Turkey, but at the last minute a cable from Ankara demanded that Shertok should not come under any circumstances, unless he had a visa. 54 Tamir's later construction appears to have been based on the "diabolical interpretation of history" (Koestler). On 31 May, Shertok cabled Istanbul that he had no visa, but that Brand should not leave Istanbul until Shertok managed to see him there. The cable was sent not only in Shertok's name, but in that of MacMichael as well. 55 But the two representatives of the British consulate in Istanbul with whom the rescue team had been in touch declared that the journey could not wait, and both had to go to Syria. Grosz now was pressing for all he was worth to leave for British-held territory. He had not fulfilled his mission, he said. He could not return; and without his returning, Brand was doomed to death if he went back alone. Brand became convinced that Grosz was right. So were the Agency people. Nevertheless, in accordance with Shertok's wish, Brand was to wait a few more days in the hope that Shertok would arrive in the meantime. Giosz was permitted to go on 1 June. But Shertok did not come. There was no way out: "there was no way but to have Joel and Ehud (Avriel) travel to you. This decision was dictated by logic, the past which had made Bandi a go-between in an affair we did not believe in at first . . . the refusal of Joel to return alone to those who will interpret Bandi's ab-

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sence as treason and flight or kidnapping—and by the silence of Budapest" (Bader had sent the "agreement" of 29 May to Budapest, but had received no answer—no wonder, because Hansi Brand and Kastner had in the meantime been arrested by the Hungarians). 56 On 7 June, Brand reached Aleppo. He met with Shertok there on the tenth, and was then spirited away to Cairo. Did the Agency group not suspect that this was what would happen? In his testimony at the "Kastner trial," Avriel claimed that he had received a British promise that Brand would be free to return to Turkey and Hungary. 5 7 This is confirmed by Shertok, 58 who protested this breach of promise to MacMichael. Brand was aware of all this. Did he, then, regret his decision not to return to Hungary from Istanbul but to go on to Syria? In a moment of truth, after his release by the British, he answered a direct question by Ira Hirschmann on this score: "He stated that after the Turks had arrested him . . . he was given the choice of returning to Hungary, but had he done so it would have been interpreted as a definite refusal by the Allies of his proposals, and he saw only dangers of additional reprisals from this eventuality. Now Brand contends that even in spite of the great trials occasioned by his incarceration, he made the right decision; that at least he accomplished something with the cessation of the deportations and the 1 , 7 0 0 refugees who did come through Hungary." Which sounds fair enough. In 1 9 5 4 , and afterwards, then, Brand was lying. Bader and Avriel were telling the truth. One had better not say anything about Tamir. 5 9 One further puzzle remains in relation to the actual terms of the Nazi offer. In his cable of 26 May, MacMichael told the British government that Brand would have to return within fourteen days after his arrival in Is-

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Brand

tanbul. But, he added, the "terms of negotiations can be prolonged if evidence is forthcoming that [the] scheme is being earnestly considered in high Allied quarters." 60 This is not quite the same as Brand's testimony at the Eichmann trial, where he declared that Eichmann had agreed to hold back the deportees for a week or two and not send them to Auschwitz but to Austria and Slovakia, where he would "keep them on ice"; but he could not wait longer and Brand had to hurry back with his answer. 61 A similar story appears in Brand's book, at the "Kastner trial," and in the accounts by Kastner and others. On the strength of these versions Brand accused the British and, by implication at least, the Jewish authorities as well, of responsibility for the continued murder of Hungarian Jewry because he was not sent back in time. Similarly, Biss and Kastner in their desperation also believed Brand to be responsible, at least in part, for the failure to rescue large numbers of people by going off to Syria instead of returning in time. It was of course obvious to Brand, as well as to Kastner and Biss, that if Eichmann had said that he would temporarily save the lives of the deportees for the first fortnight by sending them to Austria and Slovakia, he had failed to keep his promise. Later on, 1 5 , 0 0 0 Hungarian Jews were indeed sent to Strasshof in Austria in order to work there, but the East Hungarian Jews who were the first victims of Eichmann's policies were sent off straight to Auschwitz. There is also no doubt that Brand felt a tremendous responsibility with regard to his mission, and that he wanted to return to Hungary, after seeing Shertok and other leaders, Jewish and Allied, in the free world, with some kind of an answer that would satisfy the Nazis and save Jewish lives. This emerges quite clearly from Shertok's account of his talk with Brand at Aleppo on 1 0 June.

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But in his interrogation by the British as well as in his interview on 22 June with Hirschmann Brand quite explicitly denied that Eichmann had ordered him to return within a fortnight. He had no reason to deny any such order if it had been given, because if he told his interrogators that unless he returned within a given time the lives of hundreds of thousands would be lost, he would have strengthened the case he was making in all the rest of his answers. But Eichmann had said, according to Brand, that he "was not to hurry back but must settle the business." On another occasion, Brand said, he had stated that "he [Brand] might have to go to Palestine. Laufer reiterated Eichmann's reply that he would set no time limit, but that Brand must be as quick as possible." 6 2 We see again that Brand was twisting the facts in order to suit the developing situation when he claimed, years later, that he had to return within fourteen days. It is highly unlikely that he did this out of bad faith. What is much more likely is that he indeed was acting out of a great sense of urgency, that he knew he must return soon if his mission was to have any success at all, but that as time went on he distorted Eichmann's and Läufers words somewhat in order to make the appeal of what he had to say even more dramatic than it already was. Except for one minor American official, all the individuals who met Brand in May and June 1944, Jewish, British, or American, were impressed by his honesty, his genuine sense of his mission, and his personal courage. There does not seem to be any contradiction between that impression and some other, less favorable character traits that emerge from a more detailed study of Brand's statements. His adventurousness, his addiction to drink, his tendency to seek an easy life, and his penchant for exaggeration—especially when it had to do with his own role—complement, rather than deny, the impression he made in 1944.

100

THE E N D O F THE H O L O C A U S T The Mission of Joel Brand THE REACTIONS TO THE BRAND MISSION

W h a t did Brand himself chink of his mission? W h a t did he suggest should be done by the Allied authorities? Did he think goods should be provided to the Nazis in return for Jewish lives? Brand thought that one motivation for the Nazi offer might be the notion that " i f they release the remaining two million Jews, they will be forgiven the extermination of six million Jews." He did not think, he told Shertok, that the Allies would give the Nazis 10,000 trucks, but the SS was utterly convinced that the Jews ruled the free world and that if they really wanted, they could send the trucks or indeed anything else. According to Brand, however, he learned on the way to Istanbul and in Istanbul itself something about the second mission, namely that of Bandi Grosz. Grosz, he said, had hinted that it was his task to bring together Nazi and Allied representatives for talks that would go beyond the Jewish question. A t first, Brand told Shertok: I was convinced that were I to bring a positive answer (to the Germans), it would mean that I had brought salvation. Now that I have heard about Bandi's mission, I am no longer that sure. If I return with a negative answer, then immediate wholesale extermination will begin; possibly my family and my immediate friends will not be sent to the slaughterhouse straightaway, because they may want to keep an opening for further negotiations. Should I not return at all, all my friends will be murdered immediately . . . a slight chance exists that they may leave my family be in order to point to them and say: these are the family of the Jew Brand, whom we sent on a mission, and he ran away." 63 Brand repeated the same ideas in Cairo. In essence, he said he should be permitted to return not with the idea of handing over trucks, but with the idea of perhaps offering money. The main thing, however, was the process of ne-

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gotiation icself. As long as the Nazis thought the negotiations might lead to a result favorable to themselves, they would stop the murder. In short, he suggested negotiations with the SS. "The best thing I think would be that one, two, or three officers from Hungary should come to a neutral country, say Spain, or Turkey, or Switzerland, and English and American people, and myself too, and we should try to come to some sort of bargain." 6 4 As Hirschmann pointed out in his report on the interview with Brand, the Nazi idea about trucks was not very definite at all. "Brand's statement that the proposal connected with 10,000 lorries and other commodities was mentioned in an offhand way and in effect 'pulled out of the hat" by one of the German officers is a clear indication that this is not concrete or to be taken seriously." 65 Brand, then, thought that giving trucks was neither realistic nor important; negotiating about them was. The reaction of the two Western Allies was one of consternation and some indecision, at least in the first stages. Laurence A . Steinhardt, U.S. ambassador in Ankara (and a Jew with very definite assimilationist and conservative tendencies), reported the essentials of the Brand mission to Washington on 25 May. 6 6 In Jerusalem, on 26 May, Shertok informed the High Commissioner of the same details; he himself had been informed by Venia Pomerantz on the previous day. As we have seen, MacMichael cabled the message to London immediately, adding Shertok's request that the gist of the message be brought to the attention of Weizmann in London and Nahum Goldman in New York. Let us first examine the British reaction. The matter was considered serious enough to warrant a meeting of the War Cabinet Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, which duly took place on 3 1 May. The proposals were judged by the participants at the meeting

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Brand

to be blackmail and a piece of political warfare. If the Germans had anything to propose, they could do so through the Protecting Power (Switzerland), and of course negotiations with the Gestapo were out of the question. So was the idea of handing over ten thousand lorries. The idea of an exit of Jews through Spain and Portugal was designed to embarrass Allied military operations (the Normandy landings were to take place exactly a week later). It was thought that the Germans might want to exchange Jews for German prisoners of war in Allied hands. This would leave the choice of the exchangees in Hitler's hands, and His Majesty's Government would lay themselves open to criticism if they did so. The Jewish Agency in Palestine was to be informed that there could be no negotiations with the Germans. And yet, the committee was facing a dilemma. In April 1943 the Anglo-American conference on refugees at Bermuda had reached no tangible results, and criticism of Britain's lack of action on the refugee problem was mounting. From all sides of the House of Commons, from the church dignitaries—especially the Archbishop of Canterbury—from many walks of life in wartime Britain, people were demanding that their government take some action about the persecutions of the Jews. The committee therefore decided that a "mere negative should not be opposed to any scheme which promises rescue of Jews," and that a communication in this sense be sent to the United States government. While it was thought thac such a reaction might be welcomed by the Americans, the representative of the Foreign Office warned that the proposal, which actually deserved to be totally ignored if considered on its merits alone, might, God forbid, secure "sympathy . . . in Washington, where the President's War Refugee Board, backed by Mr. Morgenthau, had, partly for electoral reasons, committed itself to the 'rescue' of Jews." The opinion was expressed

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that "there seemed to be some danger that an indication that we might negotiate through a Protecting Power with the German Government might be followed up, and lead to an offer to unload an even greater number of Jews on to our hands." 6 7 The points mentioned above were included in a memorandum sent to Washington on 5 June. On the negative side, the opposition to any kind of negotiations with the Germans was based on the general Anglo-American consensus of an unconditional German surrender. This had been fortified specifically for the whole problem of the refugees at the Bermuda conference, where any negotiations with Germany other than for the usual wartime exchanges of sick prisoners of war or civilians trapped by the war on the other side were agreed to be ruled out. On the positive side, however, the prospect was held out that numbers of Jews who might be "especially endangered" could be accommodated in Spain and Portugal. With all of European Jewry facing death, it was not made clear who the "especially endangered" Jews might be. No final answer should be given to the Nazis until an agreed Anglo-American stance was formulated, and the door should be kept open. That, in fact, was what the British suggested Shertok should tell his Zionist friends in Hungary. One of the interesting points in analyzing the first responses is the fact that London was unaware of the Nazi declaration that the lorries would not be used against the West. Pomerantz did not transmit this information to Shertok, or Shertok did not volunteer it to MacMichael; in any case this obvious attempt to split the Allies was as yet unknown. Another point worth mentioning is that Grosz had been described in MacMichael's report as Brand's watchdog, and his role was simply ignored. Foreign Secretary Eden disclosed the Brand mission to Weizmann on 5 June, and Weizmann's first reaction was

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Brand

that this was just a Nazi ploy to embarrass the Allies. At a second meeting on the following day, however, Weizmann changed his stance and demanded Shertok's immediate presence in London and a more positive attitude to the whole problem. Eden promised that His Majesty's Government would see to it that the door would be kept open—a phrase which was to recur in the correspondence during the following period. 68 The British "fear" regarding U.S. policy had some basis in fact. On 22 January, Roosevelt set up the War Refugee Board, to be headed by the secretaries of State, War, and the Treasury. In fact, the acting director, John W . Pehle, formerly of the Treasury, was the guiding spirit; the full board met very rarely indeed. Pehle had sent out a cable to all United States missions abroad on 25 January, announcing that "action would be taken to forestall the plot of the Nazis to exterminate the Jews and other persecuted minorities in Europe." 6 9 The fact that the Jews were especially threatened and therefore had some claim to special attention was stated for the first time. Pehle was a nonJew, and so were his Treasury colleagues who had impressed on their Jewish secretary, Henry Morgenthau, J r . , that drastic action was needed. The War Refugee Board was given rather unusual powers. It could issue licences to transfer funds into enemy territory, in practice in contravention to other war regulations; it could ask for and receive prior consideration for shipping of refugees, at a time when shipping was a major bottleneck in military operations; it was entitled to use State Department facilities both in Washington and at the different United States missions all over the globe. By implication, it could negotiate with the enemy over refugee matters, though it was understood that prior consent would be needed. What is more, the War Refugee Board used all these privileges in practice. It was the one clear instance during World War

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II when moral and humanitarian considerations outweighed and sometimes brushed aside considerations of utility and political or even strategic interests. This is of course not to say that the War Refugee Board was either free from faults, or did not encounter strong, often even bitter opposition from other elements in the wartime Washingtonian administrative labyrinth. Understandably enough, officials at State and at War saw the War Refugee Board as something of a nuisance, occasionally as a dangerous menace. The Brand mission was just one of many issues where these tensions came to be expressed. Edward R. Stettinius, the Acting Secretary of State, informed Nahum Goldman of the American branch of the Jewish Agency of the Brand affair on 7 June, as he had been asked to do in the British note. He told Goldman that the proposal would be seriously considered. Goldman suggested that a money ransom might be offered, and the money perhaps paid through Switzerland. Alternatively, the International Red Cross might be persuaded to look after the Jews, and receive payment for it. This of course was an idea that had been tried before, and was to be revived again before the war ended. 70 In the War Refugee Board, Pehle had been busy. On 9 June, he could inform Edward Stettinius that Roosevelt had "agreed with our thought that we should keep the negotiations open if possible," in order to gain time, "in the hope that meanwhile the lives of many intended victims will be spared." 7 1 On the same day, apparently with the President's explicit approval, Ira A . Hirschmann, a wellknown Jewish businessman and supporter of the administration, was sent as War Refugee Board representative to Turkey to find out from Brand himself about his mission, and to report back to Washington. Hirschmann had been to Turkey for the War Refugee Board before, and could be relied upon to report back on the basis of his already con-

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand siderable knowledge of the background. In its instructions to Steinhardt, the War Refugee Board, through Stettinius, took the same position as the British: not to close the door to further developments.72 The immediate problem for both governments was whether to inform the Soviets. Stettinius cabled Moscow on 9 June, asking Ambassador Averell Harriman to explain to the Soviets that the United States wanted to keep the door open, but instructing him to bring the facts to the attention of the Russians. A parallel message was sent to British Ambassador Sir Archibald Clark-Kerr. They informed Andrei Vyshinski, Deputy Soviet Foreign Minister, on 15 and 14 June, respectively, and Vyshinski replied to Harriman on the eighteenth. Harriman's cable reached Washington the twentieth.73 The Soviet government, said Vyshinski, deemed it neither expedient nor permissible to negotiate with the German government regarding the problem mentioned in Harriman's note of the fifteenth. This attitude of the Soviet government could of course have been predicted. It is unclear whether the State Department and the White House turned to the Russians because they knew what the answer would be, or whether they turned to them despite this knowledge. In any case, any further meaningful official approaches to the Nazis related to the Brand mission were thereby effectively precluded. It was one thing to try to establish contacts designed to keep Jews alive while the contacts were maintained, and not to inform the Soviets about them officially; it was quite another thing altogether to establish such contacts after the Soviets had explicitly vetoed any such idea. In a sense, the American move and the Russian response meant the end of Brand's mission. In quite another, it meant that one phase of the affair had ended, but another one had only just begun. In any case, on 21 June, Steinhardt received a cable from Washington, in the wake

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of the Soviet reply, and was told not to do anything at all in the Brand affair, and to convey this information to Hirschmann. But Hirschmann no longer was in Turkey. We have seen that Brand arrived in Syria on 7 June, and was interviewed by Shertok on the tenth. Hirschmann arrived in Turkey on the eleventh, and went on to Cairo, hoping to see Brand-there. He interviewed him on the twenty-second, had several talks with Lord Moyne, the Resident Minister of State in the Middle East, and reported to Steinhardt and to Washington. Lord Moyne was worried lest the contacts with the Nazis be broken off and the Allies be accused of having caused the death of many innocent victims. He suggested that the Istanbul Agency group give some kind of an indication to the SS that its proposals were being studied. Hirschmann thought that this had best be left to Washington and London. 74 Shertok was flying to London (which he reached on the twentyseventh), and no doubt decisions would be taken soon. Pehle was dealing with the problem in conjunction and discussion with the State Department. It was not until 1 9 June that he informed Morgenthau, his real superior, for the first time regarding the Brand proposals. In the meantime, a reply had been worked out between him and State to the British note of 6 June. The American reply was delivered on the nineteenth, or one day before the devastating Soviet response was received. The American note ignored most of the reservations made by the British. It was based on a War Refugee Board draft of 1 3 June, and it indicated that the details of the Brand proposals were not as important as the possibility that the process of negotiations itself might lead to the saving of lives, because if the process were dragged out, the war might end in the meantime. It was, the Americans said, agreed that large numbers of Jewish refugees escaping from Nazi areas might prejudice military operations and that such a move-

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The Mission of Joel Brand ment was therefore not practical. But, they said, the Germans should be made aware that the two governments would be prepared to consider temporary havens for "all Jews and similar persons in imminent danger of death." 7 5 The British agonized over their reply for almost two weeks. On 26 June, Eden signed a Foreign Office memorandum which stuck to the idea that the Brand proposals be kept in play in order to avoid the accusation of indifference "to the whole Jewish catastrophe." 76 The Germans should be told that the Allies were willing to accept certain groups of Jews about whom negotiations through the Swiss had been proceeding for some time: a group of Rabbis, for Mauritius; 5,000 women and children from the Balkans to Palestine; and so on. Spain and Portugal should be invited to offer hospitality, at British and American expense, to a "stated number" of Jews, but not to "all" Jews, as the Americans had suggested. Brand should be released, and tell the Germans that they would be approached through the Swiss. The interesting thing is that the British knew of the Soviet refusal to allow the Allies to negotiate. But they still wanted to keep the doors open. They therefore proposed to negotiate quite officially through the Swiss, and wanted to instruct Brand and Shertok that no ransom would be paid, and no direct negotiations would take place. On the whole, however, Eden did not want to be bothered with the whole problem. On 28 June, Weizmann and Shertok asked to see him to discuss the Brand mission. Eden minuted: "Must I? Which of my colleagues looks after this? Minister of State (Richard Law) or Mr. (George) Hall? At least one of them responsible should be there if I have to see these two Jews. Weizmann doesn't usually take much t i m e . " 7 7 In the end, Hall saw "these two Jews" on 30 June. They suggested that the Germans be told through the Swiss of Allied readiness to meet with them to discuss the

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rescue of Jews in general. The War Refugee Board should meet with representatives of the Gestapo, provided deportations were stopped. Radio warnings should be issued to Hungarian railwaymen not to carry Jews to death camps. Finally, they demanded that the death camps at Auschwitz be bombed. 78 Two comments are in order on these new proposals. First, detailed reports regarding the Auschwitz death camp and the gassing installations in it were received in Slovakia from two Slovak Jews who escaped from the camp on 7 April 1944. These testimonies, and those of two other Jews who escaped from Auschwitz on 27 May, were carefully written down by members of the Slovak "working group," and transmitted to the Vatican, to Switzerland, and to Hungary. It is not quite clear why these reports did not reach Jewish organizations in Switzerland until about 21 June, but when they did, these groups immediately informed the British and American representatives. The British Foreign Office learned of the report from a cable which the Jewish Agency representative at Geneva, Richard Lichtheim, sent to his organization in London through the British mission at Berne on 26 June. After that date, similar cables based on these reports started coming in, the Czechoslovak government also transmitted the report, and early in July the report itself came in, from Stockholm, and then again from the Czech government in London. 79 There was therefore no reason to disregard the appeals for help from the Jewish Agency. Indeed, notes by Foreign Office officials on the report from Sweden about the Auschwitz gas chambers no longer expressed disbelief. Faced with the Nazi policy, they said, "it is difficult to see what can be done by those who like ourselves would do everything in our power to stop i t . " 8 0 Second, the idea of bombing either the death camps or the railways leading up to them, or both, had been

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel

Brand

broached on 2 June by two seemingly different sources: by Itzhak Gruenbaum, the chairman of the Jewish Agency Rescue Committee in Jerusalem, in a cable transmitted to Washington by consul Pinkerton in Palestine; and by Isaac Sternbuch, Swiss representative of the Va'ad Hahatzalah (Rescue Committee) of the Orthodox Rabbis in the United States, in a cable transmitted by the American delegate at Berne. 81 The idea was then repeated a number of times on different occasions throughout June, with Gruenbaum again repeating it to London on 29 June. 8 2 On all these occasions, the proposal can be traced back to a message sent by Rabbi Weissmandel about the middle of May, which reached Istanbul before Brand left for Syria. 83 The same message also forms the basis of a cable from Roswell D. McClelland, War Refugee Board representative at Berne, to Washington, on 24 June. 8 4 It seems strange that the very sensible idea of using Allied military power to prevent the murder of Hungarian Jews should have occurred first to an ultra-Orthodox Slovak rabbi, but that is a fact. It is even stranger that the idea was not acted upon by the military men of both Western powers. The reports on gassings at Auschwitz did not much change Foreign Office attitudes. The Jewish Agency submitted yet another aide-memoire on 6 July. By that time, a month had passed since the arrival of Brand on the Syrian border. In the meantime, the Agency paper screamed, four hundred thousand Jews had been sent to the death camps, and what went on there was known. The "stage of temporizing, in the hope of prolonging the victims' lives, is over." Negotiations were essential. A War Refugee Board and a British representative should meet the Nazis. Brand, and Grosz if possible, should return. The Nazis might let out some Jews. It might "boil down to a question of money, and we believe that the ransom should be paid." The Allies should publish a de-

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claration that they would admit refugees released by the Nazis. Another warning should be sent to the Hungarians, in which Stalin should be asked to join. The camps and the railways should be bombed. Faced with this paper, Ian L. Henderson, a high Foreign Office official, decided to warn Eden of a "complete surrender to Jewish pressure irrespective of whether political results may follow." Referring to the main point, namely that of the negotiations, Alec Randall of the Foreign Office commented, "We can't have this, and the U.S. government having now agreed not to negotiate with the Germans except with Soviet agreement, must realize that these Jewish proposals for a meeting are impossible." 85 The British were acting out of an understanding—or misunderstanding—that "the U.S. government, particularly in [an] election year, is desperately anxious to show that nothing, however fantastic, has been neglected that might lead to the rescue of Jews." Had it not been for what the British thought they had to do to accommodate American sensitivities, they would not have hesitated to "dismiss the Gestapo proposals with contempt" right at the outset. 86 In line with this basic British approach, a cable was sent to the British embassy in Washington that was to represent the furthest limit to which the British government was prepared to commit itself. Sent on ι July, the cable analyzed the Brand proposals as designed to produce a split between the Russians and their western Allies; furthermore, they were intended "to elicit a rejection, which would then be represented as justification for extreme measures against Jews" (one wonders what more extreme measures could have been taken beyond total murder). They should really have been rejected, but they had been "kept in play in the hope of staving off disaster." Therefore, the British again proposed to send Brand back, and negotiate

THE E N D OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand through the Swiss, mainly for the release of children. Spain should also be approached to receive "manageable numbers of Jewish refugees." In Shertok's words, "a 'carrot' should be dangled before the Germans in the shape of agreement by the U . K . and U.S. to discuss with them the question of Jewish rescue." Finally, the British note asked the ambassador to find out whether Shertok was correct in stating that the W a r Refugee Board was permitted to contact the Germans directly. The British thought in any case that any step to be. taken would have to receive prior Soviet approval. 87 The British attitude was undoubtedly influenced by two brief interventions of Churchill. Although motivated by the same deep feeling for the Jewish victims, and by a deep hatred for the Nazis and all their works, they tended to operate in two contradictory ways. The first one was in a brief minute Churchill wrote on 29 June, after reading Lichtheim's report on the gassings at Auschwitz. It said: "Foreign Secretary. What can be done? What can be said?" It was this minute that undoubtedly influenced the more positive Foreign Office attitude at the end of June and the first days of J u l y . When Eden then brought the results of the deliberations at the Foreign Office to Churchill's attention, and included in his report the ideas of approaching the Swiss to rescue children and investigate the possibility of bombing Auschwitz, Churchill replied on 7 July: " Y o u and I are in entire agreement. Get anything out of the Air Force you can and invoke me if necessary. Certainly appeal to Stalin. On no account have the slightest negotiations, direct or indirect, with the Huns."88 Action was taken by Eden on Churchill's remark regarding the bombing of Auschwitz—but the A i r Ministry, under Sir Archibald Sinclair, replied that the bombing was technically impossible. On the other hand, his directive

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not to have anything to do, directly or indirectly, with the Germans was interpreted by Eden as a refusal to negotiate through the Protecting Power. Thus, on 1 3 July, at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee, Eden declared that the policy had changed: no approach through the Swiss was now contemplated. 89 As if the new British attitude were not enough to bury the Brand mission, the Americans now insisted on telling the Soviets what they had not known on 9 June, when Harriman was first told to inform the Soviets of the Brand proposals: that the Nazis had "promised" not to use the trucks in the West, but only against the Russians. On 7 July, instructions were sent by the State Department to tell the Soviets all the details. The British had attempted to dissuade the Americans from thus finally dismissing all possibility to act upon the Nazi offer. The Americans were at that time trying to keep in the Soviets' good graces, and must have feared that if, as was inevitable in the end, the Soviets should discover the full details of the offer themselves, the damage would be much greater. They therefore explicitly overrode the British objections and Harriman was instructed to tell the Russians. 90 Brand and Grosz could not return without Soviet agreement. The contortions of Anglo-American policies regarding the Nazi offer received a new and somewhat unexpected turn during the second week of July 1944. The British Cabinet Committee met on 1 3 J u l y . Eden declared there that up until now the object of British policy had been to spin out the negotiations in the hope of saving lives. Now the Prime Minister had indicated that negotiations through the Swiss were to be avoided. Not only could there now be no negotiations at all, but the sinister motives behind the Nazi proposals had become much clearer: "Mr. Randall (Foreign Office) informed the Committee that a report had just been received showing that the

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand approach by Brand and Grosz had been incended as cover for a separate peace intrigue. It was stated that high Gestapo officials were implicated, their object being to put forward vague hints of peace proposals which might embarrass us with the U.S.S.R." The whole business was a trap, Eden concluded. A message from the Prime Minister to the President might be needed to explain the British change of policy. This might also produce publication of the offer by the Germans or the Jews [sic}, in which case a full exposition of the facts would be necessary.91 On 18 July, accordingly, a cable was sent via the British ambassador in Washington to the State Department, explaining the change of British policy. Until now, the note said, the British had thought that the proposals should be investigated and Brand retained in the hope that a serious proposal might emerge or that, in the interval, the murder of the Jews would cease. Neither had occurred. On the other hand, a most dangerous development had come about: "we now have evidence that the Brand mission was intended as cover for an approach to us or to the Americans on the question of a separate peace, not seriously intended, no doubt, except in an attempt to prejudice our relations with the Soviet Government." The Gestapo agent (Grosz) should be retained; if Brand still wished to return to Hungary, he could do so, provided the security people had no objections, but he must be told that the Allies "cannot be expected to take any cognisance of the suggestions he brought or the channels through which they were conveyed." 92 What was the evidence? THE MISSION OF BANDI GROSZ

Bandi Grosz, it will be remembered, left for Syria from Istanbul on ι June. He was arrested and brought to Cairo. There he was interrogated from 6 June to 22 June by the

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Mideast Intelligence Service. The interview was written up and ready for distribution on 4 J u l y , and it must have reached the Foreign Office about a week later, 93 which would explain the change in British policy on the thirteenth. After the arrest of the Abwehr people on 7 May, the SD in Budapest—Klages, Laufer, and Klausnitzer—must have decided that Grosz was their man to transmit a message to Istanbul. According to Grosz, he met the group on 1 3 May, and Klages explained to him that they had reported Brand's readiness to go and get war material in exchange for Jews to Berlin and had received instructions that Brand must be sent on his mission. The Jews would be sent (to Palestine, Klages said) and thus burden the British with vast problems. The next day (14 May), however, after the background of the Brand mission had been explained to Grosz—or at least that part of it destined for his ears— Klages talked to Grosz about the stalemate in the war, which necessitated a breakthrough. The time had come for the war between Germany and the Western Allies to cease, and a united front against Russia had become necessary. Was it possible to negotiate with the Allies through the Zionists? Grosz said that this might be a possibility. Klages now asked Grosz "whether he knew of any way to arrange a meeting in any neutral country between two or three high SD officers and two or three high British and American officers for the purpose of opening negotiations on the subject of a separate peace between the SD and the Allies (excluding Russia)." Grosz thought he could do that more easily than Brand could get his lorries, but asked "why he, a petty smuggler, should be chosen to do this instead of, for instance, Herr von Papen, Germany's diplomatic representative in Turkey." Klages said he did not want to negotiate with diplomats, but with military representatives. Anyway, he said, the SD was "having trouble

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The Mission of Joel Brand with the [Nazi] Foreign Office," and that was the real reason for Brand's mission: If Brand was successful in delivering war material, or at least a large amount of money to Germany, the Foreign Office could not turn around to the SO and ask why they were negotiating with the Zionists, and why they had altered their policy concerning the Jews. Brand's mission was really only a sop to the Foreign Office, and camouflage for the mission with which the SD was contemplating sending Gros ζ, namely to arrange a meeting between the SD and the British and Americans . . . the SD was now the real directing power in Germany, and whatever 'Heinrich mit (dem) Augenglass' [Heinrich with the spectacles}, Himmler, decreed, had to be carried out. The SD was genuinely keen to negotiate a separate peace and to obtain its own 'security.' " 9 4

Grosz was to arrange for such a meeting between the SD and the Allies through the Zionists. If this proved impossible, he was to use his contacts with the American Intelligence officer Schwarz to arrange for the meeting. The Allies could meet with any SD officer except for Himmler, who could not leave Europe. If Grosz and Brand returned to Hungary without having accomplished anything at all, they were to make another attempt through Switzerland, with the representative there of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), the main American Jewish rescue and welfare agency. 95 If that failed, they should try again through Dr. Joseph J . Schwartz, the JDC'S European director, who was working out of Lisbon. Grosz was to return by 29 May. In analyzing Grosz's testimony, one must realize that this took place two months before the attempt on Hitler's life on 20 July. We know already that the Abwehr and Schellenberg's SD shared the opinion that Germany was losing the war. We also know that Himmler was aware of the opposition groups who were planning action against Hitler, though he probably did not know that Klaus von

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Staufenberg was planning to assassinate the Führer. A peace feeler parallel to the Brand-Grosz mission was put out through Stockholm at the same time. Iver Olsen, the War Refugee Board representative at Stockholm, reported on 28 June that an ss man by the name of Peter Bruno Kleist had offered the release of two thousand Latvian Jews for $2 million, or, later, two million Swedish kroner.96 It soon became clear that this was another gauche attempt to contact American diplomatic representatives, with an ultimate aim that went far beyond the fates of two thousand Latvian Jews—or, later, χ00,000 Estonians. Such feelers could not have been put out without Himmlers express approval. What Grosz reported in Klages's name in this connection sounds genuine enough. The very turn of the phrase "Heinrich mit {dem) Augenglass" was current only among the ss. Grosz would not have been aware of it, unless it had been mentioned by an ss man in his presence. Why had Grosz, an unsavory character and a known and lowly agent, been chosen for such a top secret and important mission? Part of the answer, it seems, was provided by Grosz himself. There was a bitter enmity between the SS and the Nazi Foreign Office. A German could not be sent abroad, because then the Ribbentrop people would have asked awkward questions that might be reported to the Führer—and Himmler stood in fear and awe before the man whom he wanted to succeed or even supersede.97 On the other hand, somebody had to be sent who already had contacts with Allied services. There was only one such person in the Third Reich, and he was sitting right in Budapest under the SD'S nose: Andor "Bandi" Grosz. The contacts were to be established between the Allies and the "SD," i.e., the ss representatives, not official German negotiators. Obviously, given Himmlers intrigue

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand against Ribbentrop and his desire to make a separate peace, this was the only way the thing could be engineered. If Ribbentrop and Hitler got wind of Grosz's mission and any subsequent meetings, Himmler would be in a very awkward spot indeed. If, however, Grosz was covered by the Brand mission, which was a patriotic attempt to get war materials for the hard-pressed Thousand-Year Reich in exchange for Jews who were doomed to death anyway, then Himmler had a good excuse in any eventuality. The very fact that Grosz was a worthless lout could be utilized in an emergency: whose word should the Führer believe if the affair blew up, that of a Jewish criminal or that of his faithful and obedient Heinrich? The conclusion is inevitable that Eichmann received his orders to add Grosz to the mission ultimately from Himmler; that from the moment this happened, Grosz's mission to prepare the ground for a separate peace became the main purpose of the journey to Istanbul. If Brand succeeded in getting war materials, or money, or starting negotiations that would lead to the same result as sought by the Grosz mission, so much the better. In any case, under the cover of the fantastic proposals brought by Brand, Grosz would be able to contact the Allied Intelligence Services, which would of course immediately recognize the importance of what he had to say. His mission was the main message to the Allies. Brand's mission was an adjunct affair at best, at worst a smoke screen. The purpose, ultimately, of both was the same: a separate peace with the West and an alliance against Russia. The Western Allies did indeed recognize the importance of the Grosz mission, though it took them some time, due to the secretiveness of their own Intelligence Services and quite probably because of sheer inefficiency. Of course, from the Allied point of view, this was an out-

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rageous, stupid, and impossible suggestion. If the release of Jews was connected with negotiations with the SS on such a basis, then nothing could or should be done. It is not quite clear whether the British transmitted" to the Americans the full protocol of the Grosz interrogation. In any case, the Americans, while agreeing not to pursue the actual Brand offer any further, were now aware of the feet that some possibility existed of saving Jews by negotiation. This was to have crucial importance in the next few weeks. Was the Jewish Agency, and especially Shertok, aware of the Nazi peace feelers? Clearly, yes. Shertok was told by Brand of Grosz's mission in Aleppo, and Brand explained that he had had the first inkling of it on the plane, and then had received a more detailed account from Grosz in Istanbul. From the context it appears that Brand did not doubt Grosz's word: the feelers were genuine. In the aftermath and the publicity of the Brand mission, the crucial part played by Grosz was quickly forgotten. Postwar discussion hardly ever mentioned Grosz. The "trucks for blood" proposal captured the imagination, and the historical picture was thus completely distorted. In 1954, at the "Kastner trial," Grosz made one more appearance, before disappearing into a well-deserved oblivion. He was asked to testify against Kastner by Shmuel Tamir, because an association between a person of Grosz's character and Kästner fitted into the brief that Tamir had prepared, which included accusations against the Jewish Agency's representative, Kästner, of having collaborated with the Nazis. He even argued that the Agency had failed to prosecute Grosz as a traitor after the war because it had been afraid of what Grosz might say regarding its own collaboration with Germany. Grosz, at the trial, cut through this vicious nonsense by simply telling his story. Not only Tamir, but the prosecuting counsel, Haim

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand Cohen (defending Kastner), as well, argued, explicitly or by implication, that Grosz was a liar and a dirty little smuggler (Cohen called him "Gauner," a lout), and that his whole story about a separate peace was his own invention. In short, Grosz's story did not fit in with either side at that historic trial. The truth was too simple for the complicated constructions of postwar Jewish politicians and pleaders of special causes who were trying to accuse or defend the people who, under the Nazi threat of death, negotiated with the Devil for the lives of Jews. 9 8 Yet the unbelievable, the impossible, was the truth: the SS wanted a separate peace, without Hitler's knowledge, and they had chosen Bandi Grosz to try to establish the first contacts. The sale of Jews might be a first step in such negotiations, and in any case, as the Jews were the controlling factor in the Allied world in Nazi eyes, the way to the Allied governments had to lead through the Jewish representatives in the free world. THE AFTERMATH

The British government, worried and perturbed by the Grosz disclosure, did not wait very long before deciding to deal a final death blow to the Brand-Grosz affair. Already in its cable to Washington of 18 July it had hinted that if the situation became unpleasant, it would publish the whole affair and thus make any future negotiations impossible, and at the same time give the Russians the definitive assurance that no contacts with the Germans were taking place behind their backs. The Foreign Office, no doubt at Eden's instigation, leaked the Brand-Grosz proposals to the press. On 19 July, the New York Herald Tribune exposed the whole story under a London by-line dated 18 July, the day the cable was sent to the State Department. Termed the most monstrous blackmail attempt in history, the offer was described as intended to

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place the Allies before the choice of either prolonging the war by accepting large numbers of refugees in return for supplying the Nazis with essential war materials, or "accepting responsibility for the fate of hundreds of thousands of Jews" by refusing the offer. The next day the London Times appeared with the headline " A Monstrous Offer." "A short time ago a prominent Hungarian Jew and a German official, whose job obviously was to control his actions and movements, arrived in Turkey, and managed to get a message" to British officials containing the Nazi offer. The Times also mentioned the statement that the trucks would not be used against the West, and stated that the coarse attempt to split the Allied front would feil miserably. Similar headlines and stories were carried on the same day by the Manchester Guardian and other British dailies. The contents of these articles were duly broadcast by the BBC. On 21 July, no less a man that Wickham Steed, the journalist, broadcast over the Eastern Service of the BBC that "a rich industrialist, a Hungarian Jew, accompanied by two German officials, [came] to Turkey to negotiate with the British the eventual migration of the remaining 400,000 Jews still alive in Hungary," etc. "It is needless to say that this humanitarian blackmail was not accepted by the British who informed the U.S. and Soviet Governments of the German proposal." 99 The British certainly made sure that nothing should come of the Brand mission. Eyebrows were naturally raised in Berlin, and we have some evidence of the trouble that Himmler got into through the publication of the Brand proposals. But the Himmler plan justified itself: he could now point to the fact that he was trying to get important war materials from the Allies, and there surely was nothing wrong with that. If, in fact, our analysis of Himmlers motives is correct, we should expect that even after the obvious failure

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel

Brand

of the Brand-Grosz mission, the Nazis would continue to try to establish contact with the West. This, indeed, is what happened, and not only on the part of the Nazis, but on the Jewish Agency side as well. Both parties, for opposing reasons, wanted negotiations of some kind to take place. Shertok in London thought that the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees (IGC), a body resurrected from the dead by the abortive Bermuda conference in April 1 9 4 3 , should be the agency through which negotiations should take place. The IGC included neutral members, and its vice-director, the Swiss Kullmann, should go to Budapest and talk to the Nazis. But the British demurred—the IGC was a body of Allied as well as neutral countries, and a representative of such an organization could not possibly negotiate with the enemy. 1 0 0 Desperate at the attitude of the British, the Agency tried to influence the Americans. "The Jewish Agency earnestly appeals to you," cabled Ben Gurion to Roosevelt via Nahum Goldman, "not to allow this unique and possibly last chance of saving the remains of European Jewry to be lost, although it is fully realized that the exigencies of war are [a] primary consideration." He asked that "suitable arrangements be made to discuss the [Brand] proposal with representatives of the enemy g r o u p . " 1 0 1 When Brand and Grosz failed to return, pressure was exercised by Eichmann on Kästner and the Va'adah in Budapest. Hansi Brand and Kastner cabled on 20 June that the journey of "the two" had only been preparatory. The Nazis thought that now Schröder (Läufers alias) should meet with Schwarz (the American Intelligence agent in Istanbul). On 23 June, a somewhat garbled message by Kastner in fact invited Bader, who in Pomerantz's absence had sent the reply cables to Budapest, to come and meet the Nazis in Hungary. In his letter to Pomerantz the next day, Bader agreed that this should be done. 1 0 2 The

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cable was repeated, this time explicitly, about 2 July. Eliezer Kaplan, Jewish Agency treasurer, who happened to be in Istanbul at the time, told Bader that he could not go without British approval. The request of the Agency to send Bader to Hungary was transmitted to the Foreign Office on 5 July. Weizmann and Shertok raised it again with Eden the next day, and Eden asked for advice from his officials. The advice was, of course, to reject this new suggestion. Bader was a Palestinian, that is, a British citizen, and no negotiation between a British and a German citizen was permissible. Besides, Eden was to beware of the Agency's machinations. They might make "contacts behind our back" with the Germans over the rescue of Jews, and this was a danger. In the meantime, on 8 July, German pressure on Bader to go increased. Colonel Stiller of the German consulate in Istanbul asked for an interview with Bader, which took place in a public library. Stiller offered to fly Bader to Berlin [!] straightaway. Bader had to reply that without Allied permission he could not go. Barlas cabled to Shertok, but in the meantime the British decision was being formulated. Shertok heard of it on the thirteenth, and cabled to Goldman accordingly. On the fifteenth, he received the official refusal of the Foreign Office. But, as U.S. ambassador to London Wxnant commented rightly: the offer to Bader indicated German seriousness in seeking these contacts. One might add that the invitation to Berlin probably meant that at least Schellenberg would have received the Istanbul emissary. 103 Once the Bader trip fell through, the Germans, apparently at the suggestion of Kastner, tried to get American approval to negotiate with Schwartz of the JDC, Lisbon. The suggestion reached Pehle of the War Refugee Board on 26 July, and he rejected it, in agreement with Stettinius, the next day. 1 0 4 The reason was slightly, but

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The Mission of Joel Brand significantly, different. No ulterior motives were imputed to the Jews in general or to the JDC in particular, but Schwartz was an American citizen. If, however, someone could be found that was not an Allied citizen, could he negotiate with the Nazis? The British attitude was no. The War Refugee Board's attitude had not changed, despite Grosz. We cannot afford to slam the door to negotiations, said John W. Pehle. 105 In the latter part of July, that remained War Refugee Board policy. In the last days of July and early in August, the idea crystallized of nominating Saly Mayer, Swiss representative of the JDC, to negotiate with the Nazis. These negotiations started on 21 August, but they did not belong to the Brand-Grosz affair, and they have been described elsewhere. 108 There was no British veto on Brand himself. The British had no reason to keep him, and they offered the Agency to take him, after some procrastination. They even agreed that he should return to Hungary. The Agency was offered the choice between that and a release to Palestine. Brand was not told of that choice. The Agency decided to take him to Palestine, and not to send him to certain, and futile, death in Budapest. He would have returned with empty hands. He became a bitter enemy both of the British and of the Agency itself. He never really understood what had happened to him. Grosz stayed, quite happily, in British detention until the end of the war. The mission had failed. CONCLUSIONS

Who had sent Brand and Grosz, and why? They had been sent by the ss, on Himmlers orders, to pave the way for a separate peace. The Brand proposal was both an opening gambit in any such negotiations, and also a cover for the real mission. The Jews were Himmlers hostages.

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Their fellow Jews were, in Nazi eyes, in control of the West. They would therefore be interested in a process of talks that might save their relatives and friends—for a consideration. Did the ss really believe the war materials could be obtained? Probably yes, as part of the process of negotiations and as one of its results. Were they willing to release Jews against such materials and in the process of talks regarding peace feelers? Yes, most probably. They knew that the war was lost and the hoped-for talks, as well as possible materials, were more important to them than the Jews, whether alive or dead. The very same inhuman attitude that caused them to be able to murder masses of Jewish people, also enabled them to trade Jews for anything—trucks, soap, or peace feelers. There even was an ideological justification for this: if the Jews were spread all over the world, or even if they were concentrated in one place, they would arouse enmity and antisemitism, which would aid Nazi Germany. Was there any real possibility of the Allies accepting the proposals as they stood? Hardly. But that is not really the point. The Allies were not required to hand over war materials, interfere with the prosecution of the war, or talk peace with the Nazis. All they need have done, as Shertok and Brand both told them, was to negotiate. The process of negotiation itself, without leading to any concrete result, might have saved lives. This is exactly what Saly Mayer did in his talks with the ss, which lasted from August 1944 to February 1945. It is impossible to say how many lives, if any, would have been saved. The moral imperative, however, of trying to save even one life was ignored by an Allied world that by its lack of action denied the' rationale of its war against the absolute evil that was Nazism. The moral imperative was not anachronistic. It was stated by the Jewish representatives, by Weizmann, Ben Gurion, Shertok, and others. It was weighed in the

126

THE END OF THE H O L O C A U S T balance of war policies of the Western Allies. It was completely ignored by the Soviets. In the West, where it was weighed, it was rejected. The real conclusion is that Brand did not fail. It was the West that failed. ι . Va'adat Ezra Ve'hatzalah; not 10 be confined wich other committees of a similar name in Jerusalem (Va'adat Ha'hatzalah o f the Jewish Agency) and in New York (Va'adat Ha*harialah of the Orthodox Rabbis in the United States). а. Grosz had no visa for Turkey, but he was met by representatives of a Hungarian firm that served as cover for espionage activities in Istanbul, "ANTALYA," and chey guaranteed him to the Turkish authorities. " A bribe eventually induced the {Turkish} officials η let Grosz and Brand through together, on condition that they went to see Mehmet Bey, President of ANTALYA, in order to settle the question of their entrance visas and residence permits." (Public Record Office, PO 371/4281 I/WR 422/9/0, interrogation of Andor Grosz, 6 - 2 2 June 1944, p. 44 [hereafter cited as PRcVGrosz)). 3. Cf. Raul Hilbeig, (Chicago: Quad (ingle, 1961), pp- 542-44, 723-28; Lucy S. Dawidowicz, Tbt (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 197}), just mentions the affair in passing, p. 382; Arthur D. Morse, (New York: Random House, 1967), pp. 353-61. The main secondary sources for our story are the following: Joel Brand, ed. Alex Weissberg (Tel-Aviv, 1957) [hereafter cited as Brand I); the book also exists in German and English editions: Alex Weissberg, Dm Gtt(Koeln-Berlin, 19)6), and Alex Weissberg, (London: A . Deutsch, 19)8); Ernest Landau, ed., (Munich, 1961) [hereafter cited as Kastner]; Andreas Biss, (Stuttgart, 1966) [hereafter cited as Biss]; Henry L. Feingold, "The Roosevelt Administration and the Effort to Save the Jews o f Hungary" in Randolph L. Braham, vol. 2 (New York: World Federation of Hungarian Jews, 1969), pp. 2 1 1 - 5 2 . Professor Braham's forthcoming study on Hungarian Jewry has not reached me at the time of writing.

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4. PRO/FO 371/42811 /W* 324/3/48, interrogation o f Joel Brand, p. ι [heteafrer eked as Brand II]. This is contested by his cousin, Andreas Biss, who by the way believes his relative to have been a traitor. He claims that Blind never finished his schooling (cf. Biss, p. 40). 5. Ibid., p. 4 1 ; Brand I, p. 8, says he returned to Germany in 1930. In his interrogation (Brand II), he says he returned in 1927. б. Brand II, p. 2. 7. See Randolph L Braham, "The Kamenets Podolsk and Delvidek Massacres," in vol. 9 (1973), pp. 133—56. 8. Brand I, p. 14; Brand II, p. 5; Biss, p. 46. 9. Erno Laszlo, "Hungary's Jewry: A Demographic Overview," in Braham, vol. 2, pp. 1 3 7 - 8 2 . 10. Brand I, p. 12. 1 1 . Brand I, p. 34; Bela Vago, "The Intelligence Aspects of the Joel Brand Missioa," in vol. 10 (1974), pp. t i l — 2 8 ; Kastner, p. 42. Other members of the original Va'adah included Z w i (Ernst) Szilagyi of the left-wing Has homer Hatzair, Eugen Frankel of the Mixrahi, and Moshe Krausz, another Mixrahi member who was in charge of the Palestine Office (che official Jewish Agency office for distributing Palestine immigration certificates). Kastner and Krausz were bitter enemies. A group of Polish refugees, among whom Bronislaw Teichholz was the most prominent, also cooperated with the Va'adah. 12. Kastner, pp. 4 1 , 5 1 - 5 2 ; PRo/Grosz. 13. Kastner, p. 43. 14. Kastner, p. 56. 15. Heinz Hoehne, (London: Seeker and Warburg, 1969), pp. 486-88. 16. Brand I, pp. 56-58; Kastner, pp. 5 3 - 5 7 ; Brand II, p. 15; J DC Archives, New York, "Claims, Devccseri-Brand," 1935. (7. Kastner, pp. 57-58.

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Footnotes continued on page 731.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS

THE KASTNER CASE Aftermath of the

Catastrophe

W. Z. LAQUEUR Y AUGUST 1944 the Third Reich was defeated and most everybody knew it—even Hitler, Himmler, and the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht. One question alone remained unanswered— when the war would actually end. The war went on. The Allies could wait— whether the German surrender came in six months, in a year or in two, could no longer influence the outcome. But there was one people in Europe that could not wait For them each day was of the most vital importance. £ven though the Germans were in retreat everywhere, smoke still rose from the chimneys of Auschwitz, Maidanek, and the other death camps. For their operation, Hitler still had men, time, and money to spare. Though all his other aims might go unrealized, one, he was determined, would not: a Europe without Jews. The German, Austrian, Polish, Czech Jews, those in the occupied parts of Russia—almost all had

B

THE Kastner case had all Israel aroused some months back, but relatively few people in this country are acquainted with the facts or the anguishing issues it brought to the fore. WALTER ZE'EV LAQUEUR, who presents the whole story here, has appeaiea in COMMENTARY previously, with "Israel's Great Foreign Policy Debate" in August 1955. Until lately he was political commentator for Israel's radio station. Born in Breslau, Germany, in 1921, he came to Palestine m 1938. A book by him, Nationalism and Communism in the Middle East, is soon to be published in this country.

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST been exterminated. But "work" remained to be done at Auschwitz, where 12,OCX) Hungarian Jews were arriving daily. To "cope" with this new influx, a new extermination camp, Birkenau, had been opened near it, and was working at full speed. TRAIN with about a thousand Hungarian Jews left the Bergen-Belsen camp in Western Germany, and after various detours necessitated by Allied air raids, arrived at the Swiss border, which was crossed on August 21, 1944. In December a second such train halted at the border and its passengers likewise crossed over into Switzerland. Thus the lives of a total of 1,685 Hungarian Jews were saved. It is unlikely that Hitler knew anything about it; on the "Jewish question" he remained uncompromising to the end. Himmler, for his part, pretended ignorance of the event The 1,685 owed their lives to a local agreement between a representative of the Hungarian Jews, Dr. Rudolf Kastner of Cluj (Klausenburg), and a few middle-ranking SS leaders named Eichmann, Becher, and Wisliczeni, who later achieved deserved notoriety at Nuremberg. Reju Kastner Cas he was known to his friends) was then just thirty years old. After studying law in his home town and at the German University in Prague, he had practiced law in Cluj. In 1940, when Transylvania was ceded to Hungary, he became vice president of the Zionist Organization in Budapest and moved there with his family. He was of medium height, wore black horn-rimmed glasses, and his graying hair was brushed back. He was very skillful in dealing with people: one or two generations back he would undoubtedly have become a

A

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS Hofrat under the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. In France he might have become a minister, in Germany perhaps counsel (or a big corporation with strong political interests. Kastner had unbounded political ambitions, the number of Friends who swore by him was large, but through the years he had also acquired many bitter enemies. He was clever, but not clever enough. To put it precisely—he did not possess that strength of character, that unswerving purposefulness which ultimately distinguish the great from the average politician. In the Budapest of 1943 Kastner became neither a Hofrat nor a corporation lawyer, but chairman of the Rescue Committee of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, which had just been set up. This job did not hold out any promise of honors, medals, or speedy promotion, but it was of outstanding importance for Hungarian Jewry; it meant power—insofar as one could speak of power at all under such conditions. On March 19, 1944, German troops entered Hungary. Admiral Horthy was placed in a kind of honorary custody, and the Hungarian Nazis, the Arrow Cross party, took over. The Hungarian Jews had already suffered persecution, but Horthy and his ministers had refused to countenance any "final solution." Jews had been driven from their homes and left to starve, manv had been arrested, but none had yet been sent to extermination camps. On March 23, Dr. Kastner was summoned to Η auptsturmfuehrer Dieter Wisliczeni at German headquarters on the Schwabenberg. Wisliczeni locked his office door behind Kastner and, after a great display of joviality, finally drew a letter from his pocket. It was short, written in Hebrew, and came from Rabbi Weissmandl of Press*

4

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST burg (Bratislava), stating that Wisliczeni was a man who could be worked with. "Have you read and understood it?" 'Tes," Kastner replied. Wisliczeni threw the letter into the fire. Kastner then said: ' Ί am at your disposal. What do you want?" "We want money for every Jew who is to be saved," answered Wisliczeni. "Excuse me— does that mean we or me?" asked Kastner. That was none of Kästners business, replied the Hauftsturmfuehrer brusquely. "You will hear from me," Kastner said. Kastner conferred with his colleagues on the Rescue Committee: all were in favor of continuing negotiations if only to gain time. They did not try to figure out the motives of the SS—the Third Reich was breaking up, some Nazi leaders wanted to keep a back door open, others wanted to get rich quick. And why should the SS be less corrupt than any other Nazi "elite"? Something had to be done, but how could one get hold of the necessary money? Telegrams were sent to the representatives of the various Jewish organizations in Istanbul, Zurich, and Lisbon. Meanwhile the negotiations with Wisliczeni continued, but without any tangible result. ix weeks later, early in May of 1944, Joel Brand, another member of the Rescue Committee, was summoned bo the Schwalenberg by Obersturmbannfuehrer Adolf Eichmann, head of the "Jew Commando" and Wisliczeni's boss. He was the Nazis' specialist on Jewish affairs, knew Yiddish and Hebrew, and was said to have been born in the German Templar settlement of Sarona in Palestine. Eichmann dispensed with in-

S

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS troductory niceties. "You know who I am. I'm the man who liquidated the Jews of Poland, Slovakia, and Austria, and now I have been appointed head of the Liquidation Commando in Hungary. I'm willing to do business with you: human lives for merchandise." Eichmann smiled diabolically, which came naturally to him, and went on: "What do you want—women who can bear children? Men who can make them? Children? Old people? What's left of the biological potential of your people? Speak up!" But for the moment he did not really expect an answer, for now came the second part of his offer: "For the million Jews left I want ten thousand automobiles. In addition, one thousand tons of coffee or tea and one thousand tons of soap." As a first installment, Eichmann wanted a 10 per cent delivery of this amount of goods as quickly as possible, and in return was willing to let one hundred thousand Jews go to Spain or anywhere else —except to Palestine, for he had solemnly promised his friend the Grand Mufti, Haj Amin el Husseini, not to permit that. Brand was dismayed by the offer and did not know what to say. Four days later, on May 15, he was again sent for by Eichmann. "You can go to Constantinople right away and talk to your people about getting hold of the money. In the meantime the deportations will begin. Twelve thousand Jews a day will be fed into my meat-grinder. Tell your people that!" With these words Eichmann smilingly dismissed Joel Brand, who flew to Turkey on May 19, leaving his family behind as hostages. That same day the deportations began. Kästner visited Eichmann three times within two weeks. The mood of the chief of the Liquidation Commando changed with every

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST report from the front: first he threatened to send Kastner to Auschwitz on the next train; then on June 3 he said that to show his good will he was ready to release a few hundred Hungarian Jews. On June 15 he even said that he wanted to send fifteen thousand Jews to Austria instead of to Auschwitz and put them in "cold storage" there, as he expressed it. In return he wanted five million Swiss francs. Nobody knew whom he intended to share this sum with, or whether he intended to share it at all. In any case, the Budapest Rescue Committee did not have the money: so it decided to sell one hundred and fifty places on the train to Austria (which went to Switzerland in the end) in order to collect the ransom price for the total number. Of the 1,685 Jews on the two trains that reached the Swiss frontier in August and December 1944, 388 came from Cluj, Dr. Kastner's home town. How had these passengers been selected? The final decision had, of course, lain with the SS. But Eichmann had used the list compiled by the Rescue Committee. On June 30 the train left Budapest. Hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews remained behind. By way of Bergen-Belsen the train finally reached Bregenz on Lake Constance. After a few hours of breathless waiting, the passengers were taken across the Swiss border to Lustenaru, where a lighted train was waiting. They were saved. Kastner accompanied the train, but did not remain in Switzerland. On orders of the Jewish rescue organization, he stayed in contact with the Nazi leaders and continued his efforts to buy back the lives of the Jews of Hungary. Now he dealt chiefly with Kurt Becher, an SS Standarten fuehrer, who shortly before the fall of the Third Reich became

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS special commissioner for concentration camps. Becher took him to Vienna and to visit Bergen-Belsen and Theresienstadt. Considerable sums of money were paid Becher in return for his efforts. In March 1945 Kastner came to Berlin to meet with Himmler; he was afraid of a final massacre before the entry of the victors. Panic reigned among the Nazi leaders, but the meeting with Himmler never took place. On April 20, 1945, Kästner crossed the Swiss frontier. At the camp where the passengers of the 1944 transport were living, a great banquet was held in his honor at which he was -hailed as a savior and presented with a beautifully framed picture. Thus did the curtain fall on the first act of this tragedy in which horror went hand in hand with confusion. HE Jerusalem District Court is located on Russian Square, and is flanked by the police headquarters, a first-aid station, the government Information Office, and the Russian-Palestinian Society after which the square is named. Founded in Czarist times for purposes of cultural propaganda, the society has recently been revived by the Soviet Union. All these buildings are old and unsighdy, in Arab style, with thick walls and dark passages exuding a faint smell of carbolic acid. In this court the trial of one Malkiel Greenwald began on Januar}' 1,1954. Greenwald was accused of having violated Article 201, Section 1 of the Criminal Code of 1936 (libel). The trial attracted little notice. Only a few reporters were in the courtroom and neither they nor their editors felt like giving more than a few lines to the case. The prosecutor had already presented his case in May 1953, and all the facts were

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST known. That morning, the proceedings took only a few minutes. The indictment was read, Greenwald pleaded not guilty and asked for an adjournment in order to retain counsel; this was granted by the judge, Dr. Benjamin Halevi. Greenwald was a small man of over seventy, bald, with a screwed-up face and unsteady glance. He had been born in Shofron, Hungary, and as a young man had for some time been employed in the Austro-Hungarian consular service. He had graduated from the University of Budapest, been publisher of a weekly, and in 1938 had come to Palestine where he had joined Mizrachi, the Orthodox religious middle-class party. But his real sympathies were of a more radical nature: in word and deed he—and his children—supported the terrorist Irgun Zvai Leumi. After the founding of the State of Israel he began putting out a mimeographed newsletter, Letters to the Members of Mizrachi, that specialized in rumors about prominent political personalities; these were reported in Greenwald's own peculiar Hebrew. "How could X afford to buy a house in Y?" "How can Ζ manage to spend every Christmas with his parents-in-law in England?" and so on. In the course of his campaign for Israel's moral regeneration, Greenwald one day started the Kastner case on its way. This particular newsletter, Number 17, began as follows: Beloved friends! I smell rotting carrion! What a first-rate burial we're going to have! This Dr. Rudolf Kastner has to be finished off! For three years I have been waiting for the moment to unmask this careerist who grew fat on Hider's plunder and murders. Because of his criminal machinations and his collaboration with the Nazis I consider him implicated in the murder of our beloved brothers, etc., etc.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS So far nobody had taken Greenwald's sheet seriously, and he knew that under the criminal code the kind of innuendo he dealt in was at worst punishable by a small fine, and that he would at least get publicity in return. What they surely would not do was throw an old man like him into jail. Up to that point, then, nobody had taken Greenwald seriously—nobody except Dr. Dov Joseph, a Canadian by birth, a prominent lawyer, and at that time Israel's Minister of Commerce and Industry. Kastner was the public-relations voice of his ministry, and Dr. Joseph demanded that he be cleared once and for all of accusations like Greenwald's that had been made against him from time to time. Kastner had come to Israel in 1946 and become very active in public life. H e was chairman of the World Committee of Hungarian Jews, head of the Hungarian section of the radio station of the Jewish Agency, and co-publisher of a Hungarian-language paper, Uj Kelet. He had joined Mapai, and at Knesset elections that party honored him by making him one of its candidates, though he was never elected. Just as back in Cluj and Budapest, Kastner was very ambitious and had friends ready to stick by him through thick and thin, but also many bitter enemies. Accusations against him had been investigated several times by courts of honor of the Zionist movement and by his own party, but had in every case been rejected as without substance or unproven. NCB again Greenwald appeared in the District Court, on January 17, this time accompanied by a young lawyer, Shmuel Tamir. Tamir was the best known and undoubtedly most skillful lawyer of the

O

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST younger generation in Israel. A right-wing radical, he had been the Jerusalem commander of the Irgun, and had won his reputation the year before as the successful defense counsel for a group of young terrorists who had been accused, among other things, of throwing a bomb into the Soviet embassy in Tel Aviv at the time of the Moscow doctors' case. On that occasion he had tried to show that the real responsibility for the bombing rested with Ben Gurion and his speeches. Tamir was an extremely keen dialectician and a master of cross-examination, but also seemed without scruples. Yet he appeared really to believe in his mission: he was no actor but a fanatic. On January 17 he appeared for the first time before the court, requesting a further adjournment in order to brief himself for the trial. The judge granted the request but sentenced Greenwald at the same time to a small fine for negligence in preparing his defense. Another month elapsed before the trial began in earnest. Kastner was the first on the witness stand: "I was born in Cluj in Transylvania. By profession I am a lawyer and journalist. . . ." He spent three days on the stand, reporting in detail about his activities as a member of the Budapest Rescue Committee, quoting documents, statistics, and other persons' accounts of his activities. But it was not made quite clear why the prosecution had produced Kastner at all. In the opinion of most lawyers a conviction could have resulted only from evidence that Greenwald had in fact violated the provisions of the Criminal Code. But the public prosecutor apparendy wanted to do more than just win the case; he wanted to clear Kastner once and for all of such charges. At that point Tamir, too, was completely unaware of the possibilities the case offered

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS him. Three days after the opening of the trial Judge Halevi asked whether the defendant was prepared to retract his accusations and apologize. And lo, Greenwald and Tamir were willinoΟ to meet him more than halfway. But the public prosecutor demanded a completely unequivocal apology, which Greenwald was not willing to give. So the trial continued. For another twelve days Kastner underwent cross-examination by Tamir. It all began very innocently with requests for further information on this or that point. Then Tamir asked suddenly: "And how did it happen that Kurt Becher, the high-ranking SS leader and war criminal, was acquitted at Nuremberg as a result of your intervention and testimonv?" Kastner cried: "That's a lie! I never testified for him!" With that, he had fallen into Tamir's trap. This first inconsistency led to a second, third, and tenth, until there was no way out for him. For Kastner had testified at Nuremberg, on August 4, 1947, asking that Becher's services be accorded the "fullest possible consideration," and Tamir had had no trouble in obtaining a transcript. But worse was to follow. At Nuremberg Kastner had stated that the Jewish Agency and the World Jewish Congress had authorized him to give his testimony in Bechers behalf; this turned out not to have been so. Moreover, a year later, in a letter to Israel's first Minister of Finance, the late Eliezer Kaplan, Kastner had expressly stated that Becher was acquitted on the strength of his, Kästners, testimony. Tamir tightened the screws mercilessly. Had Becher been a good Nazi? No. Had he taken monev and valuables wherever and whenever he could? Yes. Wasn't it a national crime to testify on behalf of an SS officer and recommend his acquittal? Yes.

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST HAT was the beginning of the end. From there on it was easy for Tamir to show that a Jew willing to testify for a high-ranking SS officer was capable of any infamy. And if Kastner had intervened on Bechers behalf, it meant that there must have been good reason for it—that Kastner had been in cahoots with Becher! How could one believe a man like Kastner who had already• proved himself a liar? Weren't all his other statements lies too? Kästners answers came ever more haltingly; little was left of his original selfassurance. Meanwhile Tamir's aim became more and more apparent. He was trying to show that Kastner had been a common collaborator, a war criminal, "the greatest Nazi agent in Europe." Why else should the SS men have been so willing to negotiate with a young lawyer from Cluj? He tried to prove that Kastner had systematically obstructed every attempt to create an underground organization among the Hungarian Jews. That he had lulled them into a false sense of security when deportations had already begun. That he had tried to stop definite news about the extermination camps from reaching the outside world. That he had divided up with Becher the millions the latter had received in ransom money. That die 1,685 Hungarian Jews who reached Switzerland ha4r been nothing more than a sop to his conscience in return for sending hundreds of thousands of others to their deaths. That he had persuaded the Jewish parachutists who arrived in Budapest from Palestine in 1944 to give themselves up to the Gestapo voluntarily—again only in order to foil all resistance by the Hungarian Jews. That among the 1,685 saved, 388 had come from Cluj, Kastners home town, and among them had been almost all his own and his wife's close relatives.

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RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS All this and several other tilings Tamir tried to prove, and his tactics brought him increasing.success. From counsel for the detense he had turned into prosecutor. Kastner and his legal advisors lost their heads and began committing one blunder after another. The trial had long since become a major political affair, and Judge Halevi had to transfer the hearings to a larger courtroom. His demagogy notwithstanding, Tamir had on his side the millions of Jews whom Kastner and the Jewish Agency had been unable to save. Just as the Nazis under the Weimar Republic had used the legend of the "stab in the back," and as McCarthy and others in the United States had talked about the "betrayal of China," so Tamir tried to unload the blame for the catastrophe on the mossdot ha'leumiint, the Jewish national organizations. And because the destruction of one-third of their number was a heavier burden for Jews to bear than the loss of a world war was for Germany, or the Sovietization of China for the United States, Tamir did not find it hard to gain willing ears for his own new "stab in the back" legend. If not for men like Kastner, he argued, everything would have been different. T h e Kastners were at fault, they were the real war criminals. It was to Tamir's advantage that the catastrophe itself had been so utterly incredible that many Jews were ready to accept incredible explanations for it. witnesses appeared for the prosecution and thirty-six for the defense. T h e trial was assuming mammoth proportions. Meanwhile Judge Halevi hardly interfered. Among the witnesses called by the prosecution, Ehud Avriel and Menachem

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IGHTEEN

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST Bader attracted particular attention. Avriel was a member of Mapai, a former Israeli minister to Prague, and a right-hand man of Ben Gurion. Bader was a member of the oppositionist, pro^Soviet Mapam. Both had been in Istanbul during the war and served on the commission of the Jewish Agency whose task it was to maintain contact with Jews in the occupied countries and to help in their rescue. Tamir wanted to prove that Avriel and Bader were liars and traitors, too, and had sabotaged the rescue attempts. All this had little to do with the Kastner-Greenwald case, but was aimed at discrediting the majority parties in Israel. Judge Halevi barely interfered. Shortly before the opening of the trial he had resigned from the bench because he had been passed over when a new appointment was made to the Supreme Court of Israel; perhaps a member of a government party had been given the preference over him? A few weeks later Halevi was to withdraw his resignation. Then Joel Brand's activities were brought up. As mentioned above, Brand had carried Eichmann's offer to the Jewish representatives in Istanbul in May 1944. While there he had conferred with Avriel and Bader. Tamir now attempted to prove that Avriel had persuaded Brand to go to Palestine, although well aware that the British would arrest him at the Svrian border. Avriel and the heads of the Jewish Agency had allegedly been interested in having Brand arrested because they had not wanted the truth about the mass murders to become known in Palestine and the rest of the world. Brand had been arrested by the British at the Syrian border as an "enemy alien" and taken to Cairo. There he had met Moshe Sharett and Lord Movne,7 the British Min/

j

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS ister for Middle Eastern Affairs, as well as some top-level British counter-intelligence officers. Eichmann's offer was transmitted to London. Winston Churchill would have liked to do something for the Jews but did not know what; besides, at the time he was concerned mainly with the conduct of the war and final victory rather than with political details. Lord Movne had asked: "What would I do with one million Jews?" Foreign Minister Eden had said nothing, but probably had thought the same. After a few months Brand was released and reached Palestine. No answer concerning Eichmann's offer was forthcoming. Why should one give any credence to the word of a mass murderer? Besides, the Allies could not enter into such transactions without making themselves and their war effort look ridiculous. These and similar objections were to be heard in London, Moscow, and Washington. Perhaps they were valid. But it was also true that 12,000 Hungarian Jews were being killed every day. HEN followed the examination of Joel Palgi. Palgi was a major in the Israeli army and one of the directors of the Israeli air line El Al. Of Hungarian origin, he had known Kastner in the Zionist vouth movement and had been one of the parachutists sent to Yugoslavia in 1944 and from there to Hungary. He had written a widely read book about his experiences. In the middle of April 1944 a British transport plane had taken him and a friend of his from Brindisi to Yugoslavia. In two weeks Palgi was in Budapest, only to surrender to the Gestapo a few days later. Hanna Senesch, another parachutist, who had got to Budapest in March 1944, was at that time alreadv in a Hungarian prison. Tamir now tried to show

T

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST that Palgi had voluntarily given himself up to the Gestapo and had divulged important information without being forced to do so; in other words, that he was a traitor and not at all a national hero, and that his boolc was full of lies. It did turn out that Palgi's book had not always reported the complete truth, and on a few points even the opposite of the truth. Again and again Tamir was to return to this: Do you admit that on this point you did not tell the truth? Would you not consider that description in your book a lie? Palgi testified that in April 1944 no Jewish resistance could have been organized in Budapest, and that Kastner', whom he had sought out, had told him that Hungarian counter-espionage was already on the lookout for Palestinian parachutists. This did not sound implausible, since Hanna Senesch and a few others had already been caught. Kastner had told him furthermore that his presence, far from being a help, was likely to interfere with Kastner s negotiations with the Nazi leaders and thereby threaten the only rescue attempts possible at the time. Thereupon Palgi and Perez Goldstein, his friend and companion, had decided to surrender to the Gestapo. Under the circumstances this had certainly required a good deal of courage. Tamir, however, was not of that opinion and considered their conduct treasonable. It was not easy to prove this, because it was psychologically rather unlikely that Goldstein and Palgi had made their way from Palestine to Budapest only in order to surrender to the Gestapo. At this juncture a Frenchman suddenly appeared in court, one Antoine Tissondier, who had traveled from Yugoslavia to Budapest together with Palgi and Goldstein and had been arrested with them in Hungary.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS Tissondier reported how Palgi and Goldstein had been tortured by the Gestapo and that whatever statements had been wrung from them had by no means been made voluntarily. Against this witness, Tamir was powerless, not because the Frenchman was mentally superior to the defense counsel— Tissondier was no intellectual and the entire proceedings, conducted as they were in an unintelligible language, were noticeably foreign to him—but because he as a Gentile stood outside Israeli political squabbles. It was completely immaterial to him whether his testimony benefited or harmed Mapai or Irgun. H e wanted only to tell the truth as he remembered it. Nevertheless, Tamir had won another success. It did look as though Kastner had handed the parachutists over to the Nazi executioner (Hanna Senesch, Goldstein, and most of the others had been executed). At the same time Tamir tried to show that these parachutists—all of them "leftists"— had no: been national heroes at all; and that it followed that the real fighters for the liberation of Israel had to be looked for in the ranks of Tamirs friends, Irgun Zvai Leumi. Jerusalem in midsummer is not the pleasantest place in the world, particularly not in the forenoon when the dry, cutting hamsin is blowing from the east But the trial went on without interruption. Among Tamir's thirty-six witnesses for the defense were some strange characters. One of them was Adalbert Lewinger, a very forceful young man who introduced himself as the pre-war leader of an Orthodox youth organization in Transvlvania. He stated that after the war there had been a great deal of bitterness in Cluj against Kastner and his helpers and that the authorities had insti-

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST tuted proceedings against some of the members of the Judertrat that had functioned under the Nazis. At this point, however, the prosecutor suddenly leaped to his feet: "Mr. Lewinger, is it true that before your immigration to Israel you took a special course with the CDE?" The C D E was the Jewish Communist organization in Rumania, bitter foe of Zionism and of Israel. Lewinger's "no" to this question came after a good deal of hesitation. "Is it not true that on the boat coming here you were beaten up and would have been thrown overboard if the crew had not interfered?" Apparently, Lewinger had been smuggled into Israel as a Communist agent; the Kastner trial put an abrupt end to this phase of his career. One of the principal witnesses against Kastner was Moshe Krauss, former head of the Palestine Office in Budapest. He, too, had been in Hungary during the war and had been in contact with the Red Cross, the Swiss consul, and other neutral diplomats. Displaying a thorough knowledge of the facts,* he severelys criticized Kastner's dictatorial methods, but did not deny that he had always been an opponent—not to say a personal enemy—of Kastner's. 7 | l l this created far less of a stir than the r j L appearance of the "official witnesses," Dobkin, a member of the Executive Board of of the Jewish Agency, and Gideon Rafael and Shmuel Ben Zur, leading officials of the Israeli Foreign Office. They testified unwillingly; their memories often had to be refreshed, and on Tamirs motion the judge termed one of them a "hostile witness." And if a man was reluctant to testify, he obviously had something to hide! H i e belief gained ground that Tamir might have been right in insinuating the existence of an

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS Israeli government clique whose members favored and protected one another. The truth, however, was somewhat more complicated. We must not forget how important the political background of the trial had become. The "official witnesses" were being constandy provoked by Tamir; in fact, his mere presence offered a provocation to them. The old conflict between the Η aganah and Irgun was being re-enacted. What had once been the Η aganah was now the Israeli army, »hsreas Irgun, or the National Military Organization, had disappeared, or rather had been transformed into a diehard party of the far right, the Herut. In 1944 people like Palgi, Bader, and Avriel had been trying their hardest to save Jewish lives, often at the risk of their own. Palgi had made his way to Budapest in 1944, at a time when Tamir's friends were busy robbing banks in Palestine and engaging in similar acts of sabotage; these acts were accompanied by danger, too, but contributed litde to the rescue of the Jews of Europe. One can imagine what effect Tamir's annoying and frequendy sarcastic questions had on these individuals. Psychologically, their anger was understandable, but it led them into blunders. Instead of conceding that here and there mistakes, and serious ones, had been made in their efforts on behalf of European Jewry, they refused to admit havingΟ made anv. « Tamir and his friends could claim the same, and with more warrant, but only for the simple reason that they had tried to do hardly anything for the Jews of Europe. In Israel no one had so far attempted to get to the bottom of these things. Not a single serious book on the Third Reich's policy towards Jews had been published there. Hebrew translations of coundess books in all languages had been published,

THE E N D O F THE HOLOCAUST

but neither Gerald Reitlinger's The Final Solution, nor L6on Poliakov's Harvest of Hate was among them.* That Kastner had testified for Becher in 1947-48 was clearly on record in the transcript of the Nuremberg Trials, which was not kept secret but made fully available in book form. It was strange how things that should have been known in 1948 to anyone interested all of a sudden become sensational news in 1954. Kästners conduct should have been investigated in 1946; eight years later, many things had been forgotten, many facts could no longer be checked, it was difficult if not impossible to recall the atmosphere of 1944.

A

FTER

a brief adjournment the court re-

- sumed its sessions on August 9. A few witnesses were called back to the stand and Tamir made a trip to Switzerland to gather more material. Kastner had been the first witness, and he was the last one, too. But he had nothing of importance to add: ' Ί very much regret that in this trial far too few details have been touched on concerning our work in Budapest during the war, such as our contact with the Jews in Poland and our efforts to help the Jews in other occupied countries. For us the question of negotiating with the Germans had always been one of tactics, never of principle. That was also the reason why in December 1944 I returned to Germany from Switzerland, although of course it was by then obvious who would win the war." He concluded his statement with these words: "I only hope that one day we shall have the opportunity to evaluate this whole •Both reviewed in COMMENTARY in January 1955 by Solomon F. Bloom. The. original Frencn edition of Mr. Poliakov's book was reviewed by Hannah Arendt in our March 1Θ52 number.

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS tragic epoch outside the confines of a courtroom. We merely wanted to do our duty— under conditions that were completely unprecedented. Neither I nor my comrades have anything to hide in this matter and need not regret that we followed the dictates of our conscience—in spite of all thai has been said against us in this trial." Next morning Chaim Cohen, counsel for the government, began his final statement for Kastner. Τ amir had blamed Kastner for the extermination of hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews, for the dissemination of "tranquillizing" rumors after the deportations had started, and for the prevention of an armed rising by the Jews in Q u j and other towns in Hungary and Transylvania. Cohen showed that Kastner had been responsible neither for these rumors nor for the fact that the bulk of the Hungarian Jews—children, women, and old peoplehad been incapable of offering resistance to the Nazis. Kastner had been accused of not warning world opinion and of having obstructed the circulation of news about the deportations and the mass murders; but Cohen produced editorials and headlines in the Hebrew press for the spring of 1944 showing that these accusations were fantastic. He showed that Tamir himself could find no fault with the content of Kastner's Nuremberg testimony for Becher, apart from the fact that such testimony had been offered at all. Tamir had stressed again and again that Kastner had been "Becher's guest" when he went to Berlin to see Himmler in the winter of 1944-45—but with whom else could he have stayed? Or did Tamir want to claim that nobody should have negotiated with Himmler as long as there was the faintest chance of saving Jewish lives? Kastner may have made

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST mistakes but there was no reason at all to assume any criminal intent on his part. How could one condemn him for not knowing in April 1944 what would happen three months later? After seven hours, Cohen concluded his statement with the plea that Greenwald be found guilty. The next morning Tamir began his final statement, which lasted thirty hours. It was a holy deed, he said at the outset, to have at long last lanced this festering wound. The Jewish people were not guilty, but its leaders, men like Kastner, were. Kastner had not started out as a traitor, but in his dealings with the Nazis he had become one: he had offered them his lictle finger but they had taken his whole hand. He had sabotaged the resistance movement, sacrificed the parachutists, obstructed every rescue attempt, and seen to it that the news of the exterminations did not spread abroad. Tamir went into detail, recalling the inconsistencies and contradictions in which Kastner and other witnesses had become entangled. His speech was a masterpiece of rhetoric. He knew the answers to all the questions that had been torturing every Jew since the catastrophe. Who was to blame? It was the present regime in Israel, the people who were protecting Kastner until the end, the defeatists who always and everywhere had opposed armed insurrection. Tamir argued with seemingly invincible logic, but his whole argument rested on a single assumption: that no one would ask how much Kastner and his colleagues in Budapest had actually known in the summer of 1944 and how much they could possibly have done at that time. Tamir argued from the facts available in Jerusalem in October 1954, assuming that one should have acted in 1944 in the light of this knowledge. He

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS concluded with two demands: that Greenwald be acquitted and that the accusations against Kastner and his associates he invesdgated by the court. T TOOK

I

another nine months for Judge

Haievi to write his opinion. In Israel and in the rest of the world a good deal had happened in the meantime, and the trial that had created such a sensation in the summer of 1954 was almost completely forgotten. At the end of July 1955 general elections were to take place in Israel and the election cam* paign was conducted with unprecedented bitterness. So far, however, no one had thought of using the Kastner case as election propaganda. Judge Haievi chose to pronounce his judgment at a moment that insured its reappearance in the headlines—but perhaps this is unfair, perhaps the trial meant more to him than the elections and their outcome. I don't know. At any rate, four weeks before the voting, on the hottest dav of the year, he began to read his verdict in the District Court on Russian Square. Sentence and opinion filled three hundred typewritten pages. It soon became clear that Kastner had lost his case, Haievi condemned his negotiations with the SS leaders, and particularly those resulting in the transfer of the 1,685 from BergenBelsen to Switzerland. "Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes— in accepting this gift he had sold his soul to the devil." From then on he was in effect a creature of the Nazis, h e l p ing them to deport and destroy the Jews of Hungary quickly and efficiently. Haievi found all Greenwald's charges proven with the exception of one—that Kastner had laid hands on any part of the so-called "Becher treasure," and Greenwald was sentenced to pay a token fine of one Israeli pound

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST ($2.80). However, the court would defray part of his legal costs, Judge Halevi wanting to show thereby that the revelations made in the course of the trial had special importance in his eves. > The following day the government decided to appeal Judge Halevi s decision to the Supreme Court of Israel. This step was not approved of by the second largest party of the country, the General Zionists; probably more motivated by their hopes in the coming elections than by anything else, they resigned from the government. Public opinion was stirred up to an unprecedented degree by the verdict. Two weeks after the decision was handed down, two books about the trial had already appeared, and they became best-sellers. Once the Kastner case (Greenwald was quickly forgotten) had become res judicata, anything could be said and written about it, and the Israeli newspapers took full advantage of the opportunity. Herut and the Communists tried to exploit the disclosures of the trial in campaigning against Mapai. T h e Communists, though never directly involved in the trial, went even further than Herut and demanded that Kastner be prosecuted on the basis of the law against Nazi collaborators. This was a risky thing to do, for this same law exposed the Communist party's own top command to indictment; until June 22, 1941, it had called for "Peace with Hider" and its leaders had been arrested by the British for "sabotage of the war effort." Most of the Israeli press took a critical view of the Communist proposal, and all of them doubted whether a court in Israel was competent to judge events that had taken place in Hungary in 1944. In their opinion only those were morally entitled to sit in judgment on Kastner who had been on the scene themselves. But even from a purelv technical point of view, it was impossible to apply the

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS criteria of another time to the conditions prevailing in Hungary in 1944: in every case of doubt the judge should have accepted the interpretation more favorable to Kastner. And the Kästner case was shot through with doubt from beginning to end. L£on Blum once wrote that the Dreyfus case was unintelligible unless one remembered that it began less than eight years after General Boulanger's abortive coup d'etat. Similarly, the storm over Kastner broke eight years after the founding of the State of Israel. The latter was admittedly anything but an abortive coup d'etat, but for all the success that the Jews of Palestine had had in fulfilling their national aspirations, a variety of interests had remained unsatisfied. The initial enthusiasm of 1948 had gradually waned. People cannot live for vears on end in a frenzv/ of national fervor * and of tension. Between 1950 and 1955 the tension in Israel had abated. There was really nothing to be surprised at in the fact that those who had been, or felt, shortchanged in 1948 should have meditated revenge. In many respects the "Kastner Case" was really a "Tamir Case"; Greenwald's defense counsel belonged to a party that had had no choice all these years but to stay in the opposition. The government had kept it at arm's length, allowing none of its leaders to occupy a prominent public office. Small wonder that under suc^i conditions hatred of the "regime" grew apaoe. It must be admitted that in the course of the trial some alarming disclosures were made—alarming for the government. The picture of a corrupt ruling clique painted bv Tamir and his colleagues may have been a caricature, but the reticence of the government's witnesses and their desire to protect their old comrades-in-arms at any price could not always be explained by reasons of state. It became evident that the "regime" was in

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST fact showing symptoms of fatigue, like any other party that had remained in sole charge of a government for many years. s FOR the principal figure in the trial,

Ä. Kastner: he had the bad luck to be the plaintiff technically, and not the defendant, and thus he had had no real opportunity to defend himself. He had had the further misfortune of facing a judge who was no doubt a decent and completely independent man, determined to administer justice, but who was also a narrow-minded man, devoid of historical perspective, and lacking in the capacity to put himself in another person's place—and these were most important requirements for delivering a verdict in this trial. Had he possessed these qualifications, he might have refused to be the sole judge of this, the most tragic epoch in Jewish history. That he, a lone individual, was readv to undertake to do so can be understood either as evidence of considerable personal courage or else of lack of imagination. It was probably a mixture of both. Kästner had also had the bad luck to save the lives of 1,685 (or even more) people. This may sound paradoxical, but if that train had not reached Switzerland, no one could have stood up ten years later and asked: W h y were my parents murdered while X's relatives survived? Was it because the latter were able to pay the ransom sum? Or were they relatives or friends of Dr. Kästner? Judge Halevi may believe that he discovered the truth, which for him seems to have only one aspect. Others will not be able to agree because they see several truths on different levels. But one thing should be clear: that the story that Tamir advanced at the trial, and which the judge accepted, is not

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS :he true one. That everything would have happened differently if Kastner had not become involved with the SS leaders, and that rhe Jews of Hungary could then have been warned and many of them rescued, is a fantastic hypothesis that one can entertain only if one is completely ignorant of the conditions that prevailed in Europe at that time. It can be argued that the policy Kastner and his colleagues pursued was wrong and ended in failure, but they cannot be accused in retrospect for not having followed a "policv of strength" in Budapest in the summer of 1944. One might say that a man who, like Kastner, had been trapped in such a frightful dilemma ought never to hold public office again, but how can he be considered a criminal? Is it a crime to speak the truth even if it is about an SS leader? Many of the facts discussed in the Kastner trial can no longer be established beyond the shadow of a doubt. The meetings of the Jewish groups in Budapest in the summer of 1944 were recorded neither on tape nor in shorthand. And even if all the missing details were known, the decisive question would still be: what was the motive, what was the intent? Had Kastner really been a Nazi accomplice in the way Tamir tried to show? Had he reallv seen his task as the deliverance of his fellow-Jews to slaughter and the sharing of loot with SS leader Becher? This is not inconceivable, but psychologically it is most unlikely. W h y then should Kästner, at the end of 1944, when the victory of the Allies was already certain, have returned to Germanv from Switzerland? And whv did he emigrate in 1946 from Switzerland to Israel? If Tamir's theory were correct, the logical thing would have been to take his millions to South America. W h v would he have gone to Israel of all places, where he y

V

»

*

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST could only live in modest circumstances and would be in constant danger of being denounced and arrested as a war criminal? I know the answer neither to this nor to many another crucial question in the Kästner case. Nor do I believe that the trial has so far contributed much to the discovery of the truth—the whole truth. It may even be that it has helped obscure it. But how can the truth be discovered? W i l l three men or five, or Israel's Supreme Court, be any the better able to find it than a single man? Or would it be better to set up a Knesset committee of investigation? But in that case, again, most of the members of such a committee would be bound by party loyalties. And is anyone at this point still interested in a political party's interpretation of the truth? Like an interrogative sentence in Spanish, the Kästner case began with a big question mark and ended with several more. These question marks will occupy Israel for a long time to come.

Postscript PEOPLE will probably continue to debate for a long time as to whether the Kästner affair had any decisive influence on the Knesset elections of July 1955. T h e evidence is contradictory and inconclusive: Herut, which had suffered eclipse in the elections of 1951, made a come-back and doubled its representation. Mapai suffered a considerable loss, though still remaining the largest party by far. T h e Communists obviouslv did not profit at all. And the General Zionists, who had left the ruling coalition on the eve of the elections in order not to compromise themselves, suffered even heavier losses than Mapai. W h a t can be said is that the Kästner case undoubtedlv had some effect on the election, but certainlv not a decisive one. j

RANSOM NEGOTIATIONS In the meantime, the case has been overshadowed by the renewed tension in the South, the clashes with Egypt, and the news about the Egyptian-Communist arms deal. If vital issues of national security should continue to preoccupy the Israelis in the coming months the Kastner case may well remain submerged—but hardly for very long, and certainlv not forever.*

•On November 17, 1955, the Jerusalem Post reported that Kastner had begun a suit against Grcemvald for I £ 5 0 , 0 0 0 for defamation of character. "In the case of the State v. Greenwald . . . Dr. Kästner was unable to call witnesses who might have testified in his favour because he did not prefer the charges, but was only a witness himself."

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THE NEGOTIATIONS BETWEEN SALY MAYER AND THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE S.S. IN 1944—1945*

YEHUDA BAUER

21, 1944, Saly Mayer, the 62-year-old representative of the Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) in Switzerland met with Obersturmbannführer Kurt A. Becher. Hauptsturmfiihrer Max Griison, Hauptsturmführer Hermann Krumey, and Dr. Rudolph (Rezsö) Kasztner on the bridge between St. Margarethen, Switzerland, and Hoechst, Austria, to negotiate the possibility of rescuing Jews under Nazi rule in return for some sort of payment. These negotiations, which lasted almost until the end of the war, and some of their ramifications, are the subject of this article. The background to these negotiations consisted of contacts established in Bratislava, during the summer of 1942 at the latest, between Dieter Wisliceny, the special police attache for the Jewish problem at the German Embassy in Slovakia, and a group of Jewish rescuc workers. It might be worthwhile to examine whether a connection exists between this case and previous contacts such as the Schacht-Rublee negotiations (which were conducted in late 1938 and in 1939).1 The ON AUGUST

* A shorter version of this article, based on the lecture delivered at the Second Yad Vashem International Historical Conference, appeared in the Hebrew edition of this book, which was published in 1976. In t£e meantime, additional research has enabled the author to produce this muct| revised and expanded article. 1 In early January of 1939, Hitler agreed to a proposal put forth by Schacht, to allow the emigration of German Jews in return for certain economic advantages. See my book My Brother's Keeper, Philadelphia 1974, p. 274, ff.

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YEHUDA BAUER

Jewish rescue workers in Bratislava formed an illegal body called: "the Working Group" (pracovm skupina) which functioned within the local Judenrat (the Ustredna Zidov). It was led by two extraordinary personalities: Rabbi Michael Dov-Ber Weissmandel, a leader of the ultra-Orthodox wing of Slovak Jewry, and the Zionist communal worker Gisi Fleischmann. In the spring of 1942, Weissmandel conceived the idea of offering a bribe to the Nazis to stop the mass deportations of Slovak Jews which were then in progress. About midJune, he contacted Wisliceny, who is said to have declared that the Germans would "disinterest" themselves in further deportations, provided certain payments were effected from abroad. On June 25, 1942, a conversation took place between German Ambassador Ludin, Wisliceny, and Slovak Premier Tuka, after which Ludin sent a cable to the Foreign Ministry in Berlin on the following day, saying that further deportations of Jews were impossible due to supposed Slovak opposition.2 According to Weissmandel, the deportations were stopped after part of the money demanded by Wisliceny had been paid.3 Toward the end of September 1942, and in October, four additional transports were sent to Poland, and Weissmandel argues that this was because the Jews failed to pay the second part of the ransom money. Be that as it may, it seems clear that Wisliceny acted not on his own but according to instructions from Eichmann, who must have received them from Himmler. There were no deportations from Slovakia from October 1942 until the summer of 1944. After the payment of the second part of the ransom, and as a result of the cessation of the deportations from Slovakia, negotiations were held from November 1942 on, regarding the cessation of deportations of Jews to Poland from all over Europe, with the exception of "Old" Germany, Austria, and the Bohemian-Moravian "Protectorate." In these negotiations, which were conducted intermittently until August 1943, Wisliceny — in the name of his superiors — demanded a sum of two million dollars for a temporary halt of the deportations. Moreover, a separate agreement regarding the cessation of deportations in Poland itself might become possible later. The money 2 NG-4407, 4553. 3 Michael Dov-Ber Weissmandel,

Min ha-Meitzar, New York, 1960, p.45,ff.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST THE NEGOTIATIONS BETWEEN SALY MAYER AND THE S.S.

would have to be sent from America, and further negotiations would take place with representatives of "World Jewry." Weissmandel and Fleischmann, of course, pretended to be such representatives. Deportations would cease immediately upon payment of a first installment of $200,000. This offer was transmitted to the U.S., but Jewish leaders there did not take the German proposal seriously. They thought that this was merely another German blackmail attempt. In the absence of any proof, it was impossible to know whether the Germans were, in fact, serious.4 The negotiations regarding the end of the deportations, referred to in the Jewish correspondence of the time as the "Europa Plan," had its direct continuation in the proposal presented in Eichmann's name and brought to Istanbul by Joel Brand in May 1944. On March 19, 1944, German troops occupied Hungary. In their wake came Eichmann's Sondereinsatzkommando, whose aim it was to carry out the mass deportations of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz. Wisliceny, who was a member of Eichmann's squad, contacted two Jewish groups. He had received "references" from Weissmandel and Fleischmann which were addressed to Philip (Fülöp) von Freudiger, head of the Orthodox National Board (Landeskanzlei), and to the Zionist Relief and Rescue Committee (Va'adat ha-Ezra ve-ha-Hatzalah — Va'adah for short). The latter was headed by Otto Komoly, Chairman of the Zionist Organization in Hungary, which represented a small minority of Hungarian Jewry. His deputy was Dr. Reszö Israel Kasztner, a gifted journalist, originally from Q u j (which before 1940 had been part of Rumania). Among the members of the Va'adah was Joel Brand, a native of Transylvania, who in his youth had been a Comintern agent in Germany. After the Nazis' rise to power, he had gone to Hungary and joined the local moderate Zionist socialists. During 1943, Brand, a man with a natural affinity for adventure, was quite successful in smuggling Jewish refugees from Poland into Hungary. Among his main contacts were members of the Abwehr, the German counterespionage organization which until early 1944 was still under the control of the anti-Hitlerite Admiral Canaris. With the help of the Abwehr, Brand and other members of the Va'adah succeeded in est* Ibid., p. 67, ff., 162, ff.

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ablishing contacts with the representatives of Palestinian Jewry who were looking for ways to extend aid from their listening post in Istanbul to the European Jews being murdered by the Nazis. Tht Abwehr's main courier to Istanbul was a Hungarian Jew who had converted to Christianity, named Andor ("Bandi") Grosz, alias Andreas Gyorgy, who helped the Abwehr establish contact with British and American espionage agents. Grosz also operated on behalf of the Hungarian military secret service, who sought to contact Allied representatives. The messages he transferred and the funds he remitted for the Palestinians in Istanbul and the Va'adah in Budapest may have served as a cover, perhaps as an alibi for the future. In any case, he seems to have safely delivered everything that was entrusted to him.5 Wisliceny, meanwhile, contacted the two groups to whom he had been referred in Budapest. Freudiger and the Orthodox group soon disappeared from the negotiations, however, and limited themselves to local or individual attempts to save lives by using bribes. The main negotiations were henceforth conducted by Kasztner and Brand. Wisliceny also disappeared from the scene after a first meeting at which he declared that the deportations might be averted. On April 25, Eichmann called for Brand; at that dramatic meeting and at a subsequent one held on May 8, which were later described by Brand, Eichmann offered to release one million Jews then under Nazi rule, in return for 10,000 trucks and some other goods. The first batch of 100,000 Jews would be released to the Western world (not to Palestine, because of commitments made to the Palestine Arab nationalist leader Haj Amin el-Husseini by his Nazi hosts) and the Auschwitz gas chambers would be blown up in return for a promise from the Allies that they would send the trucks.11 5

6

Bela Vago, "The Intelligence Aspects of the Joel Brand Mission," Yad Vashem Studies, Vol. 10, Jerusalem, 1974, pp. 111-118. Joel Brand, Be-Shlichut Nidonim la-Mavet, Tel Aviv, 1957, pp. 84-87; Der Kastner-Bericht über Eichmanns Menschenhandel in Ungarn, ed. Ernst Landau, Munich, 1961, pp. 86-89, (hereafter — Kästner-Bericht). It must be remembered that Kasztner's version is also based on Brand's testimony, since Kasztner was not present at the Eichmann-Brand conversation. There are several discrepancies in Brand's various testimonies on the events. The account he presented in his book, his testimony in Istanbul (Moreshet Archives, D.I.713), and his statements to Hirschmann in Cairo (Public Record Office, London — hereafter PRO—FO 371/42807/WR 34/3/48, June 22,

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This was the message with which Brand arrived in Istanbul on May 19. He was not alone, however, but was accompanied by Bandi Grosz. The latter had been entrusted by Otto Klages, S.D. Commander in Budapest and Eichmann's nominal chief, with the task "to arrange a meeting in any neutral country between 2-3 high ranking SD officers, and 2-3 American officers of equally high standing, for the purpose of discussing the terms of separate peace between the S.D. [sic!] and the Allies."7 The term "Allies" referred to the Western Allies only. It seems quite obvious that this S.S. peace feeler was the main purpose of the mission to Istanbul, and this is also the way it was understood by the British. It might be reasonable to surmise that Himmler, Klages, and a few other leading members of the S.S. thought they could disavow a man of such doubtful character as Grosz if the need arose and the mission failed. The Jewish aspect, represented by Brand, may have been intended as an opening gambit as well as a means of applying pressure, because the Nazis were convinced that it was American Jewry that stood behind Roosevelt and the Americans' determination to wage war. Brand apparently had only a very vague notion of the character of the Grosz mission. Brand's proposals were transmitted to the British via the Jewish Agency, and to the Americans through Lawrence A. Steinhardt, the American Ambassador in Ankara. The Turks insisted that the two emissaries leaves Turkish soil immediately since they had arrived without Turkish visas. Grosz refused to return to Hungary without fulfilling his mission. Brand knew that if he returned without Grosz and without a positive answer by the Allies to his proposal it would lead to catastrophic consequences. At first, the British refused to allow him to travel to the Middle East, then they changed their minds. There was no other choice but going to Syria. Brand was arrested there by the British on June 7, and brought to Cairo — as was Grosz who had been arrested one week earlier. In Budapest, Kasztner tried to explain to Eichmann that the information from Istanbul indicated that the offer transmitted by Brand

7

1944) do not correspond on all the details. Therefore one can obtain only a general picture of Eichmann's proposals. Vago, loc. cit.; the source is: PRO—FO 371/42810/WR 324/3/48, July 12, 1944.

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had been accepted in principle. What was needed now was a followthrough and evidence of the seriousness of the Nazis' intentions. In order to put the Nazis to the test, Kasztner organized a special transport of almost 1,700 persons, composed of the elite of Hungarian Jewry, as well as of many Kasztner's friends and relatives and of several members of the Zionist youth movements in Hungary. A high ransom payment in money and valuables was made to the Nazis. The train left Budapest at the end of June, and after lengthy delays in Vienna and Bratislava reached Bergen-Belsen — not Spain as the Nazis had promised.8 During this initial stage, which we have outlined very briefly, the Western Allies formulated their position vis-ä-vis the negotiations with the Germans on the fate of the Jews. The aim of the British was to weaken the pressure of those elements in Parliament which demanded rescue actions, and to emphasize that the Jews were not the Nazis' only victims and that the British Government need not take any extraordinary steps on their behalf. "To offer Jews only priority of escape as British protected persons," wrote Eden on June 28 to Chief Rabbi Hertz, in response to the latter's proposal to put all the Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe under British protection, "would be to overlook the fact that German brutality has been directed very extensively, above all in Poland, against non-Jews." Among themselves, in the Cabinet Committee on Refugee Affairs, the British politicians were much more outspoken. Plans to rescue Jews were likely to be supported by the United States where "the War Refugee Board committed itself to the 'rescue' of Jews. There seemed to be some danger that an indication that we ...might negotiate ... might... lead to an offer to unload an even greater number of Jews onto our hands."* Thus on June 5, 1944, the British told the Americans that they considered the German proposals "a sheer case of blackmail or political warfare. Implied suggestion that we should accept responsibility for maintenance of an additional million persons is equivalent to asking the Allies to suspend essential military operations. We could not bargain over any scheme with the Gestapo and agree to trade lives β Kästner-Bericht, pp. 85-86, 106-109, 115-123, 126-134. • PRO — C A I 3 95/15/JR (44)18, May 8, 1944 (Eden to Hertz); ibid., May 31, 1944.

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against military and economic concessions calculated to stave off Germany's defeat." However, in view of the expressed policy of both governments to help refugees, if the Nazis would be willing to release Jews who were "in a position of extreme distress and danger," the possibility of their evacuation to Spain and Portugal would be considered so long as it did not interfere with military operations.10 We know of the position adopted by the Soviets chiefly from the brief cable Harriman sent from Moscow on June 19 in which he simply stated that "the Soviet Government has instructed Vishinsky to state that it does not consider it expedient or permissible to carry on any conversation whatsoever with the German government on the question touched upon." The American position on this question was somewhat less rigid. On January 22, 1944, the War Refugee Board, whose major goal was to aid the victims of Nazi persecution, and especially Jews, was established. In a memorandum dated June 9, John W. Pehle, its director, notified the Acting Secretary of State that Roosevelt "agreed with our thought that we should keep the negotiations open if possible,"11 while of course maintaining continuous consultations with the British and Soviets. The Americans thought it best to wait and see if Eichmann's proposals were not "merely the forerunners of other proposals." If this was indeed the case, and this was the key point, the negotiations should be continued "as long as possible in the hope that meanwhile the lives of many intended victims will be spared."12 This approach was identical with the policy of the Jewish Agency which suggested that the negotiations be continued in order to gain time. In his talks with British officials, Moshe Sharett proposed that "a carrot should be dangled before the Germans."13 At first, the British were also inclined to offer the Germans something tangible. In the Cabinet Committee on Refugees, Eden suggested to approach Germany through the Swiss protecting power to release certain categories of Jews whom the British had already agreed to accept, such as certain categories of children, possessors of Palestinian immigration papers, etc. 10

11 12 13

Foreign p. 1056 Ibid., p. Ibid., p. PRO —

Relations of the United States, 1944, Vol. I, Washington, 1966, (hereafter — USFR) 1074 (June 19, 1944); footnote June 9, 1944. 1074 (June 19, 1944). CAB 95/15/JR (44) 15, July 1, 1944, cable 5959 to Washington.

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Churchill, however, refused to conduct any negotiations — not even indirect ones — with "the Gestapo;" he seems to have been influenced mainly by the attitude of the Russians. June-August 1944 was after all the period of the Normandy landings and of the complicated negotiations regarding Poland. On July 13, 1944, Eden informed the Committee that contacts through the Swiss were out of the question." On July 7, Hull cabled Harriman in Moscow that the Western Allies had accepted the Soviets' opposition to negotiations with the Germans by Allied citizens, but "they are searching for a method of rescue which may be worked out through the intermediary of the Swiss."15 At this point, it was already clear to the Western powers that the real intention of Himmler and his clique was to put out initial feelers regarding separate peace negotiations. The Americans were shown the protocols of the interrogation of Bandi Grosz and it seemed clear that an attempt was being made to save Nazi Germany by splitting the Western powers from their Soviet allies and making a separate peace with them. As a result, the British now refused to have anything to do with the proposals brought by Brand. They were prepared to let Brand return to Hungary, but would not conduct any negotiations with the Germans. A clear divergence between the positions of the British and the Americans therefore emerged.10 Meanwhile, the Germans continued their attempts to establish a basis for such negotiations through the Jews. Menachem Bader, one of the Palestinian Jewish representatives in Istanbul, was invited by the Germans to fly to Berlin (sic!). Bader was willing to go, but the British vetoed the suggestion. On July 26, Pehle received notification of the German suggestion, which had originally been proposed by Dr. Kasztner, that Dr. Joseph J. Schwartz, European director of the JDC headquarters which were located in Lisbon, conduct the negotiations with the Nazis. On July 27, Pehle sent a memorandum to Stettinius recommending that the proposal be rejected. To allow American citizens to conduct negotiations with the enemy was unthinkable." 14

Ibid., JR (44) 19, July 13, 1944. USFR, op. c/r., p. 1086 f. " E . g . JR(44)21, August 3, 1944; JR(44) fourth meeting, August 4, 1944. On July 20, the daily press in England broke the story of the Brand proposals. " Moreshet Archives, D.1.713, June 24, 1944; D.I.721; D.1.746; letter of 15

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By early July, the deportations from Hungary had ceased. Following energetic intervention by Switzerland, the Swedish king, the Pope, and the United States (through the Swiss Government), Horthy gave the order to stop the transports. Horthy was also influenced by an American air attack on Budapest on July 2 (which, of course, had nothing to do with the fate of the Jews). In addition, a letter from the American Legation in Berne to the War Refugee Board was intercepted by (or perhaps leaked to) the Hungarian secret service. The letter, dated June 24, contained a proposal — by Rabbi Weissmandel, but this was not stated in the letter — to bomb the railway lines from Hungary through Slovakia. All this contributed to the end of the mass deportations on July 9. In the wake of this move, the Hungarians offered (on July 18) to allow those who possessed Palestinian immigration permits, as well as several additional small categories of Jews, to leave the country." At this point, the Nazis, having realized that the Americans would not negotiate through Schwartz, indicated their desire to conduct the negotiations with Saly Mayer, as stated by Roswell D. McClelland, the representative of the War Refugee Board in the American Embassy in Switzerland.1* McClelland recommended that Mayer be granted the authority to negotiate on condition that the Swiss Government agree. The goal from the beginning was "to draw out negotiations and to gain as much time as possible, without, if possible, making any commitments." Mayer's condition as submitted to the Nazis — with McClelland's full agreement—was that before the negotiations commence, the Nazis should immediately transfer the first 500 people from the Bergen-Belsen transport to Switzerland. This was also the chief topic of the negotiations which Kasztner was conducting with the Nazis in Hungary at the same time. In fact, a letter with this demand had already been sent by Mayer to Budapest on August 10. The Americans agreed to the negotiations, but McClelland wanted Pehle to Stettinius, July 27, 1944; letter of Stettinius to Norweb, July 28, 1944, both from the War Refugee Board Archives (hereafter — WRB), Franklin Delano Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York. 15 Henry L. Feingold, Politics of Rescue, New Brunswick, 1970, p. 267. " Telephone conversations with Lisbon, August 1 and 6, 1944, JDC Archives, Saly Mayer Archives (hereafter—SM), file No. 1; Cable of McClelland to Washington cable 5197, August 11, 1944, WRB.

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to know whether Mayer would be allowed to offer the Nazis goods or money or both. According to the Germans, 40,000 Jews might emigrate from Budapest, provided tractors were handed over. McClelland himself beKeved that, "It is impossible to embark upon a program of buying Jews out of Nazi hands, especially in exchange for goods which might enable the enemy to prolong the war." 20 Moreover, there was no guarantee that the Swiss Government would permit the entry of Jewish refugees whose release had been obtained by the payment of ransom. The War Refugee Board's decision was unequivocal. On August 21, the following instructions, signed by Hull, were sent to Switzerland: "While the government of the United States still intends to pursue all practical means with a view to relieving the desperate plight of the Jews in Hungary, it cannot enter into or authorize ransom transactions of the nature indicated by the German authorities. If it was felt that the meeting between Saly Mayer and the German authorities would result in gaining time, the Board has no objections to such a meeting. In the event that the meeting should take place, Saly Mayer should participate as Swiss Citizen and as a leader of the Swiss Jewish community, and not (repeat not) as representative of any American organization."21 True, the cable which McClelland received on August 21 reached Saly Mayer the day after his first meeting with the Nazis. McClelland, however, had informed Mayer beforehand of the problematic American answer, and Mayer had followed the instructions, which were clear-cut: do not promise the Germans goods or money, and do not negotiate as the representative of the JDC. Moreover, the JDC itself had also severely limited Saly Mayer. On August 7, Mayer had received a cable from the central European headquarters of the JDC in Lisbon instructing him not to conduct negotiations which would involve payment in goods without receiving the express approval of the JDC in New York. On the very same day, however, Mayer received a telegram from Dr. Kasztner that the Germans would arrive in Switzerland on August 13, and that the only possible basis for the negotiations would be the supply of goods. Saly Mayer took upon himself 20

J1

Ibid.

For the unparaphrased version of WRB cable 2867, August 21, 1944 see SM—13.

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a most difficult task, bound hand and foot by almost impossible conditions. At the end of the first week in August, Mayer met with Swiss government representatives. On August 8, he conferred with the head of the Alien Police, Dr. Heinrich Rothmund, whose attitude towards the Jews was, to put it mildly, ambivalent. Mayer asked Rothmund to allow 500 Jews from Bergen-Belsen to enter Switzerland. He also requested that 1,700 Jews from the same transport (he did not understand Kasztner's information about the number of people on the train) be admitted at a later date, as well as the 15,000 Hungarian Jews whom he heard had been sent to Strasshof near Vienna. Mayer was told that only the children and those adults who had relatives in Switzerland could be admitted. Moreover, their admission would be subject to two conditions — that Horthy keep his word and not renew the deportation of Jews from Hungary and that there be no negotiations involving ransom. Any individuals whose release was obtained by paying ransom would not be allowed to enter Switzerland. On August 10, Mayer was again told that he was forbidden to offer goods in the course of the negotiations and that he could not do anything that would endanger Swiss neutrality. The position adopted by the International Red Cross was even more unequivocal. Marcus Wyler, Mayer's attorney, reported that "it was definitely declared by the International Red Cross Committee that the IRC could on no account associate with people who would use illegal means for salvaging Jews."22 Saly Mayer's advisers were Pierre Bigar, one of the leaders of the Swiss Jewish Community Council {Schweizerischer Israelitischer Gemeindebund), and especially Roswell McClelland and Marcus Wyler. McClelland was not only Mayer's contact, but a personal friend as well. He and his wife Majorie had made a name for themselves as Quaker social workers in Vichy France, as a result of their efforts to save children, and especially Jewish youngsters, before McClelland 12

Arba report of Marcus Wyler—Schmidt (Arba, four in Hebrew, in Mayer's code stood for the Becher negotiations; to begin with, there were four negotiators on the German side, including Kasztner), June 15, 1945, SM17. Where no other source is indicated, the account of the events is as outlined in this report, which was based on Mayer's daily reports and notes.

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moved to Berne to serve as the W.R.B, representative. Wyler, who was Mayer's lawyer, was also a close friend, perhaps the only true friend he had and he was the only person who was aware of Mayer's thoughts, hopes, and fears. No other Jewish organization was asked to help out in the negotiations because it was obvious from the outset that the negotiations were based on deceiving the Germans and the involvement of additional organizations and individuals might endanger Saly Mayer's secret — that he was negotiating empty-handed, that he had no money, could not offer money or goods and was not authorized to speak as a representative of the Americans or even of his own organization, the JDC. The only Jewish leader who knew anything about the negotiations was Nathan Schwalb, head of the HeHalutz office in Geneva and the only Zionist who had a warm personal relationship with Mayer, who by nature was suspicious and a loner. How much JDC money did Saly Mayer have when he began the negotiations? Mayer handled money very carefully and the detailed reports he wrote give us a fairly clear picture of his financial situation. Above his desk there was a sign which read "OPM — Other People's Money." In 1942, Mayer received $669,200 from JDC, and in 1943 he was sent $1,062,500. In 1944, the Joint gave Mayer $6,467,000 and during the first months of 1945, $4,600,000. His expenditures totalled $ 274,785 in 1942, $ 1,154,465 in 1943, and $5,402,955 in 1944. A large portion of these sums — $1,913,000 in 1944 — had to be spent to maintain the approximately 25,000 refugees who had fled to Switzerland, because the Swiss Government only paid for the upkeep of Jewish refugees who arrived after August 1942. The refugees who had arrived between 1933 and 1942 had to be maintained by the Swiss Jews. In addition, Mayer supported illegal activities in Axis-occupied areas. He transferred $1,000,000 to France in 1944 to support underground activities, and additional sums were sent to Rumania ($850,000), Slovakia, Croatia, and Shanghai. Saly Mayer received 4,545,970 Swiss francs (slightly more than $1,000,000) earmarked for Hungary during the period from March 21 to December 8, 1944. In 1944, the JDC's total income was $15,599,602." 23

"Expenditures, etc. as of October 1945," JDC Archives, 51-Switzerland 1944; "Loeb and Troper, Report on Overseas Expenditures, 1942, 1943, 1944," ibid.; SM-4, JDC Financial.

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Thus it becomes clear that Mayer had relatively little money to maneuver with once he had paid for the refugees in Switzerland and transferred funds to France, Croatia, Rumania, Slovakia, and Shanghai. The process of transferring the money out of Switzerland was very complicated, if not absolutely impossible. All of Mayer's funds were deposited in a Swiss bank and were strictly supervised in accordance with the regulations governing the use of funds during wartime. Thus the only way Mayer could operate was on the basis of his promise to pay after the war. Yet despite the fact that direct remittances were forbidden, Mayer — on several occasions — nevertheless transferred cash at great risk to help finance the JDC's rescue activities in occupied countries. In the light of the above, it seems that the stories about "Uncle Saly" who was sitting on millions of dollars and was afraid to part with them, which were widespread among Jewish leaders in occupied Europe, were no more than a legend. In reality, his position was rather weak. Thus, for example, in his first meeting with the representatives of the S.S., he was forced to stand on the bridge at St. Margarethen because the Swiss authorities refused to allow the Nazis to enter Switzerland. On August 21, Saly Mayer who supposedly represented the Schweizerische Unterstützungsjonds für Flüchtlinge, the Swiss organization which handled the JDCs payments for the upkeep of the refugees in Switzerland, met with the four individuals whom we already mentioned. A t the first meeting, the Germans proposed that the Jews should obtain 10,000 trucks, suitable for agricultural puiposes as well as machines, in return for which the Nazis would allow Jews to leave for the United States. The trucks would be sent from the United States in American ships and the Jews who were released would leave Europe on the same ships. According to Mayer's report, Becher was anxious that contact be established between the so-called Sonderstab Max Griison, who was the S.S. man responsible for the execution of the plan, and the JDC. Mayer reported that he replied that although he was the representative of the JDC, he was conducting the negotiations on behalf of his Swiss organization. Moreover, he refused to negotiate under pressure, and told them that he would never perform an immoral act. Becher answered that there was nothing immoral about his suggestion. The first group of 318 people from the transport arranged by Kasztner arrived from Bergen-Belsen that day to prove

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the seriousness of the Germans' intentions, and Mayer asked for some time to consult with his superiors regarding the terms of the Nazi proposal. On August 23, Becher reported to Himmler on the meeting and claimed that, "dadurch dass im gleichen Moment bedingungslos 300 Stück über die Grenze rollten ist diese Auffassung korrigiert" ("since at that very moment 300 pieces had rolled across the border without any prior conditions this view was corrected" — i.e. the Jewish view that the Germans could not be trusted). The Jewish side had begun to take the negotiations seriously. Becher noted that Saly Mayer had doubted the practicality of payment in trucks and he suggested that, besides trucks, Himmler should demand materials which were in short supply (Engpassartikel) in Germany, such as chrome, nickel, ballbearings, measuring instruments, machine-tools, wolfram, aluminium, etc., all of which were no longer being supplied to Germany by the neutral countries due to the intervention of the Allies. Moreover, Becher said that Mayer had promised to secure the approval of the Americans for the supply of these goods by the neutral countries, as well as details on the sums of money which would be made available for the purchases and a list of materials which could be supplied immediately. According to Kasztner's version, Becher promised at St. Margarethen that the gassings would be stopped.24 It is very difficult to believe that this was the case; what is more likely is that Becher attempted to prevent the deportations of the Jews of Budapest, as he himself indicated in his report of August 23. Indeed, Himmler personally gave explicit orders not to deport the Jews from the Hungarian capital. The German Ambassador in Budapest, Edmund Veesenmayer, reported to Ribbentrop on August 25, that he had received Himmler's cable cancelling the deportations on the night between the 24th and 25th of August.23 Thus it seems that a connection exists between these two events. In return for Saly Mayer's promise to ascertain whether or not the Germans' demands would be accepted — he had not promised anything and merely spoke of the various possibilities and how 24

Randolph L. Braham, The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry, A Documentary Account, New York, 1963 (hereafter — Braham), Vol. 2, pp. 635-636 (Becher's cable of August 23, 1944) and 637; Kästner-Bericht, p. 175. " Braham, op. cit., p. 481.

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each might be carried out — Himmler ordered that the preparations for the deportation of the Jews of Budapest be halted. On the day after the first meeting, Mayer received the instructions from America which, as mentioned previously, stated very precisely how he was to conduct the negotiations. His report to the War Refugee Board was received enthusiastically, and the Americans urged Mayer to continue the negotiations for as long as possible in order to save the maximum number of Jews. On September 1, McClelland was able to inform Mayer that the W.R.B. was prepared to put a sum of two million dollars at Mayer's disposal in America, which would—under certain circumstances—be utilized for the negotiations. However, the licence which would have enabled the use of these funds in an effective manner was never sent. It was therefore obvious that the deposit of this sum was merely a meaningless gesture. In his comic quaint English, Mayer noted a telephone conversation he conducted with the European center of the JDC in Lisbon, on September 10, during which he said that whenever he had a chance, in high places of diplomacy and politics, he emphasized the danger that at the last moment, if no intervention in their favor occurred, the lives of the 800,000 Jews still in German hands would be in danger. "Please do take careful notice of the S M {Saly Mayer—Y.B.] message. Myself being after all only a mortal human being, I insist on having put on record 1 lh59 [i.e., a minute to twelve, or a dire warning of impending danger—Y.B.]. From all sides I am now well informed about 'don't' and 'noes'. But what about do it and yes [emphasis in the original—Y.B.]? USA says, no money and no goods for 'Nasty' [Nazi—Y.B.], but do not let negotiations break down. Well, there is not enough margin to go on with."26 There certainly was not. The second meeting took place on September 3, and was held on the same bridge. Mayer met with Kasztner, Griison and Dr. Wilhelm Bülitz, and declared that he was ready in principle to deposit five million Swiss francs in a bank account which he would open in the name of his Swiss organization, for the purposes of the negotiations. Mayer added that he would try to the best of his ability to convince the Swiss Government to allow the S.S. to buy goods in Switzerland, " Phone conversation with Lisbon, September 10, 1944, SM-1.

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on the condition that the lives and welfare of the Jews under Nazi rule be guaranteed and that no new steps be taken against the Jews of Hungary. Billitz, a Jewish convert to Christianity who was one of the managers of the Manfred Weisz concern in Budapest, played a key role in the negotiations and the attempts to reach a compromise solution. Griison announced at this meeting that he agreed to extend the deadline for Saly Mayer's final answer to the German demands until either the 10th or 20th of September, but he warned that a "yes" would mean life, and a "no" would mean death for Hungarian Jewry.27 At this point, Mayer's tactics may already be clearly discerned. He no longer mentioned trucks, and the subject of the negotiations was changed to the question of putting money at the Nazis' disposal in Switzerland. In return, he demanded that the Nazis guarantee not only the lives of Hungarian Jewry, but of all Jews under German rule. The sums that he promised to hand over were funds that he indeed had in Switzerland — mostly money contributed by Swiss Jewry for relief purposes. After all, he could not offer any American money. The third meeting was held on the following day, September 4, and this time Marcus Wyler, Mayer's lawyer, assistant, and personal friend, participated. Griison suddenly declared that the truce was over, and announced that he expected a final answer within 24 hours. He demanded clear-cut promises as well as the 300 trucks, supposedly promised him by representatives of Orthodox Hungarian Jews, machinery, and skins. Further discussion of the matter was simply a waste of time. Moreover, he wanted to negotiate with someone who had "full political powers" {"mit allen politischen Vollmachten')·, Mayer replied that in the light of the international situation there was no possibility to hurry, as no one could force Switzerland and the United States to change their policy and that the matter must be handled in the way that such things were usually done in these countries. Griison was requested to ask Becher to delay the final report to Himmler, and in the meantime, Saly Mayer would consult his American contact (he was thinking of Dr. Schwartz). On the following day — September 5 — the negotiators, with the addition of Pierre Bigar, the President of the Schweizerische Jüdische Flüchtlingshilfe, met again. At this point, Mayer stated that there was 2" SM-13; Arba report, SM-17.

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a possibility of reaching an agreement, but that no materials which were important for the conduct of the war would be made available. As long as the Gestapo continued its extermination campaign against the Jews (the reference was to the beginning of the final deportation of the Jews of Slovakia in the wake of the Slovak national revolt which broke out on August 28), nobody would take their promises seriously.28 The first stage of the negotiations was completed on September 5, 1944. It would seem that Mayer, at great danger to himself, overstepped the limitations imposed upon him by the Americans and the Swiss. Moreover, without promising the Germans anything, he succeeded in creating the impression that it was worthwhile for the Nazis to continue the negotiations since there was a good chance that at least some of their demands would be fulfilled. Mayer told the Americans the truth, but apparently not the whole truth. McClelland's report to the State Department only dealt with Mayer's delaying tactics. He did not reveal that Mayer had promised to open a bank account in Switzerland from which the Nazis could withdraw money to buy goods — if the Swiss Government would agree to such an arrangement.29 The situation described above is totally different from the one presented by Kasztner. In his report, Kasztner expresses his dissatisfaction with the impossible diplomacy ("die unmögliche Diplomatie") and the delaying tactics used by Saly Mayer, which in his opinion prevented the rescue of many people who could have been saved had someone like Dr. Schwartz conducted the negotiations.30 Others, for example the defense in the Kasztner Trial in Israel in 1954, agree with this appraisal. Yet Kasztner himself notes that Becher responded exactly as Mayer and McClelland had hoped he would. "He will wait in Budapest for a telegraphic clear-cut positive or negative answer from Saly Mayer. Until then no decision would be reached." {"In Budapest werde er telegraphisch eine eindeutige positive bzw. negative Antwort von Saly Mayer abwarten. Bis dahin wolle er keine Entscheidung treffen.")31 The possibility of arranging for the supply of goods from Switzerland, a feat which Ribbentrop's Foreign Ministry had « n 10

Ibid. McClelland to Washington, September 16, 1944, W R B , 6110. Kästner-Bericht, p. 182.

" Ibid., p. 179.

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failed to accomplish, was probably an important factor in the attitude of Becher and his superior, Himmler. It is even more important, however, to take note of Griison's decisive demand that the negotiations be conducted by a person with political plein pouvoir. Therein, apparently, lies the key to Himmler's true intentions. The mission of Bandi Grosz had failed. Perhaps the Swiss representative of the JDC could lead Himmler's emissaries to the Americans in the course of the talks which would be camouflaged so that people on the outside — as well as Ribbentrop, Hitler, and even Kaltenbrunner — would think that they were merely business transactions. On September 16, McClelland cabled the United States that Mayer had requested a list of goods from the Nazis, and asked the Swiss to allow a Nazi purchasing agent to enter Switzerland. "My personal opinion, and that of Saly Mayer also is that all time possible has now been gained and that in all probability the Gestapo has lost patience so that these negotiations can be considered as having lapsed, negotiations which after all were doomed to failure. Actually Saly Mayer's negotiations did not primarly concern Jews still in Hungary, but rather those still alive and deported outside of Hungary into territory occupied by the Germans."32 On September 26, Saly Mayer cabled Budapest. We do not have the exact wording of the telegram, but we know that Mayer indicated his readiness to open an account for the Nazis in a Swiss bank. Upon receiving the telegram, Andreas Biss, Kasztner's deputy, took it to Otto Klages, head of the S.D. in Budapest, and Kasztner brought it to Becher. Despite Mayer's ambiguous answer, Biss writes that, "It was surprising with what relief, even joy, Klages and Becher received the cable and promised to transmit its contents to Himmler." ("Erstaunlich war, mit welcher Erleichterung, ja geradezu Freude, sowohl Klages als auch Becher das Telegram begrüssten und versprachen, seinen Inhalt sofort an Himmler weiterzuleiten.'')S3 In the meantime, Grüson was dismissed from his post — according to Kasztner and Biss because of his attempt to intervene, together with them, to prevent the deportation of Slovak Jewry. On September 29, Herbert Kettlitz, the man chosen to take Griison's place, came to the 32 33

WRB, 6110. Andreas Biss, Der Stopp der Endlösung, Stuttgart, 1966, p. 175.

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Swiss border together with Dr. Billitz and Kasztner. Once again Becher preferred not to appear in person. Kasztner says that Mayer complained that he was forced to do certain things because of the "damn Slovak affair" ("in dieser verdammten slovakischen Angelegenheit"). After extensive negotiations, Mayer agreed to promise Becher some money. On the basis of Mayer's promise, Kasztner, Billitz, and Kettlitz wrote a report to Becher in which they stated that Mayer was willing to pay fifteen million Swiss francs in three monthly installments!! In return, three conditions, which Kasztner claims to have proposed, were made part of the deal — that the deportation of Slovak Jewry be stopped, that the Jews of Budapest not be expelled, and that the group in Bergen-Belsen be released." The story presented by Mayer and Wyler is different. According to them, Becher, through his representatives, requested a visa to Zurich and demanded goods. Mayer replied that he was unable to handle the matter of the goods since he had not been given exact details. He demanded the release of the Bergen-Belsen group and declared he had been promised that two million dollars would be placed at his disposal in order to protect the lives of the Jews. The Nazis, of course, would be able to use the funds to buy Swiss goods. The negotiations would encompass all the Jews under Nazi rule, as well as all the foreigners doing forced labor in Germany. Mayer duly noted Becher's announcement that there would be no further persecution. McClelland's cable of October 5, 1944, which reports on the meeting, emphasizes that Mayer demanded a promise that the Jews of Slovakia would not be deported. The cable contradicts Kasztner's assertions, and indicates that it was Saly Mayer who formulated the conditions mentioned by Kasztner, and that there was no basis for the claim that Mayer promised to pay fifteen million Swiss francs (close to four million dollars) in three monthly installments. Moreover, Mayer wrote in his notebook" in reference to this conversation that he told Kasztner "emes" (the truth). "Habe nur 5, m. of which one hundred thousand already spent, noch 2m. $ USA Hull: no goods, no ransom money, but keep negotiations going." u

Kästner-Bericht, p. 187.

·* McClelland to Washington, October 5, 1944, WRB, 6619; entry of September 29, 1944 in Mayer's notebooks, SM-13; Arba report, SM-17.

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At this point, we must focus our attention on another set of negotiations which took place simultaneously in Switzerland, and in which Saly Mayer was also involved. In the wake of the Nazis' occupation of Hungary, various Jewish groups in Switzerland were galvanized into feverish activity. One of these was the Committee for Hungary (Comite pro Ungarn) headed by Mihäly Banyai, and whose members included Rabbi Zvi Taubes, Joszef Mandel, and his brother George Mantello, the local San Salvador consul. This committee was in contact with the Sternbuch brothers of Montreux, the Swiss representatives of Vaad ha-Hatzala of the Orthodox rabbis in America, whose relations with the JDC were rather strained. It was also connected with Gyula Link, a rich Orthodox merchant in Hungary, and Fülöp von Freudiger, both representatives of the Hungarian Orthodox Jewish community. Binyai's group established contact in Switzerland with several Swiss who were known for their good relations with the Nazis, such as Max Boden or Bodenschatz, a merchant who smuggled diamonds from Belgium, and Otto Brindlinger, the representative of the Messerschmidt works in Switzerland. Boden may have been related to the economic attach6 at the German Embassy in Budapest who bore the same name. These individuals introduced a man by the name of Curt Triimpy of Glarus, a commercial agent who was also one of Messerschmidt's representatives in Switzerland, to the committee. On July 13, in Vienna, Triimpy attempted to conduct negotiations with the S.S. on behalf of Bänyai's committee regarding the emigration of 20,000 Hungarian Jews to Rumania. In late July and early August, Boden and Triimpy, who frequently travelled to Germany, examined similar and even more grandiose plans. According to Triimpy's testimony, he was sent to Germany on August 12. In Bregenz, he negotiated with Hauptsturmführer Gottlob Wandel, commander of the local S.D., in order to ascertain what the Nazis were demanding in return for the rescue of Jews. The Nazis sent Haster, a high ranking S.S. officer from Vienna, to investigate Triimpy, and announced that they would release part of the Bergen-Belsen inmates in return for further payments.30 Around the beginning of August, Triimpy contacted Saly Mayer, 30

Curt Triimpy's memoirs in the Swiss weekly magazine Sie und Er, September 14 — November 9, 1961.

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who asked him to find out with the help of his contacts, whom Becher was representing. This was one of the key problems as far as Mayer was concerned: Who was Becher? On whose behalf was he negotiating? Would any payment that he received, if indeed it would be possible to pay him, help save Jews? These questions were recorded as "Who is who?" in Saly Mayer's code. Mayer sent the Nazis a memorandum via Triimpy, in which he demanded that Becher or someone else receive instructions from Himmler with a clear-cut definition of German policy. We do not know, however, if Himmler ever received the memorandum. In October, the situation was further complicated by another Jewish initiative. As noted above, the Freudiger-Link group had been negotiating with the Nazis since the very beginning of the German occupation of Hungary, in the hope of ransoming some Jews in return for the delivery of 100 tractors to the Nazis. They asked the Sternbuch brothers with whom they had very close ties to pay for the first forty tractors. The Sternbuchs, however, did not have enough money to pay for the vehicles. They also were connected with Triimpy and their organization had given him 100,000 Swiss francs to secure the release of the Orthodox individuals who were on the Bergen-Belsen train, and especially of Yoel Teitelbaum, the Satmar Rebbe. As Leo Rubinfeld, a member of the Montreux group, told Triimpy, on October 8, 1944, Sternbuch's organization had no interest in the other Bergen-Belsen prisoners ("will der Hilfsverein, dem ich angehöre, von jenen Leuten, die mit dem ungarischen Transport nach Bergen-Belsen kamen, nichts wissen").37 On August 10, 1944, Freudiger and Link fled to Rumania, and on October 13, 1944 they sent a memorandum to Saly Mayer in which they stated that before his dismissal, Griison had told them that the ransom money was not that important. The real goal of the negotiations was "to induce the Jews who, as is well known, direct all the activities in England and the United States, to force the Allies to stop the war against Germany. Germany is ready for joint action with the Western Allies against Russia" ("die Juden, die doch bekanntlich alle Aktionen Englands und der U.S.A. dirigieren, dahin zu bringen, das se die Allierten zwingen, den Krieg gegen Deutschland einzustellen... ,T

Ibid., October

5, 1961, for a photocopy of the document quoted.

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Deutschland wäre dagegen bereit eine gemeinsame Aktion mit den Westmächten gegen Russland zu unternehmen")·38 Despite the fact that Isaac Sternbuch and Saly Mayer did not trust each other, the former requested that Mayer, as the representative of the J DC, finance the rescue activities of Va'ad ha-Hatzalah in Budapest. Mayer put a sum of 260,000 francs at Sternbuch's disposal before he knew about the tractors. When he was asked to transfer funds to buy tractors, however, Meyer first asked McClelland, and the latter, in accordance with official American policy, responded in the negative. Nonetheless, Mayer paid for the tractors and the Mayer Archives in New York contain documents which prove that several tractors were in fact sent to Germany. After the war, McClelland did not remember any such transaction. It would therefore appear that Mayer first asked McClelland's advice, and then completely disregarded it. In 1925 and 1930, Jean-Marie Musy, a ring-wing politician, was the President of Switzerland. During the 1930's, his outlook became increasingly pro-Nazi, and consequently Musy had no particular love for the Jews. In 1944, however, when everyone realized that the days of the Reich were numbered, Musy tried to create a moral and political alibi for himself by helping in the rescue of Jews. In April 1944, he was approached by a Jewish family in Switzerland whose relatives had been sent to Drancy, as a preliminary step to their deportation to Auschwitz, and he succeeded in arranging for their release.3· Sternbuch contacted Musy and asked him to go to Himmler and negotiate the release of all the Jews under Nazi rule. In October — the date is not quite clear — Musy and his son travelled to Germany where, with the help of Walter Schellenberg, head of the S.D., they succeeded in speaking to Himmler. Musy had received a document from Sternbuch which supposedly proved that the United States ^ a s willing to admit Jewish refugees and to pay for their transportation and maintainance. Schellenberg and Himmler estimated the number of Jews under German rule at approximately 600,000. Musy reported that Himmler would be able to arrange for their release without turning to Hitler, but he needed goods, and especially trucks. Musy said 38 30

SM-39. Musy report, SM-21; Final Report by McClelland, July 31, 1945, pp. 51-52, WRB.

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that he offered Himmler medicines, but the latter refused. Upon returning from his trip to Germany, Musy wrote in his report that "steps undertaken in Berne [sic!] to obtain authority to deliver a certain number of trucks, tractors and autos to the Germans did not seem at first to run into blanket refusal."40 The reference apparently was to Sternbuch's efforts to send tractors, which had been bought with JDC funds from Saly Mayer, to Germany. In any event, it becomes clear that Himmler and his assistant gave identical replies to Mayer, Trümpy, and Musy. Until October 1944, the S.S. demanded basically what it had already requested through Joel Brand — goods, trucks, tractors or at least other strategic and scarce materials. In October, however, it becomes clear that there is competition between Becher, Griison, Kettlitz, and their Jewish partners on one side, Schellenberg and Musy on another; and Kaltenbrunner and Eichmann on yet another, with Himmler maneuvering with, and against, his associates. Himmler was not sure who would bring him the longed-for negotiations with the West. He was therefore active simultaneously on several fronts, so to speak, including the campaign of total annihilation, whose execution remained in the hands of Kaltenbrunner, Müller, and Eichmann. Another front, which we shall mention briefly because it was of marginal importance at that time, was opened up in Sweden. On June 28, 1944, Iver Olsen, the representative of the War Refugee Board at the American Embassy in Stockholm, cabled that a group of three Nazis, headed by Kleist, apparently a member of the S.S., had offered to free two thousand Latvian Jews in return for two million dollars, or according to another version, two million Swedish kroner. The Nazis were supposed to buy medicines and non-strategic materials with the money. During the negotiations that ensued, the emphasis was less on the financial aspects and more on the favorable attitude toward Germany which would be created. These feelers produced no results, but Kleist returned to Stockholm in October, and Olsen cabled on October 14 that Kleist had come to negotiate the evacuation of 100,000 Estonians from Oesel to Sweden. At the present time, it was impossible to obtain the release of Jews from Germany in return for money, but Kleist would negotiate regarding the liberation of the Jews when he returned to Berlin. He claimed that the Swedes were pressur40

SM-21.

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ing him to aid the Jews and that he was interested in doing them a favor. He stated, moreover, that in Berlin he had advocated that the surviving Jews be treated decently so that they could be used as a pro-German factor after the war. Others did not agree with this view and proposed that all the Jews be killed. The latter proposal was rejected and the tendency now was to try and use the Jews as hostages; therefore the surviving Lithuanian Jews had not been murdered. (In July 1944, the Jews in the Siauliai (Shavli) and Kaunas (Kovno) ghettos were "evacuated" to German concentration camps rather than being sent to extermination camps.) Until early March there were no significant developments in Sweden. Mayer was aware of the negotiations being conducted with Kleist and his associates, and his impression was that what was involved were feelers, which paralleled those put out by Becher. At this point, in October 1944, Mayer pondered several problems. First of all, he must change the subject of the negotiations from money and goods, which he did not have, and which he was forbidden even to offer, to a project under the aegis of the Red Cross whose goal would be to safeguard the Jews under Nazi rule and prevent their murder. The principal reason for this strategy was that the number of Jews who could reach Switzerland was, in any event, relatively small. Second, he had to try and ensure that the negotiations would apply to all Jews under German rule — a point he labelled klal in his code — as opposed to Kasztner's emphasis on the fate of the Jews in Budapest. Third, Mayer toyed with the idea of resigning from his impossible job. After all, he had already made promises to the Nazis which he could not fulfill, and which he was not even allowed to have made in the first place. Due to the secrecy of the negotiations, he was attacked and hated by all the Jewish organizations. Moreover, his hands were tied. He could not simply explain, that in reality, he Saly Mayer, the respected industrialist and incorruptible public figure, was perpetrating fraud on a grand scale. In addition, the help he received from the JDC, his own organization, was minimal. In fact, aside from the guidance of "Hanukkah," as he called McClelland, and in a different sense, Dr. Rothmund, he stood completely alone as the representative of a non-existent Jewish power against the sinister forces of Nazism. He did not know "Who is who?" Who was Becher? Was he really given authority from shcunayim, as

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Himmler was referred to in Mayer's code? Who were Trümpy's Nazis? What was the aim of Becher and his associates, besides creating an alibi for themselves and extorting the maximum amount of goods and money possible? McClelland succeeded in obtaining entry visas for the Nazi buying agent Kettlitz and for Becher, Bülitz, and Kasztner. A cable to that effect reached Budapest on October 25, ten days after the Germans removed Horthy and Szalasi assumed power. On October 29, Billitz and Kasztner arrived in St. Gallen. According to Kasztner, Mayer greeted them with the grave accusation that they had notified Nathan Schwalb of their arrival, and threatened that he would resign from his job. Billitz proposed that the Hungarian-Swiss trade agreement, which had already been approved by the Allies, be used to arrange payments to the Nazis. Kasztner claims that Mayer was not enthusiastic about the idea and asserted that the matter depended on the Swiss. Billitz obtained the agreement of the Swiss Government in direct negotiations with Berne, but the deal was never carried out. On November 2, Becher and Kettlitz reached Switzerland. From observing Kettlitz's behavior, Mayer realized that he had no idea what to buy, was not at all acquainted with Swiss industry, and was on very bad terms with the German Embassy. According to Mayer's and Wyler's notes, Becher realized on November 4 that he could not get trucks, but that he could obtain other precious materials that would save "German blood" in return for "Jewish blood." Money which could not be converted into goods was of no use. Could goods be obtained within two to three weeks? Becher said that as far as Himmler was concerned, hundreds of thousands of Jews could be released to go wherever they pleased — except to Palestine, because of the promise of the Reich to the Arab leaders. Mayer promised to relay Bccher's demands. According to Kasztner, Becher said something completely different and far more serious. He spoke of the Nazis' willingness to release another few groups of Jews who would go to Switzerland and to transfer additional categories of Jews to the supervision of the Red Cross. In addition, however, Becher justified the murder of Slovak Jewry for military reasons and announced that the Jews of Budapest w ould, after all. be deported to the Reich. Mayer seemed not to understand the gravity of these threats and instead spoke of Swiss neu-

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trality and demanded that business terms should not be used in discussing deals concerning people; they should speak of payment and counterpayment. Due to the contradictions in the accounts of the main witnesses, we are unable to obtain a clear picture of this phase of the negotiations.41 On the following day, November 5, (according to Wyler on November 6), negotiations were conducted in Zurich between McClelland, Mayer, and Becher." There are accounts by McClelland, Wyler, and Kasztner, on the meeting (at which the latter two were not present). Mayer expounded at great length to Becher, and even read him an article by Dorothy Thompson, which appeared in Reader's Digest, about the impending defeat of the Nazis. McClelland reinforced this underlying theme of the approaching downfall of the Third Reich, following the strategy which he and Mayer had agreed upon. In view of the increasing setbacks suffered by the Nazis on the battlefield, they attempted to change their approach. Rather than base their requests for a lenient treatment of the Jews remaining in German hands on an offer of material advantages for the German war effort, they presented matters on a more basic and personal level (especially in the case of Becher, who regarded himself as an officer and a gentleman whose hands were not soiled with Jewish blood). He and others might perhaps save their hides through favorable actions. Mayer's demands were summarized in twelve points which he had previously transmitted to the Nazis via Triimpy, the most important of which concerned putting a halt to the murder of Jewish and non-Jewish civilians, and the transfer of orphaned children to Switzerland. In return, Mayer was able to show Becher the cable Hull had signed on October 29, which indicated that Saly Mayer would be given a credit of twenty million francs, which he was to use in accordance with conditions to be determined by the American Government. According to 41

On the Swedish negotiations, see WRB cable 274 from Stockholm, June 28, 1944; WRB cable 279 of August 10, 1944 and cable 281 of March 28, 1945. Regarding the talks held on November 4, see Kästner-Bericht, p. 208; SM-14, 17. « SM-17; Kästner-Bericht, pp. 211-216; Interview with Roswell D. McClelland, Oral History Department, Institute of Contemporary Jewry, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, July 13, 1967 — corrected in November 1976.

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Kasztner,43 Mayer did not insist that the Nazis promise not to deport the Jews of Budapest. This demand was, however, included in the document which Kasztner later gave Becher in Mayer's presence. Only after a heated argument, did Becher agree that the children, elderly, and sick would not be deported from Budapest. In addition, Becher did not agree with Kasztner's proposal regarding the protection of the International Red Cross and was only willing to agree that the international organization be given permission to check the various categories of Jews. Kettlitz remained in Switzerland. Mayer apparently waited very impatiently for the transfer of the five million dollars (twenty million Swiss francs) from America. However, in reply to McClelland's cable of November 16, in which he reported on the meeting with Becher and asked for the money, a cable from the American State Department arrived on November 21 which placed Saly Mayer in a very difficult position. Stettinius wrote that the deal proposed by McClelland and Mayer "cannot (repeat not) be supported by the Board in any way and further it is the Board's opinion that no (repeat no) funds from any source should be used to carry out such proposal." Thus, at one stroke, whatever chance there was of using any of the funds which were at Saly Mayer's disposal from other sources to pay the ransom was ended. Mayer's demand to receive the money or cut off contact was also answered. Despite the refusal to transfer the funds, the cable said that, "the Board is confident that you will take into consideration the fact that because of recent military developments each day that can be gained is of increasing importance." Mayer's position became untenable, and he considered abstaining from any negotiations in which he would be unable to fulfill the promises he made. He was dealt an additional blow on November 30, when he was informed that while Dr. Schwartz, the European Director of the JDC, would in fact come to Switzerland, he would not be allowed to take part in the negotiations conducted by Mayer in his capacity as a Swiss citizen.44 In the meantime, on November 8, the infamous death march, which 43

Kästner-Bericht, pp. 211-216. ** WRB cable 3932 of November 18, 1944. Mayer received the cable on November 21. SM-14.

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was organized by Eichmann and lasted until the end of November, set out from Budapest. Between thirty and fifty thousand Jews were forced to march towards the Austrian border, many dying on the way. Becher received regular reports on the developments in Switzerland. Kettlitz, the ineffective agent who according to Mayer and Wyler was enjoying his stay in Switzerland, cabled Budapest on November 18 that Mayer had no money, nor would he have any in the future. On the other hand, Kettlitz contacted members of the Sternbuch group who apparently promised him a more generous response to the Nazis' monetary demands. Sternbuch forwarded proposals along these lines to the Va'ad ha-Hatzalah in America, which in turn approached the United States Government. Stettinius cabled to McClelland to ask him his opinion. Sternbuch thought that Kettlitz's proposals were connected with those of Musy, and he suggested to McClelland to have ten to twenty million francs sent to him so he could arrange for the release of Jews in German hands. McClelland, however, trusted neither Sternbuch nor Musy. In his December 9 cable to the War Refugee Board, McClelland pointed out the "vagueness and unreliability of this whole 'scheme,'" and proposed that the deal not be supported.45 Upon receiving the cable of November 18, Becher went to Himmler to report on the situation. On November 20, without contacting Mayer, Kasztner cabled Becher from Budapest, that the twenty million francs had arrived, that Mayer was working day and night to overcome the technical obstacles, and that the assumption that payment was uncertain was incorrect." Kasztner's story, however, is implausible. Becher knew Kasztner well and was quite aware of the connections between him and Mayer. We might perhaps assume that Becher and Kasztner planned that the latter's cable would reach the former while he was with Himmler, and this would help him maintain his position with the Reichsführer. At this point, the Rumanian Government, which had joined the Allies, announced that it would be ready to exchange Jews from Northern Transylvania, who had been exiled by the Germans and were considered Rumanian citizens, for Germans from the Transylvania area. This proposal apparently made a strong impression on the « McClelland to Washington, December 9, 1944, WRB. « Kästner-Bericht, p. 235.

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Nazis, because it led them to believe that it was worthwhile to safeguard Jewish lives so that they could be exchanged for what they termed "German blood." According to Becher, who returned from his talks with Himmler, the latter had issued instructions in writing to halt the extermination at Auschwitz after orders to this effect had been given verbally in October or perhaps even earlier. The Budapest death march was also halted in late November, apparently in the wake of a similar order.47 On November 27, Kettlitz cabled again that he had not been able to contact Mayer for ten days and that he wanted to leave Switzerland. The truth was, however, that he had been expelled by the Swiss Government. Eichmann, Becher, Kasztner, and Billitz met in Budapest and the latter proposed another trip to the border. In the meantime, the Nazis demanded a positive answer from Switzerland regarding the twenty million francs. Their first ultimatum was scheduled to expire within 18 hours, on November 24, but it was subsequently extended to December 2. The transfer of the Bergen-Belsen transport was dependent on the receipt of a positive answer, as was the order to put an end to the persecution of the Jews under Nazi rule, in general, and those in Hungary, in particular. Simultaneously, Trümpy cabled Mayer and von Steiger, the President of Switzerland, from Bregenz, informing them of the Nazi ultimatum and demanding a promise that the payment would be made to the S.S.48 On November 29, Billitz, Kasztner, and Becher's new representative, Hauptsturmführer Krell, met with Kettlitz and Rubinfeld, a member of the Sternbuch group. Rubinfeld asserted that while his organization had only one million francs at the moment, they would be able to obtain more money. On the next day, Kasztner met with Schwalb and told them that Becher was angry at Mayer who was "leading him by the "nose" ("von einem alten Juden an der Nase herumgeführt")." On December 1, Kasztner met alone with Mayer. In the course of the conversation, Mayer told Kasztner the whole truth. He might be able to raise four million francs, but it would be best to give the money to the Red Cross. Moreover, Mayer believed that he could not 4T

Ibid., p. 242; on the Rumanian episode, see inter alia, Braham, op. cit., p. 750. 48 SM-14; see note 36 above. 4 » Kästner-Bericht, pp. 241-246; SM-14.

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continue the negotiations, as he had nothing to offer. Krell joined Kasztner and also heard that Mayer had barely four million francs, and neither fifteen nor even five million as he pretended in the course of the negotiations. We must point out that the payment of any sum, however small, «would have been in direct contradiction to the instructions Mayer received from the Americans.80 At this point, Mayer began to pay for Sternbuch's tractors. On Septemper 13, 260,000 francs were secretly transferred to Sternbuch, without McClelland's knowledge. On the same day, Mayer paid 64,750 francs for 3,500 kilos of coffee, and on November 30 he remitted 69,000 francs to the Willi Company for the first four tractors which were sent to Germany. On December 19, an additional sum of 145,195.60 francs was sent to the Willi Company and in early January, they received another 103,994.60 francs for tractors which were also sent to Germany." Mayer, however, reached an impasse. The sums with which he could maneuver were very small, and the Nazis were making exorbitant demands. It was at this point, that Kasztner's intervention proved decisive. On the night of December 1, Kasztner convinced Krell and Kettlitz to send Becher a cable which did not have a word of truth in it. First of all, it stated that five million francs were available; second, that the refusal to release the people from the Bergen-Belsen transport was creating many difficulties. Kasztner's version appears convincing on this point. Saly Mayer's action and statements indicate that he was desperate and on the verge of collapse, a state of affairs which at that point threatened the continuation of the negotiations. Thus, it was Kasztner's intervention which saved the situation. On December 4, Becher replied that the Jews of Budapest who had been put in a ghetto in the meantime, would not be harmed, but he demanded that the remaining fifteen million francs be paid. At the meeting of December 5, we again see a strong and aggressive Mayer. He explained to Krell, who represented the Nazis, that the delays were the result of Nazi persecution. The Americans could not take the Germans' proposals seriously while the death march was

90

Kästner-Bericht, p. 248, Kasztner's version is confirmed in Mayer's notes. " SM-21 (2).

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in progress and even the people on the Bergen-Belsen transport had not been released. Wyler was appalled by the fact that Krell had cabled Becher and promised money which did not exist. Mayer promised to try and obtain sums of money which would enable the purchase of materials. The key point, however, was Mayer's proposal to Krell that the Jews under Nazi rule be kept alive with the help of the Red Cross." On the night between the 6th and 7th of December, a train with the remaining 1,368 Jews from the Kasztner transport reached Switzerland. The train's arrival was preceded by a heated argument between Krell, who after the December 5 meeting was prepared to let the train proceed, and Kettlitz, who opposed the release of the transport. On December 10 and 11, there was an additional exchange of cables between Krell and Kasztner, and Becher, who again demanded that the fifteen million francs be paid, (he believed that the initial five million was already guaranteed). Kasztner, who received permission to enter Switzerland, met with the Sternbuch brothers and even with Dr. Schwartz who came to Switzerland for a visit. Schwartz explained to Mayer that the JDC was unable to pay the sums demanded by the Germans, as its entire income for 1944 was $15,095,000, of which Mayer had already received $6,500,000, close to 43%. The JDC did not have sufficient funds to buy tens of millions of dollars worth of war materials. Mayer then proposed that the JDC transfer five million dollars in return for what he called "board and lodging," namely the supply by the Red Cross of the minimum living requirements of those Jews who remained alive under Nazi rule. Schwartz agreed to this proposal. McClelland doubted whether the Germans would be ready to accept this sort of offer, but he nonetheless cabled it to the War Refugee Board on December 13, 1944. McClelland once again asked for the twenty million francs, "or if not in cash, its equivalent in foodstuffs, clothing, shoes and medicine." McClelland himself raised the question of the problem which was inherent in this solution — Jews who would receive food from the Allies would be exploited for forced labor by the Germans who would thereby receive military aid. Nonetheless, he agreed with Mayer's proposal and asked for "all possible support." In their response of December 19, Washington asked 53

McClelland to Washington, December 13, 1944, WRB, 8118.

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if suitable merchandise could be obtained in Switzerland, and if it was certain that the materials would reach the hands of the Jews, and not those of the Nazis. In addition, the agreement of the major allies would have to be obtained. McClelland answered on December 28 that he had discussed the matter with Schwartz and Mayer and he believed "that it is indispensable" to send the twenty million francs immediately. Schwartz notified him that Jewish sources in America would supply the money. The funds would have to be used under appropriate supervision. Schwartz believed that there was no rush to hand over the money, and if there were difficulties in obtaining the goods, so much the better. There certainly were not twenty million francs worth of suitable foodstuffs in Switzerland, and thus some of the goods would have to come from abroad. As far as McClelland was concerned, the Bergen-Belsen transport was proof that the Nazis had serious intentions.53 On January 7, 1945, the long-awaited cable signed by Stettinius finally arrived, confirming the transfer of twenty million francs to Saly Mayer by the JDC. The condition for the transfer was that no part of the sum could be expended without the approval of the United States Government. The cable stated that the money was sent "solely in order that Saly Mayer may have something tangible with which to hold open the negotiations and for the gaining of more precious time." On January 26, Mayer found out that, in any event, the money could not be used without McClelland's signature as well as his own. Three precious weeks had elapsed from the time McQelland had made his second plea for the money (December 13) until he received a positive answer. During this period, Mayer explained to Kasztner, who was staying in Switzerland, that the Nazis were not entitled to any payment in return for the Bergen-Belsen transport, as they had been paid in full in Budapest. This was the answer to Himmler, who according to Kasztner demanded one thousand dollars for every Jew who was released. At the same time, Mayer was also negotiating with the Red Cross, and he obtained their agreement in principle to care for the Jews in the camps and in the ghettos. 53

Washington to Berne, December 19, 1944, WRB, 4273; McClelland to Washington, December 28, 1944, WRB, 8390.

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According to Kasztner, Becher protected the Budapest Ghetto during this period by inducing S.S. General Winkelmann to invite the Hungarian minister Kovacs to his home and tell him that any damage done to the ghetto would be a blow to German economic interests. Becher's behavior during the siege of Budapest leads us to believe that he consulted Himmler regarding the policy to adopt vis-ä-vis the Jews. At the same time, he extorted payment in trucks from Andreas Biss for this very step. Biss contacted a German-Slovak merchant named Alois Steger who informed Becher that the trucks were ready to be placed at his disposal. In reality, the vehicles in question had in the meantime been confiscated by the Wehrmacht, and Becher was asked to recover them from the army, a feat he did not succeed in accomplishing. Steger later demanded payment for "supplying" the trucks, and as late as 1961, he threatened to sue the J DC." One week after the news of the transfer of the twenty million francs reached Switzerland (between the 13 and the 16th January), Pest was liberated by the Soviets. A month later, Buda was taken as well. Thus ended the second stage of the negotiations. The third and final stage of the negotiations began on January 15, 1945, when Musy met again with Himmler at Wildbad in Southern Germany. Musy reported that this time Himmler had demanded that five million francs be put at Musy's disposal. The money was to be paid to the Red Cross in return for medicine and food for the beleaguered German population. According to Musy, Sternbuch told him that Va'ad ha-Hatzalah was the only organization suited to conduct these negotiations as the JDC was not a political body and only dealt with philanthropic work. As for Mayer, it was said that he was interfering with Musy's mission. Upon Musy's return to Switzerland on January 17, Sternbuch cabled to America that he had an opportunity to obtain the release of 30,000 Jews in exchange for five million dollars. The Jews would be liberated at a rate of 1,500 per month, and the price for each group would be a quarter of a million dollars. A sum of $250,000 which had previously been sent to Sternbuch and was presently deposited in a Swiss bank, would be used to make the s

* SM-42; Kästner-Bericht, pp. 260-266; Becher's statement of March, 24, 1948, NO-S230. Regarding the sending of the twenty million francs see Washington to Berne, January 6, 1945, WRB and USFR, 1945, Vol. 2, Washington, 1967, p. 1121.

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first payment. On January 25, the War Refugee Board cabled McClelland to ascertain whether or not Sternbuch's story was true. In his reply of January 28, McClelland said that Sternbuch denied making any payment to Himmler, but that Musy had received 50,000 francs from Sternbuch, and 10,000 francs were extorted from an individual whose relative was taken out of Germany by Musy.39 On January 21, Musy returned to Germany. Schellenberg conducted most of the talks with Musy, and as a result of the negotiations, a train with 1,210 people from Theresienstadt arrived in Switzerland on February 7. On February 6, Musy, McClelland, and Sternbuch held a meeting at which Musy announced that the Germans were demanding five million francs in return for the release of all the Jews under German rule. McClelland thought that Musy had spoken to Himmler not only about Jews, and that "the release of Jews may be the forerunner of proposals of much greater importance to the Germans." 86 On February 16, Sternbuch obtained temporary credit locally of five million francs and he immediately informed Musy of this fact. Sternbuch thereupon requested that he be sent $937,000 (five million francs) from the U.S. to cover the credit and any additional payment to Musy. Meanwhile, Musy was about to leave Switzerland with a letter from the bank confirming that five million francs had indeed been deposited in Sternbuch's account, but he demanded, sometime around February 16, that the Swiss and American press respond favorably to the humanitarian step Himmler took in releasing the inmates from Theresienstadt.57 Va'ad ha-Hatzalah asked the JDC to pay the $937,000 to Sternbuch. The JDC granted the loan, but it did not take the trouble to inform Saly Mayer. On February 28, a confirmation of the loan was sent to McClelland. The money could only be spent with the express written approval of the War Refugee Board, co-signed by Sternbuch and McClelland. Under no circumstances could the money be used for ransom payments. The conditions were therefore identical with those put forth regarding Mayer's twenty 55

WRB communications from Berne, number 424 of January 25, 1945; number 605 of January 28, 1945. »6 McClelland to Washington, February 8, 1945, WRB, 881. 57 SM-21; Musy's statement at the Schellenberg Trial, May 8, 1948, document no. 50.

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million. On his trip to Germany after the release of the Theresienstadt transport, Musy was able to show the Germans proof that the five million francs were in Sternbuch's account, but the reaction of the Swiss and American press brought about the opposite result from that expected by Himmler's people. Hitler was angry at Himmler, and Kaltenbrunner obtained strict orders from Hitler which prohibited the release of one single additional Jew from German territory. The competition between the various S.S. leaders who were seeking an easy "Jewish" alibi reached its climax. Musy contends that he was told in Berlin that: "Sally [sic!] Mayer did everything in her [sic!] power to stop the actions of the Montreux Committee."58 He claims that he succeeded in freeing another 61 Jews — apparently the reference is to the Jews who were brought from Bratislava and whom Becher claimed to have saved. Furthermore, Musy's son, Benoit, claims that he visited Buchenwald on April 9, on the eve of the liberation of the camp, and Bergen-Belsen several days later, and saw to it that Himmler's promise to hand over the concentration camps and their inmates intact to the Allies was kept, and that he brought about the release of the women prisoners in Ravensbriick.60 It is clear that the negotiations which were conducted simultaneously through such intermediaries as Felix Kersten, Himmler's masseur, Musy and his son, and Becher, constitute a desperate last attempt by Himmler and his cohorts to extricate themselves, and perhaps part of their empire, from the rapidly collapsing Third Reich. Mayer took advantage of the chaotic situation to make various attemps to protect the lives of the Jewish remnants through negotiations with local S.S. men during the last months of the Reich — such as the efforts he made to save Jews in Bratislava through Red Cross delegate Georges Dunand or his work on behalf of the Jews in Vienna through Dr. Lutz Thudicum, another representative of the Red Cross. The competition between the various Jewish groups led Himmler to demand that the Nazis investigate whom it would be most worthwhile to negotiate with. On January 15, after negotiating with Musy, Himmler wrote that the latter had agreed to find out "Who is who?": ss

Musy report, SM-21. " Testimony of Benoit Musy at the Schellenberg Trial, May 8, 1948, document no. 51.

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"wer ist derjenige, mit dem die Amerikanische Regierung wirklich in Verbindung ist. Ist es ein Rabbiner-Jude oder ist es die Jioint [sie! ]?"eo On January 29, Becher, Kasztner, Krell, and Kettlitz met in Vienna to clarify this problem. In the meantime, Dr. Billitz had died of typhoid in Vienna. Krell and Kasztner were sent to Switzerland to ascertain whether the money had reached Mayer and had been deposited in Becher's name. Mayer was also to arrange for Becher's entry to Switzerland. Becher went to Berlin to confer with Himmler. According to Wyler's notes, on February 1 (and not on January 31, as Kasztner wrote) Krell demanded the sum of four million francs which was to be used through Saly Mayer. An additional fifteen million francs would have to be paid to the Red Cross, but would be at Becher's disposal for purchases in Switzerland which would be made through Mayer. McClelland thought that this demand was not clear and asked through Mayer whether it would be possible for all nineteen million francs be used by the Red Cross "for the upholding of Jews under German care."®1 On February 5, Krell received instructions from Berlin to halt the negotiations with Mayer because within a few days the negotiations with Musy would yield astounding results. On February 7, Mayer and Krell decided to invite Becher to the Swiss border. On February 11, Mayer showed Krell the bank letter which confirmed the existence of the twenty million francs. It was forbidden to transfer the money to Becher. Becher requested to see McClelland again in order to prove to Himmler that it was his negotiations, rather than those conducted by Musy and Schellenberg, which had led to contacts with America. The last meeting at the border between Becher, Krell, Mayer, and Kasztner took place on February 11. Mayer promised a meeting with McClelland, which never took place. Mayer's attempt to place the Jews under the supervision of the Red Cross corresponded to additional contacts made in Scandinavia during February and March of 1945, as well to the new policy adopted by the International Red Cross. Saly Mayer reported to Dr. Carl Burckhardt, the head of the Red Cross, about the negotiations, and 00 Yad Vashem Archives, 0-51 (DN) 39, 2119. SM-17; Kästner-Bericht p. 291.

01

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asked for his intervention. The latter indeed attempted to intervene in Germany on behalf of all the camp inmates. It is not clear, however, whether his efforts were connected with the negotiations conducted by Saly Mayer. After the war, Musy, with the aid of Schellenberg and the support Df Sternbuch, claimed that due to Mayer's intervention the arrival of the Theresienstadt transport was publicized in the Swiss press. He also asserted that Mayer had spread a rumor that Musy had promised Himmler the rescue of 250 top-rank Nazis in return for the release Of the Jews. These developments supposedly brought about Kaltenbrunner's intercession with Hitler who forbade any additional exchanges of Jews (in mid-February 1945)." All these assertions are groundless. McClelland's cable to the War Refugee Board is sufficient proof that it was Musy who was interested publicity for the Nazis. Mayer, who was completely surprised by the Musy negotiations and their results, certainly did not publicize the success of the Sternbuch group for whom he had little sympathy. Moreover, Schellenberg, in his testimony of June 1948, asserted that the source of the news regarding the 250 Nazis was a broadcast by a Gaullist radio station in Spain which was monitored in Germany. Musy and even Schellenberg claim that Saly Mayer was an agent of Becher and Kaltenbrunner [sic!]. It is obvious that the Nazis became hysterical when the slip-knot was tightening around their necks and this situation led to intrigues, competition, and accusations. After the war, Sternbuch and his friends reiterated these accusations and gave Schellenberg the alibi he had sought all along. On the other side, Kasztner paid his personal debt to Becher by providing him with what in those days was called a Persilschein (exoneration) to the Allied authorities. It. should be noted that in Kasztner's own report, Becher is portrayed in a completely different light — as a loyal Nazi and an anti-Semite who was capable of much brutality. es

See notes 57 and 59; cf. also the testimony of Franz Goering at the Schellenberg Trial, February 2, 1948, document no. 40; the testimony of Becher at the Nuremberg Trials, June 25, 1948; Schellenberg's testimony at his trial June 18, 1948 (see also La Tribune de Geneve, July 29, 1948); letter of Sternbuch to the Nuremberg Tribunal, November 17, 1948 and the correspondence published in the (Swiss) Israelitisches Wochenblatt, November-December 1948, SM-21.

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Who was Saly Mayer? He was born in Switzerland in 1882 and died there in 1950. The owner of a knitwear factory, he was fairly successful in business, was a member of the municipal council of his town St. Gallen, and was active in the Association of Jewish Communities, whose chairman he later became. His personal life was unhappy. His only son was emotionally disturbed, a fact which made his parents' life miserable. Saly Mayer was very withdrawn, an observant Jew who always carried a copy of Pirkei Avot in his pocket. This man was suddenly embroiled in an international diplomatic whirlpool, the likes of which few people could have successfully dealt with. In order to succeed in his mission, Saly Mayer trained himself to project an image which was quite different from his own personality. This quiet man suddenly became a compulsive talker who overwhelmed his negotiation partners with long speeches. He "led by the nose" not only Becher, but even his own friends. For example, he did not tell Wyler, his only close friend, that he had paid for Sternbuch's tractors. Thus Wyler denies that such a payment was made, while the receipts for the payments were found among Saly Mayer's papers, and the relevant sums were included in the financial reports he sent the JDC. Saly, by his nature, was a very suspicious man. All those who came into contact with him suffered as a result. His relations with Kasztner were at first based on mutual respect and even sympathy, but after he revealed inaccuracies in the accounts Kasztner presented, Mayer was angry at him and became hostile. Kasztner apologized and even humiliated himself in his efforts to restore their good relations, but later he did not refrain from taking revenge on Mayer.0* The attacks on Mayer in his report are not at all convincing, as he praises Schwartz, McClelland, and the Swiss Government as if he did not realize that these were no more than auxiliaries to the principal action which Mayer conducted. McClelland's personal opinion of Mayer is far more balanced. In the warm atmosphere of the McClelland home, together with Ros63

"Damals, dort in Budapest, war es uns nicht denkbar auzunehmen mit philanthropischen Gangsters ä la SM zu tun haben werden." time, there in Budapest, we never dreamt that we would have to philanthropic gangsters such as Saly Mayer"), Kasztner to Steger, 1947, SM-42.

dass wii (At that deal with March 9,

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well's wife, Majorie, and their three small children, the lonely man relaxed and became "Onkel Saly." According to McClelland: "perhaps, had you picked more of a diplomat, a man with greater political background and savoir faire, more could probably have been achieved. Yet this man succeeded in doing precisely what Becher once told Saly, he, Becher, was accused of by his opponents, namely of 'being led around by a ring in your nose by an old Jew.' This was exactly what happened. Saly conducted a masterful holding operation for six months. It seems incredible, in retrospect, that he could have sustained it for so long, particularly when he had so little of real substance to bargain with. Saly did have the problem of being a tremendous talker [sic!]. On occasion he would discourse in great oblique circles; and it was often hard to get Saly down to the point... He would come a little bit toward it, and then back off. But this discursiveness could also be an asset. It kept his Nazi interlocutors, for one guessing and off balance; and it gained time, precious time."44 From other accounts, it seems that Mayer could be a taciturn and secretive man. He was clearly very intelligent, but was reputed to be nervous and given to violent temper tantrums. At the same time, he was very warm-hearted. He had good relations with the JDC, and was therefore personally very offended when he found out that they had sent Sternbuch $937,000 in February 1945 without even informing him. However, he overcame this as well. What did he achieve? He took advantage of the increasing weakness of the Nazis in the summer of 1944, and he changed the subject of the negotiations (which had started out as a continuation of Eichmann's demands from Brand) from trucks to money, and from money to the safeguarding of the surviving Jews by the Red Cross. The negotiations themselves certainly contributed to a relative softening of the Nazis' policy towards the Jews, which manifested itself in the cessation of the organized gassings, although the main factor in this development was clearly the rapid deterioration of the German military position. It should be noted, however, that in view of Germany's defeats on the battlefields, the opposite reaction regarding the Jews could have been taken, and was indeed advocated by Kaltenbrunner, 94

See note 42.

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Müller, and Eichmann and apparently by Hitler as well —namely the mass murder of the Jewish remnants. It seems that the negotiations in Switzerland were one of the factors which strengthened the relatively less murderous tendencies among some German leaders. The order which was given on August 25 not to deport the Jews of Budapest seems to have been a result of the talks on the Swiss border. The continuation of this policy, including the sometimes problematic intervention by Becher, would have been inconceivable without Mayer's delaying tactics, although Kasztner and Biss, who exploited every opening, also played a key role. The arrival of the Kasztner train in Switzerland was undoubtedly a direct result of the negotiations. It is difficult to ascertain whether the negotiations helped keep alive the roughly 16,000 Hungarian Jews who were deported to Strasshof, but it seems that this was indeed the case. The negotiations conducted by Mayer opened the way for various initiatives such as those of Musy, Kersten, and others, and enabled them to attain partial success. It can be surmised that the negotiations with these individuals contributed toward preparing the ground for the surrender of Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen to the Allies, although it is difficult to estimate the influence of other factors which may have been of greater importance. Saly Mayer was far from being an angel, or even an easy-going, popular man, but he performed successfully under impossible conditions. Although he was bound on all sides by instructions and limitations, he exhibited an astounding ability to carry out his difficult task. From the outset, he fought against the Nazis' basic attitude toward the Jews. The Germans did not regard the Jews as humans, but as goods, material things, which could therefore be traded for similar goods. We have already quoted Becher's expression in a cable to Himmler where he spoke of "318 pieces" ("318 Stuck") which had "rolled" {"rollten") across the Swiss border. The dehumanized Nazi expressed his condition by dehumanizing Jews. Mayer's method of negotiation was diametrically opposed to this concept which, together with Nazi pressure, had influenced even Kasztner. Utilizing the impending collapse of the regime, Mayer steered the negotiations into a framework which became almost human again.

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Lack of unity in Jewish rescue attempts influenced Mayer's negotiation methods, but he, in turn, must bear a part of the responsibility for the disharmony. His excessive secretiveness, his often petty bickering with other Jewish organizations led to an intensification of the problems. It would, however, be difficult to say that others, especially the Sternbuch group, were any more tolerant. It is interesting to note that Mayer succeeded in achieving at least some of his aims, although he failed in his major goal of putting the Jews in Nazi territory under the supervision of the International Red Cross. He did so in the course of the only prolonged negotiations that took place during die war between the Allies and the Nazis. He succeeded in arranging a meeting between an American representative — McClelland — and an S.S. officer in order to save lives, the only occurrence of its kind in the course of the war. Compared with the results of other rescue attempts, Mayer did not do badly at all.

Part Two

Other Rescue Options

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Dalia Ofer

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THE RESCUE OF EUROPEAN JEWRY AND ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION TO PALESTINE IN 1940-PROSPECTS AND REALITY: BERTHOLD STORFER AND THE MOSSAD LE'ALIYAH BET GENERAL BACKGROUND

Illegal immigration to Palestine was an escape route for thousands of Jewish refugees from the Third Reich, and should be viewed in the context of the mass exodus of Jews from the Third Reich to all corners of the world. Palestine was not one of the major destinations sought by these refugees; but relative to its size and absorption capacity, Palestine took in a disproportionate share of displaced Jews: of the half million Jews who fled the Greater Reich from 1933 until the war broke out, about 100,000 came to Palestine, some of them illegally. This pattern of escape, very untypical of the law-abiding Central European Jewish middle class, demonstrated the gap between the number of people in need of immigration and those who were admitted by the countries to which the Jews sought entry. A combination of economic depression, an inability to grasp the nature and the danger of the Nazi Jewish policy, and the influence of Nazi anti-Semitism, decreased considerably the number of immigration permits issued by the immigrating countries —mainly the United States. From 1937 on the British restricted Jewish immigration to Palestine. This was due to a retreat in British policy from the commitment to the Jewish National Home. The White Paper of May 1939 limited Jewish immigration to a maximum of 75,000 in the next five years. This number was far below the individual applications and the request of the Jewish agency. When the Nazi policy of encouraging emigration changed to forced emigration and expulsion, illegal immigration became a mass movement. Distinguished and honored citizens, young and old, participated in this movement. The organizers of illegal immigration were few. The two major factors were: 1) the Revisionist (New Zionist Organization) organi-

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zation, through its youth movement—"Betar"—and its military underground force—"Irgun"; and 2) the "He-chalutz"—Labor Zionist Young People's Movement—which prepared its members for immigration to Palestine. Other Zionist parties participated in the illegal immigration, but they used either the Revisionist or the He-chalutz organizations to operate. Both groups created special bodies which were in charge of illegal immigration strategy and operation. Labor Zionism generated the "Mossad Le'Alivah Bet"—the organization of immigration B. T h e Revisionists created the "Mercaz Le-Aliyah" —Center for Immigration. Both had their operation headquarters in Paris. T h e Mossad was part of the Hagana —the underground military force of the Jewish community in Palestine, which was under the authority of the Jewish Agency. T h e Mercaz operation was supported in Europe by Betar members, and it was guided on the seas and in clandestine landings by the Irgun. T h e two organizations had envoys (Schlichim) in the Jewish communities who organized the immigrating groups, selected the candidates, prepared the needed documents (exit permits and transit visas), and supplied the boats, crews, and food for the voyage. A third important factor in illegal immigration was the role of private organizers. Some were motivated by the possibility of economic gain, others were motivated by Jewish solidarity, and common fate. Some of these organizers were connected to the Zionist movement, like Dr. B. Confino of Bulgaria, or to the Revisionists like W. Perl and W. Faltin from Vienna. These private organizers played a very important role in promoting the movement of illegal immigrants and between a fourth to a third of the traffic was due to their efforts (6000-7000 people). T h e Nazis' attitude towards illegal immigration derived from their approach towards Jewish emigration from all the territories under their control. T h e i r major goal was a "Judenrein" Reich, and migration was (at first, at least) regarded as a means towards this end. And although the question of where the Jews should go did concern the Nazis, it was only a secondary consideration to the issue of the Jews' willingness to emigrate at all. Therefore, the main test of illegal immigration from the Nazis' viewpoint was its degree of success in evicting the Jews from the Reich. True, Nazi anti-Semitic ideology would probably have preferred dispersing the Jews in small numbers all over the world and creating numerous small and destitute Jewish clusters to instigate further antiSemitism; whereas the gathering of large numbers of Jews in Palestine could well have raised the spectre of a "Jewish Vatican." 1 But immigration to Palestine did not depend entirely on the Nazis, nor did the immigrants arrive only from the Reich. T h i s convinced the SS leaders to adopt a pragmatic approach whereby the Reich's Jews were ordered to emigrate, as a means of 'cleansing' Germany of its Jews. T h i s policy was

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stated explicitly by Heydrich in January 1939, at the inter-ministerial meeting that established the Jewish Emigration Center in Berlin. 2 Heydrich was a staunch advocate of illegal immigration to Palestine as one of the ways of evicting German Jews from the Reich. At the same meeting, H. Wohlthat (who replaced H. Schacht in the negotiations with G. Rublee on Jewish migration affairs)2® announced that he had been told in London that Palestine could absorb another million or so Jews. If these were the numbers envisaged by Nazi policy makers, Jewish emigration to Palestine must surelv have been taken verv seriouslv indeed. The Germans therefore supported the organizers of illegal immigration. According to the resolutions of the above-mentioned meeting, such support was to be extended covertly, as the German State could hardly sanction illegal operations overtly. The operational scene was thus set for all emigration efforts from the Reich in this period. The "illegality" of these efforts was purely a British concern, as it was British policy that restricted (or barred) entry of Jews to Palestine in accordance with the White Paper policy. In 1939 Britain stepped up its struggle against illegal immigration and persisted in these measures for the first two years of the war. The coast-line of Palestine was guarded against penetration and clandestine landings; immigrants who were caught were placed under arrest and threatened with deportation to their countries of origin; captured vessels were confiscated and their crews imprisoned. Britain also exerted strong diplomatic pressures on countries with Black Sea and Mediterranean ports, to prevent the departure of immigrants for Palestine and providing them with supplies.3 In spite of all these measures, illegal immigration accounted for 63 percent of total immigration to Palestine in 1939 (of around 27,000 immigrants, some 17,000 were 'illegal'). *

*

*

CONDITIONS AFTER T H E BEGINNING OF T H E WAR

When war broke out the difficulties of organizing illegal immigration increased. At the.same time, the direct need for actual rescue operations became all the more critical: in the early months of the war Jews were already being deported from the Reich to Poland. The problems entailed m purchasing and sailing ships, acquiring foreign currency and other finances, all increased immeasurably. Shipping costs soared by hundreds of percentage points as available vessels became scarce. Countries prohibited the transfer of ships' ownership to foreign citizens, planning to use these vessels in their own war effort. No one knew how much longer immigrant ships would be able to make their way to Palestine. The Jew•sh institutions in the Reich were concerned about their contacts with the outside, while similar institutions in the free world were worried about

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maintaining communications with the Reich. Envoys from Palestine, being 'enemy aliens,' had to leave the Reich and the territories it occupied, and Jewish residents of the Reich were declared 'enemy aliens' by a British government concerned about spies and fifth columnists, although they had long since been deprived of their German citizenship. British anti-espionage precautions took on panic proportions especially after the Germans occupied Belgium and the Netherlands. 4 Jews in the Reich at first entertained hopes that the outbreak of war would create a need for a rational German policy regarding the Jews, and perhaps shift the authority for handling Jewish affairs from the SS to the army 5 —these hopes were dispelled. They still wished to emigrate, while at the same time German pressures for emigration (and illegal immigration) did not let up. In September 1939 there were still quite a few active local emigration operatives in the Reich: Ehud Avriel of the He-chalutz movement (previously an assistant to Moshe Agami, a member of Kibbutz Kfar Giladi, who was also an envov of the Mossad, and had to leave bv Eichmann's order in the Spring of 1939); Y. Dorfman, another leading He-chalutz member, who returned to Vienna from Geneva six weeks after the war broke out; W. Perl, a young Viennese lawyer and member of the Revisionist movement; and Emerich Faltin, also of the Revisionists. Both Perl and Faltin worked for the 'Immigration Center* run by the Revisionists, and in a private capacity. Berthold Storfer, a well-known Viennese businessman, and a person well-versed in migration affairs through the Zentrum Travel Agency in Vienna, was also involved. All these operatives were in touch with groups of emigrants in various stages of preparedness for travel, some of whom were just about to depart for the Black Sea. These groups comprised the complements that boarded the "Atlantic," the "Noamy Julia," and the "Rodanitzar," ships that reached Palestine in September-October 1939, and the "Hilda" and the "Sakariya" that arrived in the beginning of 1940. Other groups were either en route or in the final stages of preparation. T h e restrictions on the shipping market once hostilities broke out led to the cancellation of agreements, postponements, and various delays that called for improvisation, circumstances that affected all Aliyah operatives. The Mossad was in the process of organizing the extrication of some 10,(XX) Jews from Germany in collaboration with the German HAPAG Company 6 and groups of He-chalutz pioneers in Bratislava and Vienna were also ready to move out. The Revisionists had planned to take several groups out of the Protectorate (a plan that was partly accomplished several months later on board the "Pencho"), and further plans were under way under the auspices of individuals who had par* ticipated in the illegal organization since its inception, such as Dr. B. Confino of Bulgaria, W. Perl, R. Mandler, and Berthold Storfer. 4

*

*

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T h e Mossad was hard hit bv the loss of direct communications with local Jewish communities. Its agents and He-chalutz envoys left the Reich for various other countries. T h e independent operation of the Palestine offices—the legal immigration offices of the Zionist Movement—also came to a halt and a German government official was placed in charge of Jewish emigration. T h i s had an especially severe impact on Mossad operations, mainly because it affected the selection of candidates for illegal immigration according to their suitability for life in Palestine. T o British claims that the Germans were liable to plant spies among Jewish emigrants or use them as a fifth column by holding their families hostage in the Reich 7 —the Mossad responded by promising to maintain control over who would emigrate on their ships and by giving assurances that there would be no cause for fears about hostile elements. But their control over the selection of candidates for emigration was diminished when their agents had to leave the Reich. T h e tightening ship market and the loss of vessels through fraud only worsened the Mossad's financial problems. All these factors combined to make the operations of Mossad agents remaining in Europe extremely difficult. In addition, considerable embarrassment was caused by the renewed reservations expressed by the Zionist leadership concerning illegal immigration. T h e wartime conditions led these Zionist leaders to devise a new political strategy: collaboration in the British war effort in order to claim a share in the fruits of victory. From the Zionist movement's viewpoint, these fruits were expected to be plentiful: the strengthening of the Yishuv's defense capability as a consequence of fighting against Hitler (a prime national objective), and maneuvering Britain into changing its White Paper policy. Any attempt at undermining coordination with the British was therefore considered undesirable. Thus, although illegal immigration was conceived as a useful means of fighting against the White Paper, how could one ensure that this struggle would not damage the aspired-for collaboration in the British war effort? Illegal immigration was also a means to rescue Jews from the Reich and the areas it had occupied, a need that had intensified since the outbreak of the war. How could one reconcile these two sometimes conflicting aspects of illegal immigration? T h e Mossad suffered acutely from the ambivalent Zionist policy after the war broke out and from the other changes that have been cited. Could it somehow continue and expand immigration operations in these years? Reconstructing the historical reality of 1940, one realizes that the necessary external preconditions for illegal immigration existed. T h e Germans did not waver from their support of illegal immigration. T h e Mediterranean was still open to the sailing of boats, and the Balkan States, mainly Rumania, allowed illegal immigrants through their ports. The necessary internal (Jewish) preconditions changed, in part. Jews

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were ready to embark on illegal boats and to risk their lives on illegal voyages. But the organizations that provided the human and financial resources were ambivalent. They were reconsidering the inevitable need to cooperate with Nazi authorities in organizing illegal immigration after the war began. It became more difficult politically and morally to coordinate with the Nazis even on an illegal basis. They lost the direct involvement and control over the immigration activities, since their envoys (Schlichim) had to leave German territories. They had to rely on a middle man, Berthold Storfer, who was appointed by the Nazis, and who was assumed by many to be a Nazi agent. Under these circumstances the disadvantages of illegal immigration seemed larger than the advantages. After realizing that they could not replace Berthold Storfer, nor control him as they wished, they practically gave up the efforts to emigrate people from the Reich. This was a tragic error for reconstructing the situation of 1940 from an objective distance one can see that a unique chance to provide for the possibility of immigration was not used. This assertion, of course, requires proof and to provide the necessary evidence we now turn to a description of Storfer's personality, his methods of operation, and his relations with the Mossad.

BERTHOLD STORFER: HIS BACKGROUND AND STATUS

Berthold Storfer was a commercial consultant who was born in 1882 in Bukovina. For many years he was in the timber trade in Rumania and Hungary, and during the First World War he was engaged in transporting supplies to the Kaiser's Army on the Russo-Rumanian front (where he was decorated twice). After the war he was appointed financial advisor to the Czech and Austrian governments and also served several large commercial firms. His fields of expertise were banking credit and overseas exports. 8 What part did Storfer play in Jewish public life? He was not a central figure in the Jewish community, nor one of the party activists and he is not known to have held public office before the Anschluss. His first known public endeavor was at the Evian Conference of July 1938, in which he appeared with Professor Neumann and Dr. Löwenherz on behalf of Austria's Jewish community to present their requests on matters related to emigration. Although the delegation appeared in Evian under German auspices and was convened under German initiative, Storfer himself was nominated to it by Löwenherz, the head of the Jewish community in Vienna. 9 Why did Löwenherz nominate Storfer? No doubt Storfer's economic contacts could be helpful in organizing emigration, but there must have been other Jews with similar qualifications among the more prominent members of the Jewish community. Possibly the very fact that Storfer

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was not a prominent figure acted in his favor, and Löwenherz may have chosen him for tactical reasons—being aware of his unique contacts with the Germans. This, however, is pure speculation. Storfer did place his experience and international economic contacts at the disposal of the Evian delegation, alongside Neumann's reputation and Löwenherz's official status in the community. Storfer's status and operations in the field of emigration and illegal immigration to Palestine gained g r o u n d d u r i n g 1938. H e became a familiar figure in German official circles and in 1939 was c o m m e n d e d by Eichmann in connection with the activities of the Z e n t r u m emigration offices. 10 Z e n t r u m was one of the major offices engaged in Jewish emigration. A m o n g its other activities it sent people out of the Reich with tourist visas to conceal their true intentions. After this tactic was uncovered, groups organized by Zentrum were n o longer allowed into the countries of destination, causing great indignation, criticism, and debate in the local and international press. T h e Germans, though not averse to Jewish emigration even by such 'devious' means (provided it was carried out covertly and successfully), opposed any method whose disclosure was liable to create adverse propaganda. Zentrum was penalized several times, and even shut down for different periods. Storfer seems to have been appointed to head Zentrum in March 1939. We d o not know whether this appointment resulted from German intervention or pressure, but Eichmann's commendation concerning the future operations of this office under Storfer's direction may indicate that Eichmann knew Storfer and trusted him. From August 1939 on, and certainly after the outbreak of the war, Storfer was in control of emigration plans initiated by other organizations. H e was empowered to cancel plans or halt g r o u p s of emigrants either before their departure or en route. O n e illustration of his power can be found in the irate comments of Aliyah officials of the He-chalutz and the Revisionist movements, 11 and Ehud Avriel's letter to Storfer, dated December 1, 1939, is particularly revealing. 12 Avriel tried to organize a g r o u p of emigrants independently, without Storfer's permission, taking advantage of Storfer's absence from Vienna. (Storfer was in Lublin, on behalf of the Jewish community, inquiring after the condition of Jews who had been deported there in November 1939.) Avriel ran into financial difficulties as his group numbered 200 more persons than he had planned. He needed help, and the only way he could get it was from the Jewish community in Vienna and the Emigration Center. But this r e q u i r e d Storfer's approval. H e wrote a flattering and pleading letter to Storfer praising his work and dedication. In later evidence, and in his book, Avriel makes no attempt to disguise his contempt for Storfer, considering him an opportunist who exploited the Jewish plight to further his personal aims. By March 1940 Storfer was in sole charge of organizing emigration from all parts of the Reich. 13

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We have dealt at length with this point in order to emphasize the facts of Storfer's official status and to underline the suspicions aroused when his authority in emigration affairs grew stronger. This issue constantly clouded relations between the Jewish organizations that sought to work with Storfer, both within and outside the Reich, the Mossad, the Joint, the He-chalutz, and the Revisionists. Community leaders in Vienna and leaders of the Reichsvereinigung (the central body of the German Jewish community, created in June 1939 under Nazi order) were not alwavs hostile to Storfer. T h e Vienna archives also include manv letters of gratitude to Storfer, praising his efforts and accomplishments in the emigration cause.

STORKER S OPERATIONS-CONSTRAINTS AND ADVANTAGES

Organizing emigration from Vienna in 1939 was a very complex undertaking. Emigration offices sprouted up all over, competing fiercely for the few available visas; it was a virtual battlefield between greedy swindling adventurers over the hopes and despair of Jews who desperately sought any means of escape and who were prepared to consider any offer, serious or otherwise, provided it was channelled through the Jewish community. It was this community's j o b — through Storfer's office — to weed out the spurious bids and warn prospective emigrants. But it was difficult to maintain control over the situation, especially in view of the constant pressure exerted by Eichmann to increase the flow of emigration. Löwenherz came under constant fire from the Germans who complained that the Jews were not leaving rapidly enough, while at the same time he had to try and head off proposals which he considered fraudulent. It is therefore not surprising that Löwenherz had to lean heavily on Storfer, as the freedom of operation enjoyed by other bodies diminished: the Palestine Office was shut down in July 1939, Jewish organizations were forbidden to collect funds for emigration purposes unless through the Jewish Emigration Center, and it is possible that at some stage Löwenherz found himself totally dependent on Storfer's helpStorfer operated with a Greek travel agent named Socrates Avgerinos who was responsible for obtaining ships, establishing contacts with other travel agents, and hiring crews. He also handled the ships' provisioning, registration, ownership documents, and technical arrangements. Storfer also had 'representatives' in various countries: his brother, Joseph, in Bucharest, helped him organize the crucial Rumanian leg of the voyage; his brother-in-law, Goldner, acted as "ambassador-at-large" in Slovakia, Hungary, Rumania, and Austria, and also served as liaison officer between Storfer and Aliyah agents in other countries such as B. ConfinoO n Bulgaria), and R. Mandler (of the Perl organization in Bratislava and

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Budapest). All financial matters—even those requiring travel abroad —were handled by Storfer personally, as were contacts with the Jewish Emigration Center and the Jewish community in Vienna. Storfer was also personally responsible for negotiations with local travel agencies such as the "German Danube Company" that transported emigrants from the Reich to the Black Sea. For the sake of efficiency, Storfer needed the support of both the Germans and the Jewish organizations, especially the Joint. Without the latter's allotment of foreign currency Storfer would not have been able to operate at all. What were the considerations that guided these Jewish organizations in formulating their attitude towards Storfer? Naturally enough, one of the more important considerations would be his reputation with other Jewish organizations within the Reich itself. T h e fact that Löwenherz relied on Storfer must have weighed heavily in his favor. But the fact that Aliyah organizers for the He-chalutz and Revisionist movements regarded Storfer as a power-hungry German lackey made a distinctly bad impression. Another factor influencing the attitude of the Joint leaders to Storfer was the question of his freedom to determine his own actions. Could he impose his own scale of priorities? Could he accommodate Joint requests pertaining to emigrant lists? Or was he totally subjected to the demands made by Eichmann and the Nazis? What supervisory measures could they impose on Storfer to ensure that his methods were compatible with at least a minimum degree of safety for his charges? How could one guarantee that he would not use funds entrusted to him for personal gain or that he would not subject his passengers to inflated travel costs? Dealing with all these problems, with Germany almost completely cut off from the rest of the world, callcd for no small measure of mutual trust and for full agreement on the aims and means of the operation. Storfer was not as free an agent as he would have wished —or as the Jewish organizations would have wished. H e was completely under Nazi control. T h e Nazis were quite capable of suddenly deciding to restrict Storfer's operations exclusively to Jews from the Reich itself, whereupon any group leaving the Reich that got stranded (such as the Kladovo group) would be out of reach of his help. 14 T h e Nazis could also decide to release certain persons from their concentration camps and deport them from the Reich within seven davs. 15 Thev nurtured constant fears of imminent inspections, 'visiting' Storfer's offices unannounced to examine his correspondence with foreign countries, the Jewish community, and with individuals. They would confiscate the company's books to compare their entries with their own sources of information. 16 All this must have roade it quite clear to Storfer that his freedom was severely curtailed. Eichmann and his henchmen also interfered in security matters: when Aliyah operations were shaken by Italy's entry into the war and doubts

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were raised over the freedom of navigation in the Mediterranean, the Germans announced that none of this was relevant to the issue of emigration, and that they expected it to proceed regardless.17 All this demonstrates how constrained Storfer was in conducting his operations because of the Germans' policy with regard to "The Jewish Question." Were there any spheres in which Storfer did enjoy a free hand? Lists of emigrant candidates, subject to the overall restriction to residents of the Reich, were compiled by the Jewish community's Selection Committee, of which Storfer was a member. The Germans did not interfere with these lists and the number of camp internees they released was, quantity-wise, negligible. It seems plausible to assume that personal pressures and bribes could be employed to secure German intervention and favor, but there is no evidence of this having happened. From the Germans' viewpoint, the main object was to organize efficient emigration, so that the imposed quota of Austrian Jews would indeed depart from the country, thus achieving a "Judenrein" Austria (the deadline set for accomplishing this was at first February 1940, postponed to February 1941, and again to the end of 1941).18 We have several reports of the Selection Committee's sessions. Storfer took part in these meetings and could have proposed candidates and pressed for the inclusion or exclusion of persons on the lists. The evidence of those emigrants who reached Palestine on board his ships indicates that some people paid Storder hundreds of dollars which he pocketed. Given the conditions prevailing in Austria after the war broke out, the deportation to Lublin, the eviction from apartments, and routine confiscation of property, it should come as no surprise that attempts were made to bribe Storfer or that would-be emigrants thought it was possible to try. Is it true that Storfer abused his authority for personal gain? We do not know. We should certainlv not relv on the evidence of those who told their tale after reaching a safe haven. However, neither can we dismiss the evidence out of hand. Anyone responsible for emigration from the Reich had to work in close coordination with the German authorities or accomplish nothing. The question is not: was Storfer free of German control, but whether he was able to convey to the Germans that for the emigration effort to succeed it would have to be conducted with the full support of the Jewish community. This would have called for subtle maneuvering between antithetical elements striving for the same aim —the Germans wanted emigration to proceed apace, but it also depended on action taken by Jews outside their sphere of influence. The German Jewish community had to make it clear to the German authorities that the η o n - R e i c h Jewish communities also had to be considered, otherwise no support for emigra* tion would be forthcoming. The position taken by these non-Reich Jews depended, among other things, on their faith in the leaders of the G e r m a n

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Jewish community, and therefore it was in the German interest to foster such trust. T h e r e was not much room for maneuver, as we know today, but the Jews in the Reich were aware of the scenario and managed to maintain contact with the Joint, the British Zionist movement, and others. Jewish leaders like Epstein, from Berlin, Edelstein, from Prague, Löwenherz, and others, left the Reich for Trieste and Geneva with the Germans' blessing, to meet Jewish leaders from abroad. Storfer tried to employ the same tactics. Storfer also tried to hold his own in other spheres: he did not hesitate to complain to Eichmann about the German Danube Company, with which he was ordered to work, when they exploited their monopoly and raised their prices, created difficulties in arranging schedules, etc. 1 9 H e also managed to get help from the German Foreign Office in extending the validity of passports and the transfer of funds. 20 H e trod a wary path between German policy vis-a-vis the Jewish question and the status of the Jewish community. Nonetheless, one cannot say that his own status gave him much advantage over other organizers of emigration. H e sought ships in the same narrow Greek market, he had to bribe foreign councils to obtain proper registration, and he depended upon outside Jewish assistance for funds.

S T O R F E R S RELATIONS W I T H JEWISH ORGANIZATIONS O U T S I D E T H E R E I C H

What did the Jewish organization abroad know of all thi^? What did they glean from the information they received about the conditions prevailing in the Reich's Jewish community? T h e Joint's attitude to Storfer in the middle of 1940 can illustrate these and associated problems. In December 1939 Storfer suffered a heavy loss when a ship he chartered, the "Astria," sank with nine crewmen on the Black Sea during a severe storm. T h i s ship was to have taken on 600 emigrants waiting in Bratislava. 2 1 Storfer w as faced with a three-pronged problem: first, the funds he had invested in the "Astria" had been lost, and the insurance settlement would take time; second, the emigrants left stranded had to be provisioned, and Storfer did not have the necessary funds to do so; third, the River Danube froze early that year. Storfer had to postpone this group's departure to the Spring of 1940. In the meantine he considered purchasing a larger vessel, then docked in Greece, to carry some 1,400-1,600 passengers ~adding to the Bratislava group emigrants from Vienna whom the Germans were anxious to move out. 22 Implementation of this plan dePonded on the transfer of $55,000 via the Joint in order to purchase the vessel. Löwenherz met with representatives of the Joint in Geneva and in

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Budapest in January 1940, and obtained their general consent to finance the project. 23 Storfer planned his moves accordingly: he took out an option to purchase the vessel by the end of March and started recruiting a captain and crew and planning the details of the voyage down the Danube to the Black Sea and then to Palestine. H e did all this with the help of Avgerinos, his Greek agent (or partner). 24 By the end of March the funds from the Joint had not yet arrived. Storfer feared the entire project might be cancelled if the money was not forthcoming immediately and sent a stream of letters calling for help, advising caution, and generally seeking attention. 25 "Funds should be wired . . . situation extremely delicate and unless caution and resolution are exercised we may lose the ship . . . what will become of the voyage? Contact Brussels urgently to find the reason for the delay . . . prices are soaring daily . . . we are already in an untenable position and it is becoming worse . . . we need help and support." Storfer's pleas remained unanswered. The money never arrived. T h e Joint never sent it. Avgerinos' option lapsed. No Storfer ship sailed with the Vienna and Bratislava emigrants that April. What or who stopped the Joint from forwarding the funds? Several factors combined to support the suspicion, already growing in the minds of the Joint officials, that Storfer was unreliable and no more than a Nazi puppet. In January 1940 representatives of the Joint were berated by the British Foreign Office for supporting illegal immigration. The Foreign Office had tracked down a cable sent by H. Katzki (a Joint operative in Europe) to M. Troper, the Joint's European representative, requesting aid for the "Löwenherz refugees" whose ship had sunk, 26 probably referring to Storfer's Bratislava group destined for the "Astria." At that time about 3,000 Jewish refugees in Rumania were awaiting transport to Palestine—comprised of groups that nad arrived on the "Sakariva" and the " H i l d a " in Tanuarv and Februarv of 1940. Thev had spent a harsh winter on riverboats and their case had raised a furor in the international press. The Joint was asked to assist, while the British were on guard against their planned illegal immigration to Palestine. At the same time a group of 1,000 persons was caught in the small Yugoslav port of Kladovo, also on riverboats and in harsh winter conditions. They, too, received aid from the Joint and were placed under British observation lest they continue on their way to Palestine illegally. The Joint came under strong British pressure and had to take notice, especially since they were receiving reiterations of British concern about spies, this time from Mossad operatives as well. While Storfer was busy planning his group's Spring move, the Mossad was also trying to help its emigrants. Mossad agents sought vessels to transport groups already prepared for departure and awaiting transportation. Both Storfer and the Mossad were thinking in terms of a large vessel, capable of taking on several groups at once. Both concentrated '

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their search in the same dwindling Greek shipping market. T h e Mossad was also short of funds, a shortage that grew more acute in the winter of 1940. It considered Storfer a harmful and unreliable competitor. Should he receive Joint funds, they believed, their own chances of obtaining funds would diminish. T h e Mossad was warned —on behalf of the British —by Zionist leadership about the possibility that German spies could be planted among the emigrants. T h e Mossad dismissed this contention, but could give no firm guarantee that spies could not possibly be planted among the refugees in the absence of strict supervision over the composition of emigrant lists. T h e Jewish Agency was ready to help the British in security checks of illegal immigrants arriving in Palestine. All this the Mossad communicated quite clearly to the representatives of the Joint, who did not wish to appear as supporters of illegal actions, or of a socalled Nazi agent. The Mossad and Weizmann urged the Joint to withold support from Storfer unless a way was found to exercise control over his operations. Such control would ensure that the Germans would not be able to use emigration as cover for espionage activities. How could it be exercised? Storfer could be obliged to clear his operations through Mossad operatives or representatives of the He-chalutz movement whom they trusted. The Joint consented, and advised Storfer that he would have to countersign Shmarvahu Tzameret — the Mossad's man in Athens—in order to release the funds earmarked for him and deposited in an Athens bank. Tzameret asked to inspect Storfer's lease contracts and travel arrangements before signing the transfer order. Storfer refused. The Joint had acted in good faith. They were wary about transferring funds to Storfer and were being subjected to increasing pressure. They therefore obliged Storfer to clear the transfer through Tzameret whose task was to ensure that the money would be used for the right purpose. But Tzameret, as the representative of the Mossad, did not restrict himself to Joint directives; as a Mossad man he had an account to settle with Storfer (see below). Storfer, for his part, could not consent to Tzameret's supervision, and the end result was that the transfer of funds was delayed. The Joint had become embroiled in a dispute in which it really had no part (between Storfer and the Mossad) at the cost of postponing the departure of emigrants' ships. This, as the operatives on the spot were fully aware, could mean cancellation of the voyage. 27

STORFER AND T H E MOSSAD LE-ALIYAH B E T RELATIONS AND CONSIDERATIONS

Why did the Mossad want Storfer to fail? Would not such failure imply the failure of Aliyah in a wider sense? T h e answer to the second question

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is a definite " N o " ; and its explanation derives from the answer to the first. Mossad operatives received their information on Storfer from two sources: one was their own or other Eretz Israel envoys to Germany and Vienna operating since before the war, who had met with Storfer and were acquainted with him (for example, Pino Ginsburg, a kibbutz member in Palestine who emigrated from Germany in January 1934 and went back as an envoy of the He-chalutz in 1939, and Moshe Agami).' The second source was He-chalutz and Zionist movement leaders who remained in the Reich (Erich Frank, a leader of He-chalutz in Germany; G e o r g Israel, a major figure in the Reichsvereinigung; Jacob Edelstein, from Prague; and others). P. Ginsburg and M. Agami were familiar with the situation that prevailed before Storfer took sole charge of emigration from the Reich. T h e y were also familiar with the internal power structure and with the fact that the division of labor between the Gestapo and the Jewish Emigration Center was not yet quite clear-cut. Agami, recalling his attempts to weave his way through the various Nazi authorities, ascribes the success of illegal immigration to these delicate maneuvers. 2 8 Surprisingly, Hc-chalutz and community leaders inside the Reich also failed to correctly assess Storfer's power and status after the war broke out, and provided the Mossad with misleading information. 2 9 In January 1940 the Reichsvereinigung tried to carry on with illegal immigration operations started bv Ginsburg and the Mossad in the Spring and Summer of 1939. They hoped to do so with their German contact, "von Häffner," who had access to the SS and had worked with Ginsburg, and to implement their "Grand Plan" of emigrating 10,000 German Jews out of Italian ports. 30 If they could collaborate with the Mossad in this project, they could shake off their dependence on Storfer and on the Danube-Black Sea route. In this way they could handle the immigration according to their wishes. T h e stand taken by these leaders in Geneva concerning the Mossad operatives— in January 1940—maintained that the key to successful Aliyah was in its actual implementation. T h e Germans did not care who carried out emigration as long as it was going on efficiently. In the beginning of 1940, Storfer's status was as if declining—his ship had sunk, and the scandal surrounding Reich emigrants awaiting transport in Rumania in harsh winter conditions did nothing to improve his image (people asked themselves how these emigrants could have been allowed to leave the Reich when no ships were at hand, and this was Storfer's responsibility). 31 Storfer's (justified) excuse, that these groups had e x p l o i t e d his absence and left Vienna while he was away in Lublin, did not ease the tension. German He-chalutz members and leaders of the Reichsvereinigung believed that if the Mossad had extricated their emigrants, Storfer w o u l d have been in no position to interfere. 9 2 Jacob Edelstein, who arrived in

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Geneva at that time, held the same belief. He criticized all the leaders of the Jewish community in Vienna—not only Storfer—believing that their attitude towards the Germans was too submissive and virtually invited extreme German measures (such as deportation to Lublin). Edelstein further believed that taking a firm stand against German policy could prevent additional extreme steps, that neither Storfer nor Löwenherz was qualified to cope with the situation, and that neither of them should be given support. He thought Aliyah operations should be carried out independently and was prepared to turn over the funds still held by the Prague Palestine office to the Mossad for this purpose. Successful Mossad activities would also serve to strengthen the weakening position of that office due to the lack of immigrants. Given this approach, which reinforced the Mossad's dim view of Storfer, the opposition of Z. Yehieli, the head of the Mossad in Europe operating from Geneva to collaboration with Storfer, intensified. Storfer and Yehieli met in Bucharest in February 194033 and Storfer tried to convince Yehieli that collaboration would be to the Mossad's advantage, suggesting that he, Storfer, should continue organizing the groups of emigrants in accordance with German directives but would at the same time consider the Mossad's interests and requests in selecting candidates for emigration and giving priority to He-chalutz groups from Germany and Prague. The Mossad was, however, expected to understand that the Germans also obliged Storfer to take care of the old and infirm in Vienna as well as released camp internees. The Mossad, Storfer continued, would handle the sea voyage part of the operation. Storfer sharply criticized operations conducted behind his back that had led to scandals and harmed the emigration cause (e.g., the "Sakariva" and "Kladovo" affairs), as well as individual efforts such as those of Edelstein in Prague. Why did Storfer seek collaboration with the Mossad? He himself gave no explanation, but there is no doubt that he needed the Mossad's help mainly in order to bolster his status in the Reich's Jewish community (the Reichsvereinigung, the Palestine office in Prague), and with the Joint, thereby clearing away some of the obstacles in his fundraising efforts. He also needed the Mossad's help in everything related to sailing the Mediterranean and clandestine landings on Palestinian shores. This would both improve his own reputation as an Aliyah organizer and promote emigration operations as approved rescue policy. But instead of being a working discussion, the meeting between Yehieli and Storfer turned into a violent argument. Storfer vilified Avriel and Edelstein —which made Yehieli furious and led him to warn Storfer against taking measures against He-chalutz groups. Storfer, for his part, declared that no one could emigrate from the Reich without his consent. Yehieli was anxious, but refused to divulge Mossad plans or to promise cooperation.

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What would the Mossad gain from such collaboration, at the end of February 1940? Given hindsight, and knowing that the Mossad was shortly to find itself virtually helpless, collaboration with Storfer would seem to have been a sensible move. But this was not the way things seemed in February 1940. The Mossad had taken an option on a large Turkish vessel, the "Watan," and had reached an agreement with Edelstein whereby the funds held in Prague would be used to lease it. It was hoped that some 3,000 passengers from the Protectorate and Kladovo could board this ship. In a telephone conversation Edelstein confirmed that the Prague Palestine office had a free hand in this matter. Storfer was not in a position to interfere should the "Watan" proceed as planned. Considering all this, Yehieli had no incentive to enter into a dubious collaboration with Storfer. But events took a different turn from the one anticipated by Yehieli and his friends. The option on the "Watan" was not as secure as they had believed, the transfer of funds from Prague was delayed, and Storfer was believed to have had a hand in it. In the meantime, the Turkish government prohibited the transfer of ownership over Turkish vessels to foreigners ostensibly because of the war and their own military needs. (This move may have been instigated by pressures from the British Foreign Office following the voyage of the "Sakariva" which was also a Turkish ship.) The loss of the "Watan" was a severe blow to the Mossad. Thev conceded that the plan had been ill-conceived from the outset, but were particularly incensed at Storfer. What role did Storfer's alleged delaying tactics play in holding up the transfer of funds and the cancellation of the lease? Had the funds arrived in time and the deal closed, would it have been possible to effect the transfer of ownership? Storfer's tactics reminded Yehieli of the meeting in Bucharest and of Storfer's attitudes at that time. Just how much did Storfer have to do with the cancellation of the "Watan" scheme? There was no clear cut answer to this question, but suspicion ensued. The Mossad's opinion of Storfer, as expressed to the Joint during these very weeks, was naturally tainted by this affair. Thus, the Joint's stipulation that Tzameret would have to countersign Storfer's expenditures was, in a sense, their answer to his part in the "Watan" affair—and in kind. What we have described here is the failure of two Aliyah operations: one Storfer's and the other the Mossad's. In both cases, tactics and operational procedures were of the utmost importance. Tactics depended on a broad set of considerations whose fundamental premise was the need to promote Aliyah, and that were related to Zionist concepts of Jewish mutual responsibility. But given the complex situation of the Jews in the Reich, these considerations failed to appreciate the urgency of the matter and revealed a certain measure of inflexibility in adjusting to rapidly Λ

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changing circumstances. Furthermore, both failures resulted in bitter grudges and a desire to settle accounts on either side. Nor were all the misunderstandings and recriminations resolved several months later, at another meeting between Storfer and Yehieli in May 1940.M This time Yehieli's position was weaker than it had been the preceding February. It was Spring, and the Mossad ship had not yet sailed. In fact, the prospects for its imminent departure were extremely slim. Reports from the Reich were becoming more and more alarming, and the messages to coordinate efforts with Storfer were coming from Jewish leaders. The American Zionist movement criticized the Mossad for failing to do its job and wasting funds (the "Watan" affair). T h e Zionist leadership was growing increasingly hesitant towards illegal immigration, and sometimes even hostile, and opponents to such immigration drew support from these failures. Insufficient support was, of course, one of the causes of these failures to begin with. Even so, no collaboration between Storfer and the Mossad was in sight. The second meeting between Storfer and Yehieli, in May 1940, took place only a few days after fighting started on the western front. Storfer outlined his plan to extricate 3,500 Jews from the Reich (on board the future "Milos," the "Pacific," and the "Atlantic"), requesting aid and collaboration, especially in organizing the landing operation. His condition was the release of funds held in Greece. The passenger list that was of such great concern to the Mossad had been approved by the Reichsvereinigung officials. Yehieli contended that the lists did not include 1,000 Prague halutzim to whom the Mossad had promised passage back in January of that year, nor did it include the Kladovo group. Storfer replied that the Prague contingent had refused to work with him and that they had therefore been replaced with other passengers (namely, Mandler's Revisionists), while the Kladovo people were not "in his jurisdiction." He did agree, however, that future lists would include the Prague group and that he would try to help the Kladovo people if he could. From Yehieli's viewpoint, this amounted to rejection. 35 What could have convinced Yehieli to work alongside Storfer? Storfer sought open Mossad support primarily to bolster his position vis-a-vis the Joint. Could the Mossad gain from extending such support? In May 1940 it seemed not. The Mossad preferred not to participate in Aliyah operations in which the German authorities were directly involved, and Storfer was left to transport his emigrants without Mossad assistance.

THE FATE OF STORFER'S "THREE SHIPS"

Storfer's "Three Ships" succeeded in reaching the shores of Palestine. In P»te of enormous difficulties and frequent delays, the Reich refugees

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boarded the German Danube Company vessels in August and September 1940, reaching the Rumanian port of Tulcea where the "Milos," "Pacific," and "Atlantic" were awaiting them. The "Milos" brought 700 passengers to Palestine, the "Pacific"-1,000 and the "Atlantic"-1,800. Storfer sent unreliable reports to the Joint on the condition of these ships and his preparations: the vessels were described as seaworthy passenger and cargo ships, but the emigrants found ill-equipped freighters and disorganized crews. Tulcea is a small port on the Danube's estuary on the Black Sea, and the sudden influx of 3,500 refugees had an immediate effect on its demographic composition. Food, water, fuel, and shipping material became scarce, leading to the development of a black market in everything required for the voyage. This, in turn, increased the tension between the emigrants and their leaders on the one hand, and Storfer and his agents (his brother Joseph, and his brother-in-law, Goldner) on the other. The passengers joined in the preparation efforts and the job was completed in three weeks. The "Milos" and the "Pacific" were better ships than the "Atlantic" and their complements better regimented. Each of these two first vessels contained a socially cohesive group of youngsters: German He-chalutz members on the "Pacific" and Betar members from the Protectorate on the "Milos." The "Atlantic" —largest but least seaworthy of the three ships—was also the most crowded and its complement lacked a sufficiently large, well-organized cadre of leaders. The "Atlantic" passengers wanted to move some of their number to a fourth ship that had arrived in Tulcea in the meantime, the "Rosita," to ease the overcrowding and tensions, but Storfer refused. The emigrants then tried to contact the Rumanian authorities, seeking their intervention on the grounds that they, the Rumanians, bore pert of the responsibility for the refugees' welfare according to international law. Storfer was furious, rightly fearing that the Rumanians might unexpectedly cancel the voyage. The "Atlantic" sailed before completing all the necessary preparations, with insufficient fuel and other provisions. The sea voyage was not easy. Here, too, the "Atlantic" suffered most. Storfer did not keep his promise to maintain contact in case problems should arise; and he failed to provide the promised provisions en routeWere it not for the aid of the Jewish community in Athens the passengers would not have been able to continue on their way from the Aegean to Palestine. The voyage had not been properly organized. Letters written by emigrants from Tulcea, Varna, and Athens, 36 evidence given after landing in Palestine,37 and the report submitted by the Jewish c o m m u n i t y in Athens,38 all bear witness to general negligence. It was only thanks to the passengers' own resourcefulness, the calm weather, the assistance rendered by Jewish communities en route, and a great deal of luck that the voyage was completed safely. The British officer who sailed the "Atlantic" from Cyprus to Haifa after it was caught confirms the in1" portance of the element of luck in this enterprise.' 9

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Nonetheless, all this must be viewed in the proper context. All immigrant ships were overcrowded, and all their voyages perilous; many of them suffered from short provisions and bad communications. The tragic end of these three ships' passengers exceeds the bounds of the present study, and will therefore be related in brief: the British decided to deport the refugees to Mauritius. They assembled on board the "Patria"—all the passengers from the "Pacific," and the "Milos," and a few from the "Atlantic." The "Patria" was a French cargo vessel also caught by the British. The Jewish political leaders in Palestine failed in their efforts to have the deportation order rescinded, whereupon the Haganah decided to disable the "Patria" so as to prevent it from sailing to Mauritius. The operation was coordinated with the He-chalutz leaders Erich Frank and Hans Raubel. But the quantity of explosives required was overestimated; the vessel was old and rusted through, and started sinking rapidly shortly after the explosion, drowning 202 souls. It was a disaster. The survivors received special permission to remain ashore in Palestine, but those of the "Atlantic" passengers who had not been on the "Patria" were deported to Mauritius where they remained for the duration of the war. These three ships were Storfer's last operation. Why? He did have another ship, the "Rosita," and started planning its voyage in March 1941. The answer must therefore be sought in the change that occurred in German policy regarding emigration in general, and to Palestine in particular. This was related to the "Final Solution" and the closer ties established by the Germans with the Mufti of Jerusalem —Haj Amin el-Husseini. This issue, too, exceeds the scope of our present discussion.

CONCLUSION

Can we evaluate Storfer's operations both in historical perspective and by the yardsticks of his time? Looking back, he clearly did rescue 3,500 Jews from the Nazis. The question of how he did it seems rather immaterial nowadays. The crucial point to bear in mind is that Storfer did not rescue these people by sacrificing any other group of would-be immigrants. He is the object of harsh criticism today by people who worked w ith him, under similar conditions. Their main criticism lies in his relations with the Germans and what might be called his "style." T o his cntics, Storfer was a weak man, a coward and a sycophant, and his bargaining with the Nazis was a source of both anger and revulsion. But we m ust ask ourselves how these critics could discern, in Storfer's mannerisms a nd his obstinate stand against the German authorities, either pride in being Jewish, or an attitude of servility and cowardice? How can one distinguish between collaboration with the authorities—a necessity —and attempts at self-serving ingratiation? And at what stage do the dynamics of working alongside the Germans tend to obscure the unequivocal reali-

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zation that one is dealing with the enemy? W h o can determine the "bare minimum" of cooperation necessary? Did the protagonists at that time have strict criteria for resolving these dilemma? T h e y did not. Edelstein, Frank, and Avriel all felt that Storfer had exceeded the bounds, but they too, could only rely on their personal feelings. T h e accusations that Storfer used to set up his lists of emigrants by standards that were not necessarily Zionistic were not relevant. T h e claim that he abused his authority for personal gain was never proven. Storfer's ultimate fate was the same as that of those Jews who failed to leave the Reich in time. I therefore believe that his rescue operations had best be evaluated, first, by what they accomplished, and secondly by his integrity in relation with other organizations dealing with Aliyah. Yet another way of looking at it is according to Storfer's own self-determined norms of behavior. We have described Storfer's achievements and found them considerable. What about the other elements—his integrity in relation to other Aliyah organizations? His attitude towards other Aliyah organizations was scathing: he never let up on the shortcomings of, and constantly reviled, other Aliyah operatives—Dr. Confino, the Mossad, and the Revisionists—in his reports to the Joint, to the local community, and to the Nazis. H e fiercely attacked anyone else concerned with Aliyah. This was expressed in his reaction to the "Sakariya" affair or to Dr. Confino's efforts after the "Liber-tand" was caught (in the summer of 1940) and the "Salvador" was sunk (in December 1940). H e virtually exulted over the Mossad's failure with the Kladovo affair. H e had harsh words for the G r e e k Assistance Committee in Athens that had helped his own ships— simply because *he fact that his vessels had required help at all reflected badly on his own image. T h u s he failed to appreciate that the Greek committee had performed an act of Jewish solidarity and "love of Israel." Storfer did not inquire after the fate of groups that had been held up en route and needed assistance, such as the " P e n c h o " passengers. 4 0 What were his own norms for judging himself? Storfer never thought of himself as a leader responsible for the Jewish community's welfare. In his letters he introduced himself as a businessman, stressing the fact that h e was an honest one. H e took great pains to preserve his reputation and prevent slander against him. T h e available material does not reveal whether he drew any satisfaction o r comfort from the fact that his difficulties and injured pride were incurred in the course of helping his fellow man. H e asked Löwenherz in hurt pride and astonishment: "How did I ever get mixed up in this company?" 4 1 —i.e., the company of those leaders responsible for the fate of the Jewish community. Storfer started out on his way as a public official in the capacity of a businessman summoned by Löwenherz to participate in a specific missioni and he never ceased being a businessman. T h e task with which he was entrusted did not increase his stature, and he, for his part, did not grow

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with it H e fully appreciated his increasing influence, but it did not apply equally to his public and moral responsibilities which remained those of an "executive agent." Jews could still leave the Reich in 1940. Löwenherz believed that 30,000 Jews could be extricated from Vienna (some to Palestine). German demands to speed up the emigration process and the early deportations to Poland impressed the Reich's Jews with the urgent need to depart. But the various organizations mentioned in this study did not consider illegal immigration as a rescue operation of paramount importance. It was bound up with political undercurrents, partisan interests, and war-induced financial and logistic difficulties. Storfer operated under Nazi supervision; and the Mossad, operating within the framework of both Zionist and British policies, did not conceive of illegal immigration as a politics of rescue. Storfer and the Mossad were motivated by different goals and had different backgrounds. The result was that whentheir paths crossed in 1940, before the "Final Solution" became official German policy and while some of Europe's Jews could still escape, they had neither the flexibility nor the farsightedness to work together. HEBREW UNIVERSITY

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1. See 1). Israeli, The German Reich and Palestine (Tel-Aviv, 1974), pp. 101-261 (Hebrew); C. Browning, The Final Solution and the German Foreign Office (LondonNew York. 1978), Chapter ]. 2. Documents of the German Foreign Office, Series D, 1953, Vol. 5, pp. 333-336. 2a. In December 1938, H. Schacht, the president of the German Central Bank, proposed a plan for the emigration of German Jews. It was offered to G . Rublec, the American director of the Intergovernmental Committee. T h i s committee was established after the Evian conference, to help G e r m a n refugees to resettle. Schacht proposed that a fourth of German Jewish capital that would remain after deduction of all taxation would be placed in a giant trust. From this trust, emigrating Jews could credit 10,000 marks per person to re-establish themselves in new places. T h e money would be repaid to Germany by international corporations (namely International Jewry, in German terminology), in foreign exchange. In this way, claimed Schacht, the emigration of poor Jews would be possible. Although the proposal was opposed strongly by Jewish organizations and Western governments, it was decided not to reject it immediately. Rublee went to Berlin to discuss the proposals and offer amendments. In January 1939 H. Wolthat—a foreign exchange expert from the Foreign Office—replaced Schacht in the talks (the Foreign Office was against the proposals). For further elaboration, see H.L. Feingold's The Politics of Rescue: The Roosevelt Administration and the Holocaust, 1938-1945 (New Jersey, 1970), pp. 49-64.

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to Palestine,

1939-1942,

P h D dissertation, T h e Hebrew University of J e r u s a l e m , 1981, p p . 298-338 (Hebrew). 4. See Bernard Wasserslein, Britain and the Jews of Europe (London, 1979), Chapter 3. 5. Letter from Pino Ginsburg, September 1939; R. Bondi, Edelstein Against Time (Tel-Aviv, 1981), p. 209 (Hebrew). 6. Pino Ginsburg, Oral Testimony 1979, Oral History Department, Institute of Contemporary Jewry: Hebrew University, J e r u s a l e m ; Y. Braginsky, A Nation Moving Ashore (Tel-Aviv, 1979), elaborated in 1). Ofer, op. cit., pp. 219a-220. 7. B. Wasserstein, op. cit., p. 49. 8. Central Archives of the History of the Jewish People—the Life of Storfer — AW/665 (Jerusalem, Vienna Archives) —Central Archives. 9. Ibid., Mitteilung, 40, AW/2511), 30.4.1940. 10. Yad Vashem Archives, Löwenherz Report, 0-3/015, p. 9. 11. H a g a n a Archive —Tel-Aviv, 14/417 Kornfeld Report on Milos, November 1940. 12. E. Avriel, Open the Gates (Tel-Aviv. 1979) (Hebrew); Braginsky, op. af, Hagana Archives 14/417, the Braun Report, November 1940, and the Kornfeld Report, November 1940, and Central Archives AW/2515 Avriel to Storfer. 13. Central Archives, AW/2515. 15.6.40 and 19.7.40. 14. Ibid., T h e Storfer Report, 28.4.40. T h e " K l a d o v o g r o u p " —a name given to 1200 emigrants—got stranded in the small harbor of K l a d o v o on the Yugoslav Danube River. Of these, 700 left Vienna in haste in October 1939, under the threat of the first expulsion to Lublin. On their way, more people joined hoping to reach Palestine by illegal voyage. This transport was organized by Ehud Avriel —He-chalutz leader in Vienna —and the "Mossad Le-Alivah Bet" people in Geneva. T h e Mossad had to provide a sea boat in Rumania (Tulcea or Constanza) to proceed to Palestine, but it failed. In December 1940 the traffic on the Danube River stopped d u e to freezing conditions. T h e people entered the small Kladovo harbor for the Winter. In the Spring, they hoped to continue the voyage. Fora variety of reasons the Mossad did not succeed in getting the people out. Only 206 children received Youth Aliyah certificates and immigrated to Palestine by land, in March 1941. T h e rest of the people were m u r d e r e d by the Germans during 1941, after the occupation of Yugoslavia. T h e full story of this g r o u p has not yet been written. For further elaboration on the efforts to immigrating the people, see D. Ofer, op. cit, pp. 89-144. 15. Yad Vashem Archives, Löwenherz Report, p. 21. 16. Central Archives, AW/2515, Mitteilung 70, 6.5.40; and Mitteilung 56· 28.4.40; Löwenherz Report, p. 19. 17. Central Archives, AW/2515, Mitteilung 18. 15.6.40 and Report 12.6.40. 18. Yad Vashem Archives, TR-3/1147, March 1941, conversation with Eichmann and community leaders. 19. Central Archives, AW/2515, letters dated August 11 and 28, 1940, from Storfer to the Jewish Emigration Center; letter to Mr. Schutz of August 11, report from P r a g u e dated 12.9.40, and a letter to the Emigration Center dated 17.9.40.

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20. In addition to material in the Vienna Archives this is supported by correspondence with the German Foreign Office. Yad Vashem Archives JM/3140, from Zimke, representative of the German Foreign Office in Prague, to Berlin, 19.6.40, and Storfer's office to the Consul General in Bratislava, 13.7.40. 21. Central Archives, AW/2515, Mitteilung 22, 2.12.39; and Vertraulicher Aktion Notiz, 25.12.39. 22. Ibid., letters 3.2.40, and 7.2.40. 23. Yad Vashem Archives, Löwenherz Report. 24. Central Archives, AW/2515. 4.3.40. Summary Report to the Foreign Currency Department. 25. Ibid., AW/2515, 22.3.40, Slorfer to Löwenherz, 23.3.40, Mitteilung 45; and 31.3.40, Mitteilung 46 (Translated from German by I). Ofer). 26. P R 0 / F 0 3 7 1 / 1 2 r > 8 3 . 6857 27. For more details, see 1). Ofer, op. cit., pp. 239-249. 28. Hagana Archives, testimony of Moshe Agami. 29. Ibid., Ye hie Ii Report, 14/153. 30. The "Grand Plan" called for transporting 10,0(X) Jews from Germany's "Hemden" port on board German vessels, and was to have been executed in the lall of 1939. On von Häffner and his position, see Ginsburg testimony, op. cit, and ('•orman Foreign Office. Yad Vashem Archives JM/3140. von Häffner to Lishka. 7.12.39.

31. The "Sakariya" and "Hilda" refugees. 32. Hagana Archives 14/153. Yehieli Report, p. 20. 33. Ibid, pp. 26-27. 34. Ibid., p. 39. 35. Ibid., pp. 40-41. 36. Central Archives, AW/2515 letters from Tulcea, 18.9.40 signed H.; 19.9.40 "«signature; 21.9.40 signed Freitz; 24.9.40 signed Hanzi. Erich Frank from Varna on board the Milos 11.10.40; Ernst Brown on board the Pacific 18.10.40 to the Wish community in Athens, and to the Pacific's captain. 37. Hagana Archives 14/417. 16.10.40; 18.10.40. 38. Joint Archives 4-19, and Central Archives AW/2515 telegrams from the l»int 30.10.40, 3.11.40. 39. PRO 371/29160. 40· "Poncho" was an immigrants' ship organized by the Revisionists that sailed toiler many delays) in March 1940. T h e voyage was not properly organized and a ' l t T a hazardous journey the "Pencho" finally struck a reef and sank off an •^'gean island on the eve of Yom Kippur. T h e passengers and crew were rescued • ' V the Italian Navy and transported, first to Rhodes and later to southern Italy, additional details see 1). Ofer, of), cit., pp. 187-194. 41- Central Archives. AW/2515. letter 9.11.40.

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The Transnistria Affair and the Rescue Policy of the Zionist Leadership in Palestine, 1942-1943 Dina Porat URING WORLD WAR II, several proposals were made for halting the extermination of European Jewry by means of large-scale exchanges of J e w s for substantial amounts of money or vital products. Adolf Eichmann's offer is best known. It was made via Joel Brand to the Jewish Agency in spring 1944, and stipulated that a million Jews would be traded for trucks and goods. Another well-known overture was that made by Slovakian Jewish leaders to the local SS at the end of 1942, to cease the mass murder throughout Europe in exchange for several million dollars. Less widely publicized, however, is the Rumanian Government's proposal, also put forward at the end of1942, to permit Jews to leave Rumania in exchange for money, an offer that was given serious consideration by the Jewish Agency Executive in Jerusalem and by other official bodies in the Yishuv (Jewish community in Palestine) during 1943. It is, therefore, of interest to examine the stand taken by the leadership in Palestine regarding the last-mentioned proposal, to see whether its position influenced its attitude to the other two proposals and to the entire issue of the rescue of European Jewry. This examination is now possible since much of the relevant archival material is now accessible and includes documents of the Rumanian Government and the Rumanian Jewish community, of official bodies in the Yishuv [the Histadrut (the general trades union federation), the Vaad Leumi (National Council), the Jewish Agency and the Mapai (Land of Israel Workers' Party) Center], of the Jewish Department in the German Foreign Office (D-III) and its counterpart under Eichmann within the SS (IV-B-4), and o f the British and American governments. The Rumanian proposal reached the Jewish Agency at the end of December 1942, a month after the latter had publically announced that European J e w r y was being exterminated. It offered to permit seventy

*

I would like to thank Ephraim Ophir for a number of corrections and details.

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thousand Jews to leave Transnistria in exchange for 200,000 lei per person. (One thousand lei equalled one Palestine pound at the official rate of exchange.) This was the first time since the outbreak of the war that the Jewish Agency had discussed the possibility of releasing a large number of Jews from within the boundaries of the Axis countries.1 The proposal was transmitted by Radu Lecca, the Rumanian General Secretary for Jewish Affairs, through a Swiss Government representative in Bucharest, who had expressly, but unofficially, come to Istanbul for this purpose. The emissary met with Chaim Barlas, the Jewish Agency representative in Istanbul, who considered him to be reliable and assumed that Lecca was a confidant of Marshal Ion Antonescu, Rumania's ruler, in all matters concerning the Jews. Barlas was convinced that the proposal was authentic, and returned to Palestine immediately to lay it before the Jewish Agency Executive. This offer was also conveyed to Dr. Yosef Goldin, the Jewish Agency Aliya Department's representative in Turkey, in a telephone conversation with Dr. Wilhelm Fischer, a Rumanian Zionist leader. As a result of the conversation, another representative from Rumania — again an unofficial one — came to Istanbul and met with Goldin and Barlas. Goldin sent a memorandum to David Ben-Gurion (then chairman of the Jewish Agency Executive) and to Yitzhak Gruenbaum (chairman of the Jewish Agency's United Rescue Committee), containing details of the talks and the request of "the Zionist leadership in Rumania... to respond to the proposal with the appropriate seriousness." A second memorandum reached Gruenbaum from Eliezer Leder, his aide in Istanbul, who was in charge of collecting press and radio information on the situation of European Jewry. 2 Before they could reach a decision, the Jewish Agency Executive had to clarify several major issues. What was the position of the Jews in Transnistria and how urgent was it to get them out? (At the time, the situation of the Jews in territories under direct Nazi rule, such as Poland, was generally thought to be worse than that of the Jews living in areas controlled by Germany's allies.) Did the Rumanian Government really

1 For information on previous attempts, see Dobkin's comments at the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, December 14, 1941, Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem (hereafter C.Z.A.); also Henry L. Feingold, The Politics of Rescue: The Roosevelt Administration and the Holocaust 1938-1945, New Brunswick, N.J., 1970, p. 179. 2 Barlas is quoted here. With regard to the memorandum to Gruenbaum, see minutes of the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive of December 23, 1942, C.Z.A. I was unable to trace the Leder memorandum itself. Goldin to Ben-Gurion and Gruenbaum, December 6, 1942, C.Z.A., S26/1466. See also Menachcm Bader, Sad Missions (Hebrew), Tel Aviv, 1978, pp. 53, 64.

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intend releasing seventy thousand Jews? What were its reasons for making this offer, and was the Government strong enough to implement a plan which diametrically opposed German policy vis-a-vis the Jews? Would the Allies agree to allow Rumania, Germany's ally and a party to the invasion of the Soviet Union, to receive fourteen million Palestine pounds — or twice that amount at the official rate, and it should be recalled that four dollars equalled one Palestine pound — at a time when the Allied regulations prohibited the transfer of money or equipment that could aid the enemy. (Detailed instructions on that matter had been issued only a few months earlier, in the summer of 1942.) Even if an arrangement satisfying both sides could be reached, two other problems still remained: how to bring the people out of Transnistria, and where to take them if Britain denied them entry to Palestine. Before commencing any discussion of the Transnistria affair, it is necessary to establish what the Jewish Agency Executive knew, or could have known, about these issues in December 1942.

The Position of the Jews in Transnistria

At that time, Transnistria was a remote region in the southern Ukraine, between the Dneister and the Bog, annexed to Rumania in return for the military aid it had extended to Germany during the invasion of the Soviet Union. Civil authority in the region was in Rumanian hands, while military authority was the province of the Germans until they gradually pulled out. In October 1941, some 200,000 Rumanian Je ws, most of them from Bessarabia and Bucovina, had been quickly and brutally exiled to that area. This move was initiated by Marshal Antonescu who wished to get rid of the Jews, whom he considered a dangerous Bolshevik element and a threat to the national economy because of their supposed domination of banking, industry, etc. He was thus able to gain possession of the property of those exiled, give expression to traditional anti-Semitic trends in his country, exploit the right moment for implementing antiJewish policy, since the Germans had provided him with the framework and territory, and at the same time show his adherence to the German line. During the invasion Transnistria had suffered severe damage, and most of the Jews who had lived there previously and who might have helped the exiles had been murdered. Within a few months, about two-thirds of the exiles died of hunger, cold, and disease or were killed by the Rumanians, Ukrainians and local Germans (Volksdeutsche). In May 1942 there were only about seventy thousand left, including many

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orphans, and their plight was one of the worst suffered by Jews anywhere in Europe. 3 The Jewish Agency was aware of the situation of the exiles. Despite the prohibition on mail and travel between Rumania and Transnistria, information trickled through to Rumania, and by the end of 1941 that country's Jewish leadership had transmitted memoranda and reports through the Allied ambassadors in Bucharest to the International Red Cross, the British and American foreign ministries, and Jewish organizations. Some of this information, as well as other reports which came via Istanbul, the neutral center closest to the area in question, had reached Palestine.4 By the beginning of 1942 the situation in Transnistria was known both in Palestine and in the outside world. It should be recalled, however, that it was only at the end of 1942 that the Yishuy grasped the fact that the affliction of the Jews in Europe, including those in Transnistria, was part of an organized and comprehensive extermination plan. It should also be borne in mind that news of Rumania's brutal treatment of the Jews since the outbreak of the war had reached Palestine and, as a result, the Rumanian Government's proposal at the end of 1942 was regarded as a surprising change in its policy toward the Jews. 5

The Intentions of the Rumanian Government and the German Response On this issue, the Jewish Agency could only guess, basing its assumptions on the opinions of both its agents in Istanbul and the Jews in Rumania. At the beginning of December 1942, Lecca informed several eminent personalities in the Rumanian Jewish community that his Government was willing — with German approval — to permit the emigration of a large number of the Transnistria exiles. Wilhelm Fischer and Moshe (Mishu) Benvenisti, chairman of the Rumanian Zionist Organization, sent a report 3

Sec Joseph B. Schechtman, "The Transnistria Reservation," Yivo Annual ofJewish Social Science, vol. VIII, New York, 1953, pp. 178-198; LesJuifs en Europe, 1939-1945, Centre de Documentation Juive Contemporaine, Editions du Centre, Paris, 1949, pp. 204-214. Also in Manfred Reifer, DeathJourney (Hebrew), Tel Aviv, 1946; and in detail in Avigdor Shachan, TheGhettosin Transnistria, 1941-1944(Hebrew), unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Jerusalem, 1980. 4 Reifer, DeathJourney, p. 131; Feingold, The Politics ofRescue, pp. 178-182. See also daily press in Palestine around the middle of March 1942. 5 See especially Eliyahu Golomb's speech at the meeting of the Mapai Center, March 16, 1942, Labor Party Archives (hereafter L.P.A.), 23/42, re Lecca's radio announcement that there were no more Jews in Bessarabia.

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on the meeting with Lecca, and the negotiations which preceded and resulted from it, to Dr. Abraham Silberschein of the World Jewish Congress in Geneva. They expressed the opinion that the plan seemed vague and "quite unrealistic" and, further, that the seriousness of the Rumanians' intentions should be regarded with skepticism, as this might conceivably be "a scheme designed only to obtain a large sum of money." Nevertheless, they asked the Jewish organizations abroad to check every problem involved in the proposal: exit, transportation, destination, guarantee of the money, etc. It was also necessary, they insisted, to find out whether similar offers had been made to Jews in countries adjacent to Rumania, to ascertain whether this was truly a Rumanian proposal or part of a broader German plan. Fischer and Benvenisti concluded that, despite all their doubts, negotiations ought to be started and under no circumstances abandoned. It was essential that the Rumanians should gain the impression that their offer was being taken seriously — to gain time and to make things a little easier for the exiles.6 For the Zionist leadership in Rumania the central issue was whether the Germans were behind the proposal, and their apprehensions proved to be correct. Shortly after presenting his Government's proposal to Rumanian Jewish representatives (probably on the same day), Lecca informed Baron Manfred Von Killinger, the German Ambassador in Bucharest, that Marshal Antonescu had already instructed him, and the Jewish community, to organize the emigration of about 75,000 Jews to Palestine in exchange for 200,000 lei per person. The German Ambassador expressed his reservations: such an offer was contradictory to the talks held in Berlin with Amin el-Husseini (the Mufti of Jerusalem) and Rashid 'Ali elKilani (the former pro-Nazi prime minister of Iraq), who strongly opposed the emigration of Jews to Palestine, especially those capable of military service. Lecca replied that he would begin implementing the plan only when the position of the German Government was clarified; meanwhile he could not act any way because no boats were available. Killinger transmitted the contents of the talk to the Foreign Ministry in Berlin and received an unequivocal order to abort the plan. The Ministry added that this was an "intolerable partial solution," whereas German policy aimed at a complete one; that the conclusion of an agreement between one of Germany's allies and the enemy would lead to serious political implications; and that Rumania should be warned that it "will not receive 6

For further information see Yad Vashem Archives, Silberschein files, R77, R123, cited in Theodore Lavie, Rumanian Jewry's Struggle for Rescue (Hebrew), Jerusalem, 1965, pp. 86-89. Lavie seems to be referring to the report of December 4, 1942, Yad Vashem Archives, M20/903. See also Ephraim Ophir, " W a s It Possible to Rescue 70,000Jews from Transnistria?" (Hebrew), Yalkut Moreshet 33 (June 1982), pp. 103-128.

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preferential treatment [for carrying out the plan] from the enemy." 7 The Germans rightly suspected Rumania of using this scheme as a first step in negotiations with the West. Today it is common knowledge that at the end of 1942, after most of the Rumanian expeditionary force had been killed on the Russian Front and chances were that the Russians, not the Germans, would gain victory, Antonescu began sending out feelers to the Allies. Furthermore, at the beginning of1943 he became concerned about Allied warnings of punishment for war criminals and hoped that the emigration plan would mitigate his guilt.' It is difficult to determine just how well informed the Jewish Agency was on Rumanian-German relations. Most members of its Executive presumed that the emigration scheme was connected with the uncertainty of German victory and Rumania's fears that it would be held answerable for its policy toward the Jews.® However, they could not have known the exact identity of the Rumanian circles behind this offer. It will be recalled that two Rumanian agents had been dispatched to Istanbul. Since the details of their plans were not identical, it was difficult to conjecture whether this was a clear-cut plan emanating from a single source, or whether several different Rumanian circles were involved. Of far greater significance is the fact that the Jewish Agency leaders could not have been aware that Lecca had lied when he informed Rumanian Jewish leaders that Germany had already agreed to the scheme, and that he and Antonescu were playing a double game; nor could they have learnt that the proposal had by then been completely rejected by the German Foreign Ministry. In fact, when the Agency Executive began discussing the offer, the Germans were not only already aware of it but were also determined to thwart it.

The Allied Stand The Allied stand was more extensively discussed by the Jewish Agency than were Rumanian-German relations with which they were less famil7 See documents of the German Foreign Office in United Restitution Organization (hereafter U.R.O.), Frankfurt/Main, 1950, Band III, pp. 370-371. 372-373; and Christopher Browning, The Final Solution and the German Foreign Office, New York and London, 1978, p. 171. 8 See Lavie, Rumanian Jewry's Struggle, pp. 172-175; Feingold, Politics of Rescue, pp. 182-183. 9 See Shertok and Gruenbaum's letter to the "Ransom Committee" in Egypt, January 5, 1943, C.Z.A., S26/1251; also interview with Kaplan on April 14,1943 in The Palestine Post, C.Z.A., S53/1612; see also Dobkin's speech at the Zionist Council Executive, January 18, 1943, C.Z.A., S25/295.

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iar. Barlas, it will be recalled, presented the proposal to the members of the Agency Executive in Jerusalem, and informed them that the scheme was already known to the British Embassy in Istanbul. Apparently Goldin had reported this to them, and the Rumanians had also possibly done so on their own initiative. Whatever the case, Istanbul at that time was a center of espionage and a major source of information, and one may assume that the British could have obtained this information via their own channels. The members of the Executive felt that no harm had been done since the scheme as it stood could not be implemented without the knowledge and consent of the Allies. On the other hand, they feared that the Allies would refuse to allow the transfer of millions of dollars to an enemy state.10 It should also be recalled that the White Paper immigration quota for Palestine during the war was a total of75,000, and only 29,000 certificates still remained available. Even if it appeared to the Jewish Agency that Rumania had a good reason for releasing Jews, it would be difficult to induce the Allies to accept and help implement the proposal. On the basis of this information, the Jewish Agency decided, at the end of its first discussion, to accept the opinion of the Rumanian Jewish leadership and begin negotiations, primarily to clarify the details. At the same time, it was proposed that the negotiations should include more realistic plans that might prove acceptable to the Allies, such as returning the exiles to Rumania (at least temporarily, until emigration to Palestine or elsewhere was possible) and extending material aid to them to alleviate their plight. Eliyahu Dobkin, deputy head of the Agency's Aliya Department, and Barlas also proposed ways to circumvent the prohibition on the transfer of money by raising it among the wealthy Jews in Rumania (being unaware of the marked worsening of their economic situation), or by unfreezing Rumanian property and capital held in Britain and the United States. The members of the Jewish Agency Executive did not anticipate a positive response by the Allies. It was, nevertheless, decided that the possibilities of implementing the proposal should be examined, first by appealing to the Allied governments, then to the Red Cross and other international bodies and Jewish organizations, and it was resolved to send Gruenbaum to the United States for this purpose. Furthermore, the details would be forwarded to Moshe Shertok (Sharett), head of the Agency's Political Department, who was in England at that time, and Barlas would be empowered to begin negotiations in Istanbul with the Rumanian agent.

10 Jewish Agency Executive meeting, December 23, 1942, C.Z.A.

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Lastly, it was decided that nothing would be made public on so sensitive an issue.11 Nonetheless, rumors spread quickly throughout the Yishuv. Gruenbaum tried to deny them at the Zionist Executive, but this was not the only forum in which questions were being asked. The Vaad Leumi Executive demanded that the Rescue Committee take the matter in hand, forward directives to the negotiators in Istanbul, and induce the Agency to spend about fifty thousand Palestine pounds to verify the rumors. "We know these people [the Rumanians] and their civil servants," said David Remez, the secretary of the Histadrut Executive and a member of the Vaad Leumi Executive. Therefore there was hope of saving people as was done in the Middle Ages, by offering a ransom. Remez had received information from Melech Neustadt who had just returned from Istanbul where he had served as the Histadrut representative. Neustadt had met with one of Lecca's agents and, like Barlas before him, had been impressed with the seriousness of the offer. The Rumanian agent had also spoken with him about the possibility of helping the exiles whom he described as being worse off even than the Jews of Poland. The rumors also reached Rumanian immigrants in Palestine who tried to find out from the Rescue Committee if there was any truth to them, but the stories were denied.12 The Jewish Agency came under pressure to clarify the issue and act urgently, but the members of its Executive had no concrete answers. They gave assurances that the emissaries in Istanbul were indeed investigating details of the proposal. If it turned out to be authentic, the Agency would take care of raising the necessary money.13 Those pressuring the Jewish Agency Executive and also the members of the Executive themselves were insistent that the details had to be clarified immediately, as the situation on the war front was constantly changing. After the battle of Stalingrad at the beginning of 1943, the Russians began advancing westward. The fate of East European Jewry was becoming even more precar-

11

Ibid. Sec also Bader's comments on this meeting, at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive Committee, February 11, 1943, Histadrut Executive Committee Archives (hereafter H.E.C. Α.), 5/30. Gruenbaum did not go, despite the decision, perhaps because Shertok's trip to England and then to the United States made his own irrelevant. Sec below. 12 See speeches of Remez and Yehoshua Suprasky at the meeting of the Vaad Leumi, January 17, 1943, C.Z.A., Jl/7255; also meetings of the Zionist Council Executive of January 18, 1943, C.Z.A., S25/295, and Gruenbaum's speech on February 2,1943, C.Z.A., S25/296. See also correspondence between Rescue Committee and Organization of Rumanian Immigrants, February 5,1943, C.Z.A., S26/1338 and February 10,1943, C.Z.A., S26/1240. 13 See Dobkin's speech at the Zionist Council Executive, January 18,1943, C.Z.A., S25/295.

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ious: it was feared that as the Germans withdrew, they would murder all those Jews still alive.14 Toward the end of January 1943, practical details came to light. The illegal immigration organization (Aliya Bet) received an offer via Istanbul from a Rumanian shipping company, with the knowledge of the Rumanian Government: small Rumanian vessels would be made available to carry up to a thousand refugees a month into Turkish territorial waters. The ships, however, had to be returned since, as of the middle of 1942, even small boats were not permitted to leave Rumanian territorial waters. The next crucial step was to find other ships that could transfer these Jews to Palestine. This information was supplemented by the opinion of the Yishuv emissaries in Istanbul that Lecca was displaying a "visible tendency ... to permit emigration rather than cruel extermination." Nevertheless, the negotiations as yet had produced no real results. Once again neither the Jewish Agency nor its emissaries could have known that Lecca was still playing his double game. By the end of February, under pressure from the German Foreign Office, the Rumanians had stopped the departure of all shipping from their territorial waters. 15 Among other rescue issues, the problem of the Jews of Transnistria continued to preoccupy the Yishuv leadership. "There is no forum where the issue has not been raised," said Remez, in his opening remarks at the Mapai Secretariat in mid-February 1943. "For the first time we have to decide whether we can waste money with no guarantee that we will succeed and the money will not be lost." This was a more penetrating and open discussion than that held by Jewish Agency Executive at the end of 1942. Menachem Bader, one of the Yishuv emissaries in Istanbul, also participated. On one question the speakers were agreed: if either the Rumanian proposal or the existence of negotiations between the Rumanian Government and the Jewish Agency were publicized, the chances for success would be undermined. This point was pressed particularly by Bader who, like the emissaries who had earlier come to Palestine and those to follow, stressed the necessity for secrecy in the rescue operations. 14 See speeches of Remez and Ben-Gurion at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, February 10,1943, L.P.A., 24/43; and speech of Z. Aharonowitz at the meeting of the Histadrut Executive Committee, January 21, 1943, H.E.C.A., 3/28. 15 Joseph Barfel, of Aliya Bet, at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive Committee, January 21,1943, H.E.C.A., 3/28. At the next meeting of the Secretariat, on February 11, 1943, Bader again described the Rumanian proposal (H.E.C.A., 5/30). See also Kaplan at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat on February 10,1943, L.P.A., 24/43. On the prohibition of ships leaving, see Reifer, Death Journey, p. 172; Browning, The Final Solution, p. 171.

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But on the main issue of what should be done at that time, opinion was divided. Remez suggested giving the subject highest priority and calling a joint meeting of the major bodies of the Yishuv to raise the necessary funds. Eliyahu Golomb, a leading figure in Mapai and the Haganah, added to this a proposal that an initial effort be made to get several hundred people out of Transnistria in order to establish how serious the Rumanian proposal was, even if this meant a total waste of money. Both Remez and Golomb pointed to the difficulty of determining the correct course of action in a situation involving factors and governments over which the Jewish Agency and the Yishuv had no control and about which their sources of information were severely limited. Ben-Gurion saw things differently, distinguishing between "Jews that cannot be brought over... and those that we can get out of Europe." With regard to the first category, "[the issue] is not relevant at present but if we do not save those that we could have, then we will never be forgiven." This was the burning issue, since developments on the front endangered their lives. In Ben-Gurion's opinion it was possible to bring people to Palestine only within the limits of the White Paper quota. It would be necessary to bring them by sea, and not by train through Turkey, which entailed a waste of precious months. Hence, it was necessary to buy ships immediately and, for example, bring to Palestine the five thousand children from the Balkans as agreed by the British Government and as publicly confirmed by the Colonial Secretary, Oliver Stanley, at the beginning of February 1943. Stanley had also declared that if suitable means of transport were found, the Jewish Agency would be permitted to use all 29,000 immigration certificates still available, mainly for children. Ben-Gurion did not say that the Transnistria Plan was illogical, but he apparently regarded the rescue of the seventy thousand Jews as impossible given the immigration certificates then available to the Jewish Agency and the difficulties of sea transport. Ben-Gurion apparently believed that even if the Rumanian proposal were authentic, the Allies would not permit its implementation. As a result, he tried to remain within the realm of the possible, and attempted to restrain the impulsiveness of his colleagues without sounding completely helpless. He did not agree to the request that he devote at least two or three months of his time to rescue operations alone, and he closed the debate as follows: they would begin by collecting about 150,000 Palestine pounds to buy ships; someone with greater powers than the representatives already there would be sent to Istanbul; and a discussion would be held on "political and public activity with regard to the disaster. " 1 6 Thus, in summing up, Ben-Gurion ignored 16 The discussion took place at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, February 10, 1943, L.P.A., 24/43.

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the Transnistria Plan, probably bccausc he preferred to focus attention on bringing the five thousand children to Palestine. Bader agreed with Ben-Gurion: We do not have the time to do things on a grand scale and we cannot talk about rescuing seventy thousand Jews. If we can get hold of a ship ... with a capacity of 1,200 passengers, and if, during the two months we still have at our disposal, that ship can make two or three round trips, we will have reached the limits of our activity.

The transfer of seventy thousand, he continued, could not be carried out without the knowledge and aid of the British, or without millions of pounds that the Yishuv did not have at its disposal — the Agency's budget for 1943 was 1,150,000 pounds —although it might be possible to raise the money among the wealthy Rumanian or other Jewish communities. Since the negotiations with the British authorities and the raising of the necessary funds would both be lengthy processes and their success was doubtful, the only remaining possibility was that Aliya Bet should quietly transport a few thousand people in ships to be acquired with money from the Yishuv.17 Possibly as a result of what Bader said, the Histadrut Executive Secretariat resolved to raise the sixty thousand pounds needed by Aliya Bet to buy small boats and train a crew of Jewish sailors. Meanwhile it was rumored in Palestine that the Rumanian proposal was no longer extant. These rumors were perhaps caused by the temporary break in connections with Rumania due to internal tensions and a power struggle there. It is also possible that they owed their origin to the fact that it had still not been determined which Rumanian Jewish leaders would come to Istanbul for official talks with the Jewish Agency delegate.1* In early February 1943, there were rapid developments relating to the Transnistria affair. The U.S. State Department, with British approval, published a warning in the press of the neutral countries, notably that of Switzerland, threatening those who might have considered negotiating 17 See Bader's speech at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive Committee, February 11,1943, H.E.C.A., 5/30. It should be noted that the comments OD this subject which he claims to have made at the meeting, as recorded in his book, SaJ Missions, pp. 55-56, are not included in the minutes. 18 A decision of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive Committee; see meeting, February 21, 1943, H.E.C.A., 3/28; and Kaplan's speech at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, February 10,1943, L.P.A., 24/43. On the break in negotiations, see Bader's speech at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive Committee, February 11, 1943, H.E.C.A., 5/30; and Yehieli's speech at the Mapai Center, February 24, L.P.A., 1943.

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with the enemy about the rescue of Jews. Parallel to this, the Basier Nachrichten and the Neue Zürcher Zeitung revealed that the Rumanian Government had proposed to Britain and the United States that the seventy thousand Jews in Transnistria be released at a price of fifty dollars a head, adding that the offer would be invalidated the moment the Germans conquered Rumania. 19 Several days later, on February 13,1943, a well-known correspondent of the New York Times published the details of the offer. At the same time, however, he expressed the opinion, at the American Embassy in London, that the proposal was merely a Nazi ploy. 20 The American Ambassador in Istanbul, Laurence Steinhardt, was of the same opinion, and told Barlas that opening negotiations was a good way for a satellite country to gain an alibi with the Allies without actually releasing Jews. Steinhardt informed Barlas that Lecca's agents had "tried to talk to him too," but that he had rejected their proposals as valueless: "They are dependent upon their masters [the Germans] who will never agree!" 21 Shortly after the proposal had been given press publicity, details of the Rumanian offer were sent from the Jewish Agency Executive in Jerusalem to Shertok in London. He conferred with the local Zionist leadership whose opinion was that "there is nothing to be done" because of the Allies' threat of punishment. Shertok insisted that it was still necessary to explore all options, and asked the Foreign Office to clarify the matter in Istanbul and in Washington. The Allies, apparently, were in no hurry: Shertok's carefully worded cable, although marked URGENT, was nevertheless held up by the American censor.22 At the same time, Chaim Weizmann appealed to Lord Halifax, the British Ambassador to the United States, in the name of the Jewish Agency. He pleaded that the British Government view the Rumanian proposal as an opportunity to save human life, despite the fear that it might be merely an attempt at extortion, and not regard the Jewish Agency request as a ploy to obtain a change in the White Paper policy.

19 Baderat the meeting of the Histadrut Executive Committee, February 11,1943, H.E.C.A., 5/30; and Yehieli at the Mapai Center on February 24,1943, L.P.A., 24/43. Both quoted the Swiss newspapers which were available in Istanbul and reached Palestine belatedly, if at all. Also see Ben Hecht, Perfidy, New York, 1961. p. 191. 20 The journalist was C.L. Sultzberger. See Bernard Wasserstein, Britain and theJews ofEurope, 1939-1945, London-Oxford, 1979, p. 244; Feingold, Politics of Rescue, p. 182; Arthur D. Morse, While Six Million Died, New York, 1967, p. 64. 21 Bader regarding talks between Barlas and Steinhardt, at a meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive Committee, February 11, 1943, H.E.C.A., 5/30; and Barlas to the Aliya Department, January 15, 1943, C.Z.A., S6/1165. 22 Shertok at a meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, April 27, 1943, C.Z.A.

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Weizmann anticipated Arab opposition to the plan, but stated that such opposition should not prevent "a great humane action." He further promised that careful screening would be undertaken to assuage British fears of any spies penetrating into Palestine. He "urged and entreated" that attempts be made to save the lives of otherwise doomed people.23 Halifax asked the Foreign Office for instructions and the latter consulted the Colonial Office. The exchange of letters between the two ministries reveals that there was fear that formal rejection of the proposal would cause a public outcry in Britain and the United States, and bring about a change in the Jewish vote. However, it was held that there was not the slightest justification, from any point of view, for surrendering to Rumanian "blackmail and slave purchase." As a summary of this exchange, a letter was sent to Lord Halifax from the Foreign Office, which can be viewed as the essence of Britain's position regarding ransom plans: a. The proposal was "clearly a piece of blackmail, which, if successful, would open up an endless process on the part of Germany and her satellites in South-Eastern Europe of unloading, at a given price, all their unwanted nationals on overseas countries"; b. Concerning the entry of refugees into Palestine, "His Majesty's Government have gone to their furthest practical limits"; c. No country could agree to this kind of pressure being exerted upon it; d. His Majesty's Government, together with their allies, would carefully examine "all practical means of alleviating [the] refugee position," in ways that were commensurate with the war effort; e. The humanitarian problems created in Europe by the German Government, of which the Jewish problem was one, "but by no means the only one," would be resolved with victory, "and any step calculated to prejudice this is not in the interest of Jews in Europe.24 A reply along these lines was sent from the British Embassy in Washington to Dr. Weizmann and to Shertok, who had meanwhile reached the United States: Britain would not be dragged into action dictated by an enemy government; neither would she overstep the rules or surrender to blackmail.25 The Jewish Agency Executive had, it seems, 23 Weizmann to Lord Halifax, February 16,1943, C.Z.A., A127/543. See also Wasserstcin, Britain and theJews, p. 245; and Menachem Kedem, Chaim Weizmann's Political Activity During World War II (Hebrew), Doctoral dissertation (unpublished), Bar-Ilan University, 1973, pp. 240-241. 24 British Foreign Office to its embassy in the United States, February 26,1943, as quoted in Wasserstein, Britain and the Jews, pp. 245-246; and Kedem, Weizmann during WW II, pp. 240-241. 25 British Embassy in the United States to Weizmann on March 4,1943, C.Z.A., A127/543; and Shertok's speech at Jewish Agency Executive meeting, April 27,1943, C.Z.A. See also, Christopher Sykes, Crossroads to Israel: Palestine from Balfour to Bevin, London, 1965, p. 253.

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been entirely correct in anticipating a negative British response. However, it is not clear why Shertok and Weizmann appealed to the British only after the press publicity and not before it, or why the details of the proposal were transmitted to Shertok only as late as February 1943 and not at the end of December 1942, immediately following the Jewish Agency Executive meeting. A possible explanation is that practical details of the plan reached Palestine only in February, and that the Jewish Agency hoped to make use of the public outcry aroused by the press reports to gain support for rescue efforts. The publicity and the exchange of letters between Shertok-Weizmann and the British heralded a new phase. It was now clear that the Germans already knew of the scheme and that the Allies opposed it. The conclusion drawn by the Jewish Agency Executive was that the chances for success, slight as they had been before, were now even more remote. A feeble attempt was made to return to the status quo ante by issuing a public denial that there was, or ever had been, such a proposal. The denial was made by Rabbi Stephen S. Wise in New York in the name of the World Jewish Congress, and in parallel by the London Office of the Jewish Agency. It was also voiced in response to the action of the Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe, established in the United States by Etzel (Irgun Tzvai Leumi) circles. Some of its members — Hillel Kook, Shmuel Merlin and Ben Hecht — had published a full-page ad in the New York newspapers: "For Sale: Seventy Thousand Jews, at Fifty Dollars Apiece, Guaranteed Human Beings." The aim of these advertisements was to focus public attention on the reports that had appeared in the Swiss and American press, and pressure the U.S. Government to agree to the Rumanian offer. The Emergency Committee condemned the Zionist leadership for not alerting public opinion, contenting themselves with behind-the-scenes negotiations, and publicly denying the existence of the Rumanian proposal, having failed to grasp the importance of wide publicity in the struggle to gain public attention. The Zionist leadership in America, on the other hand, viewed the Emergency Committee as a rash body that could ruin whatever small chances remained. "They have now overplayed their rescue work," Ν ahum Goldmann stated. 26 The Transnistria affair rekindled and even exacerbated the disagreement between the Zionist establishment and the Revisionists who walked out over the rescue issue and the style and direction of Zionist policy in general. The Zionist establishment, with the Labor movement at its

26 Goldmann to Shertok. May 19,1943, C.Z.A., S25/73; Ben Hecht, Pafidy, pp. 191-192.

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center, opposed what appeared to it as blatant publicity unconnected to any concrete action. While Weizmann and Shertok awaited the British reply, an attempt was made in Palestine to reevaluate the new situation. Toward the end of February, there was a meeting of the Mapai Center at which Zvi Yehieli, a leading figure in Aliya Bet, was the main speaker on the issue. He warned his colleagues against being deluded, although Jewish Agency sources in Istanbul were continuing to claim that the satellite countries might adopt more acceptable policies in their desire to obtain an alibi and money. Yehieli believed that the Rumanian Transnistria proposal should be viewed in the general context of the debate, which had been conducted in Germany since the outbreak of the war, between those favoring Jewish emigration and those advocating extermination. This debate had spread throughout Europe, and the extremists, apparently, were gaining the upper hand: " T h e extermination of the Jews is a continual process through which every country is going." And, indeed, in a situation of such uncertainty as the war wore on, the Jews in the satellite countries could become prey to "terrible and horrendous murder." Moreover, in Yehieli's view, the proposal to release the Jews was not exclusively related to Transnistria, but expressed the approach of moderate circles within Rumania, supported by Antonescu, to supplant exile and murder by emigration. This approach went through a variety of transformations at different periods, and this might explain the inconsistency of the details of the specific plans presented by the various agents sent from Rumania. Yehieli explained that Palestine concentrated on this rescue plan because Transnistria was the only area in the East that was accessible. As it turned out, however, the first candidates for emigration were the Jews of Bucharest, as the Jews in Transnistria were prohibited from traveling to port-cities. For the moment, as long as the supporters of extermination in Rumania did not gain the upper hand, the willingness of the moderates to release the Jews had to be exploited. If the first efforts were successful, then, perhaps, Transnistrian Jewry would also be released. Furthermore, Yehieli went on, the Rumanians had requested money in exchange for the Jews, but the warnings in the press left no room for doubt about the Allied stand on this issue. Still, Rumania was interested in fostering good relations with the Allies. There was also the danger to the Yishuv of violating Allied regulations by offering a ransom. Hence, Yehieli proposed viewing the amount of money demanded by the Rumanian Government as " a very high emigration tax, but not a ransom." In general he tried to clarify and simplify the complex of issues under consideration. Yehieli arrived at the same conclusion as Ben-Gurion and Bader before

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him: the Yishuv had to do what it could quietly, without putting the Rumanian moderates in an untenable position: We must now get used to an entirely different way of thinking ... we must have the courage to expedite emigration under the existing conditions. If we succeed in getting the first thousand out, and then another thousand, it is possible that we will also get to Transnistria.

His conclusion was that the Aliya Bet organization had to obtain ships immediately. Ben-Gurion, who agreed, added that it was necessary to work without publicity and "to find money wherever possible to buy what we need. The Jewish Agency will be a party to this, and whatever can be done will be done." 27 At the same meeting Ben-Gurion became convinced that an Executive member with authority should be present in Istanbul, even if only for a short time, to enable the emissaries to reach decisions and act more quickly. Once the Allied position became clear and it was concluded that the Aliya Bet operation was the only real possibility left, Istanbul became the hub and it was decided not to dispatch agents to any other political center. Eliezer Kaplan, treasurer of the Jewish Agency, left for Istanbul a few days later, and upon his return at the end of March 1943, he was able to sum up his impressions: I cannot envisage any sensational operations. The great plan for getting seventy thousand people out of Rumania has turned out to be neither serious nor realistic. There are those who blame this on all the talking but in my opinion it was unrealistic from the outset.

He realized that the Germans were doing their utmost to hinder the efforts of Aliya Bet to get people out of Rumania. Rumanian ships carrying Jews were prevented from sailing and those under way were returned to port. Passage through Bulgaria was prohibited as the result of German pressure. As for the British, they hindered transit through Turkey, making use of various local authorities. Rumania itself, Kaplan claimed, was like all the Balkan countries. Due to waning confidence in Hitler's victory, it had begun to display a willingness to withstand German pressure. Consequently, "one may say that regarding the possibility of legal exit, at present such a possibility does exist... large numbers 27

Speeches of Ychieli and Ben-Gurion at the Mapai Center, February 24,1943, L.P. Α., 23/43. For further Rumanian proposals and contacts, see Barlas to the Aliya Department, March 2.1943, C.Z.A., S6/1165.

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[of Jews] arc ready to leave and there is a great demand for immigration [to Palestine]; the cry of despair can be heard: Save us!"2* Kaplan's analysis confirmed the conclusion already reached by BenGurion, Bader and Yehieli: there was no way to rescue the seventy thousand, either with or without the ransom. The only possibility was to try to work quietly with the Rumanians behind the backs of the Germans. Zalman Aharonowitz (Aranne), a member of the Mapai Center, tried to sum up Kaplan's information and analysis in a single sentence: "The issue of rescue is currently a matter of transportation, for in contrast to the past, exit possibilities do now exist." 29 His summation may indicate that the members of the Jewish Agency Executive, Mapai Center and the Histadrut Executive Committee were trying to boost their own morale in view of the difficult circumstances. The willingness of the Jews to immigrate to Palestine did not increase their chances of leaving Europe. Rescue was not merely "a matter of transportation." It depended primarily, as Kaplan himself had pointed out earlier, on the Germans and then on the Allies. But to admit that it was impossible to get Jews out ofTransnistria, an area close to Istanbul and a region not even officially under German control, was tantamount to admitting the impossibility of conducting any rescue operations. No one was prepared to draw such a conclusion from Kaplan's report, pessimistic as it was. The end of April 1943 saw the close of the Bermuda Conference where representatives of Britain and the United States had met, ostensibly to discuss the refugee problem, but, in reality, to lessen public criticism in face of their governments' unwillingness to make any serious rescue effort. Once the meager results of the Conference became known in Palestine, it was decided to sum up in writing exactly what had been achieved to date and examine the prospects for future work. The Transnistria Plan, inter alia, was analyzed, and Apolinary Hartglas, political secretary of the Rescue Committee, described its inherent contradiction: Too many people learned of it, and as a result, the scheme was abandoned. On the other hand, it would have been impossible to implement the rescue of tens of thousands of people in secret, simply because thousands of other people would have had to be mobilized to obtain the funds for the operation, and

28 Kaplan at the Jewish Agency Executive meeting, March 28, 1943, C.Z.A.; and at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, March 30, 1943, L.P.A., 24/43. 29 Meeting of the Histadrut Executive Committee, March 31 -April 2,1943, H.E.C.A., vol. 67/M\

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then the publicity would have destroyed the chances of making the rescue plan operative.30

The contradiction, however, was political as well. Even if the Rumanians, for reasons of their own, had intended to release the Jews of Transnistria (or even of Rumania itself) when the proposal was made, and even if the Jewish Agency were willing and able to arrange for their transportation and payment of the ransom, both parties had other superior forces to contend with. The Germans were determined not to permit the Jews to leave, while the Allies were sharply opposed to any negotiations with the Axis countries. The possible release of seventy thousand Jews appeared, especially to the British, as an unnecessary interruption in the running of the war and a departure from their Middle East policy. For these reasons, the Jewish Agency Executive came to the conclusion, four months after the plan was first broached, that the evacuation of seventy thousand people from Transnistria under the given circumstances was impracticable. The Executive, nonetheless, could still use the willingness of Rumania to modify its policy toward its Jewish citizens in ways which had seemed possible from the beginning: a. sending aid to the Transnistria exiles who were still suffering from hunger, destitution and disease; b. investigating the possibility of their return to Rumania where they could be assisted by the local Jewish communities; c. evacuating the five thousand children of whom Stanley had spoken in his February 1943 declaration. This last idea had gone through several phases, and pertained to children from Poland, Bulgaria, or Rumania, with or without adult escorts. At one stage, the Rumanian Jewish leadership initiated official negotiations between the Rumanian Government and Barlas and Kaplan, during the latter's stay in Istanbul in March 1943. They spoke of the transfer of five thousand orphans from Transnistria to Rumania. The condition laid down by the Rumanian Government was .that once the Jewish Agency assured them of immigration certificates, they would be permitted to leave Transnistria immediately for transit camps in Rumania where they would remain until emigrating to Palestine. Kaplan replied that the Agency would assume this responsibility. The transfer and the maintenance of the children in the camps were to be funded by Rumanian Jewry, but Kaplan assured its representatives that even if there was insufficient money, the plan should go into effect immediately: the Jewish Agency

30 Apolinary Hartglas, "Comments on Assistance and Rescuc" (Hebrew), February 24,1943, C.Z.A., S26/1232.

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would pay the difference. Official confirmation of the plan reached the Central Council of Rumanian Jewry from Lecca.31 Certain aspects of these efforts to rescue the five thousand children may shed some additional light on the Transnistria Plan. In March 1943, during these negotiations, the German Foreign Ministry learnt from reports in the Palestine press that several thousand children from Rumania had succeeded in reaching Palestine with the aid of the Yishuv's emissaries in Istanbul, and that others were about to follow via Bulgaria and Turkey. Cables were sent immediately to the German Ambassador in Sofia, ordering him, with the aid of Eichmann's staff, to prevent such a transfer. Many reasons were advanced for this course of action. It was not in the political interest of the German Government to permit the exit of Jews, either from Rumania or anywhere else in Europe, while the "Final Solution" was still being implemented. Furthermore, the intervention of other countries in such an impotant matter could not be countenanced as it would undermine German authority on other issues. Adults escorting the children were a source of information on Germany's military strength. Lastly, the release of these children contradicted Axis policy vis-a-vis the Arab states.32 The general attitude of the German Foreign Office toward this issue remained unchanged. The position of the Reich Security Main Office was succincdy summed up by Eichmann. Although he inexorably opposed the release of Jewish children from conquered countries, he would agree to the evacuation of five thousand children in exchange for twenty thousand able-bodied Germans of draft age living in Allied territories. Eichmann recommended haste if such negotiations were to be undertaken, since "the day is approaching when our solution to the Jewish problem will preclude the 31 Regarding the initiative of Rumanian Jewry, see Barlas to the Aliya Department, March 24,1943, C.Z.A., S6/1165; also Kaplan at the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, March 28,1943, C.Z.A., and the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, March 30,1943, L.P.A. 24/43. For Rumanian approval of transfer of children, see also Dobkin, March 28,1943, C.Z.A., S26/1237. See especially Gruenbaum to Smuts, mid-June 1943, C.Z.A., A127/543. Re Rumanians who mediated between the Jews and the Government, see Matatais Carp, Cartea Neagra, 1941-1944, vol. III — Transmstria, Bucharest, 1947, pp. 423-424. Re the Jewish Agency's obligation to obtain immigration certificates for the children, see Barlas to Linton, March 4,1943, C.Z. Α., A127/543; and an interview with Kaplan, April 14,1943, C.Z.A., S53/1612. 32 On the instructions to prevent the transfer of the children, see Franz Rademacher, Berlin, March 12,1943, to the German Consul in Sofia, Walter Pausch, U.R.O., p.375; see also Rolf Gunther of Eichmann's Department IV-B-4, March 10,1943, to Von Hahn, in the Foreign Office in Berlin, U.R.O., p. 374; Killinger to Theordore Dannecker, also an assistant to Eichmann, on April 4,1943, U.R.O., p. 522; Rademacher to Von Hahn, U.R.O., p. 376; and Browning, The Final Solution, pp. 172-173.

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evacuation of five thousand Jewish children." He knew full well that the Allies would never agree to such a proposition. Furthermore, it was doubtful whether so many Germans willing to return to Germany during the war could be found. Meanwhile, the number ofJewish children in the whole of Europe, including Transnistria, was rapidly decreasing,33 and Eichmann was well informed on this subject. Here again, as the Agency opened negotiations with Rumania about the release of the children, the Germans were already in the know. 34 The Jewish Agency Executive, on the other hand, was not only unaware that the Germans knew of almost all its moves, following as they did the Palestinian press, but it had not yet become sufficiently conscious of the degree of murderous fanaticism that guided the policy of the Reich Security Main Office. Even Kaplan, who had already suspected that the whole affair was mere blackmail, described — or understated — the situation upon his return from Istanbul: "The Germans are not particularly interested in the exit of Jews." Yehieli, who had described the ascendancy of the "exterminationists" in the countries of Europe up to that time, was also vague whether "the Germans will intervene actively against this emigration" or not. 35 Given German decisiveness on this issue, both in the Foreign Ministry and the SS, the many efforts invested by the Jewish Agency Executive in obtaining the release of the children appear a bitter mockery. In the middle ofJune, Gruenbaum appealed both orally and in writing to Field Marshal Jan Christiaan Smuts, Prime Minister of South Africa, to support the idea raised by the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees, set up at the Bermuda Conference, that once transportation was organized, the Turks should establish camps for the Transnistria refugees, funded by Jewish and international bodies. Gruenbaum stressed that the Jewish Agency had reliable information to the effect that several of the Balkan states had reservations about the extreme German line toward the Jews. He requested help from Smuts in exploiting this tendency before the possible German invasion of the Balkans.36 33 O n May 14, 1943, U.R.O., p. 384. 34 See Lavie, Rumanian Jewry's Struggle, p. 175; also Feingold, Politics of Rescue, p. 182, who believes that Hitler in fact did not oppose the plan; and G. Reitlinger, The Final Solution, London, 1968, p. 441, who believes he did. Concerning the refusal of Eberhard Von Thadden, head of the D-III Department in the Foreign Office, to keep the promise — i f it was ever given, see Yosef Tenenbaum, Lords of Raa and Evil (Hebrew), Jerusalem, 1961, p. 319. 35 Kaplan at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, March 30,1943, L.P.A., 24/43; and Yehieli at the Mapai Center, February 24, 1943, L.P.A., 23/43. 36 Gruenbaum's memorandum to Smuts, mid-June 1943, C.Z.A., A127/543; and his speech at the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, September 26,1943, C.Z.A.

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In July, Stephen Wise and Ν ahum Goldmann succeeded in obtaining Roosevelt's agreement in principle to the transfer of money from Jewish organizations in the United States to a closed account in Switzerland, from which it could be withdrawn only after the end of the war. For the moment, Jews in Rumania would be permitted to draw Rumanian currency against it to cover the purchase of clothes for the Jews of Transnistria and the costs of their emigration from Rumania. The British Foreign Office and its Ambassador to the United States strongly opposed such a transaction and stretched out the related correspondence with the State Department for months. Nonetheless, pressured by the Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Morgenthau, Jr., the State Department approved of the transfer, but only in December 1943. The strong language used by the British in their internal correspondence on the subject leaves no room for doubt about their attitude toward the rescue ofjews from Transnistria or any other region. The exit of seventy thousand Jews is "a frightful prospect," wrote one British official to another, who replied that it was not worth opposing the plan so forcefully as years would go by and no ships would be found for them.37 In August 1943, Shertok was in Istanbul and, among other things, sought means of transportation and permission for the evacuation of the children. His hopes of finding a solution were based on a letter signed by Mihai Antonescu, Marshal Antonescu's deputy, which reached the offices of the International Red Cross in Istanbul at the end of May. In it the Rumanian Government repeated its acquiescence in principle to the release of the five thousand children, and asked for practical proposals regarding transfer arrangements. Once it was certain that the proposals could be implemented, it would request permission for transit from neighboring countries.38 It should be recalled that at about the same time, in July 1943, the British Government agreed to issue instructions to the Turkish Government that any Jewish refugee who succeeded in reaching Turkish territory would be given the right to enter Palestine. These crucially important instructions, which were not specifically linked to the Transnistria Plan, were publicized by the British and officially passed on to the Turks only in March 1944. However, the emissaries in Istanbul hoped that they would help ease passage through Turkey even before that

37 Wasserstein, Britain and the Jews, pp. 246-249; Feingold. Politics of Rescue, pp. 182-183; Nahtun Goldmann, Memoirs, Jerusalem, 1972, pp. 186-187. Stephen Wise, Challenging Yean. The Autobiography of Stephen Wise, New York, 1949, pp. 274-279. 38 Shertok's report re his stay in Istanbul to the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, August 22,1943, C.Z.A. For Antonescu's letter of May 24,1943, see Haim Barlas, Rescue during the Holocaust (Hebrew), Tel Aviv, 1975, p. 268.

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date. Furthermore, there were hints that Turkey was now actively interested in facilitating the transfer ofJews from Bulgaria and Rumania through its territory. Such information had reached Barlas and the governments of the two countries in question. As 1943 drew to a close and the Allies continued to advance, these hints became more pronounced.39 In spite of all the hopes and efforts invested, no more children left Transnistria either for Rumania or for Palestine. In mid-1943, German pressure on Rumania increased: the visit of a government committee to Transnistria to choose the children and arrange their transport was canceled, and German warships were commanded to sink vessels carrying refugees outside Rumanian territorial waters. Despite enormous efforts, the Aliya Bet was unable to purchase boats until the end of1943. On a visit to Palestine at that time, Ze'ev (Danny) Shind, an Aliya Bet emissary in Istanbul, summed things up: Before, "there was talk of five thousand orphans. Now not even that is discussed ... the matter has been dropped." 40 That the plan to evacuate five thousand children from Transnistria was never implemented, despite the discussions that went on up until the end of 1943, is a clear indication that the original scheme — to bring seventy thousand Jews to Palestine —was not feasible. At the close of the year, when the situation at the front was clearly going against Germany, Rumania was still unable to overcome German opposition (if, indeed, that was its intention). Secondly, the Allies, especially England, had not yet taken any real steps to rescue Jews, although a whole year had passed since they published their first declaration on the punishment of war criminals. How, then, would it have been possible to overcome these obstacles a year earlier, at the end of 1942? Efforts to obtain ships continued and, at the beginning of 1944, about 1,200 refugees from Transnistria finally managed to reach Palestine, some arriving in March and April on the ships Milka and Maritza.41 In two other spheres of activity, namely, assistance to the expellees and their return to Rumania, success was greater. The Jews of Rumania contributed food,

39 Barlas at the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, October 4,1943, C.Z.A. 40 For changes in the Committee in Rumania, see Bader's speech at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive, May 13, 1943, H.E.C.A., 15/40. On the German decision to sink vessels, see Barlas, Rescue during the Holocaust, p. 191; and Shind at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, December 15,1943, L.P.A., 24/43. For the correspondence between the Political Department of the Jewish Agency and the Colonial Office regarding the five thousand children, see L.P.A., S25/1675. 41 See Schechtman, "The Transnistria Reservation," p. 195; Barlas, Rescue during the Holocaust, pp. 192-194.

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money, and medicine voluntarily, in an organized and resourceful manner. The emissaries in Istanbul continued to alert the Yishuv to their plight, and the Jewish Agency allocated about nine thousand Palestine pounds for this purpose between April and September 1943. Dr. Schmorak, on a visit to Istanbul in September, approved the transfer of another ten thousand pounds, and promised the emissaries that he would raise an additional ten thousand in Palestine, which would be sent before winter. About thirty thousand pounds, the equivalent of120,000 dollars at the time, was raised by the Agency to buy and send food to Transnistria.42 In October, new possibilities opened up. After lengthy negotiations, the Turkish Government approved a one-time transfer of250 tons of food, fifty thousand parcels, of five kilograms each, valued at one million dollars, through the International Red Cross. It was decided that the Joint Distribution Committee (J.D.C.) would finance almost the entire consignment; that forty tons would be distributed in Transnistria and the rest in Poland but not according to any party key; and that the Palestinian emissaries in Istanbul would make the necessary arrangements, which were highly complex due to war conditions. Four freight cars of food and warm clothing were dispatched in January 1944 to Transnistria, but its proximity to the advancing front ruled out the possibility of delivering further consignments of food. Summing up, one can say that the material and financial aid extended by the Yishuv to the exiles was limited when compared with that of the Jews of Rumania and the J.D.C., but its effect as a morale booster was immeasurable.43 42

Rc assistance given to the exiles by Rumanian Jewry, see Shachan, The Ghettos in Transnistria, pp. 243-259; Raul Hilberg (ed.). Documents of Destruction, Chicago, 1971, pp. 80-83; Lavie, Rumanian Jewry's Struggle, especially pp. 68-85; Kaplan at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, March 30, 1943, L.P.A., 24/43; fiarlas at the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, October 4,1943, C.Z. A. Description of the situation by emissaries: Bader, May 17, 1943, at a Rescue Committee meeting, C.Z.A., S26/1237; and at the meeting of the Zionist Executive, May 18,1943, C.Z.Α., S25/297; Shertok upon his return from Istanbul, at the Jewish Agency Executive meeting, August 22,1943, C . Z . Α., 37-11; Venia Pome ranz at the meeting of die Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive. August 25,1943, H.E.C.A., 28/53, etc. Regarding allocation of money: Dobkin and Schmorak at the meeting of the Rescue Committee on September 20,1943, C.Z.Α., S26/1237; Anschel Reiss, November 1, 1943, ibid.; Barlas at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadnit Executive, October 12, 1943, H.E.C.A., 30/55; and Bader, Sad Missions, p. 88. 43 For the agreement with the J.D.C. and its implementation, see Pomeranz and Bader to Dobkin. November 26,1943, C.Z.Α., S6/1850; Zimend at the meeting of the Histadrut Executive Committee. January 17.1943, H.E.C.A.. vol. 70M'; and Barlas at the meeting of the Jewish Agency Executive, October 4, 1943, C.Z.A., and at the meeting of the Secretariat of the Histadrut Executive on October 12, 1943, H.E.C.A., 30/55. On the advance at the front, see Shaul Meirov (Avigur) at meeting of the Histadrut Executive Committee, February 23-24, 1944, H.E.C.A., vol. 70M'; and Barlas's report, C.Z.A., S6/4588.

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At the end of 1943 information was received in Palestine that the Rumanian Government was about to repatriate the Transnistria exiles. It was decided, therefore, that the Jewish Agency Executive would, as a first step, make a grant of fifteen thousand pounds. Up to the end of the war and for a year thereafter, some forty thousand exiles were permitted, gradually, to return to Rumania. The costs were covered by the Rumanian Jews, the J.D.C., the W a r Refugee Board (set up by the U.S. Government in January) as well as the Jewish Agency. 44 What, then, was the policy of the Zionist leadership in this affair? It is difficult to say that it was meticulously deliberated in lengthy discussions. In the light of Nazi policy toward the Jews and the unwillingness of the Allies, especially Britain, to deal with the proposal, it would be more correct to speak about the response of Zionist leadership under the pressure of events, which only later led to a more comprehensive view. One should also bear in mind that various circles, agents and intermediaries in Rumania were dealing with the general emigration proposal; that they presented different offers, on different dates, involving different sums of money; and that no official representative of the Rumanian Government came to Istanbul. The failure to implement this first large-scale rescue plan led the Jewish Agency Executive, especially Ben-Gurion, to a more sober view of the chances of rescue in the future. There could be no illusions regarding the rescue of millions, as the Germans would not let them leave, the Allies would not grant them entry to Palestine or elsewhere, regardless of the weight of public opinion at home, and the Yishuv itself lacked the power to save them. But the rescue of several thousands was possible through independent action, secretly and illegally, and this was the Yishuv's obligation. Hence, the crucial question was not whether ten thousand or one million could be saved but whether a few thousand could be rescued by the Yishuv. This conclusion, reached by the Jewish Agency Executive as a result of the Transnistria affair, affected its position concerning other rescue plans raised at that time and later. As mentioned above, at the end of 1942 and 44 Meeting of the Rescue Committee, December 6, 1943, C.Z.A., S26/1237; Shind at the meeting of the Mapai Secretariat, December 12, 1943, L.P.A., 24/43. On the decision to allocate fifteen thousand pounds, see Gnienbaum at the meeting of the Rescue Committee on December 16, 1943, C.Z.A., S26/1237; Barlas, Rescue during the Holocaust, pp. 79-81. According to Morse, While Six Million Died, p. 257, and Ira Hirschmann, Caution to the Wind, New York, 1962, p. 60, about fifty thousand people were returned within one week. But what seems more likely is what Schechtman, "The Transnistria Reservation," pp. 194-1%, and Reifer, Death Journey, pp. 151-157, claim, i.e., that the return was gradual and continued over a period of two months.

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during 1943, a group of leaders of Slovakian Jewry tried to convince Jewish organizations around the world that there were circles within the SS ready to halt the extermination in exchange for a few million dollars. The Jewish Agency, which had already learnt from bitter experience, believed it absurd to negotiate the rescue of millions of people when in practice it was hardly possible to save even a few hundred children — and this when details of Himmler *s order to complete the killing as quickly as possible reached Palestine. In the spring of 1944, when Eichmann's proposal to trade a million Jews for money or its equivalent was broached, it was already evident to the Executive that because of the hostile attitude of the Allies to rescue operations up to that time, it was pointless to turn to them for help. Furthermore, they were now aware that the proposals of the Germans, or their alleged agreement to Jewish proposals, were not a deviation from the "Final Solution" but a part of it, aimed to delude and defraud. They had not forgotten Eichmann's former impossible "proposal" — five thousand children for twenty thousand able-bodied Germans. However, the Jewish Agency did try everything possible. They appealed to governments and leading political figures in an effort to convince the Allies to begin negotiations with the Germans, if only for appearance's sake, and to achieve something, if only the release of a small number of Jews. The Jewish Agency even invested a large sum (some 100,000 pounds or 400,000 dollars) in the Slovakian proposal on the slim chance that something might come of it. Available German documents and source material in recently opened British and American archives indicate that the Jewish Agency was correct in its evaluation of the chances of the Transnistria Plan. It is possible that initially it was raised merely as a ploy, in an attempt to extort money from Rumanian and world Jewry, with or without the knowledge of the Germans. The absence of any original Rumanian documentation on the subject makes a clear-cut conclusion difficult. However, the way the negotiations were handled by the Rumanians strengthens our doubts. It is evident that the Allies opposed the plan completely, and even ruined any chance it might have had by leaking it to the press. But the decisive factor remains the German role. In this regard, there was no feasible way of rescuing tens of thousands of Jews. It was simply not a tenable proposition. There was no failure of Zionist leadership; on the contrary, it read the situation carefully and attempted to exploit the limited possibilities of rescue to the maximum. The facts of the Transnistria affair, and the archival material coming to light regarding similar incidents, challenge the position of those who still accuse the leadership of the Yishuv of having neglected rescue opportuni-

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ties because they were so involved in building the political future of the Yishuv. The record supports a different interpretation. The Yishuv had neither the military or political means of acting independently, and the Jewish Agency was not accorded the role of coordinating all Jewish rescue operations. Despairing with the failure of one rescue plan after the other, the leadership of the Yishuv did the only thing remaining. It focused all its energies on building the Yishuv and saving the lives of those few thousand Jews from Europe it could.

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I Following the Allied occupation of southern Italy, the existing "enemy" airbase at Foggia had been taken over in December 1943 as the main operational center for British and American heavy bombers flying into central Europe. The distance these bombers could fly and bomb was dictated by the range of their fighter escort, which up to December 1943 had been limited to just over 400 miles, but which, with the introduction of the Mustang fighter, was extended to an average of up to 850 miles. With such a range, the Allied bombers could now seek out targets throughout Hungary, Slovakia, Rumania, southern Poland, and Upper Silesia. Auschwitz itself came within their range, although it had still not been identified as the destination of the continuing deportations of Jews from Europe. The Allied bombing targets during the spring of 1944 remained those set out in Operation Pointblank a year earlier: the factories on which Germany's war effort depended, and, above all, the oil storage depots and synthetic oil production plants. The Normandy landings, a closely guarded secret, were to take place in the first week of June. Meanwhile, every attempt was being made to seek out Germany's most important oil targets. On April 4 a South African aerial reconnaissance plane flew, at 26,000 feet, over the I.G. Farben synthetic oil and rubber manufacturing plant at Monowitz. This plant was a known factor in the German war effort, and one of the potential Allied bombing targets in Upper Silesia. The technique of aerial photography then in use involved the pilot turning on his camera shortly before reaching the site to be photographed and turning it off when he judged that he had flown past his objective.

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Monowitz lay 4 kilometers east of Auschwitz. The pilot turned on the camera when he was approaching his target and turned it off some 6 kilometers later. The result: twenty exposures, on three of which Auschwitz itself appeared for the first time. The intelligence personnel who developed and studied the photographs of April 4 at the Royal Air Force station at Medmenham, in the Thames Valley west of London, were looking for specific industrial installations. These were quickly identified, including "a power station, carbide plant, synthetic rubber plant and synthetic oil (Bergius) plant." Each of these plants was then analyzed in detail.1 The oil production method was seen to be similar to that already in use at BlechhammerSouth, one of the existing high-priority bombing targets. Both the synthetic oil and rubber plants at Monowitz were clearly in "partial production" already, and while work was still in progress to complete both plants, they were already producing the oil and rubber on which the German war machine depended, and they would soon be capable of doing so on a scale similar to the largest of the plants elsewhere. The Monowitz interpretation report of April 4 was sent to both American and Royal Air Force intelligence. With so much relevant and important detail visible in the factory zone, the interpreters found no need to comment on the row upon row of huts at Auschwitz I; huts which resembled hundreds of other barracks, army camps, prisoner of war camps and labor camps in the Silesian region. Nor did these first photographs include the far more extensive hutted area of Auschwitz-Birkenau, where some 52,000 Jews were being held captive, in addition to the 15,000 in barracks at Monowitz. It was not for another seven weeks, until May 31, that Birkenau itself was photographed, although even then no intelligence assessment was made of it. At Birkenau itself, the process of gassing continued without respite. On April 4, the day on which the first photograph was taken, a train reached the camp from Trieste. Of its 132 deportees, twenty-nine were sent to the barracks, registered and tattooed, while the remaining 103 were gassed. 1

The analysis made at the time is in "Interpretation Report D.377A" of April 18, 1944, "Locality Oswiecim (Auschwitz): Synthetic Rubber and Synthetic Oil Plant," United States Strategic Bombing Survey (hereafter, USSBS), Record Group (hereafter, RG) 243.

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In Auschwitz itself, two Slovak Jews, Walter Rosenberg (later known as Rudolf Vrba) and Alfred Wetzler, were making their final plans for escape, hoping to "tell the world" the truth about Auschwitz. 2 On April 6, the day before Vrba and Wetzler began their escape, Reuven Zaslani (Shiloah) of the Jewish Agency had already warned British intelligence in Cairo of a German radio broadcast in which the Germans "propose eliminating a million Jews in Hungary." 3 The first stage of the Nazi plan, the sealing of the Jews into ghettos, had already begun on April 16, in Ruthenia. Nine days later the question of rescue took an unexpected, dramatic turn: on April 25, Joel Brand, a leading Hungarian Zionist, was taken to SS headquarters in Budapest. As Brand recalled two months later, Eichmann "snapped" at him as soon as he was seated: "You know who I am, I solved the Jewish question in Slovakia. I have stretched out my feelers to see if your international Jewry is still capable of doing anything. I will make a deal with you." 4 With the truth about Auschwitz still unknown in the West, such an offer was tantalizing. But at the very moment that it was being made, evidence was reaching the Jewish leadership in Slovakia with the full and horrific details of the gassings at Auschwitz. The source of this news was the two Auschwitz escapees, Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, whose message had begun its westward journey with their escape from Auschwitz on April 10. On April 25, the very day on which Oskar Krasniansky was crossexamining Vrba and Wetzler in Zilina, Kasztner and the Hungarian Jewish leadership in Budapest received Eichmann's offer to negotiate "goods for blood": to avoid the death camps altogether in return for a substantial payment. On that fateful day, April 25, two events coincided: the truth about Auschwitz had reached those who had the ability to make it known to the potential victims, and the offer had been made to negotiate 2

I am grateful to Rudolf Vrba for providing me with important material about his escape and for answering my many questions. 3 Report of an interview, Foreign Office papers (hereafter, FO), 921/152, 6(5) 44/14, Top Secret. Zaslani's purpose, the interviewer recorded, was to advance further the Jewish Agency's scheme "for infiltrating Jews into Hungary and Rumania to stimulate resistance among the Jews there." 4 Interrogation report. File No. SIME/P 7769, p. 18, FO, 371/42811.

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"goods for blood." Those Hungarian Jewish leaders who wished to follow up the negotiations were unwilling to risk the negotiations by publicizing the facts about the annihilation process at Auschwitz. Yet that process was known to them from April 28, three days after Eichmann's first meeting with Brand, when Kasztner travelled to Bratislava, where he was given a copy of the Vrba-Wetzler report, and took it back with him to Budapest.5 But by then Kasztner and his colleagues in the Zionist leadership in Hungary were already committed to their negotiations with Eichmann and to the dispatch of their colleague, Joel Brand, to Istanbul. The first news that the Jews of Hungary had been rounded up and forced into ghettos reached the West while the seizures were still taking place. On May 5, Chaim Barlas, chairman of the Rescue Committee of the Jewish Agency in Istanbul, telegraphed from Istanbul to the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem: "Latest information from Hungary indicates new wave persecutions introducing ghettos etc." Barlas advised the Jewish Agency to telegraph Stephen Wise in New York "re warning." 6 This telegram reached Jerusalem on May 6. On May 8 Yitzhak Gruenbaum, of the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem, telegraphed Stephen Wise in New York: Received information that situation Jews Hungary desperate. Authorities there decided apply same restrictions against Jews like Poland. Restrictions and atrocities just beginning, but will grow very fast. Anxious deportation will begin soon. Imperative take all steps our power prevent or at least slow up action.

Such was the full text of Gruenbaum's telegram. It gave no indication of what he envisaged by the phrase "all steps our power." 7 That same day, May 8, the commander of the Allied air forces in Italy, Lieutenant-General Ira C. Eaker, having received an enquiry about a possible air attack on the German synthetic oil plant at Blechhammer, replied that not only were strikes on Blechhammer "feasible," but that the German synthetic rubber factory at Auschwitz, as well as the synthetic oil and coking plant at Odertal "might also 5 6 7

Statement by Oskar Krasniansky, Yad Vashem Archives (hereafter, YVA), 0-3/3366. Central Zionist Archives (hereafter, CZA), S25/1682, Telegram No. 2308. CZA, S25/1682, unnumbered telegram.

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be attacked simultaneously." Eaker added that to carry out the operation "with the greatest possible economy," it should not be attempted "until our fighter position is stronger, in about another 2 weeks." 8 This exchange of correspondence concerned the forthcoming Allied air offensive against German oil targets, in conjunction with the still top secret plans for "Overlord," the Allied landing in Normandy, planned for June 6. The first of these Allied air attacks on German oil production took place on May 12, when four sites in the Sudetenland were bombed, resulting, as Speer informed Hitler on June 30, in an immediate reduction of daily tonnage from 5,845 tons to 4,821 tons, a drop of more than 20 percent.9 Both the Normandy Landings and the Oil Campaign were closely guarded secrets. There was no way in which the Jewish leaders could take them into account in their own planning for requests for action. Rabbi Weissmandel, a leader of the Slovak Working Group, to whom Krasniansky had given a copy of the Vrba-Wetzler report at the end of April, took it from Bratislava to Nitra to show to his father-inlaw, Rabbi Unger, the head of the Orthodox Jewish community. In Nitra the report was translated into Yiddish, and a copy sent westward by courier.10 But by May 15 no answer had come. It was clear that the report had either been lost, intercepted or delayed. And on May 15 the SS began the deportation of Jews from Hungary to Auschwitz. Weissmandel realized that the facts of the Vrba-Wetzler report — the truth about Auschwitz — and the new deportations were linked. He therefore composed a telegram in simple code, and this telegram, sent on May 16 from the Orthodox community in Bratislava to the Swiss Orthodox leaders for transmission to the United States, urged the Allies to bom-

8

Eaker to Spaatz, Spaatz papers, Box 143, F. Operation Planning: Attacks against Oil Targets. I am grateful to Professor David S. Wyman for sending me the full text of this document, which was published in part in his article "Why Auschwitz Was Never Bombed," Commentary, Vol. LXV, No. 5, May 1978, p. 42. 9 Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany 1939-1945, Vol. IV, London, 1961, pp. 326-329. 10 I am grateful to Oskar Krasniansky for answering my queries concerning the arrival of Vrba and Wetzler in Slovakia and for guiding my research in connection with the fate of the Vrba-Wetzler report.

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bard the railway lines between Kosice and Presov to save those Jews who had "not yet" been deported. Weissmandel knew that the Kosice-Presov route was one of those along which the first trains had just passed from eastern Hungary to Poland. But Auschwitz itself was not mentioned, neither in this telegram nor in a second telegram sent from Slovakia seven days later. Nor did either telegram reach the War Refugee Board in Washington until June 18.11 On May 24 the news of the Hungarian deportations, now in progress for nine days, was still not known in the West. But on that day the American Consul-General in Jerusalem, L.C. Pinker-ton,, telephoned the Jewish Agency building in Jerusalem with a message for Shertok. The message had come from Istanbul, and read: "Wednesday, await at Lydda special mission in connection with Hungary. Wednesday night prepare for urgent Executive meeting. Be ready for sudden trip to Istanbul." 12 This telegram launched the Brand mission: the arrival in Istanbul of Joel Brand himself and his companion Andor Gross. That same night the British Ambassador in Ankara, Sir Hughe Knatchbull-Hugessen, telegraphing both to London and Jerusalem, reported that Brand "is said to represent Jewish community in Hungary and to have brought for Jewish Agency a proposal formally addressed to him by Gestapo for exchanging remaining Jews in Axis occupied territory against either commodities or foreign currency." The Ambassador added: "Jewish Agency representatives in Istanbul apparently regard the proposal as serious, as they have sent a certain Pomerantz to Palestine to report to Zionist executive."13 The first British reaction to the news of the Brand mission was a succinct one: "the US authorities," Ian Henderson minuted, "would look more favourably on these blockade-running schemes than we would." 14 11 12 13

14

For the arrival of the Weissmandel telegrams in Washington, see p. CZA, S25/1678. FO, 371/42758, W 8465, Telegram N o . 794, Secret. Pomerantz (Hadari) a young Polish-born Jew who had been active in Istanbul as one of Jewish Agency representatives concerned with illegal immigration and transfer of messages to and from occupied Europe. Ibid., note of May 27, 1944.

439. was the the

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On the morning of May 26, in Jerusalem, Ben-Gurion and Shertok explained the Brand proposals to the British High Commissioner in Palestine, Sir Harold MacMichael. If the Nazis' offer were rejected, he was told, "they will proceed with their programme of wholesale liquidation." Immediately after this meeting, MacMichael telegraphed a full report of it to London. One paragraph concerned the apparent fate, as Brand reported it, of some 300,000 Hungarian Jews, "already herded in concentration camps as a preliminary to deportation." Other Jews, he said, were in the process of being rounded up. Plans had been made "for daily deportations to Polish slaughter-houses of 12,000 Jews as from the 22nd May," but Ben-Gurion and Shertok told MacMichael that these deportations are "presumed to have been deferred pending negotiations." Ben-Gurion and Shertok urged the British government to take the Brand offer seriously. "In the light of the above and past experience," MacMichael noted, "Agency fears that the fate of Hungarian, Chechoslovakian and Rumanian Jews is sealed unless they can be saved in time." MacMichael included in his telegram of May 26 a verbatim statement from the Jewish Agency leaders. It read: They firmly hope that the magnitude and seemingly fantastic character of the proposition will not deter high Allied authorities from undertaking a concerted and determined effort to save the greatest possible number. They fully realise the overwhelming difficulties, but believe that they might not prove insurmountable if the task is faced with the boldness demanded by unprecedented catastrophe.

The deportations to Auschwitz had in fact begun on May 15. In his telegram of May 26, the High Commissioner went on to report that, according to Brand, as "an alternative to complete annihilation," the Nazis were "ready to evacuate 1,000,000 Jews" from Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Rumania and Poland, and, in return for 10,000 trucks and certain quantities of "coffee, tea, cocoa and soap," to send these Jews to Spain and Portugal, "though not, as they specifically stated, to Palestine." The Nazis were also prepared. Brand reported, "to exchange Jews against German prisoners of war." 15 15

Ibid., copy Palestine Telegram No. 683, and Cabinet Papers (hereafter, Cab.), 95/15.

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The Jewish Agency saw the Brand mission as a chance to save at least some of the hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews known to be doomed to death. But for the British policy-makers this area of Zionist hopes had another aspect. As Robin Hankey of the Foreign Office minuted on May 27: It seems likely that this fantastic offer is just a political warfare stunt by the Germans. They must know that it would be almost impossible to move a million Jews from Eastern Europe across France to Spain and Portugal without preventing our bombing of French railways, interfering with the Second Front, embarrassing our relations with Spain and Portugal, using shipping in the Mediterranean and Atlantic, upsetting the supply position in Spain and Portugal and (if the refugees went to the Middle East) very probably precipitating troubles in Palestine and the Middle East which would immobilise British divisions otherwise available for offensive operations. Even if we did accept, there would be no means of sending the lorries to Germany without interfering again with shipping and military operations. Finally, if once we were to agree to be blackmailed in this way we should not have an appeal for a mere million Jews, there would be Poles, Frenchmen, Dutchmen, etc., etc.16

On May 27 one of the special committees set up by the British War Cabinet, the Technical Sub-Committee on Axis Oil Reports, met to discuss the most recent developments in German oil production. Among its reports, which were circulated to both British and American air intelligence, was one on the synthetic oil plant at Monowitz, which had been photographed on April 4. The item, headed "Auschwitz," read: The hydrogenation section at the new plant at Auschwitz is only just coming into use. When the construction now in progress has been completed the output of this plant may be at the rate of 180,000 tons per annum. The planned capacity of the plant is probably to the order of half a million tons per annum. 17

In their report, the War Cabinet expert advisers stressed the extent to which the German dependence upon oil production was "vital" to Germany's ability to continue the war. And yet, they pointed out, 16 FO, 371 /42758, W 8626, folios 50-53. 17 USSBS, RG 243.· The records of the Technical Sub-Committee are in Cab. 77/19-28.

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Germany's position as far as oil production was concerned was "now more vulnerable than at any previous time," while the destruction "of from two to four" of the specialized plants manufacturing synthetic oil would "slow down the German war machine." 18 On May 31 an additional escape was made from Auschwitz itself. The escapees were a young Polish Jew, Czeslaw Mordowicz, and a Slovak Jew, Arnost Rosin. On May 31 the second South African aerial reconnaissance mission flew over Auschwitz. Once again, its photographic objective was the Monowitz industrial plant. But two of its frames showed all of Birkenau, one showed part of Auschwitz Main Camp and part of Birkenau, and three showed part of Auschwitz Main Camp, all photographed from a height of 27,000 feet.19 Even before his telegrams of May 16 and May 23, urging the bombing of the railways to Poland, Rabbi Weissmandel had sent a Yiddish version of the Vrba-Wetzler report to Switzerland. But this copy had not yet arrived; nor, in fact, had the telegrams. On May 31 Weissmandel wrote again from Bratislava to his Orthodox colleagues in the West: "Though we wrote some weeks ago, we have not to date received any indication that the letter was received and are concerned about this." His second letter, which itself was not to reach the West for more than a month, contained an anguished appeal for action to halt the deportations, which had already been in progress for two weeks. In his letter of May 31, Weissmandel also set out in detail the Eichmann proposals. "If the Jews are unwilling to accept or fulfill these terms," he wrote, "then everyone will be deported." If the terms were met, "they will permit a great exodus from this country towards the neutral sea through Germany-France-Spain." According to the Germans, Weissmandel added, "those already deported are living in Ger18

"The Oil Position in Axis Europe, First Six Months of 1944," War Cabinet Technical Sub-Committee on Axis Oil, Cab. 77/24, A.D.(44)41 (Final) of May 27, 1944. The chairman of the Sub-Committee was Sir Harold Hartley, who in World War I had been controller of chemical warfare at the Ministry of Munitions. Another member was S.P. Vinter, of the prime minister's Statistical Branch. 19 Records of the Defense Intelligence Agency (RG 373), aerial photographs of Auschwitz and Birkenau, Mission 60 PRS/462, Can D 1508 Exposures 3055-7, Can D 1509 Exposures 4056-8 and Can D 1510 Exposures 5018-20.

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many and are being kept as hostages until the Jews meet their terms." But this particular assertion, he was convinced, was "an outright lie." He himself believed that the deportees were sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau; they "are all gassed there and cremated, except for a very tiny portion." If the offer of negotiations was nevertheless real, Weissmandel wrote, then they must be concluded "without delay or negligence," and the Jews "must immediately give substance, not merely with words, but in real terms; more money perhaps, and fewer supplies." But if the negotiations were, in fact, "a plot, a maneouvre, a gesture of camouflage" aimed at winning Jewish confidence and undermining "our already meagre and paltry power to resist," then it was essential to demand "in the strongest terms" the bombing of the railway lines from Hungary to Poland.20 This letter, with both its scepticism and hope, would not reach the West for more than a month. Even as it was being written, the "Brand proposals" were being discussed at the War Cabinet's Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, nominally presided over by Anthony Eden." It was Randall who opened the discussion, in Eden's temporary absence, stating "that the Foreign Office thought there were substantial reasons for having nothing to do with the proposals as they stood." In putting this view to the United States government, however, "it should be borne in mind," he said, "that the scheme might secure sympathy beyond its merits in Washington, where the President's War Refugee Board, backed by Mr. Morgenthau, had, partly for electoral reasons, committed itself to the 'rescue' of Jews." The Colonial Office supported the Foreign Office's rejection of the Brand proposals. It should be "made clear at the outset," Oliver Stanley, the Colonial Secretary, told the Committee "that since

20

21

The full text of Weissmandel's letter of May 31, 1944, is in: Michael D. Weissmandel, Min ha-Mezar, New York, 1960, pp. 182-189 (English translation: Lucy S. Dawidowicz, ed., A Holocaust Reader, New York, 1976, pp. 321-327). Eden was unable to attend the meeting until its discussions were over. The other member of the committee, who did attend the meeting, was the Colonial Secretary, Oliver Stanley. Also present were G.H. Hall, Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office; Lord Selborne, Minister of Economic Warfare; two Home Office representatives; a representative of the Offices of the War Cabinet; and A.W.G. Randall.

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the evacuation of a million refugees from occupied territories and their maintenance in neutral or allied countries could not be undertaken without a major alteration of the course of military operations, the scheme in its present form could not be considered." During the discussion that followed, several "additional points" were made. These related to what was variously described as the "danger" and "dangerous complication" involved if the Brand proposals were in fact carried out. As the official minutes of the meeting recorded: There seemed to be some danger that an indication that we might negotiate through a Protecting Power with the German Government might be followed up, and lead to an offer to unload an even greater number of Jews on to our hands.

One of the additional points concerned the "equally strong objections" to a "large evacuation" of Jews through Turkey, since this, as the minutes noted, "would involve our being pressed to receive unmanageable numbers into Palestine, and thereby introduce the dangerous complication that the immigration quota would be exceeded at a particularly critical time." A further problem that the Committee envisaged, in the event of the Brand proposals succeeding, concerned the United Kingdom itself. Here again the minutes were explicit, noting that: "since no large number of Jews could be maintained in Spain for long, we should be strongly pressed to accommodate them in this country. Our own capacity to accommodate them was limited in the extreme.'"-'2 There was a direct link between the Foreign Office attitude toward the rescue of a million Jews and its view of the "danger" of "unmanageable numbers" of Jews reaching Palestine.23 On June 1 Eden had sent Churchill a ten-point top secret draft Cabinet paper entitled "Palestine," in which he warned of the danger "of losing to America the pre-eminent place we have always held, and which in our own strategic interests, including oil, we ought to continue to hold, in the Arab world." Eden's proposal was a "Palestinian State" whose sovereignty would lie with the United Nations, but which would be ruled 22 War Cabinet Committee on the Reception and Accommodation of Refugees, 2nd meeting of 1944, May 30, 1944, Secret Cab, 95/15. 23 FO, 371/42758, W 8507, minute of June 2. 1944.

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by a British governor taking his instructions from London. This would not be a temporary Mandate, but a permanent settlement. It would therefore end the Arab fear of a permanent political settlement based upon a Jewish majority. Up to 400,000 new Jewish immigrants would be permitted, but should come "within 100,000 of the Arab," and never closer — never, that is, a Jewish majority. Eden added: It would farther help to reconcile Arab opinion if it were possible to point to Jewish immigration being directed to other parts of the world as well as Palestine. If no suitable location for a Jewish settlement can be found in Africa it might be possible to persuade the Americans to allot a separate quota for Jewish immigrants

Eden was particularly worried that if any form of Partition scheme went ahead, the Arabs would revolt against the Jewish state that resulted, however small that state, and that this Arab revolt, "protracted, costly, maybe disastrous," would not be led "by the present Arab rulers and political leaders" but by "leaders as yet unknown: the potential Titos of the Arab world."2,1 At the end of his telegram to Shertok on May 29, Yitzhak Gruenbaum, the chairman of the Rescue Committee of the Jewish Agency, had advised "adoption extraordinary measures repeatedly suggested, view interfering deportation." But he did not say what these measures might be. On June 2, however, the day after the War Cabinet in London had rejected the Brand proposals, Gruenbaum telegraphed, through Pinkerton in Jerusalem, to the War Refugee Board in Washington, asking the United States Air Force to bomb the deportation railways. Gruenbaum's telegram was in three sections. The first concerned the need to find a ship to help rescue Jews from Rumania, the matter being "very urgent," as German forces were likely at any moment to occupy the port of Constanta as they retreated before the Red Army. The third section of the telegram urged financial aid from the War Refugee Board to help the Internationa] Red Cross and "assist in relief and protection" of the Jews of Hungary. It was the second section that referred to "a definite German decision to proceed as rapidly as possible with the systematic deportation of Hungarian Jews to Poland" and went on to state that trains were to be sent to Poland every day. 24

"Palestine," Top Secret, Colonial Office papers, 733/461, Part One.

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Indeed, Gruenbaum noted, "8,000 from Carpatho-Russia have already been taken." Gruenbaum's telegram continued: Suggest deportation would be much impeded if railways between Hungary and Poland could be bombed. Also suggest renewal of warning against Hungarian participation and persecution and inclusion of Bulgaria in warning as German influence in that country is rapidly increasing with accompanying massacres.23

In fact, by June 2, the date of Gruenbaum's telegram, not 8,000 Jews, but more than 250,000 had been deported from Hungary to Auschwitz, where most of them had been gassed. Gruenbaum's information referred to the first deportations of May 15, when 8,000 Jews from Ruthenia had been deported to Auschwitz, reaching the camp on May 18 and 19. Nor did Gruenbaum mention Auschwitz by name, but only "Poland" as the destination of the deportees. Also unknown to Gruenbaum, June 2 was the first day of a new Allied operation, Operation Frantic, through which the bombing of these very same railways could have been effected. Operation Frantic was a shuttle bombing system, whereby the United States forces flying either from Britain or Italy could use the Soviet airbase at Poltava in order to extend their range and to overfly areas previously outside the limit of their targets. Operation Frantic had two aims, neither of which automatically barred its use for the purpose Gruenbaum had suggested. Its first aim was to be "a veritable model of air warfare in order to impress the Russians with admiration and confidence." Its second aim was "to distract the Germans on the eve of the Normandy landings," to be launched in four days' time.2® Frantic remained operational for more than four months. The first Frantic, on June 2, dropped 1,000 bombs on the railway marshalling yards at Debrecen in Hungary. This action impaired the railway system considerably. "All tracks in the main marshalling yards were cut," the air intelligence reported "and a large quantity of rolling stock was 25 War Refugee Board (hereafter, WRB), Box 34, Measures Directed Towards Halting Persecution, F: Hungary, Vol. 2. 26 For the origins, aims and targets of Operation Frantic, see Wesley F. Craven and James L. Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. ΙΠ, Chicago, 1951.

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damaged. The bombs blasted or fired the central railway station and the chief buildings of an engineering establishment." But the fate of the Jews of Debrecen was not affected: all that happened was that their electricity and gas supplies were cut. Although Debrecen was a railway junction, linking several of the deportation routes, the object of the raid was to harm German communications in such a way as to help the Soviet forces then in the Carpathians. The United States bombers waited at Poltava for the return mission. A week of bad weather made flying impossible. Then, returning to their bases in Italy on June 10, the target set, and hit, was the airport at Focsani in Rumania. For the Jewish Agency, at this moment, the Brand proposals were becoming the principal and overriding hope of rescue for Hungarian, and indeed Czechoslovak and Polish, Jewry. As such, the need to follow up these proposals began to dominate the Agency's discussions during June. But neither the British rejection of the proposals, nor the reasons for that rejection, were known. In the shadow of Brand, all other schemes and priorities, including Gruenbaum's railway line bombing request, held a subsidiary place in Jewish Agency thinking. On June 5 Brand left Istanbul by rail for Aleppo. Reaching Aleppo on June 6, he was held in custody by the British until the end of the month, first in Aleppo and then in Cairo. Gross was also held by the British. He was interrogated from June 6 to June 22, and Brand from June 16 to June 30. This meant further delay, further false hopes, further focus on the Brand proposals to the exclusion of other possible measures of rescue. On June 6 the Allied forces landed on the Normandy beaches. The second front, so long awaited, so essential for an Allied victory over Germany, was now a reality. Here was the military action that the Jews had been told repeatedly could alone bring any real rescue or relief. At Auschwitz the secret arrivals and gassings continued — Jews from France. Hungary and Italy. Of the 496 Jews who reached Auschwitz on D-Day itself, June 6, a total of ninety-nine were taken to the barracks, while all the others were gassed. On that same day, June 6, a second report on the aerial photographs of Auschwitz HI was circulated to British and American air intelligence. The report was six pages long, followed by a detailed plan. The main

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source was still the aerial reconnaissance of April 4, supplemented not by the pictures of May 31, but with what was described as "a consideration of information from available ground sources." Once again no reference was made to the huts or other buildings of Auschwitz I or Birkenau, although five of the photographs of May 31 showed all or part of Auschwitz I, and three showed Birkenau. The aim of the assessment of June 6 was to examine every possible aspect of the synthetic rubber and oil plant, and this was done in remarkable detail: the Monowitz railway system, the location and extent of the factory, and the individual installations. The exact size, purpose and capacity of almost every building was precisely stated, and the buildings themselves were located by numbers on a clear and detailed map. Thus: "Steam emission from the 123 feet diameter cooling tower (79 on map) serving the compressor houses indicates that gas is being passed through the plant" and again: "Rundown tanks for the main distillation plant (95) and for the second plant (94) are built in the form of horizontal cylinders. About 35 of them can be seen, and more are already buried. Each measures 38 feet in length by 8 feet in diameter, and could accommodate 1,900 cubic feet; there is therefore visible random capacity for rather more than 1,600 tons of o i l . . " 2T The notes to the plan make it clear that the nature of the labor force at Monowitz was known to those who made the intelligence assessment. Thus area 106 is described as "Concentration Camp," 122 as "Labour Camp," and 123 again as "Concentration Camp." But the intelligence assessment makes no reference to these three areas. In fact, area 123 was the Monowitz camp for Jewish slave laborers brought mostly from Birkenau and was accurately located and drawn from one of the aerial photographs taken two months earlier.28 The meaning of what the report of June 6 described as "ground sources" was revealed two days later to the War Cabinet's Technical Sub-Committee on Axis Oil Reports. The new source was a Belgian student who had been deported from Belgium to Monowitz in May 1942 "to serve as an interpreter." After escaping in May 1943, he had 27 28

Interpretation Report No. D.3S9, "Location: Oswiecim (Auschwitz)," USSBS, RG 243. Ibid., Oswiecim: I.G. Farben, Synthetic Rubber and Synthetic Oil Plant. A.C.I.U. Plant No. D.410. Neg. No. 38618R. Based on Cover of April 4, 1944.

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managed to reach Britain, where he had been interrogated in January 1944 by the British Air Ministry. When completed, the student's report had made clear, "the plant will be very large, possibly larger than one of the Blechhammer plants." 29 It was the facts which the Belgian student had been able to give about the existence, the purpose and the capacity of the synthetic oil plant which led to the increased importance of Monowitz as a target, moving it from the larger list of "unknown status" plants, to the shorter list of "known" plants.30 Thus two different Auschwitz camps were becoming known to the Allies almost simultaneously: Birkenau with its gas chambers, and Monowitz with its oil. But the knowledge of the oil came first, by nearly two weeks, and it was this knowledge that stimulated the rapid, urgent action of air reconnaissance and attack, judged indispensable for the Allied war effort. On the day after the D-Day landings, unknown either to the Allies or to the Jewish Agency, the Nazis completed the first phase of their Hungarian deportation plan. On that day the last train reached Auschwitz from Ruthenia and Transylvania, bringing the number of Jews who had been deported to a total of 289,357; most of them were killed in only twenty-three days. Yet the hope still persisted in Jewish circles in Jerusalem and London that the continuing negotiations with Brand were delaying any such deportations. Also on June 7 Weizmann went to see Anthony Eden to discuss the Brand mission. According to a note by Randall two days later, Weizmann told Eden that he "had never heard of" Brand, "but that he might well be a trustworthy person." In these circumstances, the Foreign Office agreed to allow Shertok to interview Brand in Aleppo, having for two days refused to allow the meeting to take place. During his meeting with Eden, Weizmann raised the question of "an official direct approach" by Britain to the Hungarian government. This approach had also been suggested by Steinhardt, the United States ambassador to Turkey, to whom the Jewish Agency had also passed on details of the Brand proposals. The very fact of American support 29

"Report E.O.C. 74-1, prepared by the Western Axis Sub-Committee of the Enemy Oil Committee in Washington," copy in Cab. 77/24, A.O. (44)44. 30 Ibid., War Cabinet Technical Sub-Committee on Axis Oil Reports.

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roused the scepticism of the Foreign Office. Randall minuted on June 7: "It has to be remembered that the US Ambassador in Angora [Ankara] has declared his intention of winning the Jewish vote in New York State for the Democrats " Another suggestion, put forward originally by Weizmann in a discussion with G.H. Hall at the Foreign Office on June 2, and repeated to Eden at their meeting on June 7, as a means of preventing the deportation of Jews from Hungary, was that Churchill and Roosevelt "issue a joint warning to the Germans, which he thought might go some way to halt the slaughter of the Jews." During the discussion Weizmann also proposed that Stalin might join this declaration.31 The idea of rescuing Hungarian Jewry through the Brand proposals continued, however, to be seen in the Foreign Office as creating new problems for Britain's Middle East policy. There was always the possibility, R.M.A. Hankey minuted on June 14, "of letting the Germans flood the M.E. with Jews in order to embarrass us." 32 Throughout June 11, the first day of the Szekesfehervar deportations, Shertok was in Aleppo, questioning Brand for six hours. Brand was emphatic that even if deportations were taking place, those deported were not being killed, but kept alive for a "goods for blood" exchange. One of the reasons, Brand reported, for the Germans not allowing Hungarian Jews to leave Nazi Europe through the Balkans was that the Germans "did not want to offend the Arabs" nor to help the emergence of "too strong a Jewish state in Palestine." But the exodus of a million Jews would serve the German purpose in another way, for, as Brand reported, the Germans "consider the Jews as a spiritual disease and as such wished to distribute them over a wide area as a demoralising factor against the Allies." In this way the large "shipment of Jews" proposed by Eichmann (called Eichner in the transcript), was to be regarded "in the form of a sabotage mission against the Allies." Another reason for the exchanges, Brand told Shertok, was that the Germans, both as individuals and as a people, "wished to give themselves a good mark with the Allies and Jewry in general and

31

The discussion between Weizmann and Eden on June 7, 1944, and the Foreign Office comments on it are in FO, 371 /42758, W 9102. 32 FO, 371/42758, W 9317.

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try to expiate their sin of the extermination of six million Jews by the release of the remaining two million." N o t only was this the first mention of "six million" dead, but it also held out, on that June 12 in A l e p p o , the prospect of the rescue, not of one, but of t w o million Jews. Brand then detailed what the cost would be: t w o million cakes of soap; 10,000 kg. of tea; 40,000 kg. of coffee; 10,000 kg. of cocoa, and 10,000 trucks "to ship Jews across Europe." Shertok's first t w o questions to Brand showed the sense of urgency, and also of hope, in the mind of the Jewish A g e n c y : Shertok: Was the saving of children specifically mentioned? Brand: Yes, Eichner [Eichmann] agreed that children and old people should go first, but those of working age would have to stay on for some time as the Germans needed them. When this question was discussed Eichner to a certain extent went back on his word and said that, of course, there was not enough money in the whole of the world to pay for the evacuation of all the Jews from Europe. Shertok: Were the Nazis in any way opposed to the saving of children? Brand: No. Shertok's third question concerned the deportations, and

Brand's

answer explains why the hope still persisted that, even if actual deportations were taking place, the Jews themselves would still not die, provided the Brand mission were to succeed. A s the transcript records: Shertok: Did you call for the suspension of deportations pending the outcomc of negotiations? Brand: Yes, but Eichner said the deportations must go on. I said that he might show goodwill by ceasing the deportations, and Eichner said that there would be no killing until the answer was received, but I must hurry as the Germans cannot keep women and children for an unlimited period as it costs money. When Kummey [Krumey] was asked the same question he tried to put my mind at rest and told me not to worry, stating that as soon as they got first news of the success of my mission then the deportations would cease. When the question was raised with Klages and Schröder the first reaction was a flat denial that deportations were taking place, but later they also tried to soothe me, stating that the treatment would not be too harsh. 33 33

The twelve-page transcript of the Brand-Shertok interview of June 11, 1944, is in FO, 371/42759, W 10406, Top Secret, Assistant Defence Security Office, Northern Syria, dated June 12, 1944.

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Later on in the discussion, Brand told Shertok that if the proposals were turned down, "there are sure to be great executions," even if he himself returned to Hungary. Were he not to return, "all Jews will be slaughtered including my mother, wife, children and particularly people closely associated with me." This reply also implied that as yet there had not been "great executions." Brand went on to tell Shertok about the forcing of Jews into ghettos in April and May; of 5,000 Jews who escaped the round-ups by reaching the Rumanian border; of "lorry-loads of Jews" freed by "local peasants" in the Carpathians; of large numbers of escapees able to bribe the Rumanian police; and of the "very strict" frontier police on the Yugoslav border, which made escape southward extremely difficult. Two overriding questions remained; were Jews already being deported from Hungary or not? If not, could they be saved by accepting the proposals Brand had brought. While in Istanbul he had received a telegram which read: "Deportation not interrupted. Large camps have been arranged in Germany for old people and little children." By itself, this message could mean that no killing was taking place in the camps. But it could also mean that no deportations were taking place, as the telegram was signed with a surname, and Brand's agreed code before leaving was that any message signed by a surname "was to mean the exact opposite of what it said." Brand told Shertok he was "unable to make sense" of the message. He had telegraphed "several times" to Hungary making it plain that he could not understand it and had received no answer. Shertok had returned to Jerusalem from Aleppo on June 13. On the following morning he reported to the Jewish Agency Executive, and on June 15, together with Ben-Gurion, he went to Government House to report on his meeting with Brand to Sir Harold MacMichael. Shertok told MacMichael that he was convinced that the Nazi proposition was a serious one, sponsored by "really responsible and highly placed German authorities." He believed that the Nazis hoped that "by obtaining some credit in our eyes for not now slaughtering 2,000,000 Jews they would get away with the fact that they had slaughtered 6,000,000 Jews already," as well as an attempt to "save their own skins." Shertok also reported that Eichmann had told Brand that the "child-bearing category" of Jew was the "most difficult to

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spare at present, since they were wanted for work. Therefore, Jews might have to be content with old people and children in the first instance." Shertok went on to say that he was "convinced" that the German policy "was in fact to defer the killings," adding, as MacMichael noted, that "many Germans and their wives seemed genuinely full of compassion, though he conceded this might be spurious." Although, at this meeting of June 15, Ben-Gurion interrupted Shertok at one point to say that "it was quite likely that the whole business was a trick," Shertok went on to emphasize "the urgent and vital need to probe the whole matter and explore every avenue." It was, he felt, "essential" for there to be a meeting "with accredited German representatives," possibly by the Red Cross, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, or the American War Refugee Board. As the discussion drew to its close, Ben-Gurion asked that "if there was anything which could humanly be done in such a way as not to be of any advantage to the enemy or prejudice the war effort, he pleaded that it should be done." Commenting on Shertok's desire to open more direct negotiations with the Germans, R.M.A. Hankey noted, on June 20: He, poor fellow, is, after all, solely concerned to extricate as many Jews as he can from the clutches of the Nazis (and incidentally, to pile them into Palestine regardless of the local situation) and possibly does not care very much what the effect is on the war effort. 34

During the second week of June 1944 news was finally received in Geneva which was to transform Allied knowledge of Nazi brutality. The source of this news was the information sent from Slovakia, consisting of two separate reports: the detailed account by Vrba and Wetzler of the gassing procedure, and the news brought later by Mordowicz and Rosin, that the deportation of Hungarian Jews was actually in progress, and that they too were being gassed. Mordowicz and Rosin had reached the Slovak border on June 6 and had made contact, as Vrba and Wetzler had done, with the Slovak Jewish leadership. The two new escapees told their story — not only the facts of the nature of life and death at Auschwitz-Birkenau, as Vrba and Wetzler had related, but also their own eyewitness account of the 34

FO, 371/42758, W 9644, telegram No. 1465 and comments.

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arrival and destruction of tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews in the week before their escape. As Vrba later commented: "Wetzler and I saw the preparation for the slaughter. Mordowicz and Rosin saw the slaughter itself."35 All those in Geneva who received the Vrba-Wetzler report of the gassings were shocked and bewildered. On June 18 brief details were broadcast over the BBC as Dr. Kopecky, the representative of the Czechoslovak government, had asked, and on the following day Richard Lichtheim, the representative of the Jewish Agency in Geneva, set down his own full summary in a letter to the Jewish Agency Executive in Jerusalem. In his letter Lichtheim made it clear that as a result of the new report, "We now know exactly what has happened and where it has happened." Not only had "very large numbers" of European Jews been killed "systematically" in what Lichtheim referred to as "the well-known death camps in Poland (Treblinka, etc.)," but also in "similar establishments situated near or in the labour camp of Birkenau in Upper Silesia." Lichtheim added: There is a labour camp in Birkenau just as in many other places of Upper Silesia, and there are still many thousands of Jews working there and in neighbouring places (Jawischowitz, etc.). But apart from the labour camps proper there is a forest of birch trees near Birkenau (Brezinky) where the first large-scale killings took place in a rather "primitive" manner, while later on they were carried out in the labour camp of Β itself with all the scientific apparatus needed for this purpose, i.e., in specially constructed buildings with gas-chambers and crematoriums.

Lichtheim went on to point out that, according to the new report, not only had "many hundreds of thousands" of Polish Jews been sent to Birkenau, but also "similar" numbers of other Jews who had either been deported first to Poland, or "directly sent to Birkenau in the well-known cattle-trucks from Germany, France, Belgium, Holland, Greece, etc.," and that all of these deportees had been "killed in these establishments." The bodies of all those killed, Lichtheim reported, had been "burnt 35

Rudolf Vrba, "Footnote to Auschwitz Report," Jewish Currents, March 1966. I am also grateful to Czeslaw Mordowicz for his help in answering my queries about his escape and in guiding my research toward further material.

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in specially constructed stoves." Also burned in these stoves were those "who died by starvation or ill-treatment in the labour camps nearby." Lichtheim then informed Jerusalem that: "The total number of Jews killed in or near Birkenau is estimated at over one and a half million." What was to be the fate of the Hungarian Jews? Lichtheim's letter of June 19 informed Jerusalem that "additional reports [MordowiczRosin Report] just received" said that 12,000 Jews "are now deported from Hungary every day." Of these 12,000 deportees a day, Lichtheim wrote: "They also are sent to Birkenau." It had at last become clear what Birkenau was and what being "sent" to Birkenau meant. "It is estimated," Lichtheim wrote, "that of a total of 1,800,000 Jews or more so far sent to Upper Silesia, 90 per cent of the men and 95 per cent of the women have been killed immediately, without even being registered for work." 38 The Vrba-Wetzler report, although based entirely upon the power of two men's memories, was remarkably accurate in its details. But even before these details had reached Britain, the United States or Palestine, an urgent appeal to bomb the railway lines to Auschwitz had been put before the War Refugee Board in Washington. The source of the appeal was two short coded telegrams sent from Slovakia to Switzerland on May 16 and May 23. Both telegrams had been sent from the Orthodox community in Bratislava to Isaac Sternbuch, the representative in Switzerland of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis. Sternbuch sent them on to New York, to Jacob Rosenheim, president of the Agudat Israel World Organization. From New York, on June 18, Rosenheim sent them to the War Refugee Board. The first of the two telegrams, that of May 16, asked for "prompt disturbance of all transports, military and deportation," by the Royal Air Force and other "air raids" and recommended "bombarding" the railway between Kosice and Presov. The aim of such a bombardment would be "to save also Jews not yet deported." The message ended: "We expect Royal Air Force act very carefully." Rosenheim sent the War Refugee Board the text of the telegram, the decoded version quoted above, and a short commentary. In the commentary he noted that the Kosice-Presov railway was "the single 36

Lichtheim letter of June 19, 1944, CZA, L 2 2 / 1 3 5 .

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near route from Hungary to Poland," and that all the more eastern routes could not be used for "traffic to Poland," as there was already fighting in the areas. He added: Kaschau [Kosice] is the transit-place and main-junction for all military transports and Presov is the town through which the deportations are continued after passing Kaschau. Therefore the bombarding of these two towns is wanted. If these two places and this route be made impassable the deportations would havs to be made the long roundabout-way via Austria, which latter route — according to the advice in the wire — seems to be impossible for the Germans.

The second telegram to be sent to Washington on June 18 was that of May 23. According to the commentary sent by Rosenheim to Washington, this second telegram made three main demands: (1) to bomb most urgently without a further delay the railway lines of Kaschau and Presov, because 15,000 people are forwarded every day over this short and not disturbed route from Hungary to Poland; (2) that furthermore the town Munkacs should be bombed; (3) the bombing has to be made at once, because day after day less people could be saved and it would be very soon too late for the rescue. 37

Nearly four weeks had passed between the dispatch of this second telegram from Slovakia and its arrival in Washington. Nor did either telegram refer to Auschwitz or Birkenau: only to "Poland." Nevertheless, in forwarding it to Washington, Rosenheim asked Pehle, the director of the War Refugee Board, to use his "decisive influence" to have the plan realized and asked for the decision to be taken "after thorough consideration, without arty loss of time," adding that "every day counts, as you will see, for the destruction of thousands." In a letter that same day to Morgenthau, Rosenheim stated that "up to now, about 30,000 Jews are said to have been doomed to destruction" by deportation from Hungary "to the gas chambers of Poland." And he added that the "slackening of the process of annihilation" would be achieved "by paralyzing the railroad traffic from Hungary 37

The text of the two original telegrams of May 16 and May 23, together with the decodes and commentaries, are in WRB, Box 62, "General Correspondence of R. McClelland, F : Union of Orthodox Rabbis: Representative in Switzerland (I. Sternbuch), January-June 1944."

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to Poland, especially by an aerial bombardment of the most important railway junctions of Kaschau and Presov." 38 On June 24 Pehle went to see Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy about the bombing proposal. In a memorandum written later that day, Pehle noted how he had told McCloy "that I wanted to mention the matter to him for whatever exploration might be appropriate by the War Department," but, Pehle added, "that I had several doubts about the matter." Pehle then listed his doubts: (1) whether it would be appropriate to use military planes and personnel for this purpose; (2) whether it would be difficult to put the railroad line out of commission for a long enough period to do any good; and, (3) even assuming that these railroad lines were put out of commission for some period of time, whether it would help the Jews in Hungary.

Having expressed these doubts, Pehle had gone on, as he himself noted, to make it "very clear to Mr. McCloy" that he was not, "at this point at least, requesting the War Department to take any action on this proposal, other than to appropriately explore it." McCloy promised Pehle that he would "check into the matter." 39 Two days later the Operations Division of the War Department General Staff recommended that McCloy should reply that the suggested air operation was "impracticable" because "it could be executed only by diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations." The Operations Division added that "the most effective relief to victims of enemy persecution is the early defeat of the Axis, an undertaking to which we must devote every resource at our disposal."40 The principal "decisive operations" mentioned in this letter remained the Allied attempt to destroy all of Germany's war-making powers based upon the manufacture of synthetic oil. The continuing German success in holding up the Allied advance in Normandy added urgency to the oil campaign. On June 21, five days before Rosenheim's request had been con38 Rosenheim's two letters of June 18.1944, are in WRB, Box 35. 39 Ibid., "Memorandum for the Files." 40 Letter of Major General Thomas T. Hardy, Assistant Chief of Staff, National Archives Record Service, RG 165, Records of the War Department General and Special Staff, OPD 383-7, Section Π, Case 21.

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sidered by the Operations Division in Washington, the second Frantic mission took place, with the United States bombers flying from their English base at Lincoln across Germany, bombing the synthetic oil plant at Ruhland, south of Berlin, and flying on to Poltava. But on arrival at Poltava, the Frantic project itself came to grief, when German planes attacked Poltava airport. Not only did the Germans succeed in destroying forty-three B-17s and damaging twenty-six; they also destroyed fifteen of the Mustang fighter escort, and ignited 450,000 gallons of aircraft fuel that had been brought into Russia so laboriously throughout the spring. One American and twenty-five Russians were killed, and the Frantic shuttle was forced to delay the return operation until June 26, and to abandon any flights for the whole of July, until their Poltava fuel store had been replenished by fuel brought by truck along the long road route through Persia and the Caucasus.41 The destruction of German oil supplies had become the Allies' overriding priority by the second half of June. At the same time, the Jewish Agency's priority remained the rescue of Hungarian Jewry by negotiation with the Gestapo. At the very moment when the location and purpose of Auschwitz became completely known, the Nazis continued with the destruction of Hungarian Jewry, and the Brand mission, in my opinion, was merely a ruse of deceit. It was a deception that had succeeded for six weeks. The anguished response of the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem and London revealed that they were caught in the trap of a false hope which they could not abandon. Π It was not until June 23, 1944, that the Allies first learned that a total of more than 435,000 Hungarian Jews had been deported to Auschwitz in the previous five weeks. For on that day the co-director 41

Craven and Cate, op. cit. The sound track of a United States film of Operation Frantic, made during the autumn of 1944, states that among the supplies taken to Poltava were fuel oil, 3,000 miles, via Persia; radio equipment and operators, via Egypt and Palestine; and food and other supplies essential for the mission, 2,000 miles from Liverpool to Murmansk, then a further 2,000 miles by rail from Murmansk to Poltava. (I am grateful to Carl Foreman for the text of this sound track.)

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of the Palestine Office in Geneva, Dr. Chaim Pozner [Pazner], was handed a letter that had been sent to him from Budapest by the director of the Palestine Office there, Moshe Krausz. The information in this letter produced an impact that no earlier information had managed to produce, for it was now known in Geneva exactly what "Auschwitz" meant. The Krausz letter had been sent from Budapest on June 19 and smuggled into Switzerland by courier. It contained two enclosures. The first was yet another copy of the Vrba-Wetzler report describing the annihilation process in Auschwitz. The second enclosure set out the details, hitherto unknown in the West, of the deportation to Auschwitz of at least 435,000 Hungarian Jews between May 15 and June 19. According to this second enclosure, a further 350,000 Jews were assembled in and near Budapest awaiting deportation. In his covering letter of June 19, Krausz wrote that the whole Jewish community in Hungary was "condemned to death," and he added: "There are no exceptions, there is no escape, there is no possibility of concealment, and we have to face our fate. We have not even the possibility of escaping to a neighbouring country." 42 The urgent need revealed in the Krausz letter was to save the surviving 350,000 Hungarian Jews from deportation to Auschwitz. Action was now swift: on the following day, June 24, Dr. Gerhart Riegner, the World Jewish Congress representative in Geneva, gave a summary of the Vrba-Wetzler report to Roswell McClelland, the War Refugee Board representative in Berne. Riegner stressed, in a covering note, that these were "reliable reports" and he also included a reference to the Polish Major, who had also reported on what was happening in Auschwitz. Together with details from the Major's report Riegner added that, in agreement with Dr. Kopecky, six proposals were submitted to Washington: 1) The Allied Governments should issue a warning to the Germans and the Hungarians that they will use reprisals against the Germans living in the Allied countries. 42

Krausz to Pozner of June 19, 1944, received June 23, 1944, Yad Vashem Archives P-12/88. I am grateful to Dr. Pozner (Pazner) for his help in answering my questions about the Krausz letter and for guiding my research toward substantial documentation for this whole period.

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2) The camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau and especially the buildings containing the gas-chambers and crematoriums, recognisable by their high chimneys, as well as the sentries around the railings and the watch-towers and the industrial installations should be bombed from the air. 3) The following main railway-lines which are used for the daily transports should also be bombed: a) Kosice (Kaschau)-Kysak-Presov-Novy-Sandz [Nowy Sacz] b) Nove Mesto pod Saterom-Medzilaborce c) Munkacs-Lawoczne d) the railway-junction Cop e) Galanta-Leopoldov-Trnava-Nove Mcsto-Puchov-TrencinZilina-Cadca f) Legenye-Satoraljaujhely 4) Without mentioning in any way where this report comes from the foregoing report should be given widest publicity by radio and newspapers, so that the Germans may know that the outside world is fully informed about their atrocities. 5) The public warnings of the Allied Nations over the radio and at other occasions should be constantly repeated. 6) The Holy See should be asked to issue a strong condemnation of these crimes.43 McClelland acted immediately on receiving Riegner's letter, telegraphing details of the Vrba-Wetzler report to Washington that same day. In his telegram, after listing the principal railway deportation routes that were being used, number one being, as on Riegner's list, the Kosice-Presov line, he continued: "It is urged by all sources of this information in Slovakia and Hungary that vital sections of these lines, especially bridges along one be bombed as the only possible means of slowing down or stopping future deportations." McClelland's telegram continued with the suggestion that in order to "check" such continued deportations "we recommend British and Soviet broadcasts and especially leaflets" with which the Vatican "should be prevailed upon to associate itself." The telegram ended:

43

Archives of the World Jewish Congress, General Secretariat, Geneva.

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There is little doubt that many of these Hungarian Jews are being sent to the extermination camps of Auschwitz (Oswiecim) and Birkenau (Rajska)* in eastern Upper Silesia where according to recent reports, since early summer 1942 at least 1,500,000 Jews have been killed. There is evidence that already in January 1944 preparations were being made to receive and exterminate Hungarian Jews in these camps. Soon a detailed report on these camps will be cabled.

On reaching the War Refugee Board, McClelland's telegram made a particular impact on Benjamin Akzin, one of the Board's officials. In an inter-office communication on June 29, Akzin argued that the destruction of the "physical installations" at Auschwitz and Birkenau "might appreciably slow down the systematic slaughter at least temporarily." Akzin's letter was a sustained attempt to argue in favor of the bombing of the gas chambers and crematoria. The "methodical German mind," he believed, would require some time to rebuild the installations, "or to evolve elsewhere equally efficient procedures of mass slaughter and of disposing of the bodies." During this time some lives at least might be saved. But the saving of lives might also be "quite considerable," since, as he wrote, "with German manpower and material resources gravely depleted, German authorities might not be in a position to devote themselves to the task of equipping new large-scale extermination centers." Akzin also argued in favor of the bombing "as a matter of principle," as it would constitute, he wrote, "the most tangible — and perhaps the only tangible — evidence of the indignation aroused by the existence of these charnel-houses." One other factor was raised by Akzin in favor of bombing Auschwitz and Birkenau — that during the bombing there would also be many deaths "among the most ruthless and despicable of the Nazis." In bombing Auschwitz, Akzin added, there would be no "deflecting" of United States aerial strength from any important zone of military objectives, as Auschwitz itself was in just such a zone, the "mining and manufacturing centers" of Katowice and Chorzow, "which play an important part in the industrial armament of Germany." Akzin ended:

*

This should be Rajsko. — Ed.

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Presumably, a large number of Jews in these camps may be killed in the course of such bombings (though some of them may escape in the confusion). But such Jews are doomed to death anyhow. The destruction of the camps would not change their fate, but it would serve as visible retribution on their murderers and it might save the lives of future victims. It will be noted that the inevitable fate of Jews herded in ghettoes near the industrial and railroad installations in Hungary has not caused the United Nations to stop bombing these installations. It is submittted, therefore, that refraining from bombing the extermination centers would be sheer misplaced sentimentality, far more cruel than a decision to destroy these centers.4,1

Nothing came of Akzin's appeal. "It wasn't my job to write this sort of memorandum," he later recalled. "Sometimes, when I got excited, I put it on paper. But I was the only European fellow there — I had been born in Riga. All the others were typical Americans who knew little about Europe." 45 On the day that Benjamin Akzin made his plea for the bombing of Auschwitz and Birkenau, his superiors on the War Refugee Board sent a copy of McClelland's telegram to the Assistant Secretary of War, John J. McCIoy. McCloy's executive assistant, Colonel Harrison A. Gerhardt, had already been involved in the rejection of the Rosenheim railway bombing request only three days before. He at once noted for McCIoy, on this second bombing suggestion: "I know you told me to 'kill' this but since those instructions, we have received the attached letter from Mr. Pehle. I suggest that the attached reply be sent." The attached reply, duly signed and sent by McCIoy on July 4, turned down the request, using similar reasons to those of the Operations Division in turning down the Rosenheim proposal.49 In Hungary the deportations continued without respite, and on June 25, the day after McClelland's telegram had reached Washington, more than 15,000 Hungarian Jews were deported to Auschwitz. On June 26, while these deportations were still in progress, the second Frantic shuttle, now recovered from the German attack on Poltava airport, flew back to Italy. On its return it bombed the oil plant at 44 45 46

WRB, Box 35. Benjamin Akzin, conversation with the author, Jerusalem, December 23, 1980. Gerhardt's note is quoted in Wyman, op. cit., p. 39.

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Drohobycz. In all, 71 Flying Fortresses and 51 Mustangs took part in this return flight. Their flight path took them across several of the main deportation railways.47 Also on June 26, the third aerial reconnaissance to fly over Auschwitz and Birkenau recorded, from an altitude of 30,000 feet, the layout of both camps. As on the two previous occasions, the object of the photographs was to locate and portray the I.G. Farben factory at Monowitz. But, as before, further photographs had been taken to ensure that Monowitz really was within view of the camera, with the result that one of the frames showed all of Auschwitz and all of Birkenau. 48 One of the photographs showed all of Monowitz, Auschwitz I and Birkenau within a single frame. Twenty showed Monowitz alone. But it was not Auschwitz I or Birkenau, but Monowitz, at which the camera had been aimed, and it was Monowitz alone which, if the detail in the photographs could be exact enough, would become a target for Allied bombers. The first analysis of the Monowitz photographs was made two days later. "Although the gas plants are active,'' it was noted, "there is no evidence of production of synthetic oil." One of the generators of the water gas plant did, however, have "a smoking chimney," and five gas-holders were full. In the synthetic rubber section, "considerable progress had been made. A second kiln had been completed and a third was well advanced." Elsewhere, progress in construction had been "considerable," and it seemed probable that the synthetic rubber section "is now working at about' half its planned capacity." 49 The photographs of June 26 were analyzed in even greater detail three days later. "The works sidings are served by the OswiecimDziedzice railway. There are generally good rail and road connections with the surrounding area and with the other refineries and synthetic oil plants in this vicinity." Construction work at the synthetic oil plant had been "proceeding rapidly," since the first reconnaissance of April 4: "one of the three sets of hydrogenations stalls appeared completed;

47 48 49

Craven and Cate, op. cit. Exposure 5022, Can. CI 172, Mission 60/PR522 60 SQ. Scale 1:60,000. USSBS, RG 373. Ibid., Interpretation Report No. D326R, Prints 4043 to 4048.

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the other two pairs appear almost complete." As for "personnel," these were "seen scattered throughout area," as were large numbers of trucks, "seen in many parts of the plant — some in motion." Mechanical excavators "are seen at work in many sections of the plant" while visible throughout the plant area were "piles of construction materials and equipment awaiting erection." The aerial photographs of June 26 showed, nevertheless, that completion of "all the installations" would take "considerable time," but that once they were completed, Monowitz would have a capacity to produce 20,000 tons of synthetic rubber a year from its " B u n a " installation, and an eventual 375,000 tons of synthetic oil. But the immediate synthetic oil production, using the single completed hydrogenalion stall was estimated at only 62,500 tons a year, while if the two stalls under construction were also in use, as they "appear almost complete," this figure would be increased to 180,000 tons. The intelligence report noted that the foundations had been laid for four more stalls, hence the eventual high productive capacity. 50 Hence, also, the urgency for bombing. One of the June 26 photographs of Monowitz was attached to this second report, and a total of sixty-two items marked on it, including the completed, partially completed, and planned stalls in the synthetic oil plant, and the whole process of synthetic rubber production in the Buna Plant. Also identified was a light metal plant for the reduction of aluminum, then under construction, and the "Concentration Camp," which had also been identified on the photographs and plan of April 4. No reference was made in either of the two intelligence reports to the photcjgraph that also showed Auschwitz I and Birkenau. This section of the photograph was clearly of no relevance to those whose task was to pinpoint the industrial production of oil and rubber. Looking at the photograph today, one can identify in it several of the features mentioned in the Vrba-Wetzler report, including the small wood, the four gas chambers, the four crematoria, and the special railway spur running from the main line into Birkenau. There is even a train on the siding inside Birkenau.

50

Ibid., Mediterranean Allied Photo Reconnaissance Wing, Report N o . H . l . l l ( P ) of July 1, 1944, "Activity at the I.G. Farbenindustrie Synthetic Oil and Synthetic Rubber Works at Oswiecim (Poland)."

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The Jewish organizations in Switzerland were anxious to get the information about Auschwitz and the Hungarian deportations to Churchill himself. "I shall be grateful if you will kindly cable the attached urgent message to London," Lichtheim wrote to Douglas MacKillop at the British Legation in Berne on June 26. And he added: "More and more reports are coming in about the awful fate of the Hungarian Jews and the mass murders committed by the Germans in the deathcamps of Poland and Upper Silesia."51 MacKillop acted immediately, and shortly before 8 P.M. on June 26, the British Minister in Berne, Clifford Norton, telegraphed the Foreign Office the text of a message from Lichtheim for the Jewish Agency. The telegram, marked urgent, reached London at 4 A.M. on June 27. Its first part summarized the Krausz letter of June 19, and read: Received fresh reports from Hungary stating that nearly one half total of 800,000 Jews in Hungary have already been deported at a rate of 10,000 to 12,000 per diem. Most of these transports are sent to the death camp of Birkenau near Oswiecim in Upper Silesia where in the course of last year over 1,500,000 Jews from all over Europe have been killed. We have detailed reports about the numbers and methods employed. The four crematoriums in Birkenau have a capacity for gassing and burning 60,000s2 per diem. In Budapest and surroundings there are still between 300,000 and 400,000 Jews left including those incorporated in labour service but no Jews are left in eastern and northern provinces and according to a letter from our manager of Palestine office Budapest, the remaining Jews in and around Budapest have no hope to be spared.

The second part of the Lichtheim telegram set out the measures that the Jewish organizations in Geneva felt were urgent. The first was that the facts themselves, "which are confirmed by various letters and reports from reliable sources," should be given the "widest publicity" and that the Hungarian government "should again be warned that they will be held responsible because they are aiding the Germans with their own police to arrest and deport and thus murder the Jews." There 51 CZA, L22/56. 52 This figure was a telegraphic error. The correct figure, as given in the original message, was 12,000 a day. In the fifty consecutive days between May 18 and July 7, 1944, more than 300,000 Hungarian Jews had been murdered in the four gas chambers at Birkenau, making a minimum daily average over the whole period between 8,000 and 9,000.

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then followed four further suggestions: the first, "reprisals against Germans in Allied hands"; the second, "bombing of railway lines leading from Hungary to Birkenau"; the third, "precision bombing of death camp installations"; and the fourth, the bombing of "all Government buildings" in Budapest.53 On June 28, at Weizmann's suggestion, Shertok asked to see Eden himself. Eden was reluctant to agree to a meeting, minuting that same day to his Private Secretary: "What do you say? Must I? Which of my colleagues looks after this? Minister of State or Mr. Hall? At least the one of them responsible should be there to see these two Jews. Weizmann doesn't usually take much time." 54 It was George Hall who agreed to see Shertok and Weizmann, without Eden having to be present, on June 30. At that meeting Shertok again asked that Brand be allowed to leave Cairo and return to Budapest. His return should only be delayed, Shertok argued, "if there were a chance of his being thus enabled to take a definite answer." Shertok then stressed that "as time was desperately short" two immediate steps should be taken: a message should be sent by the Allied governments, through the Protecting Power to the German government to say "that the Allies are prepared to meet the Germans to discuss rescue of the Jews in general"; while at the same time the War Refugee Board "should meet representatives of the Gestapo." Shertok favored using the War Refugee Board in order to avoid any official approach through the Protecting Power meeting with "a formal refusal." Any reply to the Brand proposals, he added, should include a statement that the Allies expected that the deportations "would stop in the meanwhile." The meeting ended with Shertok making two further suggestions; "that there might be a wireless warning to the railwaymen of Hungary not to carry Jews to death camps," and that "death camps should be bombed," a suggestion, he said, that had originated with Krausz." Shertok's first point, the wireless warning, was taken up at once and was put into immediate effect. Five days later, on July 5, the Political 53 54 55

Norton telegram, No. 2949, Urgent, War Cabinet Distribution, copy in Premier papers, 4 / 5 1 / 1 0 . FO, 371/42807, WR 49, folio 70. "Record of an Interview granted by Mr. Hall to Dr. Weizmann and Mr. Shertok," FO, 371/42807, WR 49, folio 73.

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Warfare Executive arranged for a senior Trade Unionist, Mr. Marchbanks, of the International Transport Workers Federation, to broadcast an appeal, which was repeated on the following day, warning Hungarian railway workers not to carry Jews to the death camps, and on July 11 a further similar appeal was arranged at the specific request of the Foreign Office.58 The second point passed on by Shertok, that the death camps should be bombed, was also taken up. Although the distance from British bases was too great for a precision night bombing attack by the Royal Air Force, this target was within the range of a daylight raid by the United States Air Force. But it would need to be given a very high priority indeed, with Germany's oil resources still a grave danger to the Allied advance both from east and west. For this reason the Americans turned down the earlier request to bomb the railways. "The War Department," McCloy wrote to Pehle on July 4, "is of the opinion that the suggested air operation is impracticable." He went on to explain: It could be executed only by the diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations and would in any case be of such very doubtful efficacy that it would not amount to a practical project. 57

One opponent of the proposal to bomb the camps themselves was Leon Kubowitzki, the head of the Rescue Department of the World Jewish Congress. At the same time that the War Department was turning down the railway bombing request, Kubowitzki was warning the War Refugee Board that the destruction of the death installations "can not be done from the air, as the first victims would be the Jews who are gathered in these camps." Kubowitzki had a second objection. Such a bombing, he wrote, "would be a welcome pretext for the Germans to assert that their Jewish victims have been massacred not by their killers, but by the Allied bombing." The plan that Kubowitzki favored, and which he had already mentioned to the War Refugee Board at a meeting on June 28, was for an American approach to the Soviet government "with the request that it should dispatch groups of paratroopers to seize the buildings, to annihilate the squads of murderers, and to free the unfortunate in56 57

Ibid., folios 70-1. Wyman, op. cit., p. 39.

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mates." At the same time, Kubowitzki wrote, the Americans should ask the Polish government "to instruct the Polish underground to attack these and similar camps to destroy the instruments of death." 58 Kubowitzki's appeal for a paratroop action was not even put by the War Refugee Board to the War Department. As Pehle himself explained to Morgenthau two months later: At this stage of the war, it did not seem proper to suggest to the War Department the diversion of military equipment or military personnel to non-military purposes. Furthermore, aerial and paratroop raids of this kind must entail casualties on the part of the raiders and w e did not feel justified in asking the War Department to undertake a measure which involved the sacrifice of American troops.

Pehle also commented on Kubowitzki's request that the Polish Government-in-Exile should "direct its underground forces to destroy the death camps and free the prisoners there," a request, he said, first made on June 27 by Dr. Isaac Schwarzbart of the Polish National Council to the Polish prime minister. This request had not been acted on, Pehle noted, and he added: In view of the apparently deep-rooted anti-Semitism on the part of a large segment of the Polish Government and underground movement, it seemed most unlikely that the Poles would, in good faith, undertake to attack the death centers effectively unless strong political pressure involving political support were asserted. A s a matter of fact, it is very doubtful whether the Poles had the necessary forces to carry out any such operation. 5 0

On July 6, 1944, the Jewish Agency's two most senior representatives in London, Chaim Weizmann and Moshe Shertok, went to the Foreign Office to see Anthony Eden. The Agency's principal objective throughout this meeting was to accelerate the return of Brand to Budapest, and by this means to hold out at least some possibility of offering the Germans a deal for the rescue of the remaining Jews of Hungary. Nothing was known of Horthy's order to halt the deportations. Indeed, for another twelve days both the Allies and the Jewish Agency believed that the deportations were still in full force. During their discussion Weizmann told Eden that originally he had thought "that time might still be gained" for Hungarian Jewry. Now, 58 59

Letter of July 1, 1944, WRB, Box 35. Letter of September 6, 1944, WRB, Box 33. F : Hungary, No. 1.

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however, he said, "the catastrophe was right on them." What he and the Jewish Agency hoped was that Brand would be allowed "to go back" to Budapest. In addition, Weizmann told Eden, "an offer had been made from the other side to one of their friends in Istanbul, Mr. Bader, to go to Budapest, guaranteeing his safe return." Weizmann suggested that "it would be a good thing" if this second emissary, Menahem Bader, were to go to Budapest with Brand. It was Moshe Shertok who stressed what he called the "significant fact" of the Bader proposal. This showed, he said, "that the matter was still alive, and that the Germans seemed prepared to strike a bargain." Even if Brand were not allowed to return to Budapest, Bader "should be allowed to proceed." It might be a trap. But, on the other hand, "all it might boil down to might be a question of money." The Jewish Agency believed, Shertok told Eden, "that if that was so, the ransom should be paid." Eden rejected, however, all idea of "anything that looked like negotiating with the enemy." It was, he said, "too dangerous." As for Brand, however, Eden now revealed that the British government "would be prepared to let him go back." The problem was that "Soviet consent was essential," and that was clearly not forthcoming. Shertok replied that unless Brand could report to the Germans "that there would be a meeting," there was "little point in his returning," and he added: "The Germans — at any rate that particular group — seemed anxious to meet, and the whole question was whether that desire of theirs could not be used as a lever for saving Jews." Eden confirmed that "it was intended to put through the Protecting Power" certain proposals, such as the admission of 20,000 Jewish children into Switzerland, and " a similar proposal" regarding Sweden, as well as the emigration of people on "approved lists" to Palestine. According to the Jewish Agency's own note of the interview, Weizmann then "ran briefly through the other items" of an aide-mimoire that he had brought with him, those items "not connected with Joel Brand's mission." Eden "promised consideration" and was, as the note recorded, "particularly impressed by the proposal that Marshal Stalin should be approached with a view to his issuing a warning to the Hungarians." 60 60

"Note of Interview with the Right Hon. Anthony Eden, Foreign Office, Thursday, July 6, 1944, at 3.15 p.m." Secret. CZA, Z4/14870.

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The aide-memoire from which Weizmann read, and which he left with Eden, comprised six paragraphs. The first was based on the reports that had been received from Geneva and Istanbul, and particularly the Krausz letter of June 19, and spoke of the deportation already of 400,000 "to the death camps" of Birkenau itself, and repeated the Vrba-Wetzler information that "over 1,500,000 Jews from all over Europe" had been killed there. The first paragraph ended: "In and around Budapest there are still over 300,000 Jews awaiting their doom. According to the Istanbul message their deportation was to have started this week." The second paragraph of the aide-memoire stated that what" is called "the stage of temporising in the hope of prolonging the victims' lives" appeared to be over and that "some definite steps must immediately be taken" if what was described as "the admittedly remote chance of saving Hungarian Jewry was not to be missed." The Jewish Agency realized, as the second paragraph expressed it, that its "proposals for action" were "unorthodox, and perhaps unprecedented." They were, nevertheless, considered "warranted by the present tragedy, which is also without parallel or precedent." There then followed the Jewish Agency's proposals — beginning with the one that had dominated the actual discussion with Eden and which had been at the center of ithe Jewish Agency's request since Shertok's interview with Brand in Aleppo on June 12, more than three weeks before — that "an intimation should be given to Germany that some appropriate body is ready to meet for discussing the rescue of Jews." This proposal was elaborated in the aide-mimoire as follows: . . . a representative of the American War Refugee Board, if necessary seconded by a British official, should be ready to meet at Istanbul a member of the Nazi group in Budapest, to explore possibilities of rescue. Joel Brand, and if only possible, his former escort, should be allowed to return to Hungary; Brand being authorized to inform the other side of the course that will have been decided upon.

The Jewish Agency could not abandon, perhaps it had no right to abandon, hope that a deal with the Gestapo was possible. The fact that any Gestapo offer to release Jews "must have ulterior motives — avowed or hidden" was, the aide-mömoire stressed, fully appreciated. "It was not however improbable," it continued, "that in the false hope of achieving these ends, they would be prepared to let out a certain

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number of Jews — large or small." Hence 'the Agency maintained that if, in the last resort, it were only a question of money, ; "the ransom should be paid." The Jewish Agency's aide-memoire ended with a sixth paragraph, setting out, "apart from the question of Joel Brand's mission," five "urgent suggestions." The first suggestion was that the Allies should publish a declaration "expressing their readiness to admit Jewish fugitives to all their territories, and stating that they have in this the support of neutrals — Switzerland, Sweden, Spain and possibly Turkey — who were preparing to give temporary shelter to Jewish refugees escaping massacres." The second suggestion was that the Swiss government "in particular" should be asked to instruct its representatives in Hungary that it was willing to allow Jewish refugees into Switzerland and would at the same time "issue such documents to the largest possible number of people as might in the interim afford them some protection." The third Jewish Agency suggestion was that a "stern warning to Hungarian officials, railwaymen, and the population in general, be published and broadcast, to the effect that anyone convicted of having taken part in the rounding-up, deportation and extermination of Jews will be considered to be a war criminal and treated accordingly." It was the fourth proposal in the Jewish Agency aide-memoire that had impressed Eden. This was that Stalin should be approached "to issue a similar warning to Hungary on part of the Soviet Union." The fifth and final Jewish Agency request was a brief but positive one: "that 'the railway line leading from Budapest to Birkenau, and the death camps at Birkenau and other places, should be bombed." 01 Toward the end of their discussion, referring to this last point, Eden told Weizmann and Shertok that "as regards bombing," he had "already got in touch with the Air Ministry about the bombing of the death camps. He would now add the suggestion about bombing the railway." The meeting was about to end. As one last point, Weizmann told Eden of what he believed to be "the one conclusion to be drawn from the whole tragedy; to create a state of things which would soon make 61

"Aide-Memoire,"

ibid.

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its recurrence impossible." Here was the nub of the Zionist case: the need for a Jewish self-governing authority in its own land. Weizmann hoped "that an opportunity would soon present itself of discussing this aspect of the problem with Mr. Eden." 62 The Weizmann-Shertok-Eden interview was over. In sending an account of it to Churchill that same day, Eden reported Weizmann's appeal "that we should do something to mitigate the appalling slaughter of Jews in Hungary." Eden added that according to the Jewish Agency's "information," 60,000 Jews a day were being "gassed and burnt at the death camp of Birkenau," and, he commented: "This may well be an exaggeration." It was indeed an exaggeration, the result of a telegraphic error: for Mordowicz-Rosin and Krausz had both accurately reported a daily death toll of 12,000. Nevertheless, Eden raised with Churchill three of the suggestions that Weizmann had made following their discussion of the Brand mission. Eden informed Churchill that Weizmann "recognized that there was little His Majesty's Government could do," but suggested that something might be done "to stop the operation of this death camp" by bombing the railway lines to it and to "similar camps," and also by bombing the camps themselves "so as to destroy .the plant used for gassing and cremation." Eden told Churchill that the idea of bombing the railway lines had "already been considered," 63 but that he had told Weizmann "that I would now re-examine it and the further suggestions of bombing the camps themselves." Eden told Churchill: " I am in favour of acting on both suggestions." Weizmann had suggested that "a greater impression might be made upon the obduracy of the Hungarians," if Stalin were to issue a warning to them "couched in the strongest terms." Eden added: I told Dr. Weizmann that I would consider this suggestion. I am in favour of it. You will remember that the Soviet Government joined His 62 63

"Note of Interview . . . " ibid. Both in this discussion, and in his report of it to Churchill, Eden referred to a previous British consideration of the bombing request. But, so far, neither my own research in the archives of the Prime Minister, the Foreign Office or the Air Ministry, nor the research of others, have found any other reference to what was meant by this, or what, if anything, had been already done. The search for this evidence continues.

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Majesty's Government and the United States Government in 1942 in a declaration condemning similar atrocities and pledging themselves to exact retribution. The most appropriate form of approach would, I think, be a message from yourself to Marshal Stalin. Would you be willing to do this?

Eden also told Churchill of Weizmann's suggestion that Menahem Bader should be allowed to visit Hungary, and of his own dislike of anything "which might be interpreted as negotiation with the enemy." Moreover, Eden told Churchill, "there would be no hope of inducing Marshal Stalin to make the proposed declaration if he suspected that we were in contact with the enemy behind his back." 64 As soon as Churchill read Eden's minute, he replied with support both for the bombing proposals and for the appeal to Stalin, but rejected any follow-up of the Brand mission. His minute to Eden, dated July 7, read: Is there any reason to raise these matters at the Cabinet? You and I are in entire agreement. Get anything out of the Air Force you can, and invoke me if necessary. Certainly appeal to Stalin. On no account have the slightest negotiations, direct or indirect, with the Huns. By all means bring it up if you wish to, but I do not think it is necessary.®3

Effectively, from this Churchill minute of June 7, the Brand mission, on which the Jewish Agency had, throughout almost the whole period of the actual deportations, put its principal hopes, was in eclipse, though not yet formally discarded. But there still remained the other proposals. The priority of documents and certificates over bombing can easily be understood. It was by means of Palestine certificates and foreign passports that, over the past four years, several hundred Jews had been rescued from Nazi-occupied Europe, by a process, as those who worked in the Palestine Offices in Geneva or Bucharest have confirmed, at once slow, frustrating, and rewarding. Thus on July 6, the very day of the aide-memoire, Chaim Barlas was able to telegraph from Istanbul to Jerusalem: "exchange transport 283 refugees from Holland arrived, including 222 from concentration camp Bergen-Belsen, and 61 from Vittel. Leaving tonight by train for Palestine." 68 64 Foreign Secretary's Minute, P.M. 44/501, Premier papers, 4/51/10. 65 Prime Minister's Personal Minute, Μ 800/4, Premier papers, 4/51/10. 66 CZA, S25/1678.

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Ironically, Allied air power had almost prevented this train of refugees from leaving Europe, for at the Bulgarian border the railway line had been attacked "by an Allied bomber formation."«7 The instruction to the Air Ministry to report on the feasibility of bombing both the railways to Auschwitz and the camp itself, as well as the draft message to Stalin were both dated July 7. They had thus both been put in hand within twenty-four hours of Weizmann's request, and on the same day that Churchill had given them his explicit approval. More than that, Churchill had been so aware of the urgency as to tell Eden to bypass the Cabinet. On the following day, the last mass deportation from Hungary took place. Auschwitz itself was still receiving transports from elsewhere. But these other deportations were not yet known to the Jewish Agency, and it was to be another month before they were put forward as a reason for bombing the railways or the camp. On August 8, when the World Jewish Congress appealed to the War Refugee Board in Washington on behalf of Ernest Frischer, a member of the Czechoslovak Government-in-Exile in London, to bomb the gas chambers, crematoria, and railways leading into Auschwitz, Frischer wrote: I believe that destruction of gas chambers and crematoria in Oswieczim by bombing would have a certain effect now. Germans are n o w exhuming and burning corpses in an effort to conceal their crimes. This could be prevented by destruction of crematoria and then Germans might possibly stop further mass exterminations especially since so little time is left to them. Bombing of railway communications in this same area would also be of importance and of military interest."8

Six days later, on August 14, this appeal was rejected by John McCloy, with the same phrases which he and his assistant, Gerhardt, had used a month before. McCloy added, in a new line of argument: "There has been considerable opinion to the effect that such an effort, even if practicable, might provoke even more vindictive action by the Germans." 69 67 68 69

Jewish Telegraphic Agency report, printed in its Daily News 12, 1944. WRB, Box 35. Wyman, op. at., p. 40.

Bulletin,

July

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Meanwhile, confused by Horthy's order to halt the Hungarian deportations to Auschwitz, the Foreign Office discussed whether Auschwitz was still a priority as far as the bombing proposal was concerned. On August 20 Eden's Assistant Private Secretary, Guy Millard, minuted to Richard Allen, of the Foreign Office . . Birkenau is in Upper Silesia, formerly Poland, and is presumably being used by the Germans for incinerating German and Polish Jews as well as Hungarian?" and he went on to ask: "Have we any information to suggest that it is still being used? If it is, presumably the Jews will still want us to bomb it." Allen doubted whether bombing Auschwitz was still a priority. "I know of no information," he replied, "other than that in WR 276/10/9, suggesting that Jews are being gassed and burnt at Birkenau. It may well be so but I cannot recall having seen any recent confirmation. . . ." 70 On September 1, Richard Law, the Minister of State at the Foreign Office, wrote directly to Weizmann, referring back to Weizmann's request of July 6 for the bombing of the camps, or of the railway lines to them. " I am sorry to have to tell you that in view of the very great technical difficulties involved, we have no option but to refrain from pursuing the proposal in present circumstances." 71 This letter was originally to have been signed by Eden himself. In it were two passages that were cut out of the letter that was sent. After referring to the "very great technical difficulties involved," the original draft had gone on to say: "not to mention the diversion which would be necessary of material of vital importance at this critical stage of the war." A second passage in the original draft had referred to the British reasons, technical and material, being "reinforced by our information that the deportations have virtually ceased." This passage was also deleted before the letter was sent.72 The Jewish Agency knew, as they had informed the Foreign Office, that the deportations were continuing, even if news of them took weeks, and sometimes months, to emerge. The first bombing raid on the synthetic oil and rubber plant at 70

Millard and A l l e n minutes, F O , 371 / 4 2 8 0 9 , W R 731.

71

Ibid.,

371 / 4 2 8 1 4 , W R 749, f o l i o 200.

72

Ibid.,

f o l i o 199.

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Monowitz took place on August 20. The raid was flown by the 15th United States Air Force from their base at Foggia in southern Italy. During the raid, which began at 10:32 in the evening and lasted for twenty-eight minutes, 127 Flying Fortresses dropped a total of 1,336 500-pound high-explosive bombs from an altitude of between 26,000 and 29,000 feet. Only one of the bombers was shot down. Against the nineteen German fighters that rose to intercept them, the Americans had been able to send an escort of 100 Mustangs. The intelligence reports on the Monowitz raid of August 20 were completed three days later, following a scrutiny of aerial photographs taken immediately after the raid. The "main weight of the attack," it appeared, had fallen on the central and eastern part of the works, "where there is very considerable damage to installations and buildings." Owing to the dispersed nature of the various plants, however, "many hits have been scored on the open ground between buildings and damage is therefore not so spectacular as it might otherwise be." It seemed "probable" that the blast from these hits on open ground "must have caused a considerable amount of damage to installations" not visible on the photographs. Several buildings in the synthetic oil plant were seen to have been "severely damaged," and there was "probably also some blast damage" to one of the three active hydrogenation stalls. Heavy damage was recorded by the aerial photographs in the aluminum production plant, as well as "considerable damage to stores, buildings, contractors sheds and offices, and to huts and buildings in the various labour camps adjoining the work." 73 That day, August 24, there were, including the women, a total of some 135,000 Jews and non-Jews at Auschwitz, of whom 30,000 were working at Monowitz-Buna and kept in the Monowitz barracks. Guarding these starving and weakened slave laborers were 120 officers and 3,250 German soldiers. On the following day, August 25, American airplanes again flew over Auschwitz. Once more their task was to photograph the Mono73

Mediterranean Allied Photo Reconnaissance Wing, Interpretation Report No. D.B.I89 of August 23, 1944, GS-5612: Poland, Oswiecim (11.15 hours) Synthetic Oil and Rubber Works, USSBS, RG 373.

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witz industrial plant. Once more the camera also took pictures of Auschwitz Main Camp, of Birkenau, of the railway sidings, the gas chambers and the crematoria. The approximate location of these areas, and in particular the location of the gas chambers, the crematoria and the birch wood, had already been indicated, together with the huts in the women's camp at Birkenau and the huts in Auschwitz Main Camp in the sketch-map sent by Linton to the British Foreign Office on August 18, and acknowledged by the Foreign Office four days later. One of the photographs of August 25 actually showed Jews on the way from a train to a gas chamber and crematorium, the gate of which is seen to be open to receive them. Two gas chambers and crematoria are visible in the photograph of August 25. The outline of the underground gas chambers is seen, as are the vents in the gas-chamber ceiling. Part of the deliberate Nazi deception can also be made out: the special landscaped garden built inside the entrance, which was designed to lull those who were being led to their deaths into some sense of normality. In the photograph of August 25, Crematorium II and its chimney stand out particularly boldly in the sunlight. There is also a large pit behind Crematorium II: probably one of the pits that was being used for the open burning of bodies when the capacity of the crematorium itself was exceeded. In another part of the same photograph, recently arrived deportees can be seen lining up outside the registration building. No attempt was made to link the details on Linton's sketch-map with any of the aerial photographs of Birkenau, which dated back to May 31. Meanwhile, plans for the bombing of the Auschwitz area continued to be made. On August 25 a second intelligence report on the Monowitz raid of five days before revealed "considerable activity" of pedestrians, motor vehicles and light railway engines "over the whole area of the plant," as progress was made in clearing the bomb damage, "and particularly with roof repairs." Two of the buildings that had been slightly damaged, a gas holder and a water gas plant, were both being repaired, and the water gas plant "now appears to be operative." In addition, it looked as if an attempt were being made to start an anti-aircraft smoke screen "from smoke pots scattered about the factory area." 74 74 Ibid., Interpretation Report No. D.B.19I of August 25, 1944, GS-5612: "Poland, Oswiecim (10.35 hours) Synthetic Oil and Rubber Works."

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The sole purpose of the photographic reconnaissance over Auschwitz on August 25 was to look yet again at the damage done during the raid of August 20 and to see what further repairs were being made. Once more, both Auschwitz I and Birkenau appear in part in five of the photograps.™ But the intelligence assessment made no reference to these exposures, nor did it have any reason to do so. Over Monowitz it noted, "some slight clearances and repairs were seen," but as to the six "primary objectives," at the first, the boiler house and generator hall, "no damage seen"; at the second, the water gas plant, "no damage seen"; at the third, the H 2 S removal plant, "no damage seen"; at the CO, and CO removal plant "small installation partly wrecked," at the gas conversion plant, "no damage seen"; and at the injector houses, "no damage seen." This was a disappointing result. "The damage received," the report concluded, "is not sufficient to interfere seriously with synthetic fuel production, and should not greatly delay completion of this part of the plant." 76 A photograph attached to this report showed one of the aerial shots taken over Monowitz on August 25. In it, hundreds of bomb craters are clearly visible. The photograph was accompanied by a plan on which all damaged and destroyed buildings were marked. Also identified were 151 different buildings, including a group of buildings at the southeastern edge of Monowitz listed as "Concentration Camp." This was, in fact, the slave labor camp at Auschwitz III, with 30,000 Jews who had been brought from Birkenau. But this was not known to the interpreters. More than seventy huts and other buildings were visible, but not specifically identified, inside this particular complex, recognized as a camp, but not commented on further in any way.TT The Allied bombing of synthetic fuel plants in the Auschwitz-Birkenau area continued. On August 27 a further 350 heavy bombers 75 76 77

Ibid., exposures 3182 to 3185, Mission 60 PR/694, 60 SQ, Can. F5367, Scale 1:10,000, Altitude 30,000 feet. Ibid., Interpretation Report No. D.P.95 of August 30, 1944, GS 5612, "Poland, Locality: Oswiecim (Auschwitz)." Ibid., the photograph was Exposure 4176, Mission 60 PR/694, 60 Squadron, August 25, 1944, Altitude 30,000 feet. The plan was "Oswiecim: I.G.F. Synthetic Rubber and Synthetic Oil Plant, D. Section, Map RW, Copied from A.C.I.U. Plan No. D/410."

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struck at Blechhammer, and on August 29 a total of 218 heavy bombers struck Moravska Ostrava and Bohumin, both within 45 miles of Auschwitz I and Birkenau. III Despite the American War Department's rejections of the various appeals to bomb the railways leading to Auschwitz, or the gas chambers and crematoria in the camp itself, one officer of the War Refugee Board continued to press his superiors for action. This was Benjamin Akzin, who on September 2 wrote directly to Pehle to point out that the War Department rejection "quite likely stems from the habitual reluctance of the military to act upon civilian suggestions." Akzin reminded Pehle that the War Refugee Board had been created precisely in order to "overcome the inertia" and even, in some cases, the "insufficient interest" of the various government departments "in regard to the saving of Jewish victims of Nazi Germany." He went on to urge Pehle to go directly to Roosevelt. " I am certain," Akzin added, "that the President, once acquainted with the facts, would realize the values involved and, cutting through the inertia-motivated objections of the War Department, would order the immediate bombing of the objectives suggested." No such approach was made to Roosevelt. Nor was any action taken on a further appeal forwarded by Akzin from Isaac Sternbuch in Switzerland on behalf of Rabbi Weissmandel of Nitra in Slovakia, pleading for the bombing of railroad junctions between Budapest and Silesia, on the grounds that, since August 28, the "deportations of Jews from Budapest" had begun, and that 12,000 Jews had already been deported "to Oswiecim, in Upper Silesia." 78 This information was in fact incorrect; no such deportation had taken place. Day by day the Jewish Agency in London had likewise sought new means of rescue and relief: greater Red Cross activity, including visits to camps inside Germany, more certificates for Palestine, the dispatch of Agency emissaries and aid to the newly liberated countries, and approaches to the Soviet Union. The list was long, the requests frequent, and the agony apparent in every appeal. 78

WRB, Box 34.

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The very act of appealing seemed sometimes to offend. When on September 7, A.G. Brotman, Secretary of the British Board of Deputies, asked the Foreign Office to approach the Soviet Union on behalf of Jews in those areas of Rumania that were being liberated by the Red Army, one official, A.R. Dew, noted: "In my opinion a disproportionate amount of the time of the Office is wasted on dealing with these wailing Jews." He was, however, rebuked. "The Jews," wrote one of his colleagues, Lady Cheetham, "have been given cause to wail by their sufferings under the Nazi regime."70 The Board of Deputies' request was turned down by Eden on September 9. Yitzhak Gruenbaum made one further effort to persuade the Allies to reconsider the request to bomb Auschwitz. On September 13 he telegraphed from Jerusalem to Shertok in London that the newly installed Hungarian government had ordered the deportations to resume. "Daily transports," he wrote, "ten, twelve thousand Jews being prepared Oswiecim via Zilina, Pruska." Others, some 15,000 according to a "reliable report," had been deported, not to Auschwitz, but to Germany. Gruenbaum proposed three immediate measures: a proclamation by the United Nations that Hungarian acquiescence in these renewed deportations "will gravely impair Hungary's position"; that the railway line leading to Auschwitz through Zilina and Pruska "be bombed, destroyed"; and that "Oswiecim itself be bombed." 80 Enclosed with Gruenbaum's telegram was a list of five separate railway routes from Hungary to Auschwitz. Two of these, however, were already largely in Soviet hands. On the day that Gruenbaum sent his telegram, the American air force attacked synthetic oil plants at both Odertal and Monowitz. At Monowitz they met with intense and accurate anti-aircraft fire, but were able to hit their target, which lay within 5 miles of the still active gas chambers. They also, by mistake, dropped a number of bombs on Auschwitz I, accidentally hitting and destroying the SS barracks there and killing fifteen SS men. An additional twenty-eight SS men were badly injured.

79 80

FO, 371/42817, WR 993, Dew minute, September 1, 1944, Cheetham minute, September 7, 1944. "Copy of cable from Jewish Agency, Jerusalem, dated 13th Sept., 1944," FO, 371/42818, folio 31. The list of the railway routes is folio 32.

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The clothing workshop was also hit and destroyed, and forty camp inmates working there, including twenty-three Jews, were killed. During the raid, another sixty-five inmates were severely injured. During this same bombing attack of September 13, a cluster of bombs was dropped in error on Birkenau. One of the bombs damaged the railway embankment leading into the camp and the sidings leading to the crematoria. A second bomb hit a bomb shelter located between the crematoria sidings, killing thirty civilian workers. Five miles away, the I.G. Farben plant at Monowitz, the object of the raid, was partly destroyed. As part of the air attack on September 13, yet another photographic mission had flown over both Auschwitz and Birkenau, as well as over Monowitz. Its camera even recorded, twice, the falling bombs.81 Also visible in the Birkenau photographs of September 13 are the gas chambers and Crematoria IV and V; the latter being hidden from the camp inmates by the birch wood. On September 16 two pilots from 60 Squadron, Flight Lieutenant Tasker and Flight Sergeant Murphy, set off from Foggia to photograph eight of the recently attacked oil plants and stores. Their sortie took them over Ravenna, Bologna, Auschwitz, Vrutky, Diosgyor and Vienna. Passing over Monowitz at five minutes after midday, the photographs which they took covered only the western third of the plant, the section least affected by the attack three days before. But they did show that the cooling tower serving the main distillation had been destroyed, and a purified gas-holder had been burned out.82 Two days later, on September 18, a second reconnaissance sortie by Major Allam and Lieutenant Roth of 60 Squadron was more successful in photographing the areas hit during the September 13 air-raid on Monowitz.83 Gruenbaum's appeal that the bombing of Auschwitz should again 81

82 83

The bombs over Birkenau are seen in Exposure 3VI, Mission 464 BG: 4 M97, Can. B8413. The bombs over Auschwitz are seen in Exposure 4V2. In all, Birkenau appears in two of the photographs; Auschwitz in six. USSBS, RG, 243. Ibid., Mediterranean Allied Photo Reconnaissance Wing, Interpretation Report No. D.B.214 of September 16, 1944, Prints 4044 and 4045. Ibid., Interpretation Report No. D.B.217 of September 18, 1944. Prints Nos. 3019-3024, 4019-4025.

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be considered reached London on September 20. If was at once sent on by Linton to Paul Mason, the head of the Refugee Section at the Foreign Office. In his covering letter, Linton wrote: You will note that three proposals are made. As regards the second, I am attaching a note of the four railway routes from Budapest to Poland. About the third proposal, we were informed some time ago that there were technical difficulties in the way of bombing the Camp at Oswieczim. Since then however, we understand that the fuel depots in that area have been bombed on two occasions. If the position has changed, it might perhaps be possible to reconsider the question of bombing the Camp. We should be very grateful for anything you may be able to do in the matter.8*

Linton's request for a second consideration of bombing was not pursued any further by the Foreign Office. Ironically, when he sent it to the Foreign Office on September 20, the officials there were still commenting on the earlier request and on their own decision not to pass on to the Air Ministry the plans of Auschwitz that Linton had sent them, at their own instigation, a month before, on August 18. On September 6 the deputy chief of the Air Staff, N.H. Bottomley, had written to Lieutenant General Spaatz: The Foreign Office have now stated that Jews are no longer being deported from Hungary and that in view of this fact and because of the serious technical difficulties of carrying out bombing they do not propose to pursue the matter further. This being so we are taking no further action at the Air Ministry and I suggest that you do not consider the project any further.85

No mention was made by Bottomley of the Air Ministry's request for intelligence, nor of the Jewish Agency's prompt provision of just such material. "We are therefore technically guilty," Paul Mason minuted on September 18, "of allowing the Air Min. to get away with it without having given them (tho' we had it) the info they asked for as a prerequisite." Mason nevertheless agreed not to pursue the matter further. In all the circumstances, he minuted, "I think perhaps (tho' I feel a little uneasy about it) we had better let this go by." Pondering Mason's reflection about British guilt, Eden's Assistant Private Secretary, Guy Millard, wrote on September 20: "Surely this 84 FO, 371/42818, WR 1174, folio 30. 85 Air Ministry papers, 19/218,12/22.

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information was taken into consideration when the decision was taken not to pursue the matter." "That's the whole point," Mason replied on September 21, "It looks as if it wasn't." That same day, in a further minute to William Cavendish-Bentinck, Paul Mason wrote: " I cannot see that the topographical information made available to us by the Jewish Agency was ever communicated to the Air Ministry." He added: " I don't know whether, had the Air Ministry been sent this information (which doesn't look all that good), they would have modified their objections. But I am not quite happy about it." The point remained an "actual one," Mason noted, since "the Jewish Agency has just weighed in with a new suggestion, based upon fresh information about German extermination plans, that the camps should be bombed." Mason's own view, like that of Lady Cheetham, was that "if anyone is to do the job, it should be the Red Air Force which is much nearer." Richard Allen felt less uneasy than Mason. "Even with the information," he noted on September 22, "the Air Ministry were reluctant to risk valuable lives and aircraft in a possibly futile reconnaissance." s " They would only have done so, he added, "if the Foreign Office had been strongly in favour of the attempt." In fact, he noted, "as is quite clear" from its minutes "the Foreign Office were cooling off." Allen continued: In these circumstanccs, although I doubt if we have been quite fair to the Air Ministry in representing our failure to do what the Jewish 86

British airborne aid to the Warsaw uprising had also been affected by the argument of unnecessary risk, but to a much lesser extent. At the time of the first three flights across Poland, on August 4, 8 and 9, the Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Mediterranean Allied Air Force, Sir John Slessor, had opposed further flights on the grounds of risk. But, under pressure, he agreed to further Royal Air Force and South African Air Force flights on six consecutive days, August 12 to August 17. On these six days, 17 out of 93 aircraft were lost, after which Slessor insisted that all future flights would be carried out by Polish volunteers. As for the risk of reconnaissance flights, as raised by Richard Allen, such flights by mid-September were a regular feature of the follow-up of bombing raids for intelligence purposes, and none of the intelligence flights actually sent over Auschwitz to photograph Monowitz (on September 16, September 18 — twice — and October 6) came to grief.

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Agency wanted as due to the technical reasons alone, I do not think that the fact that we did not pass on the topographical information will have greatly affected the Air Ministry's a t t i t u d e . . . . I suggest that this be allowed to go by, unless the question is raised again, in which case the topographical details will have to be sent to the Air Ministry. 87

In fact, the question had been raised again, by Linton, in his letter of September 20. But the plans were not sent on to the Air Ministry. Linton's letter and Gruenbaum's renewed appeal were received by the Foreign Office on September 22. They prompted two comments. The first, by Lady Cheetham on September 25, noted that according to the Swiss and Swedish governments, the Hungarians had denied that Jews had been deported "for any reason except to work in Germany in conditions similar to those accepted by Hungarian nationals." In addition, the Hungarian government had told the Swiss "that they are ready to release Jews," but that the Germans would not grant exit permits for transit across Germany to either Switzerland or Sweden. Nor, owing to the military situation, was it possible for Jews to escape across the border from Hungary to Rumania. There was no proof, Lady Cheetham noted, that Hungarian policy had been "reversed again," and she added: "As to bombing the railway lines to Oswiecim, possibly the Soviets might consider doing this." Commenting on Lady Cheetham's minute, Paul Mason wrote: The first question is, is there any authentic reason to suppose that the Hungarian government have reversed the policy which existed early in August and are now preparing (doubtless under strongest German pressure) to send further people to the extermination camps in Silesia? I certainly would not accept what the Jewish Agency say without confirmation.

Mason suggested sending a "short telegram" to the Swiss and Swedish governments, to ask if either government had reason to believe "that a policy of deporting Jews to extermination camps is imminent or is actually taking place." On the basis of their replies, he felt, "would depend consideration of the further alternatives suggested by Mr. Linton," none of which, he added, "at first sight, to my mind, are really in any way practicable." 88 87 88

Minutes in FO, 371/42806, WR 823. Ibid., 371/42818, WR 1174, folio 29.

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In the United States, one further bombing request had been sent by the War Refugee Board to the War Department. Its source was a telegram from James Mann, Assistant Executive Director of the Board, who, while on a visit to England, had been told by the Polish Government-in-Exile that "in all Polish concentration camps the Germans are increasing their extermination activities." According to a telegram from Mann to Pehle: The War Refugee Board is urged by them [the Polish Government-inExile] again to explore with the Army the possibility of bombing the extermination chambers and German barracks at largest Polish concentration camps which, they say, are subject to precision bombing since they are sufficiently detached from the concentration camps.

Mann added that the Poles "have promised to furnish me with recent maps which I will forward to Washington by air-mail, although I assume the Army authorities have maps of such camps." 89 On October 3 Pehle sent a copy of this appeal to John McCloy at the War Department. Two days later Harrison Gerhardt recommended to McCloy that "no action be taken on this since the matter has been fully presented several times previously." It was the War Department's position, he added, that any such bombing should be within the "operational responsibility" of the Russian forces.90 Still, in the United States, one further request for bombing the camps had been pressed on the War Department, this time by Nahum Goldmann, who had raised it personally with McCloy. Goldmann later recalled, in a letter to the author: "McCloy indicated to me that, although the Americans were reluctant about my proposal, they might agree to it, though any decision as to the targets of bombardments in Europe was in the hands of the British. I was therefore advised to approach the British representative on the Allied High Command, General Dill... With some difficulty Goldmann managed to obtain an interview with General Dill. Their talk, he recalled, was "one of the most unforgettable and depressing of my long career." General Dill took from the start a completely negative attitude. His

89 90

WRB, Box 35. National Archives and Records Service, RG 107, 400.38 Jews.

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argument was that bombing the camps would result in the death of thousands of prisoners. I replied to him that they were destined to being gassed anyhow and explained that the idea to bomb the death camps had been suggested to us by the Jewish underground in Poland, with whom we were in a certain contact through the Polish government in exile in London, which regularly conveyed messages from the Jewish Nazi victims to us — mainly Rabbi Stephen Wise and myself — via the American State Department. General Dill thereupon revealed his real motivation, by declaring that the British had to save bombs for military targets and that the only salvation for the Jews would be for the Allies to win the war. I answered that the few dozen bombs needed to strike the death camps would not influence the outcome of the war and pointed out that the Royal Air Force was regularly bombing the I.G. Farben factories, a few miles distant from Auschwitz. At the end of our talk, which lasted over an hour, I accused General Dill and his colleagues of lack of human understanding for the terrible tragedy of the extermination camps. He regarded it as discourteous for me to be so outspoken in my criticism.91

Unknown to Goldmann, there had been a further aerial reconnaissance over Auschwitz on October 16. Once again, its sole purpose had been to examine the progress of repairs at the I.G. Farben plant at Monowitz, now that just over a month had passed since the second of the two bombing attacks. The sortie, by Captain Barry and Lieutenant Jefferys, revealed "a great deal of repair and constructional activity" in both the synthetic oil and synthetic rubber plants since the last report in mid-September. Although assessment was "hampered by hazy prints," it was still "obvious" that repairs had progressed "at almost all points." There then followed an analysis of the repair of thirteen separate groups of buildings.02 As Monowitz continued production, it remained a primary target. Indeed, in October 1944, it accounted for Germany's third highest production of synthetic oil, after Blechhammer North and Odertal." 91 Letter to the author from Nahum Goldmann, February 27, 1980. 92 Interpretation Report No. D.B.241, 60 Squadron, Sortie 60/792 of October 16, 1944. "Poland Oswiecim Syn. Oil and Rubber Plant (13.49 hours), Prints 3011-15. USSBS, RG 243. 93 Ibid., German synthetic oil production in October 1944, in tons: Blechhammer North, 3,400 tons; Odertal 2,600 tons; Monowitz 2,000 tons. Lower in the scale were Trzebinia, 1,500 tons; Kolin, 1,500 tons; Schwechat, 800 tons; and Pardubice, 200 tons. Mediterranean and South Air Forces Weekly

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The Jewish Agency's alarm about Hungarian Jews again being deported to Auschwitz had not been misplaced, although the reported numbers of the renewed deportations, "twelve thousand daily," were far in excess of the numbers now involved. Trains with Hungarian Jews had indeed reached Auschwitz on September 4, 5, 15 and 18, but with only several hundred Jews in each. A fifth train had reached Auschwitz from Budapest on September 20. Eight men were sent to the barracks, but the remaining fifty-two were gassed. Later that same day a second train arrived from Hungary: thirty-one men and twentytwo women were sent to the barracks. The remaining 146 were gassed. The one special Allied air effort that continued throughout September was aiding the Poles still fighting against the Germans in Warsaw. On September 18 the American Air Force Eighth Bomber Group had flown the last of the Frantic missions. They had left from England, dropped their supplies over Warsaw, and flown on to Poltava. A total of 107 Flying Fortresses took part, dropping 1,284 containers of arms and supplies. Nearly 1,000 fell into German hands. Less than 100 reached the Polish Home Army. 04 Two days later, on September 20, the last Polish volunteer flight from Foggia to Warsaw took place, also to drop supplies. Of twenty aircraft that took part, five were shot down. Since the beginning of August, 200 pilots had been killed on these Warsaw raids. From a map in Churchill's papers, the flight paths to Warsaw can be seen passing just to the west of Cracow, virtually over Auschwitz itself.95 But it was the agony of Warsaw, not the fate of the Jews, that had come to dominate the telegraphic exchanges of the Allied leaders. At Auschwitz on November 1 a total of seventy-three women were taken from the barracks and gassed. But a far larger number, 1,717 women and 634 men, were sent from Auschwitz by train to Ravensbriick and Bergen-Belsen to fill the growing reservoir of slave laborers

94

95

Intelligence Survey No. 9, dated March 5, 1945. USSBS, RG 243. Craven and Cate, op. cit. Premier papers, 3/352/11. On October 2, 1944, Stalin vetoed the use of Poltava for any further British or United States flights in support of the Warsaw uprising. Ibid.

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needed in central and western Germany, as the Allied armies advanced eastward from France toward the Rhine. On November 2, four women were gassed and 795 sent westward. But the process could still work in reverse, and on November 3, of a total of 509 Jews reaching Auschwitz from the Slovak labor camp at Sered, 481 were gassed on arrival. The mass killings of Jews at Auschwitz were over. As the Soviet army stood poised in the Carpathians for its next westward offensive, more and more of the Auschwitz inmates, mainly non-Jews, were sent by train to concentration camps in Germany to join the slave labor reserve, while fewer and fewer trains reached Auschwitz itself. It was only now, after the gas chambers at Auschwitz had almost ceased to work, that the full text of the Vrba-Wetzler report, the Mordowicz-Rosin report, and the Polish Major's report actually reached the desk of the director of the War Refugee Board, John W. Pehle. Upset by what he had read, Pehle wrote on November 8 to McCloy at the War Department. These eyewitness descriptions, he wrote, "have just been received" from Roswell McClelland in Switzerland. No report hitherto received by the Board, Pehle added, "has quite caught the gruesome brutality of what is taking place in these camps of horror " Suddenly, Pehle himself was in favor of bombing the camps. As he explained to McCloy: The Germans have been forced to devote considerable technological ingenuity and administrative know-how in order to carry out murder on a mass production basis, as the attached reports will testify. If the elaborate murder installations at Birkenau were destroyed, it seems clear that the Germans could not reconstruct them for some time. Until now, despite pressure from many sources, I have been hesitant to urge the destruction of these camps by direct, military action. But I am convinccd that the point has now been reached where such action is justifiable if it is deemed feasible by competent military authorities. I strongly recommend that the War Department give serious consideration to the possibility of destroying the execution chambers and crematories in Birkenau through direct bombing action.

Pehle's letter to McCloy contained further reasons why the bombing should now be carried out: It may be observed that there would be other advantages of a military nature to such an attack. The Krupp and Siemens factories, where among other things cases for handgrenades are made, and a Buna plant, all within Auschwitz, would be destroyed. The destruction of the German

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barracks and guard-houses and the killing of German soldiers in the area would also be accomplished. The morale of underground groups might be considerably strengthened by such a dramatic exhibition of Allied air support and a number of the people confined in Auschwitz and Birkenau might be liberated in the confusion resulting from the bombing. That the effecting of a prison break by such methods is not without precedent is indicated by the description in the enclosed copy of a recent New York Times article of the liberation from Amiens prison of 100 French patriots by the RAF. 96

Pehle ended his letter by pleading "the urgency of the situation" as his reason for making this appeal, and asked for McQoy's reply "as soon as possible."97 Once again, but now far too late, the bombing request was sent through the American War Department on yet another futile journey to the operations division, where once again it was turned down with the same arguments that had been used so decisively in June, July and August — that it would divert air power from vital industrial targets. The War Refugee Board learned of these arguments in a letter from McCloy sent from the War Department on November 18. The letter added that Auschwitz could only be hit by American heavy bombers based in Britain, which "would necessitate a hazardous round trip flight unescorted of approximately 2,000 miles over enemy territory." No reference was made to the Foggia airbase or to the fact that the round trip, which was far less than 2,000 miles,98 had already been carried out many times by United States planes bombing industrial targets throughout the Auschwitz region, and that for each raid a fighter escort had not only been provided, but had proved effective. Indeed, it was the range of the fighter escort, not of the bombers, that had made possible these bombing raids, including the raids over Monowitz and Trzebinia, the targets nearest to Auschwitz. 96

This was "Operation Jericho," carried out in March 1944, and already cited by the British Secretary of State for Air four months before as a possible model. 97 WRB, Box 6, German Extermination Camps. 98 The distance from the American airbase at Foggia to Auschwitz, including diversions to avoid the area immediately above the Soviet-German front line, was just under 1,300 miles.

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McCloy also told Pehle: At the present critical stage of the war in Europe, our strategic air forces are engaged in the destruction of industrial target systems vital to the dwindling war potential of the enemy, from which they should not be diverted. The positive solution to this problem is the earliest possible victory over Germany, to which end we should exert our entire means."

On receiving this refusal for bombing, the War Refugee Board decided to take one final step, the publication in full of the three reports. These were issued to the press on November 25. The three reports were prefaced by a page of explanation, including the War Refugee Board's comment that: "So revolting and diabolical are the German atrocities that the minds of civilized people find it difficult to believe that they have actually taken place." Nevertheless, the Board continued, "the Governments of the United States and other countries have evidence which clearly substantiates the facts" and "recently," according to this introduction, the Board had received "from a representative close to the scene, two eye-witness accounts of evidence which occurred in notorious extermination camps established by the Germans."100 The Vrba-Wetzler report was headed "No. 1, The Extermination Camps of Auschwitz (Oswiecim) and Birkenau in Upper Silesia" and filled thirty-three pages. The Mordowicz-Rosin report followed, as a seven-page addition to the Vrba-Wetzler report. The Polish Major's report was headed "No. 2. Transport (The Polish Major's Report)" and filled nineteen pages. All three reports were given substantial publicity in the New York Times of November 26, which published as one of its front-page headlines: U.S. BOARD BARES ATROCITY DETAILS TOLD BY WITNESSES AT POLISH CAMPS

The story that followed described "the first detailed report" made by a United States Government agency offering "eye-witness proof of mass murder by the Germans." That same day, November 26, 1944, Himmler ordered the gas chambers of Birkenau to be destroyed. 99

National Archives and Records Service, RG 107, ASW 400.38, Countries — Germany. 100 Nuremberg Documents, L-022.

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W h y Auschwitz Was Never Bombed David S. Wyman question since World War II has been why the United States rejected requests to bomb the gas chambers and crematoria at Auschwitz, or the railroads leading to Auschwitz. Such requests began to be numerous in the spring of 1944. At that time, three circumstances combined to make bombing the Auschwitz death machinery and the railways leading to it from Hungary critically important and militarily possible. In mid-April, the Nazis began concentrating the 760,000 Jews of Hungary for deportation to the killing center at Auschwitz. Late in April, two escapees from Auschwitz revealed the full details of the mass murder taking place there, thus making completely clear the fate awaiting the Hungarian Jews. And by May, the U.S. Fifteenth Air Force, which had been operating from southern Italy since December 1943, reached full authorized strength and started pounding Nazi industrial complexes in Central and Fast Central Furope. For the first time, Allied bombers had the capacity to strike Auschwitz, located in the southwestern corner of Poland. The rail lines to Auschwitz from Hungary also lay within range of these aircraft. The two escapees from Auschwitz were young Slovak Jews, Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, who fled on April 10, 1944. Toward the end of April, they reached the Jewish underground in Slovakia and sounded the alarm that preparations

A

RECURRING

is a professor of American history at the University of Massachusetts (Amherst) and the author of

DAVID S . W Y M A N

Paper Walls: America

and the Refugee

Crisis, 1938-1941.

He is currently at work on a sequel, dealing with America's response to the Holocaust, which will be published by Pantheon. In preparing the present essay, Mr. Wyman had access to previously unexamined government documents, many of which have only recently become declassified.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS were under way at Auschwitz for exterminating the Hungarian Jews. They then dictated a thirtypage report on the murder of approximately 1,750,000 Jews who had been deported to Auschwitz during the previous two years. Their account detailed the camp's geographical layout, internal conditions, and gassing and cremation techniques, and offered a statistical record of the long months of systematic slaughter. T h e precision that characterized the entire report is seen in this passage describing the operation of one of the four large gaschambers: It holds 2,000 people. . . . When everybody is inside, the heavy doors are closed. Then there is a short pause, presumably to allow the room temperature to rise to a certain level, after which SS men with gas masks climb on the roof, open the traps, and shake down a preparation in powder form out of tin cans, . . . a "cyanide" mixture of some sort which turns into gas at a certain temperature. After three minutes everyone in the chamber is dead. . . . T h e chamber is then opened, aired, and the "special squad" [of slave laborers] carts the bodies on flat trucks to the furnace rooms where the burning takes place. A copy of the Vrba-Wetzler statement, dispatched to the Hungarian Jewish leadership, arrived in Budapest by early May. By mid-June, the Slovak underground had smuggled the report to Switzerland, where it was passed to the American legation and found to be consistent with earlier trustworthy but fragmentary information that had filtered out concerning the Auschwitz death camp. The disclosures of a non-Jewish Polish military officer, also recently escaped from Auschwitz, further corroborated the Vrba-Wetzler account. During June, this information spread to the Allied governments and began to appear in the Swiss, British, and American press. By late June, then, the truth about Auschwitz, along with descriptions of its geographical location and layout, was known to the outside world. In mid-May, as deportation from the eastern provinces of Hungary started (under the direct supervision of Adolf Eichmann), Jewish leaders

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST in Budapest sent out a plea for the bombing of key points on the rail route to Poland. T h e message specified the junction cities of Kosice (Kassa or Kaschau) and Presov, and the single-track rail line between them, and added that Kosice was a m a i n junction for Axis military transportation as well. Dispatched via the Jewish u n d e r g r o u n d in Bratislava, Slovakia, the request was telegraphed in code to Isaac Sternbuch, representative in Switzerland of the American Orthodox Jewish rescue committee (Vaad Hahatzala). It reached him a b o u t May 17. Sternbuch immediately rewrote the telegram for transmission to the headquarters of the U n i o n of O r t h o d o x Rabbis in New York and submitted it to the military attache of the U.S. legation in Bern, requesting that it be telegraphed to the United States through diplomatic lines. T h r e e days later, a similar b u t more urgent telegram arrived from Bratislava. T h a t appeal also went to the U.S. military attache for delivery to New York. T h e pleas kept coming every two or three days for the next month, and Sternbuch continued to relay them to the military attache. Yet by J u n e 22, Sternbuch had received neither reply nor acknowledgment from New York. For unknown reasons, the messages had been blocked, either in Bern or in Washington. I n Jerusalem, Jewish leaders h a d received appeals similar to those that had reached Sternbuch. O n J u n e 2, Yitzchak G r u e n b a u m , chairman of the Jewish Agency's rescue committee, arranged for the American consul general in Jerusalem to telegraph a message to the W a r Refugee Board in Washington. G r u e n b a u m ' s request for bombing the deportation railroads reached the W a r Refugee Board, b u t nothing came of it. Meanwhile, d u r i n g the third week of May, R a b b i Michael Weissmandel and Mrs. Gisi Fleischmann, both leaders of the Slovak Jewish underground, wrote a long letter pleading with the outside world for help. T h e y described the first deportations from H u n g a r y and stressed the fate awaiting the deportees on arrival at Auschwitz. T h e i r stark account revealed that four forty-five-car

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS trains were leaving daily, each train carrying about 3,000 people. During the two-to-three-day trip to Auschwitz, the victims were pressed together, standing, in closed freight cars without food, water, or sanitary facilities. Many died on the way. After describing the plight of these Hungarian Jews, Rabbi Weissmandel and Mrs. Fleischmann appealed strenuously for immediate bombing of the main deportation routes, especially the KosicePresov railway. They also cried to the outside world to "bombard the death halls in Auschwitz." Writing in anguish, the two asked: "And you, our brothers in all free countries; and you, governments of all free lands, where are you? What are you doing to hinder the carnage that is now going on?" Smuggled out of Slovakia, the plea, accompanied by copies of the Auschwitz escapees' reports, reached Switzerland, but not until late June.* Some days earlier, about June 15, other copies of the escapees' reports had come via the Slovak underground to Jaromir Kopecky, the Czechoslovak minister in Geneva. He immediately showed them to Gerhart Riegner of the World Jewish Congress. Riegner summarized the reports for delivery to the American and British governments and the Czech exile government in London: To the summaries, Kopecky and Riegner added appeals for bombing the Auschwitz gas chambers and the rail lines from Hungary to Auschwitz. By that time, though, one of the earlier pleas for railway bombing, probably sent by Sternbuch and possibly transmitted through Poli&h diplomatic auspices, had at last broken through to American Jewish circles. On June 18, Jacob Rosenheim of the New York office of the Agudath Israel World Organization addressed letters to high American government officials, informing them of the ongoing deportations. He submitted that paralysis of rail traffic from Hungry to Poland could at least slow the annihilation process, and implored them to take immediate action to bomb the rail junctions of Kosice and Presov. • Mrs. Fleischmann and Rabbi Weissmandel were deported to Auschwitz, at different times, during the fall ot 1944. She was gassed there; he escaped from the train and survived the war.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST appeals to Washington were first relayed to the War Refugee Board (WRB), an agency that President Roosevelt had established by executive order five months earlier, on January 22, 1944. The President had charged the board with carrying out OSENHEIM'S

R

all measures within its [the government's] power to rescue the victims of enemy oppression who are in imminent danger of death and otherwise to afford such victims all possible relief and assistance consistent with the successful prosecution of the war. Although Roosevelt had named the Secretaries of State, Treasury, and War as equal members of the War Refugee Board, in actuality Henry Morgenthau's Treasury Department was the real force behind the agency. While technically a joint operation, the WRB was physically located in Treasury offices and had as its executive director John W. Pehle, a career Treasury official. Its other top staff members were also drawn from Treasury personnel, and the Board worked closely with Morgenthau himself throughout its existence. Nonetheless, the President's mandate had clearly specified that "it shall be the duty" of all three Cabinet departments, "within their respective spheres, to execute, at the request of the Board, the plans and programs" developed by the Board, and to supply such "assistance and facilities as the Board may require in carrying out the provisions of this Order." On June 21, Pehle transmitted Rosenheim's request to the War Department, and on Saturday, June 24, he conferred about it with Assistant Secretary of War John J . McCloy. In the discussion, Pehle himself expressed doubts about the proposal to bomb the Kosice-Presov link, but he asked that the War Department explore the idea. McCloy agreed to look into it. In fact, the War Department had started the matter through its channels -the day before, and on Saturday afternoon, June 24, the bombing request arrived at the Operations Division (OPD), the arm of the War Department charged with strategic planning and direction of operations. On

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS Monday, June 26, OPD ruled against the proposed bombing, stating that the suggestion was "impracticable" because "it could be executed only by diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations." Actually, the decision against bombing the railways was not based on any specific study of its feasibility in light of current Air Force operations in Europe. Rather, the negative decision rested on an internal War Department policy which had been arrived at in Washington nearly five months earlier. In late January 1944, in one of its first steps, the War Refugee Board had requested the British government's help in carrying out its program of rescue. T h e British government, which throughout the war showed little inclination to rescue European Jews, was reluctant to cooperate because the presence of the Secretary of War on the Board implied that the armed forces would be used in rescuing refugees. T h e War Department, moving to reassure the British on this count, quietly set down the following policy: It is not contemplated that units of the armed forces will be employed for the purpose of rescuing victims of enemy oppression unless such rescues are the direct result of military operations conducted with the objective of defeating the armed forces of the enemy. This policy effectively removed the War Department from participation in rescue efforts, except as they might arise incidental to regularly planned military operations. Another of the War Refugee Board's earliest moves was to try to arrange for a degree of cooperation from United States military commanders in the war theaters. In late January 1944, the Board proposed through McCloy that the War Department send a message to war-theater commanders instructing them to do what was possible, consistent with the successful prosecution of the war, to assist the United States government's policy of rescue. Although such cooperation was specifically mandated by the executive order which established the War Refugee Board, the military

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST leadership in Washington balked at dispatching the message. McCloy referred the proposal to the Office of the Chief of Staff after jotting on it: "I am very chary of getting the Army involved in this while the war is on." The War Department's decision crystallized in February in an internal memorandum which maintained that: We must constantly bear in mind . . . that the most effective relief which can be given victims of enemy persecution is to insure the speedy defeat of the Axis. In concrete terms, this position meant that the military had decided to concentrate strictly on the war and avoid the diversion of resources into rescue or relief activities. HEN in late June 1944, therefore, the Operations Division dealt W with Rosenheim's proposal to bomb rail points between Hungary and Auschwitz, it turned back to these two earlier pronouncements as the basis for its decision and stated that: The War Department is of the opinion that the suggested air operation is impracticable for the reasqn that it could be executed only by diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations. T h e War Department fully appreciates the humanitarian importance of the suggested operation. However, after due consideration of the problem, it is considered that the most effective relief to victims of enemy persecution is the early defeat of the Axis, an undertaking to which we must devote every resource at our disposal. Before McCloy could advise Pehle of the negative decision, another request reached the War Refugee Board in Washington. Roswell McClelland, the Board's representative in Switzerland, had sent a cablegram on June 24 which summarized much of the information that had come into Switzerland during the preceding weeks concerning the brutal deportations from Hungary. He reported that beyond any doubt some 335,000 Hungarian Jews from east of the Danube had already

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS been deported and that the concentration of 350,000 more Jews had recently been completed in Budapest and its environs. McClelland listed the five main railroad deportation routes and pointed out that it is urged by all sources of this information in Slovakia and Hungary that vital sections of these lines, especially bridges along ONE [the Csap, Kosice, Presov route] be bombed as the only possible means of slowing down or stopping future deportations. Pehle sent a copy of the cablegram to McCloy on June 29, with a note emphasizing the reference to bombing deportation railroads. Pehle and the Board were unaware of the fact that the War Department had already decided against Rosenheim's request to strike the Kosice and Presov junctions. The chance for approval of a proposition to bomb five rail systems was minute; indeed, this latest suggestion received no separate consideration. Colonel Harrison A. Gerhardt, McCloy's executive assistant, forwarded McClelland's cablegram and Pehle's covering note to McCloy, accompanied by a draft of a response to Pehle. Gerhardt also included the following two-sentence memorandum: I know you told me to "kill" this but since those instructions, we have received the attached letter from Mr. Pehle. I suggest that the attached reply be sent. T h e reply to Pehle simply adapted the Operations Division's language rejecting the earlier Rosenheim proposal to fit the new expanded bombing request. McCloy signed it on July 4. ALLS for bombing the deportation rail lines continued to come to Washington throughout the summer of 1944. But starting early in July, the appeals for Air Force action to impede the mass murders increasingly centered on the destruction of the death factory at Auschwitz. At the very end of June, before any proposals for striking Auschwitz reached Washington, Benjamin Akzin of the WRB staff argued within the Board for bombing the killing facilities at Auschwitz. He

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST held that destruction of those installations would, at least for a time, appreciably slow the slaughter, and he also pointed out that Auschwitz could be bombed in conjunction with an attack on Katowice, an important industrial center about seventeen miles from the death camp. Shortly afterward, the London-based Czech government-in-exile forwarded to Washington the summary of the Vrba-Wetzler death-camp report that Riegner and Kopecky had sent out of Switzerland about two weeks before. T h e plea that Riegner and Kopecky had included for bombing the Auschwitz crematoria stimulated further discussion of that possibility at the War Refugee Board. By July 13, Pehle and the Board had decided to press the military authorities on the question of destroying the death camp. But a careful plan to do so apparently went awry, for no formal approach took place, though Pehle and McCloy did discuss the issue some time during the summer of 1944. That conversation must have dampened Pehle's interest in the project, because he informed Morgenthau in September that the Board had decided not to refer the proposal to the War Department. Late in July, the Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe wrote President Roosevelt calling for bombing the deportation railways and the gas chambers. The letter emphasized that the railroads were also used for military traffic, and that an attack on Auschwitz could open the way for inmates to escape and join the resistance forces. Thus both proposed actions would assist, not hamper, the war effort. Nothing at all came of this overture. T h e next proposal issued from the World Jewish Congress in New York and went directly to the War Department. It drew the usual response. On August 9, 1944, A. Leon Kubowitzki wrote McCloy submitting for consideration a message recently received from Ernest Frischer, a member of the Czech government-in-exile. Frischer called for bombing the Auschwitz gas chambers and crematoria to halt the mass killings. Almost as ,an afterthought, he also proposed bombing the railways.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS T h e reply, drawn up in McCloy's office and approved by Gerhardt, was dated August 14, 1944. It followed a by-now familiar pattern: Dear Mr. Kubowitzki: I refer to your letter of August 9 in which you request consideration of a proposal made by Mr. Ernest Frischer that certain installations and railroad centers be bombed. The War Department has been approached by the War Refugee Board, which raised the question of the practicability of this suggestion. After a study it became apparent that such an operation could be executed only by the diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations elsewhere and would in any case be of such doubtful efficacy that it would not warrant the use of our resources. There has been considerable opinion to the effect that such an effort, even if practicable, might provoke even more vindictive action [!] by the Germans. The War Department fully appreciates the humanitarian motives which prompted the suggested operation, but for the reasons stated above, it has not been felt that it can or should be undertaken, at least at this time. Sincerely, John J. McCloy Assistant Secretary of War At the beginning oi September, pressure built once more on the War Refugee Board for bombing rail lines, this time the lines between Auschwitz and Budapest, where the last large enclave of Hungarian Jews was threatened with deportation. These entreaties came from the Orthodox rescue committee in New York. Rabbi Abraham Kalmanowitz, anxious for the appeal to reach the WRB as soon as possible, placed a night phone call to Benjamin Akzin, who relayed the plea to Pehle the next day. Akzin took advantage of the opportunity to spell out to Pehle, in polite terms, his dissatisfaction with the inaction of the War Department regarding the bombing requests. He maintained that the W R B had been "created precisely in order to overcome the inertia and— in some cases—the insufficient interest of the old-

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST established agencies" concerning rescue of Jews. Akzin, pointing to the Allies' current air superiority, pressed for going directly to the President to seek orders for immediate bombing of the deportation rail lines. But the Board did not move on the appeal. On the other crucial bombing issue, the question of air strikes on Auschwitz, the War Refugee Board did act, but with hesitation. Near the end of September, members of the Polish exile government and British Jewish groups came to James Mann, the WRB representative in London, with information that the Nazis were stepping up the pace of extermination in the camps in Poland. They urged the Board to explore again the possibility of bombing the killing chambers. Mann cabled their plea to Washington. Anguished messages then reaching the Board were also reporting Nazi threats to exterminate the thousands of prisoners in the camps in Poland as the Germans retreated before the Red Army. Influenced by these accounts, Pelile decided to raise the issue with McCloy once more, though not forcibly. On October 3, he transmitted to McCloy the substance of Mann's dispatch, "for such consideration as it may be worth." McCloy's office thought it worth too little consideration* to trouble the Operations Division with it, or even to write a reply to the War Refugee Board. Gerhardt, McCloy's executive assistant, recommended to his chief that "no action be taken on this, since the matter has been fully presented several times previously." McCloy let Gerhardt's recommendation of "no action" stand and the matter was dropped. Meanwhile, Mann's dispatch had independently caught the attention of the Operations Division which discussed it briefly with the Air Force Operational Plans Division on October 4, and arranged for the Air Force to radio a message to England to Lieutenant General Carl Spaatz, commander in chief of all United States Strategic Air Forces (USSTAF) in Europe. This was the only time the War Department sent a rescue-oriented bombing proposal to operational forces in Europe for consideration. The telegram asked Spaatz to consult Mann's orig-

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS inal dispatch and informed him that "this is entirely your affair." But the message pointedly advised that military necessity was the basic requirement. That admonition scarcely needed to be included« for Spaatz's staff was no more inclined to take on extraneous assignments, or to look carefully into the workability of the bombing proposal, than were the OPD or the Assistant Secretary of War's office. The next day, October 5, Spaatz's deputy commander, Major General Frederick L. Anderson, assigned his director of operations to attend to the matter. That same day, in a message to Spaatz summarizing the conclusion that emerged from the desks of the USSTAF in England, Anderson put an end to the proposal: I do not consider that the unfortunate Poles herded in these concentration camps would have their status improved by the destruction of the extermination chambers. There is also the possibility of some of the bombs landing on the prisoners as well, and in that event, the Germans would be provided with a fine alibi for any wholesale massacre that they might perpetrate. I therefore recommend that no encouragement be given to this project. Although Spaatz's officers had read Mann's message reporting acceleration of extermination activities in the camps in Poland, they could perceive no advantage to the victims in smashing the killing machinery. Nor did they seem to understand, despite Mann's statement that "the Germans are increasing their extermination activities," that wholesale massacres had already been perpetrated without any need for an alibi. Yet if the officers had wished clarification, they could readily have telephoned Mann or members of the Polish government in nearby London. The last attempt to convince the War Department to bomb Auschwitz came in November. The complete reports made by the Auschwitz escapees finally reached the War Refugee Board in Washington on November 1. Their story of horror jolted the Board. A shocked John Pehle wrote a strong letter on November 8 pressing McCloy to arrange for bombing the Auschwitz killing machinery. He alsö pointed out the military advantage that

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST would result from simultaneously bombing the Auschwitz industrial area. Pehle's appeal went from McCloy's office to the War Department's Operations Division which, true to form, turned it down on the grounds that it would divert air power from vital industrial targets. McCloy wrote to Pehle on November 18, relaying the objections put forth by OPD. The letter also explained that Auschwitz could be hit only by heavy bombers based in Britain, which "would necessitate a hazardous round trip flight unescorted of approximately 2,000 miles over enemy territory." No further requests were made for bombing Auschwitz or the rail lines to it. Unknown to the outside world, SS Chief Heinrich Himmler in late November ordered the destruction of the killing machinery—a process that was completed in December. A month later, on January 27, 1945, the Russian army liberated the camp. II HUS the proposals to bomb Auschwitz and the rail lines leading from HunT gary to Auschwitz were consistently turned down by the War Department. The chief military reason given for this refusal was that such proposals were "impracticable" because they would require the "diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations." Was this reason valid? The answer is no. From March 1944 on, the Allies controlled the skies of Europe. Official U.S. Air Force historians have stated that "by 1 April 1944 the GAF [German Air Force] was a defeated force." Allied air power had "wrecked Hitler's fighter [plane] force by the spring of 1944. After this . . . U.S. bombers were never deterred from bombing a target because of probable losses." From early May 1944 on, the Fifteenth Air Force based in Italy had the range and capability to strike the relevant targets. Moreover, neither the Normandy invasion of June 6 nor the ensuing Allied drive across France drew on the resources

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS of the Fifteenth Air Force. The August invasion of southern France only very briefly took a small amount of Fifteenth Air Force power. The Twelfth Air Force, a tactical arm also based in Italy, assumed most of that responsibility. The War Department's repeated concern about diversion of air power essential to decisive operations could not have referred to those invasions, at least not with regard to the Fifteenth Air Force. And. in fact, during the same late June days that the War Department was refusing the requests to bomb railways, a fleet of Fifteenth Air Force bombers was waiting for proper flying conditions to attack oil refineries near Auschwitz. This mission, which took place on July 7, saw 452 bombers travel along and across two of the five deportation railroads. On June 26, 71 Flying Fortresses on another bomb run passed by the other three railroads, crossing one and coming within thirty miles of the other two. As for the area of Auschwitz, as early as January 1944, Allied bombing strategists were analyzing it as a potential target because of the synthetic oil and rubber installations not far from the camp. Two months later, the huge Blechhammer oilrefining complex, forty-seven miles from Auschwitz, came under careful study. Then, in late April, USSTAF headquarters in £ngland wrote Lieutenant General Ira C. Eaker, commander of the Allied air forces in Italy, inquiring about the feasibility of a Fifteenth Air Force attack on Blechhammer. Eaker replied on May 8 that not only were strikes on Blechhammer possible, but that war industries at Auschwitz and Odertal "might also be attacked simultaneously." By May 1944, the Fifteenth Air Force had indeed turned its primary attention to oil targets. Throughout the summer, as involvement with the invasion of France lessened, the British-based U.S. Eighth Air Force and the Royal Air Force increasingly joined the Fifteenth Air Force in fighting the "oil war." Most observers, then and now, agree that the high attention given to oil in 1944 and 1945 was one of the most decisive factors in Germany's defeat. Loss of oil gradually strangled the Third Reich's military operations.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST In late June, the "oil war" was about to move into Upper Silesia, where Germany had created a major synthetic oil industry based on the va;st Si· lesian coal resources. At least eight important oil targets were clustered there within a rough halfcircle, thirty-five miles in radius, with Auschwitz near the northeast end of the arc and Blechhammer near the northwest. Blechhammer was the main target—fleets of from 102 to 357 heavy bombers hit it on ten occasions between July 7 and November 20—but it was not the only one. No fewer than six additional plants shook under the impact of tons of high explosives, including the industrial section of Auschwitz itself. On Sunday, August 20, late in the morning, 127 Flying Fortresses, escorted by 100 Mustang fighters, dropped 1,336 500-pound high-explosive bombs on the factory areas of Auschwitz, less than five miles to the east of the gas chambers. Conditions that day were nearly ideal for accurate visual bombing. T h e weather was excellent. Anti-aircraft fire and the 19 German fighter planes there were ineffective. Only one American bomber went down; no Mustangs were hit. All five bomber groups reported success in striking the target area. Again on September 13, a force of heavy bpmbers rained destruction on the factory areas of Auschwitz. T h e 96 Liberators which struck encountered no German aircraft, but ground fire was heavy and brought three of the bombers down. As before, no attempt was made to hit the killing installations which stood about five miles to the west. On December 18 and also on December 26, American bombers again struck Auschwitz as an industrial target. Beginning in early July, then, air strikes in the area were extensive. For example, two days after the first raid on Auschwitz, 261 Flying Fortresses and Liberators bombed the Blechhammer and Odertal oil refineries. Many of them passed within forty miles of Auschwitz soon after leaving their targets. On August 27, another 350 heavy bombers struck Blechhammer. Two days after that, 218 heavies hit Moravska-Ostrava and Oderberg (Bohumin), both within forty-five miles of Auschwitz. Not long before, on August 7, heavy bombers had carried out attacks on both sides of Auschwitz on the same day: 357 had bombed Blechhammer, and 55 had hit Trzebinia, only thirteen miles northeast of Auschwitz.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS It would be no exaggeration, therefore, to characterize the area around Auschwitz, including Auschwitz itself, as a hotbed of United States bombing activity from August 7 to August 29. Yet on August 14 the War Department could write that bombing Auschwitz would be possible only by the diversion of airpower from "decisive operations elsewhere." Ill UT a further question remains: Would the proposed bombing raids have been, as the War Department maintained, of "doubtful efficacy"? In the case of the railroad lines, the answer is not clear-cut. Railroad bombing had its problems, and was the subject of long-lasting disputes within the Allied military. A main argument centered on the relative effectiveness of interdiction (bombing to cut rail lines and destroy bridges) and attrition (bombing to smash rail centers and marshaling yards, thereby hurting operations as well as repair facilities). With time, close observers concluded that successful blockage of enemy transport required both interdiction and attrition. Attrition, however, would not have stopped the deportation of Jews. Bombing oil or munitions cars in marshaling yards was very effective, but blowing up trains containing deportees would have been absurd, and striking the deportation trains before loading would have required an impossibly detailed knowledge of German transportation orders. Successful interdiction, on the other hand, would have necessitated close observation of the severed lines and frequent re-bombing, since repairs took only a few days. Even bridges, which were costly to hit, were often back in operation in three or four days. Nonetheless, bridge bombing was pressed throughout the war, including strikes from high altitudes by heavy bombers. And interdiction of both rail lines and railroad bridges constituted a significant part of the Fifteenth Air

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST Force's efforts, especially during September and October 1944 when it assisted the Russian advance into Hungary by cutting and re-cutting railways running from Budapest to the southeastern front. Interdiction could be very effective, then, for targets assigned a heavy and continuing commitment of airpower. But in the midst of the war, no one proposed or expected diversion of that kind of military force for rescue purposes. It might also be argued with some validity that railroad bombing would not have helped after July 8, 1944—the day on which the last mass deportations from Hungary to Auschwitz took place. The argument is convincing with regard to the three deportation railways farthest from Budapest, because most Jews outside Budapest were gone by then. The Nazis, with astounding speed, had moved 450,000 Jews to Auschwitz in fifty-five days. The deportations were suspended after July 8 mainly because an immense buildup of world pressure, most notably from the Pope and the King of Sweden, persuaded the Hungarian Regent, Miklos Horthy, belatedly to stand up to the Nazis on this issue. Some 230,000 Jews still remained in Budapest, however, constantly threatened throughout the summer and fall by the very real possibility that the transports to Auschwitz might be resumed. Horthy's control of the situation was shaky. Some deportations did occur, and through the summer Eichmann kept attempting to reestablish his operation. Because of the continuing threat, the other two deportation railways, since they would have been used to carry Jews from Budapest to the gas chambers, remained critically important. Deportation of the Budapest Jews would have taken roughly three weeks, in addition to several days of preparations. An alarm might well have reached the outside world in time for cuts in those railroads to have been of some help, even if the bombing had to be sporadic. In this situation, the United States could readily have demonstrated concern for the plight of the Jews. Without risking more than minute cost to the war effort, the War Department could have agreed to stand ready, if deportations had resumed, to spare some bomb

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS tonnage for those two railroads, provided bombers were already scheduled to fly near them on regular war missions. And, as it happened, on ten different days from July through October, a total of 2,700 bombers carrying 6,600 tons of bombs traveled along or within easy reach of both the rail lines on the way to oil targets in the Blechhammer-Auschwitz region. HILE the ending of mass deportations from Hungary on July 8 has some bearing on the question of railroad bombing, it has little relevance to the issue of the bombing of Auschwitz. There is no question that bombing the gas chambers and crematoria would have saved many lives. Mass murder continued at Auschwitz until the gas chambers closed down in late November. Throughout the summer and fall, transports kept coming from many parts of Europe, carrying tens of thousands of Jews to their death. Could the death factories have been located from the air? The four huge gassing-cremation installations stood in two pairs, spaced along the westernmost edge of the Auschwitz complex, just outside the Birkenau section of the camp. Four chimneys towered over the extermination buildings, two of which were 340 feet long, the others two-thirds that length. As we have seen, descriptions of the structures and of the camp's layout, supplied by escapees, were in Washington by early July 1944. Heavy bombers flying at their normal 20,000 to 26,000 feet could have knocked out the massmurder apparatus. The question would have been whether sufficient precision was possible to do it with only a few bombers, or whether a larger-scale saturation bombing mission would have been required. The answer could have emerged from the results of an initial attempt at precision bombing. The main obstacles to accurate bombing were night, clouds, smoke, extreme altitudes, enemy fighter opposition, and heavy flak. The last two hindered aiming by making straight, level flight difficult. Except for one small experimental night raid on Blechhammer, all missions to Upper Silesia took place in daylight. Weather conditions in the region were excellent for air operations throughout August and most of

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST September; October was a time of poor weather. The September attack on Auschwitz ran into some smokescreening, but the one in August did not. Because the industrial area was nearly five miles from the killing installations, it is unlikely the latter would have been enveloped in smoke in any case. Unusually high-altitude flight was not a problem; the missions into Upper Silesia operated at normal altitudes for heavy bombers. Enemy fighter opposition was negligible at the Silesian targets between July and November, except for Blechhammer, and there it dwindled sharply after July. At Auschwitz, 19 German fighters appeared on August 20 to challenge 100 Mustang fighters and 127 Flying Fortresses. No German planes were encountered over Auschwitz on September 13. Flak resistance at Auschwitz was moderate and ineffective on August 20, but intense and accurate on September 13. In sum, the only real obstacle to precision bombing of the death machinery would have been flak, which might or might not have been intense and accurate enough to have interfered with aerial action on the gas-chamber side of the Auschwitz complex. Before August, Auschwitz had little flak defense; and only after the August 20 raid were heavy guns added. A useful indicator of the chances for precise bombing of the death installations is the actual outcome of the two attacks on the Auschwitz industries. The August strike left three great fires and was described by General Eaker, commenting on photographs of it, as "a remarkable piece of bombing." The September raid was less accurate, yet Auschwitz records show that it did considerable damage. If a precision bombing effort had failed, analysis of the results would have shed light on the prospects of a second attempt. If those prospects looked doubtful, a larger force could have smashed the crematoria in a saturation-bombing operation. Or a few Mitchell medium bombers, which struck with surer accuracy from lower altitudes, could have flown with one of the bomb runs into the area. T h e Mitchell had sufficient range to attack Auschwitz, since refueling was available on the Adriatic island of Vis, 110 miles before reaching the home base in Italy. T h e Vis airstrip, available

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS by May 1944, was on the direct route to Auschwitz. It was also entirely possible for Lightning (P-38) dive-bombers to have attacked the Auschwitz killing installations. On June 10, 1944, P-38's based in Italy dive-bombed oil refineries at Ploesti, making a round trip of 1,255 miles. The trip to Auschwitz and back was 1,240 miles, but stopping at Vis shortened that to 1,130. It is true that the Ploesti mission was near the limit for P-38 dive-bombers —4 landed at closer fields in Italy, thus cutting their distance to 1,185 miles. Yet almost all the returning dive-bombers completed the 1,255-mile trip. In addition, the flight into and out of Ploesti, then the third most heavily-defended target on the continent, necessitated more fuel-consuming maneuvering than an attack on Auschwitz would have required. And the P-38's had sufficient fuel to conduct strafing missions on the way back from Ploesti. Furthermore, in an emergency, Lightnings returning from Auschwitz could have landed at Partisanheld airfields in Yugoslavia. for bombing the gas O chambers were not limited to the August 20 and September 13 raids on Auschwitz. PPORTUNITIES

Bombers assigned to smash the death factory could have flown with any of the many missions to the nearby Silesian targets. Auschwitz could also have been scheduled as an alternative objective when poor bombing conditions prevailed at other targets. If the killing installations had been destroyed at this stage of the war, it would have been practically impossible for the hard-pressed Germans to have rebuilt them. At the very least, the death machinery could not have operated for many months. (Original construction of the gas chambers and crematoria, carried out in a time of more readily available labor, transportation, and materials, had taken eight months.) Without gas chambers and crematoria, the Nazis would have been forced to reassess the extermination program in light of the need to commit new and virtually nonexistent manpower resources to mass killing. Gas was a far more efficient means of mass murder than shooting, and it caused much less of a psychological problem to the killers. The operation of the gas

THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST chambers, which killed 2,000 people in less than half an hour, required only a limited number of SS men. Killing tens of thousands by gunfire would have tied down a military force. The Nazis would also have again faced the body-disposal problem, an obstacle that had caused serious difficulty until the huge crematoria were built. Available figures, which are incomplete because the Germans destroyed many of the pertinent records, indicate that 100,000 Jews were gassed at Auschwitz in the weeks after the August 20, 1944, air raid on the camp's industrial sector. If the date is set back to July 7, the time of the first attack on Blechhammer, the number increases by some 50,000. Unfortunately, requests for bombing Auschwitz did not arrive in Washington until July. If, instead, the earliest pleas for bombing the gas chambers had moved swiftly to the United States, and if they had drawn a positive and rapid response, the movement of the 450,000 Jews who were deported from Hungary to Auschwitz would most likely have been broken off and additional lives in the hundreds of thousands might have been saved. Much more significant, though, than attempts to calculate particular numbers is the fact that no one could tell during the summer of 1944 how many hundreds of thousands more would die at Auschwitz before the Nazis ceased their mass murder.· HUS, there should have been no doubt as to the "efficacy" of bombing Auschwitz. But those who called for such bombing themselves faced an anguishing moral problem: they were taking responsibility for the deaths of camp inmates who would be killed if an attack

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• Incidentally, if the gas chambers had been destroyed on August 20 or earlier, Anne Frank might possibly have survived the war. Arrested on August 4, she and her family were deported to Auschwitz from a camp in Holland on September 2. They went on the last deportation train from Holland. Later, Anne and her sister were transferred to the camp at Bergen-Belsen, Germany, where both died of typhus, Anne in Ma-rch 1945. If the Auschwitz masskilling machinery had been destroyed by August 20, the train very likely would not have left Holland, because most of its captive Jews were bound for the Auschwitz gas chambers.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS were made. Though the murder installations stood at the edge of the Auschwitz complex, about two miles from the main camp, they were located very near Birkenau, itself a heavily populated concentration camp. Jewish leaders in Europe and the United States wrestled with the problem. Most concluded that loss of life under the circumstances was justifiable.* They realized that about 90 per cent of the Jews deported to Auschwitz were gassed on arrival. They were also aware that those who were spared the gas chambers, both men and women, struggled daily through a hellish agony as slave laborers. Food was far below subsistence: ersatz coffee in the morning, one liter of thin soup at noon, and 300 grams (10.6 ounces) of poor bread at night. Clothing consisted of ragged, filthy uniforms and wooden shoes. Quarters were crowded. Heavy, physical, outdoor labor was the rule, in all weather and for long hours. Guards beat or shot workers for any slowness or awkwardness. Typhus and other diseases ran through the camp. Medical attention was a fraud. Mortality was enormous: the average prisoner had little chance for survival. In a matter of weeks, inmates were drained of life, culled from the ranks when too weak for hard labor and dispatched to the gas chambers. All these facts were known to Jewish leaders, and to government officials as well, from carefully corroborated reports made by Auschwitz escapees. Most imprisoned Jews were doomed to death. Bombing the extermination machinery would kill some of them, but it would also halt the mass production of murder.

• One major Jewish organization did not agree. The U.S. section of the World Jewish Congress (WJC) opposed bombing the death installations because Jews in the camp would be killed. They pressed instead for Russian paratroop action to liberate the camp, and for the Polish underground to destroy the killing machinery. These were vain hopes. Russia ignored the problem and the Polish underground did not have anything like enough strength for such an operation. It was, however, the U.S. section of the WJC that relayed Frischer's proposal to bomb the gas chambers to the War Department in August 1944. The British and Swiss sections of the WJC called for bombing the murder installations.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST Although the people who appealed for the bombing were unaware of it, many prisoners in Auschwitz shared their viewpoint. Olga Lengyel, a Birkenau survivor, recalled after the war that she and the inmates she knew hoped for an air raid: "If the Allies could blow up the crematory ovens! T h e pace of the extermination would at least be slowed." Pelagia Lewinska, a non-Jewish prisoner, remembered the approach of Allied aircraft as "joyous experiences": At such times we kept telling Ourselves: Maybe they will drop leaflets, maybe they will destroy our camp, maybe they will even liberate us! Two sisters, Hungarian Jews who were in Birkenau when the Auschwitz industrial areas were hit, told of the prisoners in their section praying for the bombers to blast the gas chambers. They were more than ready to die for that. IV HE basic principle underlying the War Department's rejection of the bombing proposals was that military resources could not be deflected to non-military objectives, no matter how compelling the humanitarian appeal. T h e logic of this position was extremely forceful in a world at war. But it should be emphasized that the policy was not as ironbound as the War Department indicated in its replies to the bombing requests. During World War II, exceptions to this general rule occurred quite often. Many of them, to the credit of the United States, were for humanitarian purposes. For instance, despite a severe transportation shortage, the American and British military moved 150,000 non-Jewish Polish, Yugoslav, and Greek war refugees to camps in Africa and the Middle East. American airlifts of wounded Yugoslav Partisans rather frequently brought out endangered women and children also. One such mission included four troop transports loaded with orphans. Two additional kinds of actions show that the war effort could be deflected for other decent purposes, such as art or loyalty to beaten allies.

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OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS Kyoto, ancient capital of Japan and a center of culture and art, was on the Air Force target list. In the spring of 1945, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson asked McCloy: "Would you consider me a sentimental old man if I removed Kyoto from the target cities for our bombers?" McCloy encouraged Stimson to do it. T h e Air Force command argued against the decision, but adhered to it. Kyoto was not hit. On another occasion, McCloy himself prevented the planned bombing of Rothenburg, a German town known for its medieval architecture. On August 1, 1944, as Soviet forces neared Warsaw, the Polish Home Army rose against the Germans. But the Russian advance suddenly stopped and the Red Army remained about 10 kilometers from Warsaw for weeks, while the Nazis decimated the unaided and poorly supplied Polish fighters. One cause for the unexpected Russian halt was the ferocity of the German counterattack. A second factor was the Soviet government's apparent decision to let the Germans eliminate the Home Army, a non-Communist resistance force tied to the Polish government-in-exile in London which represented a possible obstacle to Russian control of postwar Poland. Polish officials in London brought intense pressure to bear on the British government to do something about this situation. Although Air Marshal Sir John Slessor, RAF commander in Italy, believed that supply flights to Warsaw from Italy would result in a "prohibitive rate of loss to the Air Force," and "could not possibly affect the issue of the war one way or another," the British government ordered that the missions be run. Volunteer RAF and Polish units flew 22 night operations from Italy between August 8 and September 20. Of 181 bombers sent, 31 did not come back. Slessor concluded that the effort had "achieved practically nothing." T h e U.S. Air Force did not participate in the Italy-based operations to Warsaw, but American bombers from Britain did join the effort. On September 18, 107 Flying Fortresses dropped 1,284 containers of arms and supplies on Warsaw and continued on to bases in Russia. At most, only 288 containers reached the Home Army. The Germans took the rest.

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THE END OF THE HOLOCAUST The cost of the mission was low in numbers of aircraft lost, but extremely high in the amount of airpower kept out of regular operations. To deliver 288 (or fewer) containers to a military force known to be defeated, 107 heavy bombers were tied up for nine consecutive days. For four days the Fortresses sat in England, loaded with supplies, waiting for the right weather conditions. After the mission, four more days elapsed before the planes returned home, via Italy. Prevailing wind patterns made the long trip from Russia to England unsafe for Flying Fortresses. While the bombers did strike a rail target in Hungary on the way from Russia to Italy, they carried out no other bombing operations in the entire nine days. The USSTAF's director of intelligence summarized American involvement in the Warsaw airdrops. His report acknowledged that even before the September 18 flight the President, the War Department, and the Air Force realized that "the Partisan fight was a losing one" and that "large numbers of planes would be tied up for long periods of time and lost to the main strategic effort against Germany." Still, all involved concurred in the decision to go forward, "despite the lack of a firm commitment" to the Polish government by the United States. Why did the United States divert a large amount of bombing capacity during a crucial phase of the oil campaign? The report's closing paragraph supplied part of the answer: Despite the tangible cost which far outweighed the tangible results achieved, it is concluded that this mission was amply justified. . . . America kept faith with its Ally. One thing stands out, from the President down to the airmen who flew the planes, America wanted to, tried, and did help within her means and possibilities. The Warsaw airdrop was executed only by diversion of considerable airpower to an impracticable project. The justification for that serious move was no doubt partly political: some advantage in the postwar period might derive from having sacrificed for an ally. Beyond that, however, the United States had demonstrated its deep concern for the plight of a devastated friend.

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V F, when the first bombing request came to it, the Operations Division of the War Department had taken the trouble to consult the command of the relevant air arm, it would have found the Fifteenth Air Force on the verge of a major bombing campaign in the region around Auschwitz. Instead, the possibilities were never investigated in Washington. From July through November 1944, more than 2,800 bombers struck Blechhammer and other targets close to Auschwitz. The industrial area of Auschwitz itself was hit twice. Yet the War Department persisted in rejecting each new request to bomb the death camp on the basis of its initial, perfunctory judgment that the proposals were "impracticable" because they would require "diversion of considerable air support." That the terrible plight of the Jews did not merit any active response remains a source of wonder, and a lesson, even today.

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NOTE

THE basic sources used in this study are in the following archival collections: 1. National Archives—Record Group 107, Assistant Secretary of War. Record Group 165, War Department General and Special Staffs (Operations Division and Civil Affairs Division). Record Group 243, U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey. 2. Library of Congress—Carl A. Spaatz Papers. Ira C. Faker Papers. 3. Franklin D. Roosevelt Library—War Refugee Board Records. Morgenthau Diaries. 4. Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center—15th Air Force Mission Reports.

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The "Final Solution" in its Last Stages LIVIA

ROTHKIRCHEN

" . . . And when it comes, this raging thunder, the eagles will drop dead from the s k i e s . . . and the lions will slink into their c a v e s . . . " Heinrich Heine T H E D I S I N T E G R A T I O N of the Third Reich also marked the collapse of that "world" termed I'univers concentrationnaire which was one of the main pillars of the National Socialist regime from its rise to power. The advance of the Allied forces toward conquered Europe in the summer of 1944—the landing in Normandy and the great Soviet offensive on the Eastern Front—brought about fateful changes in the situation of the Jewish remnants both in the concentration camps and in the still existing ghettos. LABOURERS IN INDUSTRIES OF T H E REICH

When the process of extermination was at its height (it is estimated that between May and October of 1944 about 600,000 Jews were transported to Auschwitz, among them Jews from Hungary, remnants of the ghetto of Lodz, Theresienstadt and others), definite signs of confusion and contradiction showed up in the "Final Solution" policy. At the same time, with the speeding up of extermination procedures, certain categories of able-bodied Jews were transferred to the industry, to the ravenous Moloch of the Reich, as reinforcement to the war effort. The Führer himself1 approved this line of action in April 1944, when the decision was taken to build underground factories for the production of aircraft in conformity with 1

See minutes of discussion between the Führer and Speer, of April 6 and 7, 1944. Document from the Trials of the Major War Criminals before the International M i l i t a r y Tribunal at Nuremberg (hereafter-IMT), I MT, IV, p. 197 ( U S A - 1 7 9 ) , R-124.

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the Jäger plan2 with Jewish forced labour from Hungary. To-day it is common knowledge that in the last stages of the war thousands of prisoners were employed in the production of the V - l and V - 2 secret weapons and in construction of fortifications; their total isolation from the world was intended to guarantee the secrecy which veiled this "decisive" weapon. Tens of thousands of concentration camp inmates, many of them Jews' laboured during the last months of the war in two giant munitions plants located in Thuringia, Mittelbau (code-named Dora) and in Ohrdruf (called Laura and S—III). The project entailed setting up of a secret Führer Headquarters and construction of underground factories to escape allied bombings.4 T o this camp were sent, never to return, transports from Buchcnwald and other nearby camps. This new concept of utilization of manpower became effective in the spring of 1942,® when it became clear to the leaders of the Reich that the war would last longer than had been anticipated. In consequence, a fundamental change came about in the original concept of concentration camps, which had been established primarily for security, political and racial purposes. The one-sided political aspect —detaining prisoners solely for preventive, security or educational purposes—was no longer the camps' sole function. The camps now evolved into institutions geared to meeting economic requirements. Utilization of camp prisoners for production of armaments did not change, however, the overall extermination plan. In order to evaluate correctly the significance of this new approach, this policy must be examined in relation to forced labour8 of other, non-Jewish elements, also regarded as inferior by Nazi theoreticians, The Jäger stab was formed on March 1, 1944. Its tasks were (1) transfer of German aircraft industry underground, ( 2 ) decentralization of German aircraft industry, (3) speedy repair of bombed-out plants. See Trials of the War Criminals before the Nuremberg Tribunal (hereafter-Trials), Trials, II, pp. 524-595. s Nazi Conspiration and Aggression (NCA), IV, pp. 816-817; p. 821; Trials. V, p. 238. 4 NCA, IV, p. 823. » See PohPs letter to Himmler of April 30, 1942, IMT, III, p. 461 (USA217), R-129. β For details see E. L. Homze, Foreign Labor in Nazi Germany, Princeton University Press, 1967; E. Georg, Die Wirtschaftlichen Unternehmungen der SS. Viertcljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, 7, Stuttgart, 1963.

2

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suitable to serve as slaves of the superior Aryan race. It is well known that as early as the first year of the war millions of people were rounded up for forced labour,7 and that throughout the occupied territories a brutal manhunt was conducted to provide manpower for factories, mines and agricultural areas in Germany. It should be pointed out that a clear distinction was drawn with regard to treatment of conscripts gathered in the satellite countries in the West and in the East. The Ostarbeiter recruited in the Eastern countries (including the Baltic states and the occupied territory of Russia) constituted in Nazi eyes the dregs of humanity, and their employers treated them brutally; the racial contempt evinced toward the Eastern worker cannot however be equated with the hatred felt towards the Jew. When a shortage of labour began to affect certain sectors of Germany's war economy, Nazi leaders reconsidered the employment of foreign labourers and re-defined their status.8 (It is noteworthy that skilled workers, particularly from the occupied Western countries such as France, Norway and Holland, were accorded tolerable treatment from the outset.) The ideological line was disregarded even with regard to the much-hated Slavic peoples. Consequently from 1943 on the status of the foreign workers employed by the Reich was considerably modified, their condition improved gradually and in time reached the level, officially at least,* of that of German forced labourers (with regard to social benefits, leave, etc.). The attitude to Soviet prisoners of war also changed substantially when at the end of 1943 it became clear to the Nazi authorities that in face of the shortage of labour this vast source of raw material (Rohstoff as Himmler termed it) 1 0 should not be overlooked. The shortage of manpower was the chief concern of the German 7

Toward the end of the war, when the employment of foreign labour reached its height, every fifth worker in the Reich was a foreigner, compare Homze, op. cit., p. 153.

« Ibid., p. 169. 0 During the evacuation of the Eastern Territories in the spring of 1944 groups of forced labour, particularly Russians, were directed to concentration camps and overnight became prisoners. See M . Broszat, Nationalsozialistische Konzentrationslager 1 9 3 9 - 1 9 4 5 (Anatomie des SS-Staates I I ) , Walter Verlag, Ölten, 1965, p. 118. 1 0 For Himmler's speech in Posen see 1 M T , X X I X , p. 112, P S - 1 9 1 9 (USA170).

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leaders, who endeavoured to secure workers from every available source. Military circles viewed with grave alarm the detrimental effect to the war effort brought about by the removal of the Jewish labour from industry. High-ranking officers at Wehrmacht Headquarters ( O K W ) approached the Chief of Staff, Field Marshal Keitel, who again requested the Reichsfiihrer's ruling. 11 Himmler reacted in fury against the "military saboteurs" who under the pretext of "armaments interests" objected to the extermination of the Jews." Consequently, in spite of war difficulties and shortage of manpower, at the beginning of November 1943 Jewish workers who had been employed for over four years in industry in the General Government 18 were brought to the extermination camps. O n January 5, 1944 SS-Gruppenführer Odilo Globocnik reported to Himmler the conclusion of "Operation Reinhard" in this fashion: O n November 3 the Jews were removed from work camps and the factories "were brought to a standstill" (stillgelegt).1* At the beginning of 1944 only some 100,000 Jews were retained in major industries of the General Government (of them 70,000 in the workshops of Lodz). These were teams of model workers who were contemptuously called Makkabäer15 (Maccabees) by SS General Krüger, Supreme Commander of the SS and Police for the East. The mobilization of new recruits for the Wehrmacht and incessant air bombardments created difficulties in German industry which by the beginning of 1944 had reached a critical stage. Another obstacle in the path of conscription of foreign workers was the opposition of German military authorities in the occupied territories, who contended that such action might strengthen the local resistance movement.1® These were the circumstances leading to crystallization of the plan for exploitation of the reservoir of Jewish inmates in the con-

11

H. Höhne, Der Orden unter dem Totenkopf, die Geschichte der SS, Mohn Verlag, Gütersloh, 1967, p. 348 (Anklageschrift Wolff, p. 2 3 5 ) . " Ibid. 13 According to the order of October 26, 1939 Jews of the General Government were compelled to perform forced labour. See Georg, ibid., p. 91; Verordnungsblatt für das Generalgouvernement Polen, No. I, 1939, pp. 6-7. " I MT, X X X I V , p. 76, PS-4024. 15 St. Piotrowski, Hans Franks Tagebuch, Panstwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. Warszawa, 1963, p. 115. 16 Homze, op. cit., p. 148.

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centration camps.17 It would seem that in the difference of opinion between the chiefs of the Economic and Administrative Department of the SS (VWHA) and the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), the production enthusiasts of the VWHA, eager to retain the Jews as slave labour for greater Germany's war effort, finally gained the upper hand. It thus came about that a concise order was issued by the VWHA Chief, 18 SS-Gruppenführer Oswald Pohl," "to care for and feed well" all the enfeebled Jewish inmates in order that they recuperate sufficiently within six weeks to be graded for work. (Up to that time, such Jews had been sent to the gas chambers and those who were hospitalized were killed by injections.) This move precisely suited Himmler's ambition of expanding the power of the SS and concentrating in its hands an "economic empire" (Wirtschaftsimperium EXTERMINATION

BY

WORK

Actually, employment of Jewish prisoners in the armament industry of the Reich and in private industry (the larger employers were the gigantic trusts of I. G. Farben and the Krupp factories) did not mean an abandonment of the principles of the "Final Solution," although it did entail an innovation. Even this seemed highly disturbing to those charged with executing the extermination programme. According to Höss," commandant of Auschwitz camp, there was strong opposition to the removal from transports of Jews fit for work, for they saw the "Final Solution" endangered through possible mass escapes and other occurrences that might conceivably lead to the saving of Jewish lives. And, indeed, the employment of Jewish workers did in the final analysis modify their status—"as instruments of labour they had a definite price and as property a definite 17

It was principally Reichsführer Himmler w h o persuaded the Führer to utilize the maximum number of concentration camp prisoners in factories and armament productions. See Kommandant in Auschwitz, autobiographische Aufzeichnungen von Rudolf Höss, eingeleitet und kommentiert von Martin Broezat. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1958, p. 137; A. Speer, Erinnerungen, Prophyläen Verlag, Berlin, 1969, p. 378.

18

Cf. Kommandant in Auschwitz, p. 134; George, ibid., p. 38, 39. Kommandant in Auschwitz, p. 161; compare also testimony of Pohl V, p. 338, N O - 2 7 3 6 . Speer, op. cit., p. 382. Kommandant in Auschwitz, p. 134.

19

20 21

NCA,

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value."22 Their status as labourers granted them temporary existence and, in fact, was responsible for the eventual liberation of some of them. Testimony23 relating to the situation in the Mauthausen concentration camp faithfully reflects the changes that came about in the status of the Jewish inmates there: Up until the summer of 1944 Jewish inmates did not generally survive the concentration camp of Mauthausen longer than three days. They died in the cell blocks as a result of torture, they were shot, or they were drowned by their guards at their place of work... It was customary that when leaving for work... their escort reported to the guard at the gate: 8 guns, 2 dogs, 40 Jews. In the evening upon their return only the guns and the dogs were checked in since the work detail had been liquidated (Arbeitskommando aufgelöst)... the gist of it was simple and clear. But as from the spring of 1944 when the lack of labour was acute, there came to Mauthausen Jews from Hungary who were employed like all the other prisoners at the camp.24 The change in the policy of employment of Jews granted them only a temporary reprieve, and although they constituted a productive element, the economic aspect was secondary25 and their extermination through work (Vernichtung durch Arbeit)29 continued to See H. Arendt'» essay on "The Concentration Camp" in Man in Contemporary Society, Columbia University Press, New York, 1965, p. 1058. 2 3 H. Marsalek (ed.), Mauthausen mahnt! Kampf hinter Stacheldraht; Tatsachen, Dokumente und Berichte über das grosste Hitlerische Vernichtungslager in Osterreich, Wien, 1950, p. 68; Michel de Bonard, "Mauthausen", Revue d'histoire de la deuxieme guerre mondiale, Nos. 15-16, Paris, 1954, p. 54. «Ibid. 2 a In this connection, it is worth mentioning the directives of the Ministry of the East (Reichsminister für die besetzten Ostgebiete) of December 18, 1941 which categorically state with regard to Jews: "Economic considerations should fundamentally remain unconsidered in the settlement of the problem." 1MT, X X X I I , p. 437, PS-3666 (USA-876); NCA, VI, pp. 402403. 2 6 This definition was used for the first time in a discussion between Thierack and Himmler, on September 18, 1942, regarding asocial elements. See 1MT, X X V I , p. 201, PS-654; NCA, III, p. 468; O. Wormser, "Le role du travail des concentrationnaires dans Ficonomie d'allemande," Revue d'histoire de la deuxiime guerre mondiale, Nos. 15-16, Paris, 1954, p. 97; 22

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be the ultimate objective of those responsible for the solution of the Jewish problem. At the end of their stint the enfeebled and sick among the workers were sent for extermination to Birkenau (nach Birkenau) and their places were taken by new prisoners. It should be noted that the physical condition of most of the prisoners was so poor that some of them proved totally useless in the armament industry. 27 In July of 1944 Goebbels was appointed Plenipotentiary for Total War (Reichsbeauftragter für den totalen Kriegseinsatz). Despite the tremendous efforts devoted to "total" conscription, the number of additional workers by the end of 1944 amounted to only about 400,000 28 including a considerable number of camp prisoners and prisoners of war. O n December 30 Gauleiter Sauckel, Plenipotentiary General for Labour Allocation, reported to Hitler that the total number of forced labourers conscripted during the year 1944 amounted to 3,313,000 instead of 4,050,000 as planned. 29 In this connection it is worth mentioning that on August 15, 1944 the number of prisoners at the camps in the Reich numbered 524, 286 souls (379,167 men and 145,119 women). 30 Another source estimates that in the summer of 1944 alone about 100,000 Jews 31 who had been destined for extermination were channelled (abgezweigt ) to the industries of the Reich. According to the testimony of O. Pohl, 32 about 420,000 prisoners were employed in the armament industry (200,000 to 250,000 of them worked in private industry and 170,000 were employed by the Ministry of Armaments and Munitions); about 15,000 worked in building and in road construction; 10,000 to 12,000 were employed in erecting the Führer's Headquarters in Thuringia; 40,000 to 50,000 were employed in building J. F. Triska, "Work Redeems," Concentration Camp Labor and Nazi German Economy, Journal of Central European Affairs, April 1959, pp. 3-22. 27 The actual contribution of the concentration camp prisoners to the war effort of the Reich has not yet fully been assessed. For a more comprehensive treatment see J. Billig, L'Hitlerisme et le systime concentrationnaire. Presses Universitäres de France, Paris, 1967; Triska, ibid., Ο. WormserMigot, Le systime concentrationnaire Nazi (1933-1945), Presses Universitäres de France, Paris, 1968. 28 Homze, op. cit., p. 151. 2 » Ibid., p. 15. 30 Broszat, Konzentrationslager, p. 159; Georg, ibid., p. 41. 31 Ibid., p. 159. 32 Trials, V, pp. 445-446.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS UVJA ROTH KIRCH Ε Ν under the supervision of the Amtsgruppe-C of the Economic and Administration Department of the SS; the remainder, about 120,000 prisoners, worked in factories, agriculture and various services in the camps. At that period Auschwitz constituted a tremendous reservoir of manpower, and that at a time when 10,000 of the deportees from Hungary were sent daily to their death in the gas chambers. A statement issued by the Polish underground on August 21, 1944s3 set the number of prisoners in Auschwitz at 105,168. From time to time special selections were made in the presence of visiting factory chiefs and managers. The prisoners were ordered to pass naked before the visitors who chose candidates for work on the basis of their physical condition. The camp logbook reveals that the first group of deportees from Hungary were sent to work in the Reich as early as the end of May."4 These selections at Auschwitz continued at the end of the summer. At the two "family camps" (of Czech Jews and Gipsies which had existed since 1942-43) the productive elements were retained for work, whereas the aged, women and children were led to the gas chambers during the night 8 5 Workers by the thousands were absorbed in the camp premises, in armament work, in the factories of Krupp, in the Hermann Goering Works, in the Siemens Works and others, or were spread throughout the chain of camps established at that time close to the principal camp, Auschwitz.36 ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL ASPECTS OF NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE NAZIS

Some of the more flexible members of the SS leadership, primarily Reichsführer Himmler, were prepared to adopt a broader utilitarian approach. Initially, negotiations for the liberation of certain groups of "Exchange Jews" (Austauschjuden)i7 were conducted on a purely 38

84 88 38

37

H. Wröbel, "Die Liquidation des Konzentrationslagers Auschwitz-Birkenau," Hefte von Auschwitz 6, PMO, 1962, p. 12. Hefte von Auschwiti 7, PMO, 1964, p. 95. Hefte von Auschwitz 8, PMO, 1967, p. 49, 50, 55. Eight latellite camps (Nebenlager) were established during that period near the quarries and mines in that area. See ibid., p. 47. For this purpose a special camp was established in Bergen-Belsen for the detention of "privileged Jews" and "Jews for exchange." See directives of the RSHA of August 31, 1943 with regard to the transfer of Jews to

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economic basis. Those connections led eventually to direct contact with representatives of Jewish organizations of the free world, with officials of the International Red Cross, and even with representatives of the War Refugee Board. This activity actually began after the military occupation of Hungary (19.3.1944) when Himmler's representatives opened negotiations with the Kastner group on the notorious "Blood for Ware" deal." Undoubtedly the main objective of Himmler and his colleagues was to establish contacts with diplomatic circles among the Allies as a means of putting out peace feelers, at the same time assuring themselves of an alibi for the future as well as a reward for "acts of goodwill" (the "humanitarian" motive was mentioned only in later stages). These deals were obviously intended to serve propaganda purposes as well. At the end of July 1944 the press of the free world published the first intimation of the atrocities encountered by the Soviet forces with the liberation of the Lublin-Maidanek camp. 3 · It was also at that time that the initial first-hand description of Auschwitz was related by two young Jews from Slovakia and a Polish Captain 40 who had managed to escape from that camp. The underground "Working Group" in Bratislava recorded their testimony, which the Aufenthaltslager Bergcn-Belscn. The following are the categories of Jews eligible for exchange purposes: those having connections with the enemy countries (feindliches Ausland), hostages who may serve as means for economic or political pressure, prominent figures in public service, etc. Cf. E. Kolb, Bergen-Belsen, Geschichte des "Aufenthaltslagers," 1943-1945, Verlag für Literatur und Zeitgeschichte, Hannover, 1962, p. 211. 38 Contacts with the Relief and Rescue Committee in Budapest were established through the mediation of Wisliceny who brought to the Hungarian capital the recommendation of the Bratislava "Working Group." As is well known, Wisliceny acted as mediator of the Group in the first attempt to set up a ransom project, made in Slovakia at the end of 1942, known as "Plan Europa." See L. Rothkirchen, The Destruction of Slovak Jewry, a documentary history, YAD V A S H E M , Jerusalem, 1961, pp. 30-33. 89 The Lublin-Maidanek camp was liberated on July 24, 1944. For the report of the Soviet-Polish Committee on Maidanek see I M T , VII, p. 128, USSR-29. 40 Attached to their testimony was a letter of warning, written by Rabbi M. D. Weissmandel, proposing the bombardment of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp in order to avert the annihilation of Hungarian Jewry. See The Destruction of Slovak Jewry, pp. 237-242.

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created considerable feeling upon reaching certain addresses by way of diplomatic channels.41 It is therefore not surprising that the high Nazi officials who were responsible for the extermination urged the camp authorities to erase all traces of these acts with all possible speed. Many concentration camps began to destroy all evidence, employing as "commandos" Jewish inmates who were forced to cremate the corpses. Their work completed, they were also exterminated.42 The situation on the various fronts led a number of SS leaders to conclude that the Third Reich was on the brink of disintegration and that "humanitarian treatment" of the inmates of the camps might create more favourable public opinion toward Germany. Within the SS leadership there arose various factions, which subsequently led to the hasty evacuation on the eve of surrender of the remaining camp inmates. In these activities the Führer himself, as well as Kaltenbrunner, Eichmann and particularly SS-Reichsführer Himmler 43 played decisive roles. In order to comprehend the tactics of Himmler one must bear in mind his implacable enmity towards Soviet Russia. As early as May 1941 he put out the first peace feelers and despatched mediators to various personages in England. He made another attempt in June 1943 as well as in January, and in the fall of 1944,44 when with the aid of Jacob Wallenberg, the Swedish financier, he endeavoured to establish contact with Dr. Weizmann, King Gustav of Sweden and Winston Churchill. These contacts were of course intended to lay the foundation for future negotiations with an eye to post-war arrangements concerning a Germany "without Hitler." In this connection it should be recalled that Himmler knew of the existence of the German underground and of its valuable connections 41

42 43

44

The reports reached Hungary as early as May 1944; in June they were received by Jan Kopecky, representative of the Czechoslovak Governmentin-exile in Switzerland, and by Nathan Schwalb, representative of "Hehalutz" in Geneva. These reports were first published in extenso in the United States in November 1944 by the War Refugee Board. At the trial of Weizsäcker (Trial XI) they were presented as exhibit NG-2061. Z. Lederer, Ghetto Theresienstadt, E. Goldston, London, 1953, pp. 157-158. For details see G. Ritter, Carl Gördeler und die deutsche Widerstandsbewegung, Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1954, p. 421. Ibid., p. 422, 427, 428; Foreign Relations of the United States, Diplomatic Papers, 1944, Vol. I, Washington, 1966, p. 489, 491.

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- - ι 1 V$ λ ' '. > Cifs*'

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T H E " F I N A L SOLUTION" IN ITS LAST STAGES

with prominent persons in Sweden. Himmler even tried to exploit these ties to his own advantage after the conspirators of the July 1944 plot were sentenced to death.45 Himmler, who since 1941 had aspired to the position of Führer, was not deterred from declaring to Count Bemadotte in February 19454e that "he had sworn loyalty to Adolf Hitler; as a soldier and as a German" he could not violate his oath. Himmler also played a double role in his dealings with Jews, promoted by his plans for a separate peace with the West, and his endeavours to insert a wedge between the Allies. (It appears that the Führer himself lent a hand in these activities.)47 It may be assumed that the political aspect of the "Blood for Ware" proposal, namely, the pledge given to the Western Powers that the trucks supplied in exchange for the liberation of Hungarian Jews would not be deployed on the Western front,4" provided legal cover for the negotiations with regard to Brand's mission. But the intention of creating dissent among the enemies was overly transparent; it transpired that the Allies had definite information on the true significance of that deal. An intimation of this may be found in item 13 of the Secret Protocol signed on November 1, 1943,4" at the Tripartite Conference of Foreign Ministers, which obligated all signatories to provide full reports on every phase in the peace feeler approach. It should be noted that the Soviet position in this matter was more inflexible than that of their Western partners. This attitude was also evident in the matter of Brand's mission. Whereas the United States, intending to leave "an open door"50 in these negotiations made an attempt to investigate the nature of the proposal, « Ritter, op. cit., p. 422, 548. " Count Folke Bern&dotte, The Fall of the Curtain, last days of the Third Reich, Cassel, London, 1945, p. 22. 4 7 A hint of this may be found in the communications of SS Obergruppenführer Wolff, who conducted secret negotiations with Alan Dulles in Switzerland. Cf. John Toland, The Last 100 Days, Random House, New York, 1966, p. 478; Höhne, op. cit., p. 530. 48Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. I, p. 1090. 4 0 The deliberations of the three foreign ministers took place in Moscow between October 19 and November 1, 1943. See Foreign Relations, 1943, Washington, 1963, Vol. I, p. 749, 753; Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. I, p. 1090. «ο Ibid., p. 1091.

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and the US Ambassador in Russia declared01 that both his Government and that of Britain would not permit themselves to be led astray by the German proposal which might split the Allies, the Russians remained adamant in their refusal. A secret Soviet memorandum of June 19, 1944" sent in reply to the United States Embassy, stated that the Soviet Union "does not consider it expedient or permissible to carry on any conversations whatsoever with the German Government on the question touched upon." And indeed, representatives of the Western Powers did refrain from conducting negotiations with the Germans. The meeting between McClelland and Becher in Zurich on November 5, 1944 apparently took place with the knowledge of the Russians. The first steps in Himmler's "acts of goodwill" toward the Jews were taken with the mediation of Becher. The object was purely mercenary: on June 30, 1944 a special train left Hungary for BergenBelsen, carrying 1684 Jews" who were to be released. Before the train had left Hungary a ransom collected by the Jewish Community of Budapest (three suitcases filled with diamonds, gold, platinum and foreign currency to the value of $1,600,000—about $1,000 per capita) was delivered into the hands of the SS in exchange for the liberation of the passengers. At the beginning of August Himmler expressed his readiness to free 500 persons of the group and to send them to Switzerland.54 SS Hauptsturmführer Krumey who was appointed escort to the group, personally relayed a letter from Dr. Kastner to his father-inlaw Dr. Joseph Fischer, who headed the group at Bergen-Belsen,55 containing instructions54 to draw up a list of candidates for liberation. «Ibid., p. 1090. Ibid., p. 1074. 63 For details on the Bergen-Belsen train see R. Kastner, Der Bericht des jüdischen Rettungskomitees aus Budapest 1942-1945 (typescript) Geneva, 1946 (hereafter—Kästner'* Report); S. Rosenfeld, Tik Plili 124 (Criminal File 124), the Griinwald-Kastner Trial, Jerusalem, 1955 (Hebrew); Kolb, Bergen-Belsen, op. cit. " Kästners Report, p. 79, 90. 69 Head of the Jewish community of Kolozsv&r, and a well-known lawyer. Before the war he was a member of the Rumanian parliament. 88 The letter containing Kastner's directives is published here for the first time (see appendix). It lists the criteria governing the choice of candidates for the Bergen-Belsen train. The subject came up at the Griinwald-Kastner trial in Jerusalem in 1955 and created a furore among the Israeli public. 82

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS T H E " F I N A L SOLUTION" IN ITS LAST STAGES

In compliance with Eichmann's order, certain persons were removed from the list, among them the relatives of Brand, so that they might serve as hostages. In fact only 318 Jews were liberated at that time and sent to Switzerland, while the rest of that group were permitted to leave for Switzerland only in December.07 This was the first Jewish group permitted to leave German territory after the outbreak of the war.5* By this act of "goodwill" Himmler made a gesture toward the Joint Juden, as he termed it.8® The mission of Joel Brand was on the agenda at that time and representatives of Jewish organizations were endeavouring, in ignorance of the Soviet veto, to persuade various factors in the free world to "leave an open door" for the "Blood for Ware" deal. We should mention the fact that McClelland emphasized in his statement of February 1946*° that the talks in Switzerland in the autumn of 1944 and the spring of 1945, with Kastner as mediator, between Saly Maier of the JDC, and Kurt Becher, Himmler's representative, were held with the full knowledge of the State Department. The British and Russian Governments were also kept advised. In February 1945, Himmler made a similar gesture in deference to the Jewish Rabbis (Rabbiner Juden,*1 as he put it). In negotiations conducted with the mediation of former president of Switzerland, Jean Marie Musy, acting in the name of Agudath Yisroel and the Committee of Orthodox Rabbis in the United States,62 Himmler agreed to liberate 1,200 Jews from Theresienstadt.·8 From Himmler's The first group arrived in Basle on August 21; the second group numbering 1,368 Jews left Bergen-Belsen on December 4, 1944. Before the train pulled out, Dr. Kastner and Dr. Fischer were asked to confirm by signature "the delivery of 1,368 Jews." See Kastner's Report, p. 90, 138. 6 8 With the exception of a group of Greek Jews of Spanish citizenship who were transferred to Spain in February 1944, after prolonged negotiations between the governments of Spain and Germany. Cf. H. Avni, "Spanish Nationals in Greece and their Fate during the Holocaust," p. 57. MA passage of Himmler's notations was published in Roscnfeld's book (p. 225). 4 0 See appendix to Kästners Report. t l Rosenfeld, p. 225. 6 2 In engaging Jean Musy by means of Walter Schellenberg, Chief of the Foreign Intelligence Service in the RSHA, the Stembruch brothers of Montreux, representing the Orthodox Rabbis of America in Switzerland, were instrumental. See Kolb, op. cit., p. 151. •8 The transport left Theresienstadt on February 3, and reached Switzerland 6T

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notes on his discussions with Musy it is evident that the Reichsführer was aware of the rivalry prevailing between the Joint and the Rabbis; he also tried to determine from his fellow negotiator which of the two had greater influence upon the American government.®4 The defeatist mood among the leaders of the SS grew stronger during the "months of mutiny" with the abortive attempt upon Hitler's life (20.7.1944), the Warsaw Uprising (1.8.1944), the turn in Rumanian policy (23.8.1944) and the Slovak National Rebellion (29.8.1944). It was not by chance that Himmler asked Eichmann in August for the exact number of Jews exterminated. In a personal conversation with his colleague in Budapest,βΒ Eichmann related that he had informed the Reichsführer "on the basis of information in his possession" that in the various camps about four million Jews had been put to death, while two additional millions met their end in other ways: most of them were shot by operational squads of the Security Police during the campaign against Russia. According to Eichmann this report was not acceptable to Himmler, who was of the opinion that the number of Jews put to death was over six million." ATTEMPTS TO SAVE THE REMNANTS OF JEWRY

As the Allied forces approached closer to Germany proper, the free world viewed with mounting apprehension the fate of prisoners of war and concentration camp internees. The War Refugee Board who since the occupation of Hungary had tried in vain to convince the International Red Cross of the pressing need to reinforce their staff in view of the danger that threatened the Jews in that country,βτ once again appealed to the latter organization.68 It strongly urged Intercross to intensify its activities even if this should lead "far

on February 6, 1945. See Lederer, op. cit., p. 174; G. Reitlinger, The Final Solution, Vallentine-Mitchell, London, 1968 (2nd revised and augmented edition), p. 502. ** See Rosenfeld, p. 225. «» Affidavit of Dr. Wilhelm Höttl of November 26, 1945, IMT, XXXI, pp. 8586, PS-2738 (USA-296); NCA, V, pp. 380-382. «· Ibid. β* Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. I, p. 1021. "Ibid., p. 1039, 1147-1148.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS T H E " F I N A L S O L U T I O N " IN I T S LAST STAGES

beyond the limits of their traditional capacity," since the situation was "likewise unprecedented." At the beginning of September, the Polish government informed the American government99 of the diabolical plan activated by the commanders of the Auschwitz concentration camp to exterminate all remaining prisoners to prevent their liberation by the approaching enemy. This information also reached the Scandinavian countries, where frantic diplomatic activities were initiated for the exchange of Danish and Norwegian prisoners of war against Germans.70 The World Jewish Congress sent letters of warning to various agencies.71 On the basis of this warning, Jan Masaryk, in the name of the Czechoslovak government in exile,™ approached the governments of the United States, Great Britain and the Soviet Union asking that they urgently consider all possible ways of expediting help for the prisoners whose lives were in jeopardy. On October 10, the American government issued" a declaration warning the heads of the German regime that "those guilty of murderous acts would be brought to justice". The following day the B.B.C. broadcasted a similar warning by the British Foreign Office;74 the Soviet Union did not find it necessary to voice such a warning.75 The Jewish organizations explored additional avenues aimed at forestalling the murder of survivors in the concentration camps. At the beginning of October Dr. Jean Marie Musy was sent to Vienna by the Committee of Orthodox Rabbis in an attempt to persuade · · Memorandum of the Polish Embassy of September 23, 1944. See ibid., pp. 1252-1253. 70 For details see Bemadotte, op. cit.; F. Kersten, Totenkopf und Treue; Heinrich Himmler ohne Uniform, Robert Mölisch, Hamburg, 1952. English edition: The Kersten Memoirs 1940-1945, Hutchinson, London, 1956; L. Yahil, "Scandinavian Countries to the Rescue of Concentration Camp Prisoners," YAD VASHEM STUDIES, V I , Jerusalem, 1966, pp. 181-220. » Ibid., p. 211. 12 For the letter of the Czechoslovak Government in Exile see Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. I, p. 1253. 78 Ibid,, p. 1255. "Ibid. 78 It should be mentioned that also the stern warning issued by President Roosevelt on March 24, 1944 in reaction to the occupation of Hungary by the German forces did not receive support from the Soviet Government who held that "no special effort could be made on behalf of any group." See Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. I, pp. 1230-1231.

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Reichsführer Himmler to close down the concentration camps for "humanitarian reasons"7· and to permit transfer of the prisoners to Switzerland. In October 1944 Himmler issued the order "forbidding the further extermination of Jews and providing hospital care (Pflege) for the weak and the sick."" The text of his order has been preserved in the testimony of witnesses; its timing suggests that Himmler acted under the influence of several factors—the Anglo-American warnings, the parleys with Jean Marie Musy, and the persuasions of Kurt Bechcr, the contact man for "the Joint Line." (According to Becher's testimony at the Nuremberg Trials, Himmler acted upon the former's advice, and personally saw to it that the instructions were passed on to Kaltenbrunner and Pohl.)" Himmler's order allegedly put an end to the mass exterminations. In actual fact, however, the process of annihilation continued after the "prohibition" and on October 30, 1944 an additional 1,689 Jews brought from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz were put to death in the gas chambers, as were a transport of Jews coming from Slovakia on November 3, among them 481 men." Eichmann, too, "did not say 'halt'," 80 and exploiting the situation in Budapest with the rise to power of Fascist leader Franz Szalasi and the breakdown of communications, personally gave the order for the "death march" toward the Austrian border of about 40,000 Jews of Budapest.81 On November 7, another warning "Attention Germans!"82 was 7e

Schellenberg ascribed the beginning of the "humanitarian" activities to Musy's visit to Himmler which was arranged at his initiative. See his affidavit of June 18, 1948 at the International Nuremberg Trial; Kolb, op. cit p. 151; Höhne, op. cit., p. 525. 77 According to Becher's testimony (See IMT, X X X I I I , p. 68, PS-3762) Himmler issued the order between mid-September and October. O n the other hand, Höss in his memoirs noted that it was in the autumn of 1944. Compare also Broszat's note to this statement of Höss in Komandant in Auschwitz, p. 160. 78 Becher also placed the responsibility for the killings after that time upon Kaltenbrunner and Pohl ( P S - 3 7 6 2 ) . 7 » Hefte von Auschwitz, 8, PMO, 1964, p. 83, 84. 80 See testimony of Wisliceny IMT, IV, pp. 369-370; Kastner's Report, p. 149. 81 For a description of the death marches see the testimony collated by the Joint in Budapest at the end of the war, now kept in the archives of YAD VASHEM ( 0 / 1 5 ) . 82 For the text of the warning see Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. I, p. 1175.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS T H E "FINAL SOLUTION" IN ITS LAST STAGES

issued with a view to deterring the German people. Under the pressure of Jewish organizations, particularly the World Jewish Congress and various international agencies, General Eisenhower warned the Germans that severe punishments would be meted out to those individuals doing injury to any foreign citizen in Germany. "The advancing Allied armies expect to find these persons alive and unharmed." THE EVACUATION OF CONCENTRATION CAMP PRISONERS ON THE THRESHOLD OF LIBERATION

At the end of autumn 1944, the first transport of evacuees from Auschwitz was sent to Bergen-Belsen, Sachsenhausen and other camps.8® While at Allied Military Headquarters the "expediency" of bombing Auschwitz was being discussed,'4 the camp itself was being dismantled. As a first step the contents of the warehouses83 —personal belongings and clothing of the victims—were transferred to Germany for safekeeping, followed by transports of the prisoners themselves. On January 12, 1945 Himmler received Jean Marie Musy for a second talk88 in which an overall solution for the Jewish question was discussed; it was agreed that once every fortnight a transport of about 1,200 Jews would proceed to Switzerland (in first class trains). In exchange for this, Himmler was given an undertaking, to the effect that the world-wide propaganda campaign being 83 84

85

M

Hefte von Auschwitz, 8, PMO, 1964, pp. 85-92. In this affair the War Refugee Board took an active part but to no avail. The investigation of the matter dragged on for over four months (see above, note No. 40); it was then decided that from a military standpoint bombing would be purposeless. In his letter of October 30, 1944 J. F. Martin, private secretary to Churchill, indicated to Dr. Chaim Weizmann the "difficulties" explaining that "We have discussed this matter with the Soviets, and that's it." See G. A. Morse, While Six Millions Died, a Chronicle of American Apathy, Random House, New York, 1967, pp. 360-361. The signal for dismantling was given after the liberation by the Russians of the Lublin-Maidanek camp and this process continued until January 1945. In the autumn of 1944 transports of prisoners from Warsaw (after the Uprising), from Slovakia and from Theresienstadt were brought to the camp. Between December 1, 1944 and January, 1945, 541,843 dresses and sets of underwear were sent to Germany. See Wr6bel, ibid., p. 8. W. Schellenberg, The Schellenberg Memoirs, Andre Deutsch, London, 1956, p. 430.

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350

LIVIA ROTH KIRCHEN waged against Germany would be subdued. (The experimental first transport from Theresienstadt arrived in Switzerland on February 5 and was given publicity both in Berne and in New York in the pages of the New York Times.) According to Schellenberg "Operation Musy" was discontinued when it came to Hitler's knowledge.87 A few days later (presumably about mid-January) 88 Himmler issued an order (Räumungsbefehl) to clear the camps of those prisoners who were "in condition to leave" (marschfähige). This order in effect pronounced the death sentence upon thousands of the enfeebled survivors;89 camp commanders, guards and the SS men completed the work in an efficient fashion. Knowledge of the evacuation marchcs was made public through the testimony of the survivors, from descriptions of eye-witnesses and people such as Höss and Pohl who came across these scenes of horror in the course of travels on the public highways of the Reich. During the last months of the war most of the prisoners underwent the torture of evacuation; ghost trains loaded with skeletons moved into the interior of Germany, long lines of human beings without provisions or adequate clothing picked their way along snow-bound roads for days and nights at a time. The feeble and the sick were shot in the back; some froze to death or died by the wayside from hunger and exhaustion. Only a small number reached their new destination.90 «Ibid.

89

90

According to Höss, Himmler ordered the evacuation of the camps at the beginning of 1945. He also maintained that according to the instructions of the Reichsführer, the Higher SS and Police Leaders who in an emergency were responsible for the security and safety of the camps, were themselves to decide whether evacuation or surrender was preferable. In Broszat's opinion the order was given in the middle of January 1945. See IMT, X I , p. 407; Kommandant in Auschwitz, p. 140. The physical condition of the prisoners was extremely poor, and even those who started on the march were in no condition for long-distance marching. One of the nost appalling descriptions is to be found in the memoirs of Höss (pp. 141-142), who as an "aesthete" sought to memorialize the "colourful drama" which he himself witnessed. See also the description of the liquidation of the Oranienburg camp related by the representative of the International Red Gross in Documents sur l'activiti du Comit6 international de la Croix-Rouge en faveur des civils detenus dans les camps de concentration en Allemagne (1939-1945), Troisieme Edition, Geneve, Avril 1947, pp. 120-123.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS THE "FINAL SOLUTION" IN ITS LAST STAGES

Estimates as of January 15, 1945 give the number of prisoners in the concentration camps as 714,211 souls (511,537 men and 202,674 women). 61 It is assumed that at least one third of the prisoners were forced to undergo the terrors of the evacuation marches.®2 " . . . t h e y m a r c h e d . . . women, children, men and youths, of all the countries of the world. There marched, you might say, hounded nations, while insane shrieks, the sounds of shots, and the barking of dogs urged them on — they m a r c h e d . . . ravaged by hunger and cold, the frozen earth resounding with the clattering of their wooden shoes. They m a r c h e d . . . and on their way the slumbering earth gave forth the terrible echoes of five years of pain and torment in the camps.. . " M The order for evacuation was issued in mid-January 1945, when the Red Army reached the Vistula river. O n January 16 the city of Czestochowa was liberated. A few days later began the final evacuation of 56,000 prisoners at Auschwitz. There remained only the sick, the feeble and the medical staff, altogether about 7,000 souls, most of them Jews.· 4 O n January 27 the camp was liberated by the First Ukrainian Army under the command of Marshal Koniev. The circle closed and Auschwitz, the city of nightmares, became a universal term—"a planet loaded with corpses," 95 to weigh upon the conscience of the world. In the wake of the liquidation of Auschwitz the evacuation of the rest of the camps followed in the form of hasty transfer of prisoners to Germany proper. The text of the final evacuation order has not been preserved but an order of January 22, 194596 issued by Sturmbannführer Hoppe, Commander of the Stutthof Camp near Danzig, is available as evidence. Acting upon the order of his commanding officer, SS-General Katzmann, he ordered the evacuation of the prisoners by forced march (Fussmarsch), stating explicitly that the Θ1

Broszat, Konzentrationslager, p. 159. •2 Ibid. • ' T h i s extract is a quotation from the article written by an eye-witness, the Reverend Father Dr. Gavor, published (in Polish) in Nasza Droga, March 1948, pp. 4 0 - 4 1 ; Cf. also Wrobel, ibid., p. 25. "Ibid., p. 17. e5 D . Rousset, L'Univers Concentrationnaire, Edition du Pavois, Paris, 1946, p. 181. · · NO-3796.

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sick and those not fit to march, as well as a working crew to dismantle the camp, be left behind. For this last he ordered to exploit available German prisoners. Presumably the order for final evacuation was worded in greater detail, similar to the Security Police order issued previously on July 20, 1944,97 relating to the fate of prisoners in the prisons and camps in the Cracow area. The gist of the order reads: "If the evacuation could not be completed in time the prisons and the labour camp» were to be blown up. The liberation of prisoners or Jews by the enemy, be it the Polish underground or the Red Army, was to be avoided. Under no circumstances were they to be allowed to fall into the enemy's hands alive.·8 It should be noted that Wisliceny related to Kastner (December, 1944)99 that Eichmann had instructed the camp commanders in Poland "to punish severely any obstruction to the evacuation." SS personnel correctly interpreted Eichmann's intention and while serving as escort to the marching prisoners they managed to kill them off "in as large numbers as possible." Wisliceny also recounted that he was calling on Eichmann at his Berlin office100 when a cable arrived from Hunsche requesting contingency orders in the event of the Russians' entering Theresienstadt. Eichmann's response was terse: "The Jews should be destroyed completely," (restlos—as Wisliceny put it). With the advance of the Allied forces, the fate of the concentration camp inmates, particularly that of the Jewish prisoners, must obviously have been discussed at Nazi Headquarters with Hitler, Kaltenbrunner and Ribbentrop. There exists evidence to the effect that the Führer himself ordered the liquidation of concentration camp inmates "to ensure that they do not emerge as victors after liberation by the Allies."101 Some of his associates were present when the Führer flew into a rage on hearing that the prisoners of Buchenwald were liberated by the American army (in point of fact only half of the prisoners were released, since about 28,000 of them, mostly Jews, had been marched off to other camps on the eve of liberation). He " IMT,

XXXVII, p. 487, L-053.

·«Ibid. ·» Kastner's Report, p. 148. "»Ibid., p. 161. «ο» Kenten, op. cit., p. 342; G. Reitlinger, The SS. Alibi of a Nation 19221945, Heinemann, London, p. 416.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS T H E " F I N A L SOLUTION" IN ITS LAST STAGES

then ordered explicitly that only the sick prisoners be left behind in the camps and that the remainder be "evacuated."102 There is evidence that at the beginning of April 1945, when the American army neared Südharz, Himmler ordered that the prisoners at Mittelbau-Dora camp be exterminated by gassing in one of the camp's underground structures.10* A series of unforeseen events prevented execution of this order; it thus transpired that at the end of April the prisoners were evacuated to Bergen-Belsen (at a time when the typhus epidemic was at its most virulent). Another liquidation device known as "Operation Cloud A - l ; FireCloud" (Wolke A - l ; Feuerwolken) has been ascribed to Ernst Kaltenbmnner who, apparently, ordered the blowing up of Dachau, Mauthausen and Theresienstadt104 with their inmates. "The mass liquidation of the prisoners" was in fact brought up at the Nuremberg Trials; Kaltenbrunner was cross-examined on this matter but he categorically denied having given any such orders.105 The suicide of Himmler precluded the possibility of a thorough investigation; in the absence of relevant testimony10· this chapter has remained obscure to this day. The pressure brought to bear upon Himmler to discontinue evacuation of the camps prompted him on March 12, 194410T to give his personal physician, Felix Kersten, a written undertaking to the effect that prisoners would no longer be evacuated but handed over to the Allies "intact." However, the "lesson of Bergen-Belsen" (the world-wide publicity of the atrocities discovered by the British) convinced him that it was preferable to empty the camps of living witnesses to the horrors perpetrated there; hence the evacuations continued until the liberation. In January and February columns of prisoners were kept marching to fixed destinations, but in April, when communications between the guards and their superiors were severed, the prisoners in the ι « Affidavit H Ö J S , IMT,

X I , p. 4 0 7 .

Kommandant in Auschwitz, p. 137. »· IMT, X I , pp. 283-£; X X X I I I , p. 281, PS-3870 (Affidavit by H. Marsalek of April 8, 1946). »·» IMT, X I , p. 285. ιοβ Evidence about the preparations undertaken in different camps became available in testimony and books published in the years after the war. See for instance Lederer, op. cit., p. 305. 1 0 7 See Kersten, op. cit., p. 343.

103

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ROTHKIRCHEN

absence of definite orders were kept drifting aimlessly from place to place. The open trucks with their loads of frozen corpses proceeded without a target as long as liberation was delayed.108 EPILOGUE

We do not have exact figures for Jewish survivors among those liberated by the Allied forces (about six hundred thousand souls).100 It is estimated that in all some 100,000 prisoners110 remained alive, while approximately 80,000 to 100,000 perished during the last months of the war. (In Bergen-Belsen alone about 40,000 died on the eve of liberation.) In the years following the war, the horror of the death marches and the evacuation seems to have faded in people's minds. It may be that these revelations became submerged in the more widely publicized maelstrom of horrors relating to the scientific machinery of destruction: gas chambers, asphyxiating vans, medical experiments, etc. Even today historians and researchers tend to see in these evacuation marches a symptom of the general anarchy prevailing in Germany during the period of Götterdämmerung. Paradoxical as it may sound, it is not far removed from the truth to say that it was because of the disorder and confusion created by the approach of the Allied armies that contradictory evacuation orders were issued, enabling part of the prisoners to remain alive. It is clear that even at that advanced stage of war, despite the promises given "to spare the lives of the Jewish prisoners," the subconscious mind of the Nazi leaders and of common folk as well still retained the original concept of "exterminating the Jewish plague" and "clearing Europe of the Jews"; this concept led them to carry out the destruction of the Jewish remnant on the very eve of liberation. The "Final Solution" of the Jewish problem—the programme for the destruction of European Jewry—was defined by an authoritative historian of our days111 as a total programme which "differed essen108 109

110

111

Ibid., p. 377; the affidavit of Höss, 1MT, X I , p. 407. M. J. Proudfoot, European Refugees 1939-1954, a study in forced population movement, Faber, London, 1957, p. 306. According to the estimate of Proudfoot the Jewish survivors comprised 10 per cent of the above mentioned figure but it is surmised that their number was even higher. Sec E. Nolte, Three Faces of Fascism; Action Frangaise, Italian Fascism,

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355

the "final solution" in its last stages tially from all other extermination action both as to scope and to intention." How deeply this idea had penetrated into the consciousness of the Nazi leaders as well as that of the rank and file was starkly evident during the final episode. It is an incontrovertible fact that at the last stages of evacuation, when orders from above could safely have been disregarded, when the lives of the prisoners were in the hands of individuals (commandants of camps, guards and escorts), these latter showed no mercy for the remnant of Jews and killed them "in as large numbers as possible." A rereading of the infamous Wannsee protocol will confirm the totality of the extermination programme; the death sentence was pronounced there on the remnants (in spite of their "superiority" according to the Darwinian theory of survival of the fittest). The text reads as follows: "The remnant that manages to survive all this, since it unquestionably constitutes the hardiest portion, will have to be treated accordingly, because these people, representing a natural selection, are to be regarded as the nucleus of a new Jewish development, should they be allowed to go free. (Note the lesson of history)." 1 " Fate has willed that part of the remnants of the camps survived to see liberation. And this "natural selection," brands plucked from the fire, have become "a nucleus of a new Jewish development" part of the nation rebuilding its Homeland, the State of Israel.

National Socialism, Weidenfeld, London, 1965, p. 399. ii2 "Der allfällig endlich verbleibende Restbestand wird, da es sich bei diesen zweifellos um den widerstandsfähigsten Teil handelt, entsprechend behandelt werden müssen, da dieser, eine natürliche Auslese darstellend, bei Freilassung als Keimzelle eines neuen jüdischen Aufbaues anzusprechen ist" (Siehe die Erfahrung der Geschichte).

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Scandinavian Countries to tbe Rescue of Concentration Camp Prisoners LENI

Y A H I L

THE FULL HISTORY of the final months of the Second World War has not yet been written. It was during those months, between the end of 1944 and the surrender of Germany, that the struggle of the giants rose to its dramatic, blood-stained climax. But even then, between the battle fronts closing in on one another, between the clashing armies and amid the fearful bombings, the Nazi rulers did not loosen their grip on the Jews and continued to pursue them relentlessly. Although transport was breaking down in large parts of Germany, railway wagons were still available for the transfer of prisoners from camp to camp to prevent their rescue by the ad· vancing Allied armies. And when the railways could not be used, the pursuers—themselves now pursued—on the pretext of moving their victims to some safer place, drove them, sick, skeletons, falling by the way, over hundreds of miles until they abandoned them to their fate somewhere in the unknown, and themselves fled. Whether the concentration camp prisoners were wandering over the countryside or whether they stayed in one place until rescue (as happened with those in Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, Dachau and elsewhere), their gruesome fate never lost its grip until the very last moment. Only isolated groups were spared the horrors of the last days of the war. These were the 1,200 Jews sent from Theresienstadt to Switzerland at the beginning of February 1945,® and the

1

3

P a r t of the contents of this article, summarized, was given as a paper, "Initiative and Operations of the Scandinavian Countries in the Rescue of Concentration Camp Prisoners," read at the Fourth World Congress for Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, July 27-August 1, 1965. H . G. Adler, Theresienstadt, Tübingen, 1960, p. 199. O n the matter as a whole see: R. Henkys, Die nationalsozialistischen Gewaltverbrechen, Stuttgart-Berlin, 1964, p. 156-167.

OTHER RESCUE OPTIONS LENI YAHIL

transport that reached that country from Hungary via BergenBelsen.s Apart from these, only a few groups were released in those last months, such as holders of Turkish passports who got to Sweden and from there by Swedish ship to Turkey* and some holders of South American passports who were sent to Switzerland." There was one particular group more fortunate than all the great mass of people in the camps, whether Jews or non-Jews. These were the political prisoners from Norway and Denmark. As from the middle of March 1945 they were taken from the various camps first to Neuengamme, near the Danish border, and then gradually to Denmark and finally to Sweden. Their lot was quite different not only from that of the Jews but also from that of German concentration camp inmates from all other countries. This rescue action is known as "Bernadotte's Operation" after the Swedish King's nephew, Count Bernadotte, who headed it. This special treatment of the Scandinavian prisoners merits study. I. Varying conditions developed in Sweden, Norway and Denmark as a result of Hitler's attack on the last two on April 9, 1940. The Government and King of Norway escaped to Britain, where they set up a Government-in-exile which took part, as far as possible in the war against Germany. In Norway itself an authority was set up, headed by the Gestapo which, supported by the new government of Quisling (whose name became a by-word for treachery), crushed all popular opposition." In Denmark the legitimate Government surOn the well-known action by Dr. Kastner see E. Kolb, Bergtn-Behen, Hanover, 1962, and particularly the chapter: Die Ungarn-Transporte in die Schweiz (hereafter referred to as Kolb), pp. 93-100. 4 Kolb, p. 155. In Sweden, at the end of March 1945, Dr. Otto Schütz on behalf of the Czechoslovak Aid Committee for Deported Jews interviewed members of the group regarding the various camps. A copy was sent to the Swedish Foreign Ministry (YAD V A S H B M Archives J M / 1 2 1 9 - 2 ) . The largest group came from Bergen-Belsen, 105; Ravensbrueck, 40-50 women and children; Theresienstadt, 6. 9 See Kolb, p. 102. On the use of these passports see Nathan Eck, "The Rescue of Jews with the Aid of Passports etc." in YAD V A S H E M Studies 1, pp. 125-152. • No comprehensive account of the war in Norway has yet appeared in a language other than Norwegian, which has a many-facetcd literature on

3

357

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rendered and was forced into an agreement with the conquerors, It was able to maintain autonomy in internal affairs and a position of neutrality for three and a half years, until the agreement was undermined by the growing opposition of the population. This struggle between the occupation authorities and the resistance movement became the principal feature of the political life of the country from the autumn of 1943, even though internal administrative independence was maintained at the same time.7 Sweden, which was not attacked by the Germans, was able to preserve its neutrality, which, however, had to be paid for by numerous concessions to the Germans up to the summer of 1943; after that date these were gradually withdrawn." As time went on and on the one hand the occupation was being felt increasingly heavily and on the other the downfall of Hitler appeared nearer, the struggle between the movement of revolt and the occupation authorities sharpened. In Norway its development was noticeable already in 1942 (in Denmark only in the summer of 1943), one of its signs being the transfer of Norwegian political detainees to prisons and concentration camps in Germany. In the earlier years of the occupation most of the Norwegian prisoners were held in camps within the country, only a few being sent to Germany. From the beginning of 1942 whole groups were sent there, mostly to Sachsenhausen (2,500) and Stutthof (3,000). Of the 1,700 Jews living in Norway, about 800 were seized in November 1942, 730 of them were sent to Auschwitz, from where only twelve returned after the war. About 20 died in Norway. The the subject. Compare W. L. Shirer, Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, passim; The Challenge of Scandinavia, London, 1956, pp. 28-48; Τ. K. Deny, A Short History of Norway, London, 1957, chap. XII; H. D. Loock, "Zeitgeschichte Norwegens," in Vierteljahreshefte für Zeitgeschichte, 1965, Heft 1, pp. 8 1 - 1 1 1 . 7 On Denmark and Sweden see also Shirer's two books as above; also J. Haestrup, "Die dänisch-deutschen Beziehungen von 1933-1945", Deutschland und der Norden 1933-1945, in Internationales Jahrbuch für Geschichtsunterricht 1961(1962, Braunschweig. J. Haestrup, From Occupied to Ally, Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Copenhagen, 1963. L. Yahil, "Denmark under the Occupation, A Survey of Danish Literature" in Wiener Library Bulletin, October 1962. • S. Abrahamsen, Sweden's Foreign Policy, Washington, D.C., Chap. Ill, IV; and Shirer as above.

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LENI YAHIL

others, about 800, fled to Sweden, while a few who were recognized by the Germans as Swedish nationals crossed over legally.9 In autumn 1944 about 9,000 Norwegians were held in Germany, of whom about 1,200 were prisoners of war. 10 The first group of Danish detainees was sent out in October, 1943. Together with the first transport of Jews to Theresienstadt, 200 Danish Communists were taken to Stutthof from a camp in Denmark. Altogether, about 6,000 civilian detainees were sent from Denmark to prisons and concentration camps in Germany." Some 5,500 Norwegians were released before the end of the war and sent to Denmark and Sweden. Together with those who returned after the war, the number of those rescued reached about 6,000. Some 3,000 died in captivity, including the more than 700 Jews already mentioned. 12 On the other hand there were over 400 Jews from Theresienstadt among the approximately 5,000 Danes who returned from the camps. 13 Two main questions arise from the foregoing: (a) What were the factors that led to the rescue of such a large number of Scandinavian detainees, and how did most of them get out of the concentration camps and out of Germany even before the end of the war? Compare: Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews, Chicago, 1961, p. 356 (hereafter, Hilberg). His figures are not always correct. Sources in addition to those he gives are the official Swedish report: Sveriges joerhaallande till Danmark och Norge under Krigsaaren (hereafter Foerhaallande), Stockholm, 1945 (on the Relations of Sweden to Denmark and Norway during the War), pp. 149, 175. Documentary material on the expulsion of the Jews from Norway, YAD VASHEM Archives B/28. 1 0 Memorandum of the Swedish Legation in Oslo to Swedish Foreign Ministry of October 7, 1944, Norges Forhold til Sverige under Krigen 1940^45. Oslo, 1950 (Attitude of Norway to Sweden during the War), hereafter Forhold), Vol. 3, p. 396. Somewhat different figures in N. Ch. DitlefT, Da Tysklands Fangene ble reddet (When the Prisoners in Germany were rescued), Oslo, 1945 (hereafter Ditleff), p. 8. 1 1 L . Yahil, "Danish Jews in Theresienstadt" (Hebrew) in Moreshet Bulletin, July 1965, pp. 6 7 / 8 (hereafter L. Yahil, Danish Jews). 1 2 Ditleff, pp. 47/8. 1 3 L. Yahil, Danish Jews, p. 66. A total of 423 Jews were in the convoy from Theresienstadt to Sweden. See also L. Yahil, Test of a Democracy; The Rescue of Danish Jewry in World War II, Magnes Press of the Hebrew 9

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' ·otagc them — not in order to save the inmates, but to give himself manoeuvering space for his political schemes. Faced with conflicting signals from above, in the context of an increasingly chaotic situation, the camp commanders were left to fend for themselves. No psychological or ideological-psychological sketches 011 a comparative basis exist for the various camp commanders, but the general impression is that of weak, brutal despots who at the last minute tried to save their own hides. We d o not know of even one camp c o m m a n d e r who died d e f e n d i n g his post —they all either ran or hid, or both. In the situation just described, this personal element had a sometimes decisive influence on the final outcome: only in one camp, O h r d r u f , 110t far from Buchenwald, were the inmates m u r d e r e d 011 the eve of liberation. Elsewhere, they were either left alone to starve to death or die of typhus and typhoid; others were marched off. Only token resistance was offered by the SS when Allied troops came to liberate the camps. O u r main preoccupation, however, is with the death marches themselves. H e r e the testimonies and the d o c u m e n t a r y evidence seem to converge. O r d e r s were given to march everyone off but the sick. In fact, that is what h a p p e n e d at Auschwitz and Stutthof. Clearly, if the intention was to hide Nazi crimes, the sick should not have been left to fall into Allied hands. Later, when Buchenwald (April 11-12) and Bergen-Belsen (April 1Γ») fell to the Allies, with many thousands of inmates, the horrors were all too apparent. Perhaps the commanders at Auschwitz failed to understand the hint that the sick were to be left behind, but not necessarily to fall into Allied hands alive, and that when the turns of Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen came, the chaos was already such that no centrally conceived guidelines would be followed in any case; that while H i m m l e r had ordered the destruction of the evidence of mass graves of Nazi terror victims as early as 1942, this policy could 110 longer be implemented in the conditions of early 1945, although that was what the Nazis still wanted. However these possibilities are resolved, the proposition that the death marches took place in order to prevent the victims from telling their stories to the Allied liberators can only be accepted as a very partial explanation at best.

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There is no doubt that in early 1945, Germany was still trying to keep production going. It needed slaves, and camp inmates represented one obvious source for such labor. But even if in January 1945 there were three quarters of a million concentration camp inmates, they were a small minority among the total slave population in Germany. T h e total number, in 1944, of foreign civilian workers was estimated at over six million—both so-called voluntary workers and conscripted force laborers from occupied countries. Another 2.5 million were working POWs, or a total of 8,615,000. M Our evidence regarding the death marches clearly shows that only a fraction of the marchers were put to work between |iuiusiry and May 1945, though that docs not disprove the will to so use them. T h e theory that the prisoners were marched to the so-called Redoubt area in South Germany and the Austrian Alps where the Nazis were supposedly going to make a last stand appears to be contradicted by the fact that many of the marches were directed to other areas—to BergenBelsen in the north-west, Ravensbriick in the north, or Flossenbürg in the northeast of Bavaria. T h e language of the few surviving documents as well as some of the testimonies does, however, seem to indicate that the SS continued to think of camp inmates as forced laborers and that they should work. Again, therefore, we have a partial explanation. It would seem that a fuller explanation requires both factual evidence and an analysis of Nazi attitudes before the period here discussed. Briefly, SS and Nazi bureaucracy saw in the camp inmates criminal elements that, with few exceptions, had no right to exist at all unless they worked under strict supervision. Certain categories, such as Jews and Soviet POWs, were to be worked to death. Others were to be decimated and the future of the survivors would be decided upon after the war. T h e dehumanized murderers did not see the prisoners as human beings at all. T h e idea that these creatures should be allowed to be liberated was absolutely preposterous. They were enemies of the Reich, and it was incumbent on every good Nazi to see to it that they remained under Reich control. They belonged in a camp, and if the camp to which they were assigned was full, they would be marched to another one so long as someone of higher rank issued an order stating to which camp they should be sent. T h e crucial fact is that apart from very occasional contact with higher echelons of the SS command, the SS-men in charge of the actual transports were completely on their own. They could well have decided that these were prisoners whom they should deliver hale and hearty to a final destination, and that until they received orders about what to do with them, the prisoners should be kept in one place and fed with supplies requisitioned locally until a camp was ready to accept them. Similarly, SS-men could have accepted offers by Czech railwaymen, for example, to provide food for the trains, and keep the prisoners alive in or around the stations until they could be moved again. No case is known where this happened; it simply did not enter the Nazi mind.

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T h e s e were not h u m a n s ; they were enemies. T h e i r p r o p e r fate was death. I h a v e e v i d e n c e which shows that some, at least, of the marches were i n t e n d e d to kill the m a r c h e r s , probably because mass m u r d e r by gassing h a d been stopped, and mass shootings on G e r m a n soil might have p r o voked undesirable reactions from the local population: Elisabeth H e r z , of D o m a i l i c e in B o h e m i a , in h e r testimony dated M a y 21, 1946, says the following: On October 10, 1944, a transport of 1,000 women was brought from Auschwitz to . . . a village callcd Neustadt Inorthem Silesia]. The women, already starved from Auschwitz, dug anti-tank ditches until January 22, 1945, from 6 am to 6 pm, even in the most freezing weather of minus 30° centigrade. Food, consisting of a miserable potato soup, was brought to the field oncc a day. On January 22, at 10.30 pm they chased us out of the stables where we were sleeping on straw, gave us 2 kg of bread for the way, and drove us aimlessly over snow-covered fields—away from the approaching enemy. . . We went via Neisse . . . Liegnitz . . . Zgorlice . . . Dresden . . . Plauen . . . Oelnitz. Along this way, women who could not walk on because of exhaustion caused by hunger or some illness, were shot almost every day and left on the field. Later these skeletons of dying women were put on carts and carried along the death paths. In Oelnitz there were already five full carts. . . It was March 1st 1945.. . For nine days I had been walking completely barefoot in the snow. . . T h e transport commander selected all the barefooted and put them in the carts together with the sick. Calmly he told us that we would be shot within half an hour. . . We were not shot, but worse than death by shooting awaited us. From Oelnitz we were put into open cattle cars for three days and three nights—on Czech territory. . . On the way, 75% of us were frozen. In Zvodati, where there was a small concentration camp, we spent 18 days. Because we were unable to work we were given one litre of hot water a day and a small piece of bread. We had five to .six dead every day. There, my only sister died. . . After 18 days we were driven on: . . . Marienbad, Mrakov. In Mrakov there was great chaos due to Allied bombing, and with all the running and the SS shooting 1 and my friend managed to run away . . . On that day our transport numbered 122 persons. Some eight had run away and then we two at Mrakov and then four more in some other villages, because only 108 female corpses were exhumed after liberation in the mass grave at Nyrsko, where the rest of our transport was shot dead. . . So from the original 2,000, after four months of work at the trenches in Silesia and 11 weeks of marching, 122 were left; of these, 14 escaped and 108 were shot. T h e transport was guarded by SS men and women. 15 It would seem obvious that the SS p e o p l e in charge actually wanted to get rid of these 2 , 0 0 0 Jewish women, and that they m a r c h e d them to death — those that refused to die were shot in the end. A n o t h e r case in point is a train transport that left Ellrich, a sub-camp of D o r a not far from Kassel, on April 4. It went d u e east to Sangerhausen,

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then north via Magdeburg to Hamburg, then passed near Bergen-Belsen to Hilderheim in the south, north again to Lüneburg near Hamburg, then west to Wintermoor, and finally reached Bergen-Belsen on April 10. It went 1,574 kms to get to a place about one sixth of that distance from Ellrich. If chaotic transport conditions were the only reason for this, the train would hardly have carried on for hundreds of miles after it had already passed close to its ultimate destination. One could argue that the use of valuable train space in those chaotic conditions for aimlessly transporting dying camp victims was apparently more important than the use of those trains for military purposes. 16 Another such typical transport went from Flossenbürg to Regensburg, which is perhaps 80 kms away to the south. But the transport of 800 inmates left Flossenbürg on March 27 northwards, with the SS shooting all sick prisoners on the way. T h e group was then marched south again for about three weeks, covering a distance of 420 kms. Only a remnant reached Regensburg. 1 7 From the descriptions of survivors, it appears that transport commanders had but the vaguest idea of what to do with the prisoners beyond a general order to kill all the stragglers. It seems to me unlikely that an actual order was given to murder the victims on the way —it is here that the general consensus of the Nazi regime in relation to its real or imagined opponents came into its own. T h e SS lieutenant or NCO in charge knew by training and experience that these were enemies, and that the fewer who remained the better. If these enemies happened to be men, women or children, young boys of thirteen or fourteen, or girls in their teens, that was not his concern. He took them over at a certain point as less than humans, and when he left them they were either corpses buried in the ground or walking skeletons—he had fulfilled the intentions of his superiors and had done a distasteful j o b thoroughly and conscientiously. My conclusion is that the marches were intended to continue the mass murder in the concentration camp by other means. T h e reaction of the victims and the bystanders must now briefly be examined, in order to return once again to the perpetrators. In her memoirs, written in 1946 in a British detention camp for socalled "illegal" Jewish immigrants, Aliza (Frumka) Besser, nee Lipszyc, born 1917 in Brzeznic (near Radom in Poland), relates 19 how she was taken with 25 other girls in 1942 for forced labor at Grünberg in Silesia, and then to Neusalz (Nowa Sol) in the same area, where about 1,000 Jewish girls were put to work. Sick or dejected girls (i.e. those that cried or complained) were sent to nearby Auschwitz to be killed. On Sunday, January 21,1945, they were given two loaves of bread, a jar of marmalade and two packets of margarine and marched off. T h e area was German, and the local Hitler Youth groups threw stones at them and reviled them as they passed through the townships. T h e German peasants refused to

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lodge them in stables, "they are afraid of the Jewish devils" (p. 54); the girls had to sleep in the field, in the snow. It seemed that the guards had no clear idea where they were going. After three days they were hungry — no further food was given to them—frozen and desperately tired. Locked up in a school in a remote village one evening, Frumka and two of her friends climbed out of the window and found themselves, for the first time, without a guard. "I beg: essen, essen. The peasant woman was just giving potatoes to the pigs. With a wet eye she empties the saucepan, gives each of us some warm, half raw potatoes. Quickly we returned to the room. But Salusia Zandszajn, a black-haired young girl from Zawiercie paid with her life for these few uncooked potatoes. A bullet from the guard hit her in the temple. . . Why did we go out to beg for those potatoes?" (p. 55). There were two male and two female guards, and all the girls wanted to be in another part of the transport because there the guard was a Czech who behaved better than the Germans. Again a quote: "In Christianstadt German women tried to give us bread. But the women guards wouldn't permit it. . . One German woman with a human heart cried: 'Ihr Elende, Ihr Unglückliche. . . ' T h e brutal woman guard yelled: 'What are you doing, pitying Jews?'" (p. 56). They were brought to a women's camp with a sadistic SS officer in charge, who was killing off all the sick. There was now one SS-woman for every ten Jewish girls. From the Christianstadt camp they were marched on, with new guards. On the way they met convoys of German refugees fleeing into the interior of the shrinking Reich. There were new guards who turned away when the girls went begging for food. This is the only testimony I have read where the guards permitted begging. I quote: "Mother, mummy, your daughter Frymetl is a beggar and a garbage-rummager. All of us go to beg for alms, peep into German doors: 'Gehen Sie etwas zu essen. 'People are sorry, but they must not know that it is Jewish women who are asking. The lot fell on the fair-haired girls, they go begging and bring food to those who look Jewish. All live for each other, it is so difficult to imagine." (p. (iO). The brutalities were committed on them by women members of the SS. By March 11, when they arrived at Flossenbürg, 700 of the 1,000 girls were still alive. On March 19, they were put on open wagons, 70 to a wagon. There was no water. German guards spilt water in front of their eyes out of sheer sadism. Allied aircraft bombed and machine-gunned their train. More girls died of thirst before they reached Bergen-Belsen on March 24. One can imagine what the memoirs say about that place. The question can be asked: Why did they not run away? Basically, of course, the same question can be asked of POWs, and of all forced labor camp prisoners. The counter-question is: Whereto? Almost all transports were on German territory. The hold of the Hilter regime was still so strong that if one escaped from the guards, the next village would surely have an informer who could call the police, the army or the SS. Frumka

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Besser tells us about good Germans—they will give potatoes, will commiserate with the unfortunates, but will not provide shelter. T h e r e was one exception that Frumka tells us about: they were given one night's shelter at Heleinheini by a German peasant woman with a son and two daughters, who gave them coffee, and they told her the truth, that they were Jewish girls. She put up five of them that night. I quote: " T h e r e are still human beings among the Germans. . . That old German woman received us, gave us maternal care. She prepared a gruel, warmed water, we washed our feet. She fed us like small children. T h e son asked us questions, talked to us as with equals. They don't run like many others, they arc not afraid of the Russians, they have no guilty conscience." (p. 62). But they could not stay there. T h e guards would know they were missing, they could not be far. T h e neighbors would know. T h e r e was nowhere to hide. All tin* other transports we have evidence of had much more direct and brutal supervision than Frumka Besser's. Even her transport provided little or no op|x>rtunity for escape, except that during the very last days, when a number of death march participants did manage to flee. A Czech report says this: Between April ΙΓ» and 20, ΙίΜΓ». a transport of political prisoners came from Usti (to I . o s o v i c e ) . . . T h i s transport was mixed, about I to Γ> wagons out of l.r«-!8 were with women. On three of these were onlvj Czech women. In every wagon there were MX) to 2(X) persons. |osef I'ilney of Lovosice, gardener . . . relates that for seven to ten clays these prisoners, guarded by 16-18 year old SS men, received no food. T h e prisoners, when they could climb down from the wagons, ate grass, which was scarce there. H e also saw how the SS men made physical cxcercises with these prisoners, beating them on the heads with rifle butts. . . At night, weeping and wailing was heard, and in the m o r n i n g there were always eight to ten naked corpses near the fence. All night long, shooting could be heard. . . T h e prisoners could not even put a hand out of the wagons, they were immediately fired at. The whole time they received no food or drink until an intervention with the transport commander, a G e r m a n and the former director of a sugar factory here at Lovosice . . . enabled Pilney to give water to the victims with a garden hose. F r o m that trans|)ort fiü persons were killed in this p l a c c . . . T h e transport consisted of 1,!MX) jK'rsons, mostly Serbs and Croats, also many Czechs and Czech women. 1 9

Two remarkable facts stand out: These brutalities were committed by vicious youngsters under the direction of a local German citizen —obviously not a trained concentration camp SS guard; and secondly, a large number of Czechs, including women, imprisoned in wagons in a small village railway station surrounded by Czech citizens presumably eager to help, was not assisted by the local population, nor were there any escapes.

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Let me now return briefly to the question of the perpetrators. In researches into Nazi terror generally, and the Holocaust in particular, it is emphasized that the mass murders were committed by the SS led by intelligent and well-educated men, in a manner intentionally devoid of any human passion. T h e term used by the Nazis was eiskalt—ice-cold. Millions of Jews were murdered, shot or gassed, in cold blood — ice-cold blood. Millions of Soviet POWs were tortured to death; millions of Poles, Serbs, Croats, hundreds of thousands of Greeks, French, Dutch, Belgians, Italians and Germans were done to death —no passion, just the engineering of death for ideological-political purposes. Or, at least, that was the attitude demanded of the murderer by the regime. But in the death marches, this changes. T h e trained camp guards become a minority, most of the guards are taken from the general Waffen SS. local police, even directors of local sugar factories, as we have seen. In Mauthausen they used Viennese firemen. T h e s e were not eiskalt. T h e y behaved in a sadistic manner, especially the SS women. T h e y personally beat and clubbed victims to death, shot all stragglers mercilessly. An Austrian woman in Thalheim near Mauthausen reports on the death march from Mauthausen to Gunskirchen in late April 1945: T h e camp inmates were coming; from Schleissheim. Λιι old man, who could not carry on, was constantly being encouraged by his little son: 'Daddy, carry on, daddy; hold yourself!' T h e father could not go 011 any more. He panted heavily, and with his last strength tried to move on with his son's help. H e collapsed. Immediately, an SS man came and hit him with his rifle butt. T h e little boy knelt by his father and cried. He called 'Daddy, daddy!' T h e same SS man killed the boy with his rifle butt and threw both down over the road hedge.20 Similar brutalities were committed endlessly, it is true, in the camps. But. it has been argued, the relatively few SS camp guards were trained for this kind of thing, and then much of this sadistic behavior was given to the capos and other prisoners to perforin. During the death inarches, however, newly-recruited SS men and women and others behaved in the same way, a way more reminiscent of the SA in the early thirties and the Kristallnacht pogrom of 1938 than of the SS-type of murder. T h e questions that can be asked in the wake of the following bystander testimony of Maria Aigner of Enns in Austria, are too obvious to have to be spelled out. She lived with two children in the cellar of a cemetery attendant in the local graveyard: Carts came with dead concentration camp victims |from the death marches). They were unloaded by other camp inmates under an SS guard. . . I heard cries for water from that heap of so-called dead. So I took a dish with water and went to the mountain of dead to give water to the man who cried. Immediately, an SS guard came and smashed the dish from mv hand with the rifle butt. . . H e then turned to the person

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who had called and shot him from a short d i s t a n c e . . . T h e call for water stopped. 21

How much of all this was known to the Allies, and to bodies like the IRC, the Vatican; to Jewish organizations? Did anyone try to do anything about it? If not, why not? T h e whole problem of ivhat was known to the Allies of the Holocaust and, in a wider sense, of Nazi terror, has recently been dealt with again in two important books by Walter Laqueur and Martin Gilbert. 2 2 T h e y show clearly that it was not lack of information that prevented action but rather, perhaps, the necessary transition from information to knowledge leading to action. In other words, the information was either not believed or not internalized. 21 Information about Auschwitz brought out by two couples of escapees into Slovakia, reached Switzerland and Sweden in June 1944 and, in a shortened version, London and New York late in June and early in July. T h e full report shook the director of the United States War Refugee Board, established by President Roosevelt in January 1944 to take belated action, when it reached him early in November. But full reports about the camps were published in the Soviet press in August and September 1944, after Majdanek had been liberated on July 24. Articles by Konstantin Simonov and Vassily Grossman were translated into English and used by the western press. Majdanek was both a concentration camp and a death camp. It had, apparently, one gas chamber, and murder took place not only by asphyxiation but also by hard labor, beatings and other brutalities. In August and September details became known, especially after the publication of the SovietPolish Extraordinary Commission report on Majdanek. 2 4 In the west, these reports were considered to be good propaganda material. T h e genera] context within which that savage and bloody war was understood in the west still excluded gassings of whole nations and the willful, brutal murder of parts of others. In the USSR, one suspects, the Majdanek and other stories were more real in people's eyes—there was direct contact with the territories occupied by the German army and the atrocities committed were better known. But as no analysis of wartime attitudes of the Soviet population based on solid documentary material exists, we can but guess. In the western Chancelleries and Foreign Offices the reports were received — from western intelligence as well as from Russia —not doubted, not internalized, not understood, not acted upon. T h e y could not be false, nor could they be true—they must be exaggerated, but one could not prove that they were. It was only when British or American POWs were treated the way others were, that most of the diplomats and generals reacted. T h e r e were some important and honorable exceptions. A rather thorough analysis of press reports in Britain and the United States for the months of January to April 1945 reveals no mention at all of the death marches, and very little material on the concentration camp

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world. T h e London Daily Telegraph, which, throughout the war had both a very comprehensive and also very sympathetic coverage of Europe u n d e r the Nazis told its readers of the h o r r o r s of Breendonck prison in Belgium, where Belgian opponents of Nazism were interrogated with the usual Gestapo finesse. On February 3, on page 4, a small item reported the liberation of Auschwitz by the Soviet Army. Until April 9, no real awareness of Nazi atrocities is evidenced at all. Yet the general context is fairly clear. On August 14, and again on August 30, 1944, the Soviet reports on Majdanek had been published in full, and prominently. T h e full import of what was h a p p e n i n g u n d e r Nazi rule was not grasped. Instead, one finds frequent mention of the problems that, one way or another, seemed to strike closer h o m e : the mass evacuation of Germans from the East and the subsequent wanderings of millions of refugees in G e r m a n y , so reminiscent of the French campaign of 1940; and secondly, of course, the fate of the Allied POVVs. T h e Daily Telegraph reports on G e r m a n evacuees on January 24, 25 and 31, and again on February 7. But the interesting thing is the way the POW movements are recorded. On J a n u a r y 22, British POWs are reported as being moved from camps in Poland. This is repeated on February 14 and 17, and again on April 2. We know that these POVVs were marched parallel to, and sometimes with, camp inmates. Sometimes, too, even western POWs were simply put into the camps. This, however, did not reach the press. T h e New York 7Ym