Posted on 01/11/2008 10:05:46 AM PST by starlifter
JERUSALEM - President Bush had tears in his eyes during an hour-long tour of Israel's Holocaust memorial Friday and told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that the U.S. should have bombed Auschwitz to halt the killing, the memorial's chairman said.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Mr. President:
History does not reveal her alternatives
Allied pilots fired on the bunkers with the notion that they were enemy bunkers. On closer inspections the firing stopped anf they figured out they were labor camps.
I don’t see what the problem is.
The way it worked out seem to work.
They were liberated, the atrocity was prosecuted and many survived to share their stories with future generations.
Our brave men and the brave men of tha allied forces are to thank.
I never think of how it should have been accomplished. It already happened.
I always think of how great it was that they were liberated.
I couldn’t agree more.
Excuses for not moving on this data included trying to protect MAGIC intercepts, the Brits trying to protect postwar claims to Palestine, the Ivy Leaguers in the OSS turning a blind eye to the Jewish Problem, the general opinion that Zionists were one notch left of the Communists, and couldn't be trusted. Most of the death camps were beyond the effective range of the US and Brit bombers, since the Soviets would not allow Allied bombers to fly missions that would require refueling in Russian territory. As far as Stalin was concerned, the Germans were doing the Russians a favor by disposing of the Jews.
Why didn't the Allies smash the rail systems that fed the camps? They were too busy trying to cut off oil and industrial production. It wasn't until near the end of the war that tactical airpower was turned loose on transportation targets, like bridges, roads, rail yards and rolling stock.
It never ceases to amaze me how Jews will still vote Democrat, regardless of what FDR did to them.
I agree. It angers me when people give opinions about subjects of which they are totally ignorant. If Bush really said that, then he is an idiot if he meant it.
First, Poland was in the Russian sector of the War. The Russians could have bombed Auschwitz with their bombers.
“Ilyushin 4 (10000) - Russia’s main long range bomber. It bombed Berlin, East Germany, and the vast German-occupied territory in Eastern Europe and Russia, but it carried only 1-1.5 tons of bombs, or three torpedoes, and it suffered heavy losses by enemy fighters because of its very poor defensive weapons.”
We all know why the liberal press and Dems are not castigating the Russians for not bombing Auschwitz.
Second, American bombers and crew took horrendous losses in their attacks until after February 1944. Imagine being told that you are going to fly to Poland to bomb a death camp to save people who are making no effort to save themselves and by the way, you probably won’t be coming back. I am sure morale would be high/sarc. Shortly after February 1944 SHAEF took over the air fores for Operation Overlord. The only time Auschwitz could have been bombed with out too great a loss of men and material was after February 1944.
Third, we did invade a country to stop the extermination of civilians. It is called Iraq. I do not hear the liberal press and Dems congratulating Bush on stopping this extermination.
Fourth, if we are going to stop exterminations, then we should have bombed Cambodia, Rwanda, and should be bombing Darfur, Congo, Kosovo.
‘I don’t see what the problem is. The way it worked out seem to work.”
It worked for us but not the 6 million killed in these camps. The thought was that by bombing these camps the deaths could have been avoided. The intent wasn’t to bomb the bunkers but the railroads and other support structures.
Its hard to say, we could have bombed them and then lost because it took resources away from what was really needed. I don’t want to sit back and question the decision our leaders made back then. It was a tough position and a tough decision. It certainly wasnt because we didn’t care about the jews.
Yep. One way to say it is that every bomber that would have been diverted to try to *possibly* stop or slow down the killing in a death camp was one less bomber that would have been destroying the German's ability to resist and thus bring ALL the killing to an end. All these other killing would include the daily killings that were occurring away from dedicated death camps (concentration camps, slave labor, street executions, mobile killing units...).
Wrong. Watch Ken Burns’ “The War.” I think it was Life Magazine that had a photo essay in 1942 showing what was being done in the death camps. Also, the NY Times was writing about it and nothing was being done. A lot of Jews are down on FDR for ignoring the mass murder.
It concerns me very much what is going on in the Sudan.
One of the great mysteries of WWII was why FDR pursued the policy of unconditional surrender against the Germans and ignored the many secret overtures to the US and UK by the German resistence for help in overthrowing the Nazis...several overtures made by the head of German intelligence Wilhelm Canaris...who was ultimately executed by the Nazis.
There are many historians (Thomas Fleming among them) who believe that these were tragic errors by FDR that cost millions of lives (including the Holocaust victims) and laid the groundwork for the Communist domination of post-WWII eastern Europe
“and laid the groundwork for the Communist domination of post-WWII eastern Europe”
And I guess it had NOTHING to do with Soviet Tank Production, gun production, or communist take-overs of occupied governments??
Six million Jews. There were five to seven million OTJs that died in the camps as well.
When they nuked Nagasaki they missed by a valley. Close enough for atom bombs. Lots of targets were missed in those days.
Operationally and strategically idiotic statement.
1. A concentration camp is basically nothing more than a barbed wire enclosure surrounded by firepower. Any bombing damage can be repaired in hours.
2. The gas chambers were not essential for the killings. They were "luxuries". The gas chambers just made is psychologically easier for German troops to kill in mass quatities. If the gas chambers were not there, the method originally used by the Nazis ( dig trench, machine gun victims, refill trench ) would then have been used again.
3. Reaching Auschwitz without fighter escort would have decimated the Eigth Air Force. (The Eighth Air Force suffered 50,000 killed as it was.)
4. Redirecting bombing efforts away from German war making capabilities and massacring your own bomber assets would have prolonged the war and ultimately increased the number of Jews killed.
“6 million killed in these camps”
12 million in total, 6 million were Jews.
The other were enemies of the (state)fuher, homosexuals, communists ect.
He weeded out what he considered undesirables.
52 million souls were vanquished in WWII all together.
Half were Russians.
“Six million Jews. There were five to seven million OTJs that died in the camps as well.’
Sorry I forgot the word Jews. I was trying to remember if 6 million died in the camps or if that included the total count from places like Warsaw Ghetto and the original machine gun pits the Nazi’s used.
The camps were created because the Germans felt it was not efficient to use guns to kill them. Essentially the life of a Jew or OTJ was worth less than a bullet in the Nazi mind.
Hind sight is always 20/20. We knew about German concentration camps before we got into the war. Humphrey Bogart even declared in “Casablanca” (filmed in late 1941) that he had spent time in and was released from a Nazi concentration camp. Most leaders figured they were work camps for political, religious and idealogical undesirables. It was expected that life at such places would not be pleasants, but nothing prepared the Allied leadership for the shocking truth they learned in 1945.
The Allies didn’t bomb the concentration camps for the same reason they didn’t bomb POW camps. Had they known what was really happening, I imagine they would have made an effort to take out the roads and railroads feeding the camps.
Yup. That’s a tough one. I suppose they had it on their target list with low priority, preferring real military targets with 100% NAZI casualties.
‘52 million souls were vanquished in WWII all together.
Half were Russians.”
Isn’t the world wide count of deaths in the 20th century around 120 million. Including Germany, Pol Pot, Stalin and so on.
Good point, and also remember that the major death camps were in Poland which would probably make for a more costly mission due to the extra distance.
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