Download Don`t Bomb Auschwitz ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE BOMBING OF

ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE BOMBING OF AUSCHWITZ
The War Department argued at the time that Auschwitz was not within the range of Allied
bombers.
Assistant Secretary of War, John J. McCloy insisted in 1944 that the bombing of Auschwitz
“could be executed only by the diversion of considerable air forces now engaged in decisive
operations elsewhere.” “Such an operation,” he continued, “would be of such doubtful efficacy
that it would not warrant the use of our resources.”
The Allied bombing strategy was directed toward destroying Nazi fuel supplies, their synthetic
oil industries, the oil fields of Romania, and their communication and transport lines wherever
possible. American forces were engaged at the time with the battle for Italy and the invasion of
northern and southern France—operations that were by no means assured of success.
German air defenses and the difficulty of hitting four relatively small buildings from the air
meant high risk of American casualties when compared to results expected from bombing the
killing center. While Auschwitz had no air defenses, the nearby I.G. Farben works at Monowitz
had almost 80 heavy guns, which could have fired on planes attacking the camp. The gas
chamber-crematoria buildings at Auschwitz-Birkenau were mostly underground with only a
small structure visible from the air. Low level attacks by heavy bombers on other targets such as
Ploesti in Romania, for example, lost 30 percent of the attacking bombers to German fire.
Bombing the rail lines from Hungary to Auschwitz would be just as ineffective and costly as
targeting the camp itself. In the spring of 1944, it took the Germans about 6 hours to repair a
single track rail line hit by a 250 pound bomb and just 3.5 hours for a 100 pound bomb. The rail
line and all possible alternative lines would have to have been bombed every day to keep them
closed. Unless all routes were simultaneously hit every day, alternative routes, repair gangs and
other “make-do” efforts would negate the effort to stop the deportations.
Humanitarian concerns about the plight of European Jewry were not a priority during World War
II. Allied leaders did not discuss the Nazi genocide at any of the wartime conferences (Cairo,
Teheran, Yalta, or even Potsdam). American authorities repeatedly spoke of a “refugee crisis”
and of the massacre of “innocent civilians” without mentioning “Jews.”
McCloy was concerned at the time that the bombing of Auschwitz “might provoke even more
vindictive action by the Germans.” Germany could escalate the terror and involve the Allies in
an upward spiral of atrocities--German perpetrated massacres to be matched by Allied retaliatory
bomb attacks on German cities. Both sides would then target innocent civilians for death and
destruction. This would expose the Allies to charges of violating the rules of war and of war
atrocities.
Bombing during World War II was not very accurate. Any attempt to bomb the gas chambers at
Auschwitz would probably have killed large numbers of prisoners since barracks were only 300
feet away. The Germans could claim that the bombing, not their killing operation, was
responsible for the large number of deaths at Auschwitz.
Innocent Jews should not be the deliberate victims of American attacks. Those that condemn the
United States now for inaction would probably have accused the U.S. of complicity in the
Holocaust had American bombs killed hundreds if not thousands of Jews at Auschwitz.
Although bombing might facilitate a mass escape, but there was no haven for escaping Jews.
Poland remained in the midst of German-occupied Europe. Escaped Jews could expect little aid
from the local population-- anti-Semitism was pervasive in Poland and ethnic Poles were
concerned with their own survival—and no mercy from the Germans.
The genocide against the Jews had equal priority with the war for Germany. Even if the gas
chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau were destroyed, the Germans could still kill Jews through
shootings and other means. The Mobile Killing Units, special killing squads that roamed behind
the German lines during the invasion of the Soviet Union, killed larger numbers in less time than
the extermination camp process. After gassing operations stopped at Auschwitz in November
1944, the Germans killed hundreds of thousands of people.
There was no political consensus in the United States to support the bombing of Auschwitz. The
Roosevelt administration did not want the American public to perceive the war as a “war to save
Jews.” Which might have undermined public support for the war effort. Also, antisemitism in the
Allied camp might have been aroused which would have interfered with mobilization for victory.
Finally, since most Americans opposed the entry of additional Jewish refugees into the United
States a more active rescue policy was problematic for the Roosevelt administration.
Other non-military strategies for rescue appeared to be working. President Roosevelt’s repeated
warnings that those who were responsible for the deportations would be punished after the war—
the Hungarian government understood that Germany would lose the war-- and the actions of the
U.S. War Refugee Board and Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg in Budapest, contributed to
the survival of more than 100,000 Jews in Hungary.
The best way to engage in rescue was to defeat the Nazis as fast as possible. Any diversion of
military assets delayed the ultimate victory of Allied forces and ultimately cost more lives. Only
the total, unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany—a task that took 4 years and the
mobilization of the combined resources of Great Britain, the Soviet Union and the United
States—could save lives in German-occupied Europe.