Rex Bloomstein
Auschwitz and the Allies, Part 1

Rex Bloomstein - Auschwitz and the Allies, Part 1

- Let me begin, if I may, with an introduction to Auschwitz and the Allies, and then at the end of part one, I’ll be joined by Trudy Gold, I’d be delighted to say, and where we’ll answer any questions you may have of this part. And also, we can discuss with Trudy some of the implications of the first part of the programme. So if I may, I’ll begin with an introduction that I’ve written that gives some context. In December, 1941, during the evacuation of the Jewish ghetto in Riga, the Nazis shot and killed an 81-year-old Jewish historian called Simon Dubnow. The story is that Dubnow’s last words were an admonition to his fellow Jews, “Write and record.” Writers, historians, filmmakers, artists of all kinds, and of course, survivors, have seen this as a sacred duty reflecting the deeply-felt obligation to examine, explore, and confront the Holocaust. And this is something that I felt, and I’ve made a number of films on the tremendum as one philosopher has called HaShoah. earlier this year, I showed on lockdown, “The Gathering,” a documentary I made about the world gathering of Holocaust survivors that took place in Jerusalem. It was broadcast on the BBC in 1982, in the same week as the film that I will show this afternoon and tomorrow night in two parts. The film is called “Auschwitz and the Allies,” and inspired by the book of the same name by the Churchill biographer, Sir Martin Gilbert. The film reflects on the questions he and other historians raise. How did the allied governments respond to reports coming out of occupied Europe, about Auschwitz and the plan to exterminate the Jews of Europe? When did the Allies really know what was going on and what pressure was put on them to intervene? Could the allies have done more to save the Jews?

And what of the Jewish communities who were free of Nazi terror in Europe and America? Did they do enough to help their fellow Jews? The answers that Gilbert and other historians gave to these questions shaped our film, along with interviews with former officials working at that time in the Allied bureaucracies, along with survivors of Auschwitz, plus our own original research. So in this first part, we see the impact of the allied policy towards rescue and refugees. The reports that emerge of the destruction process from 1942 onwards, the negative response and anti-Semitic attitudes of officials in the British Foreign and Commonwealth office replicated in America with our discovery of an anti-Jewish conspiracy within the US government itself. Here a Treasury Department official reveals that his department’s plans for the relief and rescue of Jews were systematically sabotaged by anti-Semites in the State Department. Another factor is the timorousness of American Jewry and their collective failure to exert significant moral and political pressure on the Roosevelt administration and on the President himself.

It was left mainly to people described as Jewish extremists, such as the reviled Irgun, to actually protest and try to raise awareness. Meanwhile, the death camps continued their systemized mass murder. All such accounts are a product of their time. “Auschwitz and the Allies” is no exception. We used the facts and opinions available over 40 years ago. Since then, reams of academic research has been done, let alone countless studies, books, films, and documentaries also produced in these intervening years. However, this film, within its limitations, is, I maintain, also part of the historical record because virtually all the people you will see and hear are no longer with us, but they played a role in this story, and I do believe it’s valuable to glimpse the attitudes that prevailed and to know their consequences. So here then, is part one of “Auschwitz and the Allies.”

• I have no doubt that if the Allies wanted to help, if they would’ve bombed those God damned concentration camps, if they had to die, let them at least die from our bombs and not like they did.

• Come on, man, come on.

• And if they would’ve tried to do so… I mean, they could have disrupted the train, the railroad, they could have done 100 of things.

• Well, if I may-

• I’m sure the Nazis would’ve reacted differently if they would’ve seen.

• Very good.

• Oh man. Oh.

• [Woman] So sorry, Rex. Can I ask you to put yourself on mute?

• Somebody’s trying to do something. As it is, they knew that the whole world didn’t care. It was only Jews. To hell with it. They knew it. I, for one, will never forgive. Never forgive. I know that things could have been done. I know we could have helped. I know we could have saved. We had no means. That’s it. No more.

• [Narrator] In January, 1942, representatives of all the German ministries met in secret in this villa beside Lake Wannsee in Berlin. Their object, to discuss The Final Solution, the systematic extermination of the Jews of Europe. It was to become known as the Wannsee Conference. Over the previous six months, SS execution squads had shot 500,000 Jewish men, women and children in the east. But as the slaughter went on, it became clear that a more efficient killing policy was needed if Europe’s remaining 11 million Jews were to be annihilated. Successful experiments in gassing pointed the way and so a programme was agreed. Special killing centres were to be established, and a gigantic operation was begun to deport the Jews of Europe to a destination from which they would never return. The greatest centre of mass murder was here in Auschwitz. This vast enterprise took place while the allies themselves were caught up in the bitter struggle for survival against Hitler’s Germany. What follows is the story of how they received the news of Auschwitz and how they responded to the challenge it presented. As Germany had expanded in the 1930s through annexation and war, what Hitler regarded as the Jewish problem grew enormously from 300,000 German Jews to more than 6 million Jews scattered across a dozen frontiers.

Because of their different political, religious, and social aspirations, the Jews were divided, but they had one response in common, ordinary working people, Zionists, socialists, the Orthodox religious, all wanted somehow to get away. Tragically, for the vast majority, theirs was to be a stampede that was frozen. After the outbreak of war, Nazi policy towards the Jews went through several stages, isolation in the ghetto, deportation, extermination. Hydrick directed the policy on Hitler’s behalf. Adolf Eichmann was the chief organiser of The Final Solution. Eichmann was born in Germany and brought up in Austria. He became a vacuum cleaner salesman. A product of frustrated German nationalism, economic depression, and political unrest, he was a ripe convert to Nazism. He joined Himmler’s SS in 1932 and his rise through the lower ranks was unspectacular. But through diligence and organisational ability, he came to acquire a reputation as an expert on Jewish affairs. Before 1939, official Nazi policy was aimed at making Germany judenrein, Jew free. This meant forcing Germany’s half a million Jews to leave the Reich. To this end, the Nazis cooperated with anyone interested in getting Jews out. This included Western governments as well as Zionist organisations, official and unofficial. Eichmann himself visited Palestine in 1937 to further this policy.

• Eichmann developed a change of personality. He became very arrogant, very aggressive, very sure of himself. Later on, of course, we attributed it to his success. He was pushing the Jews out of Vienna in such a scale and scope that his efforts were being recognised in Berlin. And then he was given the higher positions and central positions. His goal, as he made it clear to us, and which is today clear in the German documents of the time, was to make Europe free of Jews. The German Nazi policy was not extermination of Jews. This is 1938 and 1939, and even 1940. ‘Cause as late as 1940, he helped us. He gave us foreign exchange. He gave us permits to take people out of Bohemia and Moravia, out of Slovakia, out of Vienna. Our last group that sailed in February, 1940, was financed. The funds, the foreign exchange to pay the owners of the vessels came through Eichmann’s control. As long as we could move people out, we had his support.

• [Narrator] Young Jews bound for Palestine in 1937 celebrate their release from Hitler’s Germany. But for other Jewish immigrants, doors were being closed all over the world. Widespread unemployment, fears of an alien influx, anti-Semitism, government tightfistedness, all led to the rigid application of immigration quotas. Palestine was ruled by Britain under a League-of-Nations mandate and administered by the colonial office. By 1939, Britain had let in 200,000 Jewish immigrants adding to the 200,000 Jews already there. But Arab hostility to Jewish settlement developed into violent rebellion. It was ruthlessly suppressed by the British. With war approaching, Britain issued a new White Paper imposing a strict quota on Jewish immigration. No more than 10,000 people a year for a maximum of 10 years, then a total halt. The response of the Jewish agency internationally recognised as representing Palestine’s Jews was to agitate for the cancellation of the White Paper. After war broke out in September, 1939, Nazi persecution of the Jews in occupied Europe became more brutal. The Jewish agency pressed for the creation of a Jewish state as the only way to save Jewish lives. The British government rejected both appeals outright.

• Well, it was a terrible dilemma, absolutely appalling dilemma. But you see, the pressures of wartime are such that you have to put first things first, and if by being kind to those people, we’d lost the Middle East, we wouldn’t have beaten Hitler. And really you just had to put that first. And you see, human sympathy was entirely on their side. We, all of us, had many Jewish friends and they were all of them worried about it and we were all worried about it, but you just couldn’t settle it the Palestine way. And what else could you do with them? We had to try to get them accommodated somewhere. We couldn’t do it in a way which would’ve lost the war. If it had been possible to do more for the Jews at that time, Churchill as a Zionist supporter would’ve been the very first to insist on it, but he knew it wasn’t possible. And Anthony Eden would certainly have gone along with that as long as it didn’t really upset the apple cart. But Churchill wasn’t going to set upset the apple cart either. So you see, you’ll get cabinet agreement that way, and that’s the policy that comes down. You can have any human sympathies you like, but in the civil service, we all had to take the orders of ministers. It was the ministers who had to carry the can of responsibility and we had to respect that.

• The recipient countries have made it so difficult for the Jews to get in that they can’t go anywhere. Therefore, they are left there. If they’re left within the control of the Reich, then the Reich has to find a way to eliminate them because they have no value either politically, propaganda wise or whatever it is. Actually, it got to the point in the camps, eventually, in the gas chambers, in the crematoria, that only value Jews had for Germany was the residual value. The residual value was gold filling and hair. And this they collected. And that’s all. Now, who brought the Jews into this status, into this level of having no value? The Western world, not Hitler. Hitler always attributed in his mania, in his psychopathic approaches, a strength and a value to Jews much more than they ever had. But nevertheless, even if it retreated this evaluation of value to a certain point, he still thought that up to a point, he could do something with them. He could trade them, he could sell them. The Western world lowered the boom by saying, “They don’t exist for us.” This is the greatest crime. It’s FDR and Churchill and Stalin, all part of it. Because if there would’ve been any value to living Jews, they would’ve found a way to help 1,000, 100,000, half a million, millions. There were vessels, there were vast areas. Pilgrims were being moved, prisoners of war were being moved, all kinds of movements were taking place. And up to 1941, the Germans were willing to let the Jews go. By October, 1941, they said, no more, we are not going to bother anymore. And then Himmler gave the instruction to Heidrich. Heidrich went to Wannsee, and the final chapter started.

• [Narrator] For the first eight months of 1942, the Wannsee plan to kill every Jew in Europe was still a secret, yet indications that some sort of mass murder was being carried out, reached officials representing various Jewish organisations in Geneva, in neutral Switzerland. Among them, Richard Lichtheim of the Jewish Agency, who throughout the war was to send more than 1,000 letters warning of the fate of European Jewry to his disbelieving superiors in Jerusalem and to a disbelieving world. Gerhart Riegner of the World Jewish Congress faced similar problems.

• There were mass arrests all over Europe, in Paris and in Leon and in Marseilles and in Amsterdam and in Brussels and in Antwerp, all over western Europe. And the deportation took place of tens of thousands of Jews from all these western cities. We knew about deportations from Germany, from Czechoslovakia, from Vienna. Now this news made sense, gave a certain concept to the whole, which was happening. And for the first time, you saw really what was behind it.

• [Narrator] It was in August, 1942 that the young Gerhart Riegner heard from a German source whose identity he has never revealed, of the Wannsee plan to kill Europe’s Jews, a plan which had now been in operation for eight months. He tried to inform the World Jewish Congress in London and New York by cable.

• The American council was very decent. He’s transmitted the news. But about 10 days later, he conveyed to me a letter that the State Department had not delivered the message to Dr. Wise because of its apparently unsubstantiated character of the information.

• [Narrator] Riegner’s message was that 3 ½ to 4 millions would after deportation and concentration in the east, be at one blow exterminated in order to resolve once and for all the Jewish question in Europe. The telegram reached the foreign office on the 10th of August, 1942. It was the first news of a mass extermination policy to be officially received in Britain.

• [Interviwer] When the Telegram by Gerhart Riegner eventually reached the foreign office, it spoke for the first time of a mass extermination plan. to kill the Jews of Europe.

• That’s right.

• [Interviwer] So how did you react to that?

• Well, I mean, let’s face it, we were surprised and sceptical. And I was surprised and sceptical too, not at information that the Nazis were murdering and killing and behaving in the most abominable manner because indeed we’d had plenty of evidence of that really from that really. I mean, the Nazi behaviour really changed to two stages. I mean, after the occupation of Poland in 1940, there was not yet an extermination policy, but there was a policy of putting Jews into ghettos where they often died and had diseases and we heard all this and accepted that. And then, because of course they were no longer dealing with their own nationals in Germany. It was a different problem. And then of course, things got even worse when they invaded Russia in July, 1941. And as we now know, and indeed at the time, even, reports were coming in that the SS were actually taking Jews out of villages and shooting them. But none of this… What really we were surprised about was that there should be a plan for the complete extermination of all Jews within what I think was called the German sphere of influence. And I think the phrase was at one blow. Well, we just spoke to, this is too much. They were fighting a war after all. I mean, could they give their… And indeed, it was an immense effort on the part of the Germans.

• [Narrator] In 1942, Britain was also fighting a war and not apparently winning it. The conventional business of diplomacy went on as the Americans were pushed back in the Pacific and Russia faced defeat in the caucuses. Churchill joins Eden and the war cabinet for the signing of the 1942 Anglo Soviet Alliance with Molotov, the Russian foreign minister. Eden’s advisors at the foreign office were used to this formal diplomatic activity. They reacted to the reports of the annihilation of the Jews with scepticism.

• [Interviewer] As chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, when did you first hear of the atrocities against the Jewish populations in Europe?

• I can’t remember the exact date. My impression is that it was 1943. And what I remember, there was report from the Polish underground near Lublin. That at a camp near Lublin, they were there literally exterminating Jewish prisoners and that they were gassing them, giving them gas. Well, one remembered, I remembered, during the first war, all sorts of stories were put out and we believed them, we used them in propaganda, and then they were completely untrue and the propaganda, you might say, rebounded on us. So I was a bit sceptical, but there was no doubt about it that the German Nazis were out to exterminate the Jews and didn’t want them to exist in Germany.

• [Interviewer] But when you look at your memoranda now, you wrote at the time, “In my opinion, it is incorrect to describe Polish information regarding German atrocities as trustworthy. The Poles, and to a far greater extent, the Jews, tend to exaggerate German atrocities in order to stoke us up.”

• Well, that is what I believed at the time. And it was only natural they should do so.

• [Interviewer] So you felt there was no substance in these reports?

• I didn’t think, I thought… I don’t say that I thought there was no substance in these reports, but I thought they were exaggerated at the time.

• [Interviewer] Why did you think the Jews exaggerated more than the Poles?

• Well, because I think that they had very perhaps stronger feelings, far stronger feelings than the Poles, and I think Jewish people have a vivid imagination. Read them to perhaps exaggerate. I mean, I was wrong. Yes, I admit it. But one has to try and be sceptical and balanced. I mean, during the war, I had to be sceptical very often.

• [Narrator] The Civil Service response as seen in minutes and memoranda circulating through White Hall was a mixture of confusion and irritation stemming from antipathy towards Jewish groups and Jews in general.

• What is disturbing is the apparent readiness of the new colonial secretary to take Jewish agency’s sob stuff at its face value. Why should the Jews be spared distress and humiliation when they have earned it? The allies rather resent the suggestion that Jews in particular have been more heroic or long suffering than other nationals of occupied countries. In my opinion, a disproportionate amount of the time of the office is wasted on dealing with these wailing Jews.

• Officials did not recognise that the Jews had a separate identity. They were regarded as Allied nationals or as enemy aliens. No international agreement like the Hague or Geneva conventions applied to them. The International Red Cross would not extend its protection to Jews in concentration camps. Official Jewish bodies lacked governmental status. Behind the walls of the foreign office, such opinions circulated in secret.

• Now, I mean, bureaucrats are always supposed to be dealing with paper, but my God, it is what we have to do. And a vast amount of documents flailing in and out all that time. Official dent, minute each document with an eye to the historian of the future and to whether they will appear to have been sympathetic or unsympathetic. They’re objectively dealing with how this matter should be handled and I think probably, people reading them afterwards wouldn’t quite realise that.

• [Narrator] Nevertheless, the evidence of genocide supplied by Riegner and others became too great for the allies to ignore. General Sikorski’s Polish government in exile was the most active and well-informed. The Poles set off a chain of events that led to the Allied Declaration of December 17th, 1942, which was broadcast to the world. For the first time, the Allied governments officially condemned the massacre of the Jews as a Bastille crime and warned that it was part of a deliberate plan. Pope Pius the 12th refused to endorse the declaration. He was reluctant to condemn atrocities against the Jews and considered such reports to be exaggerated. He believed that the Vatican’s denunciation of war against civilians adequately covered the subject. The Allied Declaration proved to be an empty gesture. Hopes that there might be action to save Jews either by negotiating their release or by attempting rescue, were dashed at two Allied conferences held early in 1943 in Casablanca and Bermuda. At Casablanca, President Roosevelt laid down the policy of unconditional surrender. There would be no negotiations with the enemy. At Bermuda, it was agreed there should be no significant increase in the number of refugees let in by the Allies. These were mortal blows to the hopes of rescuing Jews. The Poles in London alone urged reprisals against the Nazis for their crimes. Their appeals were always rejected by the British. But this did not stop Count Raczynski, the Polish foreign minister making the statement.

• Extermination of Jews is a definite policy of Germany being carried out now. According to official reports in the hands of my government, more than one third of the Polish Jews out of a total of 3,130,000 have already been exterminated. And also hundreds of thousands of Jews who have been transplanted to Poland from other countries. Imagine entire population of large cities all taken out and shot, exterminated in cold blood. That will give you the idea of what is happening to the Jews in Poland.

• [Narrator] This is the original film. It was never used by the newsreel companies. An example of the widespread reluctance among the Allies to publicise the facts of genocide. Shmuel Ziegelbaum was another member of the Polish National Council in London at this time, May, 1943. A Jew and an early escapee from the Warsaw Ghetto, he had made it his mission to galvanise the world into action on behalf of Polish Jews. He failed.

• Neither his work in the Polish National Council, of which he was a member, nor all his efforts with the great powers to take reprisals, to threaten the Germans with reprisal. All that has come to nothing. And probably in this, he thought that perhaps his very end would be a means of impressing the world. And that’s why he wrote a final letter in which he kind of called the attention of the world. And he offered his life and he committed suicide.

• [Narrator] Ziegelbaum wrote, “My companions of the Warsaw Ghetto fell in a last heroic battle with their weapons in their hands. I did not have the honour to die with them, but I belonged to them and to their common grave. Let my death be an energetic cry of protest against the indifference of the world, which witnesses the extermination of the Jewish people without taking any steps to prevent it. By their indifference to the killing of hapless men, to the massacre of women and children, these countries have become accomplices of the assassins.” But what of the Jews of America, the largest community outside Europe, the 5 million free Jews of the United States? Before the war, they had publicly condemned Nazism and Hitler’s antisemitism. There were giant rallies and demonstrations in New York. Leaders like Rabbi Stephen Wise, a charismatic figure who became first president of the world Jewish Congress in 1936 repeatedly attacked the Nazi regime. But as the threat to Europe’s Jews increased, protests like this petered out. American Jews became divided and insecure. The established leadership concentrated on pressing for the Jewish state. The Jewish leader Nahum Goldmann explains why protests faded after such hopeful beginnings.

• The response was very unsatisfactory. Not only American or the others, but especially American. It has two reasons. First of all, Jews are real optimistic people, therefore they survived. But therefore they paid this million of Jews because they never saw the danger. Number two, the American Jews were not fully sure of the equality of Rise. They felt a second-class citizen and therefore they dared to disturb the peace and freedom of American Jews. I give you two example. When the World Jewish Congress under my presidency proclaimed a international boycott against Nazi Germany in 1936, 80% of Americans were dead against it. They said, “We cannot disturb the normal relations between the United States of America and Germany. Another example. Stephen Wise said one… Wooser said once to Wise, "I play with the idea of making the ambassador and Berlin If Peter doesn’t accept you, I won’t call it an ambassador. American Jews, many American Jews protested against Wooser Lord to do it. It should be a provocation of German Jews. By the way, German Jews were also against it, they were much more courageous than the American Jews were.

• [Narrator] These attitudes are illustrated by a remarkable fact. After 1941, when America entered the war, this was the only demonstration by American Jews to urge President Roosevelt to rescue the Jews of Europe. A controversial group of young Palestine Jews organised these orthodox rabbis to demonstrate against the silence of American Jewry and the inaction of the US government. Although the news of the Holocaust have begun to circulate widely, the American Jewish leadership would not criticise the liberal administration of their chosen hero, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, despite his seeming indifference to the fate of Europe’s Jews.

• We pray and appeal to the Lord, blessed behi, that our most gracious President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, consider and recognise this momentous hour of history and the responsibility which the divine presence has laid upon him, that he may save the remnant of the people of the book, the people of Israel. And we pray that the Lord may aid us to gain complete and speedy victory on all fronts against our enemies, and that we may be blessed with everlasting peace. And we shall dedicate our most silent prayer on this coming day of atonement for the triumph of our beloved country, the United States of America. Amen.

• Amen.

• Very little was said in 1940-41, but beginning in '42, at least our group sought to it that a lot was said about it. And this is why we took the full page advertisement from coast to coast and as often as our budget permitted it, and sometimes when the budget didn’t permit it, to publicise what was going on, what is happening, why is there a silence, to draw the attention of the public, to draw the attention of Congress. Any means that was available to us to stir up trouble, a commotion, just the opposite of the Jewish tradition. There was no need to be quiet because all he had to do is speak to the non-Jewish community across the United States with facts and figures and they would have listened. They did listen. And at the end, you know, beginning in '43, '44, '45, the support we have had in the United States came mostly, to a very great extent, from the non-Jewish members of Congress, not from the Jewish members, from the non-Jewish members of Congress, who actively engage in an all-out effort to do something which they felt will be a standard of conscious for years to come. We succeeded in this aspect of it, but at the same time, they established elements, of course criticised, and said, "We are stirring up unnecessary attention.” And so Stephen Wise went as far as saying that Peter Bergson headed our group, he was the senior Irgun officer of our delegation, is worse than Hitler. And when the interviewer asked in the State Department, “Why does Stephen Wise swing this way?” The answer was that by their activity, by their propaganda, by their advertisement, by their pageants and so forth and so on, they’re stirring antisemitism. This antisemitism then will backfire as far as American Jews are concerned. And therefore Peter Bergson equates Adolf Hitler.

• [Announcer] Solemn memorial service for Europe’s murdered Jews. In New York’s Madison Square Garden, two audiences totaling 40,000, see an impressive pageant. European rabbis who themselves escaped Hitler’s ghettos, and the Torah, scrolls of ancient biblical law. Then the pageant salutes the Jews who have given their lives as soldiers of United Nations’ armies. Sponsored by the Committee for a Jewish Army of Stateless and Palestinian Jews, the pageant portrays the post-war peace table with Jews who have died in many lands having no land to represent them. The voices of Europe’s 2 million massacred Jews cry to the peacemakers, “Remember us, remember us.” Now narrator, Paul Muni.

• There are 4 million Jews surviving in Europe. The Germans have promised to deliver to the world by the end of the year, a Christmas package of 4 million dead Jews. And this is not a Jewish problem, it is a problem that belongs to humanity and it is a challenge to the soul of man.

• What we were doing was called hysterical. It was called extreme. It was called bad taste. It was called unjustified, illogical, emotional, overreacting, whatever you want. Any adjective was applied to it except one. And this is that when 6 million or 7 million or 11 million which was the goal of the Nazis, were being destroyed. I mean we should have gone into hysterics. I mean, Stephen Wise should have gone to the steps of the Congress and declared a fast and sat there till he died.

• [Narrator] In November, 1943, Peter Bergson, the leader of Ben Ami’s Group, aired for the first time in the House of Representatives his proposals for a government rescue agency. Congress was exerting pressure on the White House to do something to rescue the Jews of Europe. Yet there was deep-rooted, anti-alien prejudice amongst many congressmen.

• [Announcer] “The March of Time.” Nowhere in the world does the European exile find more sympathy and help than in America. But US immigration, since 1929, has been strictly limited to some 150,000 admissions a year. With fear and suspicion of access agents rising everywhere since the betrayal of Norway and the low countries, into Congress have gone a score of bills aimed at dangerous aliens. Virginia’s Smith would deport all aliens who have ever been affiliated with radical political organisations. Most violent of all suggested measures is that of Georgia’s Stephen Pace, who would immediately bar all further immigration, deport all aliens, good and bad alike. But most US lawmakers and citizens feel that existing alien legislation, which already requires registration and fingerprinting, provides ample protection.

• We duly solemnly swear on oath that you absolutely and entirely-

• [Narrator] A lucky few gained entry. But even the existing safeguards did not satisfy top officials in the State Department who secretly agreed with extremists in Congress and bitterly opposed anyone in the administration who wanted to help the Jews.

• My friends in the State Department said that another person in the State Department had said, “That Jew Morgenthau and his Jewish assistant, Dubois, were trying to take over the State Department.” In other words, since I felt so strongly about it, therefore they just assumed I must be a Jew cuz a non-Jew could never feel strongly about something like this. That there were a number of antisemites in the State Department, there is no doubt.

• [Narrator] In 1943, Josiah Dubois discovered the extent of this antisemitism when Henry Morgenthau’s Treasury Department attempted to licence the transfer of money from Jewish charities to Europe to fund a programme for the relief and rescue of Jews.

• We worked our programme out, presented it to the State Department by the end of June. Then ensued months of delay in which the State Department was opposed to the programme, and the British also got into the act and said they were opposed to it. And their reason for opposition, which was the thing that I guess that shocked me the most in that early stage, was that they said that they were opposed to any programme designed to rescue the Jews because of the difficulties of disposing of any considerable number of Jews should they be rescued. That astounding cable came to the State Department late in ‘43 in December. And it was such a shocking cable that even Secretary Hall had prepared a memorandum, which he showed the Secretary Morgenthau after Secretary Morgenthau had requested a conference, in which he expressed his shock at this cable from the British. Well, that sort of broke the deadlock. And so the State Department agreed to go along with us and issued a licence. So that was my first contact with the problem. And as a result of that particular contact, secretary Morgenthau, who was equally shocked, requested an investigation be made of the whole matter of the State Department handling of this problem of the murder of the Jews. And I was put in charge of that investigation. The result of that investigation led me to prepare a report, which I have in my hands, dated January 13th, 1944, entitled Report to the Secretary on the Acquiescence of This Government in the Murder of the Jews.

• [Interviewer] That is a very severe indictment, is it not?

• Yes it is.

• Are you saying you uncovered a State Department conspiracy deliberately designed to suppress reports coming from Europe about the annihilation of the Jewish population there?

• That is correct. “The tragic history of this government’s handling of this matter reveals that certain State Department officials are guilty of the following. One, they have known only failed to use the governmental machinery at their disposal to rescue Jews from Hitler, but have gone so far as to use this governmental machinery to prevent the rescue of these Jews. Two, they have not only failed to cooperate with private organisations in the efforts of these organisations to work out individual programmes on their own, but have taken steps designed to prevent these programmes from being put into effect. Three, but in their official capacity have gone so far as to surreptitiously attempt to stop the obtaining of information concerning the murder of the Jewish people of Europe. Four, they have tried to cover up their guilt by concealment and misrepresentation and the issuance of false and misleading statements. Unless remedial steps of drastic nature are taken and taken immediately, I am certain that no effective action will be taken by this government to prevent the complete extermination of the Jews in German-controlled Europe and that this government will have to share for all time responsibility for this extermination.” And that report was presented by Secretary Morgenthau to President Roosevelt. He personally presented it to him. He told me he had to resent, President Roosevelt had been as much shocked by the report as he was. The president immediately decided to from, at Secretary Morgenthau’s suggestion, the War Refugee Board. I might say that I personally feel that part of the reason for the formation of the board was the fact that President Roosevelt realised that if these facts became public, it would be dynamite. In fact, I never said this before publicly, but I don’t mind saying it now. I had some hesitation as to what the president might do, and I told Secretary Morgenthau personally that unless the president took some strong action, that I plan to resign and leak the facts. Give out the facts. Leak is not the word. To give out the facts to the public.

• [Narrator] President Roosevelt capitulated to growing pressure. In January, 1944, he set up the War Refugee Board to assist in rescuing the Jews in Europe. Its impact on American immigration policy was the admission of only 1,000 refugees, the maximum he would allow throughout the war. These people were virtually kept prisoners in an old army camp at Oswego, Lake Ontario. Despite Roosevelt’s order, no military resources whatever were diverted to the Board. Too little and too late, this was still the only allied government agency created during the war to rescue Europe’s Jews. What was the Russian response to genocide? In late 1941, Jewish members of the Soviet intelligentsia condemned Nazi policies.

• The time has come to fight in this sacred struggle. The Soviet Union is uniting all peoples who with sword in hand are ready to rise for the right to call themselves. Czechs, Poles, Dutchmen, Belgians, Russians, or Jews. Because it is not only a matter of saving a nation that has given humanity great poets, thinkers, and artists. Because it is not only a matter of saving a people numbering many millions of human lives, but because it is a matter of triumph of humanism over brutality, barbarism, infamy and violence, because it is a matter of bright future for all humanity, irrespective of nationality.

• [Narrator] The Red Army was best placed of all the Allied forces to prevent the annihilation of European Jewry in the death camps of Poland. They suffered staggering losses themselves, but at no time did they act to stop the killing of Jews.

• [News Announcer] Finally, the big three themselves. It’s doubtful, if so many millions have ever placed such unstinted confidence in three world leaders before. Now, all those millions have learned the result of the Teheran Conference, and although they realise that the decisions have yet to be implemented by action and by sacrifice, their confidence is united and total.

• [Narrator] Allied unity was reaffirmed, but nothing was said about the fate of the Jews. While the British and Americans had at least considered the humanitarian aspects of the Jewish tragedy, no such thoughts had ever troubled Stalin. In 1941, he set up a Jewish-led, anti-fascist committee. Six months later, he had its leader shot. In the west, politicians talked, telegrams were pigeonholed, bureaucrats procrastinated. Pleas to save Jews met a standard response. Their best hope is our winning the war. Meanwhile, the actual business of murder continued remorselessly. Auschwitz, the main killing centre, had been functioning since 1942, virtually unknown to outsiders and completely immune from attack. In 1944, that changed. Knowledge of the camp was brought to the outside world by escaped prisoners. And the Allies came within striking distance of Auschwitz itself.

• That’s the end of part one. And I have to say to you that after all these years of making it and just watching it, I’m as shocked as ever by what had been unearthed by historians, and you know, it’s incredibly disturbing and so sort of relevant in a way, I feel today in terms of policy towards refugees. Anyway, I’m delighted that my dear friend Trudy is with me and happy to answer any questions you might have. Trudy, do you want-

• Just before we turn to questions, I just wanted to say, Rex, that what I think is so extraordinary about your film is the interviews that you did with people who are no longer with us. And how you kept your cool with some of them, I will never know. It’s an extraordinary document and it is desperately, desperately sad. And I suppose my feeling is, we just don’t learn much, do we?

• No, no. I mean, listening to the foreign office people, is it too easy to condemn? How do we understand indifference on that scale? On the other hand, their in the middle of a war. I mean, the debate about the response, continues, goes on, doesn’t it? And it becomes even more poignant in part two when we look at the news of Auschwitz itself. But what were those attitudes about? Why the antipathy to the extent towards the Jewish organisations? An incredible, for me, if you think about it now, incredible response of American Jewry. The fear and anxiety in that sense. You know, the politics, the love of Roosevelt who was mainly indifferent, a liberal hero, if you like, to the favours. This adds up to be disturbing .

• It was the terrible insecurity, I think, of American Jewry. Don’t forget that the level of anti-Semitism in America was up 25 notches. You had heroes like Lindbergh and think about how long it took for… If the Japanese had not bombed Pearl Harbour, would America have entered the war anyway? There was a huge isolationist feeling. And also, if you look at the Jewish quotas at universities, at schools, there was good old-fashioned anti-Semitism. And as far as the foreign office is concerned, I’ve been actually doing some work today on a lecture I’m giving next week on the foreign office in the war and post-war in Palestine. There was huge anti-Semitism in the foreign office. Look, when you listen to people like Lord Portland, and Frank Roberts, who later on of course, goes on to be advisors to Ernest Bevin, who of course was minister for the colonies, it’s good, old-fashioned Jew hatred. I mean, Josiah Wedgwood, who was a great hero… He was in the House of Commons. I’m quoting him. He was talking about the illegal ships and how the Lord Cranbrook, when an illegal ship was sunk, he said, “Under the present happy situation, it is inevitable we should be hardened to horrors And all steps must be taken to discourage illegal immigration.” And Wedgwood says. “This is a conduct worthy of Hitler, conduct worthy of the Middle Ages carried out by the British government.” So I think there were lots of voices in Parliament who were saying, “This is ghastly.” And Churchill, ironically I think, was very much in favour of helping. So it’s a very dark, deep subject, and of course, in a way, what is so fascinating, is it is the Irgun that were most active.

• I mean, listening to Ben Ami, the Bergson representative, think of his dynamic approach, his bitterness, his revulsion, of the Orthodox Jewish leadership. The indifference and the apathy and the fear. And they’re the only group who organised one demonstration. One demonstration. I was looking at it again. I was astonished then 40 years ago, I’m astonished now that that’s all. That just shows you the depth of fear and anxiety and insecurity.

• I think the other thing it shows desperately is Jewish powerlessness because in the end, it didn’t matter whether you were . In the end, it showed just how powerless the Jews were. And when you think about today, when we are still accused of being the power force in the world by conspiracy theorists, it’s absolutely mind blowing. That doesn’t go away, Rex. And actually, to watch that film, particularly in the light of what’s been happening in British politics recently, it’s mad. There’s no other words.

• I mean, there’s been so much done since then in terms of research and the like. But I suppose looking at the film, I feel it’s main spine of it, its main impact has has some truth to it. And I thought it important to share. And I still think it important to share a glimpse of those attitudes. People who had some power, who could’ve done something. Unable to… Perhaps the other side of it though, Trudy, is that perhaps that’s unfair. You can’t expect these people born of a certain class, you know, suspicious, wary, harried to some extent. There was no imagination there. The moral base doesn’t seem to be… I mean the morality is in fighting that war, fighting this terrifying war machine. I fully understand that. But the callousness is such a tragic reminder.

• I think one of the biggest problems is that you can unequivocally say that German and Austrian Jewry in their entirety could have been saved because Hitler wanted them out. There were immigration bureaus set up. It’s only because the Allies didn’t do anything that he moves to The Final Solution. Now it’s a very dangerous statement because of course they were the perpetrators. But indifference is such an important factor in the murder of the Jews. And whether that is good, old-fashioned antisemitism, how much of it is political will, how much of it is, yes, Britain was fighting for its life and we must never forget that, but ironically, Churchill was on the side of the Jews. That’s another story for another time, perhaps. But I want to say to you about your documentary. Yes, there has been more research since then, but your main thrust of argument is completely sound, number one, and number two, it’s a brilliantly made film, it’s a brilliant teaching film, I’ve always said that to you because the way you chunk it. And the other thing I would like to say, it’s the interviews. You’ve managed to interview some of the major players whilst they were still with us. And that’s priceless. I mean, I could run a whole lesson around Lord Portland, frankly. Also Frank Roberts. So could you. Yes. Should we… It’s getting late. Should we turn it over to questions?

• Yes, very much.

• Let’s have a look at questions. Shall I read them and you answer them?

Q&A and Comments:

Sally is saying, “My grandfather never forgave Roosevelt for abandoning Polish Jews, including his family.” And she says, “Your introduction merely confirms which many of us have survived.” Rita wants to know the year of the documentary, please, Rex.

• '82. 1982.

Q - “Is your documentary available at the Holocaust Museum in DC,” R. Stan Kaplin?

A - Interesting question, Stan. I don’t know. Yes, I’m sure it’s there in some way. It probably is part of the .

Q - “What is the name of the man in the State Department that gave the reports to Morgenthau?”

A - Josiah Dubois.

Q - Fascinating man, eh?

A - Remarkable man. Remarkable.

Q - He had a moral compass. This is from Angela. “So utterly, deeply shocked my generation do not sum of these facts,” Angela from London. This is again, the whole story. The whole story that we don’t teach Jewish history.

Q: Myrna Ross, “When or where will this film be shown publicly?”

A: You better tell them the background.

A - Well, it belongs to the BBC. It isn’t shown publicly. It’s only shown through people like Trudy who make use of it. So it’s… It was only shown once, I think, repeated once, and it lays on the shelf somewhere in the BBC archive. And, you know, it’s like a lot of one’s work. I attempt to revive it if I can. 'Cause I think there is relevance there. There’s relevance there, but you can’t get it, as it were, publicly, unless somehow educationally we can make it more available if people knew about it.

• It’s an incredibly important film and I think it’s absolutely crazy that it isn’t shown more often. If I’m correct, I think it’s the first important film on the Shoah by a British filmmaker, isn’t it? I think you were the first.

• Not sure about that.

Q - I’m pretty sure. Let me check. I’m pretty sure. This is again from Sally. “Appalling to hear the evidence of the world’s indifference, especially from those in a position who could influence the policies to open the gates to the refugees. The White Paper, et cetera.” “Was there not a known understanding of the pro ab stance at the foreign office at that time?”

A - Yes. I think it was known. Yeah.

• Oh cool. Oh, sure. Yes, very much so. And wait till we… Next week, no, Thursday, I’m giving you a presentation on Haj Amin al-Husseini. So what has been so amazing, because we’ve got such an incredible group of colleagues, we’re all kind of fitting into each other at the moment.

Rita’s saying, “Thanking you for this important presentation.”

Anna’s saying, “We the Jews stand alone. Israel is our only hope.”

Q: This is Robert. “Did the Russians organise the transfer of Jews away from the Nazis to Central Asia? Some of my ancestors were so saved.”

A - I don’t know that.

• I can answer that. What is extraordinary, Robert, is that the Jews who were… What happened, when the Russians moved in and took, for example, Lithuania, certain Jews were expelled into Russia proper because they were considered undesirable elements. So ironically, that’s how many Jews were saved. Some did flee into Russia.

Q: And Barry says, “Has subsequent research uncovered evidence to change the overall tenor shown by the film?”

A - Barry, you might want to investigate that yourself. I would doubt it. I think there’s many more details, many more nuances, and it’s also very complex. And that complexity, I think, people have tackled. I think what I tried to do then, 40 years ago, was give that broad stroke, that picture of the bureaucratic response, the lack of moral response, the interactions between the Jewish communities and so on, and above all, the tragedy. You will see more in part two.

• This is Arlene. “We’ve learned nothing. The US is very antisemitic now. Many Americans have no knowledge of the Shoah. They just hate Jews in Israel.”

Lucy again, “The generation of the foreign office was also dubbed the camel call after the first war and their dominance lasted for some time.” We’ll be coming back to that. Earl Stein, “Thank you so much for your work. Everyone in the USA should be required to watch it.”

This is from Joan. “Hitler’s point was, if no one else wants the Jews, why should Germany?”

Michael. “Didn’t church or know about Jewish extermination by the Germans through the Enigma code? He said once, 'I have the goose that laid golden eggs and they have cackled.’ and issued a warning to the German leaders. They would ultimately pay for their crimes.”

• Interesting point about Enigma. That I don’t know about. Interesting to-

• Yeah, Helen has lectured on that and we’ll be coming back to that, Michael, definitely. You see, I know it’s going to ask a lot of you. You’re going to watch all our presentations because what we are trying to do is synthesise from all our areas of different expertise and it’s so wonderful that we have Rex because apart from having Rex, it’s the wonderful films he’s made. Hindi Hurt. “I remember reading a book a number years ago, and I think a woman, Ruth Grumba was responsible with the help of Eleanor Roosevelt to bring Jews to the USA and they had to move before they actually got 1,000 on board. However, if I’m correct, she had to advocate for these Jews after the war to remain in America and not to return to their place of origin. Many of them went on to make major contributions.” Yes, I can answer that, Hindi. You are totally right. Eleanor Roosevelt, by the way, was a huge humanitarian. She worked with Varian Fry and all sorts of people.

Q: Serena. “Does historic evidence show any evidence that the Zionists wanted to not rescue Orthodox Jews in order to ensure the future state of Israel would be secular?”

A - I don’t know of that.

Q - Do you want me to answer that? I will be answering that, Serena. It’s a very very com… How can I say this to you? Unfortunately, I believe it was one of the Calliumeres put out against Zionists after the war by enemies of Zionism. And I will be covering it, but it’s a complicated, very complex story.

Q: Joan said, “This film should be distributed to all watching it here because we can make sure others see it.” Can we actually do that legally, Rex?

A - No, we have to get permission from the BBC, but let’s see if there’s enough interest in it for us to try and do something.

• Hindi is thanking you.

• Thank you. Thank you, Hindi.

• Susan. Hi Susan. She’s a close friend. She’s saying it’s truly shocking and comments about the near futility of fighting antisemitism. Susan, Susan, “Some of the lucky ones. I have friends who came with Ruth Gruba to Oswego. Went to live very productive lives. Apologies, I was appalled to hear this opinion from a certain Orthodox Jew.”

Q: “Hi, Trudy, Rex. Why not get the Jewish Film Festival on Lockdown to run a series of films and invite an audience including the BBC? There’ve been so many generations of people since 1982 who will not be known to exist by programmers. There also maybe rights issues on all this wonderful archaic material.”

A: Lucy, we have an amazing archive. I mean, I’ve been talking to Wendy as to what we can do about it. It’s about clearing copyright. We would love to have our own film arm as part of Lockdown, but it’s going to take a lot of work to clear copyright. But I totally agree with you. These films must be shown. Anyone who’s got any influence, start pushing.

Q: “Why make this movie if not available to public?”

A: It was available. It’s been shown on the BBC. That’s what we are saying, but it was made a long time ago. And I’ve used it over the years for teaching because I think it works beautifully. And the point is, it hasn’t been shown again. And we asked Rex to do it because I think it’s such an important film. And what can I say? Look, the big argument, and it’s going to come up in the next episode, could the railways have been bombed? But apart from that, I think it completely holds water.

Renny Roth is saluting you, Rex. So is Smith.

Abigail. “Another idea, Trudy,” this is from Luzman, “To get a screening with current and former FCO people like my husband, Lord David Triesman, to give a talk.” I think that’s a very good idea, Lucy Huberman. Yes? I think maybe if David could do something for us, it’d be wonderful to show it at the foreign office, wouldn’t it, Rex?

• Indeed it would.

• That’s what I… This is what’s so extraordinary about Lockdown.

• But also, our concerns about refugees. I mean, this echoes all the time.

• Yeah, of course it does. Doesn’t change.

• To the other coming to.

• The other. Exactly.

• And also, our humanity. Our sense of humanity.

• Yeah.

Q: Stuart, “Is it correct to say that the Japanese accepted Jews from Germany?”

A: That is a complicated question, Stuart. The Japanese… A lot of Jews made it to Shanghai. That was then under Japanese occupation. The Japanese regarded the Jews… There was a plan called the Fuji Plan. And the Fuji is a delicacy, it’s a puffer fish. And if you eat it in the wrong place, it kills you. But it’s the greatest delicacy in the world. That is a very complex story. And please don’t forget, there were Japanese consult in Kaunas, Sugihara, and he gave thousands of visas to Jews. You see, it’s not countries, it’s people. And there were some magnificent people everywhere.

• Yes. It’s people who had a moral compass.

Q - This is Jennifer again. “While antisemitism was at the root of the Shoah, how would Trudy and Mr. Bloomstein explain the continued insensitivity to refugees and genocide?”

A: Oy, have you got five hours? That’s a debate, Rex. Do you remember how we used to have debates? Wendy and I thinking of being able to do more. And I think that’s one that you’d be brilliant, because Rex in his other life… I mean, what was the other… You held a very important post, Rex, remember?

• What was that, Trudy? What was that.

• When you worked with… Come on. Victims of torture.

• Oh yes. indeed. Yeah. And then when we formed the Medical Foundation.

• Rex is absolutely the person to host these debates. So yes, Jennifer, we will talk about that.

Q: “Now that this has been shown and recorded on Lockdown, will it be available?” Oh, that’s a question.

A - That’s a complicated question. We’ll have come back.

• And we’ve got to talk to Wendy’s advisors about clearance of copyrights. Because we can show it because we are not making any money out of it so we can show it for educational purposes. That’s not a problem on a private network. But we have to clear copyright. And again, Selma, that answers your question.

“According to Ruth Gruber, most of those records skewed on that one ship were not Jews but Yugoslavs.” Have to check that, Joan. Thank you. “The Jews that were expelled from the Baltic states were anti-communists in 1940 when there were Soviet socialists, not to save them from the fascists.” Exactly, Robert. Of course, that’s what they said.

Q: “With hindsight, would you have pushed some of the interviewees harder?”

A - Oh. You didn’t think I’d pushed them hard enough then? What do you think?

• Eric says not. I think it was brilliant.

• See, look, let me explain something very quickly. In a sense, being judgemental during an interview doesn’t get us anywhere. What I wanted to understand was what they remembered and their attitude toward it. That’s an interviewing technique you either agree with or you don’t. Yeah.

Q - Monica’s asking… There’s lots of questions complimenting you. “`Would a Jewish public library be able to get this film?”

Vivian, “I and all my friends would certainly support distributing this film. Please ascertain if it will be possible.”

Hillary, “So informative, would love a copy if we… Ba, ba, ba. Everyone’s wanting the film. Jennifer says, "Mr. Bloomstein, you are a treasure, such an elegant soul whose humanity shines through all you create. Thank you.” What a lovely compliment, Rex. That’s from Jennifer.

• Thank you, Jennifer.

Q - Again, “Would it be possible to run it through local library evenings as partnership library are running evenings on many topics.”

A: The problem is copyright again.

• Trudy, Trudy, we have to… If there was… We’d have to try and get educational rights.

• And Susan Weekers is saying, “Maybe Antony Blinken would show it in the State Department.” Lucy, “Don’t read the…” No, no.

• It was shown in the States.

• Oh, wait. Oh, oh. Lucy’s given me some very interesting information which I’m not allowed to read out but would you read it yourself. Lucy, let’s talk.

• Yes. Well… Have we got any more time, Trude?

• Not really. Barry, “A brilliant film. You deserve a medal.” “How does the film become available? Blah, blah, blah.” “How do you copyright the Shoa? Can I copyright discussing the murder of my grandpa in Lithuania?” Good point, Monty. But we cannot get Lockdown into trouble. I agree with you. Rex and I have often had these kind of discussions when we… Rex was wonderful. He and Robert Wistrich worked with me in creating a resource for schools called “Understanding the Holocaust.” And do you remember the fights we had over… A lot of German companies had actually copyrighted footage from the camps. Do you remember, Rex?

• Indeed, yes. But we-

• And my lawyers all said, “Let them sue us.”

• Let them sue us. Indeed, yeah. We must do that. We must do lessons of the Holocaust for our audience.

• Oh, wait a minute. Lucy. “I didn’t say the FCO. I mean a former FCO foreign minister. Former minister of the FCO could give a talk with someone at the screening.” Lucy, we’re taking you up on your offer, aren’t we, Rex? I’ll put you two together. And Brian has just said, “Wonderful documentary. Just watch finished watching US and Holocaust by Ken Burns.” “Congratulations.” Susan, “Ruth Gruber was a friend of mine. Most were Jews,” she said.

• Trudy, can I interrupt? The gentleman who’s just made the point about Ken Burns’ series. Did he see parallels with the film that I’ve just made? Did he see his… How does it relate to Ken’s film? I’d be interested in his response.

• Hm, okay. Can you get in touch? Rex, I think we’ve got to stop here cuz we’ve got another lecture, but thank you-

• Trudy, can I just say this to everybody? That in the second part of “Auschwitz and the Allies,” which we’ll show tomorrow at seven, there are various attempts by different organisations, individuals, Jewish and non-Jewish, to persuade the Allies to stop the process of destruction. There’s our interview, which you must see, with Rudolph Vrba who escape from Auschwitz to warn the Jews of Hungary of their impending deportation. And my question to the legendary group captain, Leonard Cheshire VC, could Britain’s Air Force have bombed the railway lines and gas chambers of Auschwitz? I hope you’ll join me for that.

• Oh, it’s absolutely important to watch all of this. So tomorrow, I’m lecturing first at five o'clock on Haj Amin al-Husseini and the Arabs of Palestine at this period, and then Rex’s film. It’s going to be a hard grind for you, but I think this is the kind of information. Some of you know it, but a lot of you, you can and spread it to your kids. This has got to be told, particularly in the light of the way the world is at the moment. Anyway, Rex, thank you so much for your talent. It’s such pleasure to work with you. God bless.