Important! SM – Dec. 28/44.
Re: “Negotiations.” Special report from
Saly Mayer of the JDC.
Summing up of results of 6 months of negotiating with the SS.
The starting point of the whole negotiations with
ARBA is President Roosevelt's appeal to all neutral countries, organizations
and private persons to help in avoiding Hitler's plan to exterminate Jews and other minorities. We have repeatedly stated,
at least orally, that there are two Nazi groups in the SS organization,
of which one is for the preservation of the still existing Jews, the
other for the extermination. It is our interest and intention to support
the former against the latter. In order to do so, we have to make an
offer. Their desire was to obtain goods, notably war materials. We have
been able to oppose to this desire all arguments which were available,
among them of course the chief one that those to whom we would have
to look for means, would not be able to furnish them to that end. Finally
we have negotiated on the basis of sustaining the Jews in the hands
of the Germans and Hungarians, by sending them supplies, i.e., eatables,
clothing and medicaments and providing later on for their removal or
emigration. This new basis excluded in fact very nearly all that was
of a business character and only preserved a humanitarian side, and
the chief interest the other party might still have in the matter, short
of killing off the remaining Jews, was to have them more or less off
their hands as far as their daily needs were concerned. In view of the
progressive shrinkage of necessities of all sorts in German-controlled
countries, inclusive of Austria and Hungary, this is not a matter of
mean importance, and the question, why a proposal as ours should be
accepted, may be well answered by it, even if we admit that it is very
far from what ARBA expected from us. Our plan also has the advantage
that it may be defended on ethical grounds, and that it contains nothing
which counteracts to the legal basis on which those to whom we have
to look for our financial basis have to work.
Of course, this plan requires financial means, and
therefore the concurrence of the Allied governments and also the assistance
of the Swiss Federal Government and of the I.R.C.; of the former in
order to obtain and pay for the necessities in Switzerland, on the other
for the forwarding, the repartition and controlling of them. It may
safely be said that on principle the concurrence both of the Swiss Government
and of the International Red Cross may be counted upon, while it would
be an act of diplomatic courtesy that the wish to have the two institutions
in question cooperate should be officially submitted to them.
It is not impossible that owing to the considerably
shrunken import and the current Swiss Relief Action (Schweizerhilfe)
supplies such as needed for the present relief work may be scarce, so
that we would like to repeat here the request we have already addressed
to the Intergovernmental Committee for Refugees to give a helping hand
in this matter of supplies.
Now, if we refer here to a question which was formerly
formulated under the heading: “Will it produce results?” we
may mention some matters which, at least in a considerable degree, may
be referred to as a result of the negotiations in question, while of
course other currents have helped in part:
The cessation of the exterminating crematorium of
Auschwitz, Himmler's order to stop premeditated killing, the forwarding
of 1,700 people from Bergen-Belsen to Switzerland, of which the second
train in good condition and comparative luxury, a fact which may safely
be set down as a direct result of pending negotiations;
the reducing of the age limit for such people who
would be allowed to stay in Budapest for reasons of age;
the permission that several thousand children could
remain in Budapest under Red Cross supervision and protection;
a promise given by the German authorities that 14,000
persons would be allowed to be brought to Switzerland;
the fact that 17,000 people were brought by rail from
Hungary to Vienna and environs;
the sufferance that some 700 persons were allowed
to escape from Hungary to Palestine, a fact which would not have been
possible without the silent concurrence of German authorities.
There are other points which may only be considered
as Expectations of Futures:
If the plan will go into working, there may be further
transports to Switzerland and therefore to a better chance of preserving
lives; If we have been able to do some amount of useful work, this may
be a first step to the intervention of institutions and bodies of more
authority and power than private persons can possibly have.
It seems to us that we should not be the first to
stop negotiations, while the opposite party is still prepared to continue
them.
We want to do all we can and we think that this is
an opening to avoid and eliminate further misdeeds not necessitated
by warlike action. We think that while the outstretched hand may not
be outstretched for mere goodwill or for charity's sake it would be
better, in view of the situation of the people who are in the power
of those with whom we deal or rather of their competitors who mean less
well, to put something into that outstretched hand, in order to help
those that are in their own way helping us.
Finally, the undersigned expresses his belief that
this action if continued skillfully and with the necessary sacrifices,
will lead to a good end.
St. Gall, December 28th 1944
[Signed Saly Mayer]
Source: David S. Wyman (ed.), "America and the
Holocaust. War Refugee Board: Hungary," Vol. 8, garland Publishing,
Inc., 1990, pp.77-79.