Exclusive Book & Movie Reviews: An Apologist for the Allies The Myth of Rescue: Why the Democracies Could Not Have Saved More Jews from the Nazis, by William Rubinstein, Routledge, 288 pp., $25.00
by Mitchell Bard
The thesis of William Rubinstein's book, The Myth of Rescue, is most clearly stated on page 84: "Not one plan or proposal, made anywhere in the democracies by either Jews or non-Jewish champions of the Jews once the mass murder of the Jews of Europe had begun, could have rescued one single Jew who perished in the Nazi Holocaust" (emphasis in the original). This may be one of the more astounding statements ever written by any non-revisionist about the Holocaust.
Refuting conventional wisdom or revising history?
Rubinstein set out to refute the arguments made by scholars documenting the failure of the Allies to prevent the Holocaust. He particularly takes aim at David Wyman, whose Abandonment Of The Jews is the seminal work on the subject. Rubinstein makes his case primarily by ignoring the historical record and insisting that others have used hindsight to inaccurately assess the knowledge and motives of officials in the 1940s. For example, Rubinstein argues the impediment to Jews emigrating was the Nazi refusal to let them go. He says the fate of the Jews was "unknown and unknowable to anyone before June 1941." Actually, the U.S. State Department anticipated American citizens might be in danger as early as 1939 and established a special division for handling matters related to the welfare of Americans abroad. At the beginning of 1941, the United States learned U.S. citizens were subject to anti-Jewish laws in France. About the same time, the U.S. minister in Romania reported that Jews were being slaughtered and warned that Americans were in jeopardy. In his book, Rubinstein seeks to disprove the conventional wisdom that anti-Semitism played a role in American decision-making. He cites polls that indicated overwhelming numbers of Americans opposed the Nazis and extrapolates from the results the "astonishing degree of American sensitivity to anti-Semitism and hostility to Nazi oppression."
The questions, however, did not measure attitudes toward Jews. Moreover, one poll, showing that more than two-thirds of Americans wanted to keep out political refugees, contradicted his argument that Hitler was the only one preventing the Jews' escape.
Inconsistent policy, atrocious consequences
The State Department's policies toward Jews can be discerned from documents that Rubinstein ignored. The general sentiment of the U.S. government was that the Nazi discrimination against Jews should not be highlighted, nor should Jews be given special consideration. One official wrote in 1942, for example: "If we once open our doors to one class of refugee, we must expect on the basis of our experience in extending relief in occupied territories that all other sufferers from Nazi (including Japanese) oppression...will likewise wish to avail themselves of our hospitality." Rescue plans existed, but Rubinstein does not know about them and, hence, does not realize they were not pursued for political reasons rather than practical ones. In 1943, Cavendish Cannon, of the State Department's Division of European Affairs, objected to a proposal to move 300,000 Jews out of Romania to Syria or Palestine because "such a plan [was] likely to bring about new pressure for an asylum in the western hemisphere. " He also objected that because atrocities were underway in Hungary, "a migration of Romanian Jews would therefore open the question of similar treatment for Jews in Hungary and, by extension, all countries where there has been intense persecution." The view that rescuing Jews somehow posed a danger to the Allies or would "take the burden or the curse off Hitler" was held by several State Department officials and was the prevailing view in the British Foreign Office. Never mind saving millions of European Jews; the United States could have taken a number of steps to save the few thousand American citizens in danger. One official suggested checking passport lists to identify Americans in Europe who might be entitled to repatriation. The idea was rejected. In June 1942, Breckinridge Long, the State Department official who set many of the policies that doomed the Jews, said only those American citizens "we want" should be allowed to return. If this was the attitude toward Americans, how can anyone question his reluctance to help European Jews?
While logistical excuses, such as that given throughout Rubinstein's book, also were used to explain the failure to help Americans trapped in Hungary, American Jews threatened with deportation in Slovakia were abandoned for the political reason that the State Department believed the authorities were using the Jews to pressure the United States to recognize Slovakia. The State Department then consciously covered up its actions.
What about Wallenberg?
Rubinstein insists not one Jew could have been rescued, and yet Raoul Wallenberg saved thousands. Rubinstein minimizes Wallenberg's actions, but the truth is, he and other "Righteous Persons," such as Japanese Consul-General Chiune Sugihara, did save lives. U.S. officials could have done the same or encouraged others to do so. Instead, U.S. policy was frequently the exact opposite, as was the case in placing the burden on Americans to prove their citizenship before giving them any assistance. The decision to create a "free port" at Fort Ontario in Oswego, N.Y., is also dismissed by Rubinstein as irrelevant because Jews under Nazi control could not be taken to Oswego. But this was an example of how executive action was possible if officials had the will. A better example was President Franklin D. Roosevelt's decision in January 1940 to grant 200 emergency visas. An entire chapter is devoted to debunking the idea that the Allies could have bombed Auschwitz. Rubinstein offers no original research, simply a regurgitation of others' arguments that the attack was not possible, was not considered until too late in the war and would have made no difference. In fact, a number of requests to bomb the gas chambers were made, but all were rejected without investigating the feasibility. Meanwhile, hundreds of bombers were attacking targets within 45 miles of Auschwitz.
The focus on Auschwitz is misplaced anyway, because that was just one of hundreds of concentration camps (albeit one of the worst). Many Jews could have been saved by bombing other camps, an idea Rubinstein ignores entirely. The Allies did bomb Buchenwald, for example, but not for the purpose of saving Jews.
Lack of initiative, or lack or interest?
Rubinstein's last chapter refutes point by point Wyman's suggestions of what the Allies could have done. For example, Wyman says the War Refugee Board could have been established in 1942. Rubinstein's response is that no one advocated this, but that is precisely the point: Officials weren't interested in rescue.
Wyman also said the Allies could have pressured neutral countries near the Axis to take Jews. He specifically mentions Switzerland, which Rubinstein acknowledges returned fleeing Jews to Nazi territory. Rubinstein then offers the familiar Swiss excuse -- that it was afraid of a Nazi invasion -- for its failure to allow Jews to escape. As we know today, the Swiss not only did little to help Jews, but they actively helped Nazis with their gold transactions.
Rubinstein repeatedly suggests the Allies did not fail because no one offered any plans to rescue the Jews, or if they did, they were too late or impractical. This begs the key question: Why did the Allies not give more thought to saving the Jews? If you look at the complete historical record, rather than Rubinstein's limited selections, you see that it is because they did not care enough to do more.
Sources: Mitchel Bard is the Executive Director of the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise
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