Abandonment of the Jews

by David S. Wyman

Book Overview

A monumental and damning analysis of America's failure to aid European Jews during World War II. Introduction by Elie Wiesel.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0394740777
• ISBN13: 9780394740775
• Release Date: January 1986
• Publisher: Pantheon Books
• Length: 444 Pages
• Weight: 1.16 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 8.2" x 5.4"

Customer Reviews

Disturbing.

The reader will not want to believe what is being read.The evil, satanic Nazi regime and it's methods intent on the slaughter and genocide of the European Jews is well documented elsewhere.Little is written or heard about the passive accomplices....I hesitate in using the latter word, but none other can really suffice in this context. The author has provided an extremely valuable service with this work in bringing this subject to our attention.It is difficult to estimate how many of the six million murdered Jews could possibly have been saved through a concerted, determined Allied rescue campaign. However, suffice to say no such measures were taken and all the victims perished.The author documents that the US State Department and the British Foreign Office has absolutely no intention of rescuing large numbers of European Jews from the Nazi genocide machine.Indeed, the author shows that the Allies actually feared that the Nazi regime would release tens of thousands of Jews into Allied hands and the inherent responsibility that such a move would impose upon them.Such a move by the Nazis would have inevitably placed immense pressure on the British to open Palestine to increased Jewish immigration, and the US to admit even larger numbers of Jews to their own shores.A situation that neither Government wanted to face. The British, although allowing virtually unhindered Arab immigration from surrounding Arab nations into Palestine, had their own reasons for refusing increased Jewish entry into what is now Israel. Instead, the British provided concentration camps of their own on Cyprus for those Jews seeking what they perceived as `illegal' entry to Palestine. A damning historical indictment, which being British and a non-Jew, I still find difficult to stomach.The author shows that there was clear, authenticated documentation available to the US State Department in 1942, that revealed unmistakable evidence that the Nazis were pursuing a systematic extermination of European Jewry. However, it is shown that nothing was done for some 14 months, and only then were limited measures eventually adopted. Even so, the US record of action is still far better than that of the British.These limited measures of assistance adopted by the US are shown to have been impeded by rampant anti-Semitism throughout US society and the US Congress, plus the mass media's failure to publicise Holocaust details and the virtual near silence of the Church and it's own leadership.The author also shows that appeals to bomb the Auschwitz-Birkenau gas chambers, railroads and bridges were refused outright amidst claims that such military action would divert essential air-power. Yet, at the very same time numerous heavy Allied bombing raids were still taking place within 50 miles of Auschwitz, only a few minutes flying time away. The value of saving Jewish lives was not worth a single Allied bomb.This is a disturbing book about a disturbing period of history and a disturbing analysis of th

Noble Price Material

Wyman wrote this book in the mid 1980's. Since then, many other historical studies have shown the same shamful findings:FDR and the State Department and many segments of the American public, including most of the Jewish leaders, not only suppressed the news on the extermination of the European Jews, but did their best to hinder efforts of rescue. Wyman includes undisputed sources for every fact, but being a gentile, he is too soft on the American Jewish leaders who looked at FDR as a God, and in order not to upset him, kept quiet. For those who still worship FDR, consider this: A million Americans are stranded in Europe during War World II and the Germans are systematically shipping them to concentration camps, torturing and gassing them. What would FDR and his administration have done? Conduct the war in a gentlemantary manner with taking of prisoners, etc., (a quarter million Axis prisoners were shipped to the US while a common American and British response to the abandonment of the Jews was no ships available), or immediately start a military operation to rescue them. Readers who still believe that saving the Jews was not possible because of the war effort, should read historical books on Great Britain during the war. While the British refused to consider any plan of saving the Jews they deployed more than 100,000 troops and a large armada in Palestine and the Med Sea for the sole purpose of capturing Jews who escaped the European hell. In 1940, the British had elaborate plans to attack would be German invaders with low flying planes dropping gas on the invaders, despite the Geneva agreements that the German kept (except with respect to the Jews, of course,who were gassed by the millions). This book is a Noble Price material because it reveals the truth about the darkest period in human history, a truth hiden because too many people still cannot confront the sicknening facts: The leaders of the free world in the 1940's were cowards, anti-Semites, and liers. Only a handful of brave men such as Hecht, Rogers, and a few Irgun members fought against overwhelming odds to bring about some response to the terrible plight of the Jews.

Convincing, painful indictment by a Protestant scholar

For anyone who has wondered whether there was something the allies could have done to obstruct the Nazi holocaust, Wyman presents the troubling answers. They are very consistent with similar investigations of the British record by Wasserstein and Gilbert. This book had to be written, as part of a truth-telling process essential for a society to understand itself. A person of conscience, as well as a painstaking historian, Wyman does not accept the bureaucratic excuses for inaction at face value. It is an unpopular line of investigation, because it upsets the myths that the USA was on the side of the angels, fighting the war to save the Jews, and that FDR was a near saint. Wyman remains cool and balanced, never forgetting that the Allied culpability was on an entirely different level from that of the Germans and their helpers, but not sugar-coating Allied indifference, obstruction and lack of imagination about trying to stem the extermination program. For example, the simple step of broadcasting to the European countries, where Jews were being rounded up, to tell them what would happen at their destination, might have slowed down the deportations by stiffening the resistance. A healthy reminder that our historical record has plenty of which to be ashamed, and that governments, even in enlightened democracies, often perform in ways that don't stand up to moral inspection. A call to vigilance.

A great book for all Americans interested in this topic

This book restates the case behind America's involvement withthe Holocaust. It relies on mostly first source material which canniether be disputed nor discredited. I encourage readers from all backgrounds to read this wonderful book!