Transcript Petchenik

A Look into
America and the
Holocaust
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A Look into America and the Holocaust
An innocent bystander is someone who during a certain event is
unknowledgeable as to what is going on and thus can do nothing to help. If
that person or those people had known what was taking place, they would
not be innocent. During the pre World War II era, Hitler and the Nazis
began making an attempt to completely eliminate all of the Jewish people.
This was called the Holocaust. American leaders knew that this was going
on, but they consciously decided to take no action. The United States
government was not an innocent bystander in World War II, because
although they knew that the Holocaust was taking place, they still chose to
stall and wait it out rather than taking any action to fight against it. It took a
direct attack on the United States for them to enter the war and fight.
A Look into America and the Holocaust
Dictionary.com defines the “Holocaust” as
“a massive slaughter” and more specifically,
“the genocide of European Jews and others
by the Nazis during World War II.” When
Hitler rose to power in 1933, he preached
that the Jews as well as other minorities in
Europe were sub-human and should be
persecuted. Jews from all over Europe were
split up and put into ghettos and eventually
sent to concentration camps.
A Look into America and the Holocaust
For most of the Holocaust, the United States took no action
to aid the European Jews. Although the United States had
acknowledged that the Holocaust was happening, the antiSemitism among government officials was just too strong.
For example, the few Jews who managed to get their
immigration papers processed were rejected when it came
time for them to enter America. Although, there was a lot of
talk about what could be done to help the Jews (such
proposals included bombing the railroads that transported
victims to the concentration camps), no action was taken.
The people in charge of making those decisions, President
Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the Department of State
officials, stalled and deliberated as a tactic for not having to
take any action. These leaders also realized that the general
public would be outraged by the mistreatment of the Jews, so
they delayed publicizing the reports of the killings. They
hoped that everything would end without them having to do
anything.
A Look into America and the
Holocaust
The Holocaust was responsible for the murder of approximately 6 million Jews. The Concentration or “Death” camps,
Aushwitz, Dachau, Aktion Reinhard, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, Chelmno, Maidanek, and Mauthausen contributed to tons
of Jewish deaths. Although some Jews tried to resist being captured, the Nazis were too strong and too powerful being that
they had no real opponent. They were able to go about killing all of the Jews that they could and there was no consequence.
Hitler’s goal was being fulfilled.
While the physical effects on the Jews were so extremely damaging, it was the mental effects that had an even bigger impact.
Jews in the camps lost the will to live. In MAUS, Anja even says, “My whole family is gone!…Oh God. Let me die too!”
(Spiegelman Volume 1: 122). Furthermore, well after the surviving Jews got out of the camps, the legacy of the Holocaust
has lived on with those whose families suffered through it.
“Yesterday, December 7, 1941 – a day
which will live in infamy,” (Roosevelt “War
Message to Congress”). On this day, the
Japanese military performed a sneak attack
on the United States naval base, Pearl
Harbor on the Oahu Island in Hawaii. Over
2,300 Americans were killed. Obviously,
the American people were outraged, and in
President Roosevelt’s speech, “War
Message to Congress”, he asked that
Congress protect the “supremacy of human
rights” and declare war on the Empire of
Japan. Being that Japan was a member of
the Axis (a group made up of Japan,
Germany, and Italy), the Germans would
finally have a worthy opponent. The defeat
of the Germans would undoubtedly end the
Holocaust. Finally, action was taking place.
A Look into America and the Holocaust
Although well into the war, the
United States still did not take
any direct action to rescue the
Jews, they did put up a strong
fight against the Axis. The Axis
started to wear down around the
same time that the Allies
(United States included) started
to realize their full potential.
Hitler’s reign ended after the
Axis was defeated in Berlin.
Hitler killed himself, and the
reign of German power was
over. By September, 1945, all
of the fighting had ended, and
the U.S. and British troops
liberated the Jews from the
concentration camps.
A Look into America and the Holocaust
A Look into America and the Holocaust
Although eventually, Hitler and the Nazis were stopped,
one can always wonder, what if.
What if the United States had leapt into action as soon
as they knew about the Holocaust?
What if the Germans were defeated before they could
harm anyone?
What if six million people hadn’t died?
What if?