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They escaped on April 7, 1944 and managed to get back to Slovakia.
Read up on them, their story is very interesting.
It is believed that they saved the lives of 200,000 people who were due to be deported.
Wasn't there some sort of policy that if you escaped, the Nazis would execute ten remaining prisoners on your behalf - aiming for your relatives if they were still alive?
Wasn't there some sort of policy that if you escaped, the Nazis would execute ten remaining prisoners on your behalf - aiming for your relatives if they were still alive?
Something like this yes but spreading word of the Holocaust and stopping more deportations. You cannot say they did wrong.
Somehow I think that escaping a concentration camp and then spreading the word about what was going on there is pretty damn courageous. Not sure what the motive is in knocking those actions.
After escaping and helping to circulate a report on what was going on in the death camps, Vrba then joined the resistance and received two awards for bravery under fire. Rudolf Vrba - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
As to Wetzler and the merits of their report itself:
Quote:
The historian Sir Martin Gilbert said: "Alfred Wetzler was a true hero. His escape from Auschwitz, and the report he helped compile, telling for the first time the truth about the camp as a place of mass murder, led directly to saving the lives of thousands of Jews - the Jews of Budapest who were about to be deported to their deaths. No other single act in the Second World War saved so many Jews from the fate that Hitler had determined for them."
The number of people saved from concentration camps is certainly open to question, but:
Quote:
The evidence eventually led to the bombing of several government buildings in Hungary, killing Nazi officials who were instrumental in the railway deportations of Jews to Auschwitz. The deportations halted, saving up to 120,000 Hungarian Jews.
So yeah, I'm more than happy classifying these guys as heroes. I'm sure like all of us they had their faults, but no question that at a minimum, they saved tens of thousands of possible Nazi victims. In my book, that qualifies them and then some.
I find it fascinating that some people seem to think that the Jews that were being rounded up had any idea what was about to happen to them. While it is impossible for Germans living near the camps to not have known, the intent of the camps was kept a somewhat guarded secret throughout Europe and no one really knew for sure what was going to happen to people who went there.
The actions of these two men are important as they gave concrete testimony as to what was happening in the camps. If you were a Jew at the time you most likely thought complying with your relocation order was the best thing you could do. Afterall those who resisted were killed on site. However, it you knew that you faced almost certain death by complying, it is far more likely you would fight the deportation. Additionally, while non-Jews may have been somewhat compliant when they thought their neighbors were simply being relocated, they may be compelled to take measures to help them if they knew they were being exterminated.
I find it fascinating that some people seem to think that the Jews that were being rounded up had any idea what was about to happen to them. While it is impossible for Germans living near the camps to not have known, the intent of the camps was kept a somewhat guarded secret throughout Europe and no one really knew for sure what was going to happen to people who went there.
The actions of these two men are important as they gave concrete testimony as to what was happening in the camps. If you were a Jew at the time you most likely thought complying with your relocation order was the best thing you could do. Afterall those who resisted were killed on site. However, it you knew that you faced almost certain death by complying, it is far more likely you would fight the deportation. Additionally, while non-Jews may have been somewhat compliant when they thought their neighbors were simply being relocated, they may be compelled to take measures to help them if they knew they were being exterminated.
I think people had an idea of what was going (as you said it seems hard not to) but in a way i don't think they wanted to believe it. Even the leaders of the countries the Germans were taking the Jews from actually did not know what was happening and when Vrba told some leaders what was actually happening, they themselves did not believe it initially. This is all based on two documentaries i have seen so i am putting faith into their accuracy.
I think people had an idea of what was going (as you said it seems hard not to) but in a way i don't think they wanted to believe it. Even the leaders of the countries the Germans were taking the Jews from actually did not know what was happening and when Vrba told some leaders what was actually happening, they themselves did not believe it initially. This is all based on two documentaries i have seen so i am putting faith into their accuracy.
I agree with you. I think it is hard to think that they didn't know what was happening was bad, however, throughout everything I've read and seen the thought of simple outright extermination was not really thought to be what was going on by the majority. I think most assumed they were being rounded up and forced to work as slave labor. I think many thought being a slave laborer may be bad, but at least you are alive and that the best chance for survival was to cooperate. Knowing that the people were simply being exterminated changes a lot.
The people initially thought they were being relocated and they stopped more people being sent.
This sentence is confusing (two "they"s).
Who stopped more people being sent? So the Nazis stopped sending Jews to concentration camps because the Jews didn't want to be deported?
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