why didnt the u.s army stop the holocaust sooner?

Question

help..for research paper???

Answer 1

The U.S wanted to remain neutral during WW2.
There had been stories in the papers here from 1940 but there had been no interest to get involved.
This country was still recovering from the Great Depression and just getting back on its feet. Most Americans were isolationists, most were also unconcerned with European peoples' struggle for survival.
The U.S. government therefore had had no mandate from the American people before Pearl Harbor. Americans have always been wary of "entangling alliances" in foreign wars (a phrase from George Washington) and this was especially true after World War I.

From the start of the war in Europe on September 1, 1939 to its end nearly 6 years later, the New York Times and other mass media treated the persecution and ultimately the annihilation of the Jews of Europe as a secondary story. They reported it. In fact, from September 1939 through May 1945, the Times published 1,186 stories about what was happening to the Jews of Europe, or an average of 17 stories per month. But the story never received the continuous attention or prominent play that a story about the unprecedented attempt to wipe out an entire people deserved. The story of the Holocaustii – meaning articles that focused on the discrimination, deportation, and destruction of the Jews – made the Times front page just 26 times, and only in six of those stories were Jews identified on the front as the primary victims. Never did page one stories appear back to back, nor did one follow another over a span of a few days. Not once did the story lead the paper, meaning appear in the right-hand column reserved for the day’s most important news – not even when the concentration camps were liberated at the end of the war. When the Holocaust made the Times front page, the stories obscured the fact that most of the victims were Jews, referring to them instead as refugees or persecuted minorities. In addition, the Times only intermittently and timidly editorialized about the extermination of the Jews, and the paper rarely highlighted it in either the News of the Week in Review or the magazine section.
To be fair, The New York Times did not downplay the Holocaust because it lacked the information to play it up. It is true that news of the destruction of the Jews did not flow unfettered to the West. Once the war started, journalists could not report at all in much of occupied Europe, and the Germans made a concerted effort to conceal at least the final stages of their campaign against the Jews. Even before the war, foreign correspondents faced hostile governments, particularly in Germany and Russia, brutal working conditions and transmission methods that were expensive and erratic.

Edit: The first concentration camp with a crematorium was Dachau which was built 10 miles outside of Munich in the town of Dachau and was completed in March 1933.
The death camps that had been specifically designed for wholesale slaughter, Auschwitz II (aka Birkenau), went into operation in October 1941

Answer 2

Firstly, most of the professional military (the General Staff, and such), simply couldn't believe that the Germans were devoting so much effort to exterminating people during a war on two fronts. The number of trains, soldiers, trucks, fuel, administrators, contractors, etc that were diverted from the war in order to carry out the murder of more than 10 million people was so enormous they figured it must be an exaggeration (Jews were only one part of the holocaust, at least as many Gypsies, political prisoners, mentally ill and retarded, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, physically handicapped, dissenting clergy, Poles and other Slavs, and anyone else deemed 'unfit' for German society were also killed in the camps). The Allied Command figured they must be using them for slave labor, not killing them directly.

Another reason is that the only way to stop it without being on the ground, is to bomb the camps and trains. Given their skepticism about the scale of the murders, they were hesitant to bomb the very people they were supposedly saving.

EDIT: BTW, the first death camp opened in Dec, 1941. The first use of mass execution was in Sept, 1941 using vans and exhaust gases. Full-scale operations didn't start until 1942, with limited success in disposing of the bodies until the crematoria were put into use. By the end of 1943, the Germans had closed down most of the camps due to Allied advances. Auschwitz continued until mid-1944, so it was only carried out for two or three years before we won the war and stopped it.

Answer 3

The holocaust wasn't evident as a genocide until midway through the war, at which point all of continental Europe was occupied by the Axis. The allies couldn't have stopped it without defeating the Germans, and that took time. D-Day was years of planning and the whole western front could have been lost easily if time and preparation were not carefully considered.
With hindsight we can see the writing was on the wall but at the time nothing like that had ever been seen before. Our governments should have done more before the war but we were too blind and ignorant to help.

Answer 4

First the US had to mobilize for war. Then we had to defeat the U Boats so we could reach Europe. Then we had to fight our way across France and Germany. All this took time.

Then there was the problem of accepting the fact that the holocaust was underway. The scale of what was being reported, while true, was unimaginable to many at the time.

This general disbelief was fueled in part by the fact that so many untrue anti-German "atrocity" stories had been told by allied propagandists in the First World War.

Answer 5

The only way to stop atrocities on the ground is to occupy the ground. That is, you can't drop bombs to stop prison camp abuses without bombing the bombs hurting the very people you want to rescue. So how do you do it? You fight your way into the camps on the ground---and Hitler's army was no push-over. Do you recall D-Day invasion of Europe? Do you recall how many Panzer (tank) divisions he had in Europe? It is unfortunate the offensive could not have moved faster but I believe Gen. Patton did set some speed records as it was. It is a miracle that anyone got out of those camps alive.

Answer 6

Because the USA did not join in WW2 until1941 and it did not get to Europe until 1943. The Holocaust was well established by then

Answer 7

Because we werent able to get onto the european continent till 1943(1944 for NW Europe). Most of the death Camps were in NW europe, Germany Proper, Eastern Europe.


And there was that little obstacle called the German Army in the way as well.........

Answer 8

The US military has never given an answer to your question. The Army knew early on in the war that jews were being exterminated. They had arial phtotos of the extermination camps and knew where they were.
Speculation is that the military didn't want to bomb civilians even though bombing the camps might have killed a few thousand, the camps would have been put out of business and millions of jews may have been saved.
The US didn't mind killing civilians in other actions during WW2, so I believe that speculation isn't valid.
My own opinion is that the US didn't care what happened to the jews at that time. It became fashionable to care about jews only after the war.

Answer 9

death of an guy or woman, even 1000's of 1000's by employing the palms of the wicked only right hurts the wicked themselves quicker or later. All those that died by employing the palms of wicked persons for the reason that the Abel would have their deaths reviewed on judgment day only so those Christ decide deserve a threat ought to be resurrected into Paradise only as Christ promised a sort of putting at his part. a million. Having stated that, the subsequent ought to be softened purely a splash. The prophecy, the promise God made the Israelites whilst they entered the holy land, or instead on the Mountain wherein they bought the regulation, grow to be as quickly as that in the event that they disobeyed God they could be pursued even foreign places and killed. for this reason what befell suitable right here could have been a fulfillment of this prophecy. 2. in spite of the case, those events have been the direct ability and purpose, the impetus, that grow to be as quickly as the propelling force for the rustic of Israel to be created in the midsection East in our slicing-factor situations. devoid of such persecution, that ought to now no longer have befell. 3. and not employing a rustic of Israel in the midsection East, the surrounding muslim international places and the Jewish state undertaking that has been so pandemic over the a protracted time for the reason that the that 2d ought to now no longer exist. devoid of this disaster, the final super Tribulation disaster with wars effective between Israel, US, and so on, and the added disaster with a purpose to purpose as to oil factors, how such effective conflict actual will halt whilst it starts off all shipment of oil out of that undertaking for a whilst. this could purpose interior a pair of weeks a number of of our international to grind to a halt. certainly, the super Tribulation promised is likely based in this setup to happen. for this reason, from a human attitude and archives, no count number if or no longer appropriate or improper, the above intent, and in all probability so plenty extra problematical concerns, have been according to some variety of 'Hitler' to envision the international scene and do what he did. The righteous who have been harm in all this, will in the event that they're ineffective now, be effective resurrections into paradise the place there is one international govt. for this reason their discomfort has only right been temporary and that they would be waiting to grow to be a member of their relatives and forefathers in a international wherein conflict is portion of the previous, wherein not extra Hitlers ought to be ruling till ultimately devoid of end.

Answer 10

To be honest, it was a damn good secret. Many heard stories but truly couldn't believe what they were hearing. Nobody could be that brutal not even Hitler. Once they got close enough to view it themselves, they became believers.