<story><title>David Dushman, last surviving Auschwitz liberator, dies aged 98</title><url>https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57379704</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>zahma</author><text>It does make sense that a soldier didn’t know. On the other hand, the American military knew of Auschwitz and Birkenau, had the opportunity to bomb and incapacitate it, and didn’t apparently at the request of FDR to direct all munitions toward winning the war. His administration was implored by escapees and refugees. One of the greatest tragedies of many during the war.</text></item><item><author>cholmon</author><text>&amp;gt; Dushman has said he was unaware Auschwitz existed during the war, only learning about the atrocities carried out there in the years after.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s always jarring to me, with my modern&amp;#x2F;simplistic&amp;#x2F;naive perspective of these major historical events, to consider that the people who lived during and&amp;#x2F;or participated in  these events didn&amp;#x27;t understand full extent of what they were seeing or what was happening. It totally makes sense, academically...fog of war, slow&amp;#x2F;spotty spread of information, determining what&amp;#x27;s propaganda and what&amp;#x27;s not.&lt;p&gt;But still, there&amp;#x27;s something mind-blowing to me about a soldier mowing down the fence at Auschwitz with a tank, but not knowing what the place was.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Animats</author><text>Old issue. See [1]&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;The first proposal to bomb Auschwitz was made on 16 May 1944 by a Slovak rabbi.&amp;quot; That was 3 weeks before D-Day (June 6, 1944).&lt;p&gt;Eisenhower&amp;#x27;s policy was to defeat Germany, and not get distracted. He had planned to bypass Paris, which wasn&amp;#x27;t on the route to Berlin.[2] (De Gaulle went off-script and liberated Paris ahead of schedule, but that&amp;#x27;s another story.) Eisenhower was trying to hold an alliance with different goals together. All the allies were agreed on &amp;quot;defeat Germany&amp;quot;, but there were other national goals. Britain was concerned about preserving its empire, for example. To hold the alliance together, Eisenhower focused on &amp;quot;win the war&amp;quot; above all else.&lt;p&gt;The person this article is about was in the Red Army. &amp;quot;One of just 69 men in his 12,000-strong division to survive the war, Mr Dushman suffered serious injuries during the conflict&amp;quot;. The USSR had about &lt;i&gt;20 million&lt;/i&gt; casualties in WWII. Never forget that.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Auschwitz_bombing_debate&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Auschwitz_bombing_debate&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.historynet.com&amp;#x2F;the-generals-who-brought-paris-back-to-life.htm&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.historynet.com&amp;#x2F;the-generals-who-brought-paris-ba...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>David Dushman, last surviving Auschwitz liberator, dies aged 98</title><url>https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57379704</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>zahma</author><text>It does make sense that a soldier didn’t know. On the other hand, the American military knew of Auschwitz and Birkenau, had the opportunity to bomb and incapacitate it, and didn’t apparently at the request of FDR to direct all munitions toward winning the war. His administration was implored by escapees and refugees. One of the greatest tragedies of many during the war.</text></item><item><author>cholmon</author><text>&amp;gt; Dushman has said he was unaware Auschwitz existed during the war, only learning about the atrocities carried out there in the years after.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s always jarring to me, with my modern&amp;#x2F;simplistic&amp;#x2F;naive perspective of these major historical events, to consider that the people who lived during and&amp;#x2F;or participated in  these events didn&amp;#x27;t understand full extent of what they were seeing or what was happening. It totally makes sense, academically...fog of war, slow&amp;#x2F;spotty spread of information, determining what&amp;#x27;s propaganda and what&amp;#x27;s not.&lt;p&gt;But still, there&amp;#x27;s something mind-blowing to me about a soldier mowing down the fence at Auschwitz with a tank, but not knowing what the place was.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ghufran_syed</author><text>Wouldn’t bombing the camp kill the prisoners? Or are you suggesting that they could have successfully bombed and “incapacitated” the camp &lt;i&gt;without&lt;/i&gt; killing the prisoners? How exactly?</text></comment>