It wasn't only Roosevelt, his top adviser John J Mccloy who was one of Roosevelt's top advisors in WW2 told Roosevelt not to bomb any of the Nazi death camps in Poland.
What [censored] me off about Mccoy was, years later he would try to blame Roosevelt for not bombing Auschwitz, when it was Mccoly who was telling Roosevelt not to bomb Auschwitz.
Read below a letter Mccloy wrote in 1944, which shows how he didn't want Auschwitz bombed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_J._McCloyAuschwitz bombing debate
Main article: Auschwitz bombing debate
During World War II, as Assistant Secretary of War, McCloy was a crucial voice in setting U.S. military priorities. The U.S. War Department was petitioned throughout late 1944 to help save Nazi prisoners by ordering the bombing of the railroad lines leading to Auschwitz. McCloy responded that only heavy bombers would be able to reach the sites from England, and that those bombers would be too vulnerable and were needed elsewhere.[citation needed]
However, only a few months earlier, Allied forces had bombed industrial centers just a few kilometres away from the concentration camp, and would continue to do so, apparently even causing some damage to buildings in Auschwitz, while sustaining very low losses. Indeed, regular US bombing raids from Foggia, Italy to nearby strategic targets routinely crossed right over Auschwitz en route.[7]
On another occasion, when replying to another appeal to bomb Auschwitz, McCloy claimed that the final decision on the selection of bombing targets, including those attacked by American planes, lay with the British alone. This was an incorrect claim. According to Michael Beschloss, in an interview three years before the latter's death (in 1986) with Henry Morgenthau, III, McCloy claimed that the decision not to bomb Auschwitz was President Roosevelt's and that he was merely fronting for him. McCloy also alleged to Morgenthau that Roosevelt refused to approve the Auschwitz rail bombing because he would then be accused of also killing Auschwitz prisoners.
In the early 1970s, McCloy stated that he himself "could no more order a bombing attack on Auschwitz than order a raid on Berlin". However, while in the field with General Jacob L. Devers, advancing eastward through Germany in early 1945, a "suggestion" from McCloy resulted in Devers' Army bypassing and sparing the historic Romantic Road town of Rothenburg ob der Tauber. For his action, McCloy was later made an honorary citizen of the town. These and other pro-German actions by McCloy resulted in significant protests much later, when McCloy was announcing the Volkswagen Scholarship at Harvard University in 1983.
Now read this letter by Mccloy in 1944, which shows he didn't want Auschwitz bombed.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/holocaust/filmmore/reference/primary/bombjohn.htmlJohn J. McCloy, Assistant Secretary of War, explains to John W. Pehle, Director, War Refugee Board, that the War Department cannot authorize the bombing of Auschwitz, November 18, 1944.
Mr. John W. Pehle, Executive Director
War Refugee Board
Treasury Department Building, Rm. 3414
Washington, D.C.
Dear Mr. Pehle:
I refer to your letter of November 8th, in which you forwarded the report of two eye-witnesses on the notorious German concentration and extermination camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau in Upper Silesia.
The Operation Staff of the War Department has given careful consideration to your suggestion that the bombing of these camps be undertaken. In consideration of this proposal the following points were brought out:
a. Positive destruction of these camps would necessitate precision bombing, employing heavy or medium bombardment, or attack by low flying or dive bombing aircraft, preferably the latter.
b. The target is beyond the maximum range of medium bombardment, dive bombers and fighter bombers located in United Kingdom, France or Italy.
c. Use of heavy bombardment from United Kingdom bases would necessitate a hazardous round trip flight unescorted of approximately 2,000 miles over enemy territory.
d. At the present critical stage of the war in Europe, our strategic air forces are engaged in the destruction of industrial target systems vital to the dwindling war potential of the enemy, from which they should not be diverted. The positive solution to this problem is the earliest possible victory over Germany, to which end we should exert our entire means.
e. This case does not at all parallel the Amiens mission because of the location of the concentration and extermination camps and the resulting difficulties encountered in attempting to carry out the proposed bombing.
Based on the above, as well as the most uncertain, if not dangerous effect such a bombing would have on the object to be attained, the War Department has felt that it should not, at least for the present, undertake these operations.
I know that you have been reluctant to press this activity on the War Department. We have been pressed strongly from other quarters, however, and have taken the best military opinion on its feasibility, and we believe the above conclusion is a sound one.
Sincerely,
John McCloy
Assistant Secretary of War
Topic: FDR's Holocaust of Inaction (Read 2924 times)