Six Great Legacies of the Nuremberg Trials that Still Impact the World Today

Posted on March 7, 2018 by CSambells

Did you know that before the Second World War, there were no international laws to protect civilians in war?

Yes, really. And let me explain.

Modern rules of war are only 150 years in the making. Some claim they started with Abraham Lincoln’s enactment of the Lieber Code in 1863, which tried to limit the military actions of his Union forces by permitting certain humanitarian measures to be taken (upon the condition that they do not contradict military objectives, of course). But I would argue that it began in 1864 on the other side of the ocean, when the red cross on a white background – the opposite of the Swiss flag – came to symbolize a neutral protective party helping another in conflict, known as the Red Cross.

Today, the international community has developed a fairly robust series of international laws that explicitly aim to limit the effects of armed conflict for humanitarian reasons. (Although reinforcing these laws is an entirely different matter…)

The critical problem before the Second World War was that individuals were subject to the laws of their nations, but could not claim rights under international law since they were not subjects of international law. (For an excellent lecture on this topic by Thomas Buergenthal, graduate of Harvard Law, a Holocaust survivor and former judge of the UN’s International Court of Justice, see here). Looking at it the other way around, as objects of international law, individuals’ status did not differ from a State’s territory or its other sovereign possessions; individuals thus belonged to the State. And let’s take a moment to consider those poor stateless individuals, such as refugees, or Jews stripped of their citizenship (as was legal in pre-war Germany), who lost their rights to any national laws…

Thus, before 1939, individuals were subjects to the laws of their nations, but not to international law. A rather subtle but critical difference, you might say.

In both the First and Second World Wars, this equated to entirely different treatment between civilians and other groups, such as prisoners of war. For example, sending or receiving post, which remains a cornerstone of human rights today, was not granted to interned, displaced or detained civilians; but instead these rights existed for POWs. Because the 1907 Hague Convention explicitly stipulated that POWs would “enjoy the privilege of free postage. Letters, money orders, and valuables, as well as parcels by post, intended for prisoners of war, or dispatched by them, shall be exempt from all postal duties,” this meant that you could send your husband knitted socks or a food parcel to a POW camp, or ask about your loved one’s whereabouts to relevant authorities.

The International Committee of the Red Cross’ massive system of indexes in Switzerland handled the two to three thousands letters of inquiry per day into the whereabouts of lost, fallen or captured soldiers. By the end of the First World War, the ICRC had compiled 4,895,000 index cards and forwarded 1,884,914 individual parcels and 1,813 wagonloads of collective relief supplies. Today, these files have been digitised and are searchable online.

The Third Geneva Convention in 1929 expanded the rights of POWs even further to include the establishment of official information bureaux by all belligerent nations and the coordinated relief of prisoners, whereby properly accredited professionals should both monitor camp operations and distribute relief. In practical terms, this meant that POW camps in WWII were regularly inspected by Red Cross officials, whereas concentration camps were not subject to humanitarian inspections.

But the Third Geneva Convention again neglected to define civilian rights.

In 1934, the world came very close to providing civilians international rights at the 15^th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies held in Tokyo. The international community vigorously tried to clearly define the rights of civilians as those people within the territory of a belligerent, or as individuals in the power of the enemy in occupied territories. But the Tokyo Draft was not signed nor implemented with any legal authority in the years that followed, and by the outbreak of the Second World War, it was shelved, reconsidered, and finally made legitimate in the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949.

Thus, by the outbreak of the Second World War, there were no international laws to protect civilians in war.

But then, the Nuremberg Trials.

In light of the mass atrocities and tremendous violations of human rights that occurred throughout wartime Europe, the Nuremberg Trials sought to administer justice to the Nazi politicians, administrators and bureaucrats that allowed such murderous policies to flourish.

The beautiful town of Nuremberg (Nürnberg) had been chosen by the Allies as it had once been the considered the spiritual centre of the Third Reich and played host to massive annual Nazi rallies. Ironically, it was also the city chosen by Hitler when enacting the 1935 Racial Laws (also known as the Nuremberg Laws) which stripped thousands of German citizens of their rights. In more practical terms, Nuremberg was chosen because it had functioning infrastructure, a serviceable airstrip and a working prison.

The International Military Tribunal (IMT) – the agreement between France, Britain, the US and Russia to persecute and punish war criminals in a court of law – decided upon four categories of crimes:

Conspiracy to commit charges 2, 3 and 4, listed here;
Crimes Against Peace “defined as participation in the planning and waging of a war of aggression in violation of numerous international treaties”
War Crimes “defined as violations of the internationally agreed upon rules for waging war”; and
Crimes Against Humanity “namely, murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war; or persecution on political, racial, or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of domestic law of the country where perpetrated.”

In 1946, Judges from the allied nations of France, Britain, America and Russia presided over the legal hearings of 22 of Germany’s highest ranking Nazis in the first and most publicized trial. Each defendant was tried for one or even all four categories based upon the available evidence often gathered from captured German records. Fortunately for justice, the Nazis were pedantic record-keepers.

Wannsee, Berlin. One outstanding discovery of evidence for the trials was by German lawyer Robert Kempner, who had scoured the German Foreign Office and uncovered (in the papers of the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Martin Luther) the record of one 90-minute meeting at the Wannsee house in south Berlin in 1942 (above). This lakeside villa became infamously known for hosting this “Wannsee Conference” when high-ranking Nazi officials formally decided on the genocidal policies of the “Final Solution” to the Jewish question – otherwise known as the Holocaust.

Twelve subsequent Nuremberg Trials persecuted other Nazi groups. These included the “Doctors’ Trial” against Nazi medical researchers who conducted experiments on concentration camp victims, the “IG Farben Trial” and “Krupp Trial” against businessmen and industrialists who profited from slave labour, and the “Judges’ Trial” against Nazi judges who enforced racial laws and eugenics.

But given that Germany’s national legal system created laws to support their discriminatory policies (ie. The Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935), and given that civilians had no international rights but were only subject to national laws, then how could the international community enforce international law?

The IMT, the judges, ultimately rejected Germany’s argument that they had been following official policy and thus was actually legally permissible by national law. Instead, they returned to a small but powerful introduction from The Hague Conventions (referred to as the Martens Clause), which states:

Until a more complete code of the laws of war has been issued, the High Contracting Parties deem it expedient to declare that, in cases not included in the Regulations adopted by them, the inhabitants and the belligerents remain under the protection and rule of the principles of the law of nations, as they result from the usages established among civilized peoples, from the laws of humanity, and the dictates of the public conscience (Hague Convention, 1899).

This rather vague and imprecise sentence was sufficient grounds for these judges (admittedly, the victors of the war) to argue that Germany had contradicted the basic human rights afforded to all civilians by the laws of humanity.

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is when it all changed.

While the Nuremberg Trials sought to punish these criminals for their cruel treatment of civilians, it actually achieved so much more – it was a dramatic legal and conceptual transformation that internationalized human rights. Importantly, it eliminated that subtle but critical difference discussed earlier; individuals were no longer subject to the laws of their nations, but subject to a higher authority of international law that guarantees their human rights.

What legacies did the Nuremberg Trials create?

1) Defined an international concept of universal human rights.

See above discussion.

2) Granted civilians in war basic human rights.

Today, civilians who experience war are guaranteed basic human rights that all belligerents must abide, or else be accused of war crimes. These are further defined by additional humanitarian laws that provide different protections depending on the whether the civilian is a child, disabled or a migrant.

For simplicity’s sake, these are some of the basic rights granted to civilians in war, which seem revolutionary compared to the pre-WWII period:

civilians have a right to receive relief and aid from any party, government or non-state actor
when detained or imprisoned, civilians must be given food, water, and allowed to communicate with loved ones in order to preserve one’s dignity and physical health;
sick or wounded have a right to receive medical assistance, regardless of whether they are a belligerent
medical workers must always be allowed to provide life-saving assistance to wounded or injured and must never be attacked
belligerents are prohibited from causing the following upon civilians: violence to the life, health or physical or mental well-being of persons (including murder, torture, corporal punishment and mutilation), outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment, enforced prostitution and any form of indecent assault; taking hostages, collective punishments and threats to commit any of the above.

If you’re a POW, you’re also afforded significant rights. If you’re a belligerent yourself, you have certain obligations to provide for civilians under occupation, and you have rights to legal process and representation.

While the Nuremberg Trials may have closed the pre-WWII loophole regarding civilians’ rights in war, war crimes against civilians still occur today. Shocking examples include the increasing male victims of rape at Libyan detention centers, or last week’s sexual exploitation of Syrian women in return for relief, or the recent abduction of 110 Nigerian school girls by Boko Haram…

On 5 March 2018, Human Rights Watch revealed that seven boys under the age of 14 living in a Russian orphanage for children with disabilities claim they were raped by staff and visitors. Although this will be handled by domestic courts, HRW uses press releases like this to bring attention to the systematic failures by national systems, like Russia’s institutions for disabled children, which is currently being monitored for widespread human rights abuses.

3) Genocide became a crime.

It might sound ridiculous to think that genocide had never been outlawed until WWII, but when one pauses and considers the multiple genocides that occurred before the Holocaust, explicit laws were evidently required to deter governments or political groups from undertaking acts “with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” (1948 Geneva Convention). And, if one pauses to consider this meaning of genocide, then it can be evidenced in other major historical contexts or themes, including colonialism, imperialism, slavery, nationalism, etc.

After the collapse of communism in the 1990s, when suppressed nationalism of multiple ethnic groups was unleashed in places like Yugoslavia and Bosnia, the UN investigated evidence of war crimes for the first time since Nuremberg. Notably, rape was recognized as a crime against humanity for the first time in the aftermath of the Bosnian Civil War.

Although genocide has been criminalized, this has not deterred governments and political groups from committing mass atrocities. To date, genocides have occurred in Uganda, Cambodia, Rwanda, Somalia, Bosnia, and many other nations. Also, the legal process to administer justice can extend into the decades. For example, on 24 March 2016, Radovan Karadzic, the former Bosnian Serb leader nicknamed “the Butcher of Bosnia,” now aged 70, was found guilty of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity by a United Nations tribunal for his actions in 1995 in Srebrenica. He was sentenced to 40 years’ imprisonment – more than many Nazi war criminals from Nuremberg.

4) Introduced explicit laws for research upon human subjects.

Subsequent Nuremberg Trials also charged the scientists and doctors with crimes against humanity for their extensive medical experiments upon concentration camp inmates. Nazi doctors’ defense was that they were ordered by their government to investigate how to overcome common ailments of German pilots and soldiers (such as hypothermia). However, the persecution team argued, forcing concentration camp victims to die in frigid and icy baths for “medical research” failed to honour doctors’ Hippocratic Oath and underlying ethics to do no harm to patients.

Ultimately, the trial exposed that there was no single blueprint for medical research and, ironically, it forced the American persecution team to find the best and most ethical doctor to testify to research physiology and whose wartime scientific interests corresponded to Nazi research interests. Dr. Andrew Ivy was called as witness for the prosecution and his testimony lasted four days, the longest of the trial.

Dr. Ivy claimed he personally followed three common-sense rules when experimenting on human subjects, such as avoiding all unnecessary physical and mental suffering and injury to patients, or conducting trials on the basis of animal experimentation first. While such guidelines were evidence that medical experiments could be undertaken ethically, this trial revealed that there were no written principles of research in the United States or elsewhere before December 1946. In fact, the legal defense at the time argued that there was no difference between the actions of Nazi doctors and those actions of U.S. doctors at Stateville Prison in Joliet, Illinois, by experimenting with a malaria vaccine on prisoners.

Again, as victors of the war, the Nuremberg judges had the final say. They created a 10-point research ethics code, known today as the “Nuremberg Code.” Although it was not formally adopted by any nation, the irrefutable importance of informed consent was adopted into the UN’s international laws in 1966. Informed consent was, and remains, the core pillar of any research upon human subjects to this day.

5) Created a permanent international court for war crimes.

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, or ICTY, was the first war crimes trial held after Nuremberg. In many ways, ICTY was similar because it held four categories of crime, it had a panel of judges, it pursued justice according to international laws and conventions. But, of course, it was modified from its predecessor; according to Bernard D. Meltzer, the ICTY sat at The Hague to signify its neutrality and internationality, it had a smaller team to collect evidence and thus relied heavily on oral history testimonies, it also utilised new methods in forensic evidence, etc.

After the International Criminal Tribunals for former Yugoslavia and then Rwanda, the international community created the International Criminal Court (ICC), in force since the Rome Statute in 2002. According to the Robert H. Jackson Centre, the ICC “is the first ever permanent, treaty-based, international criminal court established to promote the rule of law and ensure that the gravest international crimes do not go unpunished.”

The ICC is currently investigating war crimes in Uganda, Darfur (Sudan), Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Libya, Mali, Georgia, Central African Republic, Côte d’Ivoire, and Burundi.

6) Created an irrefutable historical record of war crimes.

At a time when German society, and the international community, wanted to move on from war and embrace happier peacetime activities, the Nuremberg Trials became an invaluable historical record for future generations. No one today can claim ignorance to the atrocities or scale of the Holocaust. And a great part of that is due to the extensive research, legal proceedings and publicity of the Nuremberg Trials.

Today’s discussions about Nuremberg – and essentially about international justice – now include the great disparity between Nazi Germany’s culpability and the Allies’ culpability of war crimes. For example, no Nazi at Nuremberg was charged with terror bombardment since the use of strategic bombardment against civilians had been a pillar of the British and US war efforts (the controversy surrounding Dresden still rages today). Or, the failure of Nuremberg to legitimise the brutal mass rape of German women by Soviet AND American forces in immediate post-war Germany. And, of course, many others that may not be fully explored until the victor’s narrative of the Second World War, and generation who experienced and created it, passes away.

Opportunities in Oral History Research: Guest Blog with Dr. Jane Judge

Posted on November 14, 2017 by CSambells

Have you ever asked a friend about “what happened!” on his/her latest date? Or listened to an interview with your favourite actor about their upcoming movie? Or asked your mother how on earth she baked her Yorkshire puddings so golden, puffy and gorgeous, while yours simply collapse in on themselves?

Believe it or not – so long as these events occurred in the past – then you’ve just conducted the impressive method of “oral history,” albeit very informally.

Oral history includes both the process of collecting testimony from living, breathing human beings, as well as the product itself, the narrative of past events.

And although oral history, as both method and output, is the latest trend among historians, it can’t actually be confined to the study of history alone. Key witness testimonies in high-profile murder cases rely enormously on oral history. Medical practitioners exploring the effects of new drugs, treatments and therapies rely enormously on oral history. Social workers and psychologists helping survivors of traumatic events often rely on the memories produced through oral history. As oral historian Lynn Abrams argues, “oral history has become a crossover methodology, an octopus with tentacles reaching into a wide range of disciplinary, practise-led and community enterprises” (Oral History Theory, 2010, p.2).

Although oral history is a vastly rewarding and highly deployable tool for nearly any discipline or purpose, it also comes at a cost. Professional scholars must often submit enormous ethics approval applications to their institutions or governments before even approaching a potential human subject for interview. Many aspects of interviewing can be volatile, emotional, and even dangerous (for example, Dr. Erin Jessee’s fieldwork included gathering testimonies from Rwandans convicted of genocide while they were detained in Rwandan prisons!) And what happens to the interviewee if researchers ask unsettling questions – is there post-interview psychological support for the subjects (or even the interviewer) for example? These calculations of risk are absolutely essential to the ethical responsibility of any oral history project. And, of course, the goal is to cause minimal harm, which is often the general outcome (And for Dr. Jessee’s helpful tips about about managing risk, her advice here).

Despite some risks, oral history remains an invaluable tool. Findings can influence new policies and initiatives, while researchers can harness its power as a versatile method to record history in action, bolster an organisation or government’s ethos and contribute to an initiative’s influence. In this sense, oral history can be one of the most dynamic instruments in a researcher’s arsenal, and profoundly utilised by multiple interdisciplinary stakeholders.

Dr. Jane Judge, a postdoctoral researcher in early modern history at the KU Leuven in Belgium, recently experienced the exhilarating power of oral history. Although the majority of Jane’s historical research has permitted her into fabulous dusty old libraries and national archives housing original sources with elaborate 18th Century handwriting, Jane has not been required to conduct interviews with real, living humans – until now!

Dr. Jane Judge in her natural habitat of Leuven, Belgium.

Jane currently volunteers at the Fulbright Commission in Brussels, which is an independent body that, along with the US Embassies to Belgium and Luxembourg, as well as the Belgian and Luxembourg governments, administers the US State Department’s Fulbright Scholarship Programs for Belgians and Luxembourgers going to the US, as well as Americans coming to these two countries. Since 1948, the Fulbright Commission in Brussels has connected and supported over 4,000 students, researchers, and teachers, while promoting international educational exchange and mutual understanding.

The Fulbright Program awards approximately 8,000 grants annually. Approximately 370,000 “Fulbrighters” have participated in the Program (over 4,000 through the Belgium Commission) since its inception in 1946. For more information, visit www.fulbright.be

Recently, Jane has been tasked with gathering stories from alumni of the Fulbright Commission in order to record and promote the program’s overall mission for the 70th anniversary celebrations that will take place next year. The idea is to highlight that it is the people that make Fulbright what it is as they engage in immersive experiences abroad and make human connections. This means that she has met over 15 very interesting people–and plans to meet at least 15 or 20 more–who, at some point in their lives, benefited from a Fulbright grant and the program’s international networks, financial support and scholarly community.

In Jane’s quest to gather data from real human beings, various unanticipated surprises allowed her to discover a few crucial things about oral history, interviewing techniques and the value of human input. After musings over some of her most interesting findings, we both thought it would be highly appropriate to share some of these gems in a guest blog! Here are Jane’s discerning observations about this often-tricky but fruitful research method:

Before you began interviewing, what perceptions did you have about oral history in general?

Jane: My perception of oral history generally was that it was messy, fraught with ethics issues and required intensive training to do well. As far as the Fulbright project itself, I didn’t have much choice in doing interviews. Because of the many stakeholders in this Fulbright Commission (there are commissions around the world implementing the Fulbright program in their locations), the office here already knew they wanted to focus on alumni and not the nuts and bolts history of the program. So, I didn’t really chose oral history, it chose me. That being said, the archives here are very rich, containing midterm and final reports from every grantee, as well as commentary from the offices here on American grantees that came to Belgium and Luxembourg until the 1980s. The project could have been done by just going through these and piecing together stories, pulling out interesting anecdotes. Given my background, that was much more in my wheelhouse and so I was a little apprehensive about doing interviews, especially with my rather negative preconceived notions about oral history. But I decided to see it as an opportunity rather than a challenge–an opportunity to learn and enact a new methodology, to travel throughout Belgium, and to meet lots of new people in new fields!”

Can you comment about the interview process – who, where, when, how?

Jane: Sure. The who should be fairly obvious at this point—Fulbright alumni! (Haha.) The first thing I did was go through the archive of somewhere between 3,000 and 4,000 alumni that past interns have digitized and picked out people who had dynamic profiles, represented diverse backgrounds, fields of study, and programs (undergraduates, graduates, research scholars, teachers, visiting professors, and newer summer programs). To the list that I compiled, we also added some notable alumni and some who had volunteered or been quite active as alums in the past. These included people from walks of life as diverse as being Deputy Prime Minister for Belgium or a Spanish Linguistics teacher. We have been in touch with alumni from every decade of Fulbright’s 70 years so far, so that’s quite exciting.

As for the interviewing itself, I started with in-person interviews with people here in Belgium. Funnily enough, the first interview was actually an American alumna and her husband who happened to be here on holiday, but the others have all been Belgians that had Fulbrights to the States at one time or another. I go to them, meeting them either at their homes, offices, or a quiet comfortable cafe they know, at a time that’s mutually convenient. I record the audio of our conversations with my phone, so that part’s pretty straightforward, easy, and compact! We set the interviews up by first having either the Executive Director or the Program Director for Students get in touch via email, explaining the anniversary and the project, and then I follow up with an email about logistics. If they are up for being interviewed, I take it from there as far as setting up a time and place. For the Americans and Luxembourgers (and one very busy Belgian), I will and have done the interviews by phone or internet call. The interviews themselves are pretty organic. We want to cover their personal experience, how Fulbright has impacted their lives, and what they think the program can continue to offer. So I start by just asking them to introduce themselves and explain their relationship to the program (how are they “a Fulbrighter”?) and then I really let them go, guiding them if there’s dips or when we need to get back on track.

Were there any challenges in the interview itself that you had not predicted? If yes, how did you overcome them?

Jane: I wouldn’t say there were challenges in the interview, as such. Everyone’s pretty enthusiastic and already very willing to talk about their experiences. The only things I could think of would be technical. One of the interviews took place over lunch, for example, so I worried that it wouldn’t record clearly in the cafe–this didn’t end up being a problem though, and the recording is crystal clear. I have had some trouble with the recordings of Skype interviews, but that’s, again, technical. With those interviews it’s also harder to have an official start and end of the recorded interview, since people feel like they’re chatting with me and so sometimes they start asking me questions about my experiences!

In your opinion, what was the best thing about interviewing your subjects?

Jane: Oh, by far hearing first-hand stories. I love the narrative that comes out of it. In much of my past work, I’ve had to piece together the story from snippets I’ve found in the archives. Here, I get to ask a question and then sit back and listen to a whole answer.

What would your top tips be to anyone about to conduct an interview?

Jane: Definitely get in touch with a modern historian (if you’re not one yourself), preferably someone who is already a trained oral historian. Check out the wonderful (credible!) resources available online, especially the Oral History Association and the Southern Oral History Program at UNC Chapel Hill. You were my first port of call, Chelsea, as a trained historian who was a member of the OHA, and you came through with aplomb. Definitely the best decision I made before embarking on this research adventure.

Would you ever volunteer to do it again?

Jane: Absolutely. I’ve had a complete blast doing these interviews. Even the transcriptions, though sometimes tedious and always time consuming, are fun. Since these people have fascinating stories to tell about travel, research, and all kinds of different experiences, it’s a pleasure to interview them and even to then relive that through transcription.

Finally, as a historian, what do you think that oral history achieves that archival research cannot?

Jane: Follow up questions! This is by far my favorite part of oral history to this point. When you’re working in an archive, you can pose pointed questions, go searching through piles of papers people might never have wanted to see the light of day, and uncover secrets unabashedly. However, you cannot ask a single follow-up question or check with your subjects/sources that you are interpreting them correctly. In my own research into 18th-century revolutionaries, this means that there’s never any certainty that the way I interpret how some reacted to a given decree, for example, is the way they actually felt about it. With oral history, I can follow up when someone says or writes something that’s not entirely clear. I can ask them to connect dots and even answer an explicit question, rather than trying to figure out what they were implying later when I’m trying to write my analysis.

So what?

Jane touches on a great many qualities of oral history research that traditional archival research does not possess: listening to the “whole answer” rather than piecing together small fragments of history from a dusty archive, or understanding some of the emotional reactions behind certain people’s experiences, or verifying your own analyses of history by asking follow up questions, or even anticipating and minimising risks when interviewing in a café – these diverse observations demonstrate what we can gain from oral history and the multiple opportunities oral history presents to those wanting to learn from people who experienced the past.

How about a round of applause for Dr. Jane Judge’s perceptive analysis of her oral history experience? Many thanks, Jane!

Surely Belgium’s world famous frites (or frieten in Flemish) are one of the best reasons for Fulbrighters to study in Belgium?

(Disclaimer: The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the text belong solely to the authors, and does not reflect any official opinion of Fulbright, EdUSA, or the US State Department or other groups or individuals).

A Historian’s Quest in the Archives: How to Study Controversy around a Controversial President

Posted on September 27, 2017 by CSambells

Currently, I am in Hyde Park, New York, combing through the archives of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Have you heard of him? Of course you have! He was a pretty big deal. Not only was he elected when over a quarter of Americans were unemployed during the Great Depression – pulling them out of their collective misery through massive public works projects and reviving America’s trust in the economy through weekly radio broadcasts called “Fireside Chats”– but he also held office during one of the deadliest wars in American history. Oh, and he was crippled too. Having contracted polio in his 30s, he was the only physically disabled president to be elected to office. Ever.

FDR served as US President from 1933 to 1945. Here’s a flattering photo, courtesy of Densho Encyclopaedia

Considered the most influential president of the 20^th century, FDR’s impact has been felt ever since. Under his watch, unions were given the right to form. His government was the first to provide old-age security, unemployment benefits and disability and single-parent allowances. He introduced the American public to a new relationship with its government by calmly discussing the issues of the day over the radio while they sat comfortably in their homes. He declared that the role of the central government was to secure the material well-being of the American people. Having enacted the Executive Reorganisation Bill in 1939, he broadened and increased the presidency’s overall responsibilities. He supported the United Nations and ensured the US had a key role in the UN’s Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (and thus, a key role in reshaping post-war Europe). FDR substantially changed America, and its position in the world.

But FDR also had major flaws. Politically, he broke the no-third-term rule in 1940 and sought to centralise the power of the presidency, leading some to question if he would become a dictator. Under his command, he allowed the harsh internment of Japanese-Americans on the west coast. After his death, many questioned why Roosevelt never took a leading role in helping the Jews of Europe, leaving their welfare instead to private organizations and charities. Some claimed he was a racist. Others said he was just a narcissist.

FDR also had an unusual personal life. He was a proper Mama’s boy. The closeness to his mother created a toxic atmosphere, leaving little emotional room for anyone else. Despite his mother’s fierce opposition, he married his rather remarkable wife, Eleanor. They were cousins, albeit distant. But Eleanor was unusual too; she was an independent thinker and terribly clever, likely a lesbian, and eventually became a politician in her own right in the 1950s.

Sarah Roosevelt was a clever and educated woman who apparently doted on her son. At age 26, she married FDR’s father, James, 52 years old. The birth was difficult and she bore no other children. After James’ death in 1900, she held the majority of the Roosevelt fortune. Sarah died in 1941.

The Roosevelts had an odd relationship, which historians have commented served political ends rather than being a romantic union. But, they did produce six children! While Eleanor advocated for women’s rights and various social reforms, FDR pushed his own career towards vice presidency then eventually presidency. He dealt with a painful disability daily and he adequately “overcame” the perception of it (apparently, people didn’t realise the extent of his immobility because he was so excellent at hiding it in public). He even created a foundation and rehabilitation park for other polio victims in Well Springs, Georgia.

FDR had contracted polio while at his summer home in Campobello, Canada, in July 1921. He was just 39 years old. He eventually founded a home for other polio victims in Warm Springs, Georgia, depicted here in 1924.

Affairs were rampant in the Roosevelt household. FDR kept close company with Eleanor’s secretary, Lucy Mercer and, later, his own personal secretary, Marguerite “Missy” LeHand. Meanwhile Eleanor formed “close” relationships to like-minded women, going on holidays with them regularly, all with FDR’s blessing. He even built a small cottage for Eleanor and her friends to have sleepovers just two miles from the family home in Hyde Park. After her husband’s death, Eleanor became a chief philanthropist in post-war Europe, advocating for human rights (and especially children’s rights) in the new United Nations. Evidently, the Roosevelts lived remarkable and unusual lives, both together and apart.

Eleanor Roosevelt is celebrated as one of the most influential women of the 20th century. She pushed for social reforms, women’s rights, and human rights, offering her help and influence to marginalised groups and fringe societies. Notably, Eleanor was chair of the United Nation’s Human Rights Commission and, in 1948, was the chief proponent of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In 1941, just a few years before FDR died, he oversaw the construction of the FDR Library and Archives on his family estate in Hyde Park. Not long after his death, his immediate family relinquished their rights to the estate and, at FDR’s request, it became a national park. Today it houses multiple series of the Roosevelt’s papers, with over 20,000 boxes of documents.

The FDR Library. Critics claimed FDR’s library was a shameful display of self-promotion, but he claimed it accomplished two goals: preserve documents and provide transparency of all his actions to the American people.

This brings me back to why I’m here. Considering the complexity of these multi-faceted pillars of American history, it is important to approach the Roosevelts with caution and respect, right?

But it’s tricky. As a historian, it’s hard to remain objective when you want certain things to be true. Or, when your research subject is just as controversial as the Roosevelts.

While Eleanor intrigues me, I am actually here for FDR alone. I want to discover why FDR was an obstinate and obstructive SCHMUCK to his closest ally, the British, during the Second World War. Let me explain…

During the Second World War, one of the most powerful weapons the Allies held against Nazi Germany was the economic blockade of Nazi-controlled continental Europe. ALL trade, including relief, sent by the Allies to Germany OR German-occupied countries was strictly forbidden during the war. This prevented Germany from plundering relief, while also forcing Germany to take full responsibility for the territories it conquered. Over time, the blockade would apply considerable pressure upon Germany and strain its resources and, thus, its ability to win the war. Seems logical, right?

The blockade policy was one of those items that was constantly discussed by all levels of multiple governments. I’ve witnessed this in the German, British, Swiss and now American archives. It’s incredible. And surprisingly, very rarely discussed by historians in any great detail (see Meredith Hindley or Jean Beaumont’s “Starving for Democracy”).

Public pressure from various groups (for example, thousands of letters written by concerned Yorkshire women’s groups or Pennsylvanian famers or Belgian mothers or various Red Cross branches) meant that governments were always rejecting pleas for relief from well-meaning citizens, large reputable charities, or governments in exile. And, due to Germany’s considerable exploitation of its conquered territories, the list of those governments begging for relief was very long: Polish, Belgian, Norwegian, Dutch, French, Yugoslav…

But blockade policy remained practically unyielding. (The single exception during the entre war was Greece because of a massive famine, but you can read about that here). So long as the Allies could hold it together, maintain unity on this key war policy, then the blockade have the strongest effect on the enemy.

But humanity is cunning. Swiss charities sought to overcome the blockade by relocating children to Switzerland instead. Massive child evacuations, which is the core of my research, successfully relocated Belgian, French and Yugoslav children to Switzerland for three month periods of recuperation. And the Germans allowed it! No great inconvenience to them, because it removed many mouths to feed and pacified parents. Over 60,000 children were successfully evacuated in this way during the war, and another 100,000 in the post-war period. Impressive, eh?

Swiss Red Cross nurses prepare to receive thousands of French and Belgian children at a train station in 1942 in Basel, Switzerland.

However, this changed in August 1942. Hitler’s armies invaded southern, unoccupied France and, soon after, began large round-ups of Jews. Initially, Jewish children were not included in the deportations to the East, which meant that thousands of children were abandoned and parentless. (A few weeks later though, the Germans rounded them up too).

A Belgian child (4 years old) with severe malnutrition at a Swiss train station, 1942.

Due to this invasion and deportation, thousands of French children now needed immediate relief. Swiss charities grappled with how to help. They approached the Allied governments that perhaps these Swiss-run evacuations could be increased – possibly to over 100,000 children! But, crucially, Switzerland too was experiencing war shortages – it could not adequately provide for all the children of Europe. So perhaps the Allies would send relief (food, medicines, vitamins) directly to Switzerland for all these children? Of course, the Swiss emphasised, they were neutral, not Nazi-controlled, so they were excluded from the Allies’ blockade policy.

It all sounds very logical. A clever and elegant solution to a major humanitarian crisis. While memos shot excitedly across the Atlantic between the US State Department and the British Foreign Office, dear President Roosevelt was having informal meetings with the Ambassador to Norway, Wilhelm Thorleif von Munthe af Morgenstierne. According to strongly-worded and angry British documents, in late October 1942, FDR promised the Ambassador – without consulting the British – that the US would send relief to Norway!

When the British heard of FDR’s assurances, they insisted that there was no way that relief could be sent to Norway without it being allowed also to Belgium, France, Poland, etc, thus breaking the blockade! Also, FDR’s promises complicated the possibility of sending relief to children evacuated to Switzerland, which would both relieve children while also respecting the blockade. Therefore, the British emphatically conveyed their absolute rejection of FDR’s promises to Norway in November 1942 and keenly awaited the American reply.

However, no reply was given. British documents reveal acute frustration and abhorrence that the US would ignore the British regarding such an important subject, to such an extent that Churchill himself was lobbied to become involved. And although Churchill and FDR met at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, the British government still received no official reply. WHY?

FDR and Churchill were close allies during the war. The complete (and overwhelmingly detailed) correspondence was compiled by Warren F Kimball in THREE volumes. Notably, when writing informally, Churchill was referred to as “Former Naval Person.” Only in official correspondence was his title “Prime Minister,” indicating the intimacy of their relationship.

By August 1943, the Americans finally gave a half-hearted, vague and conditional reply that they might support extra provisions to Switzerland, but the British, Swiss and Americans took no action. Allied support for child evacuations was not raised again between the British and US until May 1944, just one month before the Allied invasion of Europe on DDay. Of course, by that point, a humanitarian mission for children was hardly as important as the rapid liberation of oppressed nations by the largest invasion in history.

BUT.

Why did FDR promise such a thing to Norway? Was it during a schmoozy, drunken lunch or a formal high-level meeting? Was the promise conditional or was it a blank cheque? Did the Norwegian Ambassador perhaps misunderstand FDR’s “promise” and in fact, no promise was made? Or was FDR’s “promise” actually hollow – perhaps a vain attempt to get the insistent Norwegian off his back – and the British were just overreacting? But then, if that was the case, why would FDR not reply immediately to his ally? Why ignore their determined attempts to find out what happened? WHY? Why, oh President Roosevelt, why?

Meanwhile, let’s all remember: children are starving, being rounded up and sent to concentration camps, experiencing violence and bombings and general oppression. This makes any bureaucratic error or deliberate avoidance all the more inexcusable.

This is the purpose of my research visit. To discover the answer to these questions. My current historical opinion of FDR is not too complimentary. But even I know it’s not fair to FDR, his legacy, or the study of history to jump to conclusions. Which brings me back to my original assessment of FDR…

President Roosevelt was obviously a brilliant politician and, in many ways, a great strategist. His lasting legacy is a testament to his commendable, practical approach and determination to improve American lives. But he also prioritised certain lives over others, and was a blatant narcissist. FDR liked being in control – to such an extent as being classified as a dictator – and sought personal validation from various audiences. Some legitimate, and some behind closed doors.

A large part of good historical research is accurately determining the motives, personalities, and fears of major historical figures. Both the problem and beauty of studying FDR as a historical topic is that he was just as flawed as he was extraordinary. Throughout his remarkable but challenged life, he engaged with a broader spectrum of victory (and failure!) than others, so predicting his motivations will be exceptionally difficult. He is an infinitely complex character.

My hunch about the whole promising-relief-to-Norway thing? Based upon all the research, documentaries, articles and books I’ve had to read about the man, FDR was NOT impulsive. FDR was deliberate and purposeful. Everything he did was meaningful and goal-oriented. He was an impeccable strategist. Therefore, I truly think that President Roosevelt had a reason behind his promise to Norway. Now, I just need to figure it out…

Wish me luck!

Chelsea Sambells

Historian, Communications & Policy Researcher

Tag Archives: research