The German Extermination Camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau - title page, November 1944
The Auschwitz Protocols, also known as the Auschwitz Reports, and originally published as The Extermination Camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau, is a collection of three eyewitness accounts from 1943–1944 about the mass murder that was taking place inside the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland during the Second World War.[1][2] The eyewitness accounts are individually known as the Vrba–Wetzler report, Polish Major's report, and Rosin-Mordowicz report.[3]
Description
The reports were compiled by prisoners who had escaped from the camp and presented in their order of importance from the Western Allies' perspective, rather than in chronological order.[3] The escapees who authored the reports were Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler (the Vrba–Wetzler report); Arnošt Rosin and Czesław Mordowicz (the Rosin-Mordowicz report); and Jerzy Tabeau (the "Polish Major's report").[3]
The Vrba–Wetzler report was widely disseminated by the Bratislava Working Group in April 1944, and with help of the Romanian diplomat Florian Manoliu, the report or a summary obtained from Moshe Krausz in Budapest reached—tragically with much delay—George Mantello (Mandl), El Salvador Embassy First Secretary in Switzerland, via Manoliu who brought it to Mantello.[4] Mantello immediately publicized it despite request from Rudolf Kasztner to keep it confidential.
This triggered large-scale demonstrations in Switzerland, sermons in Swiss churches about the tragic plight of Jews and a Swiss press campaign of about 400 headlines protesting the atrocities against Jews. The unprecedented events in Switzerland and possibly other considerations led to threats of retribution against Hungary's Regent Miklós HorthybyPresident Roosevelt, Winston Churchill and others. This was one of the main factors which convinced Horthy to stop the Hungarian death camp transports.[4]
It is not known when they were first called the Auschwitz Protocols, but Randolph L. Braham may have been the first to do so. He used that term for the document in The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary (1981).[5]
The first trainload of Hungarian Jews leaves for Auschwitz.
c. 28 April
Rezső Kasztner of the Aid and Rescue Committee obtains the report and gives a copy of the report to Geza Soos, Hungarian Foreign Ministry official; Soos gives it to Joszef Elias; Elias's secretary translates it into Hungarian and prepares six copies for Hungarian officials.
May 1944
15 May
Mass transports begin of Hungary's Jews to Auschwitz, at a rate of 12,000 a day.
27 May
Arnost Rosin and Czesław Mordowicz escape Auschwitz.
June 1944
4 June
The New York Times describes the gas chambers and said that Jews were being executed.
The BBC World Service reports that 4,000 Jews from Theresienstadt were killed in gas chambers at Auschwitz during March 1944. Rosin and Mordowicz tell Krasniansky 100,000 Hungarian Jews were killed on arrival between 15 and 27 May, unaware of what was about to happen to them.
The Los Angeles Times repeats the BBC's information.
20 June
'The Washington Times Herald reports the same, courtesy of Reuters, while The New York Times offers further details. In Bratislava, Vrba discusses his report with Vatican legate Monsignor Mario Martilotti, who then sends a copy to the Vatican via Switzerland.
25 June
The New York Times reports that "new mass executions" recently took place in Auschwitz.
The Vrba–Wetzler report (the term "Auschwitz Protocols" is sometimes used to refer to just this report), a 33-page report written around 24 April 1944, after Vrba and Wetzler, two Slovak prisoners, who escaped from Auschwitz 7–11 April 1944.[6] In the Protocols, it was 33 pages long and was called "No 1. The Extermination Camps of Auschwitz (Oswiecim) and Birkenau in Upper Silesia."[7][8]
The Rosin-Mordowicz report, a seven-page report from Arnošt Rosin and Czesław Mordowicz, also Slovak prisoners, who escaped from Auschwitz on 27 May 1944.[6] This was presented as an additional chapter "III. Birkenau" to the Vrba–Wetzler report.[7]
The "Polish Major's report," written by Jerzy Tabeau (or Tabau), who was in Auschwitz under the pseudonym Jerzy Wesołowski, and who escaped with Roman Cieliczko on 19 November 1943. Zoltán Tibori Szabó writes that Tabeau compiled his report between December 1943 and January 1944. It was copied using a stencil machine in Geneva in August 1944, and was distributed by the Polish government-in-exile and Jewish groups.[9] This was presented in the Protocols as the 19-page "No 2. Transport (The Polish Major's Report)."[7]
The contents of the Protocols was discussed in detail by The New York Times on 26 November 1944.[7]
Conway, John S. in Vrba, Rudolf (2002). Appendix I: The Significance of the Vrba–Wetzler Report on Auschwitz-Birkenau. Barricade Books. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Gilbert, Martin in Marrus, Michael Robert (1989). Part 9: The Question of Bombing Auschwitz. Walter de Gruyter. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Tibori Szabó, Zoltán in Braham, Randolph L. & vanden Heuvel, William (2011). "The Auschwitz Reports: Who Got Them, and When?". The Auschwitz Reports and the Holocaust in Hungary. Columbia University Press.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Further reading
Braham, Randolph L. (1981). The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary (2011 ed.). Columbia University Press.
