I manage the Yahoo! worldwide group Remember_The-Holocaust which currently has over 11,000 postings on the history of the Holocaust, genocides, human rights and tolerance education. I congratulate the producer and all others connected with that event which is indeed a most significant event in the history of the Holocaust. An event that the general public hopefully will now be acquainted with through the viewingof your program.

Was it really such a secret. NO, it was not. Germans, Poles, Russians, French, US and England all knew about it.

Thanks for the kind words Freddy. Interestingly, I was at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Memorial museum in Israel last week and found only one tiny paragraph about this story. I’m glad we were able to go into more detail in the film

I hope you’ll pass the broadcast info on to your group and let them know when to tune in. Also, check out the article in today’s New York Times about the series.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/23/arts/television/23secr.html?ref=arts

And a good interview about the series on the Resident Media Pundit blog. http://residentmediapundit.com/?p=518

Thanks for watching.
-Jared (Executive Producer, Secrets of the Dead)

Well, I will post a reminder on certain internet newsgroups that
I frequent. Am curious how you present the Hungarian Rudolf Kastner.
This is just before Israel’s 60th. Any connection?

I think it was bad what hitler did he was not thinking those poor people he killed not just jews too poles christians danes many others the jerk i have jewish friends i understand their holidays and i think it is cool

hitler was a bad man he killed many people not just jews i have jewish friends i think jewish holidays are cool

Aztec Massacre was the first show I happened to catch.
A most interesting show, thanks!

In your interview with Resident Media Pundit you suggest
that you are seeking story ideas that shed new light on
a moment of time.

The “biggest story that never was” in recent times was
the Russian dash to Pristina.

Quote:
“I’m not going to start the Third World War for you,” the
British general was reported to have told General Clark
after refusing his orders to send assault troops and
helicopters into Pristina airport to block the Russian
forces.

The airport at Pristina, Yugoslavia (now the capital
of Kosovo) had bunkers hardened against nuclear attack.
The Russians risked a major showdown by dashing
through Kosovo to grab those bunkers. They contained
multi-treaty-breaking weapons, either biological or
nuclear (my opinion and an angle never pursued by the
news media). Something was there worth risking WWIII for.
In planning for a cataclysmal war with the West, one
would plan for the “day after”. Pristina would have been
an island of safety and it’s contents a final ace or king maker.
of safety

I am excited about seeing this. It appears to be the documentary version of Vrba’s and Bestic’s book, ‘Escape from Auschwitz.’ This was also profiled in the miniseries ‘Shoah.’

My mother told me about these two men coming to her town in Slovakia (Jelsava) when she was a young adult. The stories were so horrendous that nobody believed them. The townspeople thought that they were crazy. Subsequently, my mother ended up inAuschwitz with several of her family members.

This week, the UK removed The Holocaust from its school curriculum because it ‘offended’ the Muslim population which claims it never occurred. This is a frightening portent of the fear that is gripping the world and how easily each country is giving in to it. Now, more than ever, with Iran , among others, claiming the Holocaust to be ‘a myth,’ it is imperative to make sure the world never forgets. (from an e-mail I received today)
We cannot let this occur ever again and must remember every one who experienced this tragedy and for those who did not live.

I wish to point out that in addition to these two extremely brave men escaping from Auschwitz there were others who also successfully escaped Auschwitz. On July 21, 1944 Jerzy Bielecki, inmate at KZ Auschwitz, disguised in a stolen SS uniform escorted himself and the jewish woman he was in love with, Cyla Cybulska, out of the camp and into freedom. Their story is well documented by authorities and by Thilo Thielkes book, “Eine Liebe in Auschwitz.”

Philip, You should verify information before
you trust it enough to make it your own by
being it’s promoter.

Did this email information appeal to a particular
bias and world view you have? Is that why you
fell prey to the hoax?

Be careful what you trust and whom you trust.
And make darn (sic) sure that you can trust yourself.
(”The easiest person to fool is yourself”)

Trust is one of greatest treasurers we possess. It
is something we can teach, share and receive.

Your post is date stamped (8:33 pm) while this “Escape
From Auschwitz” was being aired, so it is not clear if you
actually watched the program. If you did you would
have heard the name Kastner, who was in a position of
trust for the Jews of Hungary, but who deceived his
fellow Jews and shepharded them onto the trains for
Auschwitz. If you knew only a modest amount about
Kastner before the program you would have been armed
enough to recognize that you can no longer trust PBS.

(I will not be available to converse further, Philip, for a while.)

Is there going to be another showing of “Escape from Auschwitz” in the
Alexandria, Virginia (Washington, DC) area I have a friend that missed
it and I found it to be very moving and well done.

What an inspriational story! I am encouraged to know that at least a few brave men escaped Auschwitz. I am disheartened to know that they had such a hard time getting anyone to believe them. I would like to know more about the Kastner issue.

Dagmar Wertheim -
On June 6, 1944, Ceslav Mordowicz (my father) and Arnost Rozin – 2 Jews who also escaped from Auschwitz on May 27, 2944, crossed the border from occupied Poland to Slovakia. Their testimony given to the Jewish community in Slovakia, validated the earlier Vrba / Wetzler testimony and was incoporated into the Auchwitz Reprot referred to in the documentary. The authorship of the report presented in the documentary should have been credited to all 4 escapees!
Following the completion of the reprot by all four escapees, Mordowicz and Vrba met with the Vatican Nunzio, after which the reprot was sent out to the Red Cross. It needs to be noted that the Mordowicz / Rozin contribution to the report was the factual testimony which validated the Hungarian transports, as the Vrba / Wetzler testimony was given before the Hungarin transports acually arrived in Auschwitz.
The heroism of Vrba / Wetzler and Mordowicz / Rozin is undeniable,
It was my prividelge to personally know Vrba, Wetzler and Rozin, with all of whom my family stayed in touch as long as they were alive.
It needs to be noted that the producres should have researched furher and credited the authorship of the report to all 4 escapees instead of singling out Vrba.
A less edited discssion by professor Gilbert or evena simple read of Gilberts book the “Holocaust” would have revealed the correct information and facts.
Dagmar Wertheim, nee Mordowicz – Toronto, Canada

Dagmar,

I feel humbled talking to someone so close to these events.

I respectfully ask what your view of Rudolf Kastner’s lack of action is,
and in particular your view of his actions.

This was truly a horrible and unthinkable event in history. My younger sister had to watch a video (very, very graphic) on the Holocaust, and the footage was real and filmed by Nazis. It is an event that we want to forget, but without the knownledge of it, it will prevent us from being prepared for an event such as this from happening again. But, sadly, many other world events are related to this, and are happening NOW.

A very touching story. Thank you.

Jag
I am a Child of an Auchitz esacpee and holocast survosvor. As I am not a historail I have not formulated an academic view olf Kastner, One can not be certain why Kastner acted the way he did. WWII cirdumstances have caused may peaple to act is somwhat less honorable ways. I’s like to reserve the judgemetn to the historains. The sole reason for posting my earlier commetn was to convey to the interested public and hopefully the producers of the program that Vrba was not the sole contributor to the Auschwitz reprot. I owe this to my Fathers memory.
Dagmar Wertheim – Toronto, Canada

Dagmar,

Thank you for replying.

Your stated sole purpose was to convey additional
information about the Auschwitz Report, which you
did, thanks.

the atrocities are unbelievable. What guts it took for the two men to \]\]expose them.

I read Rudolph Vrba’s “Escape from Auschwitz” in 1975. Wow what a story. Had my kids read it. Find on Amazon

After watching this program, I have been wondering what the outcome of the war would have been if, A.) This Information was acted on immediately, or B.) If nobody was able to escape from any of these Death Camps.
I feel that it was unfortunate that the Nazis were so methodical to engineer something this unbelieveable as to raise questions in the event that somebody did escape. Vrba and Wetzler must have been so happy when the Jewish council finally believed them.

I would like to know if these programs will be shown again. Unfortunaley, I missed all of them except for the very end of Vrba-wetzler Report. Please show the series again. Thanks

It is commendable of PBS to inform about an important historical event such as the Holocaust. As can be seen in today’s world, “forgetting the past” certainly forces us to “repeat it” if only in variations on the theme. Having said that, I have to admit I was surprised at the number of errors in the program. It is unquestionably complicated to present any single aspect of the Holocaust, but aside from so much in the way of omission, there are errors of commission. For instance, Rudolf Kaszter was neither head of the Jewish Council nor head of the Jewish community, nor even on the Jewish Council. A recent book by Anna Porter, entitled Kasztner’s Train, is a well-documented and meticulous work that discusses this subject matter, and points out that although Kasztner did not succeed on the scale he aspired to, he was no traitor. He met with the escapees from Auschwitz and, contrary to the “facts” presented in the program, he did believe them and tried to get others to believe their story. They did not. He was however instrumental in attempting to disseminate the “Auschwitz Protocols,” as the report was called, and worked with many others to attempt to stop the deportations and murders. But the initial response to the report was disbelief. By the way, Kasztner sent no train to Auschwitz (Eichmann of course did) but Kasztner in fact managed to send two trains of Jews, and not one, to freedom. He always regretted not being able to save more, but we cannot fault him for this. There are others with greater culpability in knowing and watching, and doing absolutely nothing. Kasztner came out of the war poor, so he certainly did not do his work for profit, and yet so many people said, “Why did Schindler, who was not a Jew, save so many?” And in the same breath, add, “Why didn’t Kasztner save more?” They also forget that Schindler’s Jews helped make him rich. Kasztner’s “reward” was to be assassinated in Tel Aviv after the war.

The documentary, “Escape from Auschwitz” was very well done.
I was only a part of it on Channel KPBS, and now to be able to watch it all from my computer was amazing. I am a Professional Photographer who did a Photo Documentary of Holocaust survivores several years ago. My idea was to make a book of it, however, I had to go back to work to make a living and never finished it.

KPBS showed a all day Documentary about 5 years ago and has never shone it again. It was on the History of the Jewish People. I would like very much to receive information about it.
I wish KPBS would play it again. Thank you
.

May 5 – Please let me know when these programs will be showing again.
Thank you

The story of the two escapees was indeed harrowing and the atrocities quite grim, but this show, like most, only focuses on the Jewish prisoners in the camps. Except for one sentence, at the beginning, that mentioned the other groups of people confined, we never hear of the other people subjected to the same horrors. My grandfather was a prisoner in the camps and survived three years of torture and starvation. He was not Jewish, but an Italian Army officer who would not pledge allegiance to Hitler or Mussolini. For this he was arrested and put into a camp in Hungary, then Poland, and finally ending up in Germany at the end of the war. He was liberated by a Canadian Army unit and spent months in a hospital before he could walk. I never hear this in any story of the Holocaust, why? Why are these peoples suffering relegated to a single sentence? I would like to see a more inclusive telling of the whole story, don’t leave out the others form this story, they deserve to be known.

In response to P Clausen: with all due respect for your relative’s very real suffering, I believe more attention is not paid to the other non-jewish people taken to the camps simply because they were a minority number as opposed to the 6 million jews who were interred. Those such as your relative who resisted, homosexuals and gypses are usually given little recognition not because they did not suffer but because their numbers pale in comparison to the jewish people. Hitler wanted to exterminate all lesser beings,in his mind, but the jews were his biggest foe.

We watch PBS-WNED….could you let me knw when the program will be repeated in out area?
Thanks

There is a conspicuous lack of comments
criticising this PBS program, Escape From
Auschwitz. I would add the word ‘amazing!’
(amazing conspicuous lack…), but that would be naive.

History is the story of a distorted humanity.
No surprise that history itself is distorted.
A distorted history of distorted humanity.

In our current history-making context we are mired
in a war in the country of Iraq,
whose invasion began with the vast majority
of Americans so misinformed that they
believed Saddam was involved in 9/11.
So-called journalists played their part in
convincing us of the danger from WMD and
Iraq’s association with al-Qaeda.

These so-called journalists are also participating
in the ongoing drive to demonize and dehumanize Iran
as a prelude to expanded warfare. (Not amazingly) the
narrative of the Holocaust is used in this effort.
We hear: “Ahmadenijad calls the Holocaust a myth
and wants to wipe Israel off the map”.

(Ironically,) PBS seems to have set out to prove
Ahmadenijad correct! This PBS program, Escape
from Auschwitz, buries the truth of what happened
in Hungary in an effort to create a mythology
favorable to the zionists and Israel. Amazing!

Again, there is a dearth of comments critically
analyzing this PBS program. We know the consequences
of sheepishly accepting the words of trusted authorities.
We have war in Iraq today, the Hungarians had trains to
Auschwitz yesterday, and tomorrow we may have deepening
warfare with Iran. In 2003 Iran made an offer to Bush to
end their nuclear programs, end support for Hamas
and recognize Israel. No surprise that our journalists
kept these facts hidden in a drawer from you.

It is no secret that journalism is dead.

I found out about these programs too late. Would you please let me know when they will be shown again the the Providence area?

I would like to thank PBS for telling the story of Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler. It is a story that too few know.

We were friends of Rudy and his wife, but did not see much of them in recent years. We sat with them at a lunch at which Václav Klaus was speaking a few years ago and met them at a restaurant on Vancouver’s west side perhaps three years ago. We had planned to get together in the near future but….

Rudy was very low key about his history. We had known them for several years before I heard the basics of the story, and it was almost incidental. I was driving by an open house his wife was holding (she was a real estate agent) and I dropped in to say hello. As I entered the house, Rudy was on TV, in a British ITV series called “The World at War,” and the story came out.

I was in Abu Dhabi in March 2006 when Rudy died. I was greatly saddened by his passing and of course regretted that we did not get together again. I contacted the editor of The Economist, which has an excellent obituary column, to suggest that they publish an obituary on Rudy, but they chose not to. I did email a Canadian obituary on Rudy and some other material to perhaps 1,000 persons in my contact list. Like I said above, it is a story that too few know.

I see in the previous posts some comment on Rudolf Kasztner. This is another story that should be told, from his life and activities in Hungary to his murder in Israel. This seems to be a controversial story with a number of variants. Adolf Eichmann apparently even discussed him in an article in Life Magazine of December 5, 1960. It would be interesting to see a full and balanced story, including the testimony and judgments at the two trials in Israel. Another PBS project, perhaps?

Terry,

Interesting.

Would you care to share here some of the material you
emailed?

This is a facinating story. I am a history buff and I am particularly “fond” of WWII because my father was one of the first to storm the beach at Normandy. To this day I am shocked at how the holocaust could have happend. Survivors and their realtives should NEVER let mankind forget about this wholesale murder of inocents.

If you read all the reports you can, you will find a range of opinions presented as facts. I don’t worry about any single person getting it exactly right. Though this report seems authoritative, it does seem to differ from original ones that described bringing out plans of the camp and a label from a Zyklon container. What has added some food for thought is how they described convincing others that the rumors were true, when too few could actually believe how low a sophisticated population could sink. They seem to play down the hundreds of other escapes from the portion I was lucky enough to see.
Another example I’ve found of varying reports involved a Japanese pilot, Shigenori Nishikiaichi, who landed on Niihau and received aid from Ishimatsu Shintani, Yoshio Harada, and his wife Irene before Ben Kanahele and his wife were able to overpower and kill Nishikaichi on December 13th (6 days after the attack on Pearl Harbor in this account). Different sources give different accounts, including some that seem to have far too much information, supposedly from Nishikaichi. I learned a great deal of my respect for Japanese from Joe Bak, my dad’s friend who had been captured at Corregidor, who taught me to look beyond initial reports and “established” history. Though I sympathize with the many Japanese interred during the war, many are incorrect in believing there were no instances of Japanese helping the attackers. The response was drastic overkill (probably for ulterior motives) but not totally baseless.
I don’t need, or expect, total accuracy, or any pretense of such. A visit to Dachau shortly after the war ended, and movies like “Judgment at Nuremberg” provide my basis for action and basic beliefs. The more rabid the accusations, the more I look for other sides or alternate views. Weigh a good sample of the evidence, explore the impact of what you choose to believe before you decide how and what to act on.

I saw this and was moved by the entire story. Speaking of unknown stories, a movie called “Defiance” will be coming out shortly, based on the Bielski Brothers; a trio of brothers who saved over 1,200 Russian jews during the war and created the only all jewish partisan group of the war. their story is just as fantastic as Vrba’s. I read the book a while ago, but now a movie will be released. heres the URL for the trailer.

http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount_vantage/defiance/trailer/

When will this air again?

I saw this show last night and was just so moved that i would like to see it again when well it be airing. I also must say that these men were very brave and lucky that they survied.I will recamend this show to everyone i know and Thank You for telling there story.

I saw it on 50.1 KOCE tonight (Nov. 24, 10 – 11PM) but it was not listed on that station’s program listing. When will it air again on another PBS station in the L.A. metro area?

I love that chanel

when will escape from auschwitz be aired in Columbus, Ohio?

I would like to know if Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State will be airing on WPSU anytime soon?