To Bomb, or Not to Bomb

A popular proverb in Iran says that 'they wanted to fix
a person's eyebrow but instead they made him blind.'
In our view, this summarizes Bush's policies in the Middle East
--Ali Reza Jalaeepour, Tehran political analyst

[In the] nightmare prospect of all-out civil war [in Iraq]. . .
It is very likely any president would use air power
to try to separate the sides. But whom do we target?
If there are no good guys, do we bomb some civilians
to save others?
--Vanishing Act, New York Times Magazine

There ain't no good guys, there ain't no bad guys.
There's only you and me and we just disagree.
--We Just Disagree, Dave Mason
___________

On viewing an aerial photo of Auschwitz during his recent visit to Israel's Holocaust memorial, Bush said, "We should have bombed it."

Secretary of State Rice later clarified that Bomber George was talking about the rail lines to the camp. Most likely our manichaean President hasn't a clue. He just knows that bombing is the answer to all that ails the world.

Auschwitz is a bona fide Axis of Evil moment. However, the Bush's and Walker's grew rich from their dealings with the Nazis, and in fact were only stopped from their felicitous partnerships under the Trading with the Enemy Act (How Bush's Grandfather Helped Hitler's Rise to Power.)

In this moment of tears and change, in a teary-eyed moment of expiation, grandson George W. Bush got to pontificate. Somehow, we are not quite moved.

Regarding bombing the rail lines, many believe as Holocaust scholar Michael Berenbaum does, "The Americans flubbed it. The bombing could have weakened the infrastructure and made it more difficult to kill with the efficacy with which they killed."

Ranger thinks the rail lines should have been attacked with allied-controlled partisan interdiction, or via OSS assets to organize such strikes. Unfortunately, Polish Resistance would not dedicate assets at that time to save Jewish lives.

The next option would be aerial bombing of the railway lines and crematorium. But the aerial delivery systems in 1944 did not possess the accuracy to permanently interdict the rail lines. Even in 1944 the Germans had adequate response to repair bomb damage to rail lines. The most that would have been accomplished would have been a slowing down of the pace of the genocide. Still, this would have been something.

The crematoriums themselves needed to be bombed, but this required precision bombing, and it is doubtful that could have been achieved realistically via aerial bombardment. Bombing would have led to untold loss of life, but one could argue those lives were hanging by a thread anyway. Any action would have been welcome.

The question is, why didn't we do it? U.S. State Department at that time should have immediately addressed the Jewish genocide in a diplomatic initiative exposing the German abomination to the entire world. One wonders why this wasn't done once the facts were undeniable in 1942. The extermination program was officially ignored by the allies.

This lack of diplomatic action is more damnable than the particular absence of the event of death camp bombing.

Unfortunately, this is a nuanced dialog beyond the capabilities of Bomber George Bush.