Robert Strupp’s Reviews > Vichy France and the Jews > Status Update

'By 1944, almost 75,000 Jews had been deported from France to killing centers in former Polish territory. Upon arrival, most were gassed immediately.' Although there were reports of Hitler's 'Final Solution' in the West it was disbelieved that such a massive slaughter was even imaginable. What helped the Nazis in their roundup of Jews was the use by French police of their new perforated-card [IBM?] technology.

'For the most part, French police cooperated with their German colleagues.' In Nov. of 1942, as German troops swept into France, 8 departments (states) in southeastern France were occupied by their Italian allies who absolutely refused any of Hitler's Jew deportation orders. They also refused to have the ration books of any Jews stamped with JUIF. Even when French police tried to arrest Jews, Italians stopped them.

It seems the French concentration camps where they kept Jews destined for the huge Auschwitz complex were even worse than the camps the Germans used. 'It took 3 days to reach Auschwitz. There, Jews apt for hard physical labor were sometimes put to work in the I.G. Farben plants [read Hell's Cartel ~ Diarmuid Jeffreys] attached to the Auschwitz camp, under conditions that few survived. Most Jews were killed at once.'

'The German occupation authorities reported repeatedly to Berlin that they had insufficient personnel to apply their policies towards Jews WITHOUT THE HELP of the French administration.' French doctors were called upon to certify that a man had not been circumcised...one could be interned [put in prison] on the mere suspicion of being a Jew.' French-run concentration camps were as bad as the German's.

'Even without German prompting, Vichy [the part of WWII France run by the French] wished fervently for Jewish emigration [export]. Admiral Darlan was once again discussing sending all the Jews of Europe to Madagascar... American volunteer agencies helped hundreds of prominent refugees to escape to the U.S., where special entry visas were quickly provided for scientists and artists.'

'It empowered the state to place all Jewish property in the hands of a non-Jewish trustee, who had the authority to liquidate it if it was deemed unnecessary to the French economy, or to sell it to a non-Jewish purchaser.' '...the Unoccupied Zone [Vichy] where there had been only about 5,000 Jews in 1940, now had a population that Vallat [commissioner-general for Jewish affairs] estimated in early 1942 at 150,000.'

Ribbentrop was Hitler's German Foreign Minister and met with French officials on December 7th, 1938: 'A rather loquacious Ribbentrop claimed that there were good Jews and bad Jews; all Jews in Germany were bad, whereas France and Britain had good Jews.' 'No less than before, Jews seemed pre-eminent among aliens as threats to jobs, to the purity of the French culture, and to a settlement with Hitler.'

'...France had actively encouraged immigration in the 1920s. The bloodletting of 1914-1918 [for you Common Core History kiddies, this was known as World War I] had reduced the labor force by over 1,400,000 active young men.' By 1933 France had about 55,000 Jews. Compare this to just the 720,000 Italians who fled Mussolini's regime into France during these same years.

"Vichy France" was the part of unoccupied France during World War II that the Nazis allowed to self-govern. 'Well into 1941, German authorities considered Unoccupied France a place to dump their unwanted Jews.' '...Vichy had begun its own antisemetic career before the first German text appeared, and without direct German order.'