civilians and former POWs who managed to elude the Americans and the British?
For years after it forced the last Soviet citizen to return to the communist Soviet Union, the United States denied it had ever sanctioned force. “To force those people to go back to a life of terror and persecution,” President Eisenhower proclaimed in a speech in May 1953, “is something that would violate every moral standard by which America lives. Therefore, it would be unacceptable in the American code, and it cannot be done.”
Eisenhower’s newfound sense of morality and fair play came nine years too late.
In 1977, a U.S. Army veteran who had been ordered to forcibly repatriate POWs during those baffling and hectic nine months in 1945 was still troubled. He asked a question President Eisenhower had artfully dodged.
“Who’s going to have to answer for all this suffering?”
If Soviet POWs suffered, so did American soldiers. Compliance with the dictates of the Yalta agreement took its toll on those men who, like the 102nd artillery officer, were ordered to do the dirty work. Some bent the rules. Others disobeyed orders at the risk of court-martial. Some helped POWs escape. Others looked the other way as POWs ran into the woods. On one occasion, twenty-one of the twenty-five soldiers assigned to deliver POWs to the Soviets reported sick.
Long after the war, U.S. veterans were still suffering from post-traumatic stress nightmares, anxieties, and even nervous breakdowns. “My part in the Plattling operation,” social activist William Sloane Coffin wrote in his memoir, “left me with a burden of guilt I am sure to carry for the rest of my life.”
Brigadier General Frank L. Howley echoed Coffin’s feeling. “The cries of these men, their attempt to escape, even kill themselves,” he wrote, “still plague my memory.”
The historical facts of forced repatriation impinge directly on the deportation hearing of John Demjanjuk, one of the hard core who managed to hide from the Soviets.
Did President Truman issue a presidential decree ending forced repatriation in 1948, as the government argued in both the denaturalization trial and the deportation hearing of Demjanjuk?
No.
Were displaced persons still afraid of forced repatriation as late as 1950, as Demjanjuk and his witnesses, Edward O’Connor, Michael Pap, and Jerome Brentar, argued?
Yes. The Soviets kidnapped and assassinated former citizens well into the 1970s.
Did Soviet citizens routinely lie about their country of origin to avoid forced repatriation?
Yes.
Did refugee agency employees routinely advise their clients to lie about their country of origin to avoid forced repatriation?
Yes.
Were eight out of ten POWs who returned to the Soviet Union, willingly or unwillingly, executed, as Demjanjuk argued?
No. For the most part, just officers and some Trawniki men were executed. Others like Danilchenko were sentenced to hard labor in Siberia.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
OSI attorney Bruce Einhorn couldn’t wait to flay Jerome Brentar under cross- examination. By this time, the government knew that the Cleveland travel agent and Demjanjuk financial supporter was a Holocaust denier.
“Mr. Brentar,” he began, “you don’t consider yourself, do you, an expert on post-World War Two repatriation?”
“I don’t want to be an expert.”
“But do you
“Well, I know there was repatriation.”
“Mr. Brentar, do you consider yourself an expert on the subject?”
“Expert in what capacity? I know that it happened.”
“Did you do
“Well, I read quite a bit about it. I read about the Yalta agreement and the—”
“Mr. Brentar, do you have firsthand knowledge on the subject of repatriation,” Einhorn pressed, “or is your knowledge
“They didn’t sell, or give out ringside seats, to the forceful repatriation.”
Judge Angelilli intervened. “Please answer the question,” he said. “I don’t want arguments.”
“No,” Brentar admitted. He was not an expert on repatriation.
“Thank you,” Einhorn said.
Next, Einhorn read quotations from Brentar’s court testimony at Demjanjuk’s denaturalization trial, during which he admitted that he was not an expert on either the IRO or the KGB.
Having established that Brentar wasn’t an expert on
Q: There was mass murder at the concentration camps, wasn’t there?
A: Well, this is what some say.
Q: You are not convinced though?
A: Well…
Q: You shrugged your shoulders. What does that mean?
A: Well, there were people who were killed, yes.
Q: Was there no mass murder at concentration camps?
A: That is…
Q: Open to question?
A: Yes.
Einhorn put the trial transcripts down. “Is that the colloquy, Mr. Brentar?”
“I wasn’t there [in Treblinka],” Brentar said in his defense. “Were
“Your Honor, I have to object,” O’Connor finally said. “I just want to know what the relevancy is.”
“I think interest in
O’Connor didn’t press the objection any further, and Einhorn returned to Brentar.
“With all your world travels on this case,” Einhorn asked, “have you gone to Israel to interview any of the
“No, sir.”
Next, Einhorn tried to trap Brentar in a deception.
“Is it not a fact, sir,” he asked, “that the rules and regulations under which you operated as an IRO officer excluded from… eligibility individuals who… had participated in Nazi and SS-controlled organizations hostile to Allied forces?”
Einhorn, of course, was referring to Vlasov’s Liberation Army, which was dedicated to fighting the Soviet Union, a U.S. ally during the war.
“Well, I would have to check my manual,” Brentar said. “I have it at home.”
“So you don’t know offhand?”
“I could look it up and I can tell you,” Brentar said.
“As long as you don’t remember, sir, that pretty much answers my question.”
Judge Angelilli took over the cross-examination of Brentar from Einhorn, and he didn’t tap-dance around the
