A Brief Return to the Subject of Displaced Persons

Down time during this past weekend in New York and on the train back to Washington  led me back to the period of my early life in Europe as a displaced person. (Remember? I promised I would bounce around–And to Vietnam and other things I will return.)

Yesterday’s New York Times carried an article by journalist Eric Lichtblau, who is researching the period. He stumbled on some pretty unfortunate findings about the state of Displaced Persons (DPs), especially the state of Jewish survivors of death camps (who were lumped into the DP category). The story, entitled “Surviving the Nazis Only to Be Jailed by America” included a description of a 1945 investigation into George Patton’s management of DP camps immediately after the conclusion of hostilities. The report indicted the American war hero for his callous and prejudicial views of Jewish and other refugees of the war–at points quoting his horrific views of people forced to live in utter squalor and degradation.

It is a depressing read. And like so many stories of the day it reflects certain truths and not others–the others being the relatively good treatment many of us (non-Jewish refugees) did receive in many places. Those who follow the link above to the story, might want to read some of the comments–more than 70 as I write this–which refer to the many personal realities of those days, each somewhat different and many somewhat like my own family’s and the families of Estonian and other immigrant friends.  Collectively they serve as humbling reminders about the breadth of suffering and the range of individual heroism of people of the day–for those of my generation, mainly parents now mostly gone, who hardly ever complained of the days.

The common good news, I’m thinking, was that so many survived and went on to decent lives–so often in the United States where the White House and Congress could find room in their hearts and in the land for displaced persons through the Displaced Persons Act of 1948, mentioned earlier.

But still saddening is the continuing unfortunate truth that more and more displaced persons (refugees) are being created daily. And so I give credit to Angelina Jolie, a special envoy of the UN High Commission for Refugees, who wrote of the problem in Syria and Iraq  in a January 27th article, “A New Level of Suffering.” In one paragraph she describes the scale of the problem today:

“When the United Nations refugee agency was created after World War II, it was intended to help people return to their homes after conflict. It wasn’t created to feed, year after year, people who may never go home, whose children will be born stateless, and whose countries may never see peace. But that is the situation today, with 51 million refugees, asylum-seekers or displaced people worldwide, more than at any time in the organization’s history.”

I’m certain not enough is being done by those who possess the power and money to  help in big ways, but I also wonder if I am doing enough to help in small ways. The answer is certainly, “No.”  Perhaps by the time I return to this I will have found some way.

a

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.