The word “neutrality” is taking on new meaning.
A long-awaited report on the role of the six so-called neutral nations in the Nazi war effort details trade in vital war materiel — iron ore, ball bearings, tungsten, timing devices and anti-aircraft guns — by Sweden, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, Argentina and Switzerland.
Each of those nations “made a substantial contribution to the economic foundations of the Nazi war effort,” says a U.S. State Department report that was detailed in a Bulletin article last week.
The six nations’ neutrality, it turns out, was far from neutral.
Rather, those “neutral” nations became almost tantamount to being German allies. They helped keep Hitler’s deadly war machine humming along, leveling nations and lives in its wake.
Without the help of the six countries, the war might have ended a lot sooner. And many more Allied soldiers and European Jews might still be alive today. Many prisoners might have been liberated rather than sent to the gas chambers.
To be fair, the report also points out the six nations’ contributions to the Allies, mentioning that together they offered refuge to more than 250,000 Jews fleeing the Holocaust.
Those crucial life-saving efforts should never be forgotten.
Neither should the neutrals’ trade with Germany, even if such actions were, according to a State Department spokesman, “acceptable by the standards of the time.”
Now that information about the neutral nations is coming to the fore, we hope those countries will accept full responsibility for their actions and the consequences of those actions, making apologies and some sort of reparations.
And given the rapidity with which countries’ wartime complicity is now being revealed, we can only wonder: Is the information contained in the report just the tip of the iceberg?