By Eric Vandenbroeck and co-workers

The Pope And Hitler

In early May 1943, a letter from a Dutch priest to Pope Pius XII reached the Vatican. At the end of that month, the first of the four new gas chamber-crematoria complexes that would liquidate about one million people began functioning at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The letter pleaded for papal action on behalf of the Jews. After reading the letter, Under-Secretary of State Tardini reflected that "it's not such an easy thing" to help the Jews.1 Tardini's thoughts signaled a change in the direction of papal policy regarding the Holocaust even though just a few months earlier the pope had spoken about the victims of World War II in his Christmas message. In 1943, Pope Pius decided that he needed to try to control events taking place in Rome rather than those taking place in Poland.

After having assessed, or reassessed, Pius XII's 1942 Christmas address, we may pose the question why it was both his first and his last pronouncement on genocide. If, as seems certain, the pope intended to speak again, why did he fail to do so? World War II and the Holocaust would persist for two and a half more years. At what point did Pope Pius make the decision not to raise his voice for a second time? That determination came in the spring or, at the latest, the summer of 1943, only a few months after the auspicious Christmas message-auspicious from a western point of view, at least. The Vatican's published documents provide glimpses behind the Holy See's closed doors that allow us to make an educated guess regarding the timing of a turnabout. Moreover, the circumstances of the war-the momentous developments of the spring and summer-produced a flurry of documents now available in the U.S. national archives. These also suggest guideposts for interpreting the Vatican's reappraisal of its position regarding the predicament of European Jews.

The pope's denunciation of genocide in his Christmas message was expressed by his dismay that "hundreds of thousands of persons, who, without any fault on their part, sometimes only because of their nationality or race, have been consigned to death or to a slow decline." Six weeks later, in early February 1943, the pope delivered an allocution to the college of cardinals in which he again referred to the suffering of people because of their nationality or race. His words were very similar to those of the Christmas message but with one remarkable change: in this message he referred to people "destined ... to forced extermination."2 Extermination! Only a few months prior to this time the Vatican had said it could not confirm Riegner's "final oolution" warning. It appears that a significant shift had taken place at the Vatican.

Confirmation of this fact came two months later in May. Cardinal Secretary of State Luigi Maglione wrote the following memo to himself:

After months and months of transports of thousands and thousands of persons about whom nothing more is known, this can be explained in no other way than death. Special death camps near Lublin and near Brest Litovsk. It is told that they are locked up several hundred at a time in chambers where they are finished off with gas.3

We do not know all of the additional information that came to the Holy See that triggered this remarkable admission. Certainly the Vatican continued to receive regular disclosures. In January, President in Exile Raczkiewicz detailed Nazi horrors in Poland. In March, Bishop Prey sing wrote of the almost certain death of the Berlin Jews who had just been dispatched to the east (they were in fact immediately murdered at Auschwitz). In any event, what the Holy See had long said (and continued to say until late 1942)-that it could not confirm "rumors" about mass murder-it now no longer doubted. That the Holy See did not know the exact places of the mass executions matters not at all. Pius now knew the essence of the Holocaust.

Just five days after Maglione wrote his memo to himself, the Vatican received the letter from a Dutch priest, Father De Witte, of the Redemptorist Order. What the priest wanted was nothing less than Pius XII's intervention in the matter of the killing of the Jews. Extreme circumstances, he said, call for extreme remedies. The message was certified by Archbishop de Jong, who wrote a cover letter.4 Clearly, the Dutch Church was proceeding here along the path that had led it to protest the "transportation" of Jewish citizens in February 1943. Based on its interpretation of the 1942 papal Christmas message, the Dutch Church-not unreasonably-expected the Holy See to back up its bold challenge to the German occupiers.

Their expectations were not realized. The Vatican's response to the Dutch priest's plea is found in a memo of Under-Secretary of State Tardini who, thinking to himself, pondered what to do.5 The Dutch Church was already well informed about what the Holy See "has done for the Jews," Tardini reasoned, thinking no doubt about the Dutch Church's reference to the 1942 Christmas message. Tardini wondered if perhaps the Vatican could work with the Red Cross to help the Dutch Jews emigrate, but he immediately rejected the idea since Nuncio Orsenigo in Berlin would not be able to get permission from the Germans for them to emigrate and Spain and Portugal would only provide temporary transit visas. So, Tardini mused, it would probably be best to respond that the Vatican would continue to do whatever it could. Wanting to take some immediate action, Tardini determined that he would refer the letter from the Netherlands Church to the rector of the Dutch seminary college in Rome. While proposing to reply in this way to the Dutch Church, Tardini thought to himself that helping the Jews "is not such an easy thing."6

What is the significance of the Tardini memo? Remarkably, a communication from Holland that came at the height of the Holocaust and carried the weight of approval of that country's most prominent Catholic leader did not reach the eyes of Pius XII. Rather than bring the matter to the attention of the pope, Tardini decided, probably after a discussion with Cardinal Maglione, his immediate superior, to refer the matter to the rector of the Dutch college in Rome who "has on many occasions interested himself in the question of the Jews of Holland."7 A more minimal reply to the Dutch cannot be imagined. It is clear from the Tardini memo that he took the initiative in answering de Witte's letter. He did not consult with the pope.

It might appear from Monsignor Tardini's words-"it's not easy to help the Jews"-that he did not care about what happened to them, that he was callous. This is not the case. Just six months earlier, Tardini had admitted to diplomats Francis D'Arcy Osborne and Myron Taylor that he had to agree with them that the pope needed to speak out against the atrocities being perpetrated on the Jews.8 His memo to himself indicates, rather, a new resolve at the Vatican based on Holocaust data it no longer doubted. Tardini, very much a Vatican insider and a veteran of the secretariat who reported to Pope Pius every day, knew the score.9 The Holy See had come to the conclusion that if the Germans were doing the unthinkable and the unimaginable-building death camps and gassing facilities in a foreign land to which the Jews of Europe were to be "transported" and killed-the Vatican was helpless to do anything to stop the process."It’s not easy to help the Jews" might be equated with "we cannot stop the trains."

There is another indication of the Holy See's about-face regarding the Holocaust. In June 1943, Pope Pius gave the encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi (The Mystical Body of Christ) in which he argued that the physical church-the visible church-constituted the mystical body of Christ.10 In making his case for the Church, Pius referred to Judaism:

"On the cross then the Old Law died, soon to be buried and to be a bearer of death." And to be a bearer of death! Could anyone, knowing what was befalling the Jews at that very moment in the first half of 1943, write those words in a merely figurative sense? This seems quite unlikely, but it does not mean that Pius wished for the Jews to be killed off.11 The encyclical, which went on to belabor the point about the visible church, may be taken as an indication that in the spring of 1943 Pope Pius had resolved to remain silent about what he thought he could do nothing about (the Jews) and to attend to concerns that he might be able to control, matters that had to do with Rome and Vatican City within it, the visible church. Presumably aware of the pope's decision, Monsignor Tardini seems to have thought it unnecessary to bring the letter of the Dutch Church to the pope's attention. After finally admitting the fate of the Jews and gaining an accurate insight into the Nazi killing machine, the Holy See came to the conclusion that helping the Jews "is not a very easy matter."

By the summer of 1943, Pope Pius had toned down his rhetoric considerably when referring to the Holocaust. The word "extermination," which he had used in February in his in-house address, does not appear in his subsequent public addresses. Instead, in June the pope talked rather obliquely about Poles "who have been cruelly tried and others like them." "Others like them" meant Jews, but Pius was careful not to use the word. He referred to people "sometimes dying because of nationality or descent." The phrase "sometimes dying" entirely minimized the truth about Jews as Pope Pius certainly knew it by this date. Taking the position, rightly or wrongly, that it was better not to say anything that might make the situation worse for potential victims, Pius said "do not expect from us now that we give you here the details."12 He knew the details! But the main emphasis of the pope's June 3rd address did not involve genocide; Pius XII concerned himself with the killing of hostages, presumably because of the activity of Roman partisans against the Nazis, and about aerial bombardment, which was getting closer and closer to Rome. The language the pope used in the summer of 1943 with reference to the Holocaust may be taken as another clue that in the spring the Vatican had adopted a new course, a policy of control. Pope Pius wanted to control the fate of the visible church.

It was the circumstances of the war that generated the pope's thoughts about control-about protecting the visible church. By the spring and summer of 1943 the outcome of World War II looked entirely different to Pius than it had in 1942. Previously he had not thought the Allies could win the war; rather, he believed that it would end in a stalemate.13 But just before the time the Vatican had become convinced that the Holocaust was indeed under way, the Soviet army had won the battle of Stalingrad, killing or capturing half a million German soldiers. Another major battle ensued that summer at Kursk, which the Germans again lost. In the meantime, an enormous Allied amphibious force had landed on the shores of North Africa. Within one week of the time when Maglione admitted to himself that Jews were being murdered in gas chambers, Erwin Rommel's troops had been driven off the African continent, the Germans suffering in the process losses equal at least to those of Stalingrad. With the Allies now ruling the Mediterranean, there was no doubt about where the next theater of war would be-Italy. The dangers this situation would bring to Rome and to Vatican City could not be overestimated as far as Pius XII was concerned. He was determined to do what he could to control these dangers to the visible church.

Furthermore, events in Italy hugely complicated that theater in general and Rome in particular. The overthrow of Mussolini and the fascist government of Italy in July was followed by the overthrow of the successor regime of Marshal Pieto Badoglio. In September, the Germans reappointed Mussolini, who now ruled as a puppet of the Nazis. German armed forces overran most of Italy even as Allied forces successfully invaded the boot of Italy. Since Rome was not only the capital of the country but also the most important railroad, highway, and airport nexus linking the northern and southern halves of the peninsula, there was every likelihood that it would become the focal point of hostilities. Nothing could be more ominous for Pius XII's visible church.

As if these factors were not enough, the domestic situation in Rome became vexed by two developments. Prior to the time of Mussolini's fall, the number of people who participated in the Italian resistance forces was small. After Mussolini returned as a puppet of Hitler, Italian nationalists of every stripe, from Communists to Catholics, became involved in resistance. What, Pius XII wondered, would come of resistance turmoil? He had witnessed a similar situation in Munich after World War I which gave rise to his great dread, a Communist regime. Thus, the Italian underground constituted yet another factor for Pius to attempt to control. Last in chronological order came the question of Roman Jews. The Holy See knew what was transpiring in faraway Poland; now the Holocaust would also come home to Italy since the Germans were determined to carry out the deportation of Jews there, as they had been doing in other European countries. For the moment-the spring and summer-this was not yet a problem, but when and if it became one, Pope Pius would be forced to decide where his first priorities lay when it came to issues of control.

Holocaust reality came to the Vatican in the fall. Because the Jews of Rome were seized in October, "under his very windows," the question of the pope's silence has become the focus of intense historical debate and analysis. The situation at the time of the pope's 1942 Christmas address differed vastly from the situation the Holy See encountered the following summer and fall. After dissembling or procrastinating for two years, the Vatican at last came around to the reality of the Holocaust late in 1942, although the full extent of it was not yet perceived. Mass murder took place far away in Poland. It did not yet touch Italy or Italians. After the puppet Mussolini government came to power in the fall of 1943 and Germany overran and occupied most of Italy, the reality of the Holocaust squarely confronted the Vatican.

Several months after the 1942 Christmas radio address the Holy See fell back into passivity when critical situations for Jews came to its attention. In the summer and fall of 1943, Jews in Croatia and southeast France were in danger of being captured by the Ustasa or Gestapo. The Vatican was asked to intercede in one instance by the World Jewish Congress and in the other by the Catholic rescuer Father Benedetto (Marie-Benoit Peteul), but it did not respond productively to either request. Presented with appeals to help in very concretely detailed situations, the Holy See replied vaguely and blandly: "The Holy See has already involved itself in favor of the Jews mentioned." In fact, its involvement was minimal at best.14

The bearing of the Holy See did not change as Germans began murdering Italian Jews in northern Italy in September. The Nazis in some cases made no attempt to conceal their crimes, openly discarding the corpses of victims in the Lago Maggiore, a resort area. The Vatican would certainly have learned of these crimes and must have drawn the conclusion that Jews in the Eternal City would likely become victims in due time.15 When under-secretaries of state Montini and Tardini first got wind of possible actions against Roman Jews in mid-September, their reaction set the Vatican on a course that would prevail in the following critical month of October. The under-secretaries decided that the best course of action was to see if Germany's ambassador to the Holy See, Ernst von Weizsacker, could ward off danger to people "of whatever race."16 The compatibility of German and Vatican diplomats during the crisis month of October should not surprise us. They shared, as Robert Katz has written, the same goals-to "save the Jews and save the silence" of the pope.17

And to save Pope Pius himself, it might be added. When Hitler learned of Mussolini's overthrow, he vowed in a rage to occupy Rome. Asked if this included Vatican City, Hitler vowed to pull everyone of the mongrels out of their lair-a reference to the pope and curial cardinals. Hitler's crude remark delighted the madly anti-Catholic apostate Josef Goebbels, who took note of it in a July entry in his diary.18 The German diplomatic corps in Rome, who were mostly sympathetic to the pope, sought to eliminate the threat. Pius himself took the threat seriously, according to his German housekeeper, Sister Pasqualina Lehnert.19 Vatican personnel also took Hitler at his word, as did all of the diplomats accredited to the Holy See who notified Cardinal Maglione of their intention to accompany the pope should the Germans remove him. Tittmann wrote that this "gave pleasure to His Holiness at a moment when he was especially beset with anxieties."20 Thus, Hitler's threat was believed in Rome and in Vatican City.

In fact, however, the threat backfired. Greater Germany was predominantly Catholic. If the Nazis were to manhandle the pope, serious dissent and disruption could not be ruled out at a time when Germany's war fortunes were ebbing. There were also serious propaganda disadvantages to consider. Western newspapers, anticipating the worse, were full of reports of Pius being taken prisoner. Anne O'Hare McCormick wrote in the New York Times that the pope was now more a prisoner of Rome than he had ever been (a reference to the pope's status before the 1929 Lateran Treaty).n Hastily backpedaling, the Nazi minister for foreign affairs, Joachim von Ribbentrop, assured the pope again and again that the sovereign status of Vatican City would not be violated. In late September, the Nazi newspaper Volkische Beobachter assured Rome that the Vatican's territories would be respected by German occupying forces.22 Berlin sought a public assurance from the Vatican that the occupational forces in Rome had indeed respected the Holy See's sovereignty in order to put the Fiihrer's blunder to rest.23

The Vatican's "good conduct" statement was still pending when the events that preceded the October 16th seizure of Rome's Jews and the razzia took place. During the first weeks of October, various members of the German military and diplomatic corps in Rome attempted to prevent Berlin's effort to deport Rome's Jews. It would be presumptuous to assert that their efforts came about at the Vatican's request, but it is highly likely that the Holy See was kept abreast of their actions, and at certain points we can be certain of the secretariat's knowledge and participation.

Hitler's angry impropriety and its aftermath had occurred as Nazis murdered Jews in northern Italy and as they occupied the Eternal City. In view of these circumstances, Montini and Tardini in the Vatican secretariat felt it would be best if German diplomats, rather than the Vatican, took the necessary steps to protect Rome's Jews should this prove necessary. As long as the Vatican did not meddle in Nazi antisemitic violence in Rome, there would be no danger of Hitler flying into another rage that would force Minister Ribbentrop to go back on his word that Nazis would not violate the sovereignty of Vatican City. The Vatican knew about a telegram from Berlin instructing the SS in Rome to seize the city's Jews, and it worked out an explicit understanding with German diplomats as to how the crisis was to be handled. This understanding was reached in a timely manner-that is, several weeks before the October 16th razzia, perhaps as early as late September. At some point, the secretariat instructed Bishop Hudal, rector of the German National Church near the Piazza Navona, to compile a list of all Vatican properties scattered in and about the city of Rome for the purpose of preventing Germans from searching them. As concern grew that the German occupational forces might set upon the Jews, Hudal's task was taken over by Ambassador Weizsacker himself.24 Weizsacker sent hundreds of "letters of protection" to all Vatican properties in Rome guaranteeing them extraterritorial status. He did this on the widest possible basis and even provided the German occupational forces with a map designating the location of these properties. The commandant of Rome, General Stahel, approved of Weizsacker's plan.25 The map would prevent German soldiers from making a mistake. Should Nazis, searching for Jews, show up in one of the marked places, they would be shown a document from the German ambassador indicating they had no business there. It is inconceivable that Weizsacker would have done this without the knowledge of the Holy See, especially since he took over the task from Bishop Hudal. Weizsacker and the Holy See's action accomplished a double purpose. First, with no danger that Berlin would blame the Vatican, Jews could escape by hiding in one of the extraterritorial properties. Second, because Weizsacker's letter prevented Germans from violating Vatican property, he could claim that he was ensuring just what Berlin wanted-a public assurance that the Germans had behaved well in Rome.

The Weizsacker-Vatican gambit was nothing if not shrewd, but it had a fatal flaw. To succeed, Roman Jews would have to see their peril and take advantage of the Vatican properties. It fell to Albrecht von Kassel, Weizsacker's assistant, to spread the word among Rome's Jews of their chance to find a safe harbor in one of the Vatican's properties.26 But leaving house and home is never an easy decision, and the leaders of the Jewish community, Dante Almansi and Ugo Foa, both respected fascist civic functionaries before their release from their civic occupations due to Mussolini's antisemitic laws, saw no cause for alarm. Naturally, Roman Jews took the word of these two men over that of a German, even though the Chief Rabbi of Rome, Israel Zolli, prophesied a Nazi slaughter.27

If the Holy Father himself had warned the Jewish community, would they have believed him and saved themselves? That cannot be taken for granted. Before Italian unification, Rome's Jews lived under the rule of the pope and were often subjected to economic and social discrimination and very unpleasant religious humiliation.28 Just how much residual resentment toward papal rule lingered during the seven decades before October 1943 is unclear. But Pope Pius gave them no warning. Historian David Wyman believes that Roosevelt, Churchill, and Pius were at fault for not repeatedly driving home the message that deportation meant definite death. Certainly all three could have done so. Auschwitz escapee Rudolph Vrba asked rhetorically after the Holocaust, "Would anybody [have been able to] get me on a train alive to Auschwitz if I had this information?"29 Pope Pius made Vatican properties available to those who wished to hide but left it to the well-intentioned Germans to spread the alarm. Had Pius done so himself he would have had to do it clandestinely or go through Foa and Almansi.30 A public alert would most likely have led the Nazis to violate the extraterritorial status of Vatican properties when the moment came to seize the Jews. Thus, the purpose of Weizsacker's strategy would have been thwarted. Unlike Churchill and Roosevelt, Pope Pius found himself in the immediate proximity of Holocaust action when the Nazis set upon Rome's Jews. Any warning from the pope might have been more effective had it taken place much earlier and then been renewed in early October as the Nazis prepared to capture their victims.

In the end-that is, in the days before October 16-very few Jews availed themselves of opportunities to hide. Historian Susan Zuccotti found no evidence that the populations of convents and monasteries surged before the fateful day. Very likely that held true for Vatican properties as well. Zuccotti found that not only would the Vatican not help Father Benedetti, known as the Jewish priest because of his indefatigable efforts on their behalf, but it discouraged his work.31 Why would the Holy See engage in an effort to provide shelter for Jews while deterring Benedetti? The difference in the two situations lay in the fact that the members of the Holy See prevailed upon the Germans to write the letters of extraterritoriality and warn the Jews while they themselves stood aside. At the very least, the Vatican-Weizsacker arrangement shows that the Holy See took steps to help Roman Jews.32

The police attaché to the German embassy in Rome, SS Lieutenant Colonel Herbert Kappler, somehow became aware of the VaticanWeizsacker design and reported to Berlin that the Holy See was helping Jewish refugees. Kappler wanted Berlin to know that Pope Pius would be opposed to the idea of deporting Jews.33 Kappler is notorious for holding the Jews of Rome for ransom, demanding 50 kilograms of gold from them in return for his assurance that they would not be molested. For this reason, Kappler has usually been viewed as an insidiously evil person since he did not keep his word. But he may actually have meant well. The fact that the gold was duly shipped off to Berlin suggests that Kappler aimed more to bribe Berlin than to shake down the Jews. In his cover letter to Reichssicherheitshauptamt chief Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Kappler mentioned several credible reasons for not deporting the Jews and said it would be a mistake to do SO.34 Little did he know that 50 kilograms of gold (about $56,000 in 1943 dollars) would not begin to tempt Berlin, given its voracious wartime appetite for the precious metal.J5 Whatever his true intentions were, Kappler was found guilty of extortion by an Italian court after the war.36 The OSS reported on October 6th that in addition to Kappler, General Reiner Stahel, commandant of Rome, and Field Marshall General Albert Kesselring opposed the deportation of JewsY

Kappler's demand for the gold of Rome's Jews brought about the direct involvement of Pius XII in the events culminating in the October 16th catastrophe. The Jewish community of Rome fell into a panic as word spread of Kappler's threat. He was known to be ruthless, and the Jews knew he was not bluffing when he threatened their lives if they did not come up with the gold. In consternation, they turned to the pope, who offered, as requested, to help them raise the needed amount. The Vatican's promised gold, tendered as a loan payable whenever and with no interest, appeared generous. In fact, it was not (for reasons explained in the following chapter). In the end, the loan proved unnecessary, as Roman Jews managed to collect what was demanded of them by September 28. So ended the first chapter of the drama of October. With no word of thanks for the extorted gold, Berlin cabled back crisply on October 11 th, telling Kappler to seize the Jews without delay.38

By the first week of the fateful month of October, the circle of would-be German protectors of Rome's Jews had widened to include both Weizsacker and von Kessel at the Vatican post and Eitel Friedrich Muellhausen, acting ambassador to Italy.39 On the 6th, Kappler told von Ribbentrop at the foreign ministry in Berlin that officials "in Rome were going to Field Marshal Kesselring to suggest that the Jews could be better used as laborers in Italy," and M6llhausen cabled him that General Stahel opposed the idea of deporting Jews to "liquidate" them.40 He added boldly that he thought it would be "better business" to use the manpower productively in Rome and said that he and Kappler would propose this to Field Marshal Kesselring. M6llhausen signed off with "Please advise." Without waiting for a reply, M6llhausen sent a second telegram to Berlin the next day saying that the field marshal had asked Kappler to postpone the roundup of Jews. Through Weizsacker the Vatican was kept informed of these developments.41 Pius XII knew of the plan to murder Roman Jews.

Muellhausen's brashness cost him his job. On the 9th, von Ribbentrop answered the diplomat's telegram, telling him to mind his own business. Furious that M6llhausen had used the word "liquidate" in his telegram, von Ribbentrop launched an investigation, only to learn that the diplomat had used the word purposefully because he was upset at the idea of killing the Jews.42 By then it had become clear to officials in Berlin that everyone in Rome, both the military, the SS, and diplomats, opposed their plan to kill the Jews. Knowing they could not be trusted to carry out their dirty work, Himmler put matters in the capable hands of Adolf Eichmann, who in turn sent Theodore Dannecker, the SS captain who had neatly carried out the liquidation of Parisian Jews, to Rome. During the contest of wills between Berlin and the Germans in Rome that played itself out in early October, the Vatican stood in the background. That would change.

Lacking enough men under his command to carry out the roundup of about 8,000 Roman Jews, Dannecker pressed Kappler to provide him with additional manpower and a list of the addresses of his quarry. Kappler caved in.43 Dannecker got the list and the additional troopers from Commandant Stahel, who, like Kappler, gave way under pressure.44 "Disaster struck," historian Zuccotti wrote, "early in the morning of the Sabbath, October 16, 1943 ... in the cold rain of a dreary dawn."45 The Germans surrounded the ghetto and, aided with the addresses of their victims, went from door to door awakening sleeping Jews. The terrified Jews were given twenty minutes to put their possessions into a bag or suitcase and assemble outside in the rain. The Germans nabbed over 1,000 Jews, almost 900 of whom were women and children. Later that morning they were taken to the Military College, a building several blocks away from the Basilica of St. Peter. There they awaited an unknown fate.

It was at this point in the catastrophe that the Holy See became directly involved in events. Cardinal Maglione requested Ambassador Weizsiicker to come to the secretariat to discuss the actions the Germans had taken, and a letter threatening a papal protest was drafted and telegraphed to Berlin. Both events took place on the 16th, the day of the roundup.

The letter in question is known as the Hudalletter. Bishop Alois Hudal was the rector of the German National Church of Rome and of the Santa Maria dell' Anima seminary. Hudal, as we will see, did not compose the letter, but it went out to Ribbentrop, the Nazi foreign minister, under his name. It read: I must speak to you of a matter of great urgency. An authoritative Vatican dignitary, who is close to the Holy Father, has just told me that this morning a series of arrests of Jews of Italian nationality has been initiated. In the interests of the good relations that have existed until now between the Vatican and the High Command of the German Armed Forces ... I earnestly request that you order the immediate suspension of these arrests both in Rome and its environs. Otherwise I fear that the Pope will take a position in public as being against this action, one which would undoubtedly be used by the anti-German propagandists as a weapon against us Germans.46

The author or authors of the message clearly intended to make von Ribbentrop think that his urgent request for a Vatican statement of good conduct by the Germans was in the balance. Hence the line "in the in terests of good relations" and the warning about "anti-German propagandists."

The Vatican claimed the initiative for Hudal's letter. It was in its interest to do so as the letter puts Pius XII on record as opposing the German assault on the Jews of the Eternal City, his Episcopal See. According to Actes et Documents, the pope's nephew, Carlo Pacelli, had Hudal send the letter to General Rainer Stahel, commandant of Rome, for him to forward to Berlin.47 Although this may literally be true, it does not demonstrate that the initiative came from the Vatican. It is more than a little strange that a nephew of the pope, a prince who had no official curial office, should be the one to deliver the directive to the bishop. There was an obvious intent here to avoid the usual channel, the Holy See's secretariat. After the war, Albrecht von Kessel declared that the Hudalletter did not originate with the bishop.48 And the letter was not written by Hudal but was merely signed by him. Weizsacker, von Kessel, Gerhart Gumpel (a junior diplomat posted to Rome), and, perhaps, General Stahel himself, to whom the letter was sent en route to Berlin, wrote it.49 Thus, the letter was a joint undertaking by the Holy See and the German diplomatic corps.

If the same routine of the very recent past was followed on October 16th, Montini and Tardini summoned Weizsacker and the three of them put their heads together to work out an appropriate strategy. This would mean finding a suitable person-Bishop Hudal-to act as a spokesperson for a message of an unnamed person who was "close to the Holy Father," meaning Prince Carlo Pacelli. Once the Vatican and German diplomats agreed in principle on the letter's content, they settled on Hudal as its "author." That Pope Pius himself was involved is not out of the question by any means.

The choice of Bishop Hudal as the purported letter-writer points again to Vatican involvement in the design to rescue the Jews without risking a papal statement of denunciation.50 Hudal was a Vatican outsider whom the Nazis thought was an insider. During the previous decade, Hudal had tried to convince Pius XI that racism was not the heart and soul of Nazism, and he had succeeded for a while. But the Austrian bishop's book, The Foundations of National Socialism, which Hitler himself had read and thrust in the face of the German hierarchy, had infuriated Pius XI. After the book's publication in 1936, Hudal no longer had the pope's ear, but his demotion was not public knowledgeY A schemer, Hudal stayed on in Rome as rector of the German National Church and looked for the day when he could once again be an important curial player. In the meantime he became known in Rome as the most outspoken proNazi clergyman, one who hobnobbed with top German occupational authorities like Commandant General Stahel. Hudal, who must have been overjoyed that the Vatican was once again turning to him with the matter of the letter, was merely being used by the secretariat because of his reputation in Nazi inner circles.

Ambassador Weizsacker backed up Hudal's letter with his own telegram to Berlin only a few hours later. This again suggests the connivance of the secretariat and Weizsacker's fingerprints on the Hudalletter. Weizsacker assured von Ribbentrop that Hudal knew whereof he spoke and he sent the same signal-it would be bad propaganda to deport the Jews of Rome-to furrow the brow of the foreign minister. But the matter would blow over, Weizsacker suggested, if the detained Jews were released to do labor service in Italy.52 The cunning ambassador worded his message most intriguingly by suggesting that it was the curia who was upset by the razzia, in effect telling Berlin to be careful lest Pius XII be pushed over the edge into a denunciation. Weizsacker did this by comparing the pope to some French bishops who the previous year had clearly spoken out about "similar incidents" and by comparing him to his predecessor, Pius XI, "a man of more spontaneous temperament." Years later one of the early defenders of Pius XII, Robert Graham, S.]., who assisted in editing Actes et Documents, excoriated Ambassador Weizsacker for originating the picture of a pusillanimous pope with his telegram.53 In his zeal to prop up Pope Pius, Graham completely overlooked the historical context and Weizsacker's objective. The Jews were still at that moment in detention in Rome. Releasing them, the ambassador said, would "muffle" the Vatican's negative reaction. Left unsaid, but implied, was the statement that deporting them might very well push Pius XII over the edge into denunciation of Nazi actions in Rome.54

The Hudalletter and the Weizsacker telegram of October 16th reveal that in the crisis of the day, the Vatican and German diplomats worked together to try to protect Rome's Jews.

As the Jews were rounded up and confined near the Vatican in temporary detention, Secretary of State Maglione summoned Weizsacker to discuss the situation.55 This meeting ranks as one of the most dramatic scenes of Holocaust historiography. Because of the drama and because distinguished British historian Owen Chadwick focused on it, the diplomatic aspect of the seizure of the Jews "under his very windows" has taken center stage in accounts of the razzia in Rome. I contend that its centrality has resulted from Holocaust scholarship that has directed attention to the issue of papal silence about the razzia to the detriment of examination other concerns of the day.56 The importance of the razzia historically and in historical literature is not to be denied, but we will see that issues other than the pope's silence weighed equally heavily-indeed, perhaps more heavily-on his mind.

Historians are in unanimous or near-unanimous agreement that Cardinal Maglione did not protest the seizure of the Roman Jews when he met with the German ambassador.57 A papal protest, such as the Christmas address of 1942, does not come into question; Pius XII did not himself address the October 16th roundup. L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, did address the issue a week later on the 25th, at which time most of the "transported" Jews had met their end or were about to do so in the Birkenau gas chambers. The article said that the Holy Father's charity was universal, extending to all races. The piece was so belated and vague that an American diarist living in occupied Rome, a nun writing under the name of Jane Scrivener who picked up on all news that concerned occupied Rome, the Vatican, and the Jews, failed to mention it at all.58 Romans themselves, however, assumed that the article was a swipe at the hated occupying Germans.59 They were angry that the Germans had seized and deported women and children.60 But what appeared in the Vatican's newspaper in no way compares with a papal statement from the throne of St. Peter. Newly released documents of the U.S. national archives also fail to establish that the pope protested. The police attache to the German embassy in Rome, SS officer Herbert Kappler, notified Berlin prior to the roundup on October 16th that Pope Pius would be opposed to the idea of deporting Jews, saying that the Vatican had been helping Jewish refugees. He did not report that the pope protested the deportations afterward.61 Likewise, Ambassador Weizsacker asserted the same absence of a protest in a letter to his mother on October 22nd: "Fortunately so far no one has taken a public position."62

Historians-as opposed to writers whose sole objective is to defend Pius XII-are not in agreement with the editors of Actes et Documents, who maintained that Maglione succeeded in registering a papal protest of the roundup of the Jews.63 Putting aside the issue of whether or not Maglione protested, I argue that protest was not what he wanted to accomplish when he summoned the German ambassador on the morning (probably) of the 16th. The record of the meeting, as set down by the cardinal, reads as follows:

I asked him [Weizsacker] to intervene in favor of those poor people. I spoke to him as best as I could in the name of humanity and Christian charity.

The Ambassador, who already knew about the arrests ... replied to me in all sincerity, saying with some emotion: "I am always waiting for you to ask me: Why do you remain in this position of yours?"

I exclaimed: No, Mr. Ambassador, I would never presume to ask you such a question. I simply wish to say to you, Excellency, you who have a good and tender heart, try to save these many innocent people. It is painful for the Holy Father, painful beyond words, that right here in Rome, under the eyes of the Common Father, so many people are to suffer only because of their particular descent-

The Ambassador, after some moments of reflection, asked me: "What would the Holy See do if these things were to continue?"

I replied: The Holy See would not want to be faced with the need to express its disapproval.

The Ambassador observed: For more than four years I have followed and admired the attitude of the Holy See. It has succeeded in steering the boat amid all shapes and sizes of rocks without running aground and, even though it has greater faith in the Allies, it has maintained a perfect equi librium. Now, just as the boat is about to reach port, is it worth it, I ask myself, to put it all at risk. I am thinking of the consequences that such a step by the Holy See would provoke-

These measures come from the highest level: "Will your Eminence leave me free not to report this official conversation?"

I observed that I had asked him to intervene appealing to his sentiments of humanity. I was leaving it to his judgment whether or not to mention our conversation, which had been so friendly.64

If we disregard the spin of the editors of Actes et Documents-to wit, that Maglione was registering a protest-it can be seen that the objective was to induce Weizsacker to take action to get the Jews released. The cardinal was well aware, of course, that German diplomats had been working with I, is office to register places where Jews could hide. Trusting in the experience of the past few weeks, Maglione urged the Germans to continue to handle the situation. As Robert Katz observed, a detached reading of the cardinal's minute shows it to be "a desperate plea to save the Jews," not a protest against the Nazi roundup.65 When Ambassador Weizsacker interjected that "these matters come from the highest level," he was intimating that Hitler would retaliate, as earlier he had indeed threatened to do, if the pope publicly protested. "Is it worth it ... to put all at risk?" What those words conveyed to Pope Pius, I discuss immediately below. Further, the cardinal never even alluded to the possibility of a papal protest until the ambassador prompted him to do so. The cardinal ended the meeting by returning to his original intent-an appeal on the basis of Weizsacker's "sentiments of humanity" to intervene. It was not in Weizsacker's power to do so. The Vatican underestimated Hitler's determination to seize Rome's Jews even if it meant a papal protest. When German diplomats attempted to thwart the razzia, Himmler dressed down Ribbentrop, telling him in effect to mind his own business. The editors of Actes et Documents, writing after the publication of Hochhuth's famous (or infamous) play The Deputy, spun the Maglione minute to imply that the Vatican had protested. There was no protest.

After the Holy See became convinced in the spring of 1943 that what we now call the Holocaust was indeed under way, Pope Pius shifted to a policy of control, thinking he was not able to hinder the Nazi genocide. The October 16th razzia intensely tested the pope's new policy, but he stuck to it. What exactly did Pius XII want to control? The issues that most concerned him were as follows:

Protection of Rome, the Eternal City, from destruction by aerial bombardment. Even before his 1942 Christmas address Pope Pius was worried about possible bombing in Italy. For this reason, the Peruvian ambassador to the Holy See thought the pontiff would not mention the atrocities at that time.66 obviously, the ambassador was thinking in terms of German retaliation, but as the war progressed, it was the Allies, not the Germans, who worried Pius. Judging from the Vatican's diplomatic correspondence, no issue weighed on Pius XII's mind as much during the war as aerial bombardment. The U.S. national archives hold page after page of entreaties and warnings from the Holy See on this issue.67 No issue occupied Tittmann's attention more than the Vatican's communications about the bombing of Rome. Pius warned Taylor in the fall of 1941 that if the British bombed Rome he would not remain silent; he repeated the warning in writing.68 As early as December 1942, Tittmann cautioned the State Department that the Vatican might be gearing up for a "solemn protest" should Rome be bombed.69 Then, as the danger of aerial bombardment grew, Tittmann warned again that the pope would be "constrained to protest" if it should become a reality.70 No such threat of protest was ever made regarding the fate of Jews.

In June 1943, the Vatican's warnings through Tittmann about bombing of Italian targets continued steadily, especially as the bombs neared Rome. On June 24, James Dunn of the U.S. State Department replied to Tittmann, informing him that the War Department would not dignify the "fantastic charges" about the bombings with a reply.71 On June 26, the Vatican told the apostolic delegate to the United States, Amleto Cicognani, to let the president know in no uncertain terms that Rome must not be bombed. Secretary of State Hull drafted a response to Cicognani for President Roosevelt to review. On the 28th, FDR told Hull that he would have to let the Holy See know that "war is war," meaning that since the Germans were using Rome for their military operations, the city could not be spared.72 The next day, Hull relayed the president's message to Cicognani, telling him that for twenty years Italian fascists had been killing Greeks, Ethiopians, and Albanians, implying that if Italians died because of aerial attacks nothing could be done about it.73

On July 20, Allied bombs devastated the area around the Basilica of St. Lawrence, causing extensive damage to the church structure. Pius wrote President Roosevelt to entreat him to stop the bombardment.74 "Every district," Pius wrote Roosevelt, "in some districts every street, has its irreplaceable monuments of faith and art and Christian culture, [which] cannot be attacked without inflicting an incomparable loss on the patrimony of Religion and Civilization. "75 As soon as the Allied Fifth Army occupied Rome in June 1944, the Holy See grew concerned about German bombing. On June 10th, Maglione wrote to the army command to ask that the military make its headquarters outside the central city or outside the city altogether.76 What might affect the visible church registered intensely in the pope's thinking.

Guarding Rome from becoming a second Stalingrad, an issue that was obviously closely related to bombing. Pope Pius sought to win open city status for Rome from the belligerents, both to avoid bombing and so the Holy City would not become the site of a major artillery battle between the Allies and the Germans. The pope feared that Rome would be destroyed by ground fighting, as had happened in the largest city to the south, Naples.?? Also, the fact that the Pacelli family was Roman did not escape Tittmann's attention. Writing to Washington about the pope's desire for a declaration that Rome was an open city, Tittmann made the most unflattering comment about the Vatican of his entire years of service there: "As the war closes in on Italy, one is impressed, although hardly surprised, by the increasing vividness with which the underlying Italianate character of the Holy See is being revealed."78 Ambassador Weizsacker, quoting a Catholic colleague in the diplomatic corps, wrote similarly: "The curia is the most Italian of all institutions and the most Italian characteristic is fear."79 In April 1943, the Peruvian ambassador to the Vatican said that Pope Pius was not so much thinking of peace negotiations in his Christmas address "as to the position of the cities of Italy, particularly Rome, in view of the constant air attacks and the announcement of their ceaseless repetition, made continuously from London." Consequently, he said, the Holy See was continually pursuing open-city status for Rome.80 The problem was that the Germans were using Rome and its transportation facilities for their war effort. In June 1943, President Roosevelt explained that Rome could not be declared an open city until the Germans left.81 Once the Mussolini government was in disgrace, the Romans looked to Pope Pius to save them "as if," Ambassador Weizsacker wrote, "the Germans, the Italians, and the Allies will all obey him."82 After the Allies occupied Rome, Pope Pius asked General Alexander to declare Rome an open city and remove Allied forces. The "general gave the final quietus to the Open City obsession by telling the pope that it was a matter that he could not discuss."83

Avoiding a Communist uprising in Rome. Even if Pius had succeeded in having Rome accepted as an open city, he would still have been apprehensive about communism. The pope believed that in the interlude between the German evacuation and the Allied occupation, Bolshevik insurgents had a perfect window of opportunity to seize power. This problem-to some extent imaginary-occupied Pius XII's mind just before and after the razzia. Communist bands near Rome might attack the city, Pius worried, if they were not controlled after the Germans evacuated.84 Pius contacted Osborne to ask if the Germans and the Allies might not be willing to cooperate to shut out the feared Communists.85 The pope still had this on his mind three days after the razzia, so he asked the Germans to increase their military presence in Rome to thwart the Italian partisans he suspected of being Communists (and some were).86 In the event of a Nazi seizure of Vatican City, Pope Pius did not intend to defend himself, but he very much intended to do so if it came to blows with the Communists. To this end, between September and December 1943, the Vatican increased the Holy See's guard from 400 to 1400 men8? and put in an order to the Swiss firm that manufactured machine guns for the German army for twenty automatic rifles and 60,000 cartridges.88 Pope Pius wanted a greater German police presence in Rome because he feared the partisans could open the door to a general uprising that the Communists would exploit. Pius found himself obliged "to identify the security of the [German] occupiers with that of the Holy See."89 Pius wanted order-German order-in Rome for as long as the Germans occupied the city. In March 1944, 320 Italian hostages were murdered by German authorities, Kappler and others, at the Ardeatine Caves outside the city. The editor of L'Osservatore Romano wrote a "vibrant protest" against the massacre, but Pope Pius revised the piece in such a way as to make the partisans the guilty party instead of the Germans.90 During these months, Pope Pius undoubtedly thought back to his days as Nuncio Pacelli in Munich when he stared down a gun-toting revolutionary during the Kurt Eisner Communist uprising at the end of World War I. But the situation in Italy differed from that of postwar Germany in 1919. Communist Party secretary Palmiro Togliatti promised in April 1944 to support a government of national unity comprised of all major parties. Togliatti kept his word, but Pius distrusted him from the beginning. As soon as the Allies occupied Rome, Pius asked them, as he had asked the Germans, to provide ample security for Rome. In the critical days of October 1943, Pope Pius thought and worried a great deal about Communists, perhaps much more so than about Jews.

Preventing the Germans from seizing Vatican City and the pope. If the pope had sharply protested the seizure and deportation of Ro man Jews on October 16th or immediately thereafter, it is quite possible that an enraged Hitler would have given orders to invade Vatican City and abduct Pius XII. That is exactly what Weizsacker meant by "Is it worth it ... to put all at risk?" In the absence of a papal protest, Berlin anxiously awaited the word of approval from the Vatican regarding the proper conduct of German soldiers in Rome. On October 18th, Ambassador Weizsacker went to Cardinal Maglione's office and, finding that the secretary of state was still fretting about the razzia, wondered whether the moment was opportune to press for the statement of good German conduct.91 Weizsiicker got what Berlin wanted; the assurance of good conduct came on October 19th as 1,000 Roman Jews were en route to Auschwitz.92 Thereafter the Vatican continued to deal warily with the unpredictable German dictator. But by the end of the fateful month of October, Pius felt optimistic that the Germans would leave Rome without taking him prisoner.93

5) Protecting the remaining Jews in hiding in Rome. Ambassador Weizsacker had warned the Vatican that a strong protest about the razzia could provoke a second roundup of the thousands of Jews still in hiding in Rome. A large number of the remaining Jews, perhaps more than 6,000, found shelter, many in religious properties such as monasteries and convents. But some, a much smaller number, took refuge in properties that belonged to the Vatican although they were not located within Vatican City. Given the number of letters of protection that Weizsacker issued, it is clear that many of the letters went to religious institutions that were not owned by the Holy See. After the razzia, General Stahel and Weizsacker continued to pass out the letters and placards for display in windows.94 Thus, many Jews who went into hiding after the 16th would have found safety in a property that did not belong to the Vatican but had a letter of protection asserting that it did. These properties were not to be violated (searched) because such an action would endanger the pending good conduct pronouncement that Berlin sought from the Holy See. Of course, Weizsacker's action also worked to protect any Jews who had found refuge in Vatican properties. It goes without saying that Pope Pius and secretariat personnel would have been informed of Weizsacker's effort. A few months before the end of the war, Tardini told a member of the U.S. delegation to the Vatican that clergy in Rome had given asylum to approximately 6,000 Jews during the Nazi occupation, from early September 1943 to June 5, 1945. Approximately 180 Catholic religious homes and institutions, including the Lateran and Gregorian universities, offered asylum to Jews, who were thereby rescued and saved from fascists and Nazis.95 If the Vatican protested the October 16th razzia, the Jews yet in hiding might be jeopardized, Weizsacker warned, and the Vatican policy of control would be jeopardized-indeed, probably quashed irretrievably.

Thus, a papal protest on or after October 16th might have resulted in double jeopardy: both the Jews and the Vatican might have been put at risk. In this case, the Vatican's speculation ran toward Germany, not the Allies. Hitler's rage toward the Holy See was still a fresh memory inside Vatican City. Given his volatility, a protest regarding Jews could have set him off, leading to a ruthless attack both on the pope and the remaining Roman Jews, or so the Holy See might have reasonably supposed. Weizsacker, after all, warned that a second roundup was not unlikely in the event of a protest. Actually, seizing the remaining Jews would not have been practical for the Germans. After October 16th, the Jews had acquired new identities and new addresses. About 6,700 survivors of the razzia had intermingled with 200,000 anti-fascist gentiles hiding out in Rome. Ferreting out the Jews posed a virtually impossible task; the SS no longer had a list of Jewish places of residence.96

Those who see a protest in Cardinal Maglione's minute of October 16th and conclude that it stopped the Germans from seizing more Jews are mistaken on two counts.97 First, circumstances made a mass roundup virtually impossible after October 16th, and second, German and Italian fascists continued to seize Jews individually when opportunity arose. At the end of 1943, for example, fascists raided several Vatican properties, including the Oriental Institute, where they seized Jews and gentiles of various political stripes.98 This was not an isolated incident.99 Minister Osborne made this quite clear to the pope. In a remarkable interview with Pius XII two weeks after the razzia, Osborne mentioned several of the points of concern that I have singled out:

On Nov. 1, 1943 the British minister had an audience with Pope XII. The pope was concerned about food. Wanted the Allies to bring in provisions because the Germans would probably take all the     food with them. The result would be famine and disorder in the city, the pope believed. Pope Pius XII was concerned about the period after the Germans left and before the Allies came in. The minister said that the Germans were not obeying the "open city" status of Rome .... [They were] arresting Italians and "applying their usual merciless methods of persecution of the Jews." I said it was the opinion of a number of people that the [pope] underestimated his own moral authority and the high respect in which it was held by the Nazis because of the Catholic population of Germany; I added that I was inclined to share this opinion and I urged him to bear it in mind if push came to shove during the transition period. Conversation then turned to Russia and I mentioned that Stalin was now allowing the orthodox religion. He then reiterated the usual anxieties in respect of Communism to which I replied that Communism was derived from economic conditions that were the responsibility of the governments of individual countries and was not a political infection disseminated from Moscow.100  

During the audience, Minister Osborne clearly stated that the Germans continued to molest individual Jews as opportunity arose. Except for the last concern about the Jews on my list, all of the pope's issues of control related to the physical continuation of the city of Rome and safety of the Holy See. Had the pope protested the October 16th razzia, Pius might have lost control over all the five issues he was concerned about, at least in his mind. So he did not protest. But which of the five issues was paramount in his thinking? The answer to that question is unequivocal: saving the city of Rome, not the Jews.

The preservation of a city seems trivial and petty in the face of the Holocaust. But in the mind of Pius XII, Rome, the Eternal City, anchored the faith of Catholics around the world. Pius believed that Rome, in his mind the birthplace of Christianity, symbolized the visible church for Catholics worldwide. If the heart of Christendom were to be destroyed (or seized by Communists) the faith of Catholics would also fall. Pius never said this to any diplomat, nor did anyone in the secretariat do so. But he confided it in a letter to Bishop Preysing, who wanted the pope to speak out against the Holocaust.101 Thus, when Pius XII addressed the issue directly about why he kept silent after the razzia, he pointed to concerns about the safety of the city, not the safety of the remaining Jews. An American who had an audience with the pope three days after the razzia reported that Pius worried about the possible destruction of Rome because of the war and about a possible Communist insurrection. He did not mention Jews.102 On October 11th, Maglione had mentioned the same priorities to Osborne.103 Gerhart Riegner saw in the letter to Bishop Preysing the true reason for Pius XII's failure to speak out after the 1942 Christmas address. His perception was squarely on the mark.104

When the Germans seized Rome's Jews on October 16th, all of the issues of control crowded together simultaneously in Pius XII's thoughts. It is a mistake to isolate anyone of the issues, such as the famous Weizsacker-Maglione meeting or the Hudalletter, from the others. Certainly, the circumstances surrounding the entire razzia, including its prelude and aftermath, are devilishly complex and challenging for historians. The facts, however, point to an interpretation that is consistent with Pius's policy of control. The pope moved immediately after October 16th to solidify his control of events that affected, or potentially affected, the city of Rome. On October 19th, the Vatican publicly acknowledged the good behavior of German troops in Rome (as requested by Berlin), asked for more German police to control Communists in Rome, and pressured the United States to give assurances that Allied troops would not attack the city. An additional week and a half passed before L'Osservatore Romano printed the Vatican's reaction, such as it was, to the razzia.

Unraveling the several interweaving threads that Pius XII held in his hands at the critical moment of October 16, 1943, is a complex process. Still, it is clear that an out-and-out protest would have meant loss of control of the issues that were important to the pope. Ambassador Weizsacker reported that a few days before the seizure of the Jews, Pius's foremost concern pertained to the safety of Rome.105 What was uppermost in Pius XII's mind immediately after the razzia was concern for Rome, not concern for the remaining Roman Jews. In this regard, no document compares in importance with the letter Pope Pius wrote to Bishop Prey sing in March 1944. Prey sing's letter of the previous March had precisely addressed the issue of the Jewish plight versus physical destruction by aerial bombardment. Terrible as the air raids were, Preysing wrote, what was happening to Berlin's Jews was worse. Five months later Pius, XII faced exactly that situation. Speaking out to protest the October 16th roundup would likely or, at least possibly, have led to a Roman Stalingrad. Pius XII would not allow the Eternal City to be destroyed if he could prevent it. No document in the eleven volumes of Actes et Documents addresses the Holocaust issue as directly as the March 1944 letter to Preysing; in no other document does Pope Pius himself address the issue so directly, and in no other document does the mind of Pius XII reveal itself so clearly and unambiguously.

When Pius got around to answering Preysing's letter of March 1943, he began by saying that Presying's "eight letters of 1943 and five letters of 1944" were at hand. Preysing had presumably been urging (perhaps even pressing) the pope about the murder of the Jews. (My indefiniteness here derives from the fact that the editors of Actes et Documents omitted nearly all of Preysing's letters. Of course, it is possible that the Vatican purged the letters prior to the editors' work.) Pius told Preysing that he had two reasons for not allowing Rome to be endangered, a reference to what he felt would happen if he protested the roundup of Jews. First, "in consideration of Catholics worldwide [it is] a matter of conscience for Us" to protect the city because of the "uniqueness of the Holy City in the history of mankind." Rome had been the center of "Christendom since the beginning of the church of Jesus Christ," and it was that "distinction and purpose which gave the city its special character." Second, Pius said that he had to keep Rome out of the war to preserve his impartiality among Catholics on both sides of the conflict. In this letter, Pope Pius made clear that preventing bombardment of Rome was more important to him than protecting the city's Jews.106

If, as I have argued, the threat of German retaliation was the critical factor governing Pope Pius during the fall crisis involving the Roman Jews, then he must have felt greatly relieved when the Allies became Rome's occupational force in June of 1944. Most important, the turnabout in occupying forces had been accomplished with almost no destruction within the Eternal City. Myron Taylor found that Pius, once free of Nazis, was now "eager to co-operate in the endeavor to save Jewish lives." Pius said that "neither history nor his conscience would forgive him if he made no effort to save at this psychological juncture further threatened lives. "107 It is impossible to say what Pius meant by "this psychological juncture," but the threat of the murder of over half a million Hungarian Jews in 1944 would become a test of the pope's new resolve.

The onset of genocide in Hungary came upon the Jews with terrible swiftness. The Germans occupied the country in mid-March and by July nearly 300,000 Jews had been transported to Auschwitz and gassed and cremated there. Several reasons accounted for the swiftness of the genocide. I have described these along with the conflicting advice from bishops within Hungary-some favoring supporting the Jews, others favoring doing nothing to hinder the Germans-in The Catholic Church and the Holocaust.108 Here I concentrate on Pius XII and his resolve "to ... save threatened lives." To be successful, Pius needed to overcome the resistance to act of the primate of Hungary, Justinian Sen?di-a resistance rooted in obstinacy or indifference or indecision.

From March to July, Seredi heard from Endre Hamvas, the bishop of Csanad, who told the primate that it was painful to see the Jews herded here from Zenta, Magyarkanizsa and Zombor. About two thousands of them had to leave their homes hastily with little packs on their backs. The local authorities did not know where to accommodate them on short notice, thus they have been put up for the time being in the synagogue, the Jewish school and the pigpens of the salami factory (the latter have been standing empty for several months). Sometimes up to 80 persons are crammed into a school room, men women, children and aged people together.109

Then, in June, Bishop Hamvas publicly protested the deportation of hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people, among whom were "innocent children, defenseless women, helpless old and pitifully sick persons."110 But in May, a higher-ranking bishop, Archbishop Gyula Czapic of the diocese of Eger, had counseled Seredi "that what is happening to the Jews at the present time is nothing but appropriate punishment for their misdeeds in the past." 111 Clearly, opinion about what the Hungarian Church should do about the predicament of the country's Jews was sharply divided. Which direction would the primate take? One thing is certain: unlike Archbishop Johannes de Jong, who on his own authority had challenged the occupying German administrators about Dutch Jews in 1943, Seredi did not act independently and decisively.

Voices outside Hungary also advised Cardinal Seredi. In March, the War Refugee Board, which Franklin D. Roosevelt had created very belatedly in January 1944 to coordinate efforts to rescue Jews, urged Pius XII to become involved in saving Hungarian Jews. The War Refugee Board quickly learned that the Vatican had already told the representatives of the Holy See in Hungary to "do everything possible for the relief of the Jews." 112 The principal representative of the Vatican in Hungary was Nuncio Angelo Rotta, who strongly sided with the Hungarian bishops who were urging the primate to speak out on behalf of the Jews. In June, Rotta told Cardinal Seredi in the name of the pope that what was happening to the Jews was "abominable and dishonorable."113 On the first day of the deportation of Jews, the nuncio contacted members of Regent· Miklos Horthy's government, telling them that "the whole world knows what deportation means in practice." Rotta told them that he protested in his official position as the apostolic nuncio.114 On June 8, Rotta challenged Cardinal Seredi as intensely as he had the government, asking the primate why the Hungarian bishops were not confronting the government. At this, the cardinal became incensed. What is the "utility of the Apostolic Nuntiature in Budapest" which "does nothing and nobody knows if it ever did anything?" he asked.115

Although Pius had resolved to do what he could to save the Jews, he required a good bit of prodding before he finally intervened toward the end of June. One source of pressure came from the Auschwitz Protocol. In April, two Czechs, Rudolph Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, escaped from Auschwitz and made their way to Slovakia, where they divulged in great detail the operations of the death camp. Vrba and Wetzler's information was corroborated by other escapees. When authorities in Slovakia became convinced of the truth of what the escapees told them, they drew up what became known as the Auschwitz Protocol, translated it into German and Hungarian, and circulated it in Europe. Authorities in Switzerland gave it wider circulation and credence because of a cover letter by prominent Protestant churchmen, including Karl Barth and W. A. Visser t'Hooft.116 When a copy of the Auschwitz Protocol reached the Vatican, the pope sent a messenger to Bratislava to verify its authenticity, even though he had known for well over a year that Jews were being gassed en masse. The Auschwitz Protocol subjected Pope Pius to the same kind of pressure he had felt late in 1942 when the United Nations decried the murder of the Jews. Undoubtedly, the pope did not want to find himself trailing behind the denunciations of other voices and institutions about the events in Hungary. The king of Sweden had, in fact, already urged Regent Honhy to stop the persecution.117

In addition, a number of people appealed directly to Pius. The chief rabbis of Palestine, Isaac Herzog and Ben-Zion Meir Uziel; the War Refugee Board; the Archbishop of Westminster at the behest of the British World Jewish Council; and Archbishop Edward Mooney at the behest of Leon Kubowitzki of the United States as well as others prodded Pius to do something. He finally sent Regent Horthy an open (public) telegram on June 25, urging him to "do everything in his power to save as many unfortunate people [as possible] from further pain and sorrow."118 The appeal to Honhy, historian Randolph Braham has written, was weak-a "discreet diplomatic appeal" that did not mention the Jews by name.1l9 Furthermore, it was not pain and sorrow but death that faced the Jews. And the pope's message was sent "three weeks after the liberation of Rome by the Allies, when any threat of German attack on the Vatican was gone. "120 Even though the pope's letter was not as strong as it could have been, Horthy was flooded with letters from around the world, including a very threatening one from President Roosevelt. These outbursts directly led to a cessation of deportations.

The pope's telegram moved Cardinal Seredi to do something at last. In July, when all of the Jews of Hungary were dead except those living in Budapest, Seredi issued a pastoral letter opposing deportations. It is significant that Pius intervened directly with Horthy instead of with the Hungarian bishops through the primate. When Seredi blew up at Nuncio Rotta, he concluded his rant by saying that "it is deceitful for the Apostolic See to carryon diplomatic relations with that German government which carries out the atrocities."121 This statement backed Pope Pius into the corner. It implied that if Rome pushed too hard, Seredi would respond, possibly publicly, by asking why the Vatican still recognized the legitimacy of Nazi Germany. Judging from how the pope dealt with the cardinal after June, it appears that the primate's outburst made Pius resolve to mollify him rather than press him.

The cessation of deportations to Auschwitz proved to be no more than a summer respite. The fall-October-was again fateful, as it had been in Rome the year before. It was then that Frenenc Szalasi, the leader of the fascist Arrow Cross Party, became prime minister and the new government immediately began to persecute the Jews again. Not surprisingly, after the murders in the first half of 1944, the United States and the World Jewish Congress turned again to the Vatican to forestall the killing of the remaining three to four hundred thousand Jews. On October 10, Taylor learned from the state department of "another step in the process of mass extermination" in Hungary. State wanted Taylor to get word to the Holy See because "it would seem that the most impressive means of achieving the purpose of our government to bring this message to the attention of the Hungarian authorities would be through the intercession of the Vatican." 122 Taylor heard the same dire news about extermination of the remaining Hungarian Jews from the London office of the World Jewish Congress, which also appealed direct to Pope Pius to intervene. The U.S. State Department and the British Foreign Office directed Taylor and Osborne to "encourage such a course."123 Pius knew that the news from the west was accurate because Nuncio Rotta had cabled Rome with news of "great cruelty." On October 16, the U.S. State Department again asked that the Holy See communicate through Rotta the Allied warning to Hungarian authorities to stop cooperating with the German deportations.124 Two days later, the U.S. asked the Holy See to communicate to the German ambassador the intention of the Allies to hold those responsible for the atrocities in Hungary accountable.125 There is nothing in Weizsacker's papers to indicate that the pope conveyed the message. After his audience with Pius on the following day, Taylor cabled Roosevelt that the "pope [would] make a special appeal for the salvation of the Jews in Hungary."126

The Vatican and Rotta kept in steady contact. The nuncio was told of the appeals from all sides for the pope's intervention and instructed to avail himself "of the collaboration of the episcopate" to energize Catholics to practice charity toward the persecuted.127 But here exactly was the rub. The Hungarian episcopate was badly divided. There were those like bishops Morton, Apor, and Hamvas who spoke out distinctly against persecution, but they did not have the ear of the cardinal.128 Pressure from Rome did succeed, however, in nudging Cardinal Seredi to designate Sunday, October 29th, as a national day of prayer on which a collection would be taken up for refugees. Of course, the pope's plea to the episcopate had no effect on Szalasi's fascist regime. But Nuncio Rotta insisted "in the name of the Holy See on an improvement of conditions" for Jews and extracted a statement from Szalasi that the Jews would neither "be deported nor annihilated." 129

The intensity of appeals to the Holy See in October may be taken as an accurate barometer of the danger to the 300,000 to 400,000 Jews remaining in Hungary. Late in the month the Vatican received still another plea from London and Washington, this time for a radio broadcast by the Holy Father to Hungary. Prompted by the War Refugee Board, the State Department told Taylor "urgently to approach the pope with the suggestion that he deliver a broadcast to the people and clergy appealing to them to temporarily conceal Jews and oppose the deportation and extermination of these people to the full extent of their powers." 130 Instead of a radio broadcast, Pius responded, very weakly, by sending a congratulatory word to Seredi for his plan to make October 29th a day of prayer and monetary support for Jews. This was very far indeed from what was asked of the Holy See-a direct appeal by Pope Pius to the Hungarian Catholic people. In early November, Gowen, an assistant to Myron Taylor, sent word that "it was fear of communism that in the fall of that year dissuaded Pope Pius from making a radio broadcast," at the behest of the U.S. War Refugee Board and the U.S. State Department, to save 65,000 Jews about to be deported from Hungary and murdered at Auschwitz-Birkenau.l3l Osborne provided London with a not altogether different but fuller explanation for why the pope turned down the request to give a radio broadcast. Osborne said that if he made such an announcement about Jews in Hungary he would have to make a similar statement regarding "Russian treatment of Poles and Baltic populations." 132 This was surely a hollow excuse. Pius knew very well that the Soviets were not engaged in a Nazi-style genocide or anything like it, and he knew that the Soviet's treatment of Poles could not begin to compare with the bestiality of the Nazis from 1940 to 1943 in occupied Poland.

There is no doubt that Pius XII did more to save the Jews in Hungary than in any other country. In no other instance did he intervene directly with a foreign government. Even though by that time it was clear that Germany would lose the war and that Rome was out of Hitler's reach, credit must be given for his intervention. In the end, although about 450,000 Hungarian Jews perished, some of the credit for saving the remaining 30 percent of the Jewish population belongs to Pius XII. (Of course, this leaves unattended the question of his silence before the deportation of the 450,000.) The fact remains, however, that he could have done more. As before, the Vatican remained passively active regarding Jewish concerns. His failure to appeal directly by radio to Hungarian Catholics left some of them uninhibited in their rapaciousness-forcing starving Jews to pay usurious prices for bread or taking clothes for bread for in the winter months when the Arrow Cross Party had begun again with persecution.

The Vatican received detailed information from a Hungarian priest about the pitiable condition of the Jews-children and the elderly whipped and dragging "themselves along starving, frozen, limping" twenty or thirty kilometers a day without food or a place to sleep at night. (This letter was omitted from Actes et Documents.)133 During the last months of their torture, Nuncio Rotta worked heroically to save them and alleviate their suffering (for which he was later named Righteous Gentile among the Nations by Yad Vashem). Once the Vatican supported his work with a donation of an unspecified amount, but the initiative for helping the Jews was Rotta's alone; he received no instructions from the Vatican for his relief work. 134 American Jews continued to appeal to the Vatican for more intervention by the Holy See late in December 1944. The Vatican replied that it was no longer possible for the pope to be in contact with Nuncio Rotta. Instead, Monsignor Tardini instructed the nuncio to Germany to recommend that the Nazis follow principles of "humanity and justice" regarding the Hungarian Jews. Clearly it was disingenuous for Pope Pius to have such a message sent to Nazis in Berlin knowing, as he had for some time, that their murderous agenda left no inch of room for humanity and justice.135 His success in Hungary notwithstanding, Pius XII missed a wide-open opportunity to join with Nuncio Rotta in a determined effort to end the misery of the Jews.

In this and the previous chapter we have looked closely at the perennial theme of Pius XII and the Holocaust. Several threads run through the war years that distracted the pope from attending first and foremost to genocide. Separately the threads appear as single twisted snarls that kept the pope from attending to what we generally today, more than a half century later, believe should have been his principal preoccupation. But together the threads weave a pattern that was the pope's actual principal preoccupation-preserving the Church. That preserving a Church that had not had its finest hour in the service of humanity would leave it indelibly stained was not a thought that came to him.

Preserving the Church meant protecting it from communism, meant preserving concordats, meant saving its architectural and artistic treasures in the Eternal City. The pope's mind dwelled on these concerns. When the Nazis reigned over most of Europe, Pius, as we will see, considered how Catholics could survive by emigrating to South America. Then, when Germany's war fortunes flagged, he thought about how Nazis could emigrate to Argentina and be useful against communism. While genocide was under way, he gave audiences to various people, some of whom were Nazi collaborators, to work on these strategies-correspondence about which we do not read a word in Actes et Documents.

When the war came to Italy, Pius XII was very proactive in his efforts to save the structures of the Eternal City while remaining passively active with regard to that city's Jews. The result was near-total success for the buildings but only very partial success for the Jewish people. There can be only one reason for the whimpering, absurd plea in the final months of the Holocaust for the Nazis to treat Jews "justly and humanely":

Pope Pius did not want to place the concordat at risk with the end of the Nazi regime so close at hand. Only when his moral authority was called into question in 1942 did the pope speak out in his Christmas address. Whether staving off genocide or staving off challenges to his authority was his first objective we do not yet know. In short, we must come to the realization that Pius XII had a number of concerns on his mind other than the destiny of the Jews. Certainly one of them was communism in Italy, which not only threatened the country's Christian way of life but also the financial foundation of the Vatican.

By adding English language sources, underneath we ad to the content of Pope and Devil (Papst und Teufel) by Herbert Wolf and "Nazis auf der Flucht" by Gerald Steinacher about the Nazi flight and its Vatican connection. The Vatican’s War P.1.

In Mystici Corporis Christi of 1943, the Vatican indicated that if Jews did not convert, their destiny layout of the reach of the Church because they had broken the covenant. Thus when the Archbishop of Belgium was asked to "pls.say something" in regards to the more than twenty five thousand Jews that were incarcerated around the corner from his own palace, in order to be gassed in Auschwitz; that this was "not the Church's business".* The Vatican’s War P.3.

First mentioned in our From Belgium to Kosovo Research, we also will present the final information regarding among others, Ante Pavelic and so on. The Ustasa's gold: The Vatican’s War P.4.

In 1942 Pius XII counting on a envisioned a postwar Eastern Europe anchored by a bloc of countries-a constellation like that of the AustroHungarian Empire, which earlier in the century had embraced Croatia. Hungarians, Austrians, and Croats had once been the bulwark of Europe that held off the infidel Muslim. Might not they now form a bulwark against the new infidel-the atheist Soviets? The Vatican’s War P.5.

During the years after World War II, Pius XII believed that a military showdown between the Soviet Union and the west would occur. If that were to happen, it would have his blessing. The Nazi/Vatican Connection P.6.

 

1. Acta Apostolicae Sedis 35 (1943): 165-171. The Italian reads "destinati talora, anche senza propria colpa, a costrizioni sterminatrici" (167). This message was given in February; the June address is discussed below. The February message was not public and was not picked up by the press.

2. ADSS, 9:274. The date was May 5, 1943. Maglione, in speaking about the gassing of the Jews, referred to them vaguely as "persons."

3. ADSS, 9:291.

4. ADSS, 9:287-289.

5. Ibid.

6. Ibid.

7. Ibid.

8. Owen Chadwick, Britain and the Vatican during the Second World War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986),213.

9. On the central role of Tardini in shaping the pope's policies, see Peter Godman, Hitler and the Vatican (New York: Free Press, 2004), 96 and passim.

10. Paul O'Shea referred to the encyclical in "Confiteor. Eugenio Pacelli, the Catholic Church and the Jews. An Examination of the Responsibility of Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust, 1917-1943" (Ph.D. diss., Macquarie University, January 2004),76.

11. According to Richard Rubenstein's cognitive dissonance theory, Pope Pius did indeed wish for the death of the Jews; see Richard L. Rubenstein and John K. Roth, Approaches to Auschwitz, rev. ed. (Louisville, Ky.: Westminster Press, 2003), 339. For a theological explanation of Mystici Corporis Christi that emphasizes the nonracist character of the encyclical, see Robert A. Krieg, Catholic Theologians in Nazi Germany (New York: Continuum, 2004), 168-170.

12. "Pope Bids Nations Obey Laws of War," New York Times, June 3, 1943,5.
The Times gave this story greater play than it had done earlier for the pope's Christmas address. The pope's emphasis in the June address was not on the murder of Poles "and others" but on the hostage situation. Regarding the phrase "people sometimes dying," see Zuccotti, "L'Osservatore Romano and the Holocaust, 1930-1945," Holocaust and Genocide Studies 17, no. 2 (2003): 265.

13. Harold H. Tittmann to U.S. State Department, paraphrased by Leland Harrison, Box 23, RG 84, location 350/68/25/02, NARA.

14. Zuccotti, Under His Very Windows, see chapter 10.

15. Ibid., 150-152.

16. Chadwick, "Weizsaecker, the Vatican, and the Jews of Rome," 186. During this time, fall 1943, the only conflict between the Vatican and Ambassador Weizsacker occurred when Under-Secretary of State Montini came to believe that 6,000 Italians were to be taken as hostages and killed because six Germans had been executed. The hostage report turned out to have no basis in fact and, in any event, did not concern Jews.

17. Robert Katz, The Battle for Rome: The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans, and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003), 106.

18. Louis P. Lochner, ed., The Goebbels Diaries, 1942-1943, translated and introduced by the editor (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1948); see the entry for July 27, 1943.

19. Pasqualina Lehnert, Ich durfte Ihm Dienen (Wiirzburg, 1983), 121.

20. Tittmann, Vatican City, to State Department, October 28, 1943, Decimal File 740.0011, M982, Reel 164, RG 59, NARA.

21. "Abroad: Italy Has Become Hitler's Last Scapegoat," New York Times, September 11, 1943, 12.

22. Records of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt, September 26, 1943, reel 37, CAHS-USHMM.

23. Leonidas E. Hill, III, "The Vatican Embassy of Ernst von Weizsacker, 19431945," Journal of Modern History 39, no. 2 (June 1967): 146.

24. Ibid., 147. Hill's source for this information is the affidavit of K. G. Wollemweber, book 9, unpublished materials prepared by the defense, Weizsacker's trial, "U.S. Military Tribunal, IV (IVa), Niirnberg, case no. 11, U.S. vs. Ernst Weizsacker et al," IMT Documents, Blue Set.

25. Hill, "The Vatican Embassy of Ernst von Weizsacker," 147.

26. Albrecht von Kassel, "The Pope and the Jews," in Storm over "The Deputy," ed. Eric Bentley (New York: Grove Press, 1964), 74.

27. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 63.

28. David Kertzer, The Popes against the Jews: The Vatican's Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2001).

29. David S. Wyman, The Abandonment of the Jews: America and the Holocaust, 1941-1945 (New York: Pantheon Books, 1984),238.

30. Zuccotti thinks this route would have been effective; see Under His Very Windows, 157.

31. Ibid., 181ff.

32. Zuccotti disagrees with this analysis and concludes that the Vatican "took no initiatives" to help. Ibid., 187.

33. Richard Breitman, "New Sources on the Holocaust in Italy," Holocaust and Genocide Studies 16, no. 3 (2002): 402-414. It is difficult to explain Kappler's reference to the Vatican's assistance to Jews. He did not mean Roman Jews because they remained in their homes, too unconcerned about danger, prior to the razzia. Kappler may have said this (as Breitman speculates in reference to something else) to dissuade Berlin from going ahead with the razzia.

34. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 76.

35. See the "Fool's Gold" section of the following chapter. U.S. intelligence was aware of the shipment of the Jews' gold to Kaltenbrunner; see OSS report to Donovan, October 5, 1943, Entry 210, Box 304, RG 226, location 250/64/27/04, NARA. Kappler imagined that his 50-kilogram "gift" would help Germany's balance-of-payments problem; see Entry 122, decoded messages from Rome, decode 7256, RG 226, NARA.

36. Breitman, "New Sources on the Holocaust in Italy," 404. Breitman notes that the newly available decodes neither affirm nor deny that Kappler opposed the roundup of Jews.

37. OSS report, n.d., Box 440, RG 84, location 250/64/25/05-06, NARA.

38. Kaltenbrunner to Kappler, October 11, 1943, Entry 122, decoded messages from Rome, decode 7458, October 11, 1943, RG 226, NARA.

39. Kappler distrusted von Kessel and nearly arrested him on charges of treason, but this does not seem to have had anything to do with the Roman Jews; see Albrecht von Kessel, Verborgene Saat. Aufzeichnungen aus dem Widerstand 1933 bis 1945, ed. Peter Steinbach (Berlin: Ullstein, 1992), 274.

40. Breitman, "New Sources on the Holocaust in Italy," 405.

41. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 80.

42. Ibid.

43. Kappler did not cooperate with the German diplomats in their efforts to protect the Jews.

44. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 83.

45. Zuccotti, Under His Very Window, 155. The best accounts of the events of October 16 may be found in Zuccotti, chapter 11, "The Rome Roundup"; and Katz, The Battle for Rome, chapter 7, "Under His Very Eyes."

46. Quoted in Katz, The Battle for Rome, 107.

47. ADSS, 9:509-510.

48. See von Kessel, "The Pope and the Jews," 72. Von Kessel was sympathetic to Pope Pius and therefore had not reason to lie about the letter.

49. Ibid.

50. In later years, Bishop Hudal claimed that he wrote the letter, which is true only in the sense that it was he who put pen to paper.

51. See Peter Godman, Hitler and the Vatican (New York: Free Press, 2004),

125. I discuss Hudal's machinations more thoroughly in chapter 6.

126. For the text of the telegram, see Katz, The Battle for Rome, 107.

127. See Zuccotti, Under His Very Window, 165.

128. Ibid., 162.

129. On many occasions both before and after October 16, Pope Pius spoke with German ambassadors von Bergen and Weizsacker but never brought up the subject of the murder of the Jews, even during the razzia. Pius declined to see Weizsacker. See Hill, Die Weizsacker Papiere.

56. The most remarkable aspect of Harold Tittmann's memoir, Inside the Vatican of Pius XII, is his silence about the events of October 16 and the days thereafter. The reason for the omission is that when he contacted former Delasem head Settimio Sorani to provide details of the Vatican's assistance to the Jews of Rome, he learned from Sorani that such details did not exist. See the next chapter.

57. On this point, Robert Katz, Leonidas Hill, Owen Chadwick, Susan Zuccotti, Paul O'Shea, John Morley, and I are all in agreement. Sanchez concedes that the Vatican's documents put the Holy See in a negative light, but he is unable or does not wish to come to judgment; see Jose M. Sanchez, Pius XII and the Holocaust: Understanding the Controversy (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2002), 146. John Morley discussed the Weizacker-Maglione meeting in detail in Vatican Diplomacy and the Jews during the Holocaust (New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1980), 180-181, and gives the entire text of Maglione's minute. He concluded that the meeting did not constitute a protest.

58. Jane Scrivener, Inside Rome with the Germans (New York: Macmillan, 1945). A few months later, when L'Osservatore Romano criticized the seizure Of additional Jews, Scrivener took special note of it.

59. Zuccotti, "L'Osservatore Romano," 26.

60. Entry 122, decoded messages from Rome, decode 7672, 17/10/43, RG 226, NARA.

61. Breitman, "New Sources on the Holocaust in Italy."

62. Hill, Weizacker Papiere, 355. Katz sees Weizsacker's night letter of October 17 confirming the Hudalletter as "a direct challenge" of the Vatican to Berlin. I disagree with this; Weizsacker's intent was to portray the pope as the best pontiff Berlin could hope for. This is why Jesuit Robert Graham condemned Weizsacker's letter, saying that it ruined Pius XII's reputation. I am puzzled by Katz's interpretation as it does not seem to fit the context of chapter 7, "Under His Very Eyes" in his The Battle for Rome.

63. ADSS, 9:505.

64. Original in ADSS, 9:505-506. Here I am using Robert Katz's translation; see Katz, The Battle for Rome, 104-105.

65. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 105.

66. Diomedes Arias Schreiber to his government, November 24, 1942, Entry 210, Box 419, RG 226, location 250/64/29/06, NARA.

67. Most of this correspondence may be found in Boxes 2433-2435, 2439, 2441, 2448-2449, 2151-2154, 2457-2458, 2461-2463, 2465, 2469, and 24702777, RG 59, NARA. Additional correspondence would be found in London, although English intransigence about responding to the pope's entreaties not to bomb Rome led Pius to work through the Americans.

68. Tittmann, Inside the Vatican of Pius XII, 65-66.

69. Harold H. Tittmann to Secretary of State Cordell Hull, December 31,1942, Entry 1071, Box 29, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

70. Apostolic Delegate Cicognani, Washington, D.C., to Myron Taylor, June 15, 1943, Decimal File 740.0011, M982, Reel 164, RG 59, NARA.

71. James Dunn to Harold H. Tittmann, June 24, 1943, Entry 1071, Box 29, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

72. President Franklin D. Roosevelt to Secretary of State Cordell Hull, June 24, 1943, Entry 1071, Box 29, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

73. Secretary of State Cordell Hull, Washington, D.C., to Apostolic Delegate Cicognani, June 29,1943, Entry 1071, Box 29, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

74. Pius to F. D. Roosevelt, September 6,1943, Decimal File 740.0011, M982, Reel 164, RG 59, NARA.

75. Tittmann, Inside the Vatican of Pius XII, 167.

76. Major General Harry H. Johnson, U.S. Army, Rome, to Harold H. Tittmann, June 25, 1944, Entry 1069, Box 28, RG 59, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

77. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 147.

78. Harold H. Tittmann to Secretary of State Cordell Hull, December 18, 1942, Entry 1071, Box 29, RG 59, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

79. Hill, Weizsacker Papiere, 374.

80. Diomedes Arias Schreiber to his government, December 9, 1942 (copy), Entry 210, Box 419, RG 226, location 250/64/29/06, NARA.

81. Cicognani to Taylor, June 15, 1943.

82. Hill, Weizsacker Papiere, 374.

83. Memo of the British legation to the Holy See, May 31,1945, Entry 1068, Box 7, RG 59, location 250/48/29/01, NARA.

84. OSS report of October 19, 1943, Entry 210, Box 65, RG 226, location 250/64/22/04, NARA.

85. Maglione to British minister Osborne, October 12, 1943, Decimal File 740.0011, M982, Reel 164, RG 59, NARA.

86. Susan Zuccotti, The Italians and the Holocaust: Persecution, Rescue, and Survival (New York: Basic Books, 1987), 133.

87. OSS report of February 21, 1944, Entry 210, Box 327, RG 226, location 250/64/27/07, NARA.

88. Foreign service posts of U.S. State Department, post of May 4, 1944, Entry 3220, Box 23, RG 84, location 350/68/25/03, NARA.

89. Katz, The Battle for Rome, 136.

90.  Ibid., chapter 16, especially 258-260.

91. OSS report, no date, Entry 210, Box 440, RG 84, location 250/64/25/0506,NARA.

92. Ibid.

93. OSS report, October 29, 1943, Box 65, RG 226, location 250/64/22/04, NARA.

94. Zuccotti, Under His Very Windows, 195.

95. Myron C. Taylor, Vatican City, to Secretary of State Edward Stettinius, March 26, 1945, Box 32, Entry 1073, RG 59, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

96. See Zuccotti, Under His Very Windows, chapter 13.

97. Eugene J. Fisher, director of Catholic-Jewish Relations for the Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the National Conference of Catholic
Bishops, wrote that Weizsacker (whom Fisher mistakenly identified as Catholic) communicated Maglione's protest "gently and encouragingly" to Berlin. Fisher assumed incorrectly that this put a stop to the roundups; see "Who Was Pius XII?" in The Holocaust and the Christian World, ed. Carol Rittner, Stephen D. Smith, and Irena Steinfeldt (London: Kuperard, 2000),130-132.

98. Tittmann telegram of January 4, 1944, Decimal File 740.0011, M982, Reel 164, RG 59, NARA.

99. Hill, "Vatican Embassy of Ernst von Weizsacker," 147.

100. Anonymous Foreign Service Post, Box 4 7 General Records, 1944: 840.4-848 Balkans, RG 84, NARA.

101. Pius XII, Vatican City, to Preysing, March 21, 1944, Korrespondenz 19441945, BAB V/16-4, Diocesan Archives, Berlin.

102. Anonymous telegram to J. W. Jones, U.S. State Department, October 19, 1943, Decimal File 740.0011, M982, Reel 164, RG 59, NARA.

103. Maglione to Osborne, October 12, 1943.

104. Gerhart M. Riegner, Niemals Verzweifeln, trans. Michael von Killisch-Horn (Gerlingen: Psychosozial-Verlag, 2001), 164.

105. Hill, Weizsiicker Papiere;353.

106. Pius XII to Prey sing, March 21, 1944. Copies of Presying's letters to Pius are missing from the Berlin diocesan archives except for the one dated March 1943. 107. Records of the U.S. Foreign Office; see U.S. State Department, Foreign Relations of the United States 1944 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1966), 1:1123.

107.  Phayer, The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 104-109.

108. Endre Hamvas to Justinian Sert?dy, May 11,1944, RG 52.009.01 "1, CAHSUSHMM.

110. For the remainder of Hamvas's protest, see Phayer, The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 107.

111. Moshe Y. Herczl, Christianity and the Holocaust of Hungarian Jewry, trans. Joel Lerner (New York: New York University Press, 1993),206.

112. Robert Rozett, "International Intervention: The Role of Diplomats in Attempts to Rescue Jews in Hungary," The Nazis' Last Victims. The Holocaust in Hungary, ed. Randolph L. Braham (Detroit, Mich.: Wayne State University Press, 1998),138.

113.   Ibid., 139.

114. Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of European Jews (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1988),2:838.

115. Randolph L. Braham, The Politics of Genocide (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981),2:1085.

116. Randolph L. Braham, Studies on the Holocaust (Boulder: Rosenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies of the City University of New York and Social Science Monographs of the University of Colorado, 2000), 33-35.

117.  Rozett, "International Intervention," 143.

118. David Kranzler, "The Swiss Press Campaign that Halted Deportations to Auschwitz and the Role of the Vatican, the Swiss and the Hungarian Churches," in Remembering for the Future (Oxford: Pergamon, 1988), 1:162.

119. Braham, Studies on the Holocaust, 57.

120. O'Shea, "Confiteor," 345.

121. Hilberg, The Destruction of European Jews, 388.

122. U.S. Representative to the Advisory Council for Italy A. Kirk to Myron C. Taylor, Rome, October 10, 1944, Entry 1069, Box 4,RG 59, NARA.

123. John. F. Morley, "Vatican Diplomacy and the Jews of Hungary during the Holocaust: October 15, 1944, to the End," paper presented at the Second International Holocaust Conference, Berlin, 1994.

124. Myron C. Taylor, note verbale to the Vatican Secretariat of State, RG 59, Entry 1069, Box 4, NARA.

125. A. Kirk to Myron C. Taylor, October 18,1944, RG 84, location 250/64/25/05-06, Entry 1069, Box 59, NARA.

126. Morley, "Vatican Diplomacy," 5.

127. Ibid., 5-6.

128. Phayer, The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 106-107.

129. Morley, "Vatican Diplomacy," 6.

130. War Refugee Board to Acting Secretary of State Stettinius, October 25, 1944, Box 441, RG 84, location 250/64/25/05, NARA.

131. F. C. Gowen, Vatican City, to Myron C. Taylor, November 7, 1944, Entry 1069, Box 4, RG 59, location 250/48/29/05, NARA.

132. Morley, "Vatican Diplomacy," 10.

133. Ibid., 18.

134. Ibid., 25.

135. Ibid., 20.

 

 

Bibliography and Works Cited

 

For updates click homepage here