page_title: Auschwitz bombing debate
section_title: Allied reconnaissance and bombing missions
hierarchical_section_title: Auschwitz bombing debate / Auschwitz: what the Allies knew / Allied reconnaissance and bombing missions
caption_attribution_description: English: Photograph of the German extermination camp at Auschwitz II-Birkenau in occupied Poland, taken by a United States Army Air Force plane on August 25, 1944. Crematoria II and III are visible. For the date of the image and what it shows, see The Case for Auschwitz by Robert Jan van Pelt, 2002, Indiana University Press, p. 175. ISBN 0253340160 The photograph is oriented with south at the top.
context_page_description: The issue of why the Allies did not act on early reports of atrocities in the Auschwitz concentration camp by destroying it or its railways by air during World War II has been a subject of controversy since the late 1970s. Brought to public attention by a 1978 article from historian David Wyman, it has been descried by Michael Berenbaum as "a moral question emblematic of the Allied response to the plight of the Jews during the Holocaust", and whether or not the Allies had the requisite knowledge and the technical capability to act continues to be explored by historians.
context_section_description: Auschwitz was first overflown by an Allied reconnaissance aircraft on April 4, 1944, in a mission to photograph the synthetic oil plant at Monowitz forced labor camp (Auschwitz III).
  On 26 June, 71 B-17 heavy bombers on another bombing run had flown above or close to three railway lines to Auschwitz.
  On July 7, shortly after the U.S. War Department refused requests from Jewish leaders to bomb the railway lines leading to the camps, a force of 452 Fifteenth Air Force bombers flew along and across the five deportation railway lines on their way to bomb Blechhammer oil refineries nearby.
  Buna-Werke, the I.G. Farben industrial complex located adjacent to the Monowitz forced labor camp (Auschwitz III) located 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) from the Auschwitz I camp was bombed four times, starting at 20 August 1944 until 26 December 1944. On December 26, 1944, the U.S. 455th Bomb Group bombed Monowitz and targets near Birkenau (Auschwitz II); an SS military hospital was hit and five SS personnel were killed.
  The Auschwitz complex was photographed accidentally several times during missions aimed at nearby military targets. However, the photo-analysts knew nothing of Auschwitz, and the political and military hierarchy didn't know that photos of Auschwitz existed. For this reason, the photos played no part in the decision whether or not to bomb Auschwitz. Photo-interpretation expert Dino Brugioni believes that analysts could have easily identified the important buildings in the complex if they had been asked to look.
caption: Picture of the Birkenau (Auschwitz II) extermination camp taken by an American surveillance plane on August 25, 1944. Crematoria II and III and the holes used to throw cyanide into the gas chambers are visible.
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