Roosevelt and the Holocaust

by Robert L. Beir

There is a great debate among historians about Franklin Delano Roosevelt's actions during the Holocaust. Was FDR the hero that defeated the Germans, or did he turn a blind eye to the plight of the Jews as long as he possibly could? In Roosevelt and the Ho

Genres: History, Holocaust, Nonfiction, American History, War, Politics, Jewish

324 pages, Hardcover

First published April 25, 2006

About the author

Robert L. Beir (born 1918) was a dedicated Roosevelt and Holocaust scholar who had amassed a comprehensive private Roosevelt library. In 1984, he was asked by Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr. to join the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute's Board of Directors.

Reviews

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book brought a lot of emotions to the surface. The author does a good job explaining how things were seen n felt in America then both genuinely by most of the public and behind the scenes by more than a select few.
I was happy the book was over as I was becoming furious with my country and it was a bad feeling. I do believe if more ppl knew the full extent of what had and would be happening in Germany and Surrounding countries they would have done more sooner but those who tried to forget what they'd heard even from first hand witnesses and who turned immigrants away to be sent back to die, no matter why (many were trying harder to be Americans than Jews then -such as ppl like the owners of the NY TIMES then- and sadly they're all the ones who should've and could've accomplished the most in regards to getting help to stop that madman and his henchmen ) did irreparable damage to families by the thousands by their acts of omission and I wish they alone had to live with the repercussions but I hope they at least lived with guilt after the war was over and hopefully tried to do good works from then on in some cases.
I can not go into much detail as I read this 5-6 months ago and as I was gobbling up a bunch of books on this topic (finally, being a huge part of our family history) and was not in the habit if checking off on GR after every book I'm just adding it today. It was a worthy read as I learned a lot about how things were in the USA during that time and in regards to the war and many times it was more than I wanted to know or at least not what I hoped or expected to learn..which was that no one here had any way to know what was going on across the globe or they'd surely have stepped in sooner with rescue efforts. I definitely didn't gain much respect for FDR; Mrs Roosevelt on the other hand is a different story to some degree.
The author did well in relating much of his own life during this time and asking how it was he missed certain articles etc. He was the voice of the common or rather avg American young man at the time...it was a worthy historical read to be sure.

[Jim · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fair warning. You need to get to page 75 before even he starts to talk about Roosevelt And The Holocaust. Up until then, we hear about the author's childhood, school years, young manhood, relationship with his father, a romance he had in England... it just kept going and by the time I was at the chapter before he finally started going into the title topic, I was about to give this book the heave ho. He was going on for a few pages about how his father was like FDR and how they differed.
This book could have used a good editor.
His writing style was not particularly engaging and a few of his "shocking" discoveries are pretty well known by now.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great and disturbing book except the title is not accurate

The title should have been “Roosevelt and the Holocaust: how FDR and even with Eleanor could not save the Jews and could not bring Hope to a nation“
This is a 2000-year-old story: the story of antisemitism. Antisemitism began in sibling rivalry, between the ancient Jewish religion in Israel and the rise of Christianity. As Christianity, triumphed, especially under Saint Paul, that triumph was achieved through antisemitism, one of the most dramatic cases of “us versus them.”
For 2000 years, much of official Christianity continued to vilify Jews with lies that were repeated so much and so often that they came to be believed by the general populace. More recently, the religious part of the rivalry has shifted from Christianity against the Jews to Muslims against the Jews. Moreover, and more importantly, this rivalry was aided and embedded by corporations and dictatorships. Dictators have held on to their corrupt power and wealth through creating hatred. George Orwell wrote about this phenomenon superbly in his masterpiece “1984” whether it’s political dictatorships or corporations. The themes remain the same, that is, power and money. Corporations feed the hatred of the poor by giving the poor something else to focus on other than greedy, corporate profits.
Robert Beir’s book ends pessimistically. Unfortunately, his pessimism is well founded and is likely to continue to be so. We are living in scary times. Our founding fathers wisely developed our country and its constitution with built-in checks and balances, recognizing that if any one branch of government had too much power it would be corrupted. Two mistakes were made. One was not to consider corporate power as an entity that would rival government power where checks and balances would be just as important between government and corporations. The second mistake was that corporate power corrupted government, such that even government checks and balances have now broken down. We know by the history of lynching in our country that one rule of psychology is that when people act within a group, they tend to lose the morality that they would ordinarily demonstrate as individuals. When the Supreme Court issued, its gigantically awful decision in “Citizens United,” it greatly increased the chances of corruption with massive power and immorality. Yet remains to be seen how we will find a way to fix this and restore and build on the ideals that are founding fathers fought for, that Abraham Lincoln fought for, and that all of the Roosevelts, Theodore, Franklin, and Eleanor fought for!

[TJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was not what I expected. Mr. Beir wrote this in his late 80's, which is remarkable in itself. He combines his own life story and his love of Roosevelt starting in his teenage years and into his later years when he was disappointed to learn Roosevelt didn't do much, certainly not what he could have, to help the Jewish people before and during WWII. It was like reading your own grandpa's memoir.

[Nkwright · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very thought provoking book

I recommend this book to anyone who has read or wondered about the holocaust and wondered how it happened. Why didn’t the world stop it. If you only read a little bit make sure you read the last chapter.

[Christina Asher · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great read. I learned so much from it. I was amazed at just how much work was done behind the scenes. I personally enjoyed reading about Beir life it felt like my grandfather was telling me a story.

[Megan Dyson · Rating 4 out of 5]

this was such a good book and such a great story. I learned so much about history and the time frames to which things happened. the writer has such a compelling story I just wish he wrote it sooner. I have sympathy for the author as anyone would and understand how he views FDR in such a light. this is hard to read a points due to the graphic nature of the history but anyone who is a history buff should read this

[Tomi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a different look at FDR and the Holocaust. It raised a lot of difficult questions; although first published in 2006, those questions remain unanswered (and need to be!).

[Gary Mullennix · Rating 5 out of 5]

We know too little, we do too little, we ignore too much.

I'm 74. I'm not Jewish. But, I've been aware for decades of Man's capacity for great evil acted out in the name of good. Anti Semitism has been with us since the Gospel of John, the advent of the Holy Roman Empire, the writing of the Koran and Islam's Hadith's, the writings of Luther to burn all Synagogues to the ground, Hitler's black immorality and today's war against the State of Israel.

Out of 7,000,000,000+ humans, there are 14 million Jews. Why must they live in fear? With all else there is to do to advance humanity, solve large problems and enjoy all that life can offer, why are so many people so dedicated to the furtherance of the idea of the Final Solution?

Mr. Beir cannot answer those questions. But he can artfully ask them and historically describe the insufferable horror millions of Jews have experienced and the shredding of human morality in prosecuting that end.

If you choose to read this extremely well written book, you'll know far more than you did even if you think yourself informed. And, you'll come across a handful of extra ordinary people whose actions were heroic. You'll also find those, too many, who either stood idly by or implicitly supported the deaths of Germany's enemies.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was interesting on a couple of levels - first of all, it was astonishing to me the amount of blatant anti-antisemitism the author experienced in his own life. As a non-Jew, I spent most of my life sheltered from that attitude, so I had no idea of the extent to which it existed in everyday life in this country.

Second, even though I have studied the history of WWII Germany, I did learn a few details I did not know. It is horrifying to find out about the amount of time wasted (and the amount of lives wasted,) while people met to "discuss" the problem of the exterminations and forming committees and appointing people to deal with the problem, all the while nothing was done! Very frustrating even all these decades later.

I understand that Roosevelt had to look at the big picture - that he thought the best way to end the killings was to win the war - but I still can't help lose my patience with his lackadaisical attitude. The author makes a case for forgiving and supporting Roosevelt. I don't buy it.

[Hadassa Levenson · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a misleading title!! When I opened this book, I though it would be a non fiction review of Roosevelt and his policies and actions related to the Holocaust. While the author does cover that topic, the first third of the book is primarily the author’s personal experiences in that era.
At first I couldn’t get past my anger at being deceived into reading this book, but the truth is some of his stories and experiences were interesting. And at a certain point, the author switched gears and started primarily reviewing FDR- going into detail about his policies (suggested reasons), and reviewing those who surrounded him.
I learned a lot from this book, but in retrospect I wish I first (and maybe only) read two books on my shelf that he referenced many times: The Abandonment of the Jews and A Race Against Death.

[Jammy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got to read this book for free through Kindle unlimited.
Where do I begin. I thought this was a wonderful book. I learned a lot about World War II, and Roosevelt, which means this book clearly met it's objective.

This book really painted a picture of what it was like in the United States for Jewish people during the war, not a perspective I'd really seen before. Obviously it was nothing here compared to in Europe, but it was still pretty terrible. Being in fights, being kicked out of schools, overlooked for jobs, etc.

My only thing that ruined this book for me is that parts of it jumped around. The author talked about "The night of glass" in Germany several times. Then he would go on to something else, then come back to it. And that's just one example.

[Kenneth Barber · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a memoir of sorts. The author recounts family history and his early life. He recalls his first encounter with antisemitic prejudice. He also encountered prejudice in college and grad school. When the war broke out he joined the navy and served mostly in England and Scotland. The author and his family were strong supporters of FDR and believed he saved the country. After a successful business career, the author had the opportunity to teach a class on FDR. It was during this class that he developed an interest in FDR' s response to the Halocaust. This lead to the writing of this book. Good overview of events and controversies of the issue. Nothing really new to add to the subject, but a very readable account.

[Fredrick Danysh · Rating 3 out of 5]

As anti-Sematism spread in Germany it also spread though out the rest of the world. President Franklin Roosevelt did very little to helps Jews who fled Hitler and turned almost all away from the United States. He was not alone as other countries were doing the same. In American those Jews already in the States faced rampant discrimination. Much of the work is based on the recollections of one Jew who grew up in the USA but unfortantly his recollections reflect the attitude of most Americans.

[Devorah Fox · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eye-opening. Heartbreaking. Hard to read, not because it wasn't well written. It was well-written. Despite the serious, disturbing subject matter, I could not stop reading. Part memoir, and I'm astounded about how much this man remembers of his own life, his early years, in such detail. Part history, which prior to reading this book was just dates and numbers but which now has names, faces. I am glad that Robert Beir wrote this and glad that I read it.

[pat mcclain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Learned things I never know

This is something that should be taught in schools. If I haven't read this book, I would have never known everything about Roosevelt and the Holocaust and how it came to be. Thanks for writing this book.

[Tekgypsy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not so much about Roosevelt

Not so much about Roosevelt as it is an autobiography of the author. Still, it does a good job of indicting that administration of guilt by lack of concern.

[Mark · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found the book very disorganized and more of a personal reflection than historical.

[John Luzier · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent read, writing was a bit stilted at times and a little overmuch explaining of his hero worship of Roosevelt. Still a good read though.