Mysteries in the Archives

1945: Concentration Camps Liberated in Germany (3x8)

Air date: Jan 26, 2013

Germany, April 1945. When the Nazi camps were liberated during the final offensive launched against the German Army, the Allies discovered with horror multiple mass graves and a few starving survivors. A few days before the end of the war, Allied troops advancing on the western front liberate numerous labor and concentration camps - and show the whole world the horrific evidence of Nazi terror. The discovery of the Polish death camps of Majdanek and Auschwitz by Soviet soldiers in July 1944 and January 1945 had hardly caused a stir among the Allies. It was only when the Americans discovered the German camps in Ohrdruf, Buchenwald and Dachau that the full extent of Nazi cruelty was revealed. As an immediate reaction, the three Allied generals made the following three decisions: the immediate and comprehensive documentation of the atrocities the confrontation of the German population with the Nazi crimes the inspection of the camps by other politicians.