The Wreckage

"In battle, you kept your wits about you. Don't relax that caution now," warned the ominous voice-over in the 1945 training film, Your Job in Germany. "The German lust for conquest is not dead. It's merely undercover." As the Allied powers worked to govern Europe, Jewish American GI's were stationed around the continent. As demobilization - the process of bringing American military personnel home...

Throughout World War II, more than 1,000 American rabbis volunteered to serve their country through chaplaincy service, with more than 300 American Jewish chaplains entering active duty. After the war, sixty of these rabbis remained in Europe and beyond, and were among the first witnesses to the true extent of the atrocities committed by the Nazis in pursuit of "the final solution." The work was a...

In the weeks following V-E Day, the Allied powers were faced with the daunting task of governing Germany and all formerly Nazi-controlled territories. Hitler was dead, the Third Reich had fallen, and it was now up to the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and France to rebuild the continent following the devastation of the war in Europe – all while the war in the Pacific continue...