Enough with the excuses. The names of the alleged Nazi war criminals should be released

 

Jared McBride is an assistant professor in history at the University of California, Los Angeles. Per Rudling is an associate professor in history at Lund University in Sweden.

With the noise of the U.S. election serving as a distraction, the Canadian government released its long-awaited decision on disclosing a secret report with the names of alleged Nazi war criminals on Nov. 5. The report was part of the 1986 Commission of Inquiry on War Criminals in Canada, known as the Deschênes Commission report, which looked into alleged Nazi war criminals who settled in Canada after the Second World War. Unsurprisingly, Library and Archives Canada (LAC) decided 40 years of silence was not yet enough, and the public would have to continue to wait to read this already dated investigation. In doing so, LAC and the Canadian government added another chapter of obfuscation and obstruction to this decades-old story.

Only in early September did it become known that LAC had quietly held meetings with “discrete group of individuals or organizations” over the summer to determine whether portions of the Deschênes Commission report, particularly the suspect name lists, could be released to the public. Though various constituencies were at the meeting, they forgot to invite two groups: Holocaust survivors and experts, which would include historians and legal specialists. In the wake of this revelation, another round of public debates ensued, most of which have been a retread of decades-old arguments. We have already provided a public call for the release of these records (as many have), but here we would like to address arguments against the release that have appeared in recent months.

The most consistent argument in defence of keeping the archives closed is that of privacy and potential harm to national security. When groups like the Ukrainian Canadian Congress continually refer to privacy and harm concerns, they might strengthen their argument by showing concrete examples of the harm done when the U.S. government declassified tens of thousands of pages related to Ukrainian activities during the Second World War. The 1998 Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act led to the release of a treasure trove of documents in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Anyone can walk into American archives and review FBI, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, CIA, and U.S. Army documents that touch upon Ukrainian (and other groups’) complicity in the Holocaust and even the co-operation of some nationalist groups with the Nazi regime. In fact, you do not need to leave your seat to read some of these names – one can simply search the CIA database online.

As for potential harm to governments, you will find very few making the argument that releasing these records embarrassed or harmed the United States; on the contrary, this openness and transparency has, arguably, strengthened civic society by allowing historians and journalists to initiate healthy and productive discussion about the role the CIA and other U.S. agencies played in sheltering potential war criminals in the early Cold War. The releases have resulted in numerable academic publications on several topics, which continue to this day. One can find thousands of citations to these records in a range of academic studies.  (more...)

Enough with the excuses. The names of the alleged Nazi war criminals should be released