At The Front, we try to present history impartially, and that means looking into parts
of history that some would prefer to forget about. In this video, we shine the spotlight on the
often-forgotten atrocities committed by British, French, and US forces in the Rhine Meadow Camps.
As the Allied armies advanced into a collapsing Germany, they picked up streams of POWs. Many
German soldiers realised the war was over for them and voluntarily laid down their weapons in the
months preceding VE-Day. When the war in Europe formally ended on May 8th, the Western Allies
were inundated with surrendered Axis troops. They were mostly Germans, but Hungarians, Austrians,
and other nationalities conscripted by the SS were present too. These POWs were hurriedly squeezed
into any camp that had room, including repurposed concentration camps previously run by the Nazis.
Allied commanders weren’t satisfied with just POWs;
they had been listening to Joseph Goebbels’s Radio Werwolf. The Nazi propaganda minister had been
broadcasting about waging a guerilla war against the Allies as they advanced into Germany. Goebbels
stated, "The enemy will be taken in the rear by the fanatical population, which will ceaselessly
worry him, tie down strong forces[,] and allow him no rest or exploitation of any possible success.”
The minister of propaganda was probably a victim of his own lies, as ‘Werwolf’ units
were undersupplied and strategically useless. But the Allies believed him and were worried sick
that Nazi-aligned militias would start appearing in areas under their control.
Conscription for Volkssturm in the later years of the war also meant that just
about any German man aged between 12 and 70 might have been a combatant.
Concerned about having to fight a Nazi guerilla force, and not about to let possible war criminals
escape justice, the only solution Eisenhower and his commanders could see was mass internment. They
interned just about every military-aged male they found. They also banged up anyone with
particularly strong Nazi ties — including women. Though, they didn’t arrest all Nazi Party members,
as there were several million of them. This internment policy drove the number of camp
prisoners through the roof. By 1945, the Western Allies had interned over 1.6 million people.
The administrative burden of managing such large-scale internment, governing what remained of
Germany, and supplying their own troops stretched the Western Allies' logistical network to
its limit. Something was going to give, and a catastrophe was lurking on the horizon.
Without the ability to steal all the food from its occupied territories as part of a Hunger Plan,
or utilise agricultural slave labour, Germany was headed straight for famine. The war
had cost Germany most of its infrastructure, livestock, and agricultural machinery — much of
which *mysteriously* ended up in the Soviet Union. A run of particularly bad weather made matters
even worse. In 1945, the average German citizen living in a town could only expect to receive
1,000 calories per day, which is less than half of what the average man needs.
As you’d expect, conditions were far worse for those detained in the camps.
The camps administered by the British, French, and US forces were all massively
overcrowded and critically short of desperately-needed resources. For example,
the camp near Remagen was designed for 100,000 people but ended up holding over 184,000.
In the words of Colonel Gordon, a US Army medical officer commissioned to report on the situation,
“The debacle overwhelmed many services of the Army.
German soldiers surrendered by armies; hundreds of thousands within days.
The facilities provided for receiving prisoners of war were wholly insufficient. The enclosures
for prisoners of war met their name. They were cages and little more.”
Overwhelmed Allied administrators quickly lost track of how many camps were in operation,
how many people they held, and even where the camps were. This compounded with
an already-dire supply situation to make matters even worse for the prisoners.
Unable to supply them with adequate food, shelter, or clothing, the first thing Eisenhower did was
rename the POWs to Disarmed Enemy Forces or DEFs. The Brits followed suit, designating their POWs as
surrendered enemy personnel or SEPs. DEFs and SEPs didn’t require the same amount of looking after
that the Geneva Conventions said POWs needed, so the Allies were free to make their own rules.
As soon as they were re-designated, the prisoners had their rations cut back from
the Geneva Conventions' mandated 2,500 calories to between 1,200 and 1,500. A low-calorie diet
like this is fine as an emergency stop-gap measure for healthy adults but was completely
inadequate for those detained in the camps. German fighting units were commonly poorly
supplied in the final weeks of the war, and, as a result, the men were already malnourished.
Many others were sick with all manner of common camp diseases, such as pneumonia, tuberculosis,
and the ever-present dysentery. The Allied wartime blockade severely limited imports, meaning fresh
fruit and veg wasn’t widely available. Records from Rhine Meadow Camp hospitals
suggest that the fresh fruit situation was so bad that patients were admitted with scurvy.
Even though they were built close to the river Rhine, the camps often had dire water shortages.
Colonel Gordon’s report describes “... the amount of water available per man ... [as]
hopelessly small.” This led to major sanitation problems. In one case, the prisoners were forced
to drink water contaminated with faeces because they had nothing else. On the less extreme end,
prisoners had to drink unfiltered river water and water contaminated with fuel
Camp guards also took advantage of their situation. US soldiers were especially well
known for bringing their rations to the women’s enclosures. In return for something to eat,
the women were made to “service” the GIs. Violent rape was also not uncommon.
Most officers chose to look the other way when this happened, with many using the oft-repeated
phrase: “Well their atrocities were MUCH worse anyway.” It was noted that mistreatment and rape
were far *more* common among soldiers who hadn’t seen combat, compared to the veteran units.
On occasion, locals would try to smuggle food, cigarettes, or other supplies to the prisoners.
The guards would generally try to scare them off with a few warning shots, but
if the smugglers persisted, they were shot dead.
Conditions were different, but not much better, in the French sector. The internment camp located
between Bretzenheim and Bad Kreuznach became known as the “Field of Misery”
due to the lack of shelter. Many Axis soldiers had been captured in their summer clothes
and hadn't even received blankets by winter. Reportedly, “... Rains ... turned
the enclosures into a morass and the prisoners into shivering wretches.”
740,000 Germans were transferred by US forces through camps, such as the Field of Misery,
to France for use as forced labour. These prisoners were used as a general labour
source to rebuild French infrastructure and were initially treated as expendable.
Some were even employed in deadly mine-clearance duties in the Alsace region. During the height
of these programs, the French government estimated that roughly 2,000 forced labourers
were being killed in accidents each month. This didn’t hamper the rebuilding effort though.
After all, the French had fresh memories of German atrocities and still saw them as the enemy.
Over time, conditions inside the camps improved. Strengthening supply networks and more
resources helped, but perhaps the most important contribution was from the International Red Cross.
Red Cross investigators tried to enter the camps multiple times but were continually denied by
the guards. Eventually, a few managed to sneak in and reported their findings for the world to see.
Back at home, many firmly believed that the Germans were getting what they deserved,
and the Red Cross became the only institution working to improve the prisoners' situation.
After constantly badgering Allied command, the Red Cross was finally permitted to send aid
packages into camps in February 1946. The packages became a critical addition to the food supply and
likely contributed heavily to the survival of hundreds, if not thousands, of prisoners.
Not stopping there, delegates from the Red Cross fought hard to get better sanitation,
water supplies, blankets, shelters, and heating
for the Rhine Meadow Camp prisoners. Their constant pressure gradually swayed the
commanders to improve conditions. Honestly, they’re the only heroes in this sad story.
The chaos that ensued after the Third Reich collapsed made it extremely difficult to
accurately track people's movements. Even worse, the four occupying armies didn’t share a common
language or ideology, and there was no central authority administering the POWs. We don’t know
exactly how many people passed through the Rhine Meadow Camps, or exactly how many died. But we
do know the death toll in the US sector could have been as high as 56,000. Accounting for POW
deaths in the British and French sectors as well, it may have been even higher.
The story of the Rhine Meadow Camps and what happened to Germany post-war
has become extremely politicized, especially by the far-right.
These pseudo-scholars have accused the Western Allies of murdering several million Germans
and even of deliberately trying to ethnically cleanse Germans from Germany. This is absurd.
The horrors of the Rhine Meadow Camps will never come close to the scale of the Holocaust.
Other sources claim the Allies did no wrong, and only a few thousand already-sick prisoners died.
This is equally absurd. What happened in the Rhine Meadow Camps was an atrocity,
and it deserves to be remembered as such.
That was the sad and too-often forgotten story of the Rhine Meadow Camps,
the Western Allies great shame post-World War Two. But what do YOU think? Did YOU know about
the scale of the internment? How would YOU have managed the food situation in Germany?
Do YOU think Eisenhower should cop all the blame? Let us know in the comments!