Customer Reviews

Liberators [VHS]

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This production has been at the center of controversy that has been raging since before it even first aired on PBS, over twelve years ago.

Key survivors of the 761st (subject of this book), including it's commanding officer were never interviewed for the documentary, and have stated publically that the unit did NOT liberate Buchenwald (or Dauchau for that matter). WNET, the channel that film producers Miles & Rosenburg were associated with in producing this documentary (WNET was given film credit), sponsored an investigation into claims about the 761st made in this film. The investigators concluded that it could "not substantiate the presence of the 761st Tank Battalion at Buchenwald on its day of liberation". WNET subsequently asked Miles and Rosenblum to remove the channel's name from the credits.

The best evidence seems to indicate that it was the 9th Armored Infantry Battalion of the 6th Armored Division of Patton's 3rd Army that first reached Buchenwald. Those actual liberators have been very vocal in demanding corrections to the production be made, to no avail. Their concern is justified since over 1500 men in their unit lost their lives fighting the Germans.

Miles and Rosenblum have been unable to provide any concrete evidence to support their claims about the 761st at Buchenwald or Dachau, except for recollections of a few unit survivors. One of those same surviving soldiers, featured in LIBERATORS (by E.G. McConnell), told Jeff Goldberg of the NEW REPUBLIC, in an interviewed published in February 8, 1993, "It's a lie. We were nowhere near these camps when they were liberated."

Undoubtably somebody does need to tell the story of black units that fought on the side of freedom and justice in WWII. It seems that Miles and Rosenblum may have got carried away but to the detriment of a white unit that paid a heavy price for it's accomplishment in liberating those camps. That's taking affirmative action too far, so I recommend you steer clear of this video.