Recently a photograph taken of U.S. Marines in September 2010 spread from the internet to newspapers and the TV news. It showed 10 members of Charlie Company, 1st Reconnaissance Battalion, a scout sniper unit, in Afghanistan posing in front of the American flag. Underneath the American flag was a large banner with the Nazi ‘SS’ insignia.
The photograph caused quite a shitstorm of protests, especially from Jewish groups. At first the Marine Corps announced that it did not plan any discipline because there was no malicious intent. The Marines mistakenly believed the ‘SS’ in the shape of white lightning bolts on the blue banner were a nod to sniper scouts. They did not associate it with the elite Nazi corps, units of which ran Hitler’s death camps.
Rabbi Marvin Hier, head of the respected Simon Wiesenthal Center, was outraged and did not believe the Marines made an innocent mistake. He demanded that President Obama and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta launch another investigation and discipline those involved.
Rabbi Hier said, "That 70 years after the United States Armed Forces helped liberate Europe from Nazi Germany, to learn that a unit of the United States Marine Corps serving in Afghanistan adopted the SS insignia alongside the Stars and Stripes, desecrates the memory of some 200,000 Americans who gave up their lives to defend freedom against that infamous symbol."
Thereupon Panetta asked the Marine Corps to look into the SS banner incident and to take appropriate action.
Now, as a member of the Jewish faith, I am not insensitive to anything connected to the Holocaust. I came to the United States in 1936 as a refugee from Nazi Germany. Both sets of my grandparents were sent to Hitler’s concentration camps never to be heard from again. I can only surmise that they were put to death by the SS.
However, I believe that those 10 Marines were ignorant of the connection between the SS and the Nazi death camps. Why do I believe that? It’s because those Marines are a product of our public schools which have eliminated courses in World History, Geography and Civics in favor of courses on multiculturalism and diversity. And American History courses have been watered down and barely cover WWII, opting instead to concentrate on our mistreatment of blacks and Latinos.
Because it ended in 1945, WWII will become just another blip in history. But the slaughter of six million Jews by the Nazis should never be relegated to the dustbin of history. I most certainly agree with my fellow Jews that the Holocaust must never be forgotten.
Let’s suppose those Marines were 20-years-old in 2010 when that photo with the SS banner was taken. They would have been born 45 years after the end of WWII. By the time they entered high school, World History was no longer being taught. If the Marines learned anything about the Holocaust in school, I’m sure they were not taught that Hitler’s SS operated the death camps at Auschwitz, Sobibor and Treblinka.
Those 10 Marines did something stupid. Their stupidity did not result in any deaths or injuries, nor did it put any Marine Corps operations at risk. When you compare their act to that of the Vatican in helping Nazi fugitives - including members of the SS - flee to South America, the SS banner incident becomes much to do about nothing. As a long-time donor to the Simon Wiesenthal Center, I would urge Rabbi Hier to call the President and Secretary Panetta to urge them not to let the Marines be punished.
Because I do not believe the 10 Marines associated the SS insignia with the Holocaust, I do not think they should be punished in any way. There is no law against being ignorant. Their ignorance stems from a failing public school system. At most, a reprimand may be in order and I’m sure they’ve already received that.
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