World War II had taken a turn in favor of the allies. The allied forces were moving across Europe when they ran into the most well known of the atrocities of a war that was filled with countless examples of man’s inhumanity to man. The Germans called them Work camps with large gates made of iron that said, “Arbeit macht frei” translated to “Work makes free.” In America similar camps were referred to as internment camps. We know them best as concentration camps. The stories that come from within these gated communities are grievous.
Senior leaders of the allied nations had received reports and heard rumors of these camps. However, it was the soldiers who came face to face with reality. What they witnessed were men and women who had been brutalized, traumatized, used as lab animals, and starved. Immediately, these soldiers went into action to meet the presenting need. From out of tanks and jeeps and rucksacks food appeared and the desperate victims went to work making up for lost time. These soldiers were men of compassion and sought to meet the need. What they could not have known is that their compassion was literally killing the prisoners.
The starvation was so complete that the prisoners’ bodies could not handle solid food. Doctors arrived on the scene and realized what was happening. First, they ordered the soldiers to lock the prisoners back up in the camp. The concern was that if they simply went free, they would continue to eat themselves to death. Secondly, they began a process to gradually introduce these men and women toward being able to again eat solid food. Essentially, they would be fed milk, then over time they would get formula and then soft foods and then more and more complex food.
At the time, many of the soldiers could not understand how locking them up was compassion. They struggled with the concept that withholding food was loving. However, wisdom and educated reasoning proved the concept and with the process functioning fewer died of nutrition issues. Most worked through the process and experienced a free and flourishing life.
