In the film, "The Last Days," Paul Parks, an African American WW II veteran and civil rights activist, recounts being one of a number of black troops of the then-segregated U.S. Armypresent at the liberation of Dachau, the first concentration camp the Nazis built and one of the last to be liberated. Although it was not one of the six death camps created specifically for mass murder, many thousands of people died there during the Third Reich. The historical and moral significance of African American troops taking part in the liberation of Dachau was of interest to me.
Subsequently I learned that "The Last Days" and "Liberators: Fighting on Two Fronts in World War II" — a 1992 PBS documentary that also drew attention to the presence of black troops at Dachau — were roundly attacked either for their unquestioning acceptance of claims by allegedly dishonest black veterans or for allegedly fabricating the story.
I was curious about the motives of each side in this dispute. Why would black veterans say there were black troops present if there were not? There are plenty of examples of the heroism of African American soldiers in WW II. It is also generally accepted by historians that the all-black 761st Tank Battalion had taken part in the liberation of a satellite of Mauthausen concentration camp, Gunskirchen, on May 5, 1945. There was no need to make up a role for black GIs in the liberation of Dachau.
Equally perplexing to me was the vehemence of the deniers. Why would the assertion by black veterans that they had helped liberate Dachau engender a rebuttal so passionate that it seemed to have the hallmarks of a campaign? Could racism be a factor? And, in any event, how do you prove a negative? If a given white veteran, or even a number of them, failed to see any black soldiers at Dachau at the relevant time and then testified honestly to this effect, does that prove that no black troops were there?
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