opinion
Is ‘Never Again’ Now? The Ukraine War
Ignites a Recurring Debate
BY ANDREW SILOW-CARROLL
S eventy-nine years ago this month,
crowds twice filled Madison
Square Garden for a pageant, “We
Will Never Die,” meant to draw
attention to the slaughter of Europe’s
Jews by the Nazis. Screenwriter Ben
Hecht organized the spectacle and
wrote the script; German refugee
composer Kurt Weill wrote the
score. A young Marlon Brando had a
leading role.

Two million Jews had already been
killed. The performance included
the lines, “No voice is heard to cry
halt to the slaughter, no government
speaks to bid the murder of human
millions end. But we here tonight
have a voice. Let us raise it.”
In the self-congratulatory amne-
sia called hindsight, American Jews
often look back on “We Will Never
Die” as a watershed in raising aware-
ness about the Holocaust — and a
condemnation of America’s failure
at that point to stop the genocide.

What’s often forgotten is that Hecht
had trouble getting major Jewish
organizations to sign on as sponsors.

“A meeting of representatives of 32
Jewish groups, hosted by Hecht,
dissolved in shouting matches as
ideological and personal rivalries left
the Jewish organizations unable to
cooperate,” according to the David
S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust
Studies. This was 1943, mind you, so the
debate over whether the United
States should commit blood and trea-
sure to the defense of its Allies was
already settled. But the “ideological
and personal rivalries” are reminders
that Americans were never of one
mind about entering World War II,
and certainly not about whether and
how to save the Jews.

America and its allies are
embroiled in a similar debate now,
and World War II and its lessons
are being invoked by those urg-
ing a fierce Western response to
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Chief
18 among these are Ukraine’s Jewish
president, Volodymyr Zelensky, who
has specifically cited the Holocaust
in asking governments, and Jewish
groups, to intervene.

“Nazism is born in silence. So shout
about killings of civilians. Shout about
the murders of Ukrainians,” Zelensky
said in a call with American Jewish
groups. He spoke about the Russian
missile strike near the Babyn Yar
memorial to slaughtered Jews, say-
ing, “We all died again at Babyn Yar
from the missile attack, even though
the world pledges ‘Never again.’”
Dmytro Kuleba, the foreign minis-
ter of Ukraine, also invoked “never
again” in a Washington Post oped.

tweeted. “Please stop the hype.”
In some ways the debate is seman-
tic. ”Never Again” is a phrase popu-
larized by a Jewish militant, adopted
by mainstream Jewish groups and
eventually absorbed into the global
vocabulary as a shorthand for — for
what, exactly? Is it about interven-
tion when a government targets a
people or ethnic group for slaughter,
as in Rwanda? Does it include cam-
paigns of terror meant to “ethnically
cleanse” a region, as in Bosnia or
Myanmar? Is it about a system of
“reeducation camps” meant to erase
a people’s culture, as the Chinese
are doing to the Uyghurs?
Or, as Kuleba defines it, does it
If nothing else, the debate over “never
again” demands more humility and
forgiveness in judging the failures of
previous generations.

“For decades, world leaders bowed
their heads at war memorials across
Europe and solemnly proclaimed:
‘Never again.’ The time has come to
prove those were not empty words,”
he wrote.

The rhetoric may be soaring, but
not everyone is convinced. “I’m
seeing the term genocide & the
phrase ‘never again’ used more in
the context of Ukraine,” tweeted
Emma Ashford, a senior fellow at the
Scowcroft Center for Strategy and
Security. “I understand why they’re
being used — & the resonance they
carry — but they’re not accurate
ways to talk about a conventional
war between states, even one with
humanitarian casualties.”
Damon Linker, a columnist at The
Week, made a similar point. “What
Russia’s doing is terrible, but it’s what
happens in war. It isn’t genocide, and
it certainly isn’t the Holocaust, which
is what that phrase refers to,” he
MARCH 17, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
mean “stopping the aggressor before
it can cause more death and destruc-
tion”? According to that conception
of “never again,” the Holocaust may
have ended with the death of six
million Jews, but it couldn’t have
begun without unchecked territorial
expansion by a brutal regime.

The debate is also highly concrete.

If Kuleba is right, history will judge
America poorly if it doesn’t do more
to stop Russia’s attacks on civilians
and its razing of Ukrainian cities.

And yet, while the United States
and its allies have committed arms
and sanctions meant to cripple
Russia’s economy, President Biden
has ruled out sending ground troops
to defend Ukraine, or enforcing a
“no-fly zone” over the country that
would make direct conflict with
Russian jets inevitable.

The bloody Russian invasion,
bound to get bloodier still, has not
risen to what most people and offi-
cial bodies would call a genocide.

And even if it were to, it would be
surprising if the United States would
commit troops to the battlefield.

Most Americans have little stomach
for a hot war with Russia. The threat
of nuclear escalation is terrifying.

A Cygnal poll taken last week
found that 39% of U.S. respondents
supported Washington “joining the
military response” in Ukraine — a plu-
rality but hardly a landslide. A broad
majority still preferred non-military
intervention. The United States, like the rest
of the world, has a checkered his-
tory in fulfilling the promise of “never
again.” Bill Clinton was ashamed of
America’s inaction in Rwanda. Barack
Obama in 2012 launched a White
House task force called the Atrocities
Prevention Board, although it didn’t
prevent the mass slaughter of Syrians
by their own government and Russia
on Obama’s watch.

The United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum has a Center for
the Prevention of Genocide. And
yet to paraphase Stalin, “How big is
its army?”
And yet, many refuse to allow real-
politik to deaden their response to
the tragedy in Ukraine. “We can dis-
cuss and debate a no-fly zone, but
there is one thing we can’t debate,
and that is this should be a no-cry
zone,” said Rabbi Joseph Potasnik,
head of the New York Board of
Rabbis, during a recent interfaith ser-
vice for Ukraine. “We should never,
ever see innocent people merci-
lessly murdered.”
Few could dispute that. But if noth-
ing else, history reminds us that
slogans are not policies, and that the
very best intentions crash up against
self-interest and self-preservation. If
nothing else, the debate over “never
again” demands more humility and
forgiveness in judging the failures of
previous generations. JE
Andrew Silow-Carroll is the editor in chief
of The New York Jewish Week and senior
editor of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.