The Allies received rather exact information in real time about the final stages of the Holocaust, which had not always been the case earlier. The destination was now known, the routes known, the railroads marked, and bridges pinpointed by the Allied intelligence agencies for the purposes of the 15th U.S. Air Force, based in Italy and capable of bombing the railroads leading to Auschwitz and the gas chambers. Several overtures were made by Jewish organizations, including the Yishuv's leadership, to the Allies to bomb the railroads and the gas chambers and stop the factory of death, but they allegedly were not made rigorously enough. Sometimes, as Dina Porat tells us, the Jewish Agency's officials were in doubt among themselves whether such approaches would have any effect on the Allies or even be of any help to the inmates. In other words, the Zionists allegedly succumbed to the catastrophe rather than rising to meet it.

I have asked Albert Speer what would have been the result of an effective bombing run that would have destroyed the gas chambers in Auschwitz. He replied: