HISTORY: Learning from the Kindertransport (briefing paper)

By Elise Brenton

Learning from the Kindertransport in order to inform responses to current refugee crises.

ABSTRACT

The Kindertransport was a mass-evacuation scheme set up by the British government to bring children to safety from Nazi-threatened areas. Recently, it has been suggested as a blueprint for responses to current refugee crises. If the United Nation’s 16th Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) for 2030 is taken as a guideline, the responses must be inclusive and just. This policy paper aims to highlight how a response modelled on the Kindertransport would not meet these criteria if its failings are not learned from. It will further suggest alternative response options.

Introduction to the Kindertranspor

The Kindertransport was a humanitarian effort carried out by the British government, which rescued children aged 16 and under[1] from Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Austria on the eve of the Second World War.[2] Were they to have remained in their home countries, they would have been at increasing threat of (particularly anti-Semitic) persecution under Hitler’s Nazi regime. After just two months’ preparation, the first Kindertransport set off in December 1938, and from then until its cessation in 1939, just under 10,000 children were brought to Britain.[3] Though the Kindertransport’s incredible success in rescuing any amount of people with such rapidity must be acknowledged, it was not without its failings. These will be detailed under the subheading Why are there problems with translating the Kindertransport onto current refugee crises?, before which there is an overview of the current refugee crisis and, below, an explanation of the Kindertransport’s ongoing relevancy.

Why is the Kindertransport a relevant case study?

Children made up 41% of forcibly displaced persons recorded at the end of 2021.[4] As, according to UNICEF, ‘[c]hildren make up less than one third of the global population’,[5] they are disproportionately affected by forcible displacement. Often this is because, as some of society’s most vulnerable people, they are the first to be evacuated. Similarly, children became the priority for evacuation schemes on the eve of the Second World War. In the case of the Kindertransport, only children were transported to Britain, meaning they all faced separation from their families. Most were never re-united; recent estimates suggest that up to 90% of their parents were killed in the Holocaust.[6] For children who are forcibly displaced today, fleeing alone or accompanied by only some of their family, the prospect of never being re-united with parents and other relatives is terrifyingly real. Lessons learned from the Kindertransport about minimising the trauma of this separation and the importance of keeping families together would thus be vital to contemporary rescue and integration efforts.

Secondly, the majority of Kindertransportees were Jewish:[7] they came from vastly different cultural and religious backgrounds to some of the people who took them in. This loss of a sense of security and self would have exacerbated the upheaval of relocation and increased the risk of exposure to prejudice. The significance of this was not always realised at the time,[8] though parents plead for their children to be housed with Jewish families,[9] and it is not always realised in the refugees of today. Though 69% people flee to neighbouring countries, where there is a lesser likelihood of major religious difference (for instance, in March 2021, around 82% of Syrian refugees lived in five surrounding Muslim-majority countries),[10] cultural differences still have an impact. Where there is a difference between the predominant religion of a person’s country of origin and the country they are seeking refuge in, the likelihood of prejudice increases. This is especially true of largely Christian-majority countries in Europe, where 55% of people said they opposed any more emigration from Muslim-majority states in a 2017 European Islamophobia Report.[11] In order to ‘promote peaceful and inclusive societies’, as per the 16th SDG,[12] governments must take heed of the Kindertransport’s failure to provide a suitably accepting environment for refugees.

Finally, the Kindertransport has been put forward in the past as an example to follow – indeed, to reproduce – by Emeritus Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathon Sachs in 2015, supported by peer Lord Alfred Dubs.[13] Though Sachs and Dubs have the humanitarian zeal necessary for a government action, they are mistaken in thinking the Kindertransport is an exemplary case. Its failings must be learned from before forming an appropriate and comprehensive response to the refugee crisis of today. 

What is the current refugee crisis?

Findings by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, or UNHCR, place the number of forcibly displaced persons at 103 million. Refugees from the Syrian Arab Republic, Venezuela, Ukraine, Afghanistan, and South Sudan made up 72% of these people.[14] This section will give a brief overview of each of these cases.

Syrian Arab Republic

The greatest proportion of refugees come from the Syrian Arab Republic, at 6.8 million people.[15]

This is due to the civil war which developed in 2011 out of initially peaceful demonstrations for democracy. Almost twelve years on, pro- and anti-government rebel groups, terrorist groups like Islamic State, the Syrian government itself, foreign forces and Kurdish fighters for self-government have all become involved. The extent of violence is immeasurable, and estimations of the death toll reach up to 606, 000.[16]

Many Syrian refugees, approximately 1 million (according to 2021 records), have fled to Europe.[17] Sea-crossings to reach it frequently end in devastation – 3,200 people were reported missing or deceased after treacherous sea- and land-crossings in 2021.[18]

Venezuela

The current Venezuelan president, Maduro, has assumed excessive power over the legal system, and has widely been blamed for exacerbating the economic crisis. Moreover, he has been accused of rigging elections, and consequently opposition leader Guaidó appointed himself “interim president” from 2019 to 2022.[19] As a result of this political turmoil and economic downturn, violent crime has flourished, and resources are nearly dried-up. Resources for supporting refugees in neighbouring countries are similarly depleting. The UNHCR says that even when leaving Venezuela, refugees ‘are exposed to heightened risks of exploitation, trafficking, violence, discrimination and xenophobia’.[20]

 Around 5.6 million people have fled.[21]

Ukraine

Historic tensions between Ukraine and Russia over territory erupted in February 2022, when Russian forces invaded the east of Ukraine. During the ensuing war, Russia has seized parts of the Donbas in eastern Ukraine and have heavily bombed the country. By November 2022, both armies had suffered around 100,000 casualties each, with Ukraine additionally suffering an estimated 40,000 civilian deaths.[22]

The greatest urgency to flee is among women and children (as men have volunteered for or been called up to the military), people of colour (who now face greater discrimination upon crossing the border) and members of the LGTBQIA+ community (who fear similar increases in discrimination and so are afraid to leave).[23]

A total of 5.4 million refugees have fled Ukraine.[24]

Afghanistan

The Afghanistan War lasted twenty years from 2001 to 2021. In response to the 9/11 terrorist attack by Al-Qaeda, the US attacked extremists within Afghanistan. Despite many fluctuations of territory throughout the war, the extremist Taliban began and ended the conflict in control of the majority of Afghanistan under their rule.[25] Though the war was concluded on 2nd May 2021, severe violence, poverty, hunger and displacement still effect Afghan people.[26]

2.8 million people have become refugees.[27]

South Sudan

Political unrest is at the heart of South Sudan’s refugee crisis. Civil war erupted in 2013 when the Vice President, Machar, was sacked by President Kiir, triggering a wave of protests to which the government responded with violence. The Dinka and Nuer ethnic groups are also in conflict as they opposingly support Kiir and Machar respectively. While there is optimism for a near conclusion to the war, the effects of the death, hunger, and displacement it has caused will be long-lasting.[28]

Children are the largest age group[29] amongst the total 2.4 million South-Sudanese refugees.[30]

Why are there problems with translating the Kindertransport onto current refugee crises?

The Kindertransport was successful in rescuing thousands of children from insurmountable danger and destruction wreaked by the Nazis. It was by no means, however, a flawless programme. Under the key headings of institutional inadequacy, poor communication, and selectivity, this section will highlight the lessons to be learned from the Kindertransport in order to form responses to today’s refugee crises in line with the UN’s 16th SDG:

‘Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels’[31]

Institutional inadequacy

The Refugee Children’s Movement (RCM) was responsible for the Kindertransportees once they reached Britain. [32] This was an organisation funded by donations and staffed by a few paid employees and many more volunteers, to which the government contributed no state resources[33] – it was thus in a poor position to provide a complete programme of care to Kindertransportees. Sometimes children were kept with unsuited families because host homes were too precious to risk, and manpower was too sparse to make regular, or any, follow-up visits to children.[34]

Kindertransportees also suffered throughout their lives from the lack of mental health support, beginning after their sudden move to Britain,[35] especially as it happened for many when a safe environment is vital to their development.[36] The accountability and inclusivity of this institution and of the government itself can therefore be challenged.

Poor communication

Greater caution is required for this category, as the state of total war affecting communications is vastly different to the situations of many host countries today. However, it is nonetheless something which should be prioritised as a keystone of any response to the refugee crisis. During the Kindertransport, poor communication not only limited the RCM’s ability to fulfil its role, but it also meant that some of the older children were detained as “aliens” despite their status as refugees of the Kindertransport.[37] Similar, yet far more deliberate detention of immigrants is a dehumanising and unjust policy many governments adopt worldwide, and should be prevented unconditionally for, above all, the sake of those who are fleeing persecution already.

Selectivity

Only taking children (as opposed to children and other vulnerable groups, for instance, if there was still some selective aspect to the programme) implies some specific reservations of the part of the British government. Children are easier to manage, process and house, and may not require so much direct, especially financial, help from the government. Their dependency and lack of awareness about their rights further exempts them from much of the “threat” narrative that has been foisted upon adult immigrants throughout history. In this way, the Kindertransport’s selectivity is not so much a selfless mercy, but a consciously exclusive lack of mercy for the wider demographic of refugees.

How can we learn from these problems and what actions can we take?

A selective policy, as shown above, should be discounted in every case. At its worst, it effectively plays God with the lives of people running from war, persecution, poverty, hunger, disease, and ultimately death, by variously denying and granting safe passage out of these situations. Instead, a truly international policy should be adopted through UN legislation, stating each country’s individual commitment to helping refugees. In this way, governments can still have a say in how many people they will accept – in accordance with their capacity to support them – without discrimination in who may enter. This could build on the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants of 2016 (summarised by a UN News report as an agreement ‘that the protection of refugees should be a shared responsibility’[38], signed by all member states) as its more active counterpart.

Beyond accepting refugees, robust support services should be easily accessible upon arrival. Of course, the unique situation of the Kindertransport, where the flow of people was from one country preparing for war to another, is completely different in many host countries today, yet it did highlight how a lack of government support can leave organisations without sufficient resources and funds. Government-supported services should therefore be built in to any refugee crisis response, especially for allowing easy integration, co-ordinating housing and essential provisions, and, in the longer-term, fostering inclusivity in the community.

In the same vein, refugees’ needs must be catered for beyond simply shelter and sustenance. This could mean, for instance, ensuring housing is available within realistic distance of places of worship. Support groups for new arrivals and fully-settled immigrants and refugees are also necessary for the wellbeing of new-comers especially. Yet this is no replacement for comprehensive mental health services, the importance of which Kindertransportees’ experiences have emphasised. Specialist health practitioners are essential to this.

As much as it may seem to governments a long list of requirements, each of these conditions are required. Lessons from the Kindertransport would not have been heeded, UN Sustainable Development Goals not respected, refugees not given the safe passage and environment they deserve as people in need if these requirements were not provided. Should the member states truly adhere to the New York Declaration, their shared power will be more than enough to make these services standard.

[1] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel, ‘Kindertransport: History and Memory: In memorium Erna Nelki’, Shofar (West Lafayette: Purdue University Press, Fall 2004), vol. 23, no.1 pp.21-27 <https://www.jstor.org/stable/42943756> [accessed 05/01/2023] (p. 21).

[2] Jennifer Craig-Norton, ‘Contesting the Kindertransport as a ‘Model’ Refugee Response’, European Judaism: A Journal for the New Europe, ed. Jonathan Magonet, (Oxford: Berghahn Books, Autumn 2017) Vol. 50, No.2., pp. 24-33 <https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/48561429> [accessed 19/10/2022] (p.30).

[3] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel (p. 21-22).

[4] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR, last updated 27/10/2022 <https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/> [accessed 05/01/2023].

[5] ‘Child Displacement’, UNICEF, last updated June 2022 <https://data.unicef.org/topic/child-migration-and-displacement/displacement> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[6] Jennifer Craig-Norton (p.30).

[7] Jennifer Craig-Norton (p.24).

[8] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel (p. 23).

[9] Jennifer Craig-Norton, (p.26).

[10] ‘Syrian Refugee Crisis – Globally, in Europe and in Cyprus’, UNHCR: Cyprus, 18/03/2021< https://www.unhcr.org/cy/2021/03/18/syria-refugee-crisis-globally-in-europe-and-in-cyprus-meet-some-syrian-refugees-in-cyprus/> [accessed 06/01/2023] (para. 2).

[11] Przemysław Osiewicz, ‘Europe’s Islamophobia and the Refugee Crisis’, Middle East Institute, 19/09/2017 <https://www.mei.edu/publications/europes-islamophobia-and-refugee-crisis> [accessed 06/01/2023] (para. 2).

[12] ‘Goals: 16’, UN: Department of Economic and Social Affairs: Sustainable Development, <https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal16> [accessed 05/01/2023].

[13] Jennifer Craig-Norton, (p.24-25).

[14] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR.

[15] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR.

[16] ‘Why has the war in Syria lasted 11 years?’, BBC News, 15/03/2022 <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-35806229> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[17] ‘Syrian Refugee Crisis – Globally, in Europe and in Cyprus’, UNHCR: Cyprus (para. 5).

[18] ‘Refugee Crisis in Europe’, USA for UNHCR <https://www.unrefugees.org/emergencies/refugee-crisis-in-europe/> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[19] Vanessa Buschschlüter, ‘Venezuela Crisis in Brief’, BBC News, 04/01/2023 <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-48121148 > [accessed 07/01/2023].

[20] ‘Venezuela Humanitarian Crisis, USA for UNHCR <https://www.unrefugees.org/emergencies/venezuela/> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[21] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR.

[22] ‘Ukraine war: US estimates 200,000 military casualties on all sides’, BBC News, 10/11/2022 <> [accessed 08/01/2023] (para. 1-2).

[23] ‘Why is there a Refugee Crisis in Ukraine?’, ADL, 05/03/2022, <https://www.adl.org/resources/tools-and-strategies/why-there-refugee-crisis-ukraine> [accessed 08/01/2022] (para. 3).

[24] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR.

[25] David Zucchino, ‘The U.S. War in Afghanistan: How it Started, and How it Ended’, The New York Times, 07/10/2021 <https://www.nytimes.com/article/afghanistan-war-us.html> [accessed 08/01/2023].

[26] ‘Afghanistan Humanitarian Crisis, USA for UNHCR <https://www.unrefugees.org/emergencies/afghanistan/> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[27] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR.

[28] Alexander, Hannah, ‘South Sudan: The Civil War Crisis’, The Organization for World Peace, 12/05/2021 <https://theowp.org/south-sudan-the-civil-war-crisis/> [accessed 08/01/2023].

[29] Alexander, Hannah, ‘South Sudan: The Civil War Crisis’, The Organization for World Peace.

[30] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR.

[31] ‘Goals: 16’, UN: Department of Economic and Social Affairs: Sustainable Development.

[32] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel (p.23).

[33] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel (p.24).

[34] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel (p.24).

[35] J. Angel and D. P. Evans, ‘‘Why are we not doing more for them?’: genocide prevention lessons from the Kindertransport’, Public Health (Netherlands: Elsevier Ltd., 2017), vol. 153, pp. 36-43 <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0033350617302329?via%3Dihub> [accessed 26/10/2022] (p.39-40).

[36] J. Angel and D. P. Evans (p.41).

[37] Rebekka Göpfert, and Andrea Hammel (p.23).

[38] ‘UN affirms ‘historic’ global compact to support world’s refugees’, UN News, 17/12/2018 <https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/12/1028791 > [accessed 10/01/2023].

Recommended Reading

Williams, Amy and Niven, Bill, ‘Memory of the Kinder transport in Britain and Germany, and the Current Refugee Crisis,’ Diasporas (2021).

Craig-Norton, Jennifer, The Kindertransport: Contesting Memory (2019).

Bibliography

‘The 17 Goals’, UN: Sustainable Development, <https://sdgs.un.org/> [accessed 05/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Afghanistan Humanitarian Crisis, USA for UNHCR <https://www.unrefugees.org/emergencies/afghanistan/> [accessed 07/01/2023].

Alexander, Hannah, ‘South Sudan: The Civil War Crisis’, The Organization for World Peace, 12/05/2021 <https://theowp.org/south-sudan-the-civil-war-crisis/> [accessed 08/01/2023].

Angel, J. and Evans, D. P., ‘‘Why are we not doing more for them?’: genocide prevention lessons from the Kindertransport’, Public Health (Netherlands: Elsevier Ltd., 2017), vol. 153, pp. 36-43 <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0033350617302329?via%3Dihub> [accessed 26/10/2022].

[No author listed.] ‘Child Displacement’, UNICEF, last updated June 2022 <https://data.unicef.org/topic/child-migration-and-displacement/displacement> [accessed 07/01/2023].

Craig-Norton, Jennifer, ‘Contesting the Kindertransport as a ‘Model’ Refugee Response’, European Judaism: A Journal for the New Europe, ed. Jonathan Magonet, (Oxford: Berghahn Books, Autumn 2017) Vol. 50, No.2., pp. 24-33 <https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/48561429> [accessed 19/10/2022].

Göpfert, Rebekka, and Hammel, Andrea, ‘Kindertransport: History and Memory: In memorium Erna Nelki’, Shofar (West Lafayette: Purdue University Press, Fall 2004), vol. 23, no.1 pp.21-27 <https://www.jstor.org/stable/42943756> [accessed 05/01/2023].

Osiewicz, Przemysław, ‘Europe’s Islamophobia and the Refugee Crisis’, Middle East Institute, 19/09/2017 <https://www.mei.edu/publications/europes-islamophobia-and-refugee-crisis> [accessed 06/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Refugee Crisis in Europe’, USA for UNHCR <https://www.unrefugees.org/emergencies/refugee-crisis-in-europe/> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Syrian Refugee Crisis – Globally, in Europe and in Cyprus’, UNHCR: Cyprus, 18/03/2021<https://www.unhcr.org/cy/2021/03/18/syria-refugee-crisis-globally-in-europe-and-in-cyprus-meet-some-syrian-refugees-in-cyprus/> [accessed 06/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Ukraine war: US estimates 200,000 military casualties on all sides’, BBC News, 10/11/2022 <> [accessed 08/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘UNHCR Refugee Statistics’, UNHCR, <https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/> [accessed 05/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Venezuela Humanitarian Crisis, USA for UNHCR <https://www.unrefugees.org/emergencies/venezuela/> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Why has the war in Syria lasted 11 years?’, BBC News, 15/03/2022 <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-35806229> [accessed 07/01/2023].

[No author listed.] ‘Why is there a Refugee Crisis in Ukraine?’, ADL, 05/03/2022, <https://www.adl.org/resources/tools-and-strategies/why-there-refugee-crisis-ukraine> [accessed 08/01/2022].

Zucchino, David, ‘The U.S. War in Afghanistan: How it Started, and How it Ended’, The New York Times, 07/10/2021 <https://www.nytimes.com/article/afghanistan-war-us.html> [accessed 08/01/2023].