Neutral and Nearsighted

A U.S. government study of Switzerland’s World War II dealings with Nazi Germany finds that Swiss banks knowingly trafficked in stolen goods, and that in the war’s aftermath Washington and its allies did too little to force Switzerland to return to its rightful owners gold bought from the Nazis. Those owners included occupied countries whose gold reserves Germany looted. Also in the Swiss purchases was gold stolen from Jews who perished in the Holocaust, though the report finds no evidence that Switzerland knew of its origins.

In all, Swiss records show, the Swiss National Bank bought 336 tons of gold from Germany, worth, in today’s terms, billions of dollars. In 1946, after long negotiations, Switzerland agreed to contribute $58 million to European reconstruction, a fraction of the value of its purchased gold.

By carrying out extensive trade with the Third Reich, the report says, Switzerland and other neutral states--including Argentina, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Turkey--effectively prolonged Germany’s capacity to wage war. Switzerland especially, the report charges, was content to follow a wartime policy of business as usual: “Too often, being neutral provided a pretext for avoiding moral considerations.”

Responding this week, Swiss Foreign Minister Flavio Cotti, while welcoming the report as a contribution to historical understanding, argued that more note should have been taken of Switzerland’s own vulnerability to potential German aggression. That danger certainly existed. But it did not extend into the postwar era, when Switzerland vigorously resisted Allied efforts to recover and redistribute the stolen gold. The Swiss erected morally indefensible barriers to prevent Holocaust victims from recovering what was rightfully theirs. Only now, under international pressure so tragically late for so many, is Switzerland exhibiting greater responsibility.