Panel educates service members about the Holocaust

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Joshua Edwards
  • 17th Training Wing Public Affairs
GOODFELLOW AIR FORCE BASE, Texas --  A three person panel, informed service members on the importance of remembering the Holocaust during Holocaust Remembrance Week at the Fellowship Hall here April 29.

Holocaust Remembrance Week traces back to the 1970s aligning with the liberation of the Dachau concentration camp and offers a chance to remember the events of a genocide which took millions of lives.

A few descendants of Holocaust survivors came to the event including Maj. Kelly Borukhovich, 315th training Squadron flight commander, who briefly shared her heritage with the panel.

"In honor of two of my maternal grandmother's sisters who perished in a concentration camp my mother and I were named after them," said Borukhovich. "As a descendent of holocaust survivors, I have always felt that it was critical to continue the education and reminding of what happened during that tragic time. Additionally, I always feel a personal responsibility to ensure that the education is as good as it can be, so I attend to make sure that all aspects of the equation are represented, as a Jew and as a descendent."

John V. Garrett, 17th Training Wing historian, led the panel with a silent slideshow and then provided his thoughts on the Holocaust.

"The war for Germany had become an absolute disaster, and yet they made it a priority to round up a half million Jews, put them into cattle cars, ship them north to Auschwitz and gas 90 percent of them upon arrival," said Garrett. "Even if you set aside the immorality for a moment, it's not rational to do this when the war is going so badly against you. If ever there was an opportunity for an American response, a direct response ... then this was it."

After Garrett finished his speech, Linda A. Kornasky, Angelo State University American literature professor, presented the audience with several pieces of Holocaust literature and her insight into the matter.

"When we discuss the Holocaust we tend to punctuate our message with a lot of silence," said Kornasky. "There is something about the Holocaust that seems so unspeakable that to use words to describe it does not seem ethical to us, and yet we have to. We often find that when we are in that kind of rhetorical bind that we must turn to poetry."

The panel ended with Col. Thomas L. Schmidt, 17th Training Wing Vice Commander, Garrett and Kornasky answering questions from the audience. Schmidt used his knowledge of German history and culture to answer how Germans feel about the Holocaust now.