 Carl Lutz-Dangerous Diplomacy DVDAuthor: New Destiny Films
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March 1944. Germany invaded Hungary, pressing the Hungarian government to finally participate in the 'final solution' by deporting the country's Jews --- who had been relatively spared until then --- to Auschwitz. But in Budapest, a network was put in place over the course of several months to save as many of them as possible. Behind all this was a Swiss man --- Vice-Consul Carl Lutz --- who led 'the largest rescue operation during the Second World War,' according to historian Xavier Cornut, public affairs advisor in Geneva and a board member of the Carl Lutz Foundation.In 1942, Lutz arrived in Budapest with his wife Gertrud on the heels of a six-year assignment in Jaffa. 'Unforgettable years,' he called them, immortalised in snapshots he had taken as a talented amateur photographer. In Palestine, which was under British mandate at the time, he defended German citizens in the region. Born into a Methodist family in an Appenzell village in 1895, Lutz was 'a typical Swiss man, introverted, serious, attached to religious values, but also, paradoxically, an adventurer with a strong sense of initiative. This combination of Christian values and entrepreneurial spirit accounts for the courage and shrewdness it took to set up such a large-scale protection system in the middle of a dangerous country like Hungary,' says Cornut. The Invention of The Protective Letter- As a Swiss diplomat, Lutz also represented the interests of countries that had severed diplomatic relations with Hungary, including the United States and Great Britain. Unwilling to turn away the hundreds of Jews who thronged the entrance to the Swiss legation every day, he came up with the idea of Schutzbriefe --- protective letters --- using 7,800 emigration certificates to Palestine that he acquired from Great Britain. The protective letters, still numbered from 1 to 7,800, were issued in an attempt to prevent deportation.
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