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1.20 Overview
Fred Leuchter is a man with no formal training in either chemistry or toxicology (he obtained a BA in history in 1964), and yet he claims to be a professional engineer - an assertion that has landed him in hot water in his home state. In 1988, at the request of Canada's Ernst Zundel, Mr. Leuchter went to Poland and visited the site of the Auschwitz extermination camp; (Mr. Zundel financed Leuchter's trip to Poland.) The result of this journey was the "Leuchter Report." Here's what Mr. Leuchter had to say about his "investigation:

The purpose [of the investigation and subsequent report] does not include a determination of any numbers of persons who died or were killed by means other than gassing or as to whether an actual Holocaust occurred. It, further, is not the intent of this author to redefine Holocaust in historical terms, but simply to supply scientific evidence and information obtained at the actual sites and to render an opinion based on all available scientific, engineering and quantitative data as to the purpose and usages of the alleged execution gas chambers and crematory facilities at the investigated locations. (Foner)

You will note, as we will demonstrate using Leuchter's own sworn testimony, that Mr. Leuchter failed to demonstrate any concern for the truth, even while under oath.

While testifying at Mr. Zundel's trial in Canada, Leuchter gave false evidence concerning his professional relationship with the administration of two American prisons regarding gas chambers, and proved himself to be unfamiliar with the most basic facts about the lethal gas Hydrogen Cyanide, including its flammability and the concentrations and duration required for delousing purposes.

The "Leuchter Report" purports to "scientifically demonstrate" that people were not killed by Zyklon-B at Auschwitz. It is composed of old claims made by the French Holocaust denier Faurisson, as well as some new ones. Many of the claims appear in the Institute for Historical Review's "66 Q&A on the Holocaust" pamphlet, and also in arguments offered by others who deny the Holocaust.

Zyklon-B
Zyklon-B is a powerful insecticide. It releases HCN, Hydrocyanic acid, a gas - Zyklon-B is the carrier, a material soaked with the gas; usually it comes in the shape of small pellets or disks. HCN is what causes death. While interacting with iron and concrete, it creates compounds ("Hydrocyanic compounds"). Leuchter concedes that these compounds were found in the ruins of the gas chambers in Auschwitz (as reaffirmed by the findings of the Polish government institute, which completely rejects Leuchter's conclusions - see Section 2.01).

HCN is extremely poisonous to humans. It is used in execution gas chambers in the US; the first such was built in Arizona in 1920. It is absurd to claim (as the deniers do), that Germany in the 1940's could not handle "technical difficulties" in using HCN for execution - "difficulties" that were easily solved in 1920. Moreover, the Germans had a lot of experience with HCN, as it was extensively used for delousing.

There were two types of gas chambers in Auschwitz: those used for delousing clothes ("delousing gas chambers") and those used for killing people on a massive scale ("extermination gas chambers"). The delousing gas chambers were a standard feature, and were left intact by the SS (as opposed to the extermination gas chambers, which were dynamited in an effort to conceal criminal activity from the rapidly approaching Soviet Army). The deniers try to confuse the issue by mixing the two types of chambers. For instance, they show pictures of the doors for the delousing chambers, and note that they are too weak to withstand the pressure of people trying to escape. Of course, the doors for the extermination chambers were completely different, but that fact is quietly overlooked (see 2.06).

2.01 Disparities in Hydrocyanic Compound Levels
Holocaust deniers often claim that since more hydrocyanic compounds were found in the delousing chambers than in the ruins of the so-called "extermination" chambers at Auschwitz, and the reverse would be true if people were actually gassed there, it is clear that no mass gassings occurred.

But - HCN is far more effective on warm-blooded animals (including humans) than on insects, so the period of exposure to HCN is far longer for delousing clothes than that required for homicidal gassings, and a much lower concentration is necessary to kill people as compared to lice.

A concentration of up to 16,000 ppm (parts per million) is sometimes used, with exposure times of up to 72 hours, to kill insects, but as little as 300 ppm will cause death in humans within fifteen minutes or so.

Breitman offers background information about the development of Zyklon B as a killing device, and provides clear evidence that the Nazis determined the effective Zyklon B concentration through a process of trial and error.

When the difference in the concentration of gas required to kill insects and humans was mentioned in Leuchter's cross-examination in the Zundel trial, Leuchter responded: "I've never killed beetles. I, you know, I don't know. I haven't made computations for killing beetles" - Hardly the response one would expect from an "expert" on the subject...

Because of the relatively small concentrations required to exterminate humans as opposed to lice, and because of the far shorter exposure time required, the HCN in the gas chambers used to kill humans hardly had time to form chemical compounds on the walls.

The gas chambers were not very large (those in Kremas II and III were about 210 square meters), and the Zyklon B was dropped through four openings in the roof, spreading the gas very quickly. These openings are still visible in the ruins of the gas chambers, and rare photographs of them, taken while the camp was in operation, exist, and copies are readily available (Brugioni et al) from the sources noted in Section 6.1, below. Since the concentration used was higher than the lethal one, death was swift. (See picture Krema4.gif Krema IV was above-ground, and the Zyklon B was introduced through clearly visible slits in the walls. See also picture Krema401.gif, which provides a close-up of the wall openings.)

Leuchter's data is further suspect because the delousing chambers where he obtained his samples were left intact by the SS, while the extermination chambers were destroyed. Clearly, their walls were exposed to the elements for forty-five years, which would certainly influence the validity of the samples taken. (The ruins of Krema II are covered with about three feet of water during certain periods of the year, and HCN compounds would eventually dissolve under such conditions. Nonetheless, so many gassings occurred there that someof the compound did remain).

2.09 If the gas chambers were ventilated, the gas would kill people outside.
Nonsense; it is all a question of concentration. Once the gas is released into the atmosphere, its concentration drops and it is no longer dangerous. Also, HCN dissipates quickly. The execution gas chambers in US prisons are also ventilated directly into the atmosphere. Furthermore, if this argument would hold for the extermination chambers, it would hold for the delousing chambers as well, and one would have to conclude that no delousing chambers existed either.

2.11 The people who dropped the Zyklon-B into the chambers would have died from the gas themselves.
Utter nonsense. Like those who used the Zyklon-B in the delousing chambers, the SS men who carried out the gassings utilized gas masks. (The mind boggles at the realization that a "gas chamber expert" could not figure this out.)

2.12 The death lists from Auschwitz do not show that any people were gassed, and point to a smaller number of victims.
This is because those lists refer only to those who where assigned serial numbers. The majority of people transferred to the camp were classified as "unfit for work" and gassed immediately. This fact is noted, for instance, in a report written by top SS officer Franke-Gricksch to Himmler (this report is included in our file of Nazi documents, in this archive). These people were not registered nywhere, and no one recorded their names. (Testimony of Polish prisoner Aloiz Oskar Kleta, Shelly, p. 284; Fertig, 12; Fleming, 174. Also, see testimony of Henryk Tauber, Pressac, page 488, as to how the SS routinely burned documents regarding the number of victims).