Förintelseförnekarnas misstag

Because "revisionists" often portray the soap allegations as an attack on Germans generally, Nizkor wishes to make one thing clear from the outset. We present information on Professor Spanner and the Danzig soap experiment, not because we feel this isolated case is relevant to the history of the Holocaust as a whole, nor because we believe it is especially important, but because the revisionists we cite have attempted to confuse the issue. They have conflated the Auschwitz RIF rumor and the Danzig experiment into one "soap story" and have presented statements about one or the other as though they referred to both.

In order to eliminate this confusion, and to dissect this particular technique of denial, it is necessary to explain the evidence regarding the Danzig experiment in some detail.

Nizkor takes no position as to the reliability of this evidence, as it is not clear to us whether there is consensus among historians on the issue. The reader may make up his or her own mind. The important thing is that the evidence does exist, and that the revisionist tracts we shall examine ignore that evidence in an attempt to confuse the lay reader

At the War Crime Trials Sigmund Mazur, laboratory assistant at the
Danzig Anatomic Institute, testified that the institute conducted
experiments in producing soap from human bodies. The professors collected
bodies, bones, and human fat in a building called "a laboratory for the
fabrication of skeletons, the burning of meat and unnecessary bones." the
chief, Professor Spanner, gave Mazur the soap recipe

Two British POWs gave the prosecution staff testimony on the soap
experiments

64. Has the Institute for Historical Review suffered any retaliation for its efforts to uphold the right of freedom of speech and academic freedom?

The IHR says:

The IHR had been bombed three times and completely destroyed on July 4, 1984 by a criminal arson attack. Death threats by telephone are virtually a daily occurence. All newspaper coverage is hostile, if there is any coverage at all.

Nizkor replies:

Physical violence must be strongly condemned. As for "hostile coverage," what do Nazi sympathizers expect?

And when Ernst Zündel echoes this call for freedom of speech by reposting of the 66 Q&A, it truly rings hollow. Zündel has helped distribute a pamphlet which invites the reader to "Join the worldwide campaign to BAN SCHINDLER'S LIST!" Free speech, yes, but only when it's speech he agrees with. If the IHR is such a staunch defender of freedom of speech, where is their denunciation of Ernst Zündel?

36. About how many Jews died in the concentration camps?

The IHR says (original):

About 300,000.

The IHR says (revised):

Competent estimates range from about 300,000 to 500,000.

Nizkor replies:

Again -- what would the "revisionists" be saying if real historians changed their figures around like this, raising their estimates by sixty-six percent? Yet when they do it, it's all right.
In reality, more than 3,000,000 died in the camps (the rest behind the Eastern front and in the ghettos). The two worst camps were Auschwitz (about 1.3 million victims, 1.1 million of them Jews) and Treblinka (about 800,000 victims, nearly all Jews but also about 3,000 Gypsies).

And didn't they say in question 7 that "tens of thousands" died in British concentration camps, which made them "far worse than any German concentration camp"? Another internal contradiction.

And if "competent estimates" range only to 500,000, then arguably the world's most famous revisionist, David Irving, must be incompetent by a factor of eight. Irving has recently surprised everyone by stating that he now believes that as many as four million Jews may have died in the concentration camps.

The Holocaust is one of the most documented moments in human history. The Germans left massive documentation, which has been supplemented by films and photographs, even aerial surveillance of the death camps. Survivors have written memoirs and documented their experience. One project, the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation established by Director Steven Spielberg has taken more than 50,000 interviews in 32 languages in 57 countries of the survivors. The Germans never denied their crime and court cases on five continents – beginning with the Nuremberg Trials convened by the Allies shortly after the end of World War II have established a judicial record of the crime. A recent court case in England established that it was accurate to call one of the leading Holocaust deniers "a racist and antisemite who deliberately falsified the historical record." In short, the evidence of what happened is massive and compelling.

On April 2, 1945, as the Allies were closing in on Germany, Hitler's secretary recorded his final boast: "National Socialism will earn eternal gratitude for exterminating the Jews in Germany and Central Europe" [die Juden aus Deutschland und Mitteleuropa ausgerottet habe]. [327] Auschwitz represented the finality of Hitler's vision. The gas chambers were the principal, though not only, murder instrument at Auschwitz. The ovens and burning pits were the method of disposing of the dead. The evidence presented in this study, whether it is documents, aerial photos or testimony, clearly shows that there was no shortage of facilities to accomplish this task.

The Holocaust History Project is pleased to be able to offer Jean-Claude Pressac's seminal work on Auschwitz entitled Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers. Although Pressac was at one time a revisionist, and associated with the denier Robert Faurisson, he saw the light after undertaking an in-depth examination of almost everything to do with Auschwitz. He tells the story of his conversion in a Postface beginning at page 537 of his book.

Two German firms, Tesch/Stabenow and Degesch, produced Zyklon B gas after they acquired the patent from Farben. Tesch supplied two tons a month, and Degesch three quarters of a ton. The firms that produced the gas already had extensive experience in fumigation. "In short, this industry used very powerful gases to exterminate rodents and insects in enclosed spaces; that it should now have become involved in an operation to kill off Jews by the hundreds of thousands is not mere accident

37. How did they die?

The IHR says:

Mainly from recurring typhus epidemics that ravaged war-torn Europe during the period. Also from starvation and lack of medical attention toward the end of the war when virtually all road and rail transportation had been bombed out by the Allies.

Nizkor replies:

Some died from typhus. Numerically speaking, most Jews died from gassing, the next-most from shooting.

In the camps inside the "Altreich" (see question 1), death was mainly due to starvation and disease. When inmates are given insufficient food and forced to work hard labor, there is often little practical distinction between the two. At Auschwitz, which was both an extermination and a work camp, prisoners were "selected" every so often, with the weakest being gassed. That way, fewer had the opportunity to die of exhaustion, and they met their end in the gas chambers instead.

When the Allies reached the Nazi death camps in Germany, they found the SS personnel well-fed and well-dressed, and the local population was often not undergoing serious hardship, relatively speaking. (On the other hand, the German population in the big cities did suffer a lot.) This is clearly attested to in the film footage of the liberation of the camps, where one can see the people in the nearby towns and villages, which the American soldiers brought over to the camps so they can witness what happened. None of them are starved.

There is also a famous photograph of some plump SS women being captured at Bergen-Belsen. Tens of thousands of prisoners starved at Belsen. If you've seen a film of emaciated corpses being bulldozed into mass graves, it was probably taken at Belsen. The contrast to the well-fed SS women is quite remarkable. Scenes from the liberation of Bergen-Belsen demonstrate this beyond question.

Also, hardly any of the Allied prisoners from Western nations starved to death; there were people that the Nazis wanted to keep alive, and there were people they preferred dead. A great number of Soviet POW's died -- over three million -- for this reason

Inga. De enda bevisen är efterkrigstidens vittnesmål från enskilda "överlevanden". Dessa vittnesmål motsäger sig själva och inga "överlevande" hävdar att de med egna ögon faktiskt sett någon bli ihjälgasad. Det finns inga samtida dokument och inga reella bevis överhuvudtaget: inga högar med aska, inga krematorier som klarar av att förbränna miljoner kroppar, inga högar med kläder, ingen tvål gjord av människofett, inga lampskärmar av människohud, inga arkiv, ingen trovärdig demografisk statistik.

27 mars, 1942: Proceduren är ganska barbarisk och ska inte beskrivas här. Det kommer inte finnas mycket kvar av judarna. På det hela taget kan man säga att ungefär 60 procent av dem måste likvideras medan bara 40 procent av dem kan användas som tvångsarbetare.

I motsats till förväntningarna, min artikel" Kriget och judarna "hade en stor inverkan i neutrala länder. Jag förväntade mig att judarna skulle försöka döda den med tystnad. Det skedde inte. Det har nämnts i en häpnadsväckande omfattning. Antingen judarna är dumma nog att ge artikeln breda cirkulationen, annars finns det dolda motståndare till judar i de redaktionerna som gärna utnyttja mina antisemitiska argument.

Judarna skrattade i Tyskland också när de först såg oss. De är inte skrattar längre. De valde att föra krig mot oss. Men det krig vänder sig mot dem. När de planerade ett krig för att helt förstöra den tyska nationen, undertecknade de sin egen dödsdom.

"Judefrågan har lösts allra sämst av ungrarna. Den ungerska staten är helt genomsyrad av judar och der Führer lyckades inte under sitt samtal med Horty övertyga denne om nödvändigheten av strängare åtgärder. Horty...framför i den här frågan rent humanitära motargument som naturligtvis inte har någon betydelse i detta sammanhang. Gentemot judendomen får det inte vara tal om någon humanitet, judendomen måste kastas till marken. Führern gjorde sig mycket besvär med att övertyga Horty om sin ståndpunkt."

På en motfråga av Horthy vad han då borde göra med judarna sedan han hade berövat dem så gott som alla möjligheter att nära sig — han kunde ju inte slå ihjäl dem — förklarade utrikesministern att judarna måste antingen tillintetgöras eller placeras i koncentrationsläger. Någon annan möjlighet fanns inte.

På en anmärkning av Horthy att Tyskland i detta fall hade det lättare, då där inte hade funnits så många judar, meddelade Führern siffror av vilka framgick hur ofantligt "förjudade" vissa yrken varit.

Horthy svarade att det hade han inte haft någon aning om. I anslutning härtill kom führern att tala om staden Nürnberg som i fyrahundra år inte hade tålt några judar inom sina murar medan Fürth å andra sidan hade upptagit judarna. Resultatet blev en stor uppblomstring för Nürnberg och en total nedgång för Führt. Judarna hade inte ens något organisatoriskt värde. Trots de farhågor som han (der Führer) ofta hade hört även i Tyskland gick allting sin gilla gång även utan judarna. Där judarna lämnade åt sig själva, vilket exempelvis hade varit fallet i Polen rådde det ohyggligaste förfall och elände. De var i själva verket rena parasiter. Med dessa förhållanden hade man gjort rent hus i Polen. Om judarna inte ville arbeta sköt man dem. Om de inte kunde arbeta måste de gå under. De måste behandlas som tuberkelbaciller som en sund kropp kunde dra på sig. Detta var inte grymt med hänsyn till att även oskyldiga naturvarelser som harar och rådjur måste dödas för att inga skador skulle uppstå.