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A lengthy New York Times article (October 13, 1990), complete with a front-page photo of Leuchter, called him “The nation’s leading adviser on capital punishment.” In his book about America’s capital punishment industry, Stephen Trombley confirms that Leuchter is: “America’s first and foremost supplier of execution hardware. His products include electric chairs, gas chambers, gallows, and lethal injection machines. He offers design, construction, installation, staff training and maintenance.” Thus, with Fred A. Leuchter we have the foremost, if not the only expert on execution technology in the U.S.
After reviewing all of the material and inspecting all of the sites at Auschwitz, Birkenau and Majdanek, your author finds the evidence to be overwhelming. There were no execution gas chambers at any of these locations. It is the best engineering opinion of this author that the alleged gas chambers at the inspected sites could not have then been, or now be, utilized or seriously considered to function as execution gas chambers.
On physical-chemical grounds, the mass gassings with hydrogen cyanide (Zyklon B) in the supposed ‘gas chambers’ of Auschwitz claimed by witnesses did not take place.
Camp gassings in the Altreich probably claimed the lives of only a few thousand people, almost certainly under ten thousand. Aside from "small-scale" gassing in places like Dachau, Gusen, Neuengamme, Sachsenhausen, Stutthof, and Ravensbrück, and Brandenburg, the site of the first gas chamber, it was largely confined to the "euthanasia" program, which did claim the lives of over a hundred thousand people, mostly non-Jews.
She quotes a letter published in Die Zeit, written by Professor Broszat. Again, one wonders if she read this letter, for it is dated 19 August 1960, not 1962. It appears on page 16. This letter states quite clearly that there were no mass killings in "gas chambers" either in Dachau or anywhere else in the former Reich. May I remind you that up until 1960 we were supposed to have thousands of proofs, confessions, and eye-witness evidence, that there were mass killings at Dachau, Ravensbrück, Buchenwald, and so on. Therefore, we now have to acknowledge that the authors of such confessions (Suhren, Schwarzhuber, Dr. Treite ... ) must have been subjected to "persuasive questioning" on the part of their French, British, and American jailers. This should give food for thought, at least as far as the "confessions" are concerned.
Orthodox historians have insisted for decades that "at least 700,000" people were killed there. According to an estimate cited by American Holocaust historian Nora Levin, for example, 770,000 Serbs, 40,000 Gypsies and 20,000 Jews were put to death in Jasenovac. (N. Levin, The Holocaust, 1973, p. 515.) Croats have long maintained that about 60,000 perished in the camp, but Tudjman reckons that even this figure is too high. The most probable figure, he maintains, is between 30,000 and 40,000. Moreover, he goes on, Jewish inmates were largely responsible for the killings there. (The New Republic, Nov. 25, 1991, pp. 16, 18.; Die Presse, Vienna, Jan. 28, 1992.)
Since Mr. Antun Miletic, Senior Military Researcher and President of the Association of Genocide and War Crime Stydies, on the International Conference at the Kingsborogh College New York on October (30), 1997 - which I personally also attended - stated in writing, that according to his investigation, in the camp Jasenovac have been killed total 77,200 victims of which 41,936 Serbs, Gypsies 17.500, Jews 13.055, Croats 3.400, Muslims 805 and other 304 - , this proves that more Croats have been killed after the war ended, than Serbs during the war in Jasenovac.
Source: Croation History Website
It is strange, indeed, that the Germans -- who were far more advanced than the Allies in the development of chemical weapons -- should rely upon Zyklon B, an insecticide and disinfectant, as their primary killing agent in these alleged exterminations by gas when they had much more efficient gases, which had been designed specifically as "man-killing" agents, to choose from. For example, as early as 1936, I.G. Farbenindustrie was producing Tabun, the first of a family of nerve gases which the Germans were to develop by the end of the Second World War. (By contrast, the best gas in the Allies' arsenal was an improved version of the World War I "mustard gas.") Tabun -- which was regarded as a "quick kill" agent of tremendous potency -- was followed by the development of Sarin (1938) and Soman (1944). Only about 140 mg/meter3/minute of Tabun is needed to induce severe convulsions which are almost immediately followed by collapse, paralysis, and death. Sarin is twice as deadly as Tabun and Soman is many times more potent than Sarin.
(See, Steven Rose, ed., CBW. Chemical & Biological Warfare, Boston: Beacon Press, 1968, pp. 23-24)
By the end of the war, the Germans had stockpiled nearly twelve tons of Tabun and more than 250,000 tons of the more conventional chemical warfare agents like phosgene gas. (See, Seymour M. Hersch, Chemical and Biological Warfare: America's Hidden Arsenal, Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968, pp. 7-12)]
Aside from the Revisionists, Jean-Claude Pressac is the only researcher to have approached the historical problem of the cremation of bodies in Auschwitz and Birkenau from a technical perspective. In his book Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers[8] he comes to the following conclusions:
The three double-muffle ovens in crematorium I of Main Camp Auschwitz had a capacity of 340 cremations in a 24-hour period.[9]
In 1993, he reduced this figure down to 200-250 per day.[10]
The five three-muffle ovens in crematoria II and III of Birkenau each had a maximum capacity of between 1,000 and 1,500 cremations per 24 hours,[11] but their normal capacity was 1,000 to 1,100 cremations each per 24 hours.[12]
In 1993, he reduced this figure down to 800-1,000 per day.[13]
The two eight-muffle ovens of crematoria IV and V each had a capacity of 500 cremations per 24 hours.[14]
Pressac thus puts the total capacity of the crematoria of Auschwitz and Birkenau at 3,540 cremations per day.
"This was one tough debate to judge. I read the entire debate 4 times and reread portions several more.
Both Members did a fantastic job of staying on topic and presenting their side of the issue.
However when the entire debate is examined it becomes clear that NYK537 presented a better case.
Truth4hire presented good statistics and some evidence to support his proposition, but was unable to refute NYK537's empirical findings.
NYK537 stuck to the facts and was able to present a more complete picture of his topic that was left unchallenged in several areas by Truth4hire.
It was VERY close, but I have to give the debate to NYK537"
This was a very close and very tough debate. Each fighter managed to win a couple of contentious points as to the means and efficiency of the executions, but at the end of the day, the question is whether or not the Nazis had a program of extermination, and I think both sides of the debate made it fairly clear that there was.
Truth4hire spent a lot of time attacking unreliable witness testimony that wasn't vital to the issue. He proved that Auschwitz couldn't cremate 10,000 a day. That proves that Auschwitz couldn't single-handedly carry out the holocaust and dispose of all the bodies in 20 months, but it does nothing to prove that no genocide was attempted.
nyk537 engaged on a few issues that he probably would have been better off to find his way around, and although many would take one look at the topic and think his case should be a slam dunk, there never was the precise laying out of an airtight case that one would expect.
Long story short, there were points where it was hard to see the forest through the trees- a ton of evidence (far too much of it presented as links with insufficient commentary and external sources rather than interpretation) was dumped onto the table and picked over, and at the end it was up to he reader to try and weave it all together into a coherent story.
The story that emerged was that the Nazis rounded up and imprisoned a huge number of people for some purpose and for some reason managed that imprisonment in a manner that led to a large number of deaths. The most logical explanation that I can see is that the Nazis did intend to kill a large number of people and were concerned with cost-efficiency over speed.