Questions about Hitler and Nazi Germany's attempted extermination of Europe's Jews

[iiandyiiii]

During the Belsen Trial, Dr. Fritz Klein, the Nazi camp doctor, famously answered as follows to a question about how he reconciled his actions with his ethical obligations as a physician:

“My Hippocratic oath tells me to cut a gangrenous appendix out of the human body. The Jews are the gangrenous appendix of mankind. That’s why I cut them out.”

[Ludovic]

Isn’t this a lot like a KKK member in full regalia walking through the hood?

[Mr.Miskatonic]

So I am gathering that Gack’s argument seems to be that since some people showed & filmed holocaust victims who died in the brutal & deadly work camps as opposed to the more easternly located death camps that means no holocaust and nazis = swell guys.

[Marley23]

@Gack

Too many questions to consider all at once.

In your first post to the thread, no less! You were asked six questions before this post. I counted. The OP asked four questions, and three of them were yes-or-no. It goes without saying that you haven’t answered any of them and you spent one sentence on the one question you did answer. So I think you’re not planning to do anything other than dance around and annoy people by wasting their time. You’ll answer iiandyiiii’s questions in your next post or your participation here may be at an end. To spare you the trouble of going back to the OP, here are the questions:

@iiandyiiii

Did the Nazis try to wipe out Europe’s Jews?

Did they kill any of Europe’s Jews? If so, roughly how many do you think they killed?

Do you believe Hitler’s hatred of the Jews was justified?

[Little_Nemo]

@Gack

I’m up and have responded quickly to the posts to this point that seemed directly relevant to the photographic evidence.

Being as you were the person who brought up the photographs, are you saying you’re only going to respond to your own questions?

You did say in the other thread you would answer people’s questions. What happened?

[Johnny_Bravo]

@simster

can someone explain to me, in simple terms, what the point is in ‘denying’ these events happened on the scale they did?

In the simplest terms I can think of:

If “the Jews” are lying about the Holocaust, then what else might “they” be duping us all about?

[Quartz]

I note we’re not - yet - in the Pit, so I’m going to keep this tight and polite and just mention my own brush with Nazism.

[Chronos]

OK, let’s give Gack some even simpler questions, since the ones he said he’d answer are apparently too complicated for him.

1: Have your examined the various sorts of evidence? A simple yes or no will suffice.
2: Have you thought critically about the evidence? Again, yes or no.
3: Have you come to a conclusion from the evidence? Another yes or no.
Finally, if the answer to 3 is yes:
4: What conclusion have you come to?

Yes, I know, you think that that would be giving away the punchline early. But that’s the way reasoned debate works: You state what conclusion you’re going to come to, and then you show your evidence and present your arguments that lead to that conclusion. This is how courts of law work, it’s how scientific papers work, it’s how mathematical proofs work, it’s how high school social studies essays work.

[Siam_Sam]

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere on the Board, my uncle was OSS in World War II. Before the war, he was a camera expert in Hollywood. He was very good with cameras and did repairs and such for some of the movie studios. So in the war he was stationed in London, and he worked under the director John Ford in the OSS’s photographic unit there. My uncle was in charge of a lot of film. Sometimes he took the film himself, flying behind enemy lines and filming from the plane. He died a few years ago, but in the 1990s I think it was, he was interviewed by the History Channel about his experiences doing this and what it was like working with John Ford in this capacity.

But he was one of the first people anywhere to see the photos of the concentration camps. He saw them right out of the darkroom. He saw a lot of them. And he had zero – and I mean ZERO – tolerance for Holocaust deniers. An admirable policy, I would say.

[Siam_Sam]

@Siam_Sam

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere on the Board, my uncle was OSS in World War II. Before the war, he was a camera expert in Hollywood. He was very good with cameras and did repairs and such for some of the movie studios. So in the war he was stationed in London, and he worked under the director John Ford in the OSS’s photographic unit there. My uncle was in charge of a lot of film. Sometimes he took the film himself, flying behind enemy lines and filming from the plane. He died a few years ago, but in the 1990s I think it was, he was interviewed by the History Channel about his experiences doing this and what it was like working with John Ford in this capacity.

But he was one of the first people anywhere to see the photos of the concentration camps. He saw them right out of the darkroom. He saw a lot of them. And he had zero – and I mean ZERO – tolerance for Holocaust deniers. An admirable policy, I would say.

Too, I invite anyone who doubts the Holocaust to watch the 9-hour-plus documentary Shoah.

[Bryan_Ekers]

Based on what little evidence Gack has brought to light, I’m prepared to accept the existence of Oprah.

[Gack]

@Marley23

In your first post to the thread, no less! You were asked six questions before this post. I counted. The OP asked four questions, and three of them were yes-or-no. It goes without saying that you haven’t answered any of them and you spent one sentence on the one question you did answer. So I think you’re not planning to do anything other than dance around and annoy people by wasting their time. You’ll answer iiandyiiii’s questions in your next post or your participation here may be at an end. To spare you the trouble of going back to the OP, here are the questions:

OK, here goes …

Did the Nazis try to wipe out Europe’s Jews?

The Nazis did try to rid Europe of the Jews. They put the Jews in camps. The Jews were made to work in the camps. A large number of Jews died in the camps, and there is documentation for all the camps. including the Auschwitz and Majdanek death camps, except the Rienhard camps which were razed in 43(?). The documentation at Auschwitz includes a death certificate for each prisoner that died, including religion, cause of death, and other data, the results were summarized in death books. The Soviets captured this data and kept it secret for 50 years until it was revealed following glasnost. Now the death books can be checked out of the NY public library. In the 1980s the Red Cross, using all available data, which didn’t include the Auschwitz data at that time, estimated that the total number of prisoners of all denominations that died in all the camps which they had data for totaled between 300,000 and 400,000. These reports are available for viewing. Beyond that anything I would say is conjecture. The Nazis did not kill Jews in the camps for being Jews.
Did they kill any of Europe’s Jews? If so, roughly how many do you think they killed?

As mentioned the Red Cross made an incomplete estimate of the persons that died in the camps. The records at Auschwitz indicate that Jews made up about half the total. See

http://en.auschwitz.org/m/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=109&Itemid=8

The page linked states that “In general, the people whom the Nazis deported to Auschwitz were either murdered immediately upon arriving in Auschwitz – … or registered in the camp” There is no evidence that persons were murdered immediately on arriving at the camp other than testimony.

There is also the holocaust due to the Einstazgruppen who followed behind the German troops as them moved eastward and were responsible for pacifying the occupied areas. There are verified reports of Jews being massacred by the Einstazgruppen or by local militia operating with in conjunction with the Einstazgruppen. I do not have an estimate for the number killed by the Einstazgruppen.
Do you believe Hitler’s hatred of the Jews was justified?

No.

Now, with any luck, we can get back to examining the evidence.

[Gack]

@Bryan_Ekers

Based on what little evidence Gack has brought to light, I’m prepared to accept the existence of Oprah.

Progress !

[Mr.Miskatonic]

@Gack

OK, here goes …

Did the Nazis try to wipe out Europe’s Jews?

In the 1980s the Red Cross, using all available data, which didn’t include the Auschwitz data at that time, estimated that the total number of prisoners of all denominations that died in all the camps which they had data for totaled between 300,000 and 400,000. These reports are available for viewing. .

Harwood also claimed that Die Tat, a Swiss tabloid newspaper, published statistics that concluded the number of people who died in Nazi prisons and camps from 1939 to 1945 based on ICRC statistics was “300,000, not all of whom were Jews”.[45] The January 19, 1955 edition of Die Tat did indeed give a 300,000 figure, but this was only in reference to “Germans and German Jews” and not nationals of other countries.[46] In a 1979 response to this pamphlet, the ICRC said that they have “never tried to compile statistics on the victims of the war”,[47] nor “certified the accuracy of the statistics produced by a third party”,[47] and state that the authors of such material have “falsified” both claims that the document originates from the ICRC and refers exclusively to Jews.[47]
As well as in personal correspondence, the ICRC has also addressed this misrepresentation by several other means. In 1975, the ICRC wrote to the Board of Deputies of British Jews in London regarding Harwood’s citations, stating:

The figures cited by the author of the booklet are based upon statistics falsely attributed to us, evidently for the purpose of giving them credibility, despite the fact that we never publish information of this kind.[48]
—Françoise Perret, Comité International de la Croix-Rouge, to Jacob Gerwitz, August 22, 1975.

Evidence and documentation for the Holocaust

Aaaand you fail.

[Gack]

@Chronos

OK, let’s give Gack some even simpler questions, since the ones he said he’d answer are apparently too complicated for him.

1: Have your examined the various sorts of evidence? A simple yes or no will suffice.
2: Have you thought critically about the evidence? Again, yes or no.
3: Have you come to a conclusion from the evidence? Another yes or no.
Finally, if the answer to 3 is yes:
4: What conclusion have you come to?

Yes, I know, you think that that would be giving away the punchline early. But that’s the way reasoned debate works: You state what conclusion you’re going to come to, and then you show your evidence and present your arguments that lead to that conclusion. This is how courts of law work, it’s how scientific papers work, it’s how mathematical proofs work, it’s how high school social studies essays work.

1. I’ve studied the subject intermittently for a year or so, it took me maybe 6 months to begin seeing through the fog.

2. There is no shortage of conflicting evidence and testimony. You must start thinking critically from day 1. Here is what started me … I saw a post on an .alt group that in 1990 the stone plaque at Auschwitz stating that 4 million persons had died there was taken down and replaced by a plaque stating that the number was 1.5 million, mostly Jews. There followed posts saying that the OP was an idiot, etc. It seemed like a factual question that could be easily resolved. It took maybe a day. The OP was correct.

3. One conclusion that was inescapable from maybe a month in was that somebody was consciously lying, then it became a matter of determining who it was. It was a mystery. I discovered for me what was a touchstone.

4. One conclusion is that I cannot tell you anything that will convince you of anything regarding the holocaust, the only thing I can do is try to provoke you to study it yourself. My conclusions are useless to you, you have to form your own.

[Gack]

@Mr.Miskatonic

Evidence and documentation for the Holocaust - Wikipedia

Aaaand you fail.

The matter of the Red Cross report came up during the trial of Ernst Zundel in Canada, where it was authenticated by a Red Cross (or associated) official, see Zundelsite (Zundelsite.org) and http://forum.codoh.com/viewtopic.php?t=120 and Zundelsite (Zundelsite.org)

This is a subject in itself. The point is that the Nazis were committed record keepers and the Red Cross has data from all the camps, which the public is *still *not allowed to see. There are caveats associated with the report, but I believe it was their best estimate at the time it was made.

[Capt_Kirk]

Well how about testimony from the horses mouth, Rudolph Hoss

“ I commanded Auschwitz until 1 December 1943, and estimate that at least 2,500,000 victims were executed and exterminated there by gassing and burning, and at least another half million succumbed to starvation and disease, making a total dead of about 3,000,000. This figure represents about 70% or 80% of all persons sent to Auschwitz as prisoners, the remainder having been selected and used for slave labor in the concentration camp industries. Included among the executed and burnt were approximately 20,000 Russian prisoners of war (previously screened out of Prisoner of War cages by the Gestapo) who were delivered at Auschwitz in Wehrmacht transports operated by regular Wehrmacht officers and men. The remainder of the total number of victims included about 100,000 German Jews, and great numbers of citizens (mostly Jewish) from Holland, France, Belgium, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Greece, or other countries. We executed about 400,000 Hungarian Jews alone at Auschwitz in the summer of 1944.[29]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_H%C3%B6ss

Gack?

Capt

[running_coach]

@Gack

1. I’ve studied the subject intermittently for a year or so, it took me maybe 6 months to begin seeing through the fog.

2. There is no shortage of conflicting evidence and testimony. You must start thinking critically from day 1. Here is what started me … I saw a post on an .alt group that in 1990 the stone plaque at Auschwitz stating that 4 million persons had died there was taken down and replaced by a plaque stating that the number was 1.5 million, mostly Jews. There followed posts saying that the OP was an idiot, etc. It seemed like a factual question that could be easily resolved. It took maybe a day. The OP was correct.

3. One conclusion that was inescapable from maybe a month in was that somebody was consciously lying, then it became a matter of determining who it was. It was a mystery. I discovered for me what was a touchstone.

4. One conclusion is that I cannot tell you anything that will convince you of anything regarding the holocaust, the only thing I can do is try to provoke you to study it yourself. My conclusions are useless to you, you have to form your own.

You’re wrong. Your research skills could use some work.

Besides, no one said all six million Jews were killed at one camp. And the original plaque didn’t state that either.

[Dissonance]

@Gack

Did the Nazis try to wipe out Europe’s Jews?

The Nazis did try to rid Europe of the Jews. They put the Jews in camps. The Jews were made to work in the camps. A large number of Jews died in the camps, and there is documentation for all the camps…
The Nazis did not kill Jews in the camps for being Jews.

And you expect people to think you are ernestly answering the question? You admit that: the Nazis were trying to rid Europe of Jews, put Jews into camps, forced them to work to death, and large numbers of Jews died at the camps, and your conclusion based upon all of these statements you yourself make is that the Nazis did not kill Jews in the camps for being Jews?

I do not have an estimate for the number killed by the Einstazgruppen.

Yeah, that’s a real hard thing to find.

Historian Raul Hilberg estimates that between 1941 and 1945 the Einsatzgruppen and related auxiliary troops killed more than two million people, including 1.3 million Jews.

[Mr.Miskatonic]

No. I think rather than giving a bunch of scumbag holocaust deniers any clicks I shall note that the Red Cross info Zundel used was based on POW camps.

http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/z/zundel-ernst/supreme-court/1992-judgements-below.html

The appellant’s allegations of fact in the pamphlet were divided into 85 extracts and rebutted one by one. The trial judge summarized this material at length for the jury but it will suffice here to point only to some of the more egregious examples. The pamphlet alleged that a memorandum from Joseph Goebbels revealed that the Final Solution was never more than a plan to evacuate Jews to Madagascar…

…The pamphlet alleged, purportedly relying on a Red Cross report, that all concentration camps were really humane work camps. Mr. Biedermann, a delegate of the International Committee of the Red Cross, testified that the Red Cross Report pertained exclusively to prisoner of war camps as the Red Cross personnel had not been inside any camps in which civilians were detained.