# What's the closest we've come to Auschwitz? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 16, 2015, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025 "2015-01-16T23:18:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2015, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/21 "2015-01-21T07:34:14Z")
> [@madsircool](#): > > The Romans murdered a far higher percentage of its Jews than the Nazis. cite? The Mongols really take the cake. For a somewhat complete list: [Genocides in history - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocides_in_history) More: [http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Genocide](http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Genocide) ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2015, 9:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/22 "2015-01-21T09:16:28Z")
The Japanese in China, I think…combine the brutality of mass killings and forced labour with the human experiments of Unit 731 gets you somewhere close to the _Shoah_ both in absolute numbers and scientific/industrial inhumanity. The Japanese didn’t keep all their slave labour in neat hinterland camps, but the end result was the same. Gulags Killing Fields MaoistChina - Great Leap Forward/Cultural Revolution/etc. (I’m particularly an admirer, if that’s a good word for my horrified awe, of the [Hundred Flowers Campaign](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Flowers_Campaign) - evil genius at work) ---
**Author:** ![Marion\_Wormer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d07c76/32.png) [@Marion\_Wormer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marion_Wormer)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/23 "2015-01-22T01:56:04Z")
The Congo Free State. Deaths estimated up to 10 million (Wikipedia) ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/24 "2015-01-22T02:01:13Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > I suppose the American slave trade is the only thing I can think of that compares in scale and bureaucratic indifference. I can’t equate those. The American slave trade did not transport humans for the purpose of killing them. The Nazi trains did. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/25 "2015-01-22T05:41:41Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > cite? > > The Mongols really take the cake. For a somewhat complete list: [Genocides in history - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocides_in_history) > > More: > > [http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Genocide](http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Genocide) 90% according to a uni reader. I know if its not on the web it didnt happen…:dubious: ---
**Author:** ![madrabbitwoman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c37758/32.png) [@madrabbitwoman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madrabbitwoman)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/26 "2015-01-22T07:05:00Z")
The Civil War Concentration Camps: [The Civil War Concentration Camps](http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v02/v02p137_Weber.html) > [@](#): > > Prison camps on both sides produced scenes of wretched, disease-ridden and emaciated prisoners as repulsive as any to come out of the Second World War. Does this fit? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/27 "2015-01-22T12:58:58Z")
> [@madrabbitwoman](#): > > Does this fit? It’s a long and ongoing debate. The reality is that army camps in that era were wretched and disease-ridden and, on the Confederate side, pretty emaciated by the latter years of the war. It’s arguable that both sides weren’t treating POW’s much worse than they were treating their own soldiers. The main difference was that POW’s stayed in one location so the unhealthy living conditions accumulated. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/28 "2015-01-22T13:54:28Z")
The [slaughter in Jerusalem during the First Crusade](http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Crusader.html) is before the Holocaust, but had the same determined horror. Also, the massacre and enslavements in the Americas by the Spaniards. I am reading _Robinson Crusoe_ on audiobook during my walks. It was published in 1719, and Defoe mentions the near-universal condemnation of the Spanish actions towards the indigenous population in the Americas. (Of course, the moral impact of this is undermined in the book - the protagonist is shipwrecked on his island on his way to get slaves for his sugar plantation in Brazil). Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/29 "2015-01-22T15:36:10Z")
I’m troubled by this thread because 1) we have become a “what can I get away with” society and 2) some people see us as a Liberal message board (although I think we have always been centerist). If I say that we’ve come closest by doing “X”, I’m almost worried that someone out there might read that as, "See, George? We can get away with doing up to “That” and even the Liberals can’t call us NAZIs! As long as we keep picking different groups to lock up, no one will ever catch on. Quick, put those grey uniform orders in and start production on those MP-40s… " ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/30 "2015-01-22T17:07:58Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > Um…nothing. > > No one ever has, or thought to have, an industrial complex for killing individuals in the millions. It wasn’t easy, and was unknown territory, but true dedication and the mechanical engineering of the most modern industrial society on earth and the perfect storm/culmination of millennia-old social engineering came up with it. > > Nowadays you’d try to get them althogether and just nuke em. Don’t get me wrong, as a monument to human suffering and cruelty I hope Auschwitz-Birkenau will never be surpassed, but I do wonder if other people had the same idea but were less…successful in its implantation or if there are any other parallels elsewhere in terms of intent or enactment. > [@madrabbitwoman](#): > > The Civil War Concentration Camps: [The Civil War Concentration Camps](http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v02/v02p137_Weber.html) > > Quote: > Prison camps on both sides produced scenes of wretched, disease-ridden and emaciated prisoners as repulsive as any to come out of the Second World War. > Does this fit? You ain’t kidding, looking up Andersonville unless you knew better you’d swear the survivors were liberated in Germany. They were soldiers not civilians, although let us not forget that among the first prisoners gassed at Auschwitz were Russian POWs. > [@Omar\_Little](#): > > What’s the closest we’ve come to Auschwitz? > > Well considering I’ve been there, pretty damn close… Historically, not geographically! > [@Count\_Blucher](#): > > If I say that we’ve come closest by doing “X”, I’m almost worried that someone out there might read that as, "See, George? We can get away with doing up to “That” and even the Liberals can’t call us NAZIs! Anyone that frigging stupid wouldn’t need much inspiration from here to spread such idiocy, I think. > [@Ellen\_Cherry](#): > > Fixed title. Thanks, I promise I won’t hit submit reply too early ever aga ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/31 "2015-01-22T18:04:03Z")
> [@kopek](#): > > Trail of Tears comes to mind along with some of the other reservations and re-settlements. 2-5000? Mao= 10-40 million. Winner! Imperial Japan= 5-30 million Stalin= 5 to 20 million people. Hitler= 1-5MM Congo Free State- 1-8 Million Pol Pot= 1 to 3 million people Armenia- estimates vary widely, but around 1 million. Yugoslavia; 500k- 1MM Fascist Italy: about 200K in Ethiopia, etc skipping down quite a bit: Andersonville= 13,000. Not to say that the Trail of Tears should be forgotten, but the numbers dont make it even in the top 100. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/32 "2015-01-23T04:45:07Z")
You might be underestimating some of those numbers. Only 1-5 million for Hitler? This is my go-to resource for body count arguments: [http://www.bookofhorriblethings.com/ax02.html](http://www.bookofhorriblethings.com/ax02.html) White is a statistician with an interest in mass death. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/33 "2015-01-23T04:50:53Z")
> [@Peremensoe](#): > > Ukraine, 1930s. > > Cambodia, 1970s. > > To name a couple. Armenian genocide, Kenyan genocide, North Korean prison camps, maybe the Yugoslav situation in the 90s. To name a few more. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/34 "2015-01-23T05:36:58Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Hitler= 1-5MM Where did you get this number from? 6 million Jews + 5 million others is the standard figure. ---
**Author:** ![JustinC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justinc/32/8083_2.png) [@JustinC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustinC)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/35 "2015-01-23T11:04:43Z")
Sad to say, but I expect this thread to be raised from zombie mode later in this century with new examples. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/36 "2015-01-23T11:55:21Z")
> [@madrabbitwoman](#): > > The Civil War Concentration Camps Those weren’t specifically for the sake of killing or making people die; the Holocaust was \*specifically \*all about genocide. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/37 "2015-01-23T17:11:51Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > You might be underestimating some of those numbers. Only 1-5 million for Hitler? Ooops, typo. 10-15MM ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/38 "2015-01-23T17:13:37Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > Those weren’t specifically for the sake of killing or making people die; the Holocaust was \*specifically \*all about genocide. There is some evidence that Andersonville really was about making those “Damn Yankees” suffer and die, but yes, most of those were mostly from neglect and lack of resources. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2015, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/39 "2015-01-23T17:39:30Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > There is some evidence that Andersonville really was about making those “Damn Yankees” suffer and die, but yes, most of those were mostly from neglect and lack of resources. The stronger case for deliberate infliction of suffering would be against the Northern ones, such as [Elmira](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmira_Prison), NY–where resources were not in short supply at all, yet men still starved and froze. ---
**Author:** ![HubZilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ccd318/32.png) [@HubZilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HubZilla)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2015, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025/40 "2015-01-24T02:22:28Z")
Speaking of Confederate POW camps, how about the [German POW camps](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_mistreatment_of_Soviet_prisoners_of_war) in the USSR? They pretty much just put all the Soviet POWs in barbed wire enclosures, without little shelter, food, or clothing, and waited. > [@](#): > > The most deaths took place between June 1941 and January 1942, when the Germans killed an estimated 2.8 million Soviet POWs primarily through deliberate starvation, exposure, and summary execution, in what has been called, along with the Rwandan Genocide, an instance of “the most concentrated mass killing in human history (…) eclipsing the most exterminatory months of the Jewish Holocaust” The [Japanese](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_war_crimes) gave their Axis allies a good run in the “who can depopulate the bestest” game. The Second Sino-Japanese War raged from 1937-1945. > [@](#): > > The death rate of Chinese POWs was much higher because—under a directive ratified on August 5, 1937 by Emperor Hirohito—the constraints of international law on treatment of those prisoners was removed. Only 56 Chinese POWs were released after the surrender of Japan. Not 56,000… Fifty six. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-closest-weve-come-to-auschwitz/710025.md?page=1)