From:
[email protected] (Karl Kluge)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish,soc.history,alt.activism,alt.conspiracy
Subject: Responding to Holocaust revisionism
Date: 10 Sep 91 01:08:48 GMT
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon
Nntp-Posting-Host: g.gp.cs.cmu.edu
Originator:
[email protected]
Recently certain newsgroups have experienced an infestation of postings
regarding Holocaust revisionism. While flamage, email harassment, and
attempts to get certain of these individuals thrown off the net may be
emotionally satisfying responses, they are not necessarily productive
responses. First, they allow the revisionists to assume the mantle of
persecution. Second, they fail to respond to the substance (or lack of
substance) in the revisionist posts, risking making their positions appear
better supported, and turning the uninformed into the misinformed.
The approach I would suggest is based on our experience in talk.origins.
Every so often, some bright eyed and bushy tailed creationist who is new to
the net pops up and says something like "hey, NASA thought there would be a
60 foot layer of dust on the Moon, and the dust is only 1/4" thick, so the
Moon must only be a few thousand years old," or some other argument that has
been refuted several dozen times in the past. At which point one of the
regulars just posts a prepared file providing the evidence that the argument
in question is wrong. Asymptotically the creationists come up with fewer and
fewer points for which there isn't a refutation stored away.
So my suggestion is...the next time you see a revisionist post that really
raises your hackles, go to the nearest library, check the use of sources to
see if they've pulled anything out of context, and try to find contrary
evidence. Pick some particular point (the capacity of the gas chambers at
one of the death camps, say), and find primary sources. While survivor
accounts may maximize emotional effect, Nazi documents from the people
involved are probably most convincing. That way the net will gradually build
up a cumulative distributed database of evidence refuting particular points
that can simply be reposted every time the revisionists crawl out of their
hole.
Remember, the revisionists are few in number compared to the normal people
on the net, so small individual efforts have greater total leverage -- each
person responding to the revisionist posts has to spend only a fraction of
the time each revisionist spends, and yet the revisionist claims can be
overwhelmed with contrary evidence.
To start the ball rolling, here are some pertinent extracts from DOCUMENTS ON
THE HOLOCAUST, ed. Yitzhak Arad. I should note that this volume also
contains documents relating to early Nazi policy of trying to rid Germany of
Jews through expulsion -- it must be remembered that the Holocaust as such
started fairly late in the war.
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Riots of Kristallnacht -- Heydrich's instructions, Nov. 1938
"Following the attempt on the life of Secretary of the Legation vom Rath in
Paris, demonstrations against the Jews are to be expected in all parts of
the Reich in the course of the coming night, November 9/10, 1938. The
instructions below are to be applied in dealing with these events:....
a) Only such measures are to be taken as do not endanger German lives or
property (i.e., synagogues are to be burned down only when there is no
danger of fire in neighboring buildings).
b) Places of business and apartments belonging to Jews may be destroyed but
not looted....
2) On the assumption that the guidelines detailed under para. 1 are
observed, the demonstrations are not to be prevented by the Police, which is
only to supervise the observance of the guidelines."
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ON THE INTENT TO EXTERMINATE THE JEWS IN NAZI TERRITORY:
>From the stenographic report of the meeting on the Jewish question held
under the chairmanship of Field Marshall Goring in the Reich Air Ministry at
11 am on 11/12/38:
"Goring: The second point is the following. If the German Reich should in
the near future become involved in conflict abroad then it is obvious that we
in Germany will first of all make sure of settling accounts with the Jews."
>From a speech by Hitler, 1/30/39:
"Today I will once more be a prophet: If the international Jewish financiers
in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nations once more into
a world war, then the result will not be the bolshevization of the earth,
and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in
Europe!"
>From a speech by Frank 12/16/41:
"...One way or another -- I will tell you quite openly -- we must finish off
the Jews. The Fuhrer put it into words once: should united Jewry again
succeed in setting off a world war, then the blood sacrifice shall not be
made only by the peoples driven into war, but then the Jew of Europe will
have met his end....
"But what should be done with the Jews? Can you believe that they will be
accommodated in settlements in the Ostland? In Berlin we were told: why are
you making all this trouble? We don't want them either, not in Ostland nor
in the Reichskommissariat; liquidate them yourselves! Gentlemen, I must ask
you to steel yourselves against all considerations of compassion. We must
destroy the Jews wherever we find them, and wherever it is at all possible,
in order to maintain the whole structure of the Reich..."
Minutes of the Wannsee conference, 1/20/42:
"Under appropriate direction the Jews are to be utilized for work in the
East in an expedient manner in the course of the final solution. In large
(labor) columns, with the sexes separated, Jews capable of work will be
moved into these areas as they build roads, during which a large proportion
will no doubt drop out through natural reduction. The remnant that
eventually remains will require suitable treatment; because it will without
doubt represent the most [physically] resistant part, it consists of a
natural selection that could, on its release, become the germ-cell of a new
Jewish revival. (Witness the experience of history.)"
"In conclusion, there was a discussion of the various possible forms which
the solution might take, and here both Gautleiter Dr. Meyer and Secretary of
State Dr. Buhler were of the opinion that certain preparatory work for the
final solution should be carried out locally in the area concerned, but that
in doing so, alarm among the population must be avoided."
Speech by Himmler before senior SS officers in Poznan, 10/4/43:
"I am referring here to the evacuation of the Jews, the extermination of the
Jewish people. This is one of the things that is easily said: 'The Jewish
people are going to be exterminated,' that's what every party member says,
'sure, it's in our program, elimination of the Jews, extermination -- it'll
be done.' And then they all come along, the 80 million worthy Germans, and
each one has his one decent Jew. Of course, the others are swine, but this
one, he is a first-rate Jew. Of all those who talk like this, not one has
seen it happen, not one has had to go through with it. Most of you men know
what it is like to see 100 corpses side by side, or 500, or 1000. To have
stood fast through this and -- except for cases of human weakness -- to have
stayed decent that has made us hard."
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ON THE SECRECY SURROUNDING THE "FINAL SOLUTION"
Instructions by Heydrich on policy and operations concerning Jews in the
occupied territories, 9/21/39:
"I refer to the conference held in Berlin today, and again point out that
the planned total measures (i.e., the final aim) are to be kept strictly
secret."
Signed obligation by SS men 8/18/42:
"1. that I may not under any circumstances pass on any form of information,
verbally or in writing, on the progress, procedure or incidents in the
evacuation of Jews to any person outside the circle of the 'Einsatz
Reinhard' staff;"
"4. that there is an absolute prohibition on photography in the camps of
'Einsatz Reinhard';"
Order from Bormann, 7/11/43:
"On instructions from the Fuhrer I make known the following:
"Where the Jewish question is brought up in public, there may be no
discussion of a future overall solution.
"It may, however, be mentioned that the Jews are taken in groups for
appropriate labor purposes."
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NOTES BY AN SS ENGINEER REGARDING DAILY EXECUTION RATES
>From notes made by Kurt Gerstein, an engineer working for the SS, on the
extermination camp at Belzec:
"...In Lublin, SS Gruppenfuhrer Globocnik was waiting for us. he said: This
is one of the most highly secret matters there are, perhaps the most secret.
Anybody who speaks about it is shot dead immediately. Two talkative people
died yesterday. Then he explained that, at the present moment -- August 17,
1942 -- there were the following installations:
1) Belzec, on the Lublin-Lvov road, in the sector of the Soviet
Demarcation Line. Maximum per day: 15,000 persons (I saw it!)
2) Sobibor, I am not familiar with the exact situation, I did not
visit it. 20,000 persons per day.
3) Treblinka, 120 km. NNE of Warsaw, 25,000 per day, saw it!
4) Majdanek, near Lublin, which I saw when it was being built."
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REPORT BY SD COMMANDER ON MASS SHOOTINGS OF JEWS IN LITHUANIA
"Commander of the Security Police and the SD
Einsatzkommando 3
Kovno, December 1, 1941
Reich Secret Document
Final Summary of Executions carried out in the operating area of EK 3 up to
December 1, 1941.
..I can confirm today that Einsatzkommando 3 has achieved the goal of
solving the Jewish problem in Lithuania. There are no more Jews in
Lithuania, apart from working Jews and their families.
These number:
in Shavli, about 4,500
in Kovno, about 15,000
in Vilna, about 15,000
I wanted to eliminate the working Jews and their families as well, but the
Civil Administration and the Wehrmacht attacked me sharply and issued a
prohibition against having these Jews and their families shot....
The carrying-out of such Aktionen is first of all an organizational problem.
The decision to clear each sub-district systematically of Jews called for a
thorough preparation for each Aktion and the study of local conditions. The
Jews had to be concentrated in one or more localities and, in accordance
with their numbers, a site had to be selected and pits dug. The marching
distance from the concentration points to the pits averaged 4 to 5 kms. The
Jews were brought to the place of execution in groups of 500, with at least
2 kms. distance between groups...."
DOCUMENTS OF DESTRUCTION gives the detailed breakdown by date and gender of
the victims that accompanied the report. The numbers reported shot (mostly
Jews along with the odd POW, Communist, or partisan) total 137,346.
See also document 190, in which a German armament inspector in the Ukraine
reports the shooting of 150,000 to 200,000 Jews in the Ukraine.
