@SecureSignals comments on "Culture War Roundup for the week of April 3, 2023

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 3, 2023

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Tarnstellung 1yr ago · Edited 1yr ago

Dear "revisionists", where are all the Jews?

A couple of months ago, I had a discussion with the self-proclaimed "revisionist" @SecureSignals concerning the veracity of the Holocaust, always a fun topic.

There was a bit of back-and-forth on the archaeological evidence and witness testimony, which I eventually gave up on because SS (very subtle username, by the way) clearly knew much more about the subject than me, and could thus, as the saying goes, drag me down to his level and beat me with experience. Calculating the number of corpses that can fit in a given volume definitely felt like I was being dragged down a few levels.

A more fruitful line of questioning is that of where millions of Jews disappeared to. In response to SS's accusation that:

It's astounding how much nonsense you are willing to believe without any concrete physical evidence or without the claims even being remotely possible. But believing this story requires belief in the impossible, because the official narrative makes impossible claims only supported by witnesses who lack credibility and have an obvious motive to lie.

I said:

The best piece of physical evidence I have is the missing six million Jews. Where did they all go? If Treblinka was merely a transit camp, where did the Jews transit afterwards? Compare the pre-war and post-war census data in Europe, especially Eastern Europe. Even accounting for emigration, millions of Jews disappeared.

In general, I think census data is a reliable source for estimating the number of victims. I'm not familiar with the details of the Holocaust in Europe as a whole, so the best example I can provide is the Jasenovac concentration camp. Shortly after WWII, it was estimated that around 600,000 people were killed there. These estimates were widely accepted, including by the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Later claims went as high as a million or more. In the 1980s, two researchers independently arrived at much lower estimates based on demographic data. Eventually, after the end of communist censorship, a new consensus formed that the number of victims is around 100,000, an order of magnitude lower than previous estimates.

This shows that it is entirely to possible for new research to greatly lower the estimated number of victims. There is no conspiracy to suppress the truth. Indeed, despite the number six million being embedded in popular culture, some credible historians place it at closer to five million. Yad Vashem says "the number of victims was between five and six million".

SS replied with arguments as to why the "official narrative" on Treblinka is implausible, which I was unable to argue against because, as I said, I'm not familiar with all the details of every Nazi camp. It is possible that the consensus figures for a single camp are wrong. As in the Jasenovac example, this has already happened (though it should be noted that most of the victims at Jasenovac were not Jewish). Even if true, this is at most evidence that the consensus on Treblinka is incorrect. It says nothing about the other camps, where the vast majority of the murders happened. In my reply, I said:

You clearly know much more about Treblinka than I do, so I'm not sure if I can provide any good counterarguments. Let's suppose, then, for the sake of the argument, that the archaeological evidence for the "official narrative" is insufficient. That means we don't know what exactly was done with the Jews.

Other evidence exists for the claim that over 700,000 people were killed at Treblinka, such as the Höfle Telegram and the Korherr Report. But looking at them, thanks to the euphemisms used, I suppose they might also be interpreted as supporting the transit camp theory.

However, you did not address the question in my previous post: if Treblinka was merely a transit camp, where did the Jews transit from there? Where were the hundreds of thousands of eyewitnesses after the war who testified that they passed through Treblinka and were peacefully resettled?

And more broadly, demographic data has millions of Jews unaccounted for after the war. Where did they all go? Or do you accept the rest of the "official narrative" and are only sceptical with regard to Treblinka? Auschwitz had proper crematoria, with fuel and everything – do you believe that over a million people were killed there?

As far as I can tell, SS never addressed any of this. It seems some of the comments in the thread have since been deleted, which apparently hides all child comments when viewing the thread directly, though they are still visible on the profile page. This makes it hard to reconstruct the exchange, but looking at SS's profile, I can't find anything where he addressed my argument. From his post below on Holocaust education, we can infer that he does indeed believe that not just Treblinka but the entire Holocaust is fake, a position for which he has not provided any evidence.

So, to SS and any other "revisionists" who may be lurking: Where are all the Jews?

Context

Deleted by author

To_Mandalay giordano-bruno 1yr ago

Even reading Tacitus shows the same continuity of character.

Tacitus also says that the Germans nailed people to trees and burned them alive as sacrifices to Wotan.

The Germans wouldn't have wasted delousing chemicals to kill people or have wasted forced labor that would allow them to feel self-righteous in perpetuity.

Old people and children are not wasted force labor, they're dead weight.

The notion that Germans would use euphemisms in the one extant documented meeting concerning the implementation details is absurd to anyone that has ever met a rank-and-file German.

Here is Himmler talking openly about the extermination of European Jews without use of code-words in the Posen speech of October 6 1943:

In this connection, I may comment before this very tightly knit group on a matter which you, my Party Comrades, all take for granted, and which is the most difficult task I have ever faced in my life, the Jewish problem. All of you gladly take it for granted that there are no longer any Jews in your administrative districts. All Germans — with a few individual exceptions — are aware that we could not have endured the bombings, the hardships of the fourth year of the war, and could not endure fifth and sixth years of war that are perhaps yet to come, if we still had this demoralizing pest in our national body. "The Jews must be eradicated ["ausgerottet"]." This brief sentence is easily said. But for the man who must carry out what it calls for, it is the gravest and hardest thing in existence. Now, look, after all they're Jews, only Jews. That's plain enough. But just think about how many people — including Party comrades — have addressed to me and other officials those famous petitions of theirs in which they say: The Jews are all bastards, of course, but so-and-so is a good Jew and should be left alone. I daresay, judging by the number of such appeals and the number of people who express such opinions, the number of "good Jews" in Germany must have exceeded the total Jewish population! In Germany we have millions and millions of people who each have their "one good Jew." I mention this only because you can see in the vital field of your own administrative districts how many respected and upright National Socialists have their "good Jew."

I ask that you assembled here pay attention to what I have to say, but not repeat it. The question came up: Well, what about the women and children? — I came to a determinedly simple conclusion about that, too. I did not believe that I had the right to wipe out ["auszurotten"] the men — rather I should say, kill ["umzubringen"] them or have them killed — and let their children grow up to avenge themselves on our sons and grandsons. The hard decision to wipe this people ["Volk"] off ["verschwinden"] the face of the earth had to be made. For us, the organization that had to carry out this task, it was the most difficult one we ever had. But it was accomplished, and without — I believe I can say — our men and their leaders suffering any mental or spiritual damage. That was clearly a danger. To become too brutal, too heartless, and lose respect for human life, or to be too soft and bring oneself to the point of a nervous breakdown — the path between these two ever-present possibilities is incredibly narrow, the course between Scylla and Charybdis.

We have turned over to the Reich Ministry of Economics all the wealth we confiscated from the Jews — the sums were staggering — right down to very last penny. I have always maintained: We have a duty to our people, to our race, we have a duty to a leader such as has been given to our people only once in 2,000 years, not to be petty here, but to go the limit, as we must do in all things if we are to win the war. Yet we do not have the right to take even one penny of the wealth confiscated from the Jews. At the outset, I laid down the line: Any SS men who take so much as a mark of it are as good as dead. In the past few days, I've had to sign a number of death sentences — I might as well say it, there were about a dozen. One has to be strict here, or everyone will suffer. I considered it my duty to speak very openly to you — the highest bearers of the will, the highest dignitaries, of the Party, of this political order, of this political instrument of the Führer — about this matter and to give the facts as they are. By the end of the year, the Jewish problem in the lands we have occupied will be solved. There will be left only remnants, individual Jews who are in hiding. The problem of Jews who are partners in mixed marriages and the problem of half-Jews will, in accordance with this policy, be rationally examined, decided upon, and resolved.

Source is this thread on the CODOH revisionist forum, which anyone can read if they want to see whether the revisionist interpretation of such a speech holds up.

SecureSignals Civilization is simply a geno-memetic-techno-capital machine To_Mandalay 1yr ago · Edited 1yr ago

In the Posen speeches Himmler describes the policy as "Judenevakuierung", which is alleged to have been a code-word. So he is still using the "code" at Posen. And months later he continues describing a policy of evacuation/resettlement/emigration to the East with the killing of Jews being in the context of partisan reprisals (which revisionists do not deny happened).

To_Mandalay SecureSignals 1yr ago

So he is still using the "code" at Posen.

In other speeches at Posen he uses the word "Judenevakuierung." In this speech he uses the word "umbringen," which unambiguously means "kill."

the killing of Jews being in the context of partisan reprisals

Partisans are in fact mentioned much earlier in the speech and then Himmler says, 'enough about partisans,' and then moves on to talking about other stuff, and finally when he discusses the solution to the Jewish question in the excerpted paragraphs partisans are not mentioned once.

The hard decision to wipe this people ["Volk"] off ["verschwinden"] the face of the earth had to be made.

Partisans are not a "Volk" and "the East" is a place on the face of the earth.

By the end of the year, the Jewish problem in the lands we have occupied will be solved. There will be left only remnants, individual Jews who are in hiding.

Goal is no Jews left in German-occupied territory by the end of 1943. Which included "the East," however you define it.

Yes, in speeches at Posen he describes the policy as evacuation. Two months after that October 1943 speech, in December, he also describes the policy as evacuation:

We are also too close to the development that is taking place in Europe. For the first time, as far as we can determine it historically since approximately 2 1/2 thousand years ago, we are at the point where the Germanic peoples have united, from a 65 million people in 1933 which has become 85 - 88 million people in 1941, which during the war some big migrations have taken place, a migration of 700,00 Germans who have immigrated, of 2 million foreigners who have emigrated, of such and such many Jews who have emigrated to the East; Movements of peoples, as we call them in history with infinite names, have taken place within the framework of this rapid development.

Although he mentions the killing of Jews in this December speech as well, in the context of partisans:

Measures, gentlemen, which we are shirking today, will be welcomed by our grandchildren. If I was forced to take action against partisans and against Jewish commissars in a village - I am saying this in this circle, as it is only intended for this circle -, then I gave the basic order to have the wives and children of these partisans and commissars killed as well. I would be a weakling and a criminal of our descendants if I let the hateful sons of these subhumans, who were killed by us in the fight of man against subhuman, grow up.

His defense of the decision to conduct reprisals against the families of partisans and commissars "If I was forced to take action" would not make any sense in the context of an extermination policy where extermination of all Jews would have been the policy. You are saying his statement here is just theater right? To provide cover for the fact he actually ordered the extermination of all Jews?

You are basically saying:

Posen October 4th <- evacuation euphemisms + partisans
Posen October 6th <- partisans + admitted the policy was to exterminate all Jews
Weimar December 15th <- evacuation euphemisms + partisans

Why did Himmler go "mask off" only in the October 6th speech but maintain the euphemisms in the other speeches? The Revisionist position is more sensible, that his statements about the hard decision to kill Jews in the October 6th speech resembles the same statements in the December speech which is unambiguously about partisans.

Hermann Goering- the one who actually gave the "Final Solution" order to Heydrich and would have been as aware as Himmler of its actual nature, maintained that it was a policy of evacuation for emigration and not a euphemism for extermination in the Nuremberg Trial. That stands as more significant than a narrow interpretation of a single passage which stands in contrast with other speeches before and after that single passage.

His defense of the decision to conduct reprisals against the families of partisans and commissars would not make any sense in the context of an extermination policy where extermination of all Jews would have been the policy.

Partisans and commissars were not only Jews.

Memo from January 1944:

Largest stabilisation in the G.G. since the solution to the Jewish question. – Race war. Total solution. Not allowing avengers to rise against our children.

"No avengers" refers to the solution to the Jewish question in general. Which includes Jewish partisans and commissars but is obviously not limited to partisans and commissars. There were no 'commissars' in the General Government.

It's pretty clear the 4 October speech refers to physical annihilation as well, but the 6 October speech leaves even less wiggle room.

The Revisionist position is more sensible

In one speech Himmler talked about killing partisans in particular and in another speech he talked about killing Jews in general. This demonstrates only that when Himmler wanted to talk about killing partisans he was fully capable of using the word 'partisan' to indicate that he was talking about partisans. The unjustified assumption that Himmler is talking about partisans on October 6th because he talked about killing partisans in a different speech two months later is not sensible at all.

that his statements about the hard decision to kill Jews in the October 6th

No, he said it was a hard decision to wipe a "people/race" off of the face of the earth. Once again, partisans are not a "Volk."

Women and children killed along with the men. The race wiped off the face of the earth. No Jews to be left in occupied territories except those "in hiding."

Very clear.

SecureSignals Civilization is simply a geno-memetic-techno-capital machine To_Mandalay 1yr ago

It's pretty clear the 4 October speech refers to physical annihilation as well

So much of your case rests on an extremely narrow interpretation of a few selected passages, while dismissing the much more extant documentation as "euphemism" and "coded language."

You say that the 4 October speech refers to physical annihilation because Himmler describes:

Ich meine jetzt die Judenevakuierung, die Ausrottung des jüdischen Volkes.

I am thinking now of the evacuation of the Jews, the extirpation of the Jewish people.

Your entire assumption is based on the assertion of what "Ausrottung" is supposed to denote. The meaning of this term was something of a mild controversy at the Nuremberg Trial and in the David Irving trial as well. It's misleading to call it "pretty clear" when it has been a controversy in court.

This question was brought to Alfred Rosenberg at Nuremberg:

MR. DODD: This is something you will be interested in. Will you look up and read out to the Tribunal what the definition of "Ausrottung" is?

ROSENBERG: I do not need a foreign dictionary in order to explain the various meanings "Ausrottung" may have in the German language. One can exterminate an idea, an economic system, a social order, and as a final consequence, also a group of human beings, certainly. Those are the many possibilities which are contained in that word. For that I do not need an English-German dictionary. Translations from German into English are so often wrong-and just as in that last document you have submitted to me, I heard again the translation of "Herrenrasse." In the document itself "Herrenrasse" is not even mentioned; however, there is the term "ein falsches Herrenmenschentum" (a false master mankind). Apparently everything is translated here in another sense.

MR. DODD: All right, I am not interested in that. Let us stay on this term of "Ausrottung." I take it then that you agree it does mean to "wipe out" or to "kill off," as it is understood, and that you did use the term in speaking to Hitler.

ROSENBERG: Here I heard again a different translation, which again used new German words, so I cannot determine what you wanted to express in English.

MR. DODD: Are you very serious in pressing this apparent inability of yours to agree with me about this ward or are you trying to kill time? Don't you know that there are plenty of people in this courtroom who speak German and who agree that that word does mean to "wipe out," to "extirpate?"

ROSENBERG: It means "to overcome" on one side and then it is to be used not with respect to individuals but rather to juridical entities, to certain historical traditions. On the other side this word has been used with respect to the German people and we have also not believed that in consequence thereof 60 millions of Germans would be shot.

Hitler warned of the "Ausrottung" of all European peoples (including the Allies) if Germany lost the war. Obviously this did not mean that every single European person would be killed, but something more like "an allied victory will lead to the Bolshevization of Europe," which he considered to be an Ausrottung.

So to say that it's pretty clear Himmler is referring here to physical annihilation rather than the sense used by Hitler and Rosenberg, which completely fits the evacuation policy, is grasping at straws.

It's pretty clear because Himmler says things like:

Most of you know what it means when 100 bodies lie together, when 500 lie there, or if 1,000 lie there. To have gone through this, and at the same time, apart from exceptions caused by human weaknesses, to have remained decent, that has made us hard.

and

We had the moral right, we had the duty to our own people, to kill this people which wanted to kill us

Luckily we have the 6 October speech to take us from "pretty clear" to "crystal clear." Where Himmler says, one more time:

I did not believe that I had the right to wipe out the men — rather I should say, kill them or have them killed — and let their children grow up to avenge themselves on our sons and grandsons. The hard decision to wipe this people off the face of the earth had to be made.

Please explain how "the hard decision to wipe this people off of the face of the earth" can refer to either the killing of partisans or resettlement.

More comments

Death toll post-1943 is pretty much just the Hungarian Jews sent to Auschwitz, some 400-500,000 or so, with a few tens of thousands from western European countries. Polish Jewry had already been wiped out at Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka (all closed and demolished by late 1943) and likewise for Soviet Jewry in occupied territory. Most memoirs and most famous survivors come from western European deportees who were atypical of the slain in a lot of ways.

To respond to your other comment, yes it used to be a lot more common to lay the blame for the Holocaust and the world wars at the feet of some special defect in German character. But as you note this has fallen out of favor and I believe it was pretty silly to begin with.

johnfabian giordano-bruno 1yr ago

By October 1943 the Holocaust was in many ways complete; somewhere around 5 million Jews were already dead at this point. By far the largest remaining Jewish population in Europe was in Hungary, who was still an ally (and wouldn't start deporting its Jews to Auschwitz until after March 1944 when Germany seized control). The remaining Jews still on the chopping block were smaller populations in western countries: Italy, France, the Netherlands, and Germany itself.

johnfabian giordano-bruno 1yr ago · Edited 1yr ago

The distinction is there were various kind of camps:

Arbeitslager (work camps), which were slave labour camps. Inmates were treated very poorly, but there was an active effort to keep them alive because they provided either useful manual labour or some element of skilled labour.
Konzentrationslager (concentration camps), where the inmates were more or less expected to work at menial tasks until they died.
Vernichtungslager (extermination camps) where almost all individuals were murdered immediately, usually within an hour or two of arrival. Only the strongest individuals would be selected as sonderkommandos, and these groups would be liquidated from time-to-time. If you had made it to November 1943 (the end of Operation Reinhard), the only extermination camp operational past that point was at Auschwitz (with the exception of a brief resumption of gassing operations at Chelmno in June 1944). The others were all farther east and by mid-1943 the Nazis realized they were at risk from a sudden Soviet advance.

The two main reasons why Auschwitz gets so much attention in memoirs/popular histories is that Auschwitz had a work camp, a concentration camp, and an extermination camp; so while more people were murdered there than anywhere else, there were also tens of thousands of survivors. Additionally, it was the principle destination for the western (and Hungarian) Jews who were the last to be targeted, so they were both those who entered the concentration and labour camp systems last (making them most likely to survive), and those able to freely write about their experiences post-war.

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