Continued from Part 1

On this point and on the manipulations and trickeries which the texts attributedto R. Höss received from the American prosecution as well as on relatedrevelations, see R. Faurisson , "Comment les Britanniques ont obtenules aveux de Rudolf Höss, commandant d'Auschwitz", Annales d'histoirerévisionniste, spring 1987, pp. 137-152 or "How the BritishObtained the Confessions of Rudolf Höss", The Journal of HistoricalReview, Winter 1986-1987, pp. 389-403. Until these last few years, R. Hösswas held by the majority of the historians of the "Holocaust"for the No. 1 witness of the Auschwitz crimes (homicidal gassings and numberof the victims). In 1993, one of those historians, the American professorChristopher Browning, requested by a Jewish British journalist to give hisopinion on R. Faurisson's article, finally answered: "Höss wasalways a very weak and confused witness". The same professor was nothesitating to conclude: "The revisionists use him all the time forthis reason, in order to try and discredit the memory of Auschwitz as awhole" (Christopher Hitchens, "Whose History is it?", VanityFair, December 1993, p. 117). R. Höss gave many other estimations thanthat of 3,000,000 deaths until December 1st, 1943. (10) "When you quotethe figure of 1,500,000 Jews, there again you falsify figures. It was 3,000,000Jews that were exterminated at Auschwitz-Birkenau" (David Susskind,President of the Brussels Jewish secular community center, letter publishedin Le Nouvel Observateur, May 30, l986, p. 29).In an editorial on the matterof the Auschwitz Carmelites, Heritage, the Calfornian largest Jewish weekly,asserts: "[...] huge quantities of poisonous Zyklon B pellets [...]ended the lives of some Three Million Jews at Auschwitz" (June 7, 1993).

The assertion proves the indifference of that Jewish weekly's writers tothe fact that, for three years already, the world press, as a whole, hadrevealed that such a figure was constituting an enormous exaggeration. (11)"Consequently, on the basis of my calculations the final death rollin Concentration Camp Auschwitz was 2,500,000": this is what statedunder oath Rudolf Vrba July 16, 1961 at Israel's embassy in London for theEichmann trial at Jerusalem. R. Vrba had the cheek to add that this figurecatches up that given by R. Höss at the Nuremberg trial, while thelatter had reckoned the number of the deaths at 3,000,000 until December1st, 1943, without providing an evaluation for the following fourteen months.R. Vrba added: "Thus my estimations of the death roll in Auschwitz,and the estimations of the death roll made by Rudolf Höss, though madeindependently of each other and using different methods, were neverthelessin good agreement" (Rudolf Vrba and Alan Bestic, I cannot Forgive,New York, Bantam, 1964, pp. 269-272). (12)

It is likely that, for the historianYehuda Bauer, the total of the dead of Auschwitz is of 2,000,000 to 4,000,000given that he wrote, in 1982, about the sole gassed ones: "BetweenApril 1942 and November 1944, in addition to the Soviet POWs, the gas extinguishedthe lives of probably up to 2,000 gypsies (in 1944), a few hundred moreSoviet POWs, and between 1,500,000 and 3,500,000 Jews" (A History ofthe Holocaust, New York, Franklin Watts, 1982, p. 215). In 1989, that isto say seven years later, Y. Bauer evaluated the total of the dead (gassedor not gassed) at 1,600,000 of whom 1,352,980 Jews (see note 16). (13) TheSS sergeant Pery Broad, member of the Political Section (called "Gestapo")of the camp, is supposed to have written: "2,000,000 to 3,000,000 wereput to death [at Auschwitz]! Besides thousands of Poles, Russians, Czechs,Yugoslavs, etc." ("Erinnerungen von Broad", KL Auschwitzin den Augen der SS (Tr.'s Note: Recollections of Broad, the Auschwitz concentrationcamp in the eyes of the SS), Verlag des Staatlichen Auschwitz-Museums, 1973,p. 141). (14) "An SS physician, Friedrich Entress, who served as thecamp doctor in 1942-1943, stated that, in his view, 2,000,000 to 2,500,000people were killed in Auschwitz" (F. Piper, op. cit., 1992, p. 8).(15) "Out of prudence, we are therefore going to settle for the figureof 2,000,000 [deaths at Auschwitz]" (Léon Poliakov, Bréviairede la haine, [in English Harvest of Hate], Calmann-Lévy, 1974 [1951],p. 496). "[...] the exact number of the Jews assassinated in the gaschambers on alighting from the trains shall never be known. The prudentestimate is of the order of 2,000,000..." (Georges Wellers, L'Étoilejaune à l'heure de Vichy / De Drancy à Auschwitz (Tr.'s Note:The yellow star at the time of Vichy/From [the] Drancy [camp] to [the] Auschwitz[one]), Fayard, 1973, p. 290): since this estimation bears but on the number(1) of the Jews, (2) gassed, (3) on their arrival, it is probable that forthe author the total number of the persons dead at any moment and for anyreason is well superior to the figure of 2,000,000; ten years later, thistotal number was evaluated by the same author at fewer than 1,500,000 persons(see note 18). For Lucy Dawidowicz, the figure of 2,000,000 sems to be thatof the Jews gassed (The War against the Jews / 1933-1945, New York, Holt,1975, pp. 149-149). (16) "There were never four million victims inAuschwitz [...]. The total number of people who died there [...] was inthe neighbourhood of 1,600,000 [...]. The figure for Jews murdered by gassingis 1,323,000, with 29,980 dying in the camp" (Yehuda Bauer, "Auschwitzand the Poles / Fighting the distortions", The Jerusalem Post, September22, 1989, p.6).

The author says that he is here taking into account theestimations of G. Wellers in 1983 but he transformed the total of 1,471,595 (G. Wellers' figure) into ... 1,600,000! For his own estimation in 1982,see note 12. (17) Until April 3, 1990, the commemorative plates of Auschwitz-Birkenauwere bearing: "Here, from 1940 to 1945, 4 million men, women and childrenwere tortured and assassinated by the Hitlerite genocides". The newtext, developed after years of tergiversations, is the following: "Maythis place where the Nazis assassinated 1,500,000 men, women and children,a majority of them Jews from diverse European countries, be forever formankind a cry of despair and of warning" (Luc Rosenzweig, "Auschwitz,la Pologne et le génocide" (Tr.'s Note: Auschwitz, Poland andthe genocide), Le Monde, January 27, 1995, p. 1). (18) G. Wellers, op. cit.,1993. To be compared with the same author's evaluation in 1973 (see note15). (19) "Auschwitz [...] Number [of Jews] Killed: 1,000,000 [...].The number of non-Jews who died in Auschwitz may be estimated on the basisof registrations and transfers at more than 250,000. Most were Poles"(Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews, New York, Holmes andMeier, 1985, p. 895).

For R. Hilberg, it seems that the Jews be always "killed"while the non-Jews are simply "dead". (20) "At least 1,500,000people were murdered at Auschwitz-Birkenau" (p. 11). "At least1,100,000 persons were killed or died in the camp. But if this number isregarded as a minimum estimate, what figure can we accept as a hypotheticalceiling? [...] about 1,350,000 [Jews], with the total number of Auschwitzvictims reaching about 1,500,000" (pp. 71-72). The sentence from page11 appears on a map inserted in a chapter signed by Yisrael Gutman, "Auschwitz-- An Overview". The sentences from pages 71-72 appear in a chaptersigned by Franciszek Piper, "The Number of Victims" (Yisrael Gutmanand Michael Berenbaum, Anatomy of the Auschwitz death Camp, op. cit., 1994).Previously, for F. Piper, the number of the Auschwitz deaths was of 4,000,000(see note 7). (21) "The figure of 4,000,000 victims is now regardedas "emotional" and should really [be] more in the order of 1,000,000"(Jean-Claude Pressac, Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers,New York, Beate Klarsfeld Foundation, 1989, p. 264). "Auschwitz [...]where perished about 1,000,000 Jews and Poles between 1940 and 1945"(Le Dictionnaire des noms propres, Hachette, 1992). For J.-C. Pressac'sevaluation in 1993, see note 23 and, for his evaluation in 1994, see note24. For the evaluation of a dictionary published by Hachette in 1991, seenote 8). (22) "The stark and inescapable fact that 800,000 to 900,0000human beings perished in Auschwitz, its gas chambers and its camps"(Gerald Reitlinger, The Final Solution, London, Sphere Books, 1971 [1953],p. 500). (23) "Total of the deaths: 775,000 [but this figure can beattended with gaps.

This is why the global figure of 800,000 victims shouldbe retained currently" (Jean-Claude Pressac, Les Crématoiresd'Auschwitz / La Machinerie du meurtre de masse (Tr.'s Note: The Crematoriaof Auschwitz/The Mass Murder's Machinery), éditions du CNRS [Centrenational de la recherche scientifique], 1993, p. 148. For the evaluationof J.-C. Pressac in 1989, see note 21 and, for his evaluation in 1994, seenote 24. (24) "Total of the deaths: 631,000-711,000; [...] the numberof the victims is evaluated at 630,000 to 710,000" (translation inGerman of the work referred to just above: Die Krematorien von Auschwitz/ Die Technik des Massenmordes, Munich, Piper, 1994, p. 202). For J.-C.Pressac's evaluation in 1989, see note 21 and, for his evaluation in 1993,see note 23. (25) See F. Piper, op. cit, 1992, pp. 12-13; the referencesto the Höss trial are provided by the author. (26) Sterbebüchervon Auschwitz / Death Books from Auschwitz /Ksiegi zgonow z Auschwitz, herausgegebenvom Staatlichen Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau (Tr.'s Note: Released by the Auschwitz-BirkenauState Museum), 3 Bände, München, Saur Verlag, 1995. (27) In 1983,G. Wellers was ascribing this lie or this error of spectacular dimensionsneither to the Poles, nor to the Russians, nor to the Communists.

He waswriting: "Depuis quelques années, ayant compris les difficultésde ce problème, et ayant retrouvé la lucidité du jugement,on évite d'avancer des chiffes, mais on sait que 4,000,000 de mortsà Auschwitz est un chiffre exagéré, dû au traumatisme,au choc naturel, inévitable qui dominait le psychisme des survivantspendant les premières années après la fin de la guerre,après la fin de leur cauchemar"* (G. Wellers, op. cit., 1983,pp. 138-139). G. Wellers was therefore questioning the "survivors",while forgetting to remind [people] of his own 1973 "prudent estimation"(see note 15). In 1989, Yehuda Bauer accused the "official Polish propagandists";he said that "some Poles disseminate the wrong figures [...] in orderto create a national myth"; he denounced "the Poles' concept ofthemselves as the crucified nation, the real sufferers of Europe" ("Auschwitzand the Poles / Fighting the Distortions", The Jerusalem Post, September22, 1989, p. 6). "The figure propagated by the Communist regime wasthat 2,000,000 Jews and 2,000,000 non-Jews, mainly Poles, were killed"(Ben Helfgott, Chairman of Yad Vashem Charitable Trust, London, The Independent,3 August 1990). "The communists tried to "de-Judaize" Auschwitz[...] said Lerman who is also a member of the International Council of theState Museum of Auschwitz" ("The Polish communist's false Auschwitzstory", The Philadelphia Inquirer, March 29, 1992, pp. A1, 10). LucRosenzweig implicates "the National-Communist Vulgate" ("Auschwitz,la Pologne et le génocide", Le Monde, January 27, 1995, p. 1).(28) See note 25. Besides, it shall be noticed, in our recapitulatory listeof the diverse reckonings, that the Jews themselves often indicated forthe number of their co-religionists' deaths at Auschwitz figures superiorto that of 1,500,000.

They have therefore no right to impute their own exaggerationsto non-Jews. (29) "In memory of the millions of Jews martyrs and fightersexterminated at the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp by the Hitlerian race murderers,1940-1945". That inscription was appearing on a monument built, accordingto J.-C. Pressac, during the winter of 1963-1964 and subsequently(?) removed(J.-C. Pressac, Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers,New York, Beate Klarsfeld Foundation, 1989, pp. 262-263). (30) "I feelreasonably secure in placing the total in the range 100,000-150,000, probablycloser to the former [...]. The number of Jewish deaths of natural causesat Auschwitz seems less than 100,000" (Arthur R. Butz's review of WhyDid the Heavens not Darken? The "Final Solution" in History, byArno J. Mayer, The Journal of Historical Review, Fall 1989, pp. 369-370);see also "Some Thoughts on Pressac's Opus / A Response to a Major Critiqueof Holocaust Revisionism", Ibidem, May/June 1993, p. 26). Remark -This study constitutes but a sketch of the answers given or imposed to thequestion: "How many deaths at Auschwitz?" It would be easy toprovide thousands of other references.

The work's difficulty consists, however,in that, according to the case, the evaluations can bear on very ill-assortedcategories: in one case, the number of the "killed", of the "gassed",of the "Jews" is evaluated and, in some other case, "deaths","victims" are talked about and the "Jews" are not distinguishedfrom the "non-Jews". Sometimes too, the evaluations are only abouta limited period. As far as I am concerned, I avoided any numerical extrapolationfrom a figure given for a short period of the Auschwitz camp's life. * &laqno;Depuisquelques années, ayant compris les difficultés de ce problème,et ayant retrouvé la lucidité du jugement, on évited'avancer des chiffres, mais sait que 4 000 000 de morts à Auschwitzest un chiffre exagéré, dû au traumatisme, au choc naturel,inévitable qui dominait le psychisme des survivants pedant les premièresannées après la fin de la guerre, après la fin de leurcauchemar.»