Report: Auschwitz blueprints found in Berlin apartment

[IndianaGreen]

Source: Haaretz

Report: Auschwitz blueprints found in Berlin apartment

Original plans for the construction of the Nazi extermination camp of Auschwitz, including a gas chamber and crematorium, have been found in a Berlin apartment, a newspaper reported Saturday.

The daily Bild published copies of some of the 28 plans, which the head of Germany's federal archives, Hans-Dieter Krekamp, called "authentic proof of the systematically planned genocide of the Jews of Europe."

Bild gave no indication of where, when or by whom the plans were found.

It said they were dated between 1941 and 1943 and stamped, "Waffen-SS and Police Construction Directorate." Some were signed by senior SS officials and one initialled by the head of the Nazi ideological corps, Heinrich Himmler.

Kreikamp told the newspaper the documents were "extraordinarily important."

One plan, drawn by a detainee as early as November 1941, when experiments in eliminating prisoners were already under way, had a gas chamber clearly labelled, Bild said.


Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1035393.html

---

There are still those that deny the Holocaust ever took place :grr:

[Arctic Dave]

1. Makes you wonder who it was that kept these documents for so long

they should be in a museum for the world to see and remember.

[kestrel91316]

2. And now they will be. My guess is that a former Nazi's family

members lived there and had been keeping them all these years. Perhaps for future use?

[TankLV]

11. Were any of them named "Prescott"?!?!

just wondering...

[slampoet]

23. Either that of Someone was tearing down a wall and found them.

I once found a painting behind a wall that had dropped there 50 years earlier back when the house had its original floorplan.


(wasn't worth anything though)

[Shardik]

3. If they ever hit Sotheby's they would hit seve figures easily

probably to a museum or a survivor's family. The fact that they were kept so long does bring up questions unless the keepers of them had no idea what they were.

[stlsaxman]

6. i was doing a "retro-fit" install of an Audio/Video for a hockey coach some time back...

in a house the bought shortly before. When i opened the wallspace to run the cables- out fell a bunch of newspapers of 30 years ago with headlines of the hockey team he was currently working for- St. Louis Blues. The previous owners had nothing to do with hockey.

You never know what you'll find when you open a wall.

[dipsydoodle]

10. The same could have been said

of the Hitler Diaries which turned out to be forged.

[LeftishBrit]

20. Macabre thought, but you're probably right

Someone should ensure that they are kept in an archive or museum, and never go on the market.

[LeftishBrit]

19. Agreed there

[barbtries]

27. and how they got them

in the first place.

[Maine-ah]

29. Indy, is that you?

:evilgrin:




sorry, that's all I could think when I read your post. On a serious note, I think the discovery is incredible, and agree with you that the blue prints should be in a museum for the world to see and remember. :hi:

[Arctic Dave]

30. That is too funny. I just finished watching the movie right now.

LOL:hi:

[Maine-ah]

31. Indiana Jones movies are my favorite!

:hi:


have had a crush on Harrison Ford since Raiders. :blush:

[Posteritatis]

38. The last months of the war were chaotic to say the least

Stuff turning up in all sorts of odd places doesn't surprise me in the least. Could've been anything from a government stash to a party functionary trying to get some stuff out to a Soviet soldier or plain old looter not knowing what they picked up and forgetting it after leaving.

Hopefully they wind up in an archives where they can be preserved.

[aquart]

4. What a fun war souvenir.

[Raschel]

5. Can't wait to hear the whole story. Who had them, who found them.

[IndianaGreen]

58. Perhaps someone that used to work there

Why the blueprints? Many of those that collaborated with the Nazis were never held accountable.

[Caution]

7. These are HUGELY important. If authenticated, these will destroy the biggest "argument" from the

Holocaust denier assholes.

[nodehopper]

8. I really don't think so

People who deny the Holocaust despite the existing evidence (concentration camps, countless archives, testimonies of survivors) will not see the light because of these. Crematoriums? Pshaw, they were there for the bodies of typhoid victims. Good planning on the part of the Nazis!

[Caution]

12. It's not going to rehabilitate true deniers, but their goal is to cast doubt in the eyes of others

Every piece of evidence that DIRECTLY contradicts one of their claims is an important one.

[lunatica]

32. More important is that the world needs to remember or it will repeat history

That's something I think we came very close to doing in the Bush Error which should also be documented in great detail to add to that ditty. Bush broke every law of decency and committed crimes against humanity in only 8 years. Anyone who says it can't happen again needs to be reminded and reminded once again by history. Fascism seems to be a natural way of thinking for a large number of ideologues, no matter what nomenclature they use to make it look prettier.

[IndianaGreen]

35. As we saw in Rwanda and are seeing in Darfur

Besides, the same people that say they love Israel, are the same ones that believe in a religion in which there is going to be no Jews for all wil be converted to Christianity or be damned to the Eternal Guantanamo in the Sky.

[Behind the Aegis]

53. haha. Of course those are the "same" (well kinda) ones who think "Israel" is to blame.

You know the ones of which I speak.

[nebenaube]

16. yeah...

never mind the "showers" :sarcasm:

[dipsydoodle]

9. The Holocaust is a sad historic fact which is beyond dispute.

Your reasoning however is suspect.

[Caution]

13. One of the primary arguments used by David Irving states that the modifcations

made in 1943 had nothing to do with mass killing of the Jewish people. These documents, if authenticated, will invalidate that particular claim further than it already has been. Every additional piece of evidence will further help to prevent these types of atrocities in the future.

[Igel]

14. But there will be a comeback.

It's not hard, once you accept that you can have unboundedly many factors at work to support your position.

In this case, the plans will be forgeries, of recent vintage, made in order to justify the existing claims. The authenticators will be in on it, and the fact that the skeptics aren't allowed to do their own authentication will be the "proof" needed. Any skeptics that *are* allowed to authenticate them will either point out (all-important) "inconsistencies", or will be deemed to have been bought off.

[EconomicLiberal]

15. I wonder what all of Ahmadinejad apologists think about this.

There seems to be an awful lot of them on this forum.

[Chulanowa]

17. I haven't seen any support for Ahmedinejad's Holocaust denial

Perhaps you could share?

[EconomicLiberal]

18. I have seen many people here defend Ahmedinejad.

As if he is worthy of any respect. He isn't.

[struggle4progress]

21. I've really never seen anyone at DU defend Ahmedinejad

[susanna]

22. Nor have I. n/t

[closeupready]

24. What a bizarre claim. I have

never seen anyone here "defend" Ahmadinejad. I have seen people reject the warmongering similar to that which got us into Iraq.

[Chulanowa]

26. I beleive you to be mistaken

I've seen plenty of people point out the utter bullshit and propaganda pouring out of the right about the guy - but nobody's gone "He's a swell guy and you know, I think he's right about the Holocaust" - no one.

[bitchkitty]

28. Many? Where? n/t

[lunatica]

33. What is it with some new posters that they need so much catching up to do?

:dunce:

[thewiseguy]

43. You joined DU just a week ago

So how could you make such ridiculous claims? :shrug:

[curse of greyface]

25. authentic proof of the systematically planned genocide of the Jews of Europe?

You know you really don't need proof. There is this big complex of buildings and a bunch of dead people if you were still on the whole did it happen fence.

Engineering drawings of an Apollo rocket isn't needed to prove the moon is still there.

[dysfunctional press]

34. this morning on 'this weak' with george snofflufagus, they doubled the number of holocaust victims..

it's now up to 12 million.

:eyes:

[struggle4progress]

36. Very precise estimates will never be obtainable: if one takes 5.75 million Jewish victims,

another 2.69 million non-Jewish Poles, 3.30 million Russian POWs in Germany, and a million Romani &c, one comes over 12 million; if you do not like counting exterminated POWs, you can still ask whether other civilian casualties (such as the 7 million Russians who died) can be regarded as victims of deliberate Nazi extermination (since, even if these mass deaths did not occur in death camps, the Nazis had a definite ideology of exterminating peoples they regarded as inferior)

See: http://www.holocaust-history.org/~rjg/deaths.shtml

[dysfunctional press]

37. the term 'the holocaust' has always been used in conjunction with the jews that were slaughtered...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust

The Holocaust (from the Greek ὁλόκαυστον (holókauston): holos, "completely" and kaustos, "burnt"), also known as (Ha)-Shoah (Hebrew: השואה ), Churben (Yiddish: חורבן ) is the term generally used to describe the genocide of approximately six million European Jews during World War II, as part of a programme of deliberate extermination planned and executed by the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (Nazi) regime in Germany led by Adolf Hitler.<2>

Other groups were also persecuted and killed, including the Roma; Soviet civilians, Soviet prisoners of war; ethnic Poles; the disabled; gay men; and political and religious opponents.<3> Most scholars, however, define the Holocaust as a genocide of European Jewry alone,<4> or what the Nazis called the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question." Taking into account all the victims of Nazi persecution, the total number of victims would be between nine and 11 million.<5>

[Posteritatis]

39. "10-12 million died in the camps" is not a controversial statement

Weasel-wording terms like "most scholars" as though it's true (because Wikipedia makes things true, right?) doesn't change that. The Germans killed about twelve million people. About six million were Jews. These are both true things, not the evil Jewish lobby self-martyring some more or something.

(Edit: wow, double negative completely inverting what I meant. Oops.)

[dysfunctional press]

54. "10-12 million died in the camps" is NOT what was said...

they said that 12 million died in 'the holocaust'.

[struggle4progress]

40. Very well. I might prefer to use "holocaust" for the general mass murder and "Shoah" for the Judaic

victims. But you may complain fairly that my vocabulary is somewhat nonstandard, and there's no question that Judaic Europe was disproportionately the target of Nazi mass murder

[Behind the Aegis]

41. Well, we can take solace in that you believe...

"...Judaic Europe was disproportionately the target of Nazi mass murder" I am sure we can also agree that "slavery" (in the US) is for the general and "massive involuntary servitude" was for Africans, in which there is no question was disproportionately the target of Slave traders.

[struggle4progress]

45. Frankly, I have no idea what you are trying to say. Anti-semitism played a fundamental role in Nazi

political coalition building, so the Nazis reached out early to the anti-semitic Wotan societies. Later, as the Nazis sought additional "respectability," they added some pseudo-scientific racist and eugenic ideas to their ideology and used these notions to justify their earlier anti-semitism. The pseudo-science was subsequently employed to justify mass murder in the course of their attempt to colonize and enslave Europe. To best understand the Nazi period accurately, one should not overlook the mass murder of disabled WWI vets, of Romani, of Poles, of Russian POWs -- and one should inquire into the different German attitudes that allowed such mass murders; one should also ask what German attitudes produced such a disproportion of Jewish victims

[Behind the Aegis]

46. Frankly, it is quite simple.

The "Holocaust" does not need you to re-interrupt its meaning. I am not some simpleton that fell off the turnip truck five minutes ago. I am also a fag and a kike (see the avatar, it pisses people off here quite frequently). I know what it was to both of my groups of people; I don't need a history lesson here. I also know what was does to others during that time; as I implied, I am not fucking stupid. I suggest you take a look into history, you look into the propaganda, and you look into what was done. The first target was Jews...actually, it was the disabled (mental and physical), but the biggest push was the Jews; then, came the "others." It sounds callous to say 'others' but that is what happened. They were, in gross parlance, "collateral damage." All of their deaths were made palatable because, and review the literature, were comparable to the "nasty Jews bringing down Germany."

So many get stuck with "6 million Jews, 12 million in the camps." What doesn't sink in for most, is that "6 million" was HALF of the WORLD'S population of Jews. This is also why many scoff at the misuse of the terms "Holocaust" (though, that term can actually mean different things) and "genocide." To be honest, when it comes right down to it, I don't think most now even give a shit. "It was soooo long ago."

(I am not saying this applies to you. I am just going on what I see, read, and hear.)

[struggle4progress]

47. I have considerable interest in the period: the Nazis killed my great-grandfather

You're welcome, I suppose, to take the attitude that you don't need a history lesson, but I think that I, for my own part, prefer to assume the more technical knowledge I have about the political dynamics of such a time-place, the better

I certainly have no intention of arguing with you about whether or not you fell off the turnip truck five minutes ago, since I have no opinion on the subject and considerr such a discussion is irrelevant to this thread

[Behind the Aegis]

48. Sorry to hear it.

I lost my grandmother's SIDE of the family. They foolishly thought they could settle in Poland after fleeing Russia.

You can assume any position you want; I am accommodating, neither top/bottom...well, mostly top. But, it doesn't allow you to have your own facts as truth, Sorry, again.

[struggle4progress]

49. Feel free to examine the sub-thread and tell me where I'm making up facts

QuestionAll #34 fusses they doubled the number of holocaust victims
In #36, I give a link to multiple estimates for the numbers of Nazi mass murder victims and show how an extermination number in excess of 12 million could be obtained
QuestionAll #37 objects to the use of "holocaust" to cover most of these victims
In #40, I suggest preference for "Shoah" for Judaic victims and "holocaust" for more general extermination
In #41, you say something or other that I can't parse
In #42, I provide some historical detail about the political development of the Nazis that suggests why the Party may have found the politics of industrialized murder of large numbers of European Jews easier than the politics of a more general industrialized murder but points out the imperial-expansionist "advantage" the Nazis did obtain by more general industrialized murder &c&c

:shrug:

[Behind the Aegis]

50. No problem.

"QuestionAll #34 fusses they doubled the number of holocaust victims"

It is called :sarcasm:. I have read many of your posts, so I don't think I have to include a link to a definition of that term.

"In #36, I give a link to multiple estimates for the numbers of Nazi mass murder victims and show how an extermination number in excess of 12 million could be obtained" Well, I guess :sarcasm: passed you by.

"QuestionAll #37 objects to the use of "holocaust" to cover most of these victims" Ummm, no. That is not how that post plays out at all. Perhaps I do need to start including "dictionary.com" definitions for you. "Most" would imply more than half, and, if you are a big fan of history as you claim, you would know that "most" only applies to ONE group and that would be the Jews. See, this is how it works: a number of gays were murdered, and disabled, and communists, and Romi, and other.... The aforementioned GROUPS make up a large percentage, almost half, in some accounts more than half, of those murdered in the camps. Guess who else made up the other half? ONE GROUP! JEWS! It is simple logic, MOST of the ones murdered by Nazis were Jews...almost 2 to 1. One being a COMBINATION of other groups of peoples. So, MOST victims of the Holocaust WERE Jews.

"In #40, I suggest preference for "Shoah" for Judaic victims and "holocaust" for more general extermination" This is true, however, by your own admission: "But you may complain fairly that my vocabulary is somewhat nonstandard," Well, surprise, surprise, surprise (says Gomer Pyle). Yet one more trying to distinguish the "Holocaust" from a a Jewish massacre to one of one "where others also 'got it.'" Capital "H" and lowercase "h", well, then you might have a point, but you don't here.

"In #41, you say something or other that I can't parse Well, I have to take you at your word here. You obviously didn't get the rancid play of history, You do know there were "white slaves," right?

"In #42, I provide some historical detail about the political development of the Nazis that suggests why the Party may have found the politics of industrialized murder of large numbers of European Jews easier than the politics of a more general industrialized murder but points out the imperial-expansionist "advantage" the Nazis did obtain by more general industrialized murder &c&c" I am going to assume that #42 (my post) was meant to read #45(?) And, while you 'provide' all that 'historical detail,' you neglect to provide everything else that went along with those details you provided.

Again, I have read a number of your posts, please don't tell me you are going to take the low road!?

[struggle4progress]

51. ? Have a lovely day

[Behind the Aegis]

52. Thank you. I must admit I am surprised I didn't merit a "fuck you, you are on ignore."

Perhaps we shall cross swords again....or draw them together.

[Behind the Aegis]

42. "There are still those that deny the Holocaust ever took place"

This surprises you?

[Historic NY]

44. These documents are important to show the NAZI's intents & purposes

of the camps to those that say the Holocaust never happened. They must be placed in safe hands. copies should be produced for exhibit world wide and on the internet.

[struggle4progress]

56. Disagree. The Nazis left a meticulous documentary record of their policy and its implementation

and after sixty some years of scholarly investigation, quite a lot is known. The record includes not only a vast number of original documents but also contemporary photography and film, predating the liberation

The interesting questions regarding the current documents will be who had them and why were they hidden away and saved

[Algorem]

55. Pentagon's got the new improved blueprints

[Taverner]

57. Well Holocaust Deniers, like Religious Fundies, don't beleive in evidence

[cambie]

59. That is an odd statement by Hans-Dieter Krekamp

It didn't need re-proving. In a way the Holocaust is a smoke screen, an safe assignment of blame to evil forces long gone. Not that simple.
Auschwitz was in fact a work camp. Germany then was a capitalist paradise, and at Auschwitz there were no problems with pensions or long lunch-breaks. No lunches were needed at all since the free labour could work for some months without. After that their usefulness was over, so of course the crematoriums were essential to continued profitability. It was just business you know. There were people on this side who didn't see any problem with encouraging that system and made good money at it. They are still among us.
Keep your eyes open. It wasn't just a little guy with a funny mustache.