It's now official

[Dan]

The number of dead at Auschwitz is now official, with the number 1.2 million set in stone.



By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

PARIS - A French court on Wednesday ordered the publishers of France's leading reference book to remove from its next edition a revisionist historian's claim that the figure of 6 million deaths during the Holocaust was grossly exaggerated. Five French Jewish groups had launched the legal action against the encylopedia-like reference guide, Quid, saying the passage violated a French law that makes it illegal to publish revisionist theories. The Jewish groups demanded that Quid publishers retract the 300,000 copies of its 2003 edition, which had already been sent to stores.

Judge Marie-Therese Feydau refused to grant the request, but ordered the publishers to remove the offensive passage from its 2004 edition as well as from its Internet site. Publishers were also ordered to send a correction notice to all book shops where Quid is sold and to insert the correction in the 100,000 copies still being printed. They were also ordered to publish the correction in three daily newspapers and two weeklies. "We are satisfied," said Patrick Klugman, president of the Union of Jewish Students of France. "'Never again' must not be an expression said in vain. The duty to remember must begin with those who manufacture knowledge."

The lawsuit, against Encyclopedies Quid and its publisher, Robert Laffont, was a followup to a similar suit filed in 2001. The offensive passage was ordered removed by 2003. The Quid is updated each year. In a section on World War II extermination camps, the book says that the official number of deaths at Auschwitz-Birkenau was 1.2 million. However, it adds that "other figures have circulated," and cites one by a revisionist historian, Robert Faurisson, who claims that 150,000 people died at the camp, of which 100,000 were Jews.


http://www.fpp.co.uk/Auschwitz/Faurisso ... edia3.html

[Hans]

Dan,

but the number 1.2 million was not set in stone. What happened is simpy that they had to remove a historically absurd figure for the Auschwitz death toll by a french Holocaust denier from the Quid.

The acutal scandal is that this "leading reference book" has seriously cited Faurisson's nonsense at all.

[Dan]

Dan,

but the number 1.2 million was not set in stone. What happened is simpy that they had to remove a historically absurd figure for the Auschwitz death toll by a french Holocaust denier from the Quid.

The acutal scandal is that this "leading reference book" has seriously cited Faurisson's nonsense at all.

I suppose from a Continental point of view this was the leading scandal, although very few Americans would agree with you. To most of us, the fact that a few loudmouths can impose their will on the rest of us is the chief scandal.

[viriato]

Hans I wonder if other numbers totally absurd that are also quoted by the QUID like 9 millions (you got it right) from a film by Alain Resnais, 8 million (Office des Recherches des Crimes de Guerre en 1945) , 7 million (Raphaël Figelson), 6 million (Tibère Kremer), 5 millions (appeared in an article of "Le Monde of 20/4/78 ) will disapear from future editions. 8)
I hope not in the same fashion it would be rather incongrous to delete the numbers from Faurisson.

The link to QUID:

http://www.quid.fr and choose auschwitz

[Al Carter]

I suppose from a Continental point of view this was the leading scandal, although very few Americans would agree with you. To most of us, the fact that a few loudmouths can impose their will on the rest of us is the chief scandal.

Amen to that one Dan.

Al Carter

[Roberto]

Hans I wonder if other numbers totally absurd that are also quoted by the QUID like 9 millions (you got it right) from a film by Alain Resnais, 8 million (Office des Recherches des Crimes de Guerre en 1945) , 7 million (Raphaël Figelson), 6 million (Tibère Kremer), 5 millions (appeared in an article of "Le Monde of 20/4/78 ) will disapear from future editions. 8)
I hope not in the same fashion it would be rather incongrous to delete the numbers from Faurisson.

The link to QUID:

http://www.quid.fr and choose auschwitz

I presume you are referring to this passage:

Camps d'extermination. Pologne : auschwitz-Birkenau : à 30 km au sud de Katowice. 3 camps : auschwitz I : camp de concentration destiné aux politiques décidé le 27-4-1940 par Himmler ; 4-5- début de sa construction ; 14-6 1er convoi de Polonais ; auschwitz II-Birkenau (camp d'extermination construit octobre 1941 à 3 km au nord-ouest de auschwitz I) ; auschwitz II-Monowitz (camp de travail construit l'été 1942, industrie d'armement et usine de caoutchouc). 1945-27-1 libéré par les Russes 1 200 000 †. D'autres chiffres ont circulé : Nuit et brouillard (film d'Alain Resnais, en 1955 ; conseillers : Henri Michel et Olga Wormser) : 9 000 000 ; document officiel de la Rép. française (Office de recherches des crimes de guerre en 1945) : 8 000 000 ; selon Raphaël Feigelson : 7 000 000 ; Tibère Kremer (préfacier de Miklos Nyiszli, en 1951) : 6 000 000 ; le Monde (du 20-4-1978) : 5 000 000 dont 90 % de Juifs ; Henry Mandelbaum (en 1945) ; 4 500 000 ; document soviétique du 6-5-1945 (utilisé par le tribunal de Nuremberg) : 4 000 000 (nombre inscrit sur le monument d'auschwitz-Birkenau ; rectifié en 1995, par 1 500 000) ; Miriam Novitch (en 1967) : 4 000 000 (dont 2 700 000 Juifs) ; rabbin Moshe Weiss en 1991 : plus de 4 000 000 (dont 3 000 000 Juifs) ; Rudolf Höss (ancien Cdt du camp d'auschwitz) en 1946 : 3 000 000 (jusqu'au 1-12-1943) ; Rudolf Vrba (procès Eichmann) en 1961 : 2 500 000 ; Léon Poliakov (en 1951), Georges Wellers (en 1973), Lucy Dawidowicz (en 1975) : 2 000 000 de Juifs gazés ; Yehuda Bauer (dir. de l'Institute of Contemporary Jewry, université hébraïque de Jérusalem, en 1989) : 1 600 000 (dont 1 352 980 Juifs) ; Lech Walesa : 1 500 000 ; Georges Wellers (en 1983) : 1 471 595 (dont 1 352 980 Juifs) ; Raul Hilberg (en 1985) : 1 250 000 (dont 1 000 000 de Juifs) ; Gerald Reitlinger (The Final Solution, en 1953) : 850 000 ; Jean-Claude Pressac (Die Krematorien von auschwitz, en 1994) : 630 000 à 710 000 dont 470 000/550 000 gazés ; Belzec : entre Lublin et Lvov. Décidé à Wannsee (comme Sobibór et Treblinka) le 20-1-1942, pour exterminer les Juifs de Lvov et de Galicie ; camp d'extermination immédiate, il n'est pas rattaché au système des camps ; ouvert de mars à déc. 1942 (550 000 †). Chelmno : entre ód et Pozna ; camp d'extermination immédiate ; ouvert du 8-12-1941 au 11-11-1943, il reprendra au printemps 1944 jusqu'à l'arrivée de l'armée rouge (200 000 †). Maïdanek : à 2 km au sud de Lublin ; 1941-juillet début de la construction ; jusqu'en mai 1942 camp de prisonniers, ensuite camp d'extermination ; 1944-23-7 évacué par les SS après transfert de 17 000 détenus vers auschwitz ; libéré par les Russes (400 000 †). Sobibór : à 8 km au sud de Wlodawa ; fin 1941 construit pour exterminer les Juifs de Lublin ; mai 1942 ouverture ; 14-10-1943 révolte des déportés ; oct. 1943 fermé il est détruit (250 000 †). Treblinka : à 60 km au nord-est de Varsovie ; printemps 1941 camp pénitentiaire près d'une carrière de sable et de gravier, fonctionne jusqu'au 23-7-1944 ; bombardé le 24-8. A 3 km, camp d'extermination pour les Juifs de Varsovie et Radom : construit fin mai 1942, ouvert du 23-7-1942 au 17-11-1943 ; révolte des détenus le 2-8-1943 (700 †, 12 évadés, 15 gardes †) ; ensuite détruit (800 000 †). Pays-Bas : Bois-le-Duc (1942). Pays Baltes : Kaunas, Riga (1942).

http://www.extense.com/bin/x2cgi_view.c ... HTM#marker

My French is not the best, but if the encyclopedia is stating that Alain Resnais spoke of nine million dead at Auschwitz, they obviously didn't see
Nuit et brouillard, otherwise they would know that Resnais gave this figure for all Nazi concentration and extermination camps together, not for Auschwitz-Birkenau alone.

Resnais' figure is nevertheless well above the mark, of course. The figure for all concentration and extermination camps established by German historian Wolfgang Sofsky is 3,894,305 (Sofsky, Die Ordnung des Terrors: Das Konzentrationslager, Frankfurt am Main 1993, page 57, cited after Markus Tiedemann, "In Auschwitz wurde niemand vergast." 60 rechtsradikale Lügen und wie man sie widerlegt, Mühlheim/Ruhr 2000, pages 94 and 174). According to Tiedemann, Sofsky remarks that he only included camps with ascertained statistics or acknowledged estimates on the number of victims in the total figure.

[Marcus]

I suppose from a Continental point of view this was the leading scandal, although very few Americans would agree with you. To most of us, the fact that a few loudmouths can impose their will on the rest of us is the chief scandal.

I very much doubt that the average European is worse (or better) than the average American when it comes to letting "a few loudmouths impose their will on the rest of us", so I find that kind of blanket statements childish, we are all mere humans after all.

/Marcus

[viriato]

Roberto, bingo!

I didn't copy the page because I was afraid of infringe copyright law. But if you do I presume I could have done it safely myself.

[viriato]

Roberto wrote:

My French is not the best, but if the encyclopedia is stating that Alain Resnais spoke of nine million dead at Auschwitz,...

You're correct...

...they obviously didn't see Nuit et brouillard, otherwise they would know that Resnais gave this figure for all Nazi concentration and extermination camps together, not for Auschwitz-Birkenau alone.

...and I take your word for good (I didn't see the film).

If you compute the total for all the camps described one has a total of 3,4 million deaths. Is this number in line with your quote (3,8 million deaths)?

[Hans]

I cannot believe that this well known list is produced in "France's leading reference book". This list was compiled by no other than Robert Faurisson himself!

But how comes it that France's leading reference book produces uncritical obviously absurd "revisionist" material? I wonder weather the author was a Faurisson sympathizer or just a bloody fool.

[viriato]

Hans wrote:

But how comes it that France's leading reference book produces uncritical obviously absurd "revisionist" material? I wonder weather the author was a Faurisson sympathizer or just a bloody fool.

How did you came to that conclusion? The list shows almost every possible total that was (mostly in French) recorded. Don't you find it comprehensive enough?

[Hans]

To most of us, the fact that a few loudmouths can impose their will on the rest of us is the chief scandal.

Dan,

as I see it, not the will of "few loudmouths" was imposed, but simply the french law.

[michael mills]

Hans wrote:

as I see it, not the will of "few loudmouths" was imposed, but simply the french law.

That is true, but the particular French law that was imposed in this case is the result of the imposition of the will of a "few loudmouths", namely the French Jewish lobby allied with the Communist Party.

One cannot expect Hans, with his German cultural background, to understand the concept of freedom to speak and to publish. After all, such freedoms have never been a German cultural value, and never in German history has there existed firm protection of those freedoms from State interference.

The existence of the Fabius-Gayssot law in France is a crying shame, since that country is the spiritual homeland of free speech, which was first espoused by philosophers of the Enlightenment such as Voltaire (who, being a man of clear thought and rational logic, despised Jews as obscurantist fanatics). Unfortunately, the French culture of liberty derived from the Enlightenment has been corrupted by the influence of Jewish immigrants.

The idea of free speech achieved its greatest development in Britain, and from that source was transferred to the American colonies, eventually being enshrined in the Constitution of the United States. Because of that constitutional status, the right to freedom of speech, derived from the early British settlers, could not be subverted by later immigrants from less enlightened cultural backgrounds, such as the Eastern Jews, and so it exists unassailed today, whereas in its places of origin it has been or is being whittled away, largely due to Jewish influence.

[michael mills]

Hans wrote:

I cannot believe that this well known list is produced in "France's leading reference book". This list was compiled by no other than Robert Faurisson himself!

So what if it was complied by Faurisson! The criterion should be whether the data are accurate, not who compiled them.

According to the information from Roberto, the figure attributed to Resnais may be incorrect, at least if applied to Auschwitz-Birkenau alone, but the other figures quoted all seem to be genuine estimates that were made at one time or another.

I see no harm in readers of this reference work being apprised of the fact that, in addition to the current official figure of dead, there exists a wide range of other figures suggested by worthy people.

Hans may see harm in the dissemination of such knowledge to the general public, but if so, that would be due to his being a product of the authoritarian German cultural tradition, as opposed to my origin in the libertarian British cultural tradition.

[Hans]

Hans may see harm in the dissemination of such knowledge to the general public, but if so, that would be due to his being a product of the authoritarian German cultural tradition, as opposed to my origin in the libertarian British cultural tradition.

I doubt that the reason I couldn't believe France's leading reference book" producing Faurisson's list is that I'm "a product of the authoritarian German cultural tradition" as opposed to your "libertarian British cultural tradition", but rather I'm simply very familiar with the Faurisson list as argument to deny mass crimes in Auschwitz as well as with the problems of such list that mentions serious estimations next to propagandistic figures without any further explanation.

Also it is a misinterpretation if you say I would see a harm in disseminating a wide range of other figures suggested. I think, however, there is a difference between providing a wide range of other figures suggested and spreading figures claimed by any Hinz and Kunz.

By the way, the claim in the QUID (and thus of Faurisson) that according to "Rudolf Höss (ancien Cdt du camp d'auschwitz) en 1946 : 3 000 000 (jusqu'au 1-12-1943)" is absolut incomplete. Already in 1946 in Nuremberg Höss made it clear in notes he wrote for Martin Gilbert that the Auschwitz death toll is "1.5 million at the most, for the period from the beginning of 1941 to the end of 1944" in his opinion.