Rudolf Höss .....and the numbers game....
- From: "onlyme" <onlyme_sitting@xxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2007 21:09:38 +0100
http://www.historiography-project.org/misc/hoess.html
Estimates based on Höss's testimony vary widely: [Raul] Hilberg and [E.]
Crankshaw -- one million; [Leon] Poliakoff, [Lucy] Dawidowicz, [Martin]
Gilbert, and [J.] Billig, - two million; [Yehuda] Bauer -- 2.5 million;
Encyclopaedia Judaica -- one to 2.5 million; and [A.] Weiss -- 1.2 to 2.5
million. One exception is [Eugen] Kogon, who put the number of victims of
Auschwitz at 3.5 to 4.5 million.
Although Piper's analysis is flawed by his failure to distinguish between
Jewish and non-Jewish victims, his point is well taken: not all of these
estimates can be correct.
Part of the discrepancy among death tolls can be ascribed to the fact that
there were two other commandants at Auschwitz between the time of Höss'
transfer in December 1943, and January 1945 when the camp fell into the
hands of Soviet troops. If there was a policy of mass extermination of Jews,
it wouldn't have ended with Höss' departure. Höss himself testified that
mass executions continued under subsequent camp commanders. This would mean
that to Höss' figures must be added the numbers of alleged victims in 1944
and early 1945. This problem has become even more acute as increasing
numbers of Holocaust scholars lower the estimates of murder victims at
Auschwitz to around one million, although some such as Gerald Reitlinger and
Pressac go even lower. Recently released death books from Auschwitz, though
incomplete, indicate a total death toll of around 150,000 people.
.
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