Cyanide Chemistry at Auschwitz

[Henry]

This is really top-notch stuff, Astro. I would suggest that you submit it to VffG or The Revisionist. I'd suggest the JHR, but it appears as if it's pretty moribund at this point.

I know that The Revisionist will allow to publish anonymously. Have a go at it!

[astro3]

Dr Green's Fallacy
Dr Richard Green asks his readers to believe - in his usual armchair, arm-waving fashion - that the Polish method is three hundred times more exact than that used by Rudolf:

Leuchter and Rudolf report a detection limit of about 1 mg/kg and in fact dispute the reliability of some of their own measurements showing cyanide concentrations above that. Recall that the bulk of the cyanides that they detected were in a form similar to Prussian blue. The IFFR used a much more sensitive method. Their sensitivity was 3-4µg/kg, i.e., 300 times more sensitive.[1]

We get no hint that Dr Green might need to go into a laboratory to ascertain this. He starts by trying to obfuscate the accuracy achieved by others: Alpha Laboratories used by Leuchter could only achieve 1 ppm, while the Feselius Institute used by Rudolf seems to have been able to measure reliably down to 0.1 ppm - quite an achievement.

I here argue that the method used by Rudolf and that of the IFFR (Polish) actually have the same accuracy, so that Dr Green's claim, central to his entire argument, is totally bogus.

There are two relevant papers. The first is a 1947 paper by Epstein which gives the method that was used by the Polish team, Marciewicz et al. clearly allude to it as such [2]. It measured cyanide ion by a colourimetric method. The second paper is the more modern DIN-protocol as used by Rudolf. Ask yourself, how likely is it that a 1947 method would be 300 times more accurate than the modern, German method? That's what Green is averring. As a general comment, chemists only started to be able to measure parts per billion within the last couple of decades. For example, EU mandates for pollutants and pesticides are liable to cite such low levels. But, prior to, say, 1980, you would be hard-pressed to find a chemist who would claim to be able to measure anything much down much below one part per million.

The 1947 paper by Epstein makes it quite clear, that his method only goes down to 0.2 parts per million. Or, fairly clear: it says, e.g., 'One millilitre of the solution containing up to 1.2 micrograms of cyanide ion is treated in the manner described above.' That's 1.2 parts per million; and again, 'As little as 0.2 micrograms of cyanide can be estimated ... ' and that is in one ml of solution, i.e the lower limit of detection. At last! We are clearing up the deep, deep confusion - inexcusably perpetrated by Jan Markiewicz et al in their 1994 paper. One is startled that in the (fairly respectful) debate that went back and forth between them and Rudolf, no-one seemed to realise this.

It seems to me, that this throws doubt upon the endeavour of the Polish team, with their false claim to have measured down to 2-3 micrograms of soluble cyanide, per kg of brick - which Dr Green fell for. One is surprised that he was so gullible. Let's quote the untrue and persuasive-sounding words, from the Polish report:

Having applied this method for many years, we have opportunities to find its high sensitivity, specificity and precision. Under present circumstances we established the lower limit of determinability of cyanide ions at a level of 3-4 ,ug CN- in 1 kg of the sample.[3]

In various posts above I expressed scepticism over that, but now, having finally checked out the original paper, I'm more categorical! However many years one uses a colorimetric method, ie measuring the intensity of a colour (which is logarithmically related to the concentration), it will never go down to anywhere near that accuracy.

The DIN Protocols
There are special laboratories that perform Deutsches Institut fur Normung (DIN) standard analyses. These are inspected, to make sure they are following the protocols adequately. I was able to read a copy of the cyanide-method used by Rudolf in English translation, from the British Standards Institute, and its called DIN 38-405, 13 [4]. Its very expensive, 105 Euros for a mere dozen web-downloaded pages! I was allowed just a few of its pages photocopied. This is the best, modern method - people wouldn't pay all that and have the high-standard labs required, if there were some better method available, elsewhere. There is no better method.

I summoned up my courage, and strode into my university's chemistry department, brandishing the DIN protocol. As good fortune would have it, I got chatting to a chemist, who had his elbow resting on a large book of inorganic chemical analysis - a reassuring sight. He was intrigued by the idea of cyanide wall-measurements, and he explained to me about DIN. It described two different types of cyanide that were to be measured in any sample, the one total cyanide, and the other 'readily liberable cyanide' - these two correspond to the two methods we have been examining, viz the Leuchter/Rudolf versus the Polish [5]. He explained how one must not pour cyanide residues down the sink because quite weak acids will dissociate the salts and liberate cyanide. The readily-liberatable cyanide was defined by DIN as, that which produced the gas at room temperature, with an air current and a pH of 4, i.e., weakly acidic. This worked for salts of sodium, potassium, magnesium etc., whereas the complex iron-bonded cyanide (Prussian Blue) only dissociates on boiling with hydrochloric acid (in the presence of dissolved copper) [6]. Those are the two methods.

They are both assigned the same exactitude, the same level of accuracy, by the DIN protocol. The threshold of detection applies for the final solution of cyanide, after it is liberated from the original sample, and then re-dissolved in sodium hydroxide solution. Starting with a few grams of wall, one could easily end up with a few hundred ccs of solution in which the cyanide is dissolved. Thus, if the limit of accuracy is given as 0.01 ppm or 10 ppb [7], then this could imply a limit of accuracy of 1 ppm for the brick sample. This, a major problem as regards accuracy, is the same for both methods.

For an up-to-date discussion, one should consult www.cyantists.com/analysis.html , which explains the different classifications of cyanide, which are: (1) total cyanide; (2) weak acid dissociable cyanide; and (3) free cyanide.

References
1. http://www.holocaust-history.org/auschw ... stry/iffr/ Green 'A study of the Cyanide Compound Content in the Walls of the Gas Chambers in the Former Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps,' in John C. Zimmerman, Holocaust Denial: Demographics, Testimonies and Ideologies, U.P.Amer., 2000, pp.259-262.
2. Joseph Epstein, 'Estimation of Microquantities of Cyanide' Analytical Chemistry 1947, 19, 272-4.
3. www.nizkor.org/ftp.cgi/orgs/polish/inst ... ter.report
4. Order a copy from www.mybeuth.de.
6. DIN's definition of readily liberable cyanide: 'cyanide of hydrogen and all compounds containing cyanogen groups which split off cyanide at room temperature and at a pH of 4.'
6. The non-complex iron compound, hexacyano-ferrate Fe(CN)6 is soluble, he explained.
7. This DIN procedure will work in solutions 'containing more than 0.05 mg/l cyanide ions,' at which threshold level it is repeatable within about 10%.

[astro3]

ADVICE FROM A CYANIDE EXPERT

The official, pro-Holocaust chemical argument, as put forward by Dr Richard Green, has to a large extent disintegrated, because (a) the Polish method of analysis was not reliable down to the low levels claimed, and (b) it does not convey a reliable memory of bygone decades. I have written to Dr Green advising him of these problems with his argument.

The ‘cyantist’ website (www.cyantists.com) offers advice concerning the measurement of cyanide and I found that one of the experts there commented helpfully on the dilemmas here examined. Thus, what follows is from a top expert on the subject! I doubt he will mind me quoting from his replies. What the Polish survey measured is here called ‘weak-acid dissociable’ (WAD), i.e. cyanide that is readily liberated by weak acid. First, his general comment:

There are three basic forms of cyanide, free, weak acid dissociable (WAD), and total cyanide. Total cyanide measures all forms including iron cyanide (Prussian blue), the weakly bound metal cyanide complexes such as copper, nickel, and zinc, and free cyanide which is HCN and CN-. The weak acid dissociable cyanides or WAD cyanides which are the weakly bound metal complexes is equivalent to the German [i.e. as described by the DIN protocol] readily liberated cyanide, also known as easily liberated or available cyanide. It seems very unlikely if the German procedure was used that any cyanide would have been found as these cyanide forms are not persistent over time certainly fifty years. The Polish researchers should have used the total cyanide method which measures not only the WAD forms or readily liberated but also iron cyanide the most likely form in the event the cyanide interacted with brick material which likely contained iron [it had 1% iron]. This form is stable chemically and breaks down only rapidly in the presence of light. So to answer your question the iron cyanide compounds (Fe(CN6)) would only show up if the total cyanide analysis was used. The methods I am referring to are found in Standard Methods. So in other words the Polish researchers did not use analytical procedure I would have used in this investigation.

He is clearly not approving of the Polish method in the context of Auschwitz walls.

One is startled that the accuracy of the methods seem not to have improved, in recent years:

The methods for cyanide analysis have not evolved for many years and since they are based on colorimetric analysis which is an indirect measurement it is subject to many interferences at low levels. The method can be extended for solutions down to about 0.05 mg/L which could be translated into a solid ppm value back calculated on the amount of solid originally crushed and placed in the distillation flask. Nonetheless, a very low level of cyanide could be identified. .. Reported values in the single digit ppb range are more than likely interferences and not real values as the method is subject to considerable error at this level. It is also important that a very reliable laboratory conduct the analyses one that routinely does these analyses.

He is here NOT crediting the Polish data, endlessly repeated by Dr Green and various other pro-holocaust authors, which has parts per billion background levels, and the threshold he quotes is that of the DIN protocol. The latter is dated 1981, and I was shown on a visit to the British Standards Institute (at Ealing, in London) an online draft of the new version expected next year: it still had the same limits of accuracy, unchanged!. Concerning the Cyantist's comment on how the limit has to be ‘back calculated on the amount of solid originally crushed,’ let’s recall that the 0.05 ppm DIN threshold is for the solution to be measured, and this will give a rather higher limit for the original brickwork, ie it is not evident that one can attain that 50 ppb limit for the brickwork.

Here’s a further comment from him upon the need to measure total cyanide, ie mainly iron-bound, suggesting that we cannot aspire to any further accuracy beyond that attained by the Fresenius Institute for Rudolf around 1990:

If cyanide is present at all after a half a century it would be bound in its iron form which is reasonably stable in the absence of light for decades. This of course assumes, the hydrogen cyanide in the air could penetrate and combine with metals in the brick. Of course collecting a representative sample for analysis is critical. Assuming a representative sample could be collected, the proper method would be to crush the material to a small mesh size and subject it to a total cyanide analysis using the traditional full flask distillation method followed by colorimetric finish as specified in Standard Methods for the Analysis of Water and Wastewater. If it was present it may be measurable down to a range of 0.10-1.0 ppm but very unlikely any lower.

He advised me of a US institute which was the best for cyanide measurement and which would analyse samples sent. We're now in a good position to advocate further sampling of a relatively few wall samples taken from Birkenau and Auschwitz and have them analysed both for total and ‘WAD’ (easily-liberated) cyanide to compare them.

[astro3]

Letter from Dan Desjardins

Having reviewed my original article, Kenneth Stern’s Critique of the Leuchter Report: A Critical Analysis (www.codoh.com/newrevoices/nddd/ndddstern.html):
I indeed identified ten of Mr. Leuchter’s 32 samples as having been taken from sheltered locations: samples 4-6 from Krema II and samples 25-31 from Krema I. I attributed a value to “non-detectable” samples, of 0.99 mg/kg., and did this because, a) we know some trace residue ought to be present, even if undetectable, and b) the highest amount that could be present yet still undetectable is theoretically 0.99 mg/kg. Obviously, it could be less, but I chose to err on the side of the maximum undetectable value. Given this, I average over the ten samples identified from sheltered locations:

#4, 5 & 6: 0.99 mg/kg
#25: 3.8 mg/kg and 1.9 mg/kg (Note: the sample was tested twice)
#26: 1.3 mg/kg
#27: 1.4 mg/kg
#28: 1.3 mg/kg
#29: 7.9 mg/kg
#30: 1.1 mg/kg
#31: 0.99 mg/kg

Average = 2.06 mg/kg

Now for the average over the 20 samples that were from unsheltered locations:

#1, 2, 3 & 7: 0.99 mg/kg
#8: 1.9 mg/kg
#9: 6.7 mg/kg
#10, 11, 13 &14: 0.99 mg/kg
#15: 2.3 mg/kg
#16: 1.4 mg/kg
#17, 18 & 19: 0.99 mg/kg
#20: 1.4 mg/kg
#21: 4.4 mg/kg
#22: 1.7 mg/kg
#23 & 24: 0.99 mg/kg

Average = 1.6 mg/kg

There is a difference, admittedly a slight difference, but decidedly less on average for the unsheltered sample locations versus the sheltered ones. This does not surprise me because, although ferric ferrocyanide is practically insoluble in water, one should expect surface erosion over time due to wind and rain, and it is primarily at the surface where the residues reside.

Now as to the second question: averages between locations that were allegedly homicidal gas chambers versus those that are claimed to be something else (undressing rooms, chimney rooms, washing rooms, etc.). You say that it was my observation that only two of Fred Leuchter’s samples were taken from locations designated as “gas chambers.” * This is not correct. In fact, I counted 19 samples as coming from locations alleged to be gas chambers. These are:

Krema I: sample #’s 25-27, 29-31
Krema II: sample #’s 1-7
Krema III: sample #’s 8-11
Krema IV: sample # 20
Krema V: sample # 24

Note: sample #12 was gasket material taken from the Sauna at Birkenau and is not included by me as part of the analysis.

Given the sample residue values already identified above, the average ferric ferrocyanide concentration for gas chamber locations is 1.91 mg/kg. As for samples coming from non-gas chamber locations, I identify the following:

Krema I: sample #28 (washing room)
Krema II: n/a
Krema III: n/a
Krema IV: sample #15 (chimney room), #’s 16-17 (unidentified room #2), #18-19 (unidentied room #4)
Krema V: sample #21 (unidentified room #1), sample #22 (unidentified room #2), sample #23 (unidentified room #3)

The rooms indicated as “unidentified” are ones that are shown on the official Krema schematic, but have no name and are not otherwise labeled as “gas chambers.” The room number corresponds to Fred Leuchter’s identification in his 1988 report. Given the sample residue values identified above, the average ferric ferrocyanide concentration for non-gas chamber locations is 1.55 mg/kg. You will note it is slightly less than the average sample value for the gas chamber locations. However, the difference is marginal and it is my estimation this is due to anomalies in how Fred Leuchter collected his samples and how they were analyzed afterward. For I have the impression his samples were taken with little care as to maintaining consistency between sample surface area and overall mass (difficult to do in the field in any event). Further, there is no indication Alpha Analytic shaped the samples afterward to achieve a consistent proportionality. Since the residue is essentially at the sample surface, what this means is that a sample that is deep rather than broad will have a residue to overall sample mass that is relatively small, and by contrast, a sample that is broad in surface area but not bulky in terms of depth will have a residue to overall sample mass that is relatively large. This, of course, assumes we are talking about samples taken from the same Krema, where periods of use and gas exposure were the same. I think the differences in detection levels within the same Krema helps to point this up. Take Krema I for example: why should we find samples #29 and #30 so different from one another: 7.9 vs. 1.1 mg/kg? Both are taken from the same wall, #29 roughly equidistant from three roof ports while #30 equidistant from two roof ports. The holocaustians might want to say the proximity to an additional Zyklon point of entry is the reason, but I think not – there are too many contradictions, e.g., sample 28 is in Krema I’s “washing room” and has roughly the same residue concentration as sample #30, sample #27, like sample #29, is also equidistant between three roof ports but its residue is “ND.” What is more, in Krema IV, sample #15 taken from the “chimney room” has that Krema’s highest detection level (2.3 mg/kg), whereas sample #14, from the same room, is “ND.” It gets even more bizarre when we look across Kremas with their varying usage periods and estimated gas exposures. Krema II was in operation three months longer than Krema III (with an estimated 88 theoretical gassings vs. 74) and yet, even though three of Krema II’s sample locations are sheltered relative to Krema III’s samples (all taken from exposed locations), higher detections are found in Krema II than in Krema III. The highest detection, sample #29 (7.9 mg/kg), was taken from Krema I with the least period of use (10 months) and the next highest detection (sample #9: 6.7 mg/kg) came from Krema III with the next lowest period of use (16 months). All in all, it is my belief these anomalies are to be explained by inconsistencies in sample collection. This understanding does not undermine Fred Leuchter’s basic thrust, however, for there is one thing his data nevertheless reveal to the detriment of the establishment thesis: the comparable detection levels for samples taken from alleged gas chambers versus rooms within the same Krema not identified as gas chambers. Why the approximately equivalent results? One might also point out the low mean values from locations alleged to be execution gas chambers vis-a-vis control sample #32 (the delousing chamber) with a 1,050 mg/kg detection.

In conclusion, it is true my observations differ somewhat from those of Germar Rudolf. You point out he says there were 15 samples taken from alleged execution gas chambers, while I claim as many as 19 did (with one of those samples analyzed twice). I arrive at my number based on a knowledge of where Mr. Leuchter took his samples (having verified these on-site) and official descriptions provided by the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum as to the function of each room within each Krema. You also say Germar Rudolf claimed there were six measurable results from Krema II: here I would differ yet again**, for it is obvious from reading Fred Leuchter’s report that none of the samples taken from Krema II had detectable results – they were all “ND.” Krema I involved seven samples, six of which were measurable, so possibly you and/or he are referring to this facility. On the matter of conclusions, however, it is always possible for reasonable people to disagree.
July 1st
.........................................................
* D.J. wrote in 1997, ‘it appears that only sample 20 relative to Crematorium IV, and sample 24 relative to Crematorium V, were actually removed from locations currently designated as "gas chambers," while the various other samples from these two sites were removed from Sonderkommando quarters, undressing rooms, and, in the case of Krema IV, the chimney room.’ I had misunderstood this to mean, that only two samples had been taken from AHGCs.
** Again, I was quite wrong here.

[astro3]

Comment on Mr Desjardin's letter

Its wonderful to have this detailed analysis by Mr Desjardins. He holds a clear memory of his visit to the Auschwitz ruins, where he carefully re-traced the path of Leuchter’s sampling, and he has access to his old notes on the subject. I think it is fair to say, that the above letter is the view of a published world expert on the subject. Certain others one could mention have been intimidated into silence, and so we must be grateful that Mr Desjardins is not afraid to write these words of truth, which give us the necessary clarification.

His letter tells us the vitally important fact (which I had never understood before), that there were 19 Leuchter samples taken from AHGC sites, plus 9 from ‘non gas chamber locations’ - ie, the control samples. So there was a totally adequate control group in Leuchter’s wall-samples. We follow his procedure of taking the arbitrary value of 0.99 ppm of iron cyanide for Leuchter’s too-low-to-measure samples, and thereby represent his two analyses as follows:
Samples from alleged human gas-chamber sites: 1.91 ±1.92 (n=19) ppm
Control samples 1.67 ± 1.06 (n=9) ppm
So there is a mere 14% difference between these two groups, which is nowhere near statistically significant (t=0.3).

Let’s compare that with what Desjardins found concerning the exposed-to-elements wall samples, versus those not so exposed:
Sheltered locations: 2.06 ± 2.0 (n=10) ppm
Exposed locations 1.6 ± 1.4 (n=20) ppm
This 28% difference is suggestive, although again it is not statistically significant. In other words, you have the option of believing, if you want to, that weathering from rainfall, wind and sunshine has over sixty years slightly eroded the cyanide from the old walls.

So there is a vital conclusion which here emerges, not widely appreciated: if we take Mr Desjardin’s value for samples too low for Alpha Laboratories to measure, ie 0.99 parts per million of cyanide, then Leuchter’s thirty-odd samples, as clarified by Desjardins, demonstrate that there is no significant elevation of the ‘Krema’ wall samples as compared to carefully-selected controls. Let’s listen to how Mr Desjardins expressed this matter ten years ago:

... the difference is so negligible as to suggest a rather dramatic conclusion: the entire facility, including not only the alleged gas chamber but undressing room, chimney room and Sonderkommando quarters, were exposed to essentially the same gassing levels!

I.e., levels of around one part per million indicate that the premises were generally de-loused with Zyklon-B, the idea here being that Mother Nature does not produce cyanide – or, hardly ever – and so this must have been a result of some treatment. This view (originally proposed by Faurisson) sounds quite plausible.

Summarising, we can say that from Leuchter’s Auchwitz-wall sampling data, no less than three important chemical conclusions are to be drawn.
* Firstly, that the one (but substantial) ‘disinfection chamber’ sample was three orders of magnitude higher than the AHGC samples.
* Secondly, that the AHGC samples had no elevation in cyanide with respect to control samples, ie residential quarters, etc.
* Thirdly, that there was little difference between the samples exposed to the elements and those from sheltered locations, ie the iron cyanide has not been leeched out by rain – not even by modern acid rain.

These last two conclusions only emerge from the Leuchter data once the geographic clarification brought by Mr Desjardins is applied. Science is a group endeavour, it is about different people confirming and elucidating each others' findings, and Mr Desjardin's pilgrimage to re-check Leuchter’s pioneering, midwinter visit has been of vital importance. Mr Desjardins was really the first person to confront the second of these three points, as emerging from the chemical data, and let's quote him again on the subject:

For the uncanny fact is that the cyanide levels within and without the alleged execution gas chamber rooms are of the same order of magnitude, while indeed, certain samples from without, in both cases, measure slightly higher.

These proper, scientific conclusions are to be contrasted with the daft, Kafka-esque conclusions drawn from the Polish study (Markiewicz et. al.), mainly quoted in the exterminationist literature.

Next year will be the 20th anniversary of the Leuchter Report and let’s make sure the world hears about it! No, it isn’t flawed. No, it hasn’t been discredited. Yes, it has been replicated. And, yes, its conclusions have stood up to scrutiny.

[Hektor]

What is actually the natural occurrence of Cyanides or substances from the -CN group?! To my knowledge CN can be present in ashes used in building materials.

If I understand that rightly ALL agree to have found SOME Cyanides. There is just some dispute about how they came into that place. They also used different methods and interpreted the results differently.

[astro3]

Thanks for that query Hektor and I'll look into it, re ashes in building materials. But no, the Polish study claimed to find 'no' cyanide in residential quarters at Auschwitz. That's what the exterminationists base their case on.

[astro3]

Faurisson’s Conjecture

Next year will be the 20th anniversary of the trailblazing Leuchter Report, and we try here to sort out the meaning of the low-level cyanide measurements which it found. In 1988, professor Faurisson, writing his Introduction to that Report, surmised:

The extremely low levels of cyanide found in some crematoria was likely, in my opinion, to have resulted from disinfection of the premises during the war.

He was here echoing what Fred Leuchter had written, viz. ‘The small quantities [of cyanide] detected [in the AHGCs] would indicate that at some point these buildings were deloused with Zyklon B - as were all the buildings at all these facilities".’ Could he or Leuchter be sure of that? (1)

That view was contradicted by the French pharmacist-cum-Auschwitz expert Jean Claude Pressac. The latter wrote his‘refutation’ of the Leuchter report, highly emotive in tone, damning Faurisson’s conjecture (as we’ll here call it) as ‘one of the most often-used lies in explanation.’ Zyklon-B ‘has no bacteriocidal or germicidal properties for use as an antiseptic’ and ‘a morgue is not disinfected with an insecticide or vermin killer like hydrocyanic acid.’ That would be totally useless, he raged. He denied that any general fumigation of the Krema rooms with Zyklon-B had been carried out (2). Surely, he was dead wrong.

Zyklon-B was used to fumigate rooms, during World War II. An official German report explained that, in the autumn-winter months of 1940/41,

millions and millions of cubic metres of lodging areas had to be rid of bugs by gassing with Zyklon prussic acid, to make secure for our soldiers the peace in winter they deserved (3),

and a wartime German document cited at Nuremberg stated that Zyklon-B was to be used for the fumigation of storerooms, etc (4). This was its second major function - its primary application being, the de-lousing of clothing and bedding, by placing them inside the ‘gaskammer.’

It is true that Zyklon-B does not act as a disinfectant, it only kills bugs. Others have echoed Pressac’s criticism of Faurisson for his possibly unfortunate use of this term – however, as Paul Grubach observed, in his rebuttal of Pressac’s critique (5), the German word ‘Desinfektion’ for disinfection is used in regard to delousing.

Two weighty books have appeared of late, attempting to refute the ‘revisionist’ case – Holocaust Denial by John Zimmerman (2000), and van Pelt The Case for Auschwitz (2002). Amongst all their references, neither of these mention the essential modern text, Dissecting the Holocaust. When discussing the chemical evidence, neither allude to German Rudolf’s investigations as corroborating the Leuchter Report. Both place a naïve trust in the Polish study of Marciewicz et. al. as demonstrating that their ‘gas chambers’ had raised cyanide in the walls whereas residential quarters did not.

Let’s hear John Zimmerman explaining what’s wrong with the Leuchter Report:

More importantly, however, neither Leuchter nor any of his defenders have ever explained why, if the morgues were being deloused, the concentrations of cyanide Leuchter found in the morgues did not approximate the levels found in the delousing chambers. (p186-7)

This is a totally cracked argument! If once a year or so empty rooms are deloused by fumigation, that is not remotely comparable to the far more intense use of cyanide in the DCs, where mattresses etc have to be deloused for the entire camp, continually night and day, probably with a heater in the room. That’s why there was a three orders of magnitude difference, Mr Zimmerman, and most people find that pretty obvious.

He spends several pages griping at Faurisson’s conjecture on the grounds that official statements describing the applications of Zyklon-B never mentioned its use in morgues (6). A rather semantic quibble, perhaps? Thus, ‘The real problem deniers faced was to explain why there were any traces of cyanide poisoning in crematoria morgues identified as homicidal gas chambers by many eyewitnesses.’ We ‘deniers’ have no such problem. There is no elevation of cyanide levels in the walls of such rooms, as compared to other rooms around them not so identified – or indeed, as compared to samples from postwar-reconstructed walls of those same Kremas. This has been shown, replicated, and clarified through Desjardin’s elucidation of the Leuchter data. We ‘deniers’ lie under no obligation to ascertain what the cause may be of this slight elevation above background levels. One would guess that fumigation by cyanide of a room leaves behind a slightly elevated cyanide level in the brickwork, provided some degree of moisture is present. That’s a testable conjecture.

At the Irving trial in 2000, a chemist called Colin Beer testified. Concerning the low cyanide levels found in the Kremas, ‘Far from proving these buildings had never been used as gas chambers, according to Beer the levels of cyanide residues shown in the Leuchter report, when taken in the context of the times … strongly supports both the fact and the scale of the massacres in the gas chambers of Birkenau’ (7). His report remains unpublished, but it seems at least here to comprise mere wishful thinking. It underscores the need for the Rudolf and Leuchter reports to be evaluated together, if any progress is to be made.

Let us hope that a replication can be performed, staying close to some of the sites which the Polish study sampled, of a relatively small number of samples, measuring both the permanent and soluble cyanide. In the meantime, Germar Rudolf’s conclusion over the limit of accurate measurement seems unduly pessimistic, that ‘values lower than 10 mg cyanide per kg of sample cannot be interpreted. These analyses are not reproducible’ (8). In the Rudolf report we read likewise, ‘These findings prove that cyanide values up to 10 mg per kg have only a very limited probative value, since these can be attributed to traces which occur everywhere.’ (9) One should be sceptical over Marciewicz’ claim to be able to measure cyanide down to tends of parts per billion, but on the other hand we should hope and expect that reliable measurements can be made down to below ten parts per million.


References
1. The Leuchter report, 1988.
2. Truth Prevails, p.37. See also John Zimmerman, Holocaust Denial, Demographies, Testimonies and Ideologies, American U. P. 2000, p.186
3. 1942, co-authored by Gerhard Peters, author of the classic study of Prussic acid published in 1933 (quoted in p.190 Holocaust denial (2)) and general director of Degesch, the company that sold Zyklon-B.
4. Nuremberg Document NI-9098, referred to by Paul Grubach, The Leuchter Report vindicated’ 12 JHR No. 4 Winter 192/3 p.463 www.ihr.org/jhr/r12/r12p455_Grubach.html.
5. See ref. 2; also Grubach’s recent (2006) article on Rense, ‘The Chemical and Toxicological impossibility of the Auschwitz Gas chamber Legend’ www.rense.com.general69/gasccm.htm
6. Holocaust Denial, Zimmerman, 2000, p.186-8.
7. The holocaust on Trial, History, Justice and the David Irving Case DD Guttenplan, 2000, p153.
8. Germar Rudolf, Critique of Claims Made by Robert Jan Van Pelt’ (re the Irving trial) www.vho.org/GB/GR/RudolfOnVanPelt.html
9. The Rudolf Report, 2003, p.267

[astro3]

Postwar Reconstruction of the Kremas

The Wikipedia article on Leuchter found a fault with his sampling:

the facilities Leuchter examined were, in fact, partially reconstructed. Leuchter was unaware that part of the camp and chambers were reconstructed, so he had no way of knowing if the bricks he was scraping were actually part of the original gas chamber. (1)

Unaware or not, we must be thankful that he did take such samples, as giving valuable ‘control’ samples, by which to compare the genuine ones. Germar Rudolf reviewed these low ‘background’ levels, and concluded that five of the Leuchter samples had come from post-war construction: numbers 15 (2.3 ppm), 16 (1.4 ppm), 20 (1.4 ppm) 21 (4.4 ppm) and 22 (1.7 ppm). NB these identifications are not given in his ‘Rudolf Report’ but in a web-article (2). Oddly enough, these are Leuchter’s only samples from Kremas IV and V to give measurable levels. (3)

What should we conclude from these cyanide values found by Leuchter, 1.4 to 4.4 parts per million, on Birkenau stone used in Stalin’s postwar reconstruction? The semblance of a ‘gas chamber’ is constructed, for touristic purposes, and it has measurable cyanide values no lower than the AHGC walls- do all the walls around Birkenau have such levels, from the ‘Desinfektion’ operation?

Let’s here quote Rudolf:

Leuchter's sample no. 28 was erroneously taken from a wall of what was a washing room in the war-time, not belonging to the alleged 'gas chamber'. Remarkably enough, there is nevertheless a small amount of cyanide. I have found small amounts of cyanide in a sample taken from an inmates hut (#8 = 2.7 ppm) … Most remarkable is the sample that I took from a Bavarian farm house (#25 = 9.6 ppm). It has a higher cyanide value then all alleged 'gas chambers' … this result could be reproduced when analyzed by another professional analyzing company. (4)

This echoes Desjardin’s conclusions – for example, concerning the largely demolished Kremas IV and V from which Leuchter sampled,

it appears that only sample 20 relative to Crematorium IV, and sample 24 relative to Crematorium V, were actually removed from locations currently designated as "gas chambers …[but] sample numbers 20 and 24 reveal levels of cyanide residue either less than or nearly equivalent to what was found, on average, across all the samples taken throughout each of the two facilities.," (5)

Thus, Leuchter’s non-gas chamber samples are crucial for any conclusions to be drawn.

I asked Mr Desjardins concerning Wikipedia's criticism, and he replied:

As to the … criticism [that] Fred Leuchter took samples from reconstructed chambers, one is presumably referring to Kremas IV and V. Here one does find loose brick piled atop integral (what I assume original) brick. I would need to review the tape Fred Leuchter made of his sample collections at Kremas IV and V to see how far down towards the base he took his samples. Question is, however, if this is pell-mell brick/mortar, why is it showing measurable traces of cyanide residue? Sample #'s 15, 16 (Krema IV) and 20-22 (Krema V) show measurable traces. Where did it in fact come from if not a "gas chamber" - unless the thesis be true the interior of any random building at Birkenau from which this brick was recovered experienced fumigation exposure? An interesting question for the Wikipedia editors (6)

It is here slightly relevant, to consider the startling claim was made by Pressac – and repeated more recently by Zimmerman - that ‘Leuchter deliberately avoided those areas of Crematorium II which would have yielded positive results.’ (7) I consulted Mr Desjardins on this matter and he replied,

The criticism Mr. Leuchter took samples from Krema II in such a way as to purposefully avoid areas where cyanide residue could be found is ludicrous. All samples were taken from what the Auschwitz Museum specifies as the "gas chamber" for that facility. There is no part of the gas chamber inner surface that Mr. Leuchter could have drawn samples from that would not have been exposed to HCN gas. Unless J. Zimmerman wants to propose the ruins that represent Krema II are not part of the original structure? This would beg to suggest the entire facility was never really there. I say this because Fred Leuchter took at least one sample (#6) from what I consider a basic part of the chamber, a support pillar, still standing and firmly anchored to the floor. It is also a location which, because it lies beneath the collapsed roof, is protected from the erosion effects of wind and rain, i.e., a "protected" location. And yet it shows the same sub-marginal results as per samples taken from a protected part of the wall (#5), a protected ceiling (#4), as well as exposed walls (#'s 1, 2 and 3). These walls, by the way, are not like those at Kremas IV and V: loose brick piled atop a base of integral brick (brick with interlocking mortar and some mortar overlay). So the fact Fred Leuchter took two of the wall samples only 2'2" or 2'6" below grade (#'s 2 & 1, respectively) vs. one at 4'6" below grade, is not a demonstrable problem. The only plausibility of Mr. Zimmerman's comment to my mind is in regard to sample #7 (loose sediment). This may have had the least chance of revealing measurable residue, but even at that Mr. Zimmerman is guilty of the fallacy of "converse accident," having hastily generalized on the exceptional rather than the typical sample.
There is another aspect of Zimmerman's comment that is not at first obvious: that in regard to the walls, Fred Leuchter took brick with no surface mortar. This would be a bit more substantial but I do not know if it is true. It is the surface mortar that would contain most or all of the residue. Realize, however, there is no such problem in regard to sample #'s 4 & 6: the pillar and roof were integrally made of concrete.

References

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_A._Leuchter
2. Germar Rudolf, (ref. 7), section 3 ‘Interpretation of low level cyanide residues’ He was arguing that David Irving lost his case, because he had not utilised his, Rudolf’s, replication of Leuchter’s work. In summing up the case and why Irving had lost, in early 2000, the judge stated: ‘I have not overlooked the fact that Irving claimed that Leuchter's findings have been replicated, notably in a report by Germar Rudolf. But that report was not produced at the trial so it is impossible for me to assess its evidential value. Penguin Books' solicitors were given a copy of The Rudolf Report in June 2000 for an Appeal but that was rather late in the day.
3. Mr Dan Desjardins will write to me shortly about this, and he may possibly not concur with Rudolf here.
4. Dan Desjardins, http://www.codoh.com/newrevoices/nddd/ndddstern.html
5. The Rudolf Report, 2003, p.267
6. He has kindly given me permission to quote his replies here, provided they are quoted in full, unshortened.
7. J.Zimmerman, Holocaust Denial, 2000, p.189.

[astro3]

‘The Killing was Easy’

Convict Rudolf Hoss was ‘given an affidavit which he corrected and ultimately signed’ on April 5th, 1946. In this he confessed:

When I set up the extermination building at Auchwitz, I used Cyclon B, which was crystallised Prussic Acid, we dropped it into the death chamber from a small opening. It took from 13 to 15 minutes to kill the people in the death chamber depending on climatic conditions. We knew when people were dead because their screaming stopped. We usually waited about one-half hour before we opened the doors and removed the bodies

.

His camp could exterminate 10,000 a day he averred (on April 9th, when psychologist Dr Gilbert visited him in his cell), with the two big Kremas taking 2000 at a time. ‘The killing was easy – you didn’t even need guards to drive them into the chambers; they just went in to take showers and, instead of water, we turned on poison gas.’

He could explain how two thousand naked people were persuaded to march into a relatively small chamber (he wrote in a memo): the gas chamber ‘had been prepared to look like a washroom – that is to say, showers and pipes were installed throughout, water drainage channels etc’ Once they were all inside, the doors were closed

and simultaneously the gas was forced in from above through a special aperture. It was Zyklon-B gas, cyanide acid in the form of crystals, which vapourised immediately, that is to say it took effect immediately upon coming into contact with oxygen. The people were dazed already on taking their first breath …(1)

None of this can have happened, its not physically possible. Hoss was in jail after being severely tortured for three days and nights, had been the star of the Nuremberg trial with his confession, and he did repeat his story and write it up on various subsequent occasions, re-telling it to the prison psychologist Dr Gilbert, who reckoned it was a truthful account and wrote it up in his Diary. It does make a haunting story. As Commandant of the camp he should know, shouldn’t he? ‘Throughout all these years, I never came across a single case of a person coming out of the gas chambers while still alive,’ he added.

These initial accounts all sound as if Zyklon-B were some kind of gas, where Whoosh! It is let in and the inmates all start gasping. A later re-telling on May 25th has ‘we knocked some holes in the ceiling through which we could throw in the gas crystals.’ Remember, initially there had been just one ceiling hole. Finally, his ceiling acquired ‘special hatches’ for emptying the ‘gas crystal canisters,’ plus a final version had the gas crystals poured through the vents in the ceiling and falling ‘down an airshaft which went to the floor'. Then, ‘those who were next to the air shaft were killed immediately … After twenty minutes at most no movement could be detected. … The victims became unconscious after a few minutes, according to the distance from the air shaft.’

The different versions have nothing in common – except for the half-hour period needed to kill two thousand people, who had believed they were having a shower - after which the doors were re-opened and stiffs were pulled out. None of Hoss’s stories had any heater to warm the room, to make the Zyklon-B evaporate (its not a crystal but a liquid, adsorbed onto a clay substrate, and it boils at 27° centigrade), nor any fan to circulate the deadly gas. From early accounts of just turning on ‘the poison gas’ his stories evolve into having a column – of which no trace remains – down which the ‘gas crystals’ were poured. Thus, pipes-disguised-as-showers metamorphosed into roof hatches and a column in his story.

Hoss’s confessions come unstuck over the physical properties of Zyklon-B, designed to be ‘safe’ for human use. That meant slow release, over two hours at normal room temperature: if his ‘special commandoes’ went in after about half an hour and started removing gold rings etc, as he always recalled, this would be during the peak emission by Zyklon-B of hydrogen cyanide. His accounts don’t mention total-fitting protective suits to protect them, au contraire they would hardly bother even to wear gas masks, he recalled. These are fairy tales from Hell, and they come unstuck over the diffusion rate of hydrogen cyanide gas, as it would have percolated through the chamber.

Hoss confessed to killing 2 ½ million. ‘That is something people will talk about for a thousand years,’ Hans Frank, former governor-general of Poland, said to Dr Gilbert, prison psychologist. But, it was not planned: The holes ‘knocked … in the ceiling’ sound rather leaky for a deadly poison and hardly planned in advance. Would not the careful, methodical Germans have first visited America where cyanide executions were being practiced in order to see how to do it? There, 3,200 ppm hydrogen cyanide is required for death, and they have never uses gas pellets as per Zyklon-B. Rooms have to be constructed with the intention of performing cyanide executions – otherwise the process is fatal to the executioners, that was the crux of Fred Leuchter’s message. Exterminists can wriggle, but they can’t get out of that one.

As far as I could tell (and do please contradict me), Rudolf Hoss’s testimony never mentioned the gas chambers of Auschwitz – i.e., the real gas chambers, labelled as ‘gaskammer’ in the design plans (as Pressac 1990 was the first to point out). These worked so efficiently, saving thousands of lives, but somehow faded from his memory! But they were a bit small to be designated as human execution-chambers. At the Nuremberg trial, the mere allusion to Zyklon-B canisters and their delivery was cited as evidence of a fiendish human extermination program … (2)

Did it happen? That needs an empirical test. Let a couple of thousand life-sized human dolls be crammed into a Krema-sized room, and five or ten cans of Zyklon-B (one kilo per can) be emptied onto several piles on the floor, or maybe into columns with holes in them. No heating, no fans. Then, within at most twenty minutes, a minimum concentration of between 3,000 and 300 ppm cyanide – opinions differ on this matter, for certain death in ten minutes - has to be registered at all four corners of the room at head level. If it can’t do that – it never happened.

Let's try a calculation. Krema-I has 430 cubic metres of air if crammed full of people (The Rudolf Report, p.213), and suppose that 5 kilos of cyanide was released – compatible with various conjectures of the number of canisters of Zyklon-B used. That would give a final concentration of 11 grams per cubic metre, and that is about 1% by volume (3). That is far too near the explosive limit of hydrogen cyanide (5-6%) to be permissible (the furnaces were next door). So, there is a ceiling on the amount of Zyklon-B permitted, to avoid a fire-risk, and this tends to knock on the head any calculation you may try to do, in getting a lethal level of cyanide to all corners of the chamber, in the ultra-short timescale recalled by Hoss.

Helpful figures
300 ppm cyanide – mortal level;
100 ppm – averred at the Irving Trial in London to be a mortal level (4);
3,200 ppm, US execution chamber level used;
56,000 ppm explosive threshold (5.6%).
These are volume-ratios, but if you prefer a weight-ratio: 3,000 ppm = 3.6 g/m3

References
1. All quotes come from Chapter 4 of The Case for Auschwitz, Evidence from the Irving Trial by Robert van der Pelt, 2002, Indiana U.P.
2. Ie, no-one at Nuremberg discussed whether the Zyklon-B canisters were for the delousing of matresses or gassing Jews, Pressac was the first to do that.
3. Pressac does have this 1 % by volume used during the gassings, and has witnesses averring that four to six one kilo cans of Zyklon-B were poured into Krema II (The Rudolf Report, p.211). This would correspond to complete vapourising of the gas and I don’t reckon he should be allowed this! After twenty minutes eg only 20-30% of the gas would have been released at normal room temperature. Hoss is the primary source of the horror-story and authors should not feel at liberty to embroider it as they wish.
4. Van Pelt ref 1, p. 615.

[Hektor]

Thanks for that query Hektor and I'll look into it, re ashes in building materials. But no, the Polish study claimed to find 'no' cyanide in residential quarters at Auschwitz. That's what the exterminationists base their case on.

I'm looking forward to what you can find. Exactly what in the residential quarters did they examine?! I recall not being able to interpret them on that part. Perhaps they confused stuff on purpose. The funny thing is the "accuracy" of their alleged measurements... Keep us posted!

[astro3]

For comparison - a Delousing Chamber
A normal, routine process went on in the camps, using the delousing gas chambers. New arrivals would strip off their clothes and throw them into the gaskammer, then have a shower and maybe shave all their hair off. After a couple of hours the clothes would come back, bug-free. This technology enjoyed two years of intensive use, from 1942 when the great typhus epidemics struck, until 1944 when DDT started to be used, and largely replaced hydrogen cyanide for eliminating the body louse that bore the typhus bug. These installations were hardly mentioned at the Nuremberg trials, and allusions to Zyklon-B tended to presume its use for human extermination.

A typical gas chamber would have a floor-space of some five square metres. A disinfection cycle could last from one to several hours, depending on whether it was just clothing to be de-loused, or thick mattresses. The manufacturers were proud of their efficient and scientifically-designed functioning:

This design has the greatest significance on the mass application of hydrocyanic acid fumigation facilities for mass delousing since it is only with such an installation that dependable results can be achieved in unusually short periods.

To quote from an expert from DEGESH, the manufacturing company (1). The design operated at ten grams per cubic metre of hydrogen cyanide for the delousing, equivalent to around 8,000 parts per million.

One of the four delousing chambers as it can be seen today in Dachau. (Note the heater, wire-mesh basket and other equipment visible through the open doorway.)

All steps including opening the tin of Zyklon-B were done remotely, from behind a glass screen, so no gas masks were normally required. Preheated fresh air was blown over the granules:

As a general rule, the material is spread out in a layer which is ½ to 1 centimetre thick, after which most of the hydrocyanic acid has already evolved after half an hour (2).

The air needed to be about ten degrees above the boiling-point of hydrogen cyanide (27°) for it to vaporise properly. Efficient fans circulated that cyanide-gas around the chamber. After an hour or two this lethal gas mixture was force-vented up a pipe and into the atmosphere. Then, the chamber was ventilated with fresh air, for a quarter of an hour, after which it was safe to open. The clothing or bedding was hung up outdoors to aereate, then retuned to the owners.

Visitors to Dachau can inspect these chambers:

At Dachau today, which everyone can visit, there are four DEGESCH standard delousing chambers in the crematorium building which everyone can see--and which, in at least one case, one can actually walk through. As one does that, one can clearly see all of the internal features such as the heating register and the piping to and from the automatic can opener. On the tops of each of the four "disinfection" chambers one can see the respective blowers and some of the circulation (Kreislauf) piping. Pictures that one can sometimes find from various sources often show some of those features as well. But, without the all-important explanation that these chambers used Zyklon-B to keep people alive and nothing more. (3)

The definitive work on this subject (4) presented two graphs, one showing the diffusion of hydrogen cyanide using the fans and the other by way of contrast showing how the concentrations worked using simple diffusion. The right-hand side graph shows one steep peak in a corner near where the granules were located, reaching ten grams/m3. The thick graph shows the HCN concentration at the centre of the chamber: it was mere hundredths of a gram per cubic metre after half an hour.

Rudolf Hoss issued an order on 12th August, 1942, that, when a disinfection chamber was opened to the air, members of the SS not wearing gas-masks must keep at least 45 feet away from it, for at least five hours (5). That would have been after the chamber has been evacuated for 15 minutes, to remove the cyanide gas. So this is as it were the real Hoss speaking, before torture - one who was proud of his camp. This shows us the process which really happened, safe and efficiently designed, as one would expect from the Germans - in contrast with the hallucinatory nightmare today imagined by the world.

Refs
1. Gerhard Peters, The Highly Effective Gases and Vapors in the Field of Pest Control, (in German) Ref. 6, in Freidrich.Berg, ‘Zyklon-B and the German Delousing Chambers’ http://www.nazigassings.com/zyklondelousing.html
2 Gerhard Peters, 1933, ref. 9, Ibid..
3. Letter from Friedrich Berg, quoted with permission. See Berg, ref. 1.
4. F.Puntigam, H. Breymesser, E. Bernfus, BlausaureGaskammern zur Fleckfieberabwehr [hydrogen cyanide gas chambers for the prevention of epidemic typhus], Berlin 1943.
5. Pressac, 1989, p.201; Dissecting the Holocaust, 2003, p.77.

[astro3]

Impossibility of the Human Cyanide Gas Chambers

After the Nuremberg trial, Rudolf Hoss expanded on the theme of how the Zyklon-B had been inserted into the gas chambers: the SS would ‘pour the gas [crystals] into the vents in the ceiling of the gas chamber down an air shaft which went to the floor.’ (1) Likewise the testimony of Michael Kula, given in 1945, had, for Kremas II and III: ‘Zyklon-B was distributed in the gas chamber through four introductory columns custom-made in the metalwork shops of the camp’ (2). His version had a tin container holding the granules, which was raised and lowered as required. Some decades later, Filip Muller imaginatively recalled a spiral design, of ‘hollow pillars made of sheet metal. They were perforated at regular intervals and inside them a spiral ran from top to bottom in order to ensure as even a distribution of the granular crystals as possible.’ (3)

More recently, Dr Richard Green believes that a wire-mesh bucket was suspended near the top of a column, containing the granules, which can be pulled out by the roof-hole, whenever enough gas has been released. (4) In the post-Leuchter era, exterminationists want to keep the levels of cyanide in the ‘gas chambers’ as low as possible, because of the very low levels which Leuchter found in his wall-samples. Green wants to have the sonderkommando perched on the roof to remove the Zyklon granules while still fizzing with cyanide! That sounds like moving the goalposts. Hydrogen cyanide is lighter than air, and Green's ceiling-location would not have the gas diffusing downward very quickly.

It seems odd that there should be no photos or design-plans of these columns, and odder still that there are no holes in the roof where they were once (supposedly) fixed. At his trial, David Irving informed Professor Van Pelt, his adversary, concerning the Krema-II morgue, that:

There were never any holes in that roof. There are no holes in that roof. There were never four holes through that roof. The concrete evidence is still there. You yourself have stood on that roof and looked for those holes and not found them. (5)

Presented with this clear proof, Van Pelt began wittering about how the retreating Nazis had, he presumed, cemented over the ceiling holes (6).

Any exterminationist thesis has to be compatible with Rudolf Hoss’s testimony, as that was the source of it. I suggest that Green’s conjecture be not permitted for that reason. It seems to me that this Great Debate is like a game of chess and we are getting near to a checkmate situation. It cannot go on much longer. I do appreciate that the various post-Irving trial publications feel that they have won the argument. However the points are of a technical-scientific nature, and at that trial one historian was not quite up to answering a battery of pro-holocaust experts (7).

How Untruth comes into our world is not our business. It is our business to check and verify or refute stories, according to whether they are physically feasible. Let the exterminationists have their four columns, and dream up their ceiling holes. These columns would have to be so strong to resist the frantic, dying crowds wouldn’t they? The more solid they are imagined, and the bigger the pan in which the Zyklon-B was held, the less is any cyanide going to diffuse out.

The arguments which Irving attempted to use at his trial were essentially winnable, if only he had had some chemical-scientific experts to support him. Krema-II morgue was thirty metres long, and recollect now the huge gradient in cyanide gas that the little delousing chambers would develop, across only a couple of metres, were they not vented. There would have to be at least a three orders of magnitude differential between the source of cyanide and, eight metres away, the corners of that morgue.

We are asked to participate in a thought-experiment, as to whether human gassing in accord with Hoss’s recollection would have worked. Efficient German technology, in the delousing chambers, had boiling the hydrogen cyanide coming from the granules, by means of convected, heated air – whereas, this thought-experiment involves merely letting it evaporate below boiling-point, with no convection or heating. Chemically, this deals with the notion of vapour-pressure. My guess is, that it would take at least two hours for a morgue the size of Krema-II to build up the requisite concentration in all four corners, the bare minimum here being 300 ppm (8). This definitively violates the Hoss story – and various others, which have times even shorter than half an hour (9).

In the meantime, all of the cyanide would have been released, from five to ten kilos used, and that means, yes there now is a fire risk, and a single spark produced by the hobnail boots of the SS guards - entering to remove the corpses – is liable to blow the place up.* Does this really sound like German technology?

Or, suppose we stay within ‘Hoss’s half-hour’ and we have – as Richard Green wants us to believe – the SS guards on the roof pulling up their tins of Zyklon-B once ‘enough’ has been released, after about twenty minutes. Then – I hereby predict – you would have at least 20% of the victims still alive and conscious, and another 20% unconscious and liable to recover. Let’s here recall the nutty chemistry promoted at the Irving trial, where the judge was advised by Professor Van Pelt, ‘ because the gas chambers were operated at a low (but lethal) hydrocyanic acid concentration of 100 ppm, there was no danger of explosion’ (10) – and his authority was an anonymous ‘expert’ (who did not have the decency to give his name) concerning ‘the 100 ppm operating concentration.’ The delousing chambers had an ‘operating concentration’ at which they worked, however this is a quite meaningless concept within the alleged human gassing scenario – one would instead have a gradient of gas diffusion, from the granules out to the corners of the chamber. In no way would a 300 ppm lethal concentration be established throughout the chamber, in that 20 minutes, by simple passive diffusion without fans or heating. Checkmate. End of argument.

An experiment can decide these things. Let’s have a hut the size of the Krema-II morgue, and let the exterminationists provide the four floor-to-ceiling ‘columns,’ however they reckon they were designed. Let four cyanide-ometers measure its air concentration in each corner. Let the windowless hut be stuffed with a couple of thousand lifesize dolls. Pour in the Zyklon-B through the four holes and see what happens. If the corner concentrations don’t reach anywhere near the lethal concentrations within half an hour, an hour, two hours, the exterminationists will have to finally shut up.

Prisoner-in-chains Germar Rudolf twice alluded to Karl Popper’s book Objective Erkentnis, ‘Objective Knowledge’ which he bought into court with him. Popper said that scientific theories had to be testable and in principle falsifiable. This one is, and then the world will come to realise that it belongs in the same category as the Witches’ Sabbath, likewise used to try and imprison people.

……………………………………………………..
* The main door opened onto a cremation-room with burning furnaces. The Leuchter Report pointed out this impossibility for a ‘gas chamber’. All US execution-chambers using cyanide have to be explosion-proof. No wonder Francisjek Piper wanted to have this door sealed shut when ‘‘this room that had served as a mortuary was converted into a gas chamber’ in 1942 (11) – well he can’t, because it wasn’t. The rather tiny, outside-access door was not added until 1944 when it was converted into an air-raid shelter (12). The door to the cremation-room was the only one, apart from one to a toilet.


Refs
1. Van Pelt, The Case for Auschwitz, p.256.
2.Gutman and Berenbaum, Anatomy of the Auschwitz Death-camp, 1994, p. 167.
3. Filip Muller Eyewitness Auschwitz, Three Years in the Gas chambers NY 1979 p60-61.
4. http://www.holocaust-history.org/auschw ... e-science/
For the removable cyanide tins, Green alludes to: Jamie McCarthy, ‘Zyklon Introduction Columns’ 2005 http://www.holocaust-history.org/auschw ... o-columns/
5. On Tuesday, 25th January 2000, at the Royal Courts of Justice in The strand, London: Van Pelt (1), p.463.
6. Ibid, p 475, 486
7. Irving initiated the case because he objected to being labelled as a holocaust –denier, so one could say that his goal here was less than fully clear.
8. For assured mortality - ie nobody gets out alive - as Hoss recalled, for the screaming to have stopped and nobody moving by twenty minutes, one would surely require the US execution operating concentration of 3,200 ppm, an order of magnitude higher, however we are rather sort of data on this matter (Dissecting the Holocaust, p. 351). Inhaled cyanide locks irreversibly onto blood haemoglobin, thereby preventing any further oxygen exchange, so its rate of action is proportional to its concentration. One should reject the view propounded at the Irving trial that 100 ppm would here have been adequate.
9. Eg, Professor Zimmerman, writing in 2002, reckoned that groups of 1500 people were gassed in ‘no more than 20 minutes each’ (Holocaust Denial, p.364).
10. Van Pelt (1), p.388.
11. Gutman (2), p.159.
12. The Rudolf Report, p.82; Dissecting the Holocaust, 2003, p.343.

[jnovitz]

My suggestion would be just to go to auschwitz and chip a few samples off the wall and run your total and WAD cyanide analysises.

I think you have probably reached the end of what can be achieved with extensive footnoting.

The present claim is that while no appreciable FeCNs can be found a similiar level of WAD and free Cyanide ions can be found in the delousing and the alleged homicidal facilities.

On the face of it it appears an unlikely claim without a physical explanation. But the beauty of science is repeatability, so until the someone tries to repeat the Jan Sehn Institute's analysis and show it to be unfounded their claim will stand.

[Hannover]

astro 3 said:

It seems odd that there should be no photos or design-plans of these columns, and odder still that there are no holes in the roof where they were once (supposedly) fixed.

The so called 'holocaust' History Project has devised this embarrassment:


for more see:
'Zyklon-B wire mesh insertion devices debunked'
http://forum.codoh.com/viewtopic.php?t=309

Kula drew this:



for more see:
'alleged 'gas chambers' device debunked by Dr. Countess'
http://forum.codoh.com/viewtopic.php?t=1004

- Hannover