Why are the facts on such a huge event as the holocaust so innacurately documented?

Question

The numbers of Jews killed was drastically inflated then deflated. And so many holes have been shot in the official story that its hard to know what to believe. Were the gas chambers really that? Who would benefit by exaggerating the numbers?

Historians once agreed the number killed in the holocaust was 6 million, but not anymore. That figure has now been reduced to 1 million.
No doubt the holocaust hapenned, no doubt any number would be horrific just the same.And certainly this is no small matter, using it as a form of ridicule shows the barbarian nature of some people. But for someone looking for accurate and reliable details, its a tough job frinding them.

Some witnesses-including the soviets and nazi perpetrators themselves have made statements that later turned out to be false or exaggerated, leading one to question other statements made by them.

Answer 1

You've been listening to those stupid revisionists again, haven't you?

The figure is still 6 million. The only figure that has changed is the number murdered at Auschwitz - and that has only changed because the original number, just after the war, was based on an estimate of the potential capacity of the crematoria. ie it assumed that the maximum number of people that could have been killed were. Further, patient research has reduced the figure for Auschwitz only. No one reputable disputes the new figures.

Auschwitz isn't the be all and end all of the Holocaust, the numbers murdered in other camps and by the Einsatzgruppen are huge and while there may be minor disagreements about numbers, the figure of approximately 6 million remains static.

The figures are not exact because the Nazis did their best to destroy the documentation and always used coded language and face to face meetings rather than committing everything to paper.

Despite their efforts, an awful lot is known for sure and only neo-nazis and other inadequates and anti-semites would deny the known facts.

Remember that David Irving tried to sue someone who accused him of being no historian for denying the holocaust. He lost - the court held that no reasonable historian could hold that opinion.

Answer 2

First of all, to say historians "agree" on any number of deaths in the Holocaust is inaccurate. The figure used commonly while I was in college was 11 million killed - of which 6 million were Jewish. But to state that "historians agree that it is 1 million" is wrong.

While the people creating the original figures may or may not have had agendas (creation of a Jewish homeland being one), many of the people trying to revise the numbers down now clearly do have agendas. Many of the current holocaust deniers are from the Islamic world, including the President of Iran.

There is simply too much evidence from the Nazi's themselves to say the Holocaust did not exist. They documented the existence of gas chambers. I recommend the link below for further reading.

In sum, I would always caution an examination of the source of the information. Like many things that still have current political resonance, numbers may be misleading when someone wants to present a certain view.

Answer 3

There are too many accounts of the gas chambers for them not to have existed. Even Nazis admitted it, afterwards. As for exaggerating the numbers, anyone with a cause would wish to manipulate those numbers, but I doubt people do anymore, because every school kid learns 6 million, and how do you argue with that? The facts are so scewed because, during the war, the Allies had no idea about the camps. The Nazis, and the puppet governments they set up, were seeking to lift up their own people; as soon as the Jews, and anyone else they didn't like, were gone, they ignored them, and thus, the people ignored them, thanking...whoever, that is wasn't them. Some few fought back, resistance fighters and the like, but most of the ordinary people were too scared to ask questions for which they might be shot. Or sent to the same place.

After the war, when the Allies came in and saw the camps, they began to document what they saw. But the Nazis, while preparing to flee, had destroyed so much paperwork that it was nearly impossible to tell who had been where. Most bodies were not buried, they went to the crematoria, and how do you identify ashes? So the only accounts they had of who was there and killed were fellow prisoners, who were starving, sick, and severely shell-shocked. Sometimes they remembered full names, sometimes only first names or nicknames, and sometimes they went into hysterical fits if they had to remember anything at all. I certainly don't blame them for that reaction, either. But, the point is, when entire families have been wiped out, when entire villages have been wiped out, and the perpetrators have destroyed all evidence of who they were, how do you discover that? Those who did survive, scattered. There's no way to track them all down, and so there is no way to know the exact number of those who died.

And so those who would say the Jews inflated the numbers for sympathy, or that it never happened at all, use this as a springboard, a place from which to say, "You see, even you don't know who died. How can you prove any did, when you have no evidence?" Of course, they bypass all those who survived the camps, apparently believing that all these people tattooed themselves, killed every member of their own families, and came up with this ridiculous story that quite a few people seem to have come up with at precisely the same time.

Answer 4

Wartime documentation is very often a mess. Same for post-war documentation. And the Nazis destroyed a lot of paperwork before the surrender.

This is highly charged issue. No reasonable person doubts the existence of the Holocaust. The numbers have been debated back and forth, with 6 million the most commonly accepted number. Then it became difficult to argue the number, because Jewish organizations accused historians of minimizing the importance of Jewish deaths.

Now we have Neo-Nazis denying the Holocaust ever happened. The Arabs have a contest to generate the most amusing political sketch of the Holocaust. And in the confusion, there are anti-Semites who agree with the Neo-Nazis, and claim the whole thing was a Jewish plot to gain sympathy. The Jews respond with rage.

How is any truth supposed to be extracted from this mess? My fear is that it will be forgotten. And some day, repeated.

Terrifying.

Answer 5

There's a crapload of evidence in proof that the Holocaust happened. Testimonies, physical evidence, govt. documents, etc. are all solid proof. Those who believe that the gas chambers were nothing more than Hollywood props have a really weird agenda as well as an axe to grind.

The exact number of those perished is unknown; the rough estimate is 6 million people. Unfortunately, Stalin out-did Hitler by putting about 10 million people in the ground. Mao Tse Tsung starved out 30 million of his population in the 50s.

It isn't much better from the Armenian and Rwandan genocides.

Answer 6

I need to ask why the number really matters that much? Does it really matter whether Hitler's regime progressively de-humanized, enslaved, and then methodically exterminated one million people or six million people? Does it make the events less barbaric or more forgiveable? It would be good to know to develop the "facts" of the situation, but where I would suggest what we really need to work on is the "truth" of the situation. Through a combination of complacency and senseless bickering in western society we all allowed fellow humans to be treated as little more than insectoid vermin. That is what we need to remember about the Holocaust. Everytime you start making a question of six or one million the big historical issue, you just give more credit to those jack-azz deniers who act like statistics our society lost track of in the fog of war outweigh the ovens and gas chambers left behind in Poland or the lampshades of human skin found in Dachau, or the "labratories" found anywhere between the concentration and death camps, or the survivors themselves. I'm not saying anything negative about your personal curiousity. Just don't get lost in debated "facts" and lose sight of the "truth"

Answer 7

Spent the last 2 hours searching and reading about the extermination of Jews by the Germans in WW2. I couldn't find where the number had been reduced from 6mil to 1mil. Except in articles that appeared to me to be bias. Articles disputing the gas chambers, numbers of Jews killed, etc. but they either didn't make a whole lot of sense to me or I found flaws in their reasoning or facts. These sites I looked at were antisemitic. Such as the Institute For Historic Review. It sounds legitimate. But a little bit research proved to me it was created just to give the reader the false impression that it is a serious & credible historical source. Which it isn't, being entirely dedicated to disproving the holocost. I could find no credible athority for reducing the number of jews killed to 1mil. If you have one please let me know [e-mail].

Answer 8

Just some more to add to the above: there were train loads of evidence, written and film provided during the Nuremburg Tribunals... Much of the damaging evidence came from the SS themselves, the German were efficient, if anything and very detailed.

One item that jumped out at me was the bills of lading produced during the trials of the directors from the pharmacy conglomerate IG Farben showing 4 1/2 tons of Zclone-B being delivered PER MONTH to the SS. The Directors were squirming on the stand trying to answer the prosecutors.

Answer 9

I think it is an okay question to have but this can be a can of worms!

I suggest that we look at the total number of Jews living in Europe pre-WW II and then question: What happened to them?
It sheds some light on just how many people disappeared.

I've been to a camp myself and witnessed just how efficient the process of disposal was.

I believe that 6-million is probably the most accurate number we'll be able to rely on.

Answer 10

perhaps because so many groups were targeted in the Holocaust that questions aren't specific enough? In the end it really doesn't matter- even one person being killed for who they are and not what they've done is one too many.

However, I am pleased that the horrors visited upon Asia during this period of time are finally getting the recognition they deserve as equally on par with the Holocaust- in fact dwarfing it in terms of number of people killed.