General Holocaust Denial Discussion Part II

[Sebastianus]

And in actual fact, there were intact skulls, bones and bits of charred flesh lying around sites like Treblinka when the Soviets arrived. Subsequent archaeological investigation at Belzec and Sobibor has found deeply buried layers of intact corpses and what amounts to human sludge (layers of adipocere). So the process of cremation was by no means complete.

You responded to a post that referred to hundreds of thousands of charred bodies. The quantity of human remains in the pictures of the site when the Soviets arrived is minuscule next to the alleged extermination.

As for adipocere, it almost certainly comes not from cremation remains, but from uncremated corpses. But at Treblinka the witnesses tell us that all of the corpses were cremated. Furthermore they tell us that the cremation remains could be crushed into the finest dust, "like cigarette ash". This contradicts the idea of incomplete cremation at Treblinka.

 

[Sebastianus]

You were asked how you can generalise from trying to burn one body with gasoline to discussing the burning of many bodies with gasoline.

Indeed, and that's what I responded to. The post you are responding to comes from a response to Wahrheitseeker's reference to Wiernik's description of the first method of body disposal at Treblinka, which allegedly consisted of merely soaking corpses in gasoline. According to Wiernik and Wahrheitseeker, this method was successful for the women but not for the men.

On its own, gasoline wouldn't necessarily work; that is what Wiernik reports regarding the first attempts at cremation at Treblinka.

Not quite. Wiernik reports that it was successful for the women, but not for the men.
Disputing the idea that this is possible is what the posts you are responding to were about.

In such a scenario, gasoline is an accelerant

I'm glad you said that. So is it correct to say that a given collection of wood burns faster when soaked with gasoline than when not soaked with gasoline?

that combines with the wood and the economies of scale derived from cremation en masse, to start an at least partially self-sustaining cremation which also exploits body fat as a further fuel supplement. Such a method no doubt requires some stoking or the addition of further fuel depending on how successfully the quantities were balanced at the outset.

The problem with arguing that body fat made a substantial contribution is that the jews in question are said to have been very lean. This may make a sizable difference in open air incineration. Indeed, I recall reading about two attempts at cremation with either napalm or gelled diesel. The one that tried to cremate a cow was a success, but the one that tried to cremate bison was a failure, This difference was possibly attributable to the difference in the levels of fat.

In any event, even with fat carcasses, I have never seen a properly documented case of mass carcass incineration that was self-sustaining in any sense. Can you offer any such example?

You mention the necessity of stoking, and this is indeed well attested in the literature on carcass incineration. But it is not well attested in the witness accounts of Treblinka. Can you give a testimony to the stoking of the Treblinka pyres? or to the addition of further fuel?

It's also unclear how the pyres could have been stoked. It would require heavy machinery, and the excavators allegedly present would not have been suitable (as their buckets hung from cables and therefore could not have been used for controlled pushing). In fact, it's worse than this: the Treblinka cremations are said to have taken place with all bodies above the rails and all the fuel below them, but this design pretty much precludes effective stoking altogether.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

But at Treblinka the witnesses tell us that all of the corpses were cremated.

Oskar Strawczynski / Treblinka wrote:
The graves could never be emptied entirely, because blood mixed with water accumulated at the bottom. Motorized pumps were set up to draw it out. However, they could never manage to drain the bottom few meters, and so the graves were simply covered over.

Do more research before posting again to avoid this sort of basic error.

 

[Sebastianus]

Oskar Strawczynski / Treblinka wrote:
The graves could never be emptied entirely, because blood mixed with water accumulated at the bottom. Motorized pumps were set up to draw it out. However, they could never manage to drain the bottom few meters, and so the graves were simply covered over.

Yes, Matthew, that's a fair case to cite as a counterexample. However, it is an exception. As you will no doubt recall, Chil Rajchman stated in his memoirs that the graves were completely emptied:

By the end of June the space of the eleven pits, where hundreds of thousands of bodies had lain, was completely cleared.

Pinchas Epstein is another example of a witness who clearly contradicted the notion that the graves had not been completely emptied.

In light of this, it's worth stopping to ask whether Strawczynski's tale makes any sense. First, remember that the graves were supposedly emptied with excavators, so that contrary to Strawczynski's story, liquid in the graves would not have been an obstacle to emptying them. Second, remember that Treblinka's soil is generally described as sandy, and therefore having good drainage. Blood would not accumulate in the graves, but drain down through the sand underneath. The only reason liquids might accumulate in the pits would be if they were beneath the water table - but then how were they filled in the first place?

If you want to run with Strawczynski's version, however, you need to clarify how many bodies you believe were uncremated. Recall that the issue at stake is the Treblinka cremations; if some bodies were left uncremated the task of cremation would be proportionally diminuished. But Judge Lukaszkiewicz's investigation did not find mass graves:

The Examining Judge of Siedlce, on November 13, 1945, rules in consideration of the fact that with great probability no mass graves are any longer to be found on the grounds of the former camp today, as is to be concluded from the witness testimonies examined so far and from the results of the work carried out at the site

So on the basis of both the known testimonies and the diggings carried out at the site, it was found that there were no mass graves remaining at Treblinka. Judge Lukaszkiewicz also wrote that

During the work on the terrain, I found no mass graves, which, in connection with the statements by the witnesses Romanowski and Wiernik, leads to the conclusion that nearly all of the bodies of the victims were burned, all the more so since the camp was liquidated early and the murderers had much time.

So according to Judge Lukaszkiewicz, the witnesses Wiernik and Romanowski also support the idea that, if any bodies were left uncremated, the number was certainly quite small. ("Romanowski" is probably Chil Rajchman, who used the name Henrik Romanowski.)

So, Matthew: how many corpses do you believe were left uncremated at Treblinka?

 

[Sebastianus]

First, recall that according to the Treblinka story, 2000-3000 bodies were cremated at a time on a pyre 30 meters long. The cremations are said usually to have been completed overnight - a duration of cremation of perhaps 12 hours. The fuel used is said to have been bushes, branches, twigs, and/or brushwood, possibly soaked with a liquid fuel.

Nick Terry has quite correctly pointed to the UK foot and mouth epidemic as a case relevant for the study of mass cremation. Now, 950 cremation sites were used during that epidemic. That means that it's absurd to compare the Treblinka cremations to the cumulative cremations during the FMD epidemic. Fortunately, we have quite a bit of detailed information about this and other mass cremation. The United States General Accounting Office and the Unites States Department of Agriculture (USDA) offer the following information (pp. 64-66)

When burial is not feasible, the [FMD response] plan recommends incineration as the alternative means of disposal even though USDA recognizes that incineration is both difficult and expensive. According to a USDA veterinarian who helped during the U.K. outbreak, a 200-meter funeral pyre was used to incinerate 400 cows or 1,200 sheep or 1,600 pigs. Such a pyre required 1,000 railway ties, 8 tons of kindling, 400 wooden pallets, 4 tons of straw, 200 tons of coal, and 1,000 liters of diesel fuel.
[...]
According to a USDA veterinarian, in the United Kingdom the pyres generally burned for about 9 to 10 days before all of the carcasses were incinerated.

Now, the statement that the United States Department of Agriculture recognizes that incineration is both difficult and expensive is quite interesting. The USDA sounds quite similar to the "holocaust deniers". The information about the UK pyres is particularly interesting, and suggests the following question:


If 1200 sheep or 1600 pigs can be cremated in 9-10 days on a pyre 200 meters long with fuel consisting of 1,000 railway ties, 8 tons of kindling, 400 wooden pallets, 4 tons of straw, 200 tons of coal, and 1,000 liters of diesel fuel, how many Jews can be cremated overnight on a pyre 30 meters long with fuel consisting of perhaps one ton of dry wood and perhaps as much gasoline as can be soaked into the wood?

(The value of one ton comes from estimating the weight of brushwood or bushes forming a layer according to the testimony of Rajchman: 50 cm thick, in a grate 30 meters long and 1.5 meters wide.)

 

[Matthew Ellard]

Yes, Matthew, that's a fair case to cite as a counterexample. However, it is an exception. As you will no doubt recall, Chil Rajchman stated in his memoirs that the graves were completely emptied:

No there are other examples. You simply haven't done enough research. Remember Rachel Auerbach's quote from "In the Field of Treblinka" Look there, at the edge of that hole," said the judge, "these are bones from a child's leg!" One of the Treblinka survivors rushed over. "Be careful!" said another. "There's still some flesh hanging from that leg"

The Germans simply couldn't completely empty the graves and hide all the evidence of mass executions at Treblinka.

In light of this, it's worth stopping to ask whether Strawczynski's tale makes any sense.

It does make sense. Other people found body parts at Treblinka in mass graves. Body part were lying on the ground.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

Now, the statement that the United States Department of Agriculture recognizes that incineration is both difficult and expensive is quite interesting.

Yes. It means your claim it was impossible has now been dismissed as completely wrong. You are now claiming the Nazis didn't burn the bodies to hide their crime because it was expensive. Good luck with that argument.

 

[Sebastianus]

No there are other examples. You simply haven't done enough research. Remember Rachel Auerbach's quote from "In the Field of Treblinka" Look there, at the edge of that hole," said the judge, "these are bones from a child's leg!" One of the Treblinka survivors rushed over. "Be careful!" said another. "There's still some flesh hanging from that leg"
[/COLOR]

Remember Rachel Auerbach's statement that at Treblinka blood “was found to be a first-class combustion material”? It's certainly an interesting explanation of how the cremations worked.

More seriously, you are confusing body parts with intact bodies.

We need to divide witness statements into those from people who claim to have been in the camp while it was operational, and those who observed the site after it was out of operation.

In the first category, Strawczynski stands alone in his assertion that the mass graves were not emptied due to a mysterious accumulation of blood and water. There are others who claim that incompletely cremated body parts were sometimes thrown into the graves for reburial as an act of sabotage, but to my knowledge no other witness states that the graves were not fully emptied.

Auerbach's statement fits in the second category. She saw only incompletely cremated body parts. This matches the findings of Judge Lukaszkiewicz's investigation. It would be no wonder if incompletely cremated body parts were found. After all, charred flesh is sometimes found in archaeological investigations of Roman cremations. If you watch the video (sorry, Nick) of this archaeological cremation to the end, you will see that there was uncremated flesh remaining despite the use of an impressive amount of fuel to cremate one pig.

So again, Matthew: how many corpses do you believe were left uncremated at Treblinka?

 

[Sebastianus]

Yes. It means your claim it was impossible has now been dismissed as completely wrong. You are now claiming the Nazis didn't burn the bodies to hide their crime because it was expensive. Good luck with that argument.

I have never claimed that burning bodies is impossible in itself. Rather, it is impossible to burn as many bodies as are said to have been burned at Treblinka, in the space and time claimed to have been used at Treblinka, or with a fuel loading consistent with the statements of the Treblinka witnesses. I gave some precise information on the resources needed in a particular instance of mass cremation:

According to a USDA veterinarian who helped during the U.K. outbreak, a 200-meter funeral pyre was used to incinerate 400 cows or 1,200 sheep or 1,600 pigs. Such a pyre required 1,000 railway ties, 8 tons of kindling, 400 wooden pallets, 4 tons of straw, 200 tons of coal, and 1,000 liters of diesel fuel.
[...]
According to a USDA veterinarian, in the United Kingdom the pyres generally burned for about 9 to 10 days before all of the carcasses were incinerated.

Again, I'd like to ask you a simple question, Matthew: If 1200 sheep or 1600 pigs can be cremated in 9-10 days on a pyre 200 meters long with fuel consisting of 1,000 railway ties, 8 tons of kindling, 400 wooden pallets, 4 tons of straw, 200 tons of coal, and 1,000 liters of diesel fuel, how many Jews can be cremated overnight on a pyre 30 meters long with fuel consisting of perhaps one ton of dry wood and perhaps as much gasoline as can be soaked into the wood?

Now, I'd like to elaborate a bit on the issue of species. The average weight of carcasses in the UK FMD epidemic is usually given as
cattle = 500 kg
pigs = 100 kg
sheep = 50 kg.

You might wonder why more pigs than sheep can be burned, even though pigs are twice as large. We find an answer in Carcass Disposal: a comprehensive review:

The efficiency and throughput of all three incineration methods—including open-air burning— depend on the type of species burned; the greater the percentage of animal fat, the more efficient a carcass will burn (Brglez, 2003, p. 32). Swine have a higher fat content than other species and will burn more quickly than other species (Ellis, 2001, p. 28).

Now, the Jews said to have been incinerated at Treblinka are not supposed to have been as fat as pigs, or even as fat as sheep. In fact, they are supposed to have been very poorly fed, and hence have had very low body fat. Out of the species considered, sheep seem to be the closest to the Jews, both in size and in body fat. However, there is an additional consideration: wool. A sheep's wool insulates the body and hinders cremation. Fortunately, we have some information about shorn sheep as well, courtesy of the Australian Veterinary Emergency Plan (AUSVETPLAN):

For fuel estimation, one adult cattle carcase is equivalent to four adult pigs or shorn sheep, or three woolly adult sheep.

Note that the ratio 1 cow : 3 woolly sheep : 4 pigs match the ratios in the example from the UK: 400 cattle : 1200 (woolly) sheep : 1600 pigs. Using the information from the AUSVETPLAN, we can see that had the sheep been shorn, 1600 rather than 1200 of them could have been cremated.

A shorn sheep, with an average weight of 50 kg minus the weight of the wool (a few kg, probably), seems to be the best approximation of the Jews said to have been cremated. The main difference is that the Jews likely had less body fat, and consequently were harder to cremate.

The AUSVETPLAN also gives some information on fuel requirements:

Experience has demonstrated that carcases can be completely consumed using dry wood alone at the rate of 1.5 tonnes for a 500 kg adult bovine or 1.5 tonnes of coal briquettes or equivalent combinations. For multiple carcases, the amount of fuel may be reduced to 1.0 tonne per adult bovine because of economies of scale. Straw and liquid fuel are required to start the burn.

So in mass burning, 1000 kg of dry wood (plus liquid fuel and straw to start the burn) is needed per cow. The fuel requirement for a shorn sheep is 1/4th that for a cow, or 250 kg.

Given, say, 800,000 Jews cremated at Treblinka, with a fuel requirement of 250 kg of dry wood per Jew, we have a total fuel requirement of 200,000,000 kg of dry wood, or 200,000 metric tons. This cremation is supposed to have taken place in four months. Let's round that up to 133 days, so that there are 6,000 cremations per day. That means that every day, 250*6000 = 1,500,000 kg of dry wood had to be delivered to Treblinka. If we assume 3 ton trucks were used, that's 500 truckloads every day. Why do none of the testimonies talk about anything of this nature?

AUSVETPLAN also gives some information on how a pyre should be loaded:

Carcases should be stacked one row high and have sufficient air space between them. Restricting airflow around fuel and carcases will result in an inefficient burn.

Needless to say, 2000-3000 bodies on a pyre 30 meters long and 1.5 meters wide would be more than one row high, to put it mildly.

 

[MaxMurx]

Those images shown as attachment have the typical problem of invalid forensic evidence:
1. No indication who shot the photo, where and when.
2. No comparison with overview of the site for a comparison of the size and the location.
3. No ruler or benchmark available to compare the size of the objcects.
4. Misleading captions. Those bones which undoubtedly are "body parts" do not indicate any trace of being human body parts.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

No there are other examples. You simply haven't done enough research. Remember Rachel Auerbach's quote from "In the Field of Treblinka" Look there, at the edge of that hole," said the judge, "these are bones from a child's leg!" One of the Treblinka survivors rushed over. "Be careful!" said another. "There's still some flesh hanging from that leg"

Remember Rachel Auerbach's statement that at Treblinka blood “was found to be a first-class combustion material”? It's certainly an interesting explanation of how the cremations worked.

And? I'm only dealing with your incorrect statement about all graves were emptied. You are trying to "jump" to another issue to hide your error.

More seriously, you are confusing body parts with intact bodies.

For what purpose? The evidence is evidence. You are the holocaust denier. State your detailed alternative claim and provide all the evidence to support that claim.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

Yes. It means your claim it was impossible has now been dismissed as completely wrong. You are now claiming the Nazis didn't burn the bodies to hide their crime because it was expensive. Good luck with that argument.

I have never claimed that burning bodies is impossible in itself. Rather, it is impossible to burn as many bodies as are said to have been burned at Treblinka, in the space and time claimed to have been used at Treblinka, or with a fuel loading consistent with the statements of the Treblinka witnesses.

Well good for you. You should write a very stern letter to the families of Franz Stangl and Kurt Franz and write a book.

Kurt Franz / SS-Untersturmführer / Commandant Treblinka from August 1943 — 19 October 1943)
I cannot say how many Jews in total were gassed in Treblinka. On average each day a large train arrived, sometimes there were even two. This however was not so common

 

[Sebastianus]

I'm only dealing with your incorrect statement about all graves were emptied. You are trying to "jump" to another issue to hide your error.

Ok, let's take this very slowly.

My initial statement was that the Treblinka witness claimed that all the bodies were cremated. You correctly pointed to Oskar Strawczynski as a witness who made a contrary claim. In response I clarified my statement, and will clarify it further.

1. Most of the Treblinka witnesses claimed that all the bodies were cremated. This includes Yankiel Wiernik, Chil Rajchman, and Pinchas Epstein.

2. To my knowledge, the only Treblinka witness to claim that some bodies were left in the graves uncremated is Oscar Strawczynski, whose claim about the graves being filled with blood and water makes little sense technically and is not echoed by any other Treblinka witness. Furthermore, Strawczyski claimed to have been in the Treblinka lower camp, not the upper camp where extermination and cremation allegedly took place. That means that Strawczyski is not a direct witness to the Treblinka cremations, but a hearsay witness - he is reporting not what he saw himself, but what others told him (or what he simply invented, of course). Hearsay witnesses have much lower value than direct witnesses.

3. Judge Lukaszkiewicz's investigation did not find any mass graves, and concluded on the basis of both the diggings at Treblinka and the testimony of Treblinka witnesses that there almost certainly were not mass graves remaining on the site. You can find more information about his investigation in this book on Treblinka.

Now, as for Rachel Auerbach:

First, by pointing to Auerbach's statement that blood was a first rate combustion material, I was not changing the subject, as I returned to the central issue immediately after making that statement. Rather, I was mentioning information directly relevant for assessing Auerbach's value as a witness, which is very low.

Second, Auerbach's claim to have seen survivors commenting about flesh on a bone at postwar Treblinka does not contradict the assertion that all the bodies were cremated. As I pointed out, open air cremation often leaves some degree of uncremated flesh, as can be seen in this archaeological cremation.

The upshot of all this is that if the Treblinka story were true, then all or nearly all of the bodies at Treblinka would have to have been cremated on open air pyres, as described by such witnesses as Chil Rajchman, Yankiel Wiernik, and Heinrich Matthes. This raises some serious technical problems because mass cremation is an difficult task, and is highly resource intensive in terms of time, space, and fuel, all of which were in short supply at Treblinka.

Now, Matthew, it's time for you to answer some specific questions:

How many corpses do you believe were left uncremated at Treblinka?


If 1200 sheep or 1600 pigs can be cremated in 9-10 days on a pyre 200 meters long with fuel consisting of 1,000 railway ties, 8 tons of kindling, 400 wooden pallets, 4 tons of straw, 200 tons of coal, and 1,000 liters of diesel fuel, how many Jews can be cremated overnight on a pyre 30 meters long with fuel consisting of perhaps one ton of dry wood and perhaps as much gasoline as can be soaked into the wood?

 

[Sebastianus]

Well good for you. You should write a very stern letter to the families of Franz Stangl and Kurt Franz and write a book.

The implication of your remark seems to be that confessions prove beyond all doubt that the standard Treblinka story is true. Let's think through the implications of this argument:

Throughout history, many women have confessed to being witches. Do you believe in witchcraft?

To take an example closer to home, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, the commandant of Theresienstadt confessed that Jews were gassed in Theresienstadt. Do you believe that Jews were gassed at Theresienstadt? (Hint: modern orthodox holocaust historiography does not.)

 

[Sebastianus]

To get a clear sense of whether the Treblinka cremation story is possible, let's look at the nearest thing to a full scale test that we have: a mass burn site from the 2001 UK FMD epidemic. We've already established that huge amounts of fuel are needed for mass cremation, amounts far in excess of the pitifully small quantities reportedly used at Treblinka. Let's look now at space requirements for mass cremation.

At the mass burn site at Eppynt, according to the NAO report, 37,500 carcasses were burned. Only 7,000 of these were cattle. According to the AUSVETPLAN, in terms of fuel requirements cattle are the equivalent of 3 woolly or 4 shorn sheep. However, according to the USDA carcass burning guidelines, in terms of space requirements, cattle are the equivalent of 5 sheep.

Let's be as generous as possible and assume that cattle are the equivalent of 5 sheep, so 7,000 cattle are the equivalent of 35,000 sheep, while simultaneously converting the 30,500 woolly sheep into 40,667 shorn sheep. Technically we shouldn't make the latter conversion, because cremating woolly sheep doesn't take more space, just more fuel, but we'll be generous and make it all the same.

This means that the equivalent (in terms of space requirements) of 35,000 + 40,667 = 75,667 shorn sheep were cremated at Eppynt. The cremation lasted from April to August, or 4 months. This is the same amount of time that the Treblinka cremations lasted, according to Yitzhak Arad's standard book on the subject. But at Treblinka there were supposedly close to 800,000 cremations, or at least 10 times as many.

So the Treblinka cremation pyres should have been 10 times as large, right? Well, no. The Treblinka cremation facilities are described as being 30 meters long, and 1.5 meters wide - 45 square meters in all. Their number has been given as anywhere from one to six, with some witnesses suggesting that their number was gradually increased (so that, say, for the first month there was 1, for the second month 2, for the third month 4, for the last month 6). I will be as generous as possible and assume that there were six for the entire duration of the cremations. The total pyre area at Treblinka is therefore 45 * 6 = 270 square meters.

But the pyre at Epynt, as documented in the first link above, was planned to be 250 meters long and 10 meters wide; however it apparently ended up being more than 400 meters long. Assuming that the width did not also increase, and rounding down "more than 400" to 400, that gives us an area of 4,000 square meters.

So according to the Treblinka cremation story, pyres with area at most 270 square meters cremated more than 10 times as many Jews as the British were able to cremate (counting shorn sheep equivalent carcasses) in more than 4,000 square meters, in the same amount of time.

Now, why do all the self-proclaimed skeptics on this board believe in such a miracle?

 

[A'isha]

Yes, but they didn't meticulously document their organized state-run witchcraft, so that's not even close to being a relevant comparison.

To take an example closer to home, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, the commandant of Theresienstadt confessed that Jews were gassed in Theresienstadt. Do you believe that Jews were gassed at Theresienstadt? (Hint: modern orthodox holocaust historiography does not.)

Why do you rely on a barely two-paragraph news item for what Rahm "confessed" to, instead of looking at what he actually testified and admitted to during his trial (hint: Rahm was responsible for mass deportations from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz, which indeed had gas chambers)?

 

[Loss Leader]

Yes, but they didn't meticulously document their organized state-run witchcraft, so that's not even close to being a relevant comparison.

Comparing apples to oranges appears to be a favorite denialist technique. Why are we even talking about how the British government carefully cremated livestock? The goals of that cremation and the goals of Nazi cremation were so different, there is no comparison. You can describe an orange in as much detail as you'd like, it's still not going to tell you much about an apple.

The confessions in Salem were from girls who were victims of the government's insane murderous rampage. The testimony of the Nazis were from government officials engaged in an insane murderous rampage. The two have nothing to do with each other.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

OK Let's take this very slowly

Judge Lukaszkiewicz's investigation did not find any mass graves, and concluded on the basis of both the diggings at Treblinka and the testimony of Treblinka witnesses that there almost certainly were not mass graves remaining on the site.

I think you need to read evidence more slowly.

Judge Lukaszkiewicz found no "full" mass graves. He found the empty mass burial pits from which the bodies were removed. This is why you are trying so hard to argue that the bodies couldn't be cremated, remember?

Judge Lukaszkiewicz / "During the work on the terrain, I found no mass graves, which, in connection with the statements by the witnesses Romanowski and Wiernik, leads to the conclusion that nearly all of the bodies of the victims were burned",

Judge Lukaszkiewicz / "Its walls give recognizable evidence of the presence of a large quantity of ashes as well as human remains – was further excavated in order to discover the depth of the pit in this part of the camp. Numerous human remains were found by these excavations, partially still in a state of decomposition. The soil consists of ashes interspersed with sand, is of a dark gray color and granulous in form. During the excavations, the soil gave off an intense odor of burning and decay. At a depth of 7.5 meters the bottom was reached, which consisted of layers of unmixed sand. At this point the digging was stopped here".

Try harder next time.

 

[Sebastianus]

Yes, but they didn't meticulously document their organized state-run witchcraft, so that's not even close to being a relevant comparison.

What precisely is the argument you are suggesting? If it is that there is meticulous documentation for the organized state-run gassing and cremation of some 800,000 Jews at Treblinka, then you are mistaken. As Christopher Browning has written,

documents relating to gassing in Poland is [sic] scant. For gassing, therefore, witness testimony and circumstantial evidence play a much larger role

If on the other hand you were suggesting that Treblinka guards gave meticulously detailed confessions, and that unlike witchcraft confessions such detailed confessions cannot be false, then you are again wrong. Witchcraft confessions were often highly specific; you can see discussion of such an example here.

Why do you rely on a barely two-paragraph news item for what Rahm "confessed" to, instead of looking at what he actually testified and admitted to during his trial

You will find that I linked two news items, in fact. Are you suggesting that the Jewish Telegraphic Agency was engaged in false reporting? If I had access to the archives of the Peoples Court in Litmerice (assuming they exist) then I might be able to offer further details, but I do not.

(hint: Rahm was responsible for mass deportations from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz, which indeed had gas chambers)

Both of the linked articles contradict the interpretation which you seem to be suggesting, in which what Rahm really admitted was that he was responsible for transporting people to Auschwitz and its gas chambers. Specifically:

Rahm, who in the beginning maintained that the Gestapo was responsible for all activities within the ghetto, finally confessed to having participated in the planning, construction and use of poison gas chambers in which Jews and Czech patriots were murdered.

Karl Rahm, former commandant of the Theresienstadt camp, today admitted responsibility for the construction and use of gas chambers

The planning, construction, and use of gas chambers, not transporting people to a camp which had gas chambers.

You may also be interested in reading some testimony about the Buchenwald gas chamber - which again even orthodox holocaust historians agree never existed.

 

[Sebastianus]

Why are we even talking about how the British government carefully cremated livestock?

Well, one of the reasons that we are talking about it is that Nick Terry suggested it as a parallel case. Apparently you believe that he was wrong to do so. Why do you believe this?

The goals of that cremation and the goals of Nazi cremation were so different, there is no comparison.

What evidence do you have that cremation in the foot and mouth epidemic was fundamentally different from the alleged Treblinka cremations? If you look at a picture of a foot and mouth cremation in progress, you can see that the initial fuel has burned, but many of the carcasses are still largely intact. More fuel will be needed to destroy these bodies. If things were left like that at Treblinka, I think the Russians might have noticed the hundreds of thousands of charred bodies - and Judge Lukaszkiewicz's investigation certainly would have.

The confessions in Salem were from girls who were victims of the government's insane murderous rampage. The testimony of the Nazis were from government officials engaged in an insane murderous rampage. The two have nothing to do with each other.

Except that in both cases there were at least some false confessions, which demonstrates that confession evidence is much more problemmatic than people tend to assume.

You may find another relevant example of false confession in the case of the Norfolk four, in which four US Navy officers falsely confessed to a rape and murder. The Frontline program The Confessions gives a detailed account of this case, and is well worth watching. You can watch it here. You can also read some statements of a detective interviewed for this program.

Can people falsely confess?


Oh, of course. It's very easy to get a false confession.


How does it happen?

… All I've got to do is take you in that room, and I have the luxury of keeping you there and wearing you down. ... I will lie to you. I will weaken you mentally, physically, until you confess. ...

They will want to confess. You will put them into a mental state that, in order for them to get the release, the desire that they need to get out of the room, they will say anything just to get away from you.

Even if they're innocent?

Even if they're innocent or even if the consequences will be bad for them. No one will confess over an hour or two, believe me, no one that didn't commit a crime. You have to mentally wear them down, and besides mentally, physically wear them down.

At the end of the day -- and confessions can go for over 24 hours -- you will have sleep deprivation. Your subject will be hungry, but probably doesn't even want to eat. You know, so you're taking him into another situation. So many people say, "Well, how could you confess to a crime that you never did?" Well, I'll tell you something: Put them in a room with me, I could do it.

If false confessions can happen in ordinary police interrogations, how then can you defend the claim that false confessions could not happen in postwar trials?