Vrba is "corroborated" on a fake Himmler visit (says Nessie)

[Archie]

Rudolf Vrba in his memoir claimed that Himmler visited Auschwitz in 1943 when the new crematoria were finished in order to watch a ceremonial inaugural gassing. Nessie claims that this is "corroborated" because Himmler did visit Auschwitz at some point (ignoring completely what Vrba says Himmler did during the visit). Nessie says simply that Vrba was "bad with dates" but no big deal because that's normal.

By "known facts" you mean revisionist beliefs that the gassings and cremations were physically impossible and there are no mass graves. That is not corrobroation. Corroboration comes from other contemporaneous evidence. When a Jewish prisoner and Nazi guard both state they saw gassings, that is corrobroation. When a Polish railworker and a Nazi document both record regular mass transports arriving at a location, that is corroboration.

You then dismiss all the witnesses who say they saw mass gassings, thousands being cremated at a time on pyres and mass graves, as liars, because you do not think they are credible claims.

"Revisionist beliefs"?

No. By known facts, I mean known facts. Nessie, if you are not going to be reasonable, then you can move along.

Example 1: It is known that Himmler visited Auschwitz in the summer of 1942 and it is also known that the Birkenau crematoria were completed in 1943. Vrba claimed that Himmler came to Auschwitz for a special inaugural gassing at the new crematoria. But when Himmler was there the crematoria hadn't been built yet. Vrba's story is therefore contradicted by known facts.

Example 2: Vrba claimed that he hid in a woodpile during his escape. And he describes an air raid while he was in the woodpile. But there was no air raid at Auschwitz in April 1944. The first bombing of Auschwitz was August 20, 1944. The story is therefore contradicted by known facts.

Vrba is corroborated about, and is therefore being truthful that Himmler visited the camp and that there were air raids. His credibility, however, is reduced by getting the dates wrong. That does not serious damage his testimony, because most people are poor at remembering dates. We also know that Vrba was actively gathering testimony from others, so much of what he relates is hearsay, he did not see it and so its accuracy is likely to be diminished.

You have not dealt with corroboration. You have merely shown that he got dates wrong. On the events he is relating, he is corroborated. Memory and hearsay explain why he got the dates wrong. Vrba remains an important witness to general events at the camp and as one of the earliest reports. His testimony does not support revisionist claims that the Kremas had another purpose other than gassings and that there were regular mass transports back out of the camp, of people not selected to work at the camp.

Come on.

This is not "getting the dates wrong." This is fabricating an elaborate scenario that we KNOW for a fact DID NOT HAPPEN.

Vrba goes on for like three pages about this in his book.

In fact he [Himmler] was far from satisfied with what he had seen, but it was not the appalling conditions which worried him. It was the grossly inefficient methods which were being used to exterminate the Jews who were beginning to arrive in their thousands from all parts of Europe.

The gas chambers were no more than makeshift affairs. The burning of the bodies in open trenches wasted valuable fuel and caused the Germans who by that time occupied the nearby Polish town of Auschwitz to complain of the stench. To a former teacher of mathematics, the whole business was just too haphazard for words.

And so he gave orders for the greatest, most efficient extermination factory the world has ever known. For the modern concrete gas chambers and the vast crematoria that could absorb as many as 12,000 bodies in twenty-four hours and, in fact, did so. For the machinery that sucked in 2,500,000 men, women and children in three years and puffed them out in harmless black smoke.[...]

Heinrich Himmler visited Auschwitz Camp again in January, 1943. This time I was glad to see him arrive, though not because I still nursed any faint hope that he would improve our lot through benevolence or any sense of justice.[...]

The main purpose of his visit was to see for himself the bricks and mortar which had sprung from the plans he had outlined in Auschwitz seven months earlier.

He was to watch the world's first conveyor belt killing, the inauguration of Commandant Hoess's brand new toy, his crematorium. It was truly a splendid affair, one hundred yards long and fifty yards wide, containing fifteen ovens which could burn three bodies each simultaneously in twenty minutes, a monument in concrete, indeed, to its builder, Herr Walter Dejaco.

Nessie claims Vrba's story is "truthful" because Himmler did visit the camp. He ignores that Vrba is explicitly claiming another visit. ("visited Auschwitz Camp AGAIN in January, 1943" and "the plans he had outlined in Auschwitz seven months earlier", i.e. in summer of 1942).

This story obviously fails corroboration. Vrba is writing FICTION.

Here is a relevant exchange from the Zundel trial.

Q: Now, did you say you were witness to a visit by Heinrich Himmler in January 1943?
A: I was witness to two visits by Heinrich Himmler--one was July 1942 when I saw him from quite close.
Q: Where?
A: In Auschwitz I. And the second visit took place some time in '43, but I did not see him directly. I saw his cavalcade, so if it was Hitler or someone else sitting in the car of similar significant dignitary--
Q: Well, I put it to you that Heinrich Himmler, in the Calendarium of the camp that you so far accepted as accurate, visited on the 7th of March, 1941, and the 17th of July, 1942; but he did not visit the camp of Birkenau or Auschwitz in 1943, as you allege in your book.
A: I was informed at that time by grapevine in the camp that Himmler is coming to visit the camp again, and then there was a cavalcade equipped as if it would be Himmler -- in other words, the standard Mercedes and the standard sycophants constantly around, but he didn't come to shake hands with me and to introduce himself to me or to say, "I am Himmler", or he didn't tell me, you know, "Himmler didn't come this time but I am instead of his and this is my name." So you might be quite right that that information might be not perfectly exact, on close to exact.

When he is caught in the lie, then he tries to say he "heard" it was Himmler and saw the car and so he just assumed. There is not so much as a whiff of this uncertainty in the book. In the book, he tells us what Himmler was thinking, etc.

The Nessie method is actually just to use motivated reasoning to decide what is "truthful" and "corroborated" and work back from that.

[Nessie]

Rudolf Vrba in his memoir claimed that Himmler visited Auschwitz in 1943 when the new crematoria were finished in order to watch a ceremonial inaugural gassing. Nessie claims that this is "corroborated" because Himmler did visit Auschwitz at some point (ignoring completely what Vrba says Himmler did during the visit). Nessie says simply that Vrba was "bad with dates" but no big deal because that's normal.

......

This story obviously fails corroboration. Vrba is writing FICTION.

Here is a relevant exchange from the Zundel trial.

Q: Now, did you say you were witness to a visit by Heinrich Himmler in January 1943?
A: I was witness to two visits by Heinrich Himmler--one was July 1942 when I saw him from quite close.
Q: Where?
A: In Auschwitz I. And the second visit took place some time in '43, but I did not see him directly. I saw his cavalcade, so if it was Hitler or someone else sitting in the car of similar significant dignitary--
Q: Well, I put it to you that Heinrich Himmler, in the Calendarium of the camp that you so far accepted as accurate, visited on the 7th of March, 1941, and the 17th of July, 1942; but he did not visit the camp of Birkenau or Auschwitz in 1943, as you allege in your book.
A: I was informed at that time by grapevine in the camp that Himmler is coming to visit the camp again, and then there was a cavalcade equipped as if it would be Himmler -- in other words, the standard Mercedes and the standard sycophants constantly around, but he didn't come to shake hands with me and to introduce himself to me or to say, "I am Himmler", or he didn't tell me, you know, "Himmler didn't come this time but I am instead of his and this is my name." So you might be quite right that that information might be not perfectly exact, on close to exact.

When he is caught in the lie, then he tries to say he "heard" it was Himmler and saw the car and so he just assumed. There is not so much as a whiff of this uncertainty in the book. In the book, he tells us what Himmler was thinking, etc.

The Nessie method is actually just to use motivated reasoning to decide what is "truthful" and "corroborated" and work back from that.

What you have, quoted, is a lawyer teasing apart Vrba's testimony to establish what he saw and what was hearsay to establish the accuracy of his evidence. That is common practice, as hearsay is not usually allowed as evidence, due to its inaccuracy, and its use by a witness helps to establish witness credibility. What the lawyer achieves is to determine that Vrba is mixing hearsay with what he saw. Primarily, in the exchange above, we find that Vrba did not see Himmler at the second visit, instead he believed it was Himmler because of rumours. Vrba admits he likely made a mistake.

You call it a lie, but the court does not dismiss his evidence as lies. That is because, unlike you, they are experienced with and well versed in witness evidence giving and recall. There is no doubt that Himmler visited A-B. The issue is how many times and when. It has been established during the cross-examination, that the 1943 visit, which Vrba had reason to believe was Himmler, was in fact someone else. As far as the court is concerned, they have now established what was hearsay, why Vrba thought Himmler visited in 1943 and that Vrba now admits he made a mistake. The court has not accused Vrba of lying, because his error is explained and admitted to.

Vrba is corroborated the Himmler visited A-B, but not on the date he remembers, where he now admits he did not see Himmler and instead was told it was him. Revisionists, with their lack of any training or experience with witnesses and lack of knowledge of all the studies of memory and recollection, mistakenly think that is evidence of lying.

That revisionists claim every error, unlikely claim, claim they find unbelievable, to be evidence of lies, is why they end up in the extraordinary situation of 100% of the people who worked at A-B, went inside the Kremas, and say they saw mass gassings to be lying about the gassings and that no such gassings took place. They are then unable to produce a single witness who worked inside the Kremas, who speaks to a process that did not include mass gassings.

Vrba was not an eyewitness too much of what he wrote about in his report and subsequent book. His cross-examination at the Leuchter trial, by lawyer Doug Christie, clearly establishes just how much of Vrba's testimony is hearsay. That does not therefore mean Vrba is a liar, all that all of his evidence should be dismissed. The ley events he relates, such as the gassings, are corroborated by those who worked inside the Kremas, along with documentary and other supporting evidence.

[Nazgul]

The ley events he relates, such as the gassings, are corroborated by those who worked inside the Kremas, along with documentary and other supporting evidence.

I am not sure what ley events are, perhaps a typo. How are the ley events corroborated? Did the staff of the Krema have debriefing meeting after each shift to compare and contrast notes along with their SS comrades. There is no documentary evidence apart from some stuff about gas doors which most morgues have. There is little other supporting evidence apart from a few cronies reporting fake news.

Trying to bring integrity to discredited witnesses is awe inspiring but somewhat ineffectual.

[Archie]

"I saw a chimpanzee play Chopin on the piano"

"No, you didn't"

"Ok, well, I saw a chimpanzee once at the zoo."

"Close enough!"

Nessie logic.

[Nessie]

The ley events he relates, such as the gassings, are corroborated by those who worked inside the Kremas, along with documentary and other supporting evidence.

I am not sure what ley events are, perhaps a typo. How are the ley events corroborated? Did the staff of the Krema have debriefing meeting after each shift to compare and contrast notes along with their SS comrades. There is no documentary evidence apart from some stuff about gas doors which most morgues have. There is little other supporting evidence apart from a few cronies reporting fake news.

Key events. Every single person, Jewish (of various nationalities) Nazi, German and Polish civilian, who worked at the Kremas, reports their use for mass gassings. When such a disparate group, who would not collaborate, agree with each other, that is strong corroborative evidence. The "apart from" documents you try to dismiss corroborate the witnesses with regards to undressing, gassing and mass cremations. The circumstantial evidence of mass arrivals, selections, the property collected and motive also corroborate.

Typically for a revisionist, you try to dumb down the volume of evidence, whilst you ignore your inability to produce an evidenced history of what happened. Revisionists cannot even agree on what happened.

Trying to bring integrity to discredited witnesses is awe inspiring but somewhat ineffectual.

Vrba has been tested by historians, journalists and in court and the only criticism he faces is mixing hearsay with what he saw and not making clear what is what. The errors he makes are understandable and whilst reducing his credibility, they do not damage his testimony to the extent it cannot be used. That revisionists conclude he lied about gassings, without any cognition of witness behaviour and recollection, is truly ineffectual. Indeed, only revisionists think they have a case.

[Nessie]

"I saw a chimpanzee play Chopin on the piano"

"No, you didn't"

"Ok, well, I saw a chimpanzee once at the zoo."

"Close enough!"

Nessie logic.

You are unable to refer to any study of witness behaviour or recollection, to prove your belief that Vrba lies, when he makes mistakes. So, you make ridiculous claims that bear no resemblance to what I have argued.

"I saw Himmler at A-B in 1943"

"No you didn't as he did not visit in 1943"

"Ok, well, I saw a dignitary visit A-B, that was just like the visit I saw of Himmler in 1942, and I was told it was Himmler. I realise now it may not have been Himmler"

That Vrba made a mistake and accepted the mistake when it was put to him, is to his credit. Your lack of experience when dealing with witness evidence is all the more clear with every post you make.

[TlsMS93]

The day you are accused of something, I hope that this argument that you criticize us revisionists for is not used in your defense. It is very comfortable to defend this mental gymnastics from the comfort of your home.

He got the date wrong but Himmler view gassing firsthand. Unbelievable

“It is not the true reality, but it is my reality.”

Herman Rosenblatt

[Nessie]

The day you are accused of something, I hope that this argument that you criticize us revisionists for is not used in your defense.

What argument is that?

It is very comfortable to defend this mental gymnastics from the comfort of your home.

He got the date wrong but Himmler view gassing firsthand. Unbelievable

“It is not the true reality, but it is my reality.”

Herman Rosenblatt

Historians, lawyers and journalists understand hearsay, that witnesses make mistakes and that does not prove they lied. Revisionists are unique in their belief that repeating hearsay and making mistakes are evidence to prove lying.

[TlsMS93]

The argument that a witness lies has no impact whatsoever on the case against someone. I hope that you do not suffer any harm and that you use this in your defense against whoever testifies.

There are courts where the judge instructs the jury to disregard any statement made by a witness if an untruth was told. But the Holocaust was special, unique, so it gained an aura of sanctity, a religion

[Nessie]

The argument that a witness lies has no impact whatsoever on the case against someone.

That is not my argument. My argument is that revisionists have failed to prove that 100% of the witnesses lied about gassings. It is an extraordinary claim that hundreds of people, Nazi, Jewish, from multiple nationalities, all lied that they saw gassings and extraordinary claims need extraordinary levels of evidence, and revisionism has none.

Instead, revisionists concentrate on credibility, arguing that if a witness is to them not credible, therefore he lied. That is a logically and evidentially flawed argument. A witness can be credible and lying, or vice versa. If a revisionist argues that a witness is describing something impossible, but I argue that it was possible, how do we determine who is correct? The answer is corroborating evidence. Evidence independent of a witness is the most accurate and reliable method to determining lying. If the witness is corroborated by other evidence, they are not lying.

I hope that you do not suffer any harm and that you use this in your defense against whoever testifies.

I have been the accused at a trial. The witnesses did not lie, but one exaggerated and the other was found to be repeating what they had been told, hearsay, so their evidence was excluded. It cannot be proved they lied, so no action was taken against them. My defence then presented alternative evidence, to prove a different version of events from the prosecutions alleged version. I was found not guilty, with the crime I was accused of not being established by the prosecution.

There are courts where the judge instructs the jury to disregard any statement made by a witness if an untruth was told. But the Holocaust was special, unique, so it gained an aura of sanctity, a religion

To dismiss a witness as a liar, mistakes, exaggerations, hearsay, memory failures have to be excluded and the lie proved with other evidence. If mistakes etc cannot be excluded as the reason why the witness made their claim, then a lie cannot be proved.

The example here is that Vrba was caught using hearsay evidence, when he claimed Himmler visited in 1943. That does not prove he lied. He made a mistake. He was told it was Himmler visiting, but that was wrong. If witnesses were accused of lying when they make mistakes, no one would risk giving evidence. If there was evidence to prove that there was no formal visit of a senior Nazi to A-B in 1943, and that Himmler never visited the camp, that would be evidence to prove Vrba lied. Vrba was treated no differently to any witness who presents hearsay in court. Like the witness in my trial, he was informed that he must be clear about what he saw personally and not to repeat what he had been told. Courts do not expect witnesses to be knowledgeable about hearsay evidence.

Revisionists need evidence to prove all the witnesses to gassings lied. Some have tried, by claiming the Kremas were used for purposes other than homicidal gassings in 1943-4. They have variously claimed bomb shelters, clothing delousing, corpse storage and mass showering. Their evidencing is so poor that revisionists cannot even agree amongst themselves what took place inside the Leichenkellers. None can name a single witness who worked inside a Krema, to what they believe happened.

That is why revisionists are wrong to dismiss Vrba as a liar, whose evidence about gassings is part of a hoax.

[TlsMS93]

And what is the material evidence corroborating the witnesses who agree with each other? Watertight doors and ventilation ducts? There are Kremas that don't have this and yet they insist that it was a gas chamber.

What is the need for a witness to go to court to talk about rumors and not limit himself to what he saw? Why does historiography continue to give so much credibility to these people as if they were camp security cameras?

Buildings altered by the liberators become an invalid object for any proof of crime and I will never accept the logic of the undressing room being larger and better ventilated than the supposed gas chamber itself.

[Nazgul]

extraordinary claims need extraordinary levels of evidence.

Indeed so stop trying to reverse the burden of proof and show extraordinary evidence of this alleged gassing, not just bogus witnesses. The late Fritz Berg demanded the same answer in the 2nd version of RODOH, but nothing new, just the same obfuscations by exterminationist, particularly you, previously mentioned, a multitude of times, with the same discredited witnesses. There was nothing concrete. Something new please not the rehashed crap given over the last decade. To be honest, if there was some concrete evidence of gassing, I am sure many would re-consider their position, or stance on the matter. Nessie you do few favours for the hoaxers side of the discourse.

While convictions have occurred on testimony alone, many are quashed due to lack of hard corroborating evidence. Thousands have seen "miracles".
Oct. 13, 1917, marked the last Marian apparition in Fátima and the day on which thousands of people bore witness to the miracle of the dancing sun

The Sun does not dance, nor are there miracles, especially religious ones. The quote above from Wiki, shows that something happened but not what people thought. People are curiously gullible.
The same human failings affected the krema witnesses based on prior beliefs and experiences, including propaganda, so the interpretation is aligned, not to reality but to similar beliefs and culture and expectations. This is how people make sense of their world. It is the old philosophical question regarding epistemology; what does it mean to "know" something.

[Nessie]

And what is the material evidence corroborating the witnesses who agree with each other? Watertight doors and ventilation ducts? There are Kremas that don't have this and yet they insist that it was a gas chamber.

Gas tight doors, an improved ventilation system, a mesh insertion device, shower parts are all documented and corroborate witness claims of use of the Leichenkeller as a gas chambers made to look like a shower, where Zyklon B was dropped into the chambers. Then there are the documents that corroborate witness claims about an undressing room and ovens that could create more than one corpse at a time.

What is the need for a witness to go to court to talk about rumors and not limit himself to what he saw?

Criminal courts limit themselves, with few exceptions, to only what the witness saw. A civil court, such as Leuchter's case, is more open to hearsay evidence, as it has a lower burden of proof.

Why does historiography continue to give so much credibility to these people as if they were camp security cameras?

The earliest reports, from escaped prisoners such as Vrba, are an important part of the history of the camp. The majority of Vrba's claims were later corroborated by other prisoners and Nazis, along with documentary and other evidence, so they become an important part of the evidence.

Buildings altered by the liberators become an invalid object for any proof of crime...

They are not proof, they are evidence, and because of alterations, they are poor evidence. They are not invalid, that is you trying to dismiss as much evidence as possible, to deflect from your lack of evidence.

... and I will never accept the logic of the undressing room being larger and better ventilated than the supposed gas chamber itself.

I have never heard of that being the case. The plans I have seen make them about the same size and the Topf & Sons engineer, Karl Schultze, responsible for the ventilation system gave testimony about the improved ventilation for the gas chambers.

https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=61650

"The ventilation installation provided for a ten-times air exchange; it served to suck out the gas that had collected and pump in fresh air. The pipes of the ventilation, which I personally constructed for the gas chamber, were immured in the walls of the chamber."

[Nazgul]

"The ventilation installation provided for a ten-times air exchange; it served to suck out the gas that had collected and pump in fresh air. The pipes of the ventilation, which I personally constructed for the gas chamber, were immured in the walls of the chamber."

I agree with you that the leichenkellers had great ventillation and not for the leap of faith claimed above.
Here are the recognized best practice ventilation requirements for morgues or leichenkellers. Autopsy Equipment/Fixtures

1. Ventilation
   Mortuary areas require good ventilation. The exhaust air is to be discharged to the atmosphere such that it cannot be drawn back into the mortuary, any other ventilation inlet, or any indoor portion of the hospital.
2. All external ventilation openings should be fly- and vermin-proof.
3. Exhausted air must not pose a hazard to any person who is outside the mortuary. (See room-requirement sheets) Air exhausted from clinical areas should be safely discharged to outside with no chance for re-entrainment or contamination of other indoor spaces. Where these precautions are by no means possible, exhaust air shall be EN1822 H13 HEPA filtered.
4. Sufficient ventilation is required for controlling noxious odours present in mortuaries and should also provide a means of protection to personnel working in the facility from possible airborne infections originating from corpses.
5. Tuberculosis, Hepatitis and HIV are among the most regularly encountered diseases in mortuaries in South Africa and, as such, the spread of these pathogens beyond the mortuary, via a ventilation system, must be avoided. Airborne-infection control is of particular concern and must be integrated into the design of the ventilation system. Airborne-contamination control principles must be applied to the design of the ventilation of high-risk. Refer to the IUSS:GNS Building engineering services guidance document for further guidance on airborne-contamination control principles.
6. The ventilation system must be designed such that airborne pathogens that may be present in the body-holding area and autopsy room do not contaminate the remainder of the mortuary facility.
7. No recirculation of air extracted from the clinical areas is permitted.
   Air from public areas, with the exception of viewing rooms, may be recirculated where this is in accordance with the National Building Regulations.
8. Exhaust ventilation is to be designed in such a manner that this extracts more from the areas with the highest risk of infection, while more “clean” air is to be supplied into the lower-risk areas. This is to create a pressure cascade with cleaner areas being at a relatively higher air pressure than dirty areas.
9. Supply air registers should be at a high level and the extraction registers should be at a low level. The bottom of low-level extraction grilles shall not be between 300mm and 500mm above the finished floor level of the room from which the extraction is taken. Low-level air-register positions shall consider locations of water points and potential splashing during washing.
10. Low-level extraction grilles shall have removable faceplates to enable easy duct cleaning.
    Air Conditioning
11. The mortuary and autopsy area must have a temperature maintained between 20˚C and 21˚C.
    Public areas must be kept at a constant temperature between 23˚C and 25˚C.
12. Air extracted from the mortuary and autopsy area may not be used for energy recovery or recirculation.

[TlsMS93]

Carlo Mattogno and Germar Rudolf have already covered all this exhaustively, including the testimony given to the Soviets by the engineers of the crematoriums. There have been exterminationists who have advocated the demolition of these structures so that only witnesses would remain.

It does not matter how technically such extermination was possible. It was technically possible because it happened.