resources squandered on the haulocost

On 2015-05-24 3:55 PM, Chris Allen wrote:
".

Post by Chris Allen
Strangely, none of these programs discuss the holocaust or the resources
squandered on it when they were so desperately need else where.

Goodness only knows why they would not have devoted the time and energy
to make documentaries question the efficiency of the Holocaust. I don't
want to come across as sounding in any way that I might be supporting
the efforts to eradicate the Jews and other races, but I have to
disagree that it might have been a waste of resources. If they had
treated the Jews, Gypsies and their many other victims as well as they
treated their own kind, they would have had to use their limited
resources to feed and clothe them all. A couple days journey to ship
them to camps where they would be used as slave labour or to be murdered
would not be more taxing on the infrastructure than to keep them alive
for a an extended period of time.

I would not expect an author to invest his time to write a book trying
to justify those actions. Nor would I expect a documentary producer to
go through similar efforts to do it on film. It just isn't politically
correct to try to present the argument.

Malcom Mal Reynolds

2015-05-25 04:45:26 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
".

Post by Chris Allen
Strangely, none of these programs discuss the holocaust or the resources
squandered on it when they were so desperately need else where.

Goodness only knows why they would not have devoted the time and energy
to make documentaries question the efficiency of the Holocaust. I don't
want to come across as sounding in any way that I might be supporting
the efforts to eradicate the Jews and other races, but I have to
disagree that it might have been a waste of resources. If they had
treated the Jews, Gypsies and their many other victims as well as they
treated their own kind, they would have had to use their limited
resources to feed and clothe them all. A couple days journey to ship
them to camps where they would be used as slave labour or to be murdered
would not be more taxing on the infrastructure than to keep them alive
for a an extended period of time.
I would not expect an author to invest his time to write a book trying
to justify those actions. Nor would I expect a documentary producer to
go through similar efforts to do it on film. It just isn't politically
correct to try to present the argument.

Considering the numbers, had they not implemented the Holocaust, they
might well have added as many as 1 million men to the Heer. They might
also have added as many as 10000 doctors and even more nurses. There are
the engineers that might have made a difference, not to mention they
might have been able to allow farmers to remain on their farms to help
produce food. In short there is no telling what effect those going to
the camps might have had on the progress of the Axis war effort

Michele

2015-05-25 15:27:20 UTC

I don't

Post by Dave Smith
want to come across as sounding in any way that I might be supporting
the efforts to eradicate the Jews and other races, but I have to
disagree that it might have been a waste of resources. If they had
treated the Jews, Gypsies and their many other victims as well as they
treated their own kind, they would have had to use their limited
resources to feed and clothe them all. A couple days journey to ship
them to camps where they would be used as slave labour or to be murdered
would not be more taxing on the infrastructure than to keep them alive
for a an extended period of time.

I tend to agree with Mr. Smith. I don't know how you come to the number
of 1 million men. The most mobilized country in WWII was Britain, with
some 20% of the population, including women, being mobilized one way or
another. Germany did not mobilize women until very late in the war, and
didn't mobilize so much in general, so to get 1 million men you would
need, say, a 10-million population basis for a 10% mobilization.

The various extermination efforts of Nazi Germany probably went above
that figure - IF you consider all the foreigners. I.e., lots and lots of
people who wouldn't serve in the Heer; or, if they did, they would be
HiWis or other auxiliaries; and, if they did, would have a very
questionable actual value (see, for instance, the Poles from the Western
Poland region directly annexed to the Reich, who were eventually granted
provisional German citizenship, sent to the West in uniform, and
generally deserted at the first opportunity). If you count only actual
German victims, the population basis is below 1 million, which would
give you 100,000 men.

And once you have 100,000 men, you have to arm them, and as we know the
Germans came short on that with the troops that they actually had.

Then you have to feed that whole population, etc.

Dave Smith

2015-05-25 22:43:51 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
I would not expect an author to invest his time to write a book trying
to justify those actions. Nor would I expect a documentary producer to
go through similar efforts to do it on film. It just isn't politically
correct to try to present the argument.

I don't know where you are getting those numbers from. The question was
about the waste of limited reserves. I don't understand why Hitler and
the Nazis are so determined to rid the world of Jews and Gypsies, though
the racial intolerance of the time had a lot to do with it. They were
viewed as a drain on the system. They needed to be fed, clothed and
housed. Since the Nazis were apparently determined that they should be
exterminated, it would make sense to them to pack them into cars and
ship them off to concentration camps to become slaves or to slaughtered.
While I cannot condone their actions I can understand that they would
consider it to be less demanding on their resources to work them to
death or gas them than to use the same resources to keep them alive.

Do not expect the activities of Hitler and the Nazis to make sense to
the normal mind. This is a guy, backed by a bunch of thugs, who figured
that Germany should be be the major power in Europe, that it was
entitled to roll over its neighbours, to kill or enslave them. Hitler
made the same mistake that Germans had made in WW I when they tried to
conduct a war on two fronts.

Bear in mind that part of the Holocaust involved the use of slave
labour. Those who were fit for work were making planes, rockets, machine
guns and other war materials.

Malcom Mal Reynolds

2015-05-26 01:28:50 UTC

Frankly they spent a lot of resources transporting those to be
exterminated. they also spent a lot of resources to house them and to
bury them. The einsatzgruppen were a more sensible solution but of
course eventually these hardened thugs couldn't take it any more. For
efficiency sake, just bulldoze large holes, push the soon to be dead
into the holes and then cover over. Least waste of resources

Post by Dave Smith
Do not expect the activities of Hitler and the Nazis to make sense to
the normal mind. This is a guy, backed by a bunch of thugs, who figured
that Germany should be be the major power in Europe, that it was
entitled to roll over its neighbours, to kill or enslave them. Hitler
made the same mistake that Germans had made in WW I when they tried to
conduct a war on two fronts.
Bear in mind that part of the Holocaust involved the use of slave
labour. Those who were fit for work were making planes, rockets, machine
guns and other war materials.

I believe that you would find that slaves do not make dependable labor
for the more technical devices. Also imagine that one of those newly
non-slaves while working at the plant that makes the MG42 discovers a
way to make it X% faster or cheaper...would a slave volunteer that info

Don Phillipson

2015-05-31 19:21:23 UTC

.. . The question was about the waste of limited reserves. I don't
understand why Hitler and the Nazis are so determined to rid the world of
Jews and Gypsies, though the racial intolerance of the time had a lot to
do with it. They were viewed as a drain on the system. They needed to be
fed, clothed and housed. . . .

These comments betray ignorance of the events. The elimination
of European Jewry was a primary objective of the Nazi programme
(not a byproduct of "the racial intolerance of the time ") Jews &c.
were not "viewed as a drain on the system" but as an infectious
bacillus, i.e. an active agent of direct harm to the Aryan race and Aryan
civilization. Nazi doctrine did not accept that such populations
"needed to be fed, clothed and housed:" Policy documents
confirm reduction of the Slav population by starvation was a
conscious policy of the occupation regimes for Poland and
the Ukraine, and Jews were (temporarily) dumped into ghettos
with no plans "to be fed, clothed and housed:"

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

Dave Smith

2015-05-31 23:37:24 UTC

On 2015-05-31 3:21 PM, Don Phillipson wrote:
...

Post by Don Phillipson

I beg to differ. The suggestion was that it was a race of resources to
kill so many people when they were using precious resources to do so. No
one is questioning that the Nazis were determined to get rid of the
Jews and the Gypsies.

The alternative to feeding and clothing them was to let them starve on
the streets. I find it hard to believe that even the most fervent
supporters of the Nazis were prepared to deal with that, not even within
the ghettos. Even shooting them and burying them in mass graves was
seen as demoralizing for the people who had to do the dirty work.

If you have not seen the movie "Conspiracy" you should check it out. It
is supposed to be based on the Wannsee Conference, a meeting of the top
Nazis where the discussed the final solution.

Reduction of Slavic populations would have been different than dealing
with Jews and Gypsies from western Europe.The Slavs were back in their
homelands, out of sight and out of mind the the Germans. Their reduced
population would be seen by the German population as a change in
statistics. To see people starving and dying in the streets would have
had a greater impact on them.

I think that has a lot to do with why the extermination camps were
mostly in Poland. The transport of the victims fed the German desire
to be rid of the people they considered to be undesirables. Out of
sight, out of mind. They were not affected by the deaths of them. I
doubt that the Nazis could have managed to kill as many Jews and Gypsies
as they did if they had not been able to "transport" them to the east
for extermination.

Malcom Mal Reynolds

2015-06-01 00:12:48 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
...

Post by Don Phillipson

I beg to differ. The suggestion was that it was a race of resources to
kill so many people when they were using precious resources to do so. No
one is questioning that the Nazis were determined to get rid of the
Jews and the Gypsies.
The alternative to feeding and clothing them was to let them starve on
the streets. I find it hard to believe that even the most fervent
supporters of the Nazis were prepared to deal with that, not even within
the ghettos. Even shooting them and burying them in mass graves was
seen as demoralizing for the people who had to do the dirty work.
If you have not seen the movie "Conspiracy" you should check it out. It
is supposed to be based on the Wannsee Conference, a meeting of the top
Nazis where the discussed the final solution.
Reduction of Slavic populations would have been different than dealing
with Jews and Gypsies from western Europe.The Slavs were back in their
homelands, out of sight and out of mind the the Germans. Their reduced
population would be seen by the German population as a change in
statistics. To see people starving and dying in the streets would have
had a greater impact on them.
I think that has a lot to do with why the extermination camps were
mostly in Poland. The transport of the victims fed the German desire
to be rid of the people they considered to be undesirables. Out of
sight, out of mind. They were not affected by the deaths of them. I
doubt that the Nazis could have managed to kill as many Jews and Gypsies
as they did if they had not been able to "transport" them to the east
for extermination.

which brings up the following question: if the Nazi's had been
victorious, what would the general population have felt when they
learned exactly what had been done to the Jews and Gypsies?

Dave Smith

2015-06-01 14:40:38 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
I think that has a lot to do with why the extermination camps were
mostly in Poland. The transport of the victims fed the German desire
to be rid of the people they considered to be undesirables. Out of
sight, out of mind. They were not affected by the deaths of them. I
doubt that the Nazis could have managed to kill as many Jews and Gypsies
as they did if they had not been able to "transport" them to the east
for extermination.

which brings up the following question: if the Nazi's had been
victorious, what would the general population have felt when they
learned exactly what had been done to the Jews and Gypsies?

That's hard to say. The Nazis had done a pretty good job of
brainwashing the public into vilifying the Jews. The had started to
persecute them years before the war. They had no tolerance for their
opponents and did not take kindly to opposition. If they could organize
boycotts, stick them into ghettos and then transport them to the east, I
would suggest that public outrage would have been effectively stifled.

Consider the effect of smell. Part of their smear campaign against Jews
portrayed them as dirty and smelly. The poor people were packed into
cars. They didn't have room to sit. They were do densely packed that
some suffocated on route. There were no toilets, the had to pee and crap
where they stood. There were no showers to wash and no clean clothes.
When those trains loaded with Jews went through towns they stunk of BO
and sewage, reinforcing that stereotype. When corpses were rotting in
camps they stunk.

I doubt that they German people would have accepted that blame. They
would have distanced themselves from any role it it.

Rich Rostrom

2015-06-01 16:14:55 UTC

Post by Malcom Mal Reynolds
if the Nazi's had been
victorious, what would the general population have felt when they
learned exactly what had been done to the Jews and Gypsies?

If the Nazis had been victorious, the general population
would never learn exactly what had been done to the Jews
and Gypsies.

There would only be rumors. The facts would be suppressed.
The Jews and Gypsies would simply have disappeared. No
information about the numbers present beforehand would
be published. Any distinctive physical remains of Jewish
communities (e.g. cemeteries) would be demolished.

Approved history would mention only a few Jews who would
be portrayed as swindlers, parasites, subversives, or
degenerates.

There might be a "cover story" in which the Jewish
degenerates had all been deported to colonies in
rural/wilderness areas, where they quietly died out.
The quasi-official narrative about this would imply
(through anecdotes) that this was due to incapacity
or unwillingness to perform physical "hard work" such
as farming, endemic disease due to filthy living habits,
sex perversion and venereal disease, constant mutual
distrust and cheating, liquor and dope, inbreeding.
and general demoralization.

Note that the subjects of the USSR never learned exactly
what happened in the Great Purge or the Terror Famine.

--
The real Velvet Revolution - and the would-be hijacker.

http://originalvelvetrevolution.com

Dave Smith

2015-06-01 20:00:53 UTC

Post by Rich Rostrom

Post by Malcom Mal Reynolds
if the Nazi's had been
victorious, what would the general population have felt when they
learned exactly what had been done to the Jews and Gypsies?

There are still a lot of former Nazis and neo Nazis who will deny that
there were mass exterminations. There have been a number of incidents
where the culprits denied involvement and responsibility and tried to
blame the other side. Consider how long it took to investigate the Katyn
massacre. More recently we have seen uncovering of mass graves in the
former Yugoslavia. Then there was the genocide of the Rwandan Tutsi.
There are ethnic tensions out there that a strong enough that atrocities
can be committed and people will go out of their way to pretend they
never happened.

Don Phillipson

2015-06-09 20:05:51 UTC

Post by Don Phillipson
These comments betray ignorance of the events. The elimination
of European Jewry was a primary objective of the Nazi programme
(not a byproduct of "the racial intolerance of the time ") Jews &c.
were not "viewed as a drain on the system" but as an infectious
bacillus, i.e. an active agent of direct harm to the Aryan race and Aryan
civilization. Nazi doctrine did not accept that such populations
"needed to be fed, clothed and housed:" Policy documents
confirm reduction of the Slav population by starvation was a
conscious policy of the occupation regimes for Poland and
the Ukraine, and Jews were (temporarily) dumped into ghettos
with no plans "to be fed, clothed and housed:"

The alternative to feeding and clothing them was to let them starve on the
streets. I find it hard to believe that even the most fervent supporters
of the Nazis were prepared to deal with that, not even within the ghettos.
. . .
Reduction of Slavic populations would have been different than dealing
with Jews and Gypsies from western Europe.The Slavs were back in their
homelands, out of sight and out of mind [of] the the Germans. Their
reduced population would be seen by the German population as a change in
statistics. To see people starving and dying in the streets would have had
a greater impact on them.

The best sources seem focussed on Arthur Rosenberg, the Nazis'
house philosopher (author of The Myth of the 20th Century, 1930) who
was made Nazi government Minister for Eastern Territories after
Barbarossa. He had all sorts of rational plans for how Occupied
Ukraine ought to be managed, engaging the sympathy and
active help of local populations, e.g. abolishing Soviet collective
farms to restore peasant-owned farming etc. -- but all this was ignored
in favour of the (earlier) SS-based plans to reduce the population by
deliberate starvation, closure of advanced colleges etc., so as to produce
slave workers and nothing else (e.g. no newspapers, no intellectuals
or politicians or artists.) Although unsuccessful, Rosenberg kept
this up so long as he was Minister for Eastern Territories (two
years before the Red Army recaptured these lands.) He was
nevertheless found guilty at the Nuremburg IMT and hanged.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

Bill Shatzer

2015-06-09 23:51:57 UTC

That would be Alfred Rosenberg, not Arthur, no?

Michele

2015-06-10 14:38:21 UTC

Post by Don Phillipson
The best sources seem focussed on Arthur Rosenberg, the Nazis'
house philosopher (author of The Myth of the 20th Century, 1930) who
was made Nazi government Minister for Eastern Territories after
Barbarossa. He had all sorts of rational plans for how Occupied
Ukraine ought to be managed, engaging the sympathy and
active help of local populations, e.g. abolishing Soviet collective
farms to restore peasant-owned farming etc. -- but all this was ignored
in favour of the (earlier) SS-based plans to reduce the population by
deliberate starvation, closure of advanced colleges etc., so as to produce
slave workers and nothing else (e.g. no newspapers, no intellectuals
or politicians or artists.) Although unsuccessful, Rosenberg kept
this up so long as he was Minister for Eastern Territories (two
years before the Red Army recaptured these lands.) He was
nevertheless found guilty at the Nuremburg IMT and hanged.

Er. Suppose he had succeeded at not starving the Ukrainans and even at
his toy project of an independent (but subservient) Ukraine. What makes
you think he should not have hanged for what he had in store for the
Russians, on the other hand? He's on record saying:

"The job of feeding the German people stands this year without doubt on
top of the list of Germany's claims on the East, and here the southern
territories and the northern Caucasus will have to serve as a balance
for the feeding of the German people. We see absolutely no reason for
any obligation on our part to feed also the Russian people with the
products of that surplus. We know this is a harsh necessity, bare of any
humane feelings. It will undoubtedly be necessary to carry out a
large-scale evacuation and the Russians are doomed to live through some
very hard years" (June 20, 1941, document 1058-PS).

In other words, his position was, let's conquer the hearts and minds _of
the Ukrainans_; we will carry out mass deliberate starvation, _of the
Russians_. Even if he had succeeded at the former, he'd be, and was,
guilty as charged for the latter.

m***@netMAPSONscape.net

2015-05-26 01:07:38 UTC

Post by Malcom Mal Reynolds
Considering the numbers, had they not implemented the Holocaust, they
might well have added as many as 1 million men to the Heer. They might
also have added as many as 10000 doctors and even more nurses. There are
the engineers that might have made a difference, not to mention they
might have been able to allow farmers to remain on their farms to help
produce food. In short there is no telling what effect those going to
the camps might have had on the progress of the Axis war effort

Had they not been the sort to implement a Holocaust, they might well have
kept most of Jewish scientists in Europe (as well as some of the non-
politically acceptable non-Jews), thus depriving the US/UK of their
chance to build atomic bombs.

Mike

m***@netMAPSONscape.net

2015-05-26 00:58:57 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
disagree that it might have been a waste of resources. If they had
treated the Jews, Gypsies and their many other victims as well as they
treated their own kind, they would have had to use their limited
resources to feed and clothe them all.

Well.... certain areas under Stalin welcomed the Germans as liberators
(the Baltic States and the Ukraine come to mind.) Had the Germans put
on their smiley faces, they would have had more populations/armies
to fight more Russians (populations that would have fed and clothed
themselves.) Plenty of time to turn on your "friends" once the main
enemy is vanquished.

Mike

Michele

2015-05-26 14:42:40 UTC

Save that they needed the food of the Ukrainans to feed their Ostheer. A
smiley face serves if you aren't, at the same time, half-starving the
city dwellers. Actually treating the Ukrainans well (as opposed to just
propaganda) _and_ also having hundreds of thousands of Ukrainans in the
army means that the caloric deficit Germany and its occupied territories
always operated under cannot be tackled in any way.

Dave Smith

2015-05-26 16:55:24 UTC

Post by Michele

Post by m***@netMAPSONscape.net
Well.... certain areas under Stalin welcomed the Germans as liberators
(the Baltic States and the Ukraine come to mind.) Had the Germans put
on their smiley faces, they would have had more populations/armies
to fight more Russians (populations that would have fed and clothed
themselves.) Plenty of time to turn on your "friends" once the main
enemy is vanquished.

The Germans did not have much trouble finding local people to do their
dirty work for them, and there were lots of recruits for the German army
from the occupied territories. I once read that there were more Dutch
men fighting for the Germans in the Friekorps than there were in the
resistance.

There are some places where the people may have got a bit of a bum rap
for supporting the Germans. In some places that had been under Soviet
domination the Germans would have been seen as saviors.

The Germans were not the only ones to turn on their friends, even if it
was more of an uneasy alliance. Consider the Warsaw uprising. The
Soviets may or may not have been legitimately regrouping and rearming,
but the most definitely sat by and let the Germans deal with the Poles
who were revolting, knowing that those were the same people that would
likely oppose their occupation.

Michele

2015-05-27 14:44:10 UTC

Post by Michele

Sure. It's a matter of scale. The Ukrainans initially volunteered in the
tens and tens of thousands. The hard but plain truth is that the Germans
could not afford to recruit all the volunteers. They would not have had
enough boots, let alone rifles, let alone the artillery that the
theorietical number of infantry divisions that could be made with that
manpower would have required.
And they wanted the food for themselves, too. It's that simple. So yes,
they did employ Ukrainans in the SS, and in countless Ost units and HiWi
labor units, and they expected Ukrainan farmers to keep working in the
fields and deliver most of the harvest to them. But all of that fell
very very short of a full exploitation of the theoretically available
manpower.

Post by Dave Smith
There are some places where the people may have got a bit of a bum rap
for supporting the Germans. In some places that had been under Soviet
domination the Germans would have been seen as saviors.

Yeah, for the first couple of weeks. When you see that the saviors are
starving you, you change your mind.

Mario

2015-05-26 16:11:06 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
disagree that it might have been a waste of resources. If
they had treated the Jews, Gypsies and their many other
victims as well as they
treated their own kind, they would have had to use their
limited resources to feed and clothe them all.

Well.... certain areas under Stalin welcomed the Germans as
liberators (the Baltic States and the Ukraine come to mind.)
Had the Germans put on their smiley faces, they would have
had more populations/armies to fight more Russians
(populations that would have fed and clothed themselves.)
Plenty of time to turn on your "friends" once the main enemy
is vanquished.

Who can trust Hitler in 1941?

--
oiram

Les

2015-05-25 01:52:16 UTC

On Sunday, May 24, 2015 at 4:55:50 PM UTC-3, Chris Allen wrote:

(stuff deleted)

Post by Chris Allen
Towards the end (starting early 1944?), the Nazis ramped up the scale of
the operation & devoting enormous industrial capacity to make it more
"efficient".

Also note, when the Nazi's launched the Holocaust, they split the railway
resource allocation evenly between shipping the Jews (and Gypsies,
Communists, Gays, etc.) East, and supplying the invasion effort. In short,
they devoted about as much logistical effort into destroying undesirables
as they did to a campaign that, if it failed, would have catastrophic
results.

Post by Chris Allen
From any point of view not poisoned by Nazi groupthink, there was no

logical reason for the Holocaust at any point in the war. About the only
reason I read ("Rites of Spring," IIRC) for the Holocaust was
psychological. The argument goes that Hitler had projected all of his
flaws (ambition beyond ability, treachery, greed, etc.) on the Jews, and
that by exterminating them (along with other "life unworthy of life")
he would be exterminating his faults by proxy and thus everything would
come out better.

Granted, the old "the Nazis were simply evil thugs" argument also holds
as much water.

(stuff deleted)

There was a type of logic to the superweapons being used prematurely.
After 1943, it was apparent that Germany could not field their
conventional weapons in sufficient quantity to defend against the
Allies, let alone go back on the offensive. The superweapons at least
gave the Axis the hope (well, delusion) that they could still turn the
tide. Also, if they actually waited for their super-weapons to become
fully functional, it was likely all they would do is become impressive
trophies for the Allies.

Post by Chris Allen
Strangely, none of these programs discuss the holocaust or the resources
squandered on it when they were so desperately need else where.
Why not?

The Holocaust never made sense from its inception, so calling it a waste
of resources in 1944 is redundant.

David Wilma

2015-05-25 20:51:45 UTC

It was pointed out in his NG that the Final Solution used about one
train a day into Auschwitz, about 10,000 persons, subtracting from about
100 trains a day to supply the war in the east.

WJHopwood

2015-05-26 04:02:25 UTC

Post by David Wilma
It was pointed out in his NG that the Final Solution used about one
train a day into Auschwitz, about 10,000 persons, subtracting from about
100 trains a day to supply the war in the east.

That makes it sound like the number of trains used for the death
camps were only one percent of the trains being used for the
Nazi war effort. However there were seven death camps all of
which had a steady flow of trains arriving daily, sometimes more
than once a day.
A comprehensive article titled "The Holocaust" availale at
Wikepedia mentioned the train situation. Here is an excerpt:
"Shipments of Jews to the camps had priority on the German
railways, and continued even in the face of the increasingly dire
military situation.... Conducting a global war did not deter the
Nazis from directing resources to their killing operations.
Confounding as it must have been for military leaders, strategy
suffered as additional manpower and material allocations needed
to transport Jews took priority and train schedules were adjusted
accordingly..... Army leaders and economic managers
complained about this diversion of resources.... however, Nazi
leaders rated ideological imperatives above economic
considerations.."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust#cite_ref-249

WJH

...

David Wilma

2015-05-26 23:22:07 UTC

Post by WJHopwood
That makes it sound like the number of trains used for the death
camps were only one percent of the trains being used for the
Nazi war effort. However there were seven death camps all of
which had a steady flow of trains arriving daily, sometimes more
than once a day.
A comprehensive article titled "The Holocaust" availale at

Priority yes, but even if seven camps handled one train a day
and they never approached that level, they all operated only for
a limited period of time in '42 and '43. Auschwitz took the work
in '43 and '44 and Auschwitz still could handle about a train a day.

The waste impacting the war effort should be calculated in other ways
as has been pointed out in the destruction of useful human capital and
soldiers detailed to manage the campaign. Even the non-German
collaborators could have been better used in combat.

WJHopwood

2015-05-27 05:07:57 UTC

..... However there were seven death camps all of which had a steady
flow of trains arriving daily, sometimes more than once a day.
Priority yes, but even if seven camps handled one train a day
and they never approached that level, they all operated only for
a limited period of time in '42 and '43. Auschwitz took the work
in '43 and '44 and Auschwitz still could handle about a train a day.

Apparently Auschwitz could handle more than one train per day.
during the 1944 period and apparently did so if the following
figures at website "Gate to Hell" are correct:
"Between May 14 and July 8,1944, 437,402 Hungarian Jews
were deported to Auschwitz in 148 trains. This was probably the
largest single mass deportation during the Holocaust."

http://auschwitz.dk/Auschwitz.htm

That was 148 train arrivals during a period of 55 days which would
have been on average 3 trainloads per day. But as for the number
of people delivered to Auschwitz by those 148 trains, that could only
have accounted for an average of 3000 victims per trainload. That
seems too low to me . IIRC I've seen other sources which indicate
that the average number of victims per trainload was near double
that figure.
However, to pin down exact figures is probably next to
impossible as they varied considerably depending on which time
period was involved.. I believe we can agree, however, that there
were a lot of trains involved, that their usage did affect Nazi military
rail scheduling particularly in the waning months of the war, and
that Himmler et al were so obsessed with the ideology of
exterminating Jews that they considered it a priority ahead of the
Nazi military needs of the war.

WJH

m***@netMAPSONscape.net

2015-05-26 01:29:32 UTC

Post by Les
(stuff deleted)

Post by Chris Allen
Towards the end (starting early 1944?), the Nazis ramped up the scale of
the operation & devoting enormous industrial capacity to make it more
"efficient".

Even odder was the effort Himmler (I believe) went to to locate and hide
some of the earlier atrocities, when the Soviet forces began nearing the
areas they were committed. So they took resources away from the war
effort to commit atrocities, then took more resources in order to try to
hide them.

Mike

WJHopwood

2015-05-25 01:52:54 UTC

Post by Chris Allen
From time to time we see programmes about the holocaust.
...one particularly interesting question arises towards the end.
and (starting early 1944?), the Nazis ramped up the scale of the
operation & devoting enormous industrial capacity to make it
more "efficient".
Comment is often made the this should have severely
reduced their capacity to wage war at a time when they were
clearly not winning.

By early 1944 I don't believe the Nazi's were "ramping up" the
Holocaust. On the contrary, by then the tide of war had begun
to change and the domination of rail traffic and demand for
other resources by the Holocaust had brought heavy pressure
from the Nazi military against such interference with its needs.
Within months the death camps and the few survivors in them
were being liberated by the advancing Allies and by then the
"Final Solution" for Germany was to surrender.
Despite its evil mission, the Holocaust was not a complete
drag on the Nazi war effort. It produced a large number of slave
laborers for German war production. Some in highly critical
areas such as the production of the V-1 and V-2 rockets used
against England.

Post by Chris Allen
.... Some of these "super weapons" may have been useful, if
they had made more of them, and earlier, but it was always
"too little, too late".

Unfortunately for the people of London, they were neither too
little nor too late to cause a lot of death and destruction.

Post by Chris Allen
Strangely, none of these programs discuss the holocaust or the
resources squandered on it when they were so desperately
need else where. Why not?

My guess is because the horrors of the Holocaust itself far
outweigh anything else in connection with its existence.

WJH.

m***@netMAPSONscape.net

2015-05-26 01:30:15 UTC

Post by WJHopwood

I believe Himmler stepped in against such "interference" by the military.

Post by WJHopwood
Despite its evil mission, the Holocaust was not a complete
drag on the Nazi war effort. It produced a large number of slave
laborers for German war production. Some in highly critical
areas such as the production of the V-1 and V-2 rockets used
against England.

I don't believe slave labor was used in building the V1s. I believe it
was only the V2s. To paraphrase the wikipedia article, it may have killed
more people by being produced than by being deployed.

Post by WJHopwood

Post by Chris Allen
.... Some of these "super weapons" may have been useful, if
they had made more of them, and earlier, but it was always
"too little, too late".

Unfortunately for the people of London, they were neither too
little nor too late to cause a lot of death and destruction.

The V1 & V2 programs cost more than the Manhatten Project, to much less
effect. More than 40,000 civilians were killed by the Blitz, compared
to about 8,000 by the V weapons.

Mike

Bill Shatzer

2015-05-26 04:45:42 UTC

Post by m***@netMAPSONscape.net
I don't believe slave labor was used in building the V1s. I believe it
was only the V2s. To paraphrase the wikipedia article, it may have killed
more people by being produced than by being deployed.

There was an assembly line for the production of V-1s at the Mittelwerk
underground facilities.

The workers were concentration camp inmates and workers more or less
forcibly recruited from various occupied territories.

Dave Smith

2015-05-26 14:43:12 UTC

Post by m***@netMAPSONscape.net
The V1 & V2 programs cost more than the Manhatten Project, to much less
effect. More than 40,000 civilians were killed by the Blitz, compared
to about 8,000 by the V weapons.

Maybe you need to factor in the air crew casualties The Allies suffered
close to 160,000 airmen, the majority of which were involved in bombing
operations. There were three to four times as many casualties at the
receiving end. Compare that to 8,000 casualties without losing any
pilots or air crew. The idea of the V1 and V2 programs was more about
terror than about real damage. The British never knew when they were
going to be hit by those rockets. Meanwhile, the Allies were conducting
bombing raids day and night, weather permitting, and suffering
horrendous casualty rates.

m***@netMAPSONscape.net

2015-05-31 19:21:48 UTC

Even factoring that in, though, the actual damage to the British war machine
was, what? Nothing?

Mike

Dave Smith

2015-05-31 23:38:02 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
pilots or air crew. The idea of the V1 and V2 programs was more about
terror than about real damage. The British never knew when they were
going to be hit by those rockets. Meanwhile, the Allies were conducting
bombing raids day and night, weather permitting, and suffering
horrendous casualty rates.

Even factoring that in, though, the actual damage to the British war machine
was, what? Nothing?

I am not sure that the intention of area bombing was to damage the war
machine as much as it was to demoralize the people and get them to urge
their government to sue for peace.

Les

2015-06-01 02:30:38 UTC

On Sunday, May 31, 2015 at 8:38:03 PM UTC-3, Dave Smith wrote:

(stuff deleted)

Post by Dave Smith
I am not sure that the intention of area bombing was to damage the war
machine as much as it was to demoralize the people and get them to urge
their government to sue for peace.

According to Arthur "Bomber" Harris in his book "Bomber Offensive," he
pursued area bombing on cities in order to disrupt production at all
levels. He discounted morale effects, citing the effect as minor and
temporary.

If you get a chance to read the book, I recommend it. He had a rather
dry sense of humor (to the point where I found it hard to tell when he
was joking), but was not afraid to voice his views, no matter how
controversial. He was the only author I read who claimed the bombing
of Coventry was militarily useful.

Kenneth Young

2015-06-01 14:39:52 UTC

Post by Dave Smith
I am not sure that the intention of area bombing was to damage the
war machine as much as it was to demoralize the people and get them
to urge their government to sue for peace.

The British area bombing campaign was the result of technical
limitations and experience of the Blitz. Cherwell calculated that
dehousing had had a significant impact on British production. Coupled
with the inability of Bomber Command to hit anything smaller than a city
this led to Churchill deciding on area bombing.

m***@netMAPSONscape.net

2015-06-11 04:37:48 UTC

Even factoring that in, though, the actual damage to the British war machine
was, what? Nothing?

I am not sure that the intention of area bombing was to damage the war
machine as much as it was to demoralize the people and get them to urge
their government to sue for peace.

Or to give the German people some hope.

Either way, like most alpha products, promise but more heat than light.

Mike

Geoffrey Sinclair

2015-06-05 15:01:30 UTC