THE AUSCHWITZ CENTRAL CONSTRUCTION HEADQUARTERS LETTER

DATED 28 JUNE 1943:  AN ALTERNATIVE INTERPRETATION1


by Carlo Mattogno

Edited and Copyrighted © MCMXCIX Russ Granata
Box 2145 PVP CA 90274 USA
http://www.russgranata.com/
[email protected]


The Auschwitz Zentralbauleitung (Central Construction Headquarters) letter dated 28 June 1943 indicates a Leistung (output/capacity/performance) of the crematoria of Auschwitz-Birkenau which is technically impossible in terms of both cremation duration as well as coke consumption.

While this is not the place to delve into arguments which have been previously presented2  it must be stressed that such alleged Leistung  is about 4 times more than the true one, while fuelcoke consumption amounts to almost 3 times less than necessary.

This document had also bothered  J.C. Pressac, who offered two different interpretations:

1.0   The J.C. Pressac interpretations.
As a reference, in 1989 Pressac wrote the following:

    "On 28th June [1943], following the handover of the Krematorium III, the last one to be completed, Jährling calculated the overall throughput for the five Krematorium as 4,756 persons in 24 hours, and sent this information to SS General Kammler in explaining operations to high-ranking visitors (cf. SS Major Franke-Gricksch's report above, giving a figure of 10,000 in 24 hours), had no basis in practice, and probably has to be divided by two or three to arrive at the true figure.  The different visitor, SS, political leaders or others, were obviously unable to check the figures given by the cam SS, but accepted them as true and went away praising the Auschwitz SS for having found such splendid solution to the "Jewish question".
Then this represents a very acute observation:3
    "The throughput of Krematorium I, estimated at 340 per day, is a valid figure based on relatively long practice,4 but the figures for Krematorium II, II, IV and V are purely theoretical, especially those for IV and V which were calculated by extrapolation from the planned figures of Krematorium II and III.  The fact is that Krematorium II (and hence also III) was planned as early as 30 October 1941 to incinerate 60 corpses per hour.  Obviously the SS had to stick to this figure that they had announced:

    60 per hour x 24 hours = 1,440 corpses per day.
Any lower throughput would be bad for their promotion prospects or could even be regarded as sabotage.  As Kr II had 15 muffles and Kr IV and V each 8 muffles, the throughput each of these last was calculated as:

    (1440 x 8)/15 = 768 corpses per day,
    a purely hypothetical figure based on no practice of any sort". 5
In effect, in the "Erläuterungsbericht Zum Vorentwurf für den Neubau des Kriegsgefangenenlagers der Waffen-SS, Auschwitz O/S."(explanatory report of the preliminary draft for the new construction of the prisoner of war camp of the Waffen-SS, Auschwitz O/S) October 30, 1941, one reads:

    "Infolge des grossen Belages (125.000 Gefangene) wird ein Krematorium errichtet.  Es enthält 5 Stück Muffelöfen mit je 3 Muffeln für 2 Mann, sodass in einer Stunde 60 Mann eingeäschert werden können",6
    (As a result of the sizeable occupants (125,000 prisoners), a Crematorium is being constructed. It contains  5 [crematory] muffel ovens each [oven] with 3 muffles for 2 men, so that in one hour 60 men could be cremated).
which would amount to cremating  2 adult corpses per muffle per half  hour!

This exchange of correspondence cannot be purely coincidental and there is no doubt that on this point Pressac was correct; but this relates to purely formal correspondence, because the Leistung referred to in this document - [cremating]  2 corpses in one muffle in 30 minutes - had to do with a different project, though illusory, by Kurt Prüfer.  In the month of October of 1941, the Topf 3 muffled-oven  was still a project in its building phase, in which the only stable principle was the assembling of three interconnected muffles.  The reference  appearing in the Erläuterungsbericht of 30 October 1941 corresponded to a different project from the one already completed, as different as the one relating to the "Kostenanschlag auf Lieferung von 2 Stück Dreimuffel-Einäscherungs-Öfen" (cost estimate re delivery of 2 three-muffled crematory ovens) of 12 February 1942,7  where the 3-muffled oven had been fitted with only one gazogene  located with the central muffle.

On the contrary, the ovens which were actually built, were projected to cremate one single corpse per muffle8  per hour. 9
In 1993 Pressac went back to this argument when he affirmed:

    "Diese offiziellen Zahlen sind eine interne Propagandalüge, und dennoch sind die verläßlich. Ihre offensichtliche Gültigkeit beruht auf der Tatsache, dass eine Einäscherung von zwei Kindern von je 10 kg und einer Frau von 50 kg ebenso lang dauert, wie die eines Mannes von 70 kg, was einen Multiplikations-Köeffizienten von 1 bis 3 ergibt, so daß letztlich alle Angaben bezüglich der Einäscherungsleistung der Krematorium vom Zufall abhängig sind".10 (These official figures are an internal propaganda lie, and never the less they are reliable.  Their public validity derives from  the fact that a cremation of two children each of 10 kg and a woman of 50 kg lasts as long as a [cremation] of one 70 kg man, which results in a multiplication coefficient from 1 to 3, so that finally all reports regarding the cremation output of the crematorium depends upon coincidence.)  
This argumentation is nothing but a simple excuse to avoid the problem.  The introduction of women and children corpses into the Leistung is not only  not born out by the subject letter, but is in open contradiction to what Pressac precisely wrote  in 1989: since the Leistung of the four crematoria of Birkenau could not come from the Erläuterungsbericht mentioned above, and since that document indicates a Leistung of 2 adult male corpses per muffle per half hour, what is the idea of then introducing corpses of women and children  into the calculation? That crematorium was destined for Soviet prisoners of war and it does not make sense to me that the Soviets would send women and children to the Front.

Other than historically, the explanation offered by Pressac is unfounded also technically, because the Leistung of the crematoria at Birkenau corresponds to the cremation of 4 corpses per hour; even if we accept the Pressac data (one man 70 kgs, one woman of 50 kgs and two children of 10 kgs each), the above-mentioned Leistung would be impossible, while the cremation of such a load in one muffle, equivalent to two corpses of 70 kgs, would have required double time (120 minutes),11  but this, for the crematoria of Birkenau, corresponds exactly to the capacity of the Leistung indicated in the letter.

The problem thus remains unsolved.

2.0   The interpretation of the article « "Schlüsseldokument" ist Fälschung » 
(Key Document is a Forgery) (VffG, Heft 3, September 1998, pp. 166-174).

Ingenieur M. Gerner, in the article referred to above, has tried to solve the problem by adducing an interpretation which in my judgment cannot be separated from the general formulation because it starts with the assumption that the 28 June 1943 letter is a "Fälschung" (fake), though eventually, as shall be explained shortly, it cannot be anything else but a Verfälschung" (a fraudently altering) of an original document.  From the viewpoint of  methodology, the presentation in photocopy of documents A-E (pp. 166-168) may have its own justification in History, but not in Criticism, because the only version of the document worth criticizing is the photocopy of the original, i.e. version B-D. I refer to "version" (singular) because documents B and D are two photocopies of the very same document.

Version A is not actually a "Fälschung" as the author believes (p. 168), but a very normal archive "Abschrift" (copy) of a photocopy of the original document made by Archivist Cossens, who certified at the bottom of the copy, the conformity of the transcription with the original ("Für die Richtigkeit der Abschrift") (for the correctness of the copy).  The Archivist has believed that the handwritten name appearing on the left [side] under "Verteiler" (distributor) - Jährling - was that of the author of the letter, thus wrote it down on the right [side] attributing him at the same time the title of SS-Sturmbannführer, a title that correctly belonged to Bischoff.

The archive number of my copy of this document is:
StA Durnburg, ND 4586.

Version C is a simple transcription of the document shown in a book and is not herein referenced.

Version E is identical to version B-D, but without the page heading.
From the viewpoint of  methodological accuracy, we must therefore take into consideration only version B-D.

It is a mistake that up until now no original of the document has been noted (p. 168) : the original document is precisely the one kept in Moscow with the following reference: "502-1-314, p. 14a".
No "delo" (file/dossier) "502-1-314a" exists in the Zentralbauleitung archives (the author of this text has examined them all).

The subject document is not a late one as one seems to believe (p. 166).  In Moscow,  I have seen a translation in Russian by the Soviet Commission for Investigations at Auschwitz of February 1945, but I am not in a position to indicate its exact archival reference.

The source mentioned by Pressac in the German translation of his last book, 12  "502-1-324" (p. 166) is clearly a typographical error; in the French text the source is correctly indicated as "502-1-314".13

The argumentation relating to the formal authenticity of the document as presented by the author is hindered by the above-mentioned error.  In general, how can proof of a "Fälschung" (forgery) be deduced from poorly relevant details such as the missing year in the Brieftagebuchzeile (the reference ID)  (p. 169) or the incomplete indication of the grade of Kammler (p. 171) ?  These are indications at the most of  a "Verfälschung" (fraudently altering) of an original document.  And effectively the letter contains so specific references that we cannot but presuppose the presence of an original.  This obtains from the following observations on the formal structure of the letter:

The second line shows Kirschnek who was Bauleiter of the Bauleitung der Waffen SS und Polizei Auschwitz and to whom the copy was addressed for information in his capacity.

The third line of the "Verteiler" indicates the "Registratur K.G.L. BW 30" where normally all actions relating to all the crematoria of Birkenau were registered.

Finally there follows the handwritten name "Jährling".  This is not a signature, as the author of the article believes (p. 172) because Jährling signed differently and by rule added the abbreviation "ZA Ing." (Zivilangestellter Ingenieur) to his signature.  Jährling, by profession a Heating Systems Technician, was part of the "Technische Abteilung" (technical department) of the Zentralbauleitung which took care, among other things, of all the "Heizungsanlagen" (heating installations) of the camp, including the crematoria; hence it is not surprising that a letter copy  would be addressed to him also for information.

The "inhaltliche Fehler" (content errors) mentioned by the author of the article (p. 171) are irrelevant or simply misspellings, therefore how can it be considered a "Falschmeldung" (false report) that Crematorium I had ceased operation on 19 July 1943 as the letter in question is from before that date, being dated 28 June 1943?

The fact that on 28 June 1943, Crematorium II was temporarily out of service has no importance at all regarding the finality of the letter, which refers bureaucratically to the plans, as completed Bauwerke (construction projects), independently of their operating at that particular moment.
On this question, which is more important than may at first appear,  I shall return.

Summing up, the Brieftagebuchzeile, and more so the "Verteiler" lead us to think more about a "Verfälschung" (fraudently altered) than a "Fälschung" (fake) document.
However, even this hypothesis has its weak points.  Anyway, who could have been the forger?  That document certainly existed already in February 1945, but it is difficult to attribute it to the Soviet Commission of Investigation, because this is too contrasting with the data brought out by the Soviet specialists who investigated a Leistung of 300 to 350 corpses per day for Crematorium I; of 3,000 per day for each one of Crematoria II and III,  and of 1,500 for each of Crematoria IV and V.  If the forger had been a member of that Commission, it seems reasonable to think that he would have introduced this data in his forgery.

The forger may also have been a prisoner employed in the offices of the Zentralbauleitung, who could have been able to carry out the forgery between the time of the escape of the SS and the arrival of the Soviets; this forger would have had the necessary knowledge  to create a "Fälschung", but considering the tendency of the prisoners to show hyperbolic exaggeration, in this case, the forgery would certainly contain a much higher Leistung.

3.0   An alternate interpretation:

It is therefore possible that the document is authentic.  With that hypothesis, it seems to me important to recall attention to the Pressac observation which was  mentioned at the beginning: that the Leistung indicated in the subject document has an obvious mathematical relation to the ratio stated in the "Erläuterungsbericht zum Vorentwurf für den Neubau des Kriegsgefangenenlagers der Waffen-SS, Auschwitz O/S." of 30 October 1941.

As an alternative to the forgery hypothesis, there still exists another explanation which was already advanced by Pressac which I favor - but in a wider perspective.  In the 28 June 1943 letter there are various anomalies that M. Gerner has not noted.  The most important one has to do with the presence of a fact that should not be there and the absence of another fact that should be present.  Let me explain:  That "Fertigstellung" from a BW was an official communication to the SS-WVHA replying to a specific Kammler order of 06 April 1943 requiring

    "Zur Beurteilung der Tätigkeit der Baudienststellen und zur Überwachung der befohlenen Baufristen ist es unbedingt erforderlich, dass sämtliche nachgeordneten Dienststellen die Fertigstellung eines Bauwerkes oder Bauvorhabens umgehend melden.
    Ich ordne daher folgendes an:
      1) Nach Fertigstellung eines Bauwerks bzw. nach Inbetriebnahme desselben ist mit der hausverwaltenden Dienstelle eine Übergabeverhandlung zu tätigen.  Das Ergebnis dieser Verhandlung ist in einer Niederschrift festzuhalten. [...]". 17
    (In order to evaluate the work of the building headquarters and to supervise the required construction dead-line, it is absolutely necessary that all subsequent departments report immediately the completion of a construction project or a construction plan.  I am therefore giving the following order:
      1) After the completion of a construction project, or after the start of its operation, a transfer proceeding  must occur with the local  department .  A written record of these proceedings must be filed.)

What the directives of Kammler required was the communication of the "Fertigstellung" of a BW and the indication of the relative Übergabeverhandlung (transfer proceedings), as appears in the referred document.  For that reason, the mentioned "Aufstellung der bereits übergebenen Bauwerke an die Standortverwaltung" (the list of the already transferred construction projects to the local administration), written according to the directives of Kammler, contains among other things, the reference number of the Brieftagebuch of the letter with which the Übergabeverhandlung of a BW was transmitted to the "Kommandantur des K.L. Auschwitz", the date of the Übergabe and the Brieftagebuch of the "Meldung an Amstgruppenchef C".

Now, if the Crematorim III Übergabeverhandlung was written on 24 June 194318  and transmitted to the Kommandantur that same day19  and if the Standortverwaltung had officially taken Crematorium III in consignment on 25 June,20  in that letter of 28 June there is no reference to that fact  -  and that is the fact absent that should be present.

The announcement of the "Fertigstellung" was a purely formal act relating precisely to the Fertigstellung of a BW, not to its technical particulars, and therefore in the 28 June 1943 letter, the indication of Crematoria Leistung (capacity) is bureaucratically senseless -  and that is what is present that should be absent.

The indication of Crematoria Leistung shows in turn two other anomalies:  Above all, the use of the term "Personen" (persons).  This label appears rather strange to me: in such a context, I would expect the term "Leichen" (corpses)  or at least "Häftlinge" (inmates/prisoners).
Then,  the operational time period in which Leistung is presented:  ("bei einer 24 stündiger Arbeitszeit") (within  a 24-hour work period)  is simply technically senseless because of the fact that crematory oven activity required a daily stop of a couple of hours for the cleaning of the oven grills and the removal of coke ashes.  This does not mean that a cremation activity could not have been possible for 24 hours or more, only that after some 20 hours of activity, crematory oven efficiency would have progressively worsened until it would have totally stopped!

But in this referenced letter as it thus stands written, Leistung does not refer to one single day but rather to a continuous working of 24 hours per day, every day, and this is simply technically impossible. Moreover the Aktenvermerk (memo) written by Jährling on 17 March 1943 concerning coke consumption of the Birkenau Crematoria, considers a "Tagesbetrieb" (work-day) of 12 hours.21

Another interesting fact deserving attention is that the subject letter is a unique document without any relation to the others: there is no other document mentioning or making reference to the Leistung of the Crematoria, as stated herein.  The thing is much more strange since  it concerns an official document directed to Amstgruppenchef  C of the SS-WVHA,  SS-Brigadeführer and Generalmajor of the Waffen-SS Kammler.   Amt C/III was concerned with "Technische Fachgebiete" (technical subject areas)  and was subdivided into four subsections, among which were  the "Hauptabteilung C/III/1 Ingenieurbau" and the "Hauptabteilung C/II/3 Maschinenbau und Elekrotechnik" (main sectors engineering, mechanical, and elecro-technic), that included also an "Abteilung III/3a Heizung und Lüftung" (heating and ventilation sector). 22

Now since the Leistung indicated in the Bischoff  letter is technically impossible, how can we believe that the engineers of Amt C/III, observing this false information, did not require an explanation from Bischoff?  On his own, Bischoff would have answered,  and based upon the question,  a whole correspondence would have resulted of which there is not a trace.  Similarly, Järhling, who three months earlier had drawn the previously cited Aktenvermerk concerning the Birkenau crematoria coke consumption based upon information from Topf23  and therefore knew the capacity of the cremation ovens,  he [Jährling] could not have failed to react, in view of the figures given in that letter,  and then not  leave a written trace of his perplexity.

The most obvious conclusion we come to from the observations given above, is that the author of this letter did not have much familiarity with the technicalities of crematoria Leistung,  and still less with the bureaucratic procedures which were in force, and that presumably it was a person coming from a Sachgebiet (specialty field) other than the Zentralbauleitung, and still inexperienced in the bureaucratic procedures of his new job,  perhaps  typically SS-Sturmmann Nestripke.  The author of the letter would then have added on his own initiative to the communication of the Fertigstellung the non-requested information concerning crematoria Leistung, based upon the Erläuterungsbericht of 30 October 1941, because -  as revealed by Pressac - the Leistung of the ovens had to correspond bureaucratically to that indicated in this document.24  It would therefore not be a matter of intentional "exaggeration" to brag about the performance of the assumed extermination machinery at Auschwitz, but only of a simple question of bureaucratic coherence.

A last point remains to be examined: the 28 June 1943 letter was sent to the SS-WVHA?  As I have stated above, this would have involved an exchange of letters of which there is no trace in the archives of the Zentralbauleitung, just as there are none in the minutes of the Pohl Trial.  The fact that the letter lacks a signature may signify that Bischoff, aware of the double error it contained, did not retain it as valid and had it rewritten in the prescribed form with indication of the Übergabeverhandlung but without the crematoria Leistung.  There are other cases of canceled documents which were re-written correctly within the self-same Brieftagebuchzeile (reference identification), for example the Aktenvermerk of 13 September 1943 of which there is a version full of mistakes corrected in long hand 25 without signature and a correct dactylographic transcription with the signatures of Kirschnek and Bischoff.26

The fact that the copy of the correct version of the 28 June 1943 letter does not exist in the Zentralbauleitung archives could obviously depend upon the selection of documents made by the Soviets.

I conclude with one last observation.  Above I mentioned the double mistake of the 28 June 1943 letter that could not have escaped Bischoff's attention.  The first one is the very presence of Leistung within a document in which Leistung should not have appeared, and this is a true fact.  The second mistake is the [rate of] Leistung itself which that letter attributes to the crematoria which is in clashing contrast with a document of the Zentralbauleitung signed by Bischoff almost a year before.

On 15 June 1942, the Bauleitung of the Stutthof Concentration Camp sent to the Zentralbauleitung of Auschwitz a request for information about the construction of a crematorium.  On 10 July, Bischoff responded by sending "die Pläne für ein Krematorium für 30.000 Häftlinge [...] mit 5 Stück Dreimuffel-Verbrennungsöfen" (the plans for a crematorium for 30,000 inmates [...] with 5 three-muffled crematory-ovens)  in other words, the future Crematorium II.  It is then easy to note that Bischoff could not sensibly give out for 30,000 prisoners, a plan for a theoretical Leistung of 1,440 corpses in 24 hours, because then, theoretically, it could have cremated (1,440 x 30=) 43,200 corpses per month, which would have translated into a mortality rate of an impossible 144% per month! 27

Therefore, Bischoff was well aware of the falsehood of the information relating to crematoria Leistung contained in the 28 June 1943 letter, and this proves his total innocence in this.

Unless one wants to maintain as in the 1989 Pressac version, that they had intentionally lied to brag about a non-existent efficiency of a presumed extermination machine, but this hypothesis is untenable for various motives.  In the first place, this explanation could make sense if the letter in question had been addressed to RSHA (Reich Main Security Office), the institution allegedly directly responsible for the alleged Hebrew extermination; but why would Bischoff have had to exhibit himself in a show so gross and absurd in front of the boss of Amtsgruppe C of the SS-WVHA (Economic-Administrative Main Office) that cared so much for "Bauwesen" (construction matters)? And how could Bischoff have hoped the engineers and technicians of Amt C/III would not notice that the Leistung quoted in that letter was false?

Secondly, there is still the formal anomaly indicated above: why would Bischoff have drawn a bureaucratically senseless communication indicating non-requested data and omitting requested data? Since this had nothing to do with the request of the Fertigstellung, we must suppose that he had received an explicit request to that effect from Kammler, but then, according to procedure, he would have answered with a specific letter, mentioning in the "Bezug" (in reference to) of the heading, the Brieftagebuchzeile and the date of the Kammler letter.

Thirdly, why did not Bischoff sign that letter? According to procedure, Bischoff regularly signed with an abbreviation the carbon copies of the documents drawn by himself or in his name.

Naturally, this interpretation is also an hypothesis, but it does raise serious problems which students of the history of the Concentration Camp Auschwitz, beginning with J.C. Pressac, cannot underestimate.



Abbreviations:
APMO: Archiwum Panstwowego Muzeum w Oswiecimiu, Oswiecim.
TCIDK: Tsentr Chranenija Istoriko-dokumental'nich Kollektsii, Moscow.
WAPL: Wojewódzkie Archiwum Panstowowe w Lublinie, Lublin.




NOTES


  1. For a general background of the problems treated in this article, I refer to my study The "Zentralbauleitung der Waffen-SS und Polizei Auschwitz", Edizioni di Ar, 1998.  On the other hand I present some preview of my work, The Auschwitz Crematoria: An Historical-Technical Study.

  2. C. Mattogno and F. Deana, Die Krematoriumsöfen von Auschwitz-Birkenau, in: E. Gauss, Grundlagen Zur Zeitgeschichte.  Grabert Verlag, Tübingen, 1994, pp. 281-320.

  3. J.C. Pressac, Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers.  The Beate Klarsfeld Foundation, New York, 1989, p. 244.

  4. This affirmation is totally unfounded: the 3 Topf two-muffled ovens of Crematorium I, though they would have had a similar Leistung as the Topf two-muffled oven of Gusen, would have had a maximum theoretical Leistung of 216 corpses in 24 hours.  This hypothesis is unreal because the exceptional Leistung of the Gusen oven (theoretically 72 corpses in 24 hours) depended upon the special formation of the Schamotterost (fire-brick grate) and presence of the Saugzuganlage (intake installation).

  5. See note 3.

  6. TCIDK, 502-1-233, p. 20.

  7. APMO, BW 30/34, pp. 27-32.

  8. The Betriebsvorschrift des koksbeheizten Topf-Driemuffel-Einäscherungsofen prescribed to introduce the corpses in the muffles "hintereinander" and "nach einander", not two at a time. Photocopy of the document in J.C. Pressac, Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers, p. 222.

  9. See note 2.

  10. J.C. Pressac, Die Krematorien von Auschwitz.  Die Technik des Massenmordes.  Piper Verlag, München, 1994, p. 103.

  11. In the animal crematory ovens of the cited H. Kori, in which, depending on the model, from 250 to 900 kgs of organic animal substance was reduced (complete carcasses or partly), in optimal condition, the duration of the cremation required from 54 to 43 seconds per 1 kg of organic substance; the consumption of fossil carbon varied from 0,328 to 0,268 kg.  These data are directly relative to the load of the oven; for example in the smaller model, the cremation of 250 kgs of organic substance (equivalent to 4 corpses of 62.5 kgs of organic substance (equivalent to 4 corpses of 62. Kgs each) required about 3 hours and 45 minutes, equivalent to about 56 minutes for each corpse.

  12. J.C. Pressac, Die Krematorien von Auschwitz: Die Technik des Massenmordes.  Randnummer 252a p. 142.

  13. J.C. Pressac, Les cr�matoires dAuschwitz. La machinerie du meurte de masse.  CNRS Editions, Paris 1993, note 252,  p.107.

  14. APMO, 30/25, p. 14. Brieftagebuchzeile and "31550/43/Ja/We".  The abbreviation "We" could be a transcription error.

  15. That is from  other offices of Zentralbauleitung.

  16. TCIDK, 502-1-229, p. 11.

  17. Letter of Kammler "an sämtliche Bauinspektionen und Bauinspektionen und Baugruppen" of 06 April 1943.  WAPL, Zentralbauleitung, 54, p. 68.

  18. TCIDK, 502-2-54, p. 84.

  19. The accompanying letter by Bischoff shows erroneously the date of 23 June 1943.  TCIDK, 502-2-54, p. 21.

  20. See note 14.

  21. Aktenvermerk of Jährling dated 17 March 1943.  APMO, BW 30/7/34, p. 54.  This document contains the autograph signature of Jährling.

  22. TCIDK, 502-1-4, p. 28.

  23. See note 21.

  24. Moreover, the Leistung attributed to Crematorium I has no relation to the above-mentioned document, nor with reality and it is quite difficult to say where it comes from.

  25. APMO, BW 30/25, pp. 11-12.

  26. TCIDK, 502-1-26, pp. 144-146.

  27. A photocopy of this document with its related discussion is published in the study entitled,
    I forni crematori di Auschwitz. Studio storico-tecnico.