The Gas Vans: A Critical Investigation - Holocaust Handbooks

SANTIAGO ALVAREZ, THE GAS VANS 253
For my summary of witness statements I have relied on witness
statements as contained in various documents, as summarized by the
above analyzed court verdicts, and as rendered in the general literature.
Where pertinent, I will comment such claims in each subsequent subchapter.
4.2. Claimed Features of the Vehicles
4.2.1. Introduction
In his 2010 article, Byford used internal contradictions of witness
accounts as one method to show that gas van claims for the murder of
non-Jewish Serbs in Serbia during the war are false, all the more so as
they are not supported by any documents. Although a few documents
exist for the claim that gas vans had been employed in Serbia (Semlin
camp, spring 1942), Poland (Chemno) and Russia (by the Einsatzgruppen),
a critical analysis of them reveals that they make technically impossible
claims, are contradicted by other, doubtlessly authentic documents,
and have probably been forged immediately after the war. This
leaves us with the witness statements. Following Byford’s approach, I
will now list the claims made about the alleged gas vans in all the extant
material analyzed for this study, that is: both witness statements and the
forged documents, which are basically nothing else but claims by anonymous
persons. As indicated in chapter 3.7.1., this list of claims is far
from complete, as I had to rely on bits of information contained mainly
in verdicts and secondary literature, whose authors have not been interested
in shedding any light on the alleged features of these gas vans.
Kogon et al., for instance, list a large number of witness statements at
their disposal at the Zentrale Stelle, but what they tell us about them
hardly ever includes anything about the van’s features. Once critical researchers
will be able to tap into that resource, I am convinced that the
discrepancies will turn out to be even more glaring than they are already
now. But already now my lists show crass divergences between the
claimed features which are much more pronounced than in Byford’s
case. The logical conclusions to be drawn from this are obvious.
I have rendered in bold what could be considered a kind of “standard”
claim, as it is the most frequently found description in the various
court verdicts.