The Gas Vans: A Critical Investigation - Holocaust Handbooks

266 SANTIAGO ALVAREZ, THE GAS VANS
chambers! With exhaust pipes turned into the interior, with carbon
monoxide the people had been murdered.”
First of all, a village named Dünamünde did indeed exist; this is the
German name for Daugavgriva (which has the same meaning, i.e. the
mouth of the Düna/Daugava river), which is in fact a neighborhood in
northwestern Riga. 125 Next, this testimony is contradicted by orthodox
historiography, which insists that gas vans were not used during the
clearing of the Riga ghetto (Angrick/Klein 2009, p. 334, note 3):
“The deployment of gas vans in this operation is not documented.
Latvian policemen from Victor Arajs’s auxiliary security police who
were deployed during Operation Dünamünde spoke exclusively of
shooting operations. Because a good many of them were transferred
to Minsk in spring 1942 in order to guard the arrival of Viennese
Jews at the extermination camp Maly Trostenez […], where gas
vans were used, the difference in their actions was quite apparent to
them […].”
The Chemno camp is an exception in this regard, as the alleged deployment
of gas vans there is narrowly defined in time and space. Here
the majority of witnesses claimed either two or three deployed gas vans,
although inconsistencies can be found here as well (see Mattogno
2011a).
4.2.9. Conclusion
As unsettling as these witness reports may be by there sheer number,
their discrepancies are just as unsettling, or should be for the critical
historian. Many witnesses’ descriptions are very vague, whereas others
describe trivial events which were later distorted and gave rise to ominous
rumors whose origins have to be seen in war propaganda. Other
witnesses have shaped their testimony according to what they have
learned only after the war. Karl Loewenstein is a classic example for
this. Although his testimony is very detailed (1961, p. 51), it contains
not only absurd aspects (trucks with painted windows, curtains, shutters
plus a fake chimney to make it look like a trailer home), but he actually
quotes the Becker letter (of 501-PS) in full right after his own statement,
which clearly shows where he got his fanciful fantasies from.
Again others clearly told what they were expected to tell, like the Polish
witness Falborski (see chapter 3.6.2.3.).
125 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daugavgr%C4%ABva.