Given a 100% duty cycle of all the crematoria in all
the camps in German-controlled territory, what is the maximum
number of corpses it would have been possible to incinerate during the
entire period such crematoria were in operation?
44. Given a 100% duty cycle of all the crematoria in all the camps
in German-controlled territory, what is the maximum number of corpses it
would have been possible to incinerate during the entire period such
crematoria were in operation?
The IHR says:
About 430,600.
Nizkor replies:
This faulty figure is the result of several cumulative errors. Errors
in burning time per corpse and maintenance requirements are addressed in
the reply to
question 42.
The error of the number of corpses per muffle is addressed in the reply
to
question 45.
Looking at theoretical numbers can be instructive, if one remembers
that the theoretical capacity was never reached for a number of reasons.
But, if one wants to consider what the theoretical numbers could have
been, using a hypothetical 100% duty cycle and no downtime due to
maintenance, the numbers are staggering.
We needn't look at all Nazi camps; let's consider Auschwitz-Birkenau
alone. In fact, let's consider only the two largest crematory
facilities (out of five). Those two ovens alone, working at their full
estimated capacity 24 hours a day from their installation in April 1943
to their decommissioning in November 1944, could have incinerated over
1.7 million corpses.
This is simple arithmetic, based on the furnace capacity that the
Nazis themselves estimated. See a
photograph
of the document, or
Pressac,
Auschwitz: Technique and Operation, 1989, p. 247.
Note that the Nazis later began to realize that the theoretical
capacity of the ovens was too impractical, and in late 1942 reduced
their estimates from 1440 per Krema per day to 800 (see Gutman et al.,
Anatomy of the Auschwitz Death Camp, 1994, p. 212). Using that
more-accurate figure, not quite a million corpses could be incinerated,
in those 20 months, by those two Auschwitz crematoria.
This corresponds with reality, since there were other Kremas
available to incinerate corpses, and since we know that the ovens were
often overburdened by the sheer number of corpses, requiring bodies to
be burned in open pits. See
question 41.
In total, 1.1 million to 1.5 million people were killed at Auschwitz and
their bodies incinerated.
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