Assignment 1 – The Atrocities of Zyklon B Since the Holocaust, nearly 70 years ago, the world has watched as similar catastrophes have occurred in various continents across the globe. Few, however, have been as far-reaching in their affliction, targeted in their hate or as determined in the systematic approach to crimes against humanity. The gays, roma, mentally handicapped and physically disabled were all victims of the Nazi regime, and the way in which those deemed ‘inferior’ were exterminated took an (if possible) increasingly sadistic turn with the emergence of a dangerous new chemical weapon in 1941. The new asphyxiating agent, Zyklon B, was used wholly for pest control up until this point; after which it became a tool of mass annihilation …show more content…
The containers of Zyklon B, generic name Prussic Acid, contained pellets of “hydrocyanic acid that vaporize when exposed to air (Gavin 1).” For extermination, the prisoners (predominantly at Auschwitz) crowded into sealed chambers that the Nazi guards had disguised as showers and the Zyklon pellets were poured in through vents in the ceiling. The cyanide inside of the pellets once vaporized, left blue stains on the chamber walls which still can be seen today and when the gases that were given off from the vaporization were inhaled “the vapors combined with red blood cells, depriving the human body of vital oxygen, causing unconsciousness, and then death through oxygen starvation (Gavin 1).” This new human application of Zyklon B was first discovered when Commandant Hoess used a group of 500 Russian prisoners of war as an experimental group in August of 1941. Commandant Hoess realized Zyklon B was much more effective than the carbon monoxide that was already being used at Auschwitz and there was now heightened pressure as Heinrich Himmler had instructed Hoess to begin the extermination of the Jews at Auschwitz. The success of Hoess’s experiment led to the “purchases of Zyklon B by the S.S. [to increase] tremendously,” and the dividends of the product’s producer to benefit as …show more content…
The obvious illustration was the monetary gains that were accrued. The German Corporation for Pest Control was partially owned by I.G. Farben a chemical industry conglomerate and their dividends on its “Degesh investment for the years 1942, 1943, and 1944 were double those of 1940 and 1941 (Borkin 123).” The profits were a direct reflection of the newfound ‘prosperity’ at Auschwitz, but there was another way in which Degesch was ethically invested in Zyklon B. When Zyklon B was being produced as a pesticide it contained, by German law, an odor indicator to warn humans of its toxicity. The S.S. demanded with their high quantity order Zyklon B be produced without the odor indicator. Initially, Degesch was reluctant due to the fact that the odor indicator is what held the patent on Zyklon B and thus secured their monopoly, but eventually in the end the S.S. got their way. By removing the odor indicator it implies implicit participation in dooming the Jews at Auschwitz and solidified Zyklon B’s infamous role in Nazi
85 years ago, over a 12 year period, nearly six million Jews were killed in a genocide called The Holocaust. The Holocaust was led by the Nazi Party and Adolf Hitler was their leader. The mass murders took place at concentration camps throughout Europe. The majority of concentration camps resided in Poland and Germany. Many people believe there were only a few concentration camps. “However, researchers found that the Nazis had actually established 20,000 camps between 1933 and 1945” (“How Many Camps,” n.d.). In this paper I will be discussing the largest concentration camp, Auschwitz-Birkenau.
It caused hallucinations and suffocation. Zyklon B was a highly poisonous chemical used to mass-murder people during the Holocaust, led by a man named Adolf Hitler. This chemical was produced in pellet form, and transported in airtight containers. Before it was used to take the lives of innocent jews who were too weak to work in concentration camps, Zyklon B was used as a common disinfectant and insecticide. Once Hitler’s army, the Nazis, gained control of Germany, they tried different ways to kill as many jews at once as
Zyklon B also know as gift gas, is a blue pallet produced in a crystal from. When Zyklon B is exposed to air it turns into a highly poisonous gas.To keep zyklon B pellets exposed to air, they stored them in a hermetically canisters.Nazis would ask prionserns to get undressed to take a “shower” but really they were shoved in a gas chamber. The gas chambers had fake shower heads. When the door closed, Zyklon B was released through a vent in the roof. Within 10-20 minutes all of them died due to suffocation.
One of the most famous concentration camps, Auschwitz, had some of the poorest living conditions. In Auschwitz, the prisoners lived crammed tightly in small, brick barracks. Since the prisoners simply couldn’t all fit inside these barracks, they were also forced into basements and lofts, along with hundreds of others. The tight living quarters were a main factor in the spreading of diseases and epidemics. In another concentration camp named “Birkenau”, the barracks had two styles which included both brick and wood. The brick barracks were hastily built, and were very dangerous and unsafe. Even though these brick barracks weren’t fit to hold people inside them, more than 700 prisoners were assigned to each barrack. The barracks did not have any way to heat or cool the rooms, and also lacked any sanitary facilities. The second style of barrack at the Birkenau concentration camp was another wooden barrack, except these were made to fit approximately fifty-two horses, not hundreds of prisoners. These barracks had many rodents and vermin, and had no way to prevent the damp roofs from leaking on the prisoners. Also, the foul smell and prisoner’s diarrhea made the already difficult living conditions much
Fritz Haber was a contested recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing a process using atmospheric nitrogen for ammonia synthesis, primarily due to his wartime efforts on behalf of Germany. The Haber Process was used by the Germans to make explosives during World War I after access to nitrates were cut off by Allied blockades (The Nobel Foundation, 2014). Additionally, Haber developed chemical weapons used against Allied forces. Later controversy was surely stirred by the fact that Haber developed the poisonous gas, Zyklon B, used at Auschwitz. In an ironic twist of fate, Haber was Jewish by birth (Manchester, 2002).
The economic greed was seen a handful of times during the trials. In Document A7, the mayor of Bamberg, Germany writes to his daughter the following,”...for God’s sake confess something, whether it be true or not. Invent something, for you cannot endure the torture which you will be put to… you will not escape...
By autumn 1941, the SS and police established gas vans (“USHMC, 1999”). They pumped poisonous carbon monoxide gas into small spaces, killing anything within its reach. On July 17th of 1941, Hitler told SS Chief Heinrich Himmler it was his responsibility to take care of all the security in the Soviet Reunion. One of the things Heinrich had to do was to get rid of any threats to the German rule. On July 31, 1941, the Nazi leader Hermann Goering told General Reinhard Heydrich to make the preparations for the execution.
One of the biggest examples of indifference was how the german soldiers treated the existence of Jews equally to that of pests. The Nazi’s experimented, exterminated, and tortured these “pests”. Nazi’s saw them as nothing more than a mistake in existence, dehumanizing them, acting barbaric,
The Holocaust was Adolf Hitler’s plan to exterminate the Jews of Europe during WWII. He ordered the Nazis to round up the Jews and send them to concentration camps to be exterminated. The Nazis chose gas chambers as the method of extermination. One of the gases they chose was Zyklon-B. “Zyklon B was created in California in 1880 to be used as a pesticide to exterminate insects. In 1942, Zyklon-B emerged as the preferred killing tool of the Nazis for the concentration camps” (The History Place).
Zyklon B is a terrible thing, it killed more than 1 million people. It was used by the Nazi's to kill as many people as possible. The people killed were so innocent and did nothing to desire it. Some of the things about Zyklon B is the chemical was very poisonous, the people were tricked to going into the gas chambers, and this chemical is still used today.
Even with such massive extermination the German leaders were unsatisfied and demanded a more efficient and permanent answer to the problem. The directive to exterminate all the Jews in Europe was issued on July 31, 1941. In December of that year, a law banning Jews from leaving any German territories was put into effect. Then finally, on January 20, 1942, Reinhard Heydrich came up with what was termed "the final solution to the of the Jewish question." He proposed a plan to erect six camps built for killing large numbers of people. The Germans built six such camps in the two years to follow, Belzec, Majdanek, Treblinka, Sobibor, Auschwitz, and Chelmno. Chelmno was the first of the camps to be built. It used large trucks into which they crammed as many Jews as possible who choked on the trucks own exhaust fumes. Most of the other camps had permanent gas chambers, which killed by the fumes of a stationary engine. Although Auschwitz used Zyklon B, a type of hydrogen cyanide. These venues of death were host to over 3 million Jews who lost their lives. (Wyman)
Therefore, instead of just simply providing the women with treatment, Mengele decided to gas the entire block. To add on, Josef Mengele once supervised the
Over seventy years ago, one of the deadliest wars of human history took place named World War II. In 1933, Adolf Hitler took power in Germany. Along with the Nazi Party, he viewed Jews, mentally handicapped, gypsies, and others “undesirables” as inferior to those of Aryan blood. “The Final Solution” was the name of Hitler’s plan to kill all those deemed “undesirable”. To exterminate the many “unfit”, the Nazis set up death and concentration to slaughter the many who were forced to travel there. The Schutzstaffel, also known as the SS, was “Hitler’s personal army”, and did a lot of his “dirty work” like implementing the Final Solution (Britannica Encyclopedia 2015). The SS, was an organized, loyal and deadly group of Aryan men.
World War II was one of the largest loses of human life in present day history, with an estimated of around “fifty million casualties.” This wasn’t limited to military personal, but also civilian life, which helped distinguish this war of pervious conflicts. The amount of civilian causalities was unlike anything the world has ever seen. Targeting of cities center by bombers was common but the high death toll had another sinister reason. (Kishlansky, Geary & O'Brien 650) The Nazis and Soviets had come to use concentration camps and genocide as a way to exert their control over their population and foreign lands. The camps, where the inhabitants were treated as feral animals, were forced to work as slaves in back breaking labor. The Nazis generally
For example, they sometimes would hand the prisoners a bar of soap so they would think that were actually going to take a shower. Usually in this case they were just led to the gas chambers. In these gas chambers, a form of Zyklon B was dropped in there, and once it made contact with air it changed to the gas form. After this, the bodies of the dead were taken to the crematoriums. Jewish prisoners were given the jobs of transferring the deceased bodies to the crematoriums. Every day many died. Almost one million people were killed in Auschwitz alone.