AUSCHWITZ:                         Technique and Operation                             of the Gas Chambers       Click on Thumbnail to       see original image
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We are extremely grateful to The Beate Klarsfeld Foundation for permission to present Jean-Claude Pressac’s extraordinary book AUSCHWITZ: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers on the Mazal Library web site. This is arguably the most important early book on a frightening and difficult subject. Holocaust deniers have seized on the opportunities created by the Nazi decision to destroy the crematoria in Auschwitz-Birkenau at the end of World War II. They argue that homicidal gas chambers were not employed to murder Jews and other minorities in the camp. Although some of Pressac’s work is now outdated and has been supplanted by more modern texts it is, and will remain, an important documentary source of information. This copyrighted material is presented exclusively for use by our readers to assist in their research. The material may not be copied, downloaded or placed on another web site without the express permission in writing from the Mazal Library. Special requests may be addressed to: hmazal@mazal.org Please respect these conditions. Pressac’s original effort resulted in a massive and unwieldy 564 page tome measuring 12” x 18” (30 x 45 cms). The original run was limited to 1,000 copies making it very rare and highly desirable.A copy can cost one thousand dollars or more in today’s used book market. We are honored by, and grateful to, Beate and Serge Klarsfeld of The Beate Klarsfeld Foundation, owners of the copyright, for permission to share this important resource with millions of readers on the World Wide Web. Because of the unwieldiness of Pressac’s large pages, our volunteers have reformatted each page to a more comfortable 700 pixel-wide centered format, this page being an example. The change in format has been designed to flow naturally, page by page, with all of the illustrations and charts in the original book. The original scans of the book itself may be viewed at any time by clicking on the thumbnail icon at the top of each page. These are very large files recommended only for readers with wide-band connections. We have taken certain editorial liberties with the format of the text. Pressac variously refers to publications using different formats. These include: "Title"; "Title"; Title; Title; Title; Title, etc. We have tried to standardize the references by using the MLA Style handbook. In the presentation of our electronic text these references will eventually read: Title. Similarly, Pressac employs italics and bold text to emphasize certain words or phrases. The electronic version of the book will use bold text exclusively for emphasis, reserving the italics for the cases where Pressac quotes words or texts by others. When Pressac calls for emphasis in these quoted texts, we will use bold italics. Similarly italics will be used in some cases where languages other than English are used, and [italics] when referring to key documents. Pressac often refers to images or texts that appear on different pages than the one on the screen. For ease in reading and viewing, we will hyper-link those references to the appropriate page or image. Simply clicking on that link will open a new browser window allowing the reader to view that text or image alongside the original page. This second window may be closed at any time without losing the original page. To simplify word searches using our built-in Google search engine, we have attempted to standardize spelling. For example, "Zyklon-B" is used in preference to "Zyclon-B", " Zyklon", "Zyclon", etc. throughout the text. Similarly, because the overwhelming majority of our readers reside in the United States. conventional American spelling will supplant British spelling. Like any endeavor of this magnitude we are bound to have made mistakes and/or ommissions. We beg that you report these to: hmazal@mazal.org

Table of Contents

AUSCHWITZ: Technique and operation of the gas chambers Jean-Claude Pressac c. 1989, The Beate Klarsfeld Foundation
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