The Leuchter Report Vindicated:
A Response to J.-C. Pressac’s Critique
Paul Grubach
In early 1988, American execution hardware expert Fred A. Leuchter, Jr., carried out the first-ever forensic investigation of the alleged extermination gas chambers at Auschwitz, Birkenau and Majdanek. His sensational conclusion — that these structures were never used as gas chambers to kill people — set off an international controversy that is still continuing. In a detailed report, commonly referred to simply as The Leuchter Report, the gas chamber specialist summed up the result of his investigation: /1

After a study of the available literature, examination and evaluation of the existing facilities at Auschwitz, Birkenau and Majdanek, with expert knowledge of the design criteria for gas chamber operation, an investigation of crematory technology and an inspection of modern crematories, the author finds no evidence that any of the facilities normally alleged to be execution gas chambers were ever used as such, and finds, further, that because of the design and fabrication of these facilities, they could not have been utilized for execution gas chambers.

Not surprisingly, indignant defenders of the orthodox Holocaust extermination story have tried frantically to discredit Leuchter and refute his findings. Undoubtedly the most ambitious effort to impeach The Leuchter Report on scientific and technical grounds consists of two articles by French pharmacist Jean-Claude Pressac in a book sponsored by “Nazi-hunter” Beate Klarsfeld, and grandiloquently titled Truth Prevails: Demolishing Holocaust Denial: The End of the Leuchter Report. /2 [A review of Truth Prevails, which deals with more generally with the book’s non-scientific criticisms of Leuchter, is published elsewhere in this issue of the Journal. — Editor.]
[…]
Poland’s Institute of Forensic Research (Krakow) has provided independent corroboration of Leuchter’s findings. The Institute’s investigation team found no cyanide residue in the “gas chamber” samples they took, except for one taken from the Crematorium II ruins. It measures 6 micrograms per 100 grams of material. This is equal to .06 milligrams of cyanide per kilogram of material (mg/kg). /15
This is less than the minimum amount that could be detected by the measuring instrument of the Alpha laboratory. The minimum trace level of cyanide that could be detected by Alpha was one mg/kg. /16 Anything below this amount was rightly considered inconsequential. Thus, Leuchter’s findings are consistent with those of Poland’s Institute of Forensic Research: there was no significant cyanide residue in material taken from Crematorium II’s “gas chamber.”
[…]
Conclusion
Based on spurious knowledge, inducing specious logic which leads to false conclusions, Pressac’s attacks on The Leuchter Report stem from faulty scientific and technical understanding, and thus utterly fail to demolish it. As already noted, since the publication of Truth Prevails, a study by Poland’s leading forensic institute has given strong corroboration to Leuchter’s findings, and thus to his methodology.
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