What was Auschwitz?
Auschwitz was a concentration camp that operated between 1940 and 1945. Auschwitz consisted of three main camps: Auschwitz I (the original camp), Auschwitz-Birkenau (concentration/extermination camp), and Auschwitz-Monowitz (a labour camp). Intially, Auschwitz was built to keep political Polish people captive, as they were seen as a danger to the Nazis in Poland. The first extermination to take place was in September 1941, it was the Polish people. From 1942 to 1944, trains would transport Jewish people, including women and children, to the death camp to gas them. Around 1.3 million people were sent to Auschwitz, at least 1.1 million of them died there. 150,000 Polish, 23,000 Romanians and Sinti, 15,000 Soviet POW's, 400 Jehovah's Witnesses, and tens of thousands of others were sent to their death. Those who weren't sent to the gas chamber often died of starvation, disease, execution, exhaustion, and medical experiments.
Did Nazi experimentation help with Modern science?Although the Nazi experiments were inhumane and disgusting, they may have contributed to what we know in modern medicine. Without the experimentation of high altitudes, conducted by Dr. Sigmund Rascher, we would have never known about the potential hazards of flying at high altitudes. Another example could be the sea water experiments, which was conducted by Dr. Willhelm Beiglboeck. Again, without this cruel experiment, we may have never known how deadly sea water is to the human body.
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Scratch marks of those who spent their last moments inside the gas chambers.
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