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Retiree, 89, Held for Trial as Auschwitz Guard
nyt ^ | June 18, 2014 | Jon Hurdle and Eric Lightblau

Posted on 06/18/2014 6:39:36 PM PDT by re_tail20

Johann Breyer, 89, shuffled unsteadily into a federal courtroom here on Wednesday morning, using a cane for support as he sunk slowly into a chair at the defense table.

The retired toolmaker from what was then Czechoslovakia, who immigrated to the United States in 1952, was thin and pale and dressed in a green jail uniform after a night spent in lockup following his arrest at his home in Philadelphia. He looked confused at times, too, but when the judge asked him if he understood why the German authorities wanted to put him on trial there, he answered simply, “Yes.”

Nothing about his demeanor suggested the long-ago secrets that the authorities in both Germany and the United States say Mr. Breyer has carried with him for 70 years. As an armed guard at the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz and a member of the notorious SS “Death’s Head” battalion, the authorities charged Wednesday that Mr. Breyer was complicit in the gassing of 216,000 Jews brought there in 1944 from Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Germany.

The Germans, seeking to have him extradited to the Wieden district to stand trial, have charged him with 158 counts of “aiding and abetting” in murder — one count for each of the 158 trainloads of Jews brought to the killing center at Auschwitz in a six-month span. Most of the so-called deportees, including many thousands of women, children and old people, were killed in gas chambers almost immediately after arriving at Auschwitz, then cremated.

Mr. Breyer acknowledged two decades ago, when first questioned by the American authorities, that he had worked as a guard at Auschwitz, but he said that he did so “involuntarily” and that he had nothing to do with the gassings....

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption
KEYWORDS: auschwitz; breyer; moralabsolutes; nazis
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To: re_tail20

There might be some confusion about Auschwitz.

Auschwitz concentration camp was a *network* of concentration and extermination camps built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany during World War II.

It consisted of Auschwitz I (the original camp), Auschwitz II–Birkenau (a combination concentration/extermination camp), Auschwitz III–Monowitz (a labor camp to staff an IG Farben factory), *and 45 satellite camps*.

Here is a map of many of the camps of Europe, to give an idea about the complexity of the Nazis schemes, though many more camps were too small to be shown on this map:

http://i.imgur.com/xuxULrd.jpg


81 posted on 06/18/2014 8:31:43 PM PDT by yefragetuwrabrumuy ("Don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative." -Obama, 09-24-11)
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To: HiTech RedNeck

There does appear to be some risk of becoming what you believe yourself to be eradicating, looking back through the centuries.


82 posted on 06/18/2014 8:34:11 PM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: yefragetuwrabrumuy

The accepted “civilized” war practice in that era and region was to be fairly humane to POWs. Hitler in his mad vindictiveness (and/or vindictive madness) wanted to PUNISH the Jews, and many other innocent people, that stood in the way of his evil rage. That ended up hampering his war efforts more than helping them. But this was about far more than mere war. It was about a hellish madness.


83 posted on 06/18/2014 8:35:09 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
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To: re_tail20

And the financiers who put the Nazis in power and planned WWII are today continuing to march the world towards new world order.

Prosecutions like this are a show for the sheeple.

And apparently a lot of the sheeple love the show.

And the sheeple have zero clue that the same people who run America today put Hitler in power.

And they have the US military guarding their opium fields in Afghanistan.

Man, are some of the sheeple dumb.


84 posted on 06/18/2014 8:35:32 PM PDT by PieterCasparzen (We have to fix things ourselves)
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To: RegulatorCountry

The devil will, if you permit, drag you down to his level.

The nonintuitive (to a worldly mind) way to push away the devil is through acts and thoughts of grace.

That’s what God really wants the world to get a clue about. That devil does not need to dominate your mind.


85 posted on 06/18/2014 8:38:52 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
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To: PieterCasparzen

This is a picture of man attempting to achieve divine justice through worldly means.

It will never work.

God will not fail to forgive anyone who is willing to accept the forgiveness, which is the bridge to returning to a right relationship with God. But, God won’t excuse people who cling to wickedness.


86 posted on 06/18/2014 8:43:23 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
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To: HiTech RedNeck
Your comment of the German people and Hitler.

The country at large did not know he was regularly blowing his top by this time.

There were propaganda films and I have seen them. The Nazi films showed fairly reasonable conditions and even had concerts within the camps. Some say that terrible things then happened, because of the war going against Germany. Of course the idea putting people into camps was a horrible thing. Of course, the propaganda war was one which was considered essential to Britain's war effort. Orwell himself was perturbed as a part of it. He salved his conscience by saying one had to do it, to defeat Hitler.

We, in England were told that all Germans supported the war and they were going to get what they deserved. Thank God, that at the end of the war, America decreed that the guilty would be punished, the innocent to be allowed human decency.

That is another story.

87 posted on 06/18/2014 8:48:56 PM PDT by Peter Libra
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To: Peter Libra

There were a lot of delusions and lies going around during that era. Hitler went in for a blend of paganism which was custom crafted to bring the demons of hell to Germany. It matters less that we “punish all the guilty people” than that we remember that the grace of God was sold out for messes of pottage, and that we ourselves do it if not as severely. Witch hunts have a way of keeping the potentially penitent from actually being so.


88 posted on 06/18/2014 9:01:55 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
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To: wideawake

According to Obama if you’re a Muslim Terrorist responsible for the blood shed of. thousands you get a pardon. The left wing media says they aren’t dangerous.
Not much outcry from Americans

3 million Vietnamese and Cambodians were murdered after the Americans left, thanks to the democrats. Yet, I do not hear anyone scream out for the holocaust that happened after 1974

Here’s a 90 yr old man and there’s nothing but blood lust for his head.

Oh, ye sheeple how you are manipulated.


89 posted on 06/18/2014 9:07:03 PM PDT by ChiMark (America no more)
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To: ChiMark

And... as far as we know... never sent one Jew to one oven and certainly is not planning to do so now. If he did send any Jews to any ovens, then sure treat him in a condign manner. But it appears he didn’t.

There is a point where a sprawling spirit of vengeance will dominate us and make us do things we wish we never had.


90 posted on 06/18/2014 9:17:05 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
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To: madison10
he was 19...the whole country was caught up in the mania....I'd say at this time, forget prosecution....

I'd like to see them go after Soros....

91 posted on 06/18/2014 9:17:50 PM PDT by cherry
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To: re_tail20

Before I get all worked up about an 89yr old Camp guard taking orders, I’m still waiting for just one frigin’ East German Communist Stasi official to be prosecuted for all the crimes that regime before the wall was torn down.

Just one....


92 posted on 06/18/2014 9:17:53 PM PDT by RedMonqey ("Gun-free zones" equal "Target-rich environment.")
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To: madison10
he was 19...the whole country was caught up in the mania....I'd say at this time, forget prosecution....

I'd like to see them go after Soros....

93 posted on 06/18/2014 9:17:55 PM PDT by cherry
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To: GrandJediMasterYoda

But they would’ve first vetted him to make sure he had a valid BC.


94 posted on 06/18/2014 9:34:25 PM PDT by 353FMG
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To: wideawake
Mr. Breyer chose to embrace evil.

Unlike an 19 year old enlistee, we have had over sixty years of exposure to the horrors of the Nazi regrime through over sixty years of radio, newspaper, magazines, television, and now , the internet.

He grew up in a totalitarian regime where ALL forms of communications were heavy censored and propagandized by sociopaths at all levels of government and any opposition was treated as agents of the enemy and dragged away in the middle of the night.

And how wise and brave were you at this age? Not pointing fingers because I know I wasn't that strong nor wise enough to stand up to a monolithic EVIL at that age.

And you can say he freely "choice evil"?

Then judge the whole nation of Germans at that time, not just an individual 19 year old....
95 posted on 06/18/2014 9:37:31 PM PDT by RedMonqey ("Gun-free zones" equal "Target-rich environment.")
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To: wideawake
Breyer made the effort to get the plum position of working there.

You may have a point here.

Instead of getting drafted and sent to the freezing Hell and certain grizzly death at the hands of the vengeful Soviet Red Army at the Eastern Front, he "choose" to be a guard at an comfortable position of guard at an "camp"

Damn, no 19 yr old kids nowadays would pick THAT option!!(sarc)
96 posted on 06/18/2014 9:49:59 PM PDT by RedMonqey ("Gun-free zones" equal "Target-rich environment.")
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To: yldstrk

The Real Odessa: How Peron Brought the Nazi War Criminals to Argentina by Uki Goni

Read it front to back, among other books. Fleeing from the Nazi’s my ass.


97 posted on 06/18/2014 9:52:32 PM PDT by llevrok (Straight. Since 1950.)
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To: Mastador1

If he is 89 now, he was born in 1925. He would have been 14 at the start of WWII and 20 at its end. He must have risen to a high command level. Nice to know the NAZI hunters got their man. It’s the most important thing that needs to be done in a world where Islam, homosexuals, and Marxists are flooding the world,


98 posted on 06/18/2014 10:33:06 PM PDT by LoneRangerMassachusetts (The meek shall not inherit the Earth)
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To: wideawake

Statute of limitations has nothing to do with it. For years Nazi camp guards have been brought to trial and there have not been any creditable witnesses. Old ladies who say “yes I remember him” to anybody put in front of them.

We sent one poor guy to Israel that could not be convicted or released. Not convicted because even the Israeli court did not believe the old witnesses. And nobody would take the man back into their country. Not even the US who’s supposed citizen he was.

Don’t talk of statute of limitations. The problem is that you cannot find anyone to convict this man. You just want him dead because he is German. He will sit waiting for a trial until he dies.


99 posted on 06/18/2014 10:46:56 PM PDT by poinq
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To: madison10

So in the same vein all of the illegals have been here for awhile so just give them amnesty, right?


100 posted on 06/18/2014 11:10:16 PM PDT by Reddy (B.O. stinks)
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