Concentration camps existed long before the Russian
revolution--there were even concentration camps operated by Imperial
Germany in its African colonies. So the German Nazis didn't need the
Soviets to teach them about concentration camps. Nor were the Soviet
camps a model for the Nazi extermination camps, the ones which are of
direct relevence to the Holocaust--indeed there was no model for such
operations. The Soviet Union certainly accounted for many crimes and the
mass starvation during the collectivization campaigns killed millions, but
this "the Commies did it first" line has been part and parcel of Holocaust
minimization campaigns in Germany and the Baltic countries
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