Death camp

A death camp (extermination camp or death factory) is a concentration camp which has been deliberately set up in order to kill those imprisoned there; such camps are not intended as punishment for criminal actions, rather, they are intended to facilitate genocide. The most famous death camps are the Nazi Vernichtungslagern, used during World War II. The term is sometimes used to describe concentration camps which opponents wish to deride, such as the Guantanamo Bay military prison. The term has also been applied to refugee camps, which have suffered a relatively high moratlity rate.

Nazi Germany

The death camps of Nazi Germany were part of the Holocaust, a systematic industrialized killing of Communists, Gypsys, Homosexuals, Jews, and other groups; as part of the so-called "Endlösung" (final solution). Approximately 12 million people were killed in the camps, about half of those individuals were Jewish.

Unlike concentration camps such as Dachau and slave labor camps, where there were horrendous death rates as a byproduct of starvation and ill treatment, the extermination camps were designed specifically for the elimination of persons through gas chambers or other means. All six German extermination camps were built in occupied Poland. Of these, Auschwitz and Chelmno were located within areas of western Poland annexed by Germany - the other four were located within the General Government area.

Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibór were constructed during Operation Reinhard. These camps, plus Chelmno were pure extermination camps, built solely to kill vast numbers of Jews within hours of arrival. No non-Jews were ever sent to any of these four camps.

Croatia

The Croat Ustaše puppet regime also operated an extermination camp at Jasenovac.