A death camp was established in the Polish town of Belzec in 1942. This was the first of three camps under 'Aktion Reinhardt', the Nazi operation aimed at killing all Jews in the Generalgouvernement (General Government – the area administered by the German occupiers). The other two camps were Sobibor and Treblinka. Over 430,000 people were murdered in Belzec over a 10-month period, mostly Jews but also Roma. Only a few managed to escape and survive the war. The camp was dismantled in 1943. Many of the perpetrators also did not make it to the end of the war or met their end shortly afterwards. As a result, Belzec has long been an under-researched and somewhat forgotten camp.

A small number of books focusing on the history of Belzec have been published over the years. The most recent one is by the British historian, Chris Webb. Webb has published extensively on the main death camps. For instance, he was involved with ARC (Aktion Reinhardt Camps), H.E.A.R.T. (Holocaust Education and Archive Research Team), and most recently the Holocaust Historical Society. All three are extensive online projects that try to inform the public about these camps and to counteract (online) disinformation. In addition, Webb wrote several books on Auschwitz, Chelmno and the Aktion Reinhardt camps. His book on Belzec has now appeared in a second, revised edition.

As most people will probably expect, the history of Belzec is horrifying. The book will most likely evoke strong emotions in most readers. Yet the book is absolutely worth reading. Within the persecution and extermination of European Jews, Belzec occupies a unique position. More than any other death camp, it brings together various stages of the Nazi genocidal project in the 1939-1945 period.

The book opens with the history of the labour camps in the Belzec area in the spring and summer of 1940. Here, some brutal leaders like Hermann Dolp and Oskar Dirlewanger were barbarically giving form to the principle of 'Vernichtung durch Arbeit' (destruction through labour). These labour camps were closed in the autumn that same year. However, the local SS had discovered the logistical advantages of the Belzec railway junction and gained experience in raiding and deporting large groups of victims.

In August 1941, on Hitler's orders, the killing of physically and mentally disabled people (called Aktion T4) was officially stopped. This made the group of men who carried out these murders suddenly redundant. During the same period, the Einsatzgruppen were already active in the Soviet Union with the so-called 'Holocaust by bullets', the mass murder of Jews, mostly by mass shootings. SS officials were also experimenting in several places with gassing people in specially converted trucks, often referred to as gas vans. In Chelmno, there was a manor house set up to streamline the process and kill a larger number of people in a more efficient way using these gas vans.

At the same time (late 1941, early 1942), the Belzec death camp was built. Here, several people who came from Aktion T4 were put in charge. It had been decided that the Jews from the Generalgouvernement should be murdered and it was up to the Aktion T4 men, with their previous experience, to work this out. SS-Obersturmführer Christian Wirth was the central figure coming from T4 and was appointed the first commander of the Belzec camp.

Webb writes at length about the central figures. He describes Wirth as a particularly domineering and violent man. Because of his previous experiences, he experimented extensively with the killing process once he arrived in Belzec. By following this process, we gain insight into the choices he made and how the mass murder was shaped step by step under his guidance. Belzec was the first death camp with permanent gas chambers. The well-known Auschwitz was not yet the massive extermination camp it would become in the later years of the war. Belzec would thus become the blueprint from which Sobibor and Treblinka were subsequently built. The problems encountered in Belzec were gruesome lessons on how to do things in these other camps. During the ten months Belzec was in operation, some adjustments were also made, such as building new and enlarged gas chambers.

This experimental nature also meant that Belzec operated differently from the stereotypical image many people have of Auschwitz. Although there were Jews in the camp to do the heavy work for the Nazis, the selections for work were very limited. The camp was also very small and there were only a few barracks to house people. Generally, people were only deported to Belzec to be gassed. These gassings were carried out with exhaust fumes from a tank engine instead of the poisonous gas Zyklon. Furthermore, there was no purpose-built crematorium to burn the bodies, victims were buried in mass graves at first. Later, when the Belzec killing was coming to a close, bodies were exhumed and burned on open fires.

In short, the history of Belzec has been one of great consequence. And of course, its history is a lot more nuanced and complicated than this brief summary can explain.

What surprises in the book is how many witness statements Webb manages to present. Of course, some of these vary in reliability. During some of the trials, SS officers mainly wanted to minimise their own role which might have influenced their version of events. However, there are also Polish workers who were involved in the construction of the camp, railway workers who witnessed deportations and many other bystanders who testified after the war. Unfortunately, due to the very low number of survivors, there is only the testimony of Rudolf Reder that can shed light on what happened in Belzec from a survivor’s perspective. Despite these limitations, Webb demonstrates that a more extensive picture of Belzec can be constructed, especially when compared to more simplistic accounts in many other books.

Webb's humanity really comes to the forefront in this book. Even though he knows it is impossible to be complete, he tries to name as many victims as possible and give whatever information about them he has been able to find. The victims are not just terrible statistics, but real people, rudely taken away from their existence. And this is how he proceeds with the perpetrators too, these are not just statistics but as much as possible, these men are named and described. The quotes used in the book are often included in full, longer than most other authors include. As a result, Webb's book comes across as very comprehensive, at least as far as possible.

Webb has an accessible style of writing. The book is of course largely a reference work with a lot of biographical information, but where he tells the history of the camp he does so in a very readable and interesting way. In doing so, it is also abundantly clear that Webb wants to be as careful and accurate as possible. He is transparent about what is certain and what uncertainties remain, which ensures that the reader can learn a lot from his book.