Different Views on the Holocaust

(Mark Weber)

Nearly everyone has heard that the Germans killed some six million Jews in
Europe during the Second World War. American television, motion pictures,
newspapers and magazines hammer away on this theme. In Washington, DC, an
enormous official Holocaust Museum has been built.

Scholars Challenge Holocaust Story

During the past decade, though, more and more "revisionist" historians,
including respected scholars such as Dr. Arthur Butz of Northwestern University,
Prof. Robert Faurisson of the University of Lyon in France and best-selling
British historian David Irving, have been challenging the widely-accepted
extermination story.

They do not dispute the fact that large numbers of
Jews were deported to concentration camps and ghettos, or that many Jews died or
were killed during the Second World War. Revisionist scholars have, however,
presented considerable evidence to show that there was no German program to
exterminate Europe's Jews, that numerous claims of mass killings in "gas
chambers" are false, and that the estimate of six million Jewish wartime dead is
an irresponsible exaggeration.

Many Holocaust Claims Abandoned

Revisionists point out that the Holocaust story has changed quite a lot over
the years. Many extermination claims that were once widely accepted have been
quietly dropped in recent years.

At one time it was alleged that the
Germans gassed Jews at Dachau, Buchenwald and other concentration camps in
Germany proper. That part of the extermination story proved so untenable that it
was abandoned more than 20 years ago.

No serious historian now supports
the once supposedly proven story of "extermination camps" in the territory of
the old German Reich. Even famed "Nazi hunter" Simon Wiesenthal has acknowledged
that "there were no extermination camps on German soil." (note 1)

Prominent Holocaust historians now claim that masses of Jews were gassed
at just six camps in what is now Poland: Auschwitz, Majdanek, Treblinka,
Sobibor, Chelmno and Belzec. However, the "evidence" presented for "gassings" at
these six camps is not qualitatively different than the "evidence" for alleged
"gassings" at the camps in Germany proper.

At the great Nuremberg trial
of 1945-1946 and during the decades following the end of the Second World War,
Auschwitz (especially Auschwitz-Birkenau) and Majdanek (Lublin) were generally
regarded as the most important "death camps." For example, the Allies alleged at
Nuremberg that the Germans killed four million at Auschwitz and another 1.5
million at Majdanek. Today, no reputable historian accepts these fantastic
figures.

In addition, more and more striking evidence has been presented
in recent years that simply cannot be reconciled with the allegations of mass
exterminations at these camps. For example, detailed aerial reconnaissance
photographs taken of Auschwitz-Birkenau on several random days in 1944 (during
the height of the alleged extermination period there) were made public by the
CIA in 1979. They show no trace of the piles of corpses, smoking chimneys and
masses of Jews awaiting death, all of which have been alleged and would have
been clearly visible if Auschwitz had indeed been an extermination center.

We now also know that the postwar "confession" of Auschwitz commandant
Rudolf Hoess, which is a crucial part of the Holocaust extermination story, is a
false statement that was obtained by torture. (note 2)

Other Absurd Holocaust Claims

At one time it was also seriously claimed that the Germans exterminated Jews
with electricity and steam, and that they manufactured soap from Jewish corpses.
For example, at Nuremberg the United States charged that the Germans killed Jews
at Treblinka, not in gas chambers, as is now claimed, but by steaming them to
death in "steam chambers." (note 3)

Such bizarre stories have also been
quietly abandoned in recent years.

Disease Claimed Many Inmates

The Holocaust extermination story is superficially plausible. Everyone has
seen the horrific photos of dead and dying inmates taken at Bergen-Belsen,
Nordhausen and other concentration camps when they were liberated by British and
American forces in the final weeks of the war in Europe. These unfortunate
people were victims, not of an extermination program, but of disease and
malnutrition brought on by the complete collapse of Germany in the final months
of the war. Indeed, if there had been an extermination program, the Jews found
by Allied forces at the end of the war would have long since been killed.

In the face of the advancing Soviet forces, large numbers of Jews were
evacuated during the final months of the war from eastern camps and ghettos to
the remaining camps in western Germany. These camps quickly became terribly
overcrowded, which severely hampered efforts to prevent the spread of epidemics.
Furthermore, the breakdown of the German transportation system made it
impossible to supply adequate food and medicine to the camps.

Captured German Documents

At the end of the Second World War, the Allies confiscated a tremendous
quantity of German documents dealing with Germany's wartime Jewish policy, which
was sometimes officially referred to as the "final solution." But not a single
German document has ever been found which even refers to an extermination
program. To the contrary, the documents clearly show that the German "final
solution" policy was one of emigration and deportation, not extermination.

Consider, for example, the confidential German Foreign Office memorandum
of August 21, 1942. (note 4) "The present war gives Germany the opportunity and
also the duty of solving the Jewish problem in Europe," the memorandum notes.
The policy "to promote the evacuation of the Jews [from Europe] in closest
cooperation with the agencies of the Reichsfuehrer SS [Himmler] is still in
force." The memo noted that "the number of Jews deported in this way to the East
did not suffice to cover the labor needs."

The document quotes German
Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop as saying that "at the end of this war, all Jews
would have to leave Europe. This was an unalterable decision of the Fuehrer
[Hitler] and also the only way to master this problem, as only a global and
comprehensive solution could be applied and individual measures would not help
very much."

The memorandum concludes by stating that the "deportations
[of Jews to the East] are a further step on the way of the total solution ...
The deportation to the [Polish] General Government is a temporary measure. The
Jews will be moved on further to the occupied [Soviet] eastern territories as
soon as the technical conditions for it are given."

This unambiguous
document, and others like it, are routinely suppressed or ignored by those who
uphold the Holocaust extermination story.

Unreliable Testimony

Holocaust historians rely heavily on so-called "survivor testimony" to
support the extermination story. But such "evidence" is notoriously unreliable.
As one Jewish historian has pointed out, "most of the memoirs and reports [of
"Holocaust survivors"] are full of preposterous verbosity, graphomanic
exaggeration, dramatic effects, overestimated self-inflation, dilettante
philosophizing, would-be lyricism, unchecked rumors, bias, partisan attacks and
apologies." (note 5)

Hitler and the 'Final Solution'

There is no documentary evidence that Adolf Hitler ever gave an order to
exterminate the Jews, or that he knew of any extermination program. Instead, the
record shows that the German leader wanted the Jews to leave Europe, by
emigration if possible and by deportation if necessary.

A document found
after the war in the files of the Reich Ministry of Justice records his thinking
on the Jews. In the spring of 1942, State Secretary Schlegelberger noted in a
memorandum that Hitler's Chief of Chancellery, Dr. Hans Lammers, had informed
him: "The Führer has repeatedly declared to him [Lammers] that he wants to see
the solution of the Jewish problem postponed until after the war is over." (note
6)

And on July 24, 1942, Hitler emphasized his determination to remove
all Jews from Europe after the war: "The Jews are interested in Europe for
economic reasons, but Europe must reject them, if only out of self-interest,
because the Jews are racially tougher. After this war is over, I will rigorously
hold to the view ... that the Jews will have to leave and emigrate to Madagascar
or some other Jewish national state." (note 7)

Himmler's SS and the Camps

Jews were an important part of Germany's wartime labor force, and it was in
Germany's interest to keep them alive.

The head of the SS camp
administration office sent a directive dated Dec. 28, 1942, to every
concentration camp, including Auschwitz. It sharply criticized the high death
rate of inmates due to disease, and ordered that "camp physicians must use all
means at their disposal to significantly reduce the death rate in the various
camps." Furthermore, it ordered: "The camp doctors must supervise more often
than in the past the nutrition of the prisoners and, in cooperation with the
administration, submit improvement recommendations to the camp commandants ...
The camp doctors are to see to it that the working conditions at the various
labor places are improved as much as possible."

Finally, the directive
stressed that "The Reichsführer SS [Himmler] has ordered that the death rate
absolutely must be reduced." (note 8)

The head of the SS department that
supervised the concentration camps, Richard Gluecks, sent a circular letter to
each camp commandant dated January 20, 1943. In it he ordered: "As I have
already pointed out, every means must be used to lower the death rate in the
camp." (note 9)

Six Million?

There is no real evidence for the incessantly repeated claim that the Germans
exterminated six million Jews. It is clear, though, that millions of Jews
"survived" German rule during the Second World War, including many who were
interned in Auschwitz and other so-called "extermination camps." This fact alone
should raise serious doubts about the extermination story.

A leading
newspaper of neutral Switzerland, the daily Baseler Nachrichten,
carefully estimated in June 1946 that no more than 1.5 million European Jews
could have perished under German rule during the war. (note 10)

One-Sided 'Holocaustomania'

Even after more than 40 years, the stream of Holocaust films and books shows
no sign of diminishing.

This relentless media campaign, which Jewish
historian Alfred Lilienthal calls "Holocaustomania," portrays the fate of the
Jews during the Second World War as the central event of history. There is no
end to the heavy-handed motion pictures, the simplistic television specials, the
vindictive hunt for "Nazi war criminals," the one-sided "educational courses,"
and the self-righteous appearances by politicians and celebrities at Holocaust
"memorial services."

Britain's chief rabbi, Immanuel Jakobovits, has
accurately described the Holocaust campaign as "an entire industry, with
handsome profits for writers, researchers, film-makers, monument builders,
muse-um planners and even politicians." He added that some rabbis and
theologians are "partners in this big business." (note 11)

Non-Jewish
victims just don't merit the same concern. For example, there are no American
memorials, "study centers," or annual observances for Stalin's victims, who
vastly outnumber Hitler's.

Who Benefits?

The perpetual Holocaust media blitz is routinely used to justify enormous
American support for Israel and to excuse otherwise inexcusable Israeli
policies, even when they conflict with American interests.

The
sophisticated and well-financed Holocaust media campaign is crucially important
to the interests of Israel, which owes its existence to massive annual subsidies
from American taxpayers. As Prof. W.D. Rubinstein of Australia has candidly
acknowledged: "If the Holocaust can be shown to be a `Zionist myth,' the
strongest of all weapons in Israel's propaganda armory collapses." (note 12)

Jewish history teacher Paula Hyman of Columbia University has observed:
"With regard to Israel, the Holocaust may be used to forestall political
criticism and suppress debate; it reinforces the sense of Jews as an eternally
beleaguered people who can rely for their defense only upon themselves. The
invocation of the suffering endured by the Jews under the Nazis often takes the
place of rational argument, and is expected to convince doubters of the
legitimacy of current Israeli government policy." (note 13)

One major
reason that the Holocaust story has proven so durable is that the governments of
the major powers also have a vested interest in maintaining it. The victorious
powers of the Second World War -- the United States, Soviet Russia and Britain
-- have a stake in portraying the defeated Hitler regime as negatively as
possible. The more evil and satanic the Hitler regime appears, the more noble
and justified seems the Allied cause.

For many Jews, the Holocaust has
become both a flourishing business and a kind of new religion, as noted Jewish
author and newspaper publisher Jacobo Timerman points out in his book, The
Longest War. He reports that many Israelis, using the word Shoah, which is
Hebrew for Holocaust, joke that "There's no business like Shoah business." (note
14)

The Holocaust media campaign portrays Jews as totally innocent
victims, and non-Jews as morally retarded and unreliable beings who can easily
turn into murderous Nazis under the right circumstances. This self-serving but
distorted portrayal is meant to strengthen Jewish group solidarity and
self-awareness.

A key lesson of the Holocaust story for Jews is that
non-Jews are never completely trustworthy. If a people as cultured and as
educated as the Germans could turn against the Jews, so the thinking goes, than
surely no non-Jewish nation can ever be completely trusted. The Holocaust
message is thus one of contempt for humanity.

Holocaust Hatemongering

The Holocaust story is sometimes used to promote hatred and hostility,
particularly against the German people as a whole, eastern Europeans and the
leadership of the Roman Catholic church.

The well-known Jewish writer,
Elie Wiesel, is a former Auschwitz inmate who served as chairman of the official
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council. He received the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize. This
dedicated Zionist wrote in his book, Legends of Our Time: "Every Jew,
somewhere in his being, should set apart a zone of hate -- healthy, virile hate
-- for what the German personifies and for what persists in the German." (note
15)

Let Both Sides Be Heard

As even defenders of the orthodox extermination story concede, skepticism
about the Holocaust story has grown dramatically in recent years.

Responding to this trend, officials in some countries -- including
France and Israel -- have made it a crime to challenge the Holocaust story.
Revisionists in France and Germany have been heavily fined for their views.
Teachers in the United States and elsewhere have been summarily dismissed from
their positions for daring to doubt the Holocaust story. Criminal thugs have
brutally attacked prominent Holocaust revisionists; one was even killed for his
views.

In spite of desperate restrictions on free speech, frantic media
attacks against those who "deny the Holocaust," a seemingly perpetual Holocaust
media campaign, and even physical attacks, considerable headway is being made.
More and more thoughtful people in the United States and around the world are
willing to express doubts about at least some of the more sensational Holocaust
claims.

Summary

The Holocaust extermination story is breaking down as suppressed evidence
becomes better known, and as more people become aware of the facts about what is
certainly the most hyped and politicized chapter of modern history.

Artificially maintaining the hatreds and passions of the past prevents
genuine reconciliation and lasting peace.

Revisionism promotes
historical awareness and international understanding. That's why the work of the
Institute for Historical Review is so important and deserves your support.

Notes

Books &Bookmen, London, April 1975, p. 5, and in Stars and
Stripes (Europe), Jan. 24, 1993, p. 14.

Ruper Butler, Legions of Death (England: 1983), pp. 235-237, and R.
Faurisson, Journal of Historical Review, Winter 1986-87, pp. 389-403.

Nuremberg document PS-3311 (USA-293). IMT blue series, Vol. 32, pp.
153-158; IMT, Vol. 3, pp. 566- 568.; NMT green series, Vol. 5, pp. 1133, 1134.

Nuremberg document NG-2586-J. NMT green series, Vol. 13, pp. 243-249.

Samuel Gringauz in Jewish Social Studies (New York), January 1950,
Vol. 12, p. 65.

Nuremberg document PS-4025. D. Irving, Göring: A Biography (New
York: 1989), p. 349.

H. Picker, Hitlers Tischgespräche im Fuehrerhaupt quartier
(Stuttgart: 1976), p. 456.

Nuremberg document PS-2171, Annex 2; NC&A red series, Vol. 4, pp.
833-834.

Nuremberg document NO-1523; NMT green series, Vol. 5, pp. 372-373.

Baseler Nachrichten, June 13, 1946, p. 2.

H. Shapiro, "Jakobovits," Jerusalem Post (Israel), Nov. 26, 1987,
p. 1.

Quadrant (Australia), Sept. 1979, p. 27.

New York Times Magazine, Sept. 14, 1980, p. 79.

The Longest War (New York: Vintage, 1982), p. 15.

Legends of Our Time (New York: Schocken Books, 1982), chap. 12, p.
142.

About the Author:

Mark Weber is editor of The Journal of
Historical Review, published by the Institute for Historical Review. He
studied history at the University of Illinois (Chicago), the University of
Munich, Portland State University, and Indiana University (M.A., 1977). For five
days in March 1988, he testified as a recognized expert witness on the "final
solution" and the Holocaust issue in a Toronto District Court case. He is the
author of many published articles, reviews and essays on various aspects of
modern European history. Weber has been a guest on numerous radio talk shows,
and on the nationally-syndicated "Montel Williams" TV program.

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