Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day004.07
Last-Modified: 2000/08/01

   Q.   You have.  You have seen it on some of the Auschwitz
        documents, have you not?
   A.   Are we going to get into a discussion now on
authenticity
        of documents?
   Q.   No.  I just want to know what you say about that
little
        word?
   A.   I am saying that it is not regular German.
   Q.   No, but it is a mistake, if it be a mistake, that a
German
        could easily make, is it not?
   A.   It could be a mistake that an ill educated German
would
        make, as would be, for example, on blatt 7, if I may
turn
        to that.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Before you do that, whereabouts on this
page
        are you, 1st December, Mr Rampton?
   A.   Very first line top right.
   MR RAMPTON:  Top right hand corner underneath handwritten
119.

.          P-56



   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Page 5.
   MR RAMPTON:  I asked your Lordship to go back to page 1,
just
        to identify it, because your Lordship wanted it
        identified.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Sorry I missed you.  Right.
   MR RAMPTON:  Kauen is one German form of Cogno?
   A.   For Cogno.
   Q.   1st December 1941.  I am going to look at much more of
        this in a moment, but it is a report.  I cannot read
the
        first one gezundt aus stellung (?), is it?
   A.   Gezundt aus stellung.
   Q.   A full ----
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Collective presentation.
   MR RAMPTON:  Presentation.
   Q.   Der imber Reich (?) -- What does that mean?
   A.   In the area of.
   Q.   E K 3, up to the 1st December 1941, of executions
carried
        out.  Is that right?
   A.   Yes.  Do you wish to address briefly the authenticity
of
        this document.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  If you are denying it, you ought to say
so.
   A.   He has asked me would I accept that um ersten (?)
December
        is authentic German and I would say no, it is not.  It
        would be incorrect irregular German.
   Q.   Do you say this is not an authentic document?
   A.   My Lord, I am not saying that.  I am answering his

.          P-57



        question.  I also wish to draw attention on page 7,
about
        15 lines down in the third complete paragraph, das
zeil
        (?), halfway down there, my Lord, you will see that
the
        rank of SS Oberstum Fuhrer and SS is typed as two
capital
        Ss.
   Q.   So?
   A.   All the high ranking SS officers had typewriter with
the
        SS runes, my Lord.  They would not type SS.  It would
be
        very rare to find an SS document in which SS is typed
as
        two capital Ss.  It is not entirely impossible, but it
is
        very rare.
   Q.   I am baffled by this.  Are you challenging the
        authenticity of this?
   A.   My Lord, it is not a document I have relied upon.  It
is
        not a document laid before me when I wrote my book and
I
        am quite happy to answer questions on the content of
it.
        But Mr Rampton asked me my opinion about the document
and
        I spotted straight away those two discrepancies just
by
        leafing through it.
   MR RAMPTON:  You may have done, Mr Irving, but that really
does
        not answer his Lordship's question.  I have no doubt
that
        you recognized this document immediately as soon as we
        opened the file, did you not?
   A.   I know what it is about.  I have heard about it, yes.
   Q.   No, you recognized it.  You said this is the Jaeger
        report.

.          P-58



   A.   Yes, by the date, 1st December 1941.
   Q.   You have never read it?
   A.   No.  I have never analysed it in detail, let's put it
like
        that, and I certainly did not read it when I wrote my
        books.
   Q.   Either you have X-ray eyes or you read very quickly
        because you seemed to have spotted a mistake, as you
call
        it, on blatt 7 immediately.
   A.   That is what I was looking for.  That is the real
        giveaway.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  You knew it was there?
   A.   No, my Lord, you would have seen it.  When he asked me
to
        look for it, I began leafing through it and looking
for
        SS, which is the first thing you would look for in a
        document you are suspicious about.  But, for the
purpose
        of this morning, I will accept that it is authentic,
with
        reservations.
   MR RAMPTON:  Then we have had an interesting but wholly
        academic discussion.
   A.   Mr Rampton, you asked me if I considered it to be
        authentic.
   Q.   I asked you whether you accept that this is an
authentic
        document.
   A.   That is right.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Anyway, now we all accept it is.
   MR RAMPTON:  Now we know that it is so far as this
discussion

.          P-59



        is concerned.
   A.   With reservations.
   Q.   Yes.  Page 5?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Under the middle of the page, months of November.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Third line, 25th November of 41, Kauen F 9 is Fort 9.
It
        was divided up into different sort of fortresses, was
it
        not?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   They kill, execute, 2,934 Jews, Jewesses and Jewish
        children?
   A.   That is correct, yes.
   Q.   In brackets underneath it says, again roughly
speaking:
        Evacuees from Berlin, Munich and Frankfurt?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Do you agree that it is likely that that is where your
        train load of 944 well provisioned Jews wound up?
   A.   I would say it is not impossible.  It is eight days
        later.  There were several train loads, of course.
        I cannot speak specifically that that particular train
        load would have ended up in that particular atrocity.
   Q.   I can tell you that there are no other references to
Jews
        from Berlin in this document.
   A.   In this document?
   Q.   Yes, and this document is a complete report of the
doings

.          P-60



        of that unit or formation.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   In that place and all over Cogno up to the beginning
of
        December.
   A.   May I say that this particular page was supplied to me
by
        Dr Gerald Fleming in fact, two or three years ago.
        I relied on that when I wrote my Goebbels biography.
   Q.   Sorry?
   A.   This particular page was supplied to me by Dr Gerald
        Fleming, and I relied on the statistics in it when I
wrote
        my biography of Dr Joseph Goebbels.  You will find
that I
        have quoted his statistics.
   Q.   We are looking at it now, Mr Irving, as you no doubt
        noticed.
   A.   I recognized the figures.  You will find that page in
my
        discovery.
   Q.   What you say in the Goebbels book is a little more
        generous in point of truth or accuracy than what you
said
        just now.  You said it was a possibility that it was
the
        same one.  In the book you said on page 377: "So much
for
        Minsk".  I do not know what you are saying about
Minsk,
        but it may not matter.
   A.   Very much the same.
   Q.   The train load of Berlin's Jews sent to Kanas, Cogno,
in
        Lithuania on November 17th probably fared no better".
You
        cite the Jaeger report and that entry in it.

.          P-61



   A.   Yes.  How can I be called the Holocaust denyer when
again
        and again I put these statistics in my books, if I may
ask
        the question?
   Q.   Let's get the position clear.  You keep asking that
        question rhetorically as though it answered itself,
        Mr Irving.  It does not.  So far as the shooting of
Jews
        is concerned, what do you reckon is the total number
that
        were disposed of by shooting?  We maybe had this
        discussion on the first day of the trial, I cannot
        remember, but tell me again if we have.
   A.   Disposed of by shooting?  Where?  In the East?
   Q.   Yes.
   A.   Order of magnitude I would say at least half million,
and
        probably as many as one and a half million.
   Q.   Where we part company, Mr Irving, I think, is that you
        have repeatedly said, have you not, that these were,
and
        you rely for example on the message to Jekiln (?) Of
1st
        December from Himmler?  You have repeatedly said that
        these words, quasi or not even quasi, were criminal
        shootings by high Maverick commanders of the SS out in
the
        East?
   A.   The phrase used by Himmler is arbitrary actions.
   Q.   We are coming back to Himmler very shortly.
   A.   And actions against the guidelines.
   Q.   Your position is that these mass shootings and other
        shootings in the East were not in any sense part of a

.          P-62



        system, but were local acts of criminality?
   A.   The system ended when the train arrived.  The system
put
        the Jews and the other victims on the trains and sent
them
        to the East with the food and equipment to start a new
        life.  Once they arrived on the spot, the system broke
        down, and the murderers stepped in.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  But these reports coming back from the
        Einsatzgruppen are going to Berlin, are they not?
   A.   We do not know, my Lord, because there is no kind of
        indication on it or initialling on whom it went to.
   Q.   Where do you say they were going then?
   A.   They certainly went -- unfortunately we do not know,
my
        Lord, because my copy of the report ends on page 9,
        I think, so it has not even got a signature on it.  It
has
        a signature Jaeger, but no address list, so we do not
know
        where it went to.  But it would be reasonable to
assume
        that the report went to the Reichzeike heis haufdampt
(?)
        Of Heydrich.
   Q.   Which is in Berlin?
   A.   In Berlin.
   MR RAMPTON:  Because Mr Irving, in Berlin, in Heydrich's
        headquarters, from time to time -- I do not know
whether
        they were regular or how frequent they are -- but
there
        were these things called areignis meldungen (?)
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Which were actually composed in that office in Berlin,
and

.          P-63



        many of them carry summaries of this kind of material?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Do they not?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   So the probability is that that went back to Berlin?
   A.   The probability is that this went back to Berlin, yes,
as
        I said.
   Q.   Is that not evidence of some kind of system operating
at
        the behest of and under the control of the authorities
in
        Berlin?
   A.   I draw your attention to the fact this is the very day
        when the very sharp reprimand went from Hitler's
        headquarters, signed by Himmler, to the people
carrying
        out the murders saying these arbitrary actions are to
stop
        forthwith, and the murder of the Jews stopped for many
        months, the German Jews.
   Q.   These Jews?
   A.   The murder of the German Jews stopped for many months,
so
        that is indication that the system had broken down.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes, but you agreed on Wednesday or
whenever
        it was that that message related only to German Jews
and
        these reports cover all other manner of Jews?
   A.   The message did not relate only to German Jews but
        certainly the effect was German Jews.  The killing of
        German Jews stopped and these are the numbers to which
        Mr Rampton has drawn attention to, Jews being
evacuated

.          P-64



        from Berlin and Munich and other cities, I believe.
   MR RAMPTON:  The shooting of these Jews, Mr Irving, I quite
        accept, if you are right that there was to be no mass
        shootings under any circumstances of German Jews,
these
        few, and in the context of this report alas there are
few,
        these few German Jews, probably also the ones from
Vienna
        and Bresslau in the next entry, probably would have
        infringed the Himmler order if the Himmler order had
got
        to Jaeger in time to save them, which evidently it did
        not.
   A.   That is the reason why I submit that the system broke
down
        upon the arrival of these train loads of Jews in the
East.
   Q.   Right.
   A.   And the people on the spot said: Let us just get rid
of
        them, liquidate them ourselves.
   Q.   And they had food for a maximum of about three weeks
        anyway?
   A.   A start up food supply, yes.
   Q.   I see.  So Berlin was expecting the SS in Cogno to
feed
        them indefinitely?
   A.   No.  The instructions were to build camps for them.
They
        had to build their own concentration camps to live in.
        They were expected to build the camps and set up their
own
        work shops there and start a new life in the East,
        anywhere but Germany.  That sounds very nice for the
        planners in Berlin, but it is less practical on the
spot

.          P-65



        when you have got a military disaster looming.

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