Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day029.12
Last-Modified: 2000/07/25

   Q.   I am not at all, Mr Irving.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Well, I think I understand the point that is
        being made.  But let us look at it anyway.
   MR RAMPTON:  If you look, you see this is for the whole of Germany?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Is it not?  "Statistik des deutschen Reichs", that is the
        whole of the Reich for the year 1932.  If you look down
        the left-hand side of this big sheet, we find Nos. 80,
        80B, 80C and 81.  Now, in 1932 -- I am going to work
        upwards -- in the whole of Germany, No. 81, there were but
        74 cases of insurance fraud, do you agree?

.          P-103



   A.   You say in the whole of Germany, but although I agree you
        have given us the title page of this, this is page 112, we
        do not know if it was the whole of Germany or just a
        province of of Prussia or what.
   Q.   I am told it is the whole of Germany.
   A.   Well ----
   Q.   Mr Irving ----
   A.   Because I am quite familiar with these statistical reports
        and they are broken down into provinces, and I would like
        the assurance we are not just looking at Berlin or just at Prussia.
   Q.   So far as it is within my power to do so, I give you that
        assurance because that is what I am told and I regard my
        source as reliable.  Now, even if it were just Berlin,
        Mr Irving, just 74 cases of insurance fraud were committed
        by persons of all ethnic backgrounds in Berlin, if you
        like, but in fact for the whole of Germany during 1932.
        Where are these over 50 per cent of 31,000 insurance
        swindles committed by Jews?
   A.   We are looking at 80B and 80C, is that right?
   Q.   81 is ver sicherungsbetreff which I think means insurance fraud?
   A.   Yes.  I was looking at the betreff, the ones above, which
        total something like 70,000, 60,000.
   Q.   Betreff, 80A, that is plain fraud is 50,000 plus?
   A.   Yes.

.          P-104



   Q.   Repeat frauds, that is 80B [German] 7,000 and a bit?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   And then something about minor fraud offences, 80C, 312.
        81, insurance fraud -- insurance swindle, to use your word
         -- 74 cases, yes?
   A.   The overall total of frauds ----
   Q.   Is 57,888 for the whole of Germany?
   A.   And Daluege says that in Berlin it was 32,000 -- of
        course, we are looking at different years, are we not?
        One is 1932 and here it is 1934 or thereabouts.
   Q.   No, Mr Irving, I am sorry.  Leave Daluege out of this, if
        you will?  You made an assertion of fact in your book
        about the number of frauds committed by Jews, mainly
        insurance swindles, in 1932.  I am suggesting that any
        reputable historian would have gone to this document, as
        opposed to some rabid Nazi's utterance to a press
        conference, to find out what the truth was.
   A.   Are you saying that Paul Veiglin is a rabid Nazi and that
        Walter Keolein, who is a very well-known German historian
        of the police, is a rabid Nazi?
   Q.   Those are your other references, are they?
   A.   These are my other sources -- two of the other, two of the
        four sources used, yes.
   Q.   Well, then if we find that your figures and statements are
        not supported by either of those sources, will you accept
        without equivocation that you have here committed a

.          P-105



        deliberate distortion, inflation of the figures against
        the interests of the ----
   A.   Obviously, if you find that those books do not support the
        statements I made, then I would accept that I have made an
        error.  But, of course, I am not going to accept that such
        an error is deliberate because I have got no reason to
        make a deliberate error.  You do not establish a
        reputation by making deliberate errors and I am baffled
        that anyone could suggest that you do.
   Q.   Well, I think I have about 25 in my pocket by now,
        Mr Irving, and that is the 26th.  Thank you.  Now I want
        to deal with the Goebbels diaries.  My Lord, may I stop
        now because it is quite intricate and it is 1 o'clock?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes, but before you depart, can we work out
        where we are going to put these?
   MR RAMPTON:  It is in a sense a new section because it is a new period.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Shall we put it at the back of what I
        am calling J3?
   MR RAMPTON:  Yes.  Could your Lordship put it at in the
        separate tab at the back of N1?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Back of N1.
   MR RAMPTON:  Because it is an historical document.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Right, 2 o'clock.

                        (Luncheon adjournment)

   MR RAMPTON:  Mr Irving, before I pass from the criminal

.          P-106



        statistics for 1932 to a question or two about the
        Goebbels diaries, can I pass you up a piece of paper?  It
        is a sheet from the same German government document that
        we were looking at this morning, and there is one for the
        judge, please.  (Same handed).  I would like you to look
        at the section headed "Summer A bis D" for the year 1932.
        Tell us, please, to what area or areas of Germany these
        statistics relate?
   A.   Which?  I am sorry, the bottom one, right.
   Q.   What does the heading say?
   A.   It says the crimes and misdemeanours against Reich laws
        that have been tried by German courts.
   Q.   Yes.  That disposes of that question.  This relates to the
        whole of Germany, does it not?
   A.   Yes, apparently.
   Q.   Thank you very much.
   A.   This particular page.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  It is the page before the following page, is it?
   A.   It is not, my Lord, no.
   MR RAMPTON:  No, there are some pages missing, but you can see,
        if you look at the top of page 112, which we already have,
        that the numbers run serially.  At the beginning we start
        with 1 and by 112 we are at 63B.
   A.   That may or may not be the case, I cannot comment on that,
        but there are pages missing.  I am sure your researchers

.          P-107



        would not mislead us deliberately.
   Q.   I hardly think that.  The missing pages are here, if you
        would like to see them.  (Same handed).  I feel quite
        confident in saying that these run serially from 1 through
        (as the Americans say) 115.  Anyhow, have a look and see
        if you agree with me that these are the statistics for the
        whole of Germany for 1932.
   A.   Yes, they do.
   Q.   Do you agree?
   A.   Yes, they do.
   Q.   They do?  Good.  Excellent.  Perhaps we could have that
        back because it is not mine.  I said Goebbels diary, but I
        have been interrupted because we do not have sufficient
        copies of the documents I want, so that will take about a
        quarter of an hour to do.  I want to pass to something
        else instead, if I may, which is your assertion that the
        gas chambers were an invention of British propaganda
        during the war.  Do you agree that you have, on a number
        of occasions, made that assertion?
   A.   Yes.  This is the Foreign Office clip of documents you
        gave me recently?  Is that right?
   Q.   Yes.  Has the judge got a copy of the clip of documents on
        this topic?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  No?
   A.   I do not know if I still have it.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I thought you meant a new clip.  The old

.          P-108



        ones?
   MR RAMPTON:  I feel cautious about that, but yes.  File L1, tab
        6.
   A.   Yes.  I still have it here.
   Q.   My Lord, this relates to two different years, 1942 and 1943.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes.
   MR RAMPTON:  1943 starts at page 11, and I will deal with 1942
        first, if I may.  Through no fault of ours, the passage of
        time, inefficiency of typewriters in those days, some of
        this is a bit difficult to read, but never mind.  The
        first page -- does your Lordship have it now?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes, I have.
   MR RAMPTON:  The first page contains some typescript in the
        top, and some manuscript in the bottom.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Mr Irving, doing the best I can, the date of this,
        I think, is 8th August 1942.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   It says "Reported German plan for extermination of all
        Jews".  Do you see that?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   This is a Foreign Office document, is it not?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Then it says, I think, "Geneva telegram No. 174, Message
        for Mr Sidney Silverman, Chairman of World Jewish

.          P-109



        Congress, London, from Mr Gerhard Riegner, Secretary of
        World Jewish Congress, Geneva.  Mr Riegner has received a
        report stating that in the Fuhrer's headquarters a plan
        has been discussed and is under consideration for the
        extermination after deportation to East of all Jews in" --
        can you read the next bit -- "in the areas occupied or
        controlled by Germany.  Action is planned for the autumn.
        Ways and means are still (something or other) and include
        the use of prussic acid".  Hydrogen cyanide, that is, is it not?
   A.   Yes.  The full text is on the next page actually in
        typescript.  You could have read it.
   Q.   I know that, but I just wanted to see the first date at
        which this information was relayed to the Foreign Office
        in London via Mr Sidney Silverman via Mr Gerhard Riegner in Geneva.
   A.   It was received 11th August 1942.
   Q.   Exactly.  17th August 1942, which is the next page, that
        information is laid out.  Says the Foreign Office, "Have
        received by telegraph through His Majesty's Consul General
        at Geneva the following message", and then in a legible
        form we see it on the next page, page 3.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   I will read this: "Following for Mr Sidney Silverman, SS
        Silverman MP, chairman of British section, World Jewish
        Congress London, from Mr Gerhard Riegner, Secretary of

.          P-110



        World Jewish Congress, Geneva.  Received alarming report
        stating that in the Fuhrer's headquarters a plan has been
        discussed and is under consideration, according to which
        all Jews in countries occupied or controlled by Germany
        numbering three and a half to four millions should after
        deportation and concentration in the East, be at one blow
        exterminated in order to resolve once and for all the
        Jewish question in Europe.  Action is reported to be
        planned for the autumn.  Ways of execution are still being
        discussed, including the use of prussic acid.  We transmit
        this information with all the necessary reservation as
        exactitude cannot be confirmed by us", that is Geneva.
        "Our informant is reported to have close connections with
        the highest German authorities, and his reports are
        generally reliable.  Please inform and consult New York".
                  That message from Geneva is an authentic
        message, or was an authentic message, was it not, Mr Irving?
   A.   Yes.  I am very familiar with these documents.
   Q.   It was not an invention of the British propaganda machine,
        was it?
   A.   No.
   Q.   So why do you maintain that the use of homicidal gas
        chambers employing prussic acid, hydrogen cyanide,
        Zyklon-B, was an invention of British propaganda?
   A.   Because the following pages make plain the skepticism of

.          P-111



        the Foreign Office about this particular report.
   Q.   Well, unless you want to go ----
   A.   Page 5, at the foot of it, says, "I do not think we should
        be wise to make use of this story in propaganda to Germany
        without further confirmation".
   Q.   And the decision is made not to do so.  Do you agree?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Can we take it in stages?  The first thing
        is, are you accepting you said that this was all an
        invention of British propaganda?
   A.   My Lord, you will be familiar with the document on which
        I rely, which is a year later than this, signed by
        Cavendish-Bentinck, saying, "we have no evidence
        whatsoever that these things" ----
   Q.   That is why I asked you.  I am asking you about whether
        you agree that you have claimed that the lie about the gas
        chambers was an invention, underline "invention"?
   A.   Yes.  A propaganda story put out by the British in early 1942.
   Q.   Invented by the British?  That is the point.
   A.   And invented by the British propaganda agencies.
   Q.   What Mr Rampton is putting to you is that this is a
        message from Geneva that they have had a report.
   A.   Yes. They are two separate ----

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