Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day029.15
Last-Modified: 2000/07/25

   Q.   So, on the advice, no doubt of the Department of State in
        the United States and of the Foreign Office in Great
        Britain, the reference to gas chambers in the draft has
        been removed?
   A.   Yes, because it was -- there was no adequate evidence.
   Q.   Yes, the Allies and, in particular, the British PWE
        decided against using, unhappily perhaps, but they decided
        against using the gas chamber story as propaganda,
        correct, am I not?
   A.   This is not a propaganda declaration; this is a warning to
        the German leaders, to the Italian leaders, that

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        retribution is on its way to them.  It is nothing to do
        with propaganda.  Propaganda was what we broadcast of
        which there is any amount of evidence.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Well, I would like to see it because at the
        moment I do not have any no evidence at all.
   A.   I have great confidence on this score.
   MR RAMPTON:  I have been given Claimant file F, my Lord, on
        page 61 your Lordship will find it, I hope.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I think we have had this before.  F became
        something else.
   MR RAMPTON:  You should have a separate file F, my Lord, a
        small file F.  It had originally, I think, a two-page
        index and the document in question is page 62.  I think
        Mr Irving should have it too, please.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I think this what I had in mind.
   MR RAMPTON:  Yes.  This is the so-called Ringelbulm diary.  It
        has, I am afraid, no year date on it.  But I will read it
        just the same because it is rather interesting.  But I do
        think Mr Irving should have it.  Could somebody please
        find Mr Irving a file F?  I hope, Mr Irving, that your
        index page, your contents page, 62, there are two pages
        from this book?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   294, 295, is that right?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Can we look at 295 which is on the right-hand side in my

.          P-132



        copy?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   "Friday, June 26th has been a great day for OS", what is
        "OS", see introduction", well, that is hopeless.  I have
        not got the introduction.  What is "OS", Mr Irving?
   A.   No idea.
   Q.   OK.  "This morning the English radio broadcast about the
        fate of Polish Jewry.  They told about everything we know
        so well, about ... (reading to the words)... Lemburg and
        Chelmno, and so forth.  For long months we had been
        suffering because the world was deaf and dumb to our
        unparalleled tragedy.  We complained about Polish public
        opinion, about the liaison men in contact with the Polish
        government in exile.  Why were they not reporting to the
        world the story of the slaughter of Polish Jewry?  We
        accused the Polish liaison men of deliberately keeping our
        tragedy quiet so that their tragedy might not be thrown
        into the shade.  But now it seems that all our
        interventions have finally achieved their purpose.  There
        have been regular broadcasts over the English radio the
        last few weeks treating of the cruelties perpetrated on
        the Polish Jews, Belzec and the like.  Today there was a
        broadcast summarizing the situation.  700,000, the number
        of Jews killed in Poland was mentioned.  At the same time
        the broadcast avowed revenge, a final accounting, for all
        these deeds of violence".

.          P-133



                  Which year, Friday June 26th, Mr Irving?
   A.   1942.
   Q.   1942.  Do you see anything in there about gas chambers?
   A.   No.
   Q.   Am I right that the Polish Government in exile at the
        instance, no doubt, of people in Poland had been, as it
        were, hacking at the Allies to pay attention to these
        stories for some considerable time?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   These stories were not invented by the British Government,
        were they?
   A.   Inasmuch as when the British Government put them out, they
        had no firm evidence that they were true and they later
        summarized that they had no such evidence, they were.
   Q.   Now I think we know where we are.
   A.   My Lord, on the broadcasts in their clip there is a number
        of docments which I did not actually rely on when
        I cross-examined Mr Klemperer.  When we next come
        together, I will produce a schedule of broadcasts and what
        they contained in this respect, I think, as far as I can.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Is there anything else in this clip at the
        moment that ----
   A.   Well, I think it would take up too much of the court's
        time to read the 10 or 15 pages.
   Q.   I am not too bothered about that.  I do not think it would
        take very long.  Do you rely on the ----

.          P-134



   A.   But what I am really saying is ----
   Q.   Do you rely on the diaries of Klemperer?  I am sorry,
        Mr Rampton, it is just that once one is on this topic, one
        really needs to ----
   A.   Well, I do not really want to do it in a hurried manner
        and if I do it in a slow manner, then your Lordship will
        get impatient.  What I am really saying is that we do not
        want to go back and have a look at the files to see what
        else I can dredge up.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  We have got 64.  I am just looking for
        references to a broadcast.  Page 64 is Klemperer.
   Q.   Page 67, I think.  Could you just read the top of page 67,
        Mr Irving?
   A.   I do not have those numbers on this.
   Q.   Sorry, page 442 of whatever it is.
   A.   "Millions of German people did, in fact, listen
        attentively and regularly to German language BBC
        broadcasts, even though it was illegal for them to do so.
        Moreover, the BBC German service took considerable pains
        to convey accurate and believable information about the
        annihilation of the Jews.  These efforts were particularly
        noteworthy considering that they were frowned on by the
        British Foreign Office which did not regard Jewish
        persecution as an efficacious theme for propagandists to
        take advantage".
   MR RAMPTON:  So Mr Irving, your story is now this, is it not,

.          P-135



        if this story was an invention, it was the BBC, the wicked
        journalists and their informants who invented it, it was
        not the British Government?  Is that right?
   A.   I think at all material times the BBC was in arm with the
        British Government and the Ministry of Information.  It
        certainly did not operate in a kind of independent way.
        I think it would be useful if I do draw up a schedule of
        references, including whether it specifically referred to
        gassing or not and the dates.  This will...
   Q.   I am moving to another topic now, my penultimate topic,
        Mr Irving, you will be pleased to hear.  The first page in
        this clip should be a page from the transcript in this
        trial on day 23, Monday, 21st February 2000, is it?
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Do you see what his Lordship was asking you on page 140?
        You were cross-examining.
   A.   Gita Sereny, yes.
   Q.   You were cross-examining Professor Evans about a passage
        in his report which asserted that you had falsely accused
        Gita Sereny, or having ignored Gita Sereny's assertion
        that Christa Schroeder had said that Hitler knew about the
        Holocaust.  I am paraphrasing.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   Mr Justice Gray at line 18 on page 140 asks you this: "Is
        it your case that there is not any record, whether tapes,
        notes or anything, of Gita Sereny's interview with Christa

.          P-136



        Schroder and she is, in fact, making the whole thing up?"
        Mr Irving, "Yes".  Is that still your position?
   A.   I beg your pardon?
   Q.   Is that still your position that Gita Sereny made the
        whole thing up?
   A.   On the basis of what I have seen in her discovery in the
        other action, yes.
   Q.   Now we are going ----
   A.   You are familiar with the fact that I requested to see all
        her-- I had discovery from her.
   Q.   The date of this exchange between his Lordship and you is
        Monday, 21st February 2000.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   I am now going to show you some papers from your case
        against Gita Sereny and whichever newspaper it is,
        I forget, the Observer, I think.  The second page in this
        little clip is a letter from you to the solicitors for
        those Defendants ----
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   --- Lovell White Durrant, dated 4th January 2000.  You say
        this:  "I note from my discovery item No. 545 that your
        client, Sereny, took notes of her conversations with
        Gunsche, von Welloff and Schultzer and that Frau Schroeder
        also wrote to her" -- notice those words, please.  "These
        items appear to be missing from your client's discovery
        and I would request that" ----

.          P-137



   A.   "She".
   Q.   --- "you give disclosure" or "she" it might be "give
        disclosure of these within a reasonable amount of time".
        I do not know what the second document is.
   A.   To which I received no reply.
   Q.   I see.  545 is what you enclose with your letter.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   It is a letter from the Associate Managing Editor of the
        Sunday Times dated 13th October 1997 to you:  "Dear
        Mr Irving, thank you for your letter.  With regard to the
        first point, you will be interested to see the enclosed
        letter which appeared in the Sunday Times two weeks after
        publication of the original article.  It indicates that a
        misunderstanding on this point has already been publicly
        acknowledged and corrected.  With regard to the second
        point, there is no such necessity.  We have records of
        Gita Sereny's conversations with Walter Gunsche, Colonel
        von Welloff and Richard Shultzer supporting what was said
        in our article.  Christa Schroeder's comments on the
        subject of Hitler and the extermination of the Jews were
        conveyed to Miss Sereny in a letter.  Under the
        circumstances, therefore, I think you will agree that
        there is no basis for the complaints made in your letter".
                  In response to your letter to them, Lovells
        replied on 27th January:  "Thank you for your letter dated
        4th January 2000.  We have raised your request with

.          P-138



        Miss Sereny and will revert to you again in this
        connection once we have received her response.  We take
        the opportunity to note that we have not", and so on and
        so forth.  That is something else.
                  Then they write again on 10th February, this is
        but 11 days before you gave your evidence in this court.
   A.   Yes.
   Q.   "We write further to our letter dated 27th January 2000,
        having now discussed your request with Miss Sereny.  The
        documents which you seek have already been disclosed.
        There were no notes in Miss Sereny's conversations was
        Gunsche, von Welloff and Schultzer, only tape recordings.
        These have been disclosed to you.  The letter to
        Miss Sereny from Frau Schroeder was disclosed as item
2.57 in schedule 1 part 1 of the same list".  The rest is
        irrelevant.
                  The last page, please, here is the letter,
        please tell me what the penultimate paragraph says.  The
        first of the two letters printed on this page is from Frau
        Schroeder herself, is it not?
   A.   Yes.  "Dear Miss Sereny, I regret that for health reasons
        I have not been able to receive you", for an interview, in
        other words.  So there was no interview.
   Q.   Carry on.
   A.   "As far as the telephone conversation that you sketched of
        1976 is concerned, what you write about, what you mention

.          P-139



        about Himmler in connection with me appears, you appear to
        have fallen victim of having heard, misheard something.
        Himmler has not", underlined "not", "spoken with me",
        underlined "with me", "in this manner.  I have tried to
        arrange an interview between you and his, Himmler's,
        daughter, but I have unfortunately failed for which
        I request that you leave out this passage.  As far as the
        Judenfrager is concerned:  I consider it improbable or
        unlikely that Hitler did not know -- that Hitler knew
        nothing.  He had frequent conversations with Himmler which
        took place as tete a tete.  More than that,
        I unfortunately cannot tell you as I am ignorant of the things".
   Q.   Now 10 days after being reminded of that letter because it
        had been in the discovery originally according to
        Lovells  ----
   A.   Yes.

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