Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day029.18
Last-Modified: 2000/07/25

   MR RAMPTON:  Perhaps we can bypass the good Dr Goebbels, my
        Lord, because this is Professor Irving writing his Goring
        book in 1989ish, I think, page 337.  "It is probably only
        now that he", that is probably Hitler, might be Goring,
        "learned that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbour.
        At the Reichstag session on December 11th Hitler declared
        war on the United States".
   A.   I found it at the same time, yes.
   Q.   Well, who is right?  You or you?
   A.   This time you are right.
   Q.   OK, the 11th.
   A.   Luckily I am not a betting man.
   Q.   Lucky you have not lost a million quid, yet.
   A.   I would have phoned a friend if I had one.
   Q.   Mr Irving, this was a very important speech, was it not?
   A.   No.

.          P-159



   Q.   The day after the declaration of war on the United States?
   A.   It was the usual Adolf Hitler pep talk.  He did not often
        see the Gauleiters.  He did not like the Gauleiters.  He
        said to Martin Bormann after Rudolf Hess went, "Keep the
        Gauleiters off my back".
   Q.   What he said was: "You Jews, I threatened you, I promised
        you, you have got it coming to you, and now it is here
        because the world war has begun".
   A.   Do you want to see his actual speech?
   Q.   No.  I would like you to look at what Goebbels reports
        that he said.
   A.   That is what I am asking.
   Q.   That is at the bottom of page 50 of the Moscow microfiche.
   A.   That is 22 pages beyond how far I got.
   Q.   It is not.  It is 12 pages.  I must say -- I have to say,
        Mr Irving -- pretty weedy little pages too, narrow and
        short.  Bezuglich der Judenfrager ist der Fuhrer.  It is
        the last line on page 50.  It goes through, probably the
        bit about the Jews, only as far as page 51, because he
        starts something new on the bottom of page 51.  Yes, here
        we are.  This is going to be the German India in the
        future in the East.  So the little bit about the Jews is
        really mostly on page 51.  If you read it to yourself ----
   A.   I have read it.
   Q.   I repeat my question.  This is a statement that the threat
        will now be fulfilled, is it not.

.          P-160



   A.   Yes.  He had said it endless times before.  It is exactly
        the same thing.  Mr Rampton, I had the advantage of having
        read these Hitler speeches through and through for 35 years.
   Q.   I am sure you have.
   A.   After a time, you know what he is going to say next.  He
        is that kind of person.
   Q.   I am surprised you remain sane, Mr Irving.
   A.   Thank you for the compliment.
   Q.   However, the fact is that the world war, which was what
        Hitler was ranting about in the Reichstag on 30th January
        1939, for example, is now here.  The day before.
   A.   He had had the entire British Empire around his neck
        already, so it was not exactly a localised conflict, and
        the Soviet Union.
   Q.   It is highly significant to anybody, is it not, Mr Irving,
        who is in the least bit interested in an objective account
        of Hitler's responsibility for what happened to the Jews?
   A.   Well, I can only repeat what I said earlier.  There are
        two separate issues here:  Whether I saw it and suppressed
        it and whether, if I saw it, I attached any importance to
        it, or would have attached any importance to it, and the
        answer to the second question is decisively no.  I would
        not have attached any undue importance to that passage
        beyond what Hitler had said on countless occasions
        before.  The answer to the first question I can say with

.          P-161



        the utmost emphasis is that I never saw this passage,
        I did not read the passage, I did not get that far in the
        glass plate, I had other things on the shopping list.
   Q.   I make it clear, Mr Irving -- I am going to sit down
        now -- that I do not accept either of those answers so
        that you shall not be surprised when I say it when I close
        this case.  May I just take a moment to read my briefing,
        my Lord?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes, of course.
   MR RAMPTON:  (After a pause).  Thank you, Mr Irving.
   A.   Thank you.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes Mr Irving.
   A.   Unless your Lordship has any questions on that?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  You have somewhat theoretical possibility of
        re-examining yourself if you want to add anything by way
        of evidence to what you have told Mr Rampton.
   A.   I re-examine myself every night in the small hours to see
        what I have done wrong, and that is as far as I can get,
        unfortunately.  By way of submission, I will certainly
        make certain propositions which, whether permitted or not,
        is the only way that I can effectively do it on the basis
        of documents.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes.  I think I would find it quite helpful
        if you were able to perhaps fax the little clip of
        documents that I think you are probably going to produce
        in relation to the invention by the British, the PWE.

.          P-162



   A.   The broadcasting.  I have made a note of that.  The
        immediate question is when do we next come together?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Do you want to return to your usual place?
   A.   Yes.
                    (The witness withdrew).

   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Mr Rampton, there are a number of loose ends,
        I think.
   MR RAMPTON:  Yes, I agree.
   MR IRVING:  Can I ask a technical question?  Is Mr Rampton
        continuing to rely on any other names in the bundle?
   MR RAMPTON:  What names?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I am sorry, what names?
   MR IRVING:  Hancock and names like that.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Who?
   MR IRVING:  Mr Hancock.
   MR RAMPTON:  No, I have the answer I need about Mr Hancock.  He
        is some kind of unattached roving rightist who thinks that
        all immigrants should be sent home.  He is in the diary
        entry for what he is worth.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY: I am taking it that the Defendants are relying
        on ----
   MR RAMPTON:  The list.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  --- all the names on the list.
   MR RAMPTON:  Yes.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Although they may abandon some of those names
        in the light of your answer.  I do not know whether they

.          P-163



        will or they will not, but they are entitled to rely on them.
   MR IRVING:  The question I am really asking, my Lord, is do
        I need to make submissions about any of the other names
        than those that I have been cross-examined on?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  The ones that are not on the list you mean?
   MR IRVING:  The ones that I have not been cross-examined on.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I am not sure that there really in the end
        there were any.  There may have been one.
   MR IRVING:  There were several.  I am not going to mention names.
   MR RAMPTON:  I have no intention of cross-examining Mr Irving
        on any of the names on the list in so far as the
        cross-examination was done for me by Professor Funke over
        the last two proceeding days.  There is no point in my
        cross-examining and repeating just on Professor Funke has
        said.  I rely on the evidence of Professor Funke, so far
        as those names are concerned.  But, as I have said before,
        principally do I rely on Mr Irving's own words and appearances.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I am taking it that if the names on the list
        have not featured in the oral evidence at all, then they
        drop from the picture.
   MR RAMPTON:  I would accept that.
   MR IRVING:  Easily.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I think you will find that only is one or

.          P-164



        two.
   MR IRVING:  I think there are rather more than that.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I am open to correction on that.  The first
        thing is, any evidence that you have not, as it were,
        formally tendered, Mr Rampton, now I think probably is the
        time it should be done.  You have some more evidence?
   MR RAMPTON:  I?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Not oral.
   MR RAMPTON:  I see, the Civil Evidence Act witnesses, yes
        I think we probably have.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  It is customary to inform the court what the
        evidence you rely on is.  It is just that I do not
        actually really ----
   MR RAMPTON:  I really do not want to ask Miss Rogers to stand
        here and read them out.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  No.  I want to know what there is, because
        I was slightly alarmed to get a bundle that I am not sure
        I previously had which I have kept.
   MR RAMPTON:  Can we not make a snap statement about that now.
        To say I have not read it would be false, but to say
        I have not read it recently would be true.  I cannot even
        remember what is in it.  I do not have it.  Lipstadt your
        Lordship can forget, not as a person but as a witness.  As
        to the rest, frankly your Lordship can forget the
        Russians, I have got what I need from Mr Irving.  As to
        the rest, they are all Americans I think.

.          P-165



   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I do not even have an index in this bundle.
   MR RAMPTON:  Can we come back on that?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Are we meeting tomorrow?
   MR RAMPTON:  I would rather not meet tomorrow if it is possible.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Then I need to know now, do I not?
   MR RAMPTON:  Unless we are meeting on Monday or unless we send
        a written note to your Lordship's Clerk just saying which
        names we rely on.  I certainly do not feel competent to
        make a decision about that now.  I know I rely on Miss
        Gutmann, but beyond that I really cannot say.  For
        example, it may be possible that some of these people make
        reference to people that I do not rely on as primary
        actors, in which case this Civil Evidence Act Notice can
        be ignored.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I am not entirely happy, if I may say so,
        with it being left in quite that way, because I do not
        think it is reasonably to expect me to plough through
        whatever it may be you are relying on. I am just wondering
        whether we are not going to have to have a further session
        in court before everybody goes away to write final
        speeches to deal with, at any rate, that.
   MR RAMPTON:  I do not mind coming back tomorrow morning, if
        that would help.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I think it really is not, if I may say so,
        satisfactory just to be told, well, we rely on some of

.          P-166



        them, but we cannot really say which or which parts.
        I think it has to be a bit more crystallised than that.
   MR RAMPTON:  I was suggesting might be able to do it on paper,
        that is all.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Mr Irving, do you have any submissions to
        make about this.
   MR IRVING:  I would be perfectly happy to receive a faxed list
        of the names on which they intend to rely, if it would
        prevent your Lordship from reading untoward material on
        which they are not intending to rely.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes, quite.  It is not just which witnesses
        but also I think some guidance as to which parts of the
        witness statements.  I do not know how long they are.
   MR RAMPTON:  Would your Lordship like us to take your C1 back
        and send you an edited version?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes.
   MR RAMPTON:  Would that help?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes, it would.
   MR RAMPTON:  We will send it to you tomorrow.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Absolutely.
   MR RAMPTON:  That was not my idea, needless to say.
   MR IRVING:  The next question is when can we appoint the time
        for me to make the submissions I have to make on various
        other documents and bundles?
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Yes.  Mr Rampton, Mr Irving is asking when he
        can make the submissions he has, which are basically, as I

.          P-167



        understand it, really objections to certain parts of the evidence.
   MR IRVING:  Objections, but also I wish to put in bundle E if
        I possibly can.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  Put in what?
   MR IRVING:  Put in bundle E by way of submission.
   MR RAMPTON:  Bundle E is in, without objection from me.  The
        question of what anybody makes of bundle E is a matter for
        submission at the end of the case, final speeches.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  I think that is right, Mr Irving.
   MR IRVING:  Yes.
   MR JUSTICE GRAY:  We are really dispensing with the rules of
        evidence pretty much entirely in this case, which I think
        is actually right and inevitable, but that means that you
        have got into bundle E a whole lot of documents that in an
        ordinary case would not be evidence or admissible or even
        relevant some of them.  So do not worry about that, but if
        you are objecting to any of the evidence that the
        Defendants have put in, then my own feeling is that that
        ought to be dealt with sooner rather than later, because
        if there are documents that are going to disappear from
        the case, well, then it is better we know they are going
        to disappear sooner rather later.

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