© Copyright 1993, H. David Kirk

[Continued]

Why Clean up Hitler?

While Professor Jäckel's essays addressed Irving's fantasy about Hitler's guiltlessness in the murder of Europe's Jews, he did not raise the question of what Irving's attempt to disinfect Hitler, if successful, would do for the neo-Nazi movement. A clue to the potential utility of such a cleanup appeared in an article by Martin Broszat [12] He said that a majority of the German people had enthusiastically identified themselves not with men like Himrnler, Bormann and Heydrich, nor with the Nazi party, but with Hitler. Thus it was the "Fuehrer" on whose posthumous stature the neo- Nazi movement could bank for a possible political come-back. But the demon in Hitler's reputation would have to be exorcized if the figure of the Fuehrer were to serve a new political purpose. That is what Irving seems to have been doing.

Revisionist Incest

That people who keep regular company would also share outlook and ideas is hardly surprising. But in the case of "revisionist" history and neo-Nazi ideology, that affinity calls for special attention. If Irving's cleanup of Hitler is useful to the neo-Nazi movement's political ambitions, in what sense is the neo-Nazi movement useful to Irving? One need only inspect the range of the man's books to find a possible clue.

In his 1960s books, such as The Destruction of Dresden and The Virus House, Irving judged "even-handedly" Allied and Nazi war guilt, equating the two combatants as "war criminals." It was a very attractive message for the likes of Zundel, Butz[13] and Faurisson. Their world-wide distribution networks enabled Irving to gain attention far beyond what his publishers alone have been able to do for him.

Having become a valued client, Irving shaped his later books, such as Hitler's War and Goering with even more partisan messages. He now feels free to back charlatans like the self-styled "gas chamber expert" Leuchter, who denies that at Auschwitz Jews were gassed with prussic acid ( Cyclon B). Thus Irving has put himself squarely in the neo- Nazi camp. Whatever Irving may once have been, and whatever he may once have wanted his books to say, he has now become the willing darling of neo-Nazi interests. And as his deal with The Sunday Times of London has shown, even that unvarnished bias does not seem to militate against Irving's drawing considerable profit from it.

[Continued]

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