Ulrich von Hassell - 15 May 1943 diary entry claiming 100,000 Jews gassed in Poland

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Ulrich von Hassell - 15 May 1943 diary entry claiming 100,000 Jews gassed in Poland

Postby Lamprecht » 3 years 3 months ago (Sat Feb 22, 2020 3:24 am)

German diplomat Ulrich von Hassell supposedly wrote on 15 May 1943 in his diary:
"Shocking reports come in from the good [Max] Fraunendorfer [administrator in the General Government] in Poland. While [Hans] Frank publicly declares he wanted to give Poland a dignified and free existence, and while the gang tries in vain to befuddle world opinion about [better 'with'] the Katyn murders, the SS in Poland carries on most shamefully. Countless Jews have been gassed in specially built chambers, at least 100,000. [...] Meanwhile the unhappy remnants of the Jews [in Warsaw] prepared to defend themselves, and there is heavy fighting which will certainly lead to their complete extermination by the SS."
- The von Hassell Diaries (London, 1948), p. 272
This quote can be found in a republished version on Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=HSHOA ... 22&f=false

The German:
"Erschütternde Berichte des braven Frauendorfer aus Polen, während Frank öffentlich erklärt, man wolle Polen ein menschenwürdiges freies Dasein geben und während man - vergeblich - die Welt durch Katyan abzulenken sucht, haust die SS in Polen weiter in unvorstellbar beschämendster Weise. Unzählige Juden werden in besonders gebauten Hallen vergast, jedenfalls 100 000.[...] Iinzwischen setzte sich der unglücklich Judenrest in Warschau zur Wehr, und es kam zu schweren Kämpfen, die Wohl zur völligen Ausrottung durch die SS führen werden."
- Vom anderen Deutschland. Aus den nachgelassenen Tagebüchern 1938-1944 (Zürich, 1947), p. 314

Ulrich von Hassell was deeply involved in the anti-Hitler resistance movement. He was sentenced to death on 8 September 1944 as a result of his involvement in the 20 July plot to kill Hitler, along with supposedly 5,000 or so others. So von Hassell did not survive the war. I am not sure where his diaries were kept or who found them, the Google Books link has the first 130 or so pages removed.

The diaries were first published in English in 1947, so someone was quite hurried to do it. This passage is used as evidence that many German officials knew that there were gassings of Jews. I guess it's possible that it was tampered with, but that is not necessary to explain what we see here.

Assuming that this entry is genuine, all we have is hearsay, a rumor. By mid-1943 there were many "Shocking reports" about homicidal gas chambers and many other things all over the English-language press. Australia has a large collection of newspapers digitized, you can search yourself and see all sorts of reports: https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/

British reactions

On 27 August 1943, just a few months after von Hassell's diary entry, the chairman of the Britain's Joint Intelligence Committee, Victor Cavendish-Bentinck, commented:
"The Poles, and to a far greater extent the Jews, tend to exaggerate German atrocities in order to stoke us up... These mass executions in gas chambers remind me of the story of employment of human corpses during the last war for the manufacture of fat, which was a grotesque lie and led to the true stories of German enormities being brushed aside as being mere propaganda."

Another Foreign Office official, Roger Allen, noted (17th July, 1943):
"It is true that there have been references to the use or gas chambers in other reports; but these references have usually, if not always, been equally vague, and since they have concerned the extermination of Jews, have usually emanated from Jewish sources... These stories may or may not be true, but in any event I submit we are putting out a statement on evidence which is far from conclusive..."

These two telegrams are on Irving's site here: http://archive.is/tmuK0

At the suggestion of the British government, it was therefore agreed to delete the reference to gas chambers from a joint Allied declaration on German atrocities in Poland that was issued later that year by Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin. (B. Wasserstein, 1979, "Britain and the Jews of Europe, 1939–1945", pp. 295–96)

Conclusion

This diary entry does not prove much of anything beyond that von Hassell's got hold of one of the many widely circulating atrocity reports. Von Hassell was against Hitler's rule and wanted him overthrown, supposedly wrote in his diary that he read a "Shocking report" of 100,000 Jews being gassed. There were many of these reports at the time, gas chamber atrocity propaganda was all over the English-language press along with electrocution chambers and all sorts of absurdities. This is nothing but hearsay, he did not claim to have witnessed a gassing at all. Besides, the official "holocaust" story claims that a million or more Jews were actually gassed by this time. So it wouldn't be referring to any German government report (plus, we see no such report).
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance -- that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
— Herbert Spencer


NOTE: I am taking a leave of absence from revisionism to focus on other things. At this point, the ball is in their court to show the alleged massive pits full of human remains at the so-called "extermination camps." After 8 decades they still refuse to do this. I wonder why...

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Re: Ulrich von Hassell - 15 May 1943 diary entry claiming 100,000 Jews gassed in Poland

Postby Lamprecht » 3 years 3 months ago (Sat Feb 22, 2020 4:20 am)

Some examples of reports of gassings from BEFORE this diary entry in the mainstream [Australian] news (from: https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/)

25 Jun 1942, The Daily News (Perth, WA) p. 10:
"700,00 Polish Jews slaughtered ... by the Germans in 'the greatest massacre in world history' So states a report which has been smuggled from Poland to a Jewish representative on London's Polish National Council... In Chelmno from November to March, 5000 people from four towns and 35,000 from the Lodz ghetto were killed in vans fitted as gas chambers"

22 Jul 1942, The Courier-Mail (Brisbane, Qld) p. 2:
"Germans aim to destroy Poland... Since the beginning of the war 100,000 Polish citizens— Poles and Jews — have been killed... Compulsion to dig their own graves, mowing down with machine guns and hand grenades, and even poisoning with gas are the daily methods of exterminating the Jewish population."

12 Oct 1942, Gippsland Times (Vic) p. 2:
"Savage treatment of Poles... Among the other experiments being tried on the prisoners is the use of poison gas... September 5th to 6th last year about a thousand people were driven down to the underground shelter in Oswiecim [Auschwitz] ... the living bodies were simply forced in, regardless of broken bones. When the shelter was full gas was injected into it, and all the prisoners died during the night."

22 Oct 1942, The Hebrew Standard of Australasia (Sydney, NSW) p. 7:
"Death in the gas chamber. Gruesome story from Poland..."

30 Dec 1942, The Evening Advocate (Innisfail, Qld) p. 2:
"Polish Jews seek death. Jews herded into Polish concentration camps, knowing they are to be massacred, bribe the guards to shoot them... Polish Government in London... report says that most of the executions were carried out at special murder camps... At Belzec an electrocution camp was established... The condemned are carried off to execution camps at Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor."

21 Apr 1943, The Northern Champion (Taree, NSW) p. 4:
"Exterminating Jews. Record of Nazi atrocities... eye witnesses have confirmed reports that concrete buildings, on the former Russian frontiers, are used by the Germans as gas chambers in which thousands of Jews have been put to death."

Von Hassell writing that he believed some of this atrocity propaganda in a report is not evidence of anything except maybe his gullibility, or perhaps confirmation bias. A recent thread with a related topic is here:

German reactions to Allied propaganda on the Holocaust
viewtopic.php?t=13110
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance -- that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
— Herbert Spencer


NOTE: I am taking a leave of absence from revisionism to focus on other things. At this point, the ball is in their court to show the alleged massive pits full of human remains at the so-called "extermination camps." After 8 decades they still refuse to do this. I wonder why...

Otium

Re: Ulrich von Hassell - 15 May 1943 diary entry claiming 100,000 Jews gassed in Poland

Postby Otium » 3 years 3 months ago (Sat Feb 22, 2020 5:35 am)

I couldn't agree more. A very accurate assessment I think Lamprecht.

We cannot forget, Hitler himself had been subject to such propaganda too.

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Hans Frank confronts Hitler regarding Extermination Rumours:

The rumor, however, that the Jews were being killed in the manner which is now known to the entire world would not be silenced. When I expressed the wish to visit the SS workshop near Lublin, in order to get some idea of the value of the work that was being done, I was told that special permission from Heinrich Himmler was required.

I asked Heinrich Himmler for this special permission. He said that he would urge me not to go to the camp. Again some time passed. On 7 February 1944 I succeeded in being received by Adolf Hitler personally-I might add that throughout the war he received me three times only. In the presence of Bormann I put the question to him: "My Fuehrer, rumors about the extermination of the Jews will not be silenced. They are heard everywhere. No one is allowed in anywhere. Once I paid a surprise visit to Auschwitz in order to see the camp, but I was told that there was an epidemic in the camp and my car was diverted before I got there. Tell me, My Fuehrer, is there anything in it? "The Fuehrer said, "You can very well imagine that there are executions going on-of insurgents. Apart from that I do not know anything. Why don't you speak to Heinrich Himmler about it?" And I said. "Well, Himmler made a speech to us in Krakow and declared in front of all the people whom I had officially called to the meeting that these rumors about the systematic extermination of the Jews were false; the Jews were merely being brought to the East." Thereupon the Fuehrer said, "Then you must believe that."

Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20170428180020/http://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/04-18-46.asp

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Re: Ulrich von Hassell - 15 May 1943 diary entry claiming 100,000 Jews gassed in Poland

Postby Hannover » 3 years 3 months ago (Sat Feb 22, 2020 10:58 am)

How convenient.

A dead man who was not around to verify the alleged entry.

An alleged a "diary" entry where we do not see the actual diary nor the alleged entry.

An alleged "diary" entry which supposedly mentions gassings which, as we know, were scientifically impossible as alleged.

Then there is the complete lack of human remains which would necessarily exist if the 'reports' were true.

Remember, none of the conspirators against Hitler ever mentioned 'holocaust' like actions as the reason for their attempted assassination & coup.

This alleged diary entry is another case of contrived misinformation.

- Hannover

"Only lies require censorship."
If it can't happen as alleged, then it didn't.


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