BroncoBuff wrote:Brand new to this Board - briefly my perspective: I think the Holocaust happened mostly the way popular history has recorded it, though I do understand the truism "the victors write the history books," and how that dynamic very likely resulted in exaggeration and overstatement. I believe the Jews have not been shy about playing the issue for all it's worth, and Israel (and especially Netanyahu) have played that victim card as justification for extraneous criminal treatment and bullying of neighbors.
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That said, my input: I've been a criminal defense attorney for most of the past 25 years, and I have a thorough if not comprehensive appreciation for the motivations and impulses of defendants on trial for crimes.
In my cursory research of the Nuremberg Trials, at least of the most serious tier of 24 defendants, I found those defendants had either 1) pleaded for mercy, 2) claimed un-involvement, or most often, 3) claimed they were merely "following orders," and that their superiors, from Heydrich on down, would have executed them had they refused.
This is a real problem for Holocaust deniers or Third Reich revisionists: When faced with criminal charges that could well result in a sentence of death and summary execution, none of them claimed "it was all a hoax." No defendants went on record claiming it was all a fiction concocted by the allies, and none of it happened. I recall two or three mentions that certain of the Jews (those the particular defendant was in charge of), were treated "well" (comparatively) because they were useful for manufacturing.
In my fairly extensive experience, I promise you people will say damn near anything to avoid even 30 days in jail, much less death.
Moreover, none of those who were convicted, served sentences and were later released, have gone on record that the Holocaust was a hoax. Albert Speer and Karl Donitz have written books on the Reich and the War, but neither made a claim of hoax, even decades later when such claims would no longer have put their lives in peril.
I cannot believe this line of reasoning has never been broached, please tell me how it's countered. I am not opposed to the idea it was a hoax, or did not occur as widely believed.
You're so wrong it's not even funny.
Prisoners would also say damn near anything when tortured. Rudolf Hoess is the prime example of this (see my post on the torture
https://forum.codoh.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=9066&p=92512#p92512).
If any National Socialists were to outright deny instead of play dumb then it might've lead to brutalities against them. Seeing their fellow comrades admit to things that were untrue and brought forth by brutal means when not in a position to know themselves would not lead them to definitive answers one way or the other. If you're suggesting those who were in a position to know, knew but denied their knowledge then it is simply on you to prove that this is the case. More than that, it is you who must prove
what the Holocaust is, how it was done and by what means. Simply declaring it's reality through a lack of statements by the defendants isn't going to make your horror stories of Holocoasters, Electric conveyor belts, Lampshades, burning baby pits, Jewish soap, poisoned dog teeth, electric wank machines of imminent death real. Nor will Simon Rozenkier's stories of hunchback tortue and sterilising X-Rays become legitimate. Moshe Peer who claimed to have been gassed six times and survived will not be real, William Lowenbergs magic third quenching pebble, Yankel Wiernik's tales of women leaping 10 feat into the air, giant outdoor hibachis, or Morris Hubert's claim of surviving bear cage torture every day at Buchenwald. It's all rubbish and nobody with any sense would take the Holocaust as it is based on eyewitness testimony seriously
https://web.archive.org/web/20190101011316/http://balder.org/judea/The-Most-Fantastic-Holocaust-Survivor-Stories-Jewish-Soap-Lampshades-Fertilizer-Mengele-Miracles.phpRibbentrop's memoirs are also quite interesting. He was a man doomed to execution, no chance of escape and yet he denied the slightest possibility that Hitler, the man himself, knew anything about any kind of killing. Granted Ribbentrop seems to have bought the idea that killing was done, but to what degree and how is left unanswered.
For the sections I'm quoting see
https://web.archive.org/web/20181101142651/https://www.stormfront.org/forum/t837409/ and for the full memoirs see
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.183521From the moment I joined the N.S.D.A.P. I tried to bring about a revision of its anti-Semitic principles, or, at least, to have the Jewish problem solved by way of evolution through a 'numerus clausus'. I also though there was a possibility that my hope for more tolerance would come true.
Germany undoubtedly had a Jewish problem even before 1933. Jews had gained considerable influence in many sectors of the life of the nation. They were almost predominant in German cultural life, the Press, the cinema, the stage and especially business and finance. A well-known Frankfurt Jew and family friend of ours of long standing frequently spoke to me about this at the time full of anxiety. He was worried lest the conduct of certain German and immigrant Jews should lead to serious conflict sooner or later.
After the promulgation of the Nuremberg Laws in September, 1935, I had a long detailed talk with the Führer about the Jewish question. It was soon after the conclusion of the Naval Agreement with Britain; the Führer had great confidence in me, and I therefore pointed out the repercussions these Laws would have abroad. His reply seemed to me to indicate that the new legislation was intended to be the concluding measure, and that the Jews, while very much restricted in their scope, would retain an altogether fair chance of Hitler and of Party headquarters up to 1936, when I left for London, appeared to be not unfavourable to the emergence of quite toleration.
When in 1938 I returned to Berlin as Foreign Minister I found an entirely new situation. The reaction of world Jewry, especially in the U.S.A., to the Nuremberg Laws had been strong, and the result had been the sharpest attacks on National Socialist Germany, especially in the foreign Press. This in turn had made the Führer much harder. The vicious circle had begun.
Following the murder by the Jew Grunspan of Legation Counsellor vom Rath in our Paris Embassy, the well-known excesses against Jews occurred in November, 1938. As soon as I heard of them I went to the Obersalzberg and told Hitler of the serious effect such illegal anti-Semitic measures were bound to have on our own German people, and the inevitable political consequences. Hitler replied in deadly earnest that it was not always possible to determine the course of events as one liked, and that everything would return to its normal course. I had the impression that Hitler himself was surprised by the extent of the reaction.
During the winter of 1938 to 1939 I repeatedly made vain representations to the Führer in favour of a complete return to the situation as it existed before the excesses. I submitted to him a plan which provided for the voluntary emigration of Jews with permission to take with them part of their property. In fact many Jews did emigrate at that time, although other countries, including the U.S.A., made the immigration of German Jews very difficult.
After the outbreak of hostilities the propaganda war between National Socialist Germany and international Jewry became increasingly bitter; this made Hitler even more inflexible and it became more and more difficult to talk to him about the Jewish question. In spite of this I indicated to him the great disadvantages from the point of view of foreign policy of the anti-Jewish policy on several occasions. American propaganda, and even that of some neutral governments, made great play with the Jewish question and made things very difficult for us. Most of this propaganda originated in the Anglo-American world. I always told Hitler that the enmity of world Jewry appeared unnecessary, and that it was tantamount to having an additional great power as an enemy.
However, Hitler's conviction that world Jewry had systematically prepared the war against Germany and was in the end responsible for its outbreak became more and more deeply rooted. In his view, the desired comprehensive settlement with Britain had been foiled by the Jews alone, in that country and in America. Moreover, before and after the outbreak of the Russian war, Hitler believed that international Jewry was also responsible for the communist threat in the East, and that it had compelled Stalin to decide first to defeat Germany by an attack from East and West and then to bolshevize her.
I repeatedly advanced my contrary opinion: I was convinced that the war had been caused by Britain's hostility to German aspirations. While Jewish influence may have contributed, it had not been the primary cause. On the contrary this lay in the anxiety of British imperialists to preserve the balance of power in Europe. When discussing these questions with Hitler I recalled that in the era of Napoleon, when the Jews exerted no appreciable influence in England (the Rothschilds only rose to eminence after Waterloo), the English nevertheless fought an embittered war against the French Emperor; and later, Britain had proclaimed the Emperor Wilhelm II as her enemy, although he was a friend of the German Jews.
Hitler was immovable and always replied that I did not understand this issue. He remained convinced that the war had been brought about by the Jews of England and France, and especially of the U.S.A. American Jews, who exercised almost complete domination over the American Press, had systematically prepared for war and driven Roosevelt into his anti-German attitude. My proposal for a change in our Jewish policy were rejected.
After the victory over Poland and France Hitler gave Himmler jurisdiction over the Jews in occupied Europe. I was only informed late and incompletely about his actions for the resettlement in the East, first of German Jews, and then of the Jews in the occupied territories. As late as 1944, the Terezein (Theresienstadt) camp, for instance, was still open to inspection by representatives of the International Red Cross. Since the Foreign Office acted as the intermediary, I received a report which described conditions as satisfactory. I heard no details, and certainly not about other camps, because the Führer had given authority over these exclusively to the Reichsführer S.S. (Himmler.) The Foreign Office was told that these matters of domestic administration, and it was thereby expressly excluded from concerning itself with Jewish questions.
When in 1943 I submitted to the Führer a memorandum with proposals for a change in our ecclesiastical and Jewish policies, Hitler replied that he thoroughly disagreed with me on all matters. Nor did a subsequent talk, which was conducted in a comparatively calm atmosphere, yield any positive result. Hitler said: 'You understand foreign policy; the Jewish question you do not understand. This question is best understood by Goebbels. The Foreign Office can do nothing; it is not its business.' I nevertheless advanced every possible argument to prove how our situation, which had become so much more difficult through the worsening of the war, could be eased by an ideological peace. Hitler replied: 'That is naïve. This is an ideological war between the Jewish-bolshevist world and the world of nations, and it cannot be won in the field of diplomacy; arms must decide.'
The Foreign Office could only try to oppose the adoption of extreme anti-Jewish measures, and it was often able to exert a calming influence. Hitler, personally, gave few instructions to the Foreign Office on the Jewish question, and those which he did send were generally concerned with representations to friendly governments, asking that more attention should be paid to the Jewish question, and that Jews should be removed form important posts. But this, too, always led to unpleasantness without allies. Thus the Führer once sent me a message to the effect that a big Jewish espionage and sabotage organization had been discovered in Italian-occupied France, and instructed me to make serious representations to Mussolini. In our diplomatic work in neutral states it became increasingly apparent that the Jews were working against us there.
In 1944, Hitler spoke even more of his conflict with Jewry and he became fanatically obstinate. But never, down to 22nd April, 1945 when I last saw him in the Reich Chancellery, did he ever mention the killing of Jews. That is why even to-day I cannot believe that the Führer ordered these killings; I believe that Himmler presented him with accomplished facts.
Goering also backs up what Ribbentrop had written in his memoirs.
With icy composure Goering cast doubts upon ail the documents and all the testimony connected with the subject. He would not venture, he said. to describe them as wholly false, but he did take into account the possibility that they might well be inconclusive or incomplete; in any case they were far too much at variance with everything he knew to be accepted. And cven if the events described by the Prosecution had taken place, he did not believe Hitler had given the order; it was more likely to have been Himmler. - Hans Fritzsche, The Sword in the Scales, London, 1953, pp.145
Goering is notorious for believing that the alleged extermination of the Jews was an allied myth. He even said that in Nuremberg it was the first time he was ever hearing of it (again see
https://web.archive.org/web/20181101142651/https://www.stormfront.org/forum/t837409/In Chapter 7 of Fritzche's book, he talks about documents and the claims against the 21 defendants. It's quite clear that rather than believing it to be true they had no clue as to what was going on. They wanted to look through documents, but weren't granted a great deal. They weren't allowed to have meetings among themselves to discuss or cover documents for a defense,
Each of us engaged in a feverish survey of documentary evidence which was itself often anything but easy to obtain. Sauckel wanted the text of the instructions he had issued concerning the treatment of foreign workers; a year ago these instructions were to be found all over Germany, now they seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth. Streicher enquired for documents relating to a certain hostile threat to destroy, not the German Government, but the German people; they had been published in America by a Dr. Kaufmann-but how to lay hands on them in the present nruddle ? In pracl.ice there were only three sources of information at our disposal: the documents belonging to the Prosecution, which were naturally biassed; a complete set of the south German edition of the Völkischer Beobachter, which contained comprehensive references to much important evidence; and the library of Erlangen University, which would certainly not have been of great use for our purpose - Hans Fritzsche, The Sword in the Scales, London, 1953, pp.136-137
they simply thought it was utterly useless to try and defend their own innocence because to them the mind of the public and prosecutors had been made up.
For the Prosecution at this time it seemed sufficient that the atrocities had been committed. Who was specifically responsible for the orders or for the actual deeds either came second in their estimation or simply did not interest them. No matter how slight the connection between such an occurrence and any of the prisoners the shadow of disgrace invariably fell on all twenty-one of us; and under its cover various false assertions--such as for instance that there had been a generally prevailing and virulent anti-semitism in Germany found an all too ready acceptance. No one ventured to dispute such charges; we were too conscious of the horror of that monstrous campaign of extermination. To all outward seeming the matter was closed.
Among ourselves, however, the questions persisted: Who was involved? How was it carried out? Were such atrocious actions the outcome of strong anti-semitic feeling? What had we overlooked? Where did we arrive at wrong conclusions? What were our sins of omission? Some, for example Frick, based their defence on the plea that they knew nothing about the whole business. They were not indifferent to the immeasurable human suffering revealed at each state of the evidence; but, first and foremost they wanted to keep out of it--it was not their affair.. Others, like Seyss-Inquart, had more imagination and endured the ghastly statements of the witnesses with new and agonising life. They bowed their heads in shame and declared that it was useless to protest their own ignorance and innocence; that could be left to future historians . The present generation would never believe that any leader of the Third Reich could be unaware of the Birkenau gas chambers and the activities of the "special squads".
Others again persisted for a considerable time in doubting the authenticity of the evidence, even when this was no longer rationally possible. And a few, such as Dr. Frank, accused themselves of having through sheer indifference been content to know only half the truth, without attempting to draw the obvious conclusions from the information at their disposal.[/u][/b] Kaltenbrunner became unusually talkative at this time and assured us that he could confirm the statements about the mass murders because he himself had put a stop to them. When I asked him why, knowing these things, he had described the general accusation as absurd his answer was that the actual perpetrators were now dead. - Hans Fritzsche, The Sword in the Scales, London, 1953, pp.137-139
Reading this far you really feel how utterly confused these men were. And it's abundantly clear that they knew nothing, and to them anyone who did was already dead. They themselves seem to have the demeanor of discovering these facts for the first time with varying degrees of skepticism and not simply outright denying it because in actuality none of these men are in positions to know anything. They're bewildered by it all.
For the first time an atmosphere of profound mutual mistrust grew up among the prisoners, and though it did not have much chance to develop in the artificial little community, each of us wondered in his own mind whether, after all, his neighbour knew more than he cared to admit. Some of us, nevertheless, got together and collected every scrap of available material and then, item by item,
checked the hideous account. Five million persons were stated to have been murdered. Was such a thing technically possible ? The capacity of the corpse-factories described by Hciss did not seem sufficient. Where were these five million-mostly Jews Supposed to have come from? Not from Germany, where in 1939 they numbered scarcely half a million. But when we got hold of information about the Jewish population of the occupied eastern territories, we saw that the numbers might tally if none had emigrated and none survived. But how had it been possible to conceal this monstrous crime from the public ? At this point every attempt at explanation failed' The majority of the twenty-one prisoners were faced with the task of explaining to the court-or rather, to the world how it was feasible that in a modern state hundreds of thousands of people could be killed without its corning to the ears of the man in the street, or to the knowledge of all members of the government and others in high places. Those who had the best right to say that such a thing was possible, and had induced happened, were the least able to prove it.--Thus for the first time we saw the road leading from the Germany that we knew to the Germany which had been hidden from many of us. - Hans Fritzsche, The Sword in the Scales, London, 1953, pp.139,142
Whatever the nature of the 'massacres' as Fritsche describes them, he makes plain on pages 140-143 that the defendants including himself took the statements of the SS Judges Reinicke and Morgen seriously. On these pages he describes the statements made, and trots out the now defunct idea that Gas came out of shower heads. And in-fact it was the National Socialists themselves who looked into and stopped the supposed massacres.
It is open to doubt whether the Prosecution took much account of Morgen's statements; but for most of us they were conclusive. It was only after he appeared on the scene that I personally felt that in protesting my ignorance of these massacres, I was not offending against all the laws of human reason - Hans Fritzsche, The Sword in the Scales, London, 1953, pp.142-143
This shows us that rather than having foreknowledge, the defendants were themselves convinced of the lie.
It was certainly proved beyond dispute that the butchery came to an end in the autumn of 1944 and that-however unlikely it may appear-the Jews were from that moment under the special protection of the Chancellor's S.S. - Hans Fritzsche, The Sword in the Scales, London, 1953, pp.143
Interesting that Hitler's SS would put protection over the Jews isn't it? You see, Hitler also got word of these supposed brutalities. Hans Frank himself took his concerns to Hitler.
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." https://web.archive.org/web/20170428180020/http://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/04-18-46.asp
There is no more eloquent testimony to the tragedy and tyranny of Nuremberg than the pathetic astonishment or outraged disbelief of the accused persons themselves at the grotesque charges made against them. Such is reflected in the affidavit of S.S. Major-General Heinz Fanslau, who visited most of the German concentration camps during the last years of the war. Although a front line soldier of the Waffen S.S., Fanslau had taken a great interest in concentration camp conditions, and he was selected as a prime target by the Allies for the charge of conspiracy to annihilate the Jews. It was argued, on the basis of his many contacts, that he must have been fully involved. When it was first rumoured that he would be tried and convicted, hundreds of affidavits were produced on his behalf by camp inmates he had visited. When he read the full scope of the indictment against the concentration camp personnel in supplementary Nuremberg Trial No. 4 on May 6th, 1947, Fanslau declared in disbelief: "This cannot be possible, because I, too, would have had to know something about it."
Source:
https://www.ihr.org/books/harwood/dsmrd04.htmlHave you noticed the theme? Hitler has no idea, even when broached about it at the time of it's supposed occurrence. After the war the men closest to Hitler all say that without a doubt it's more likely to be Himmler and not Hitler. These men at nuremberg know nothing and have been finding out what charges lay against them as they happen. There's no proof here that i've seen which makes the holocaust legitimate. Nothing at all.
