Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day024.04 Last-Modified: 2000/07/24 Q. Very well. The first page, page 1 -- I am looking at the big numbers at the bottom -- the ausrottung des Prostesten . P-28 tismus? A. Your bundle, yes. Q. It is my little bundle, yes. This is 1900 ---- A. Yes. Q. -- published by some church body, and it is about the ausrotten des Prostesten tismus in Salzburg? A. Yes. Q. Obviously, they are not talking about liquidating all the Protestants, are they? A. I do not know, I mean, you know, in Germany in the 17th century, for instance, they had what they called religious wars and many people were actually ausgerot for religious reasons. So if you give me a chance to find out whether this is about the 30 year war. MR JUSTICE GRAY: It appears to be dated 1900. I do not know whether the Gothic script means it is older than that. A. It is written 1900, but is it not historical subject? MR JUSTICE GRAY: Mr Irving, if I may say so, I do not think we will get very much help out of that. A. I see. It is about the church history of the 18th century. Q. I am looking just at the use of the word, my Lord, and suggesting strongly that at this time they were not -- it is in close parallel to the phrase the ausrotten des Judentums? MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes. I follow the point you are making, but . P-29 can one not put it this way? Do you accept or not, I do not know, Dr Longerich, that you can use "ausrotten" to mean "rooting out". It depends on the context? A. I am not sure about "rooting out". I think the meaning here of "ausrotten" is to wipe out, to get completely rid of. Q. All right, wipe out? A. This applies not to -- I do not know, I mean, I am not familiar with the -- I mean, if you give me the time I will try to do my best to get familiar with the history of the churches, of a church in Salzburg in the 19th century, I am not sure whether they kill anybody or so. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Let us forget about ---- A. I think the term "ausrotten" applies to an organization which probably Protestentismus is here. It does not necessarily mean that everybody who belongs to this organization is going to be killed. You can also speak, I mean, today about "ausrotten" of criminality, for instance, if you mean, you know, that you get rid of this problem. But I think what is more important is that, you know, it is more tricky when it comes actually to the ausrotten of human beings, then I think the meaning is quite clear, as far I see it. MR IRVING: Can we now go to page 2 which is a 1935 Nazi reference to it, one which you have not adduced in your glossary. This is a speech by Rudolf Hess on May 14th. My . P-30 Lord, the translation is the final paragraph on that page. "National socialist legislation", the actual phrase which I am going to look at is "National Sozialische Deutschland des Judentums etwa richtiglos ausgerottet wurde". A. Where is that? Q. So there is a specific reference here to ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: Fourth line? A. Yes. MR IRVING: --- the fourth line of the German. Here you have: "National Socialist legislation has now introduced corrective measures against this overalienisation. I say 'corrective' because the proof that the Jews are not being ruthlessly ausgerottet", which I say is rooted out, "in National Socialist Germany, is that in Prussian alone 33,500 Jews were working in the manufacturing industry, 89,800 are engaged...", and so on. So he is talking clearly there about rooting out, is he not, not about liquidating because this is 1935, no one is killing Jews at that time, are they? A. I take your word that this is the authentical texts. I have not seen this document myself. I do not know the context. He is saying that the Judentum, which is probably the Jewry in this context, is not ausgerottet in 1935, which is perfectly true, I think. It is a preHolocaust document, I cannot see ---- Q. It is a Nuremberg document, is it not, if you look --- - . P-31 MR JUSTICE GRAY: But the point that is being put, Dr Longerich, is that "ausrotten" is being used there in a context which has nothing to do with extermination. That is the only point that is being put. MR IRVING: By a Nazi, in connection with the Jews? A. Yes, so it is not the Jews, it is the Judentum, the term "Judentum" means here, let us say ---- MR IRVING: The Jewish community? A. --- the Jewish community, the alleged social position of the Jews in Germany, their property, their wealth and so on. So I think that, and so far the term means not only human beings, a collective, but it also means more than that, and in this sense the Judentum was not ausgerottet, so that is.... Q. The next page, Dr Longerich, on page 3 is the English translation, but you can look at the German, if you wish, which is on page 5. This is on item that you yourself have adduced. This is Adolf Hitler's use of the word "ausrottung" in 1936. He is not talking about Jews, but it is the same word. He is talking about the need for an economic four-year plan. On page 3 he puts in this sentence: "A victory of Bolshevism over Germany would not lead to a Versaille Treaty, but to a final destruction, indeed the ausrottung of the German nation", "volk". Is Hitler saying that if the Bolsheviks succeed in war against Germany, they are going to exterminate the German . P-32 nation? A. I am sorry. Normally, I have more time to interpret documents than this one or two minutes. Q. This is one referred that you yourself have referred to though, is it not, in your glossary? A. So I just have to look at it because I quoted it myself in my own document, he goes then on and says after you stop here, "And if the ausrottung", he tries to explain what "ausrotten" means. In English, it says here that: "After a Bolshevik victory, the European states, including Germany, would experience the most terrible catastrophe for its people since humanity was affected by the extinguishing of the states of classical antiquity". So I think if you say, "Well, this will be worse than the end of the Roman Empire", this statement involves clearly that this will be done in a very, that this ausrottung will be done in very cruel manner, it will cost a lot of lives. I think this is implicit here in Hitler's words. Q. But "ausrottung" here cannot be equated to the word "extermination", can it? He is not saying, "If the Bolsheviks win in a future war, it will lead to the extermination of the German people", he is saying, "It will lead to the emasculation of the German people or the end of them as an important power in Europe"? A. I would not agree because when he makes this reference, "It is more terrible than the end of the Roman Empire, . P-33 the states", he says. Q. Yes. A. Then it is quite something. I mean, this is not just, you the Versaille Treaty, as he said. It is not just the collapse of the German Empire; it is much, much more. Q. Hunger, starvation and pestilence. A. In a way, I am trying not to speculate what Hitler thought in 1936 what is actually more terrible than the end of the Roman Empire. I think it is quite reasonable to assume that this kind of "ausrottung" would, as the end of the Roman Empire did, involve the killing of many, many people. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Can you just for my benefit translate quickly, if you would not mind, the immediately following words, where he talks about what a catastrophe that would be? MR IRVING: "The extent of such a catastrophe cannot be really imagined". MR JUSTICE GRAY: Next sentence? MR IRVING: "How the densely populated west of Europe, including German, would survive after a Bolshevik collapse, it would experience probably the most awful national catastrophe since the extinction of the antique states -- since the" -- it is a complicated sentence. MR JUSTICE GRAY: It is a complicated sentence, but, Dr Longerich, it is all pretty apocalyptic stuff, is it . P-34 not, that he is ---- A. Yes. Exactly, and I think I translate it a little bit more, I said, "The most terrible catastrophe", "grauenhaft", I think is the word "terror" in it, and so it is ---- MR IRVING: "Awesome"? A. I think it is more than that. Q. Can I just ask you briefly about this document. This is, of course, a document dictated by Adolf Hitler to his private secretary, is it not? It is not a speech. He is choosing his words carefully. A. Yes. I do not know whether he dictated this to his private secretary. It is a document he provided for Goring. It is an instruction for Goring to carry on with ---- Q. Well, I know because Christa Schroeder told me he dictated it to her. A. I am trying to explain this to the court. It is the document which actually says that Germany should be able within four years to fight the next war. So it is an instruction for Goring. But I think if we go -- no, I cannot read more than that in this document. MR JUSTICE GRAY: We have your answer about that document anyway. MR IRVING: Yes. Page 6, again we are still in 1936, but collection of documents published obviously by anti-Nazis . P-35 now about the expropriation, the humiliation and the vernichtung of the Jews in Germany ---- A. Yes. Q. --- since the government of Adolf Hitler. This time it is the word "vernichtung". A. Yes. Q. 1936, of course, the Jews as such had not been vernichtet, had they, and yet this is a history of the destruction of the Jews? A. I have to make here a general observation. I just have to trust that this is all, you know, this is original. Q. I have the original documents here. A. And I always prefer to look at documents in the appropriate context, but, of course, it is possible that somebody in '36, and I think these are the Jews who emigrated from Germany, would use the term "vernichtung" in a sense that, you know, "vernichtung" there, you would use it in the sense that he would not refer to the actual killing of the Jews because the actual killing, as we know, did happen later on. So I do not think how this document can help us to interpret or to put the Nazi terminology into the historical context. Q. Yes, I agree. It is a low grade document. It is outside Germany but there is the phrase "vernichtung der Juden" in 1936. A. Yes, and who actually published it, do you know that? . P-36 MR JUSTICE GRAY: Let us move on. It is a low grade document. MR IRVING: The next one is high grade. It is page 7, Walter Hewel? A. Yes. Q. Walter Hewel was a diplomat on Hitler's staff. He was the liaison officer, von Ribbentrop, was he not? A. Yes. Q. H-E-W-E-L? A. Yes. Q. And he wrote a memorandum on the conference between Hitler and this Czech State president Hacha -- H-A-C-H-A -- on March 15th 1939, which is in the official published volumes, is it not, ADAP? A. Well, again I cannot recall the document. I just trust that this is correct what you are saying. I do not have the ADAP with me and I do not have ---- Q. Well, if this is a fig quotation, no doubt, I will be shot down in due course by the Defence. The phrase in German is [German - document not provided] which I will translate as "If in the a autumn of the last year, 1938, Czechoslovakia had not given in, then the Czech volk would have been ausgerottet? A. Yes. Q. What is Hitler saying there? A. Well... Q. Is it important, do you think, this use of the word here? . P-37 MR RAMPTON: Do let him answer. One question at a time.
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