Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day022.09 Last-Modified: 2000/07/24 MR RAMPTON: I believe the evidence of Mr Irving was in cross-examination that this error was pointed out to him some time in the early 1980s, I think by Eberhard Jaeckel, but I am not sure.---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: I am afraid I had forgotten that. . P-75 MR RAMPTON: Which is why he retranscribed it in the typewritten version that we have in J3 at page 13 -- sorry, J1, tab 3, page 13. I think his evidence was that he retranscribed the word "haben" from "Juden" on a typewriter which I think he said he had thrown away over 15 or 20 years ago. MR JUSTICE GRAY: So, mid 80s? MR RAMPTON: Yes, I think it is early to mid 80s. I am open to correction. That was done entirely from memory, but I think that is what the evidence was about it. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Can you remember, Mr Irving, as a matter of ---- MR IRVING: Well, unfortunately, the mid 80s would be a crucial date because mid 80s is when the second edition went to press. MR JUSTICE GRAY: What, the 1991 edition? It could not have been six years, could it? MR IRVING: Books of this size are in the gestation period a long time, and I sent it off to be edited down and cut down and trimmed, and the first edition was 1975. MR JUSTICE GRAY: '77. MR IRVING: Well, the German edition was 1975, my Lord. 1977 was the first English edition which means that it was actually finished in 1974. So it is not an easy kind of question to answer, that. So I think that is why it is more sensible to look at Goebbels and say it is quite . P-76 simply ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: Well, it has gone from Goebbels. MR IRVING: It has gone from Goebbels ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: --- and everybody accepts that. MR IRVING: --- so the appropriate action was taken. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes? A.I do not accept that, Mr Irving. I would need to know exactly when you -- when this was pointed out to you. Q.You do not accept that it went from Goebbels. A.No, no. I do not accept that the appropriate action was taken as soon as it was pointed to you, but in any case that is not really what we are talking about. The point is that it was in your books in the first place. Q.Yes, so to summarize your evidence, your evidence is that the reading of "haben" in old German handwriting as "Juden" was a totally perverse and deliberate action I took in order to exonerate Adolf Hitler? A.Yes. Q.And that, in your opinion, therefore, even when you are confronted with the original faded photocopy that I had before me, and not the printed volume that scholars now use, this was not a permissible misreading? A.No, I think anybody who reads the German handwriting and approaches this with any degree of objectivity can see that it says "Verwaltungsfuhrer der SS haben zu bleiben". Q.This kind of handwriting is pretty easy to read, is it? I . P-77 mean, any historian can read it? MR JUSTICE GRAY: Have we not really had that questioned asked and answered? MR IRVING: Well, I was going to ask one obvious follow up, and that is if it so easy to read, why was it not until I used it that it was ever used? A.I do not dispute the fact that you were the first person to read a number of documents. The point is, Mr Irving, the misuse you make of them when you do read them. Q.Is your contention that that was a sufficiently important sentence in that paragraph that its removal makes no difference to the thrust of my arguments? A.I think you have that sentence the wrong way round. Q.In other words that ---- A.Could you remind me of the page again? I foolishly shut the book. Q.Let us move on. We will move on then, for heaven's sake. A.I think its removal does weaken the paragraph, yes. Q.Will you turn to page 357 of your expert report, please? A.Do I need this bundle still? Sorry, let me just clear the decks again. Q.You are accusing me of further ---- A.Have we finished with this? Well, I will keep that. Q.No, you will not, I will have it. It is mine. A.You have it back, yes. Q.Professor Evans, you accused me of further . P-78 misrepresentations and omissions in connection with the Bruns Report and the subsequent events. Page 357 of your report. A.Yes. Yes. Q.The specific omission you accuse me of is not making use of or not referring to a document, a letter, written by, if you look at page 359, paragraph 6, a man called Schulz-Du Bois? A.No. Q.You do. You say: "However, he makes no mention of the letter's contents"? A.That is not the specific -- I mean, I make a number of points about this, but that is one of them, yes. Q.One objection you make to my use of the Bruns document is that I rely on the fact that after these German Army officers saw what was going on, the SS shooting Jews on that morning November, 30th 1941, they discussed among themselves who was going to bring it to Hitler's attention, is that right? A.Where is that? Q.According to General Bruns? I am telling you what is in the report. A.Right. Can you just point me to the paragraph and where I say that? Q.I am telling you what is in the report and we have had this evidence before the court. . P-79 A.In my report? Q.In the report by General (as he became) Bruns. A.I am looking in my report for where I make this allegation. Q.Paragraph 1 on page 357 is your reference to it. A.Yes. Q."Irving relies on Walter Bruns as the source for his claim that a report about the killings in Riga eventually reached Hitler's headquarters". Does that refresh your memory? A.Yes. It quotes: "Hitler seemingly intervened at once to order a halt to 'diese Massenerschiessungen' (these mass shootings)" ---- Q.Can we take this stage by stage? A.--- "as soon as a report, signed by a junior officer, was forwarded to him". Q.Will you be responsive to the questions I am asking? A.That is what you say. Q.Have you read the Bruns Report? A.Yes. Q.Does the Bruns Report describe how the Army officers who witnessed these atrocities discussed among themselves how to bring it to Hitler's attention? A.Yes. Do we have a copy of that? MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes, we must look at it. A.We must look at it, yes. . P-80 MR RAMPTON: It is a very bad copy, I am afraid. It is J1, tab 4, my Lord. It is very difficult to read. A.Do we have a page number? MR RAMPTON: It is the beginning of tab 4. A.Yes, of course, that is right. MR RAMPTON: So it is a wartime copy document. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes. A.Right. MR IRVING: Have you found the passage towards the end of the report where they are discussing, the question was who was going to bring it to the Fuhrer's attention? A.That is right, yes. Q.Do you agree that Colonel Bruns at that time was a senior German Army Engineer Officer in Riga? A.At the time he is referring to, yes. Q.At the time he is referring to, but at the time of this conversation that the British have overheard he is a Major General ---- A.That is right. Q.--- in British captivity? A.That is right. It is, whatever you call it, a spying, a record made by the British without the Germans, the captives, knowing that it was being made. Q.What kind of reliance would you place on a report like this on the British intercept, if I can call it that, of an overheard conversation? Is it liable to be dependable, . P-81 used with caution, with proper circumspect? A.One should use all documents with proper circumspect and caution, but it is certainly, since they do not seem to have been aware that they were being recorded, it does seem to be quite reliable. Q.There might be a tendency to brag a bit or possibly even to conceal things they had a guilty conscious about? MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think you got your answer "yes" is the answer. MR IRVING: The reason I am about to ask this is to say how would this compare with the testimony given by somebody in the witness box at Nuremberg, the same person? Would it be more reliable or less reliable? A.That would -- I mean, one has to take all these things individually and actually look at them. One would be perhaps a little more suspicious at the testimony in the witness box at Nuremberg, but one would have to take these things on their merits. Q.Having read the Bruns Report or scanned it, would you agree that he is describing something he actually witnessed, the shooting of these people at the pits, the girl with the flame red dress ---- A.Yes. Q."I see her in my mind's eye even now"? A.Yes, yes. Q.The same General Bruns in 1948, did he not deny that he . P-82 had witnessed these things? He said in the witness box under oath that, yes, he had received reports on it and he had sent people out to see what was going on? A.Right. Q.So, in fact, there are distinctions between the calibre of evidence? Sometimes ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think the witness has accepted that already. MR IRVING: Yes. A.Yes. I mean, clearly here he did not think he was implicating himself because he thought he was talking in private, whereas in the witness box he was very careful about making any admissions. MR IRVING: So used with proper caution, a document like this CSDIC report is a valuable source? A.Yes. Q.What kind of cautions were then used about what one accepts? Should one be careful about hearsay where they are reporting what B has said to C, or is there any other kind of caution you would apply? A.Yes, cautious in every -- I mean, you take it on its merits. Q.A self-serving statement you would be cautious about? A.If it is obviously self-serving, yes, but, as I say, it is less likely to be self-serving in these circumstances than it is in the witness box. . P-83 Q.Are you familiar with these CSDIC reports? Have you worked with them in any detail? A.I have not, no. Q.You have not? A.No. Q.There is something like 50,000 pages of these overheard conversations with top Nazis and you never used them? MR JUSTICE GRAY: Well, come on, Mr Irving, is that helpful? MR IRVING: Page 359 -- I am sorry, we had better have a look at page 358 at paragraph 3. What happened to the report that went up to Hitler, that was finally sent up to Hitler? How did it go, do you know? A.You tell me, Mr Irving. Q.Is it right that the report was drafted by a junior Army officer was sent up through what one can call Army channels and then across to intelligent channels to Admiral Canaris? A.That seems to be the case, according to the Schulz-Du Bois document, yes. Q.When Schulz-Du Bois refers in his letter, which was, apparently, written in January 1942, is that right? I referred you to paragraph 6. A.Well, yes, it is certainly uncertain. I mean, his wife dated it to January '42, yes. Q.Well, Schulz-Du Bois did not survive the war? A.That is right, yes. . P-84 Q.On the foot of page 359, you say the report had been forwarded to the top counter-espionage official. Is that a reference to Admiral Canaris? A.Yes, I presume it is, yes. Q.Would you consider a statement made by Admiral Canaris as against Adolf Hitler to be dependable or not? In other words, if he had made a statement that was critical of Adolf Hitler, would that be dependable? A.Those are two different questions. Q.The second question. A.Again, one does regard this in the same way as other sources. I mean, this is ---- Q.Was Adolf Hitler a member of the anti-Hitler resistance? A.You mean was Canaris? Q.I am sorry. Was Admiral Canaris -- a Freudian slip -- was a member of the anti-Hitler resistance and was he hanged for this on April 8th 1945? A.He was indeed, yes.
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