Transcript of an interview with David Irving
Radio Station 2BL, Sydney, Australia
"AM," Friday, November 8, 1996

Compere:

But we begin with the historian who could fan the race debate in Australia. The British historian, David Irving, is testing John Howard's declaration that he's restored free speech in Australia by again applying to enter this country.

The Immigration Minister, Philip Ruddock, will today announce whether he'll be allowed to.

Mr Irving argues there were no Nazi gas chambers and is a strident apologist for Adolf Hitler. Those views have seen him banned from Canada and from Austria, and Mr Irving was also banned from entering Australia back in 1993 when, ahead of a planned visit, Synagogues were attacked and fire bombed and Nazi stickers and literature were circulated.

Julie Posetti asked him what he thought his chances were of getting official approval for another visit to Australia.

David Irving:

I'm fifty-fifty about that. My own belief is that it is not unlikely that the Australian Government will find, that for reasons of political correctness, it has to allow the IRA terrorist, Gerry Adams, to come into Australia and at the same time, for political correctness, they have to deny the British Historian David Irving his permission to enter which will be the proof that the bomb is more powerful than the pen.

Julie Posetti:

If your application is successful, though, how will you interpret its approval?

David Irving:

Well, I will rejoice for Australia - for the Australian people that freedom of speech has been restored there. All the benefits and the blessings and the all downside that that brings.

Julie Posetti:

What action will you take, though, if the application is refused?

David Irving:

Well, if it's refused, then there's an immediate line of action that we can take and that is on the basis of natural justice. And we shall certainly, immediately, take them to task. It will be back around the mulberry bush in the law courts in Australia, again, I'm afraid.

Julie Posetti:

You've been banned from Canada, as you mentioned earlier, in fact I think in 1992 the Canadian's Secretary of State described your views as abhorrent and as an incitement to racism and you were later declared persona non gratia, there. But you did choose to enter Canada illegally and were arrested while giving a speech to Neo-Nazis, apparently at a Chinese restaurant.

You've also ignored bans imposed on you by some countries in Europe. If Australia does refuse you entry, will you choose to come here by stealth anyway?

David Irving:

Oh, no. Good Lord. I'm a great believer in abiding by the law and I don't give speeches to Neo-Nazis. The audiences who come to attend my talks in restaurants or in private halls or whatever, they're middle aged people, usually respectable gentlemen and their wives wearing collars and ties and eating with knives and forks. No jack boots on site, no skinheads, no Nazi flags. This is just a picture that is concocted by my enemies to try and make me unappetising.

Julie Posetti:

Well, in fact, the accounts that I've read of some of your addresses, including one in Germany, there were Neo-Nazis chanting slogans, you spoke from the back of a truck and Nazi salutes were being given, and you were being guarded by White Supremacists, Neo Nazi thugs were present - none of that true?

David Irving:

Repeatedly on television in Australia they show this scene of me speaking from the back of a truck in Halle, and half way through that scene, you then see young men with skinheads in the front of the audience giving the Hitler salute and shouting, "Sieg Heil", and what I say is show the whole film, please, because then you will see me saying to these idiots in the front row, who've been hired by the local television cameramen to do precisely that, me shouting at them through the microphone, "Why are you giving these outdated and discredited salutes and slogans of the past when I've just said to you, you are Germany's future and the eyes of the world are on you".

Julie Posetti:

There's another account in March 1991 where you addressed a rally of around about eight thousand people in Passacel - apparently rioting followed that as well. And you were reported in the Independent Newspaper afterwards as saying, "I'm a mob orator".

David Irving:

Yeah.

Julie Posetti:

What did you mean by that? Were you hoping to incite the masses?

David Irving:

Oh, Good Lord, no.

Julie Posetti:

But in a historical context, a mob is usually used to describe the masses of people, often poorly educated, who rise up and revolt.

David Irving:

I take your word for it, yes.

Julie Posetti:

Have you heard of Pauline Hanson and the talk of the outbreak of racial hatred in Australia which has been linked to her attacks on Aborigines and Asians here?

David Irving:

I read her Parliamentary Maiden Speech with great interest and I understand that is what triggered the whole of this particular recent avalanche. And it's a very interesting phenomenon. I think it's symptomatic of how Governments get out of contact with public feeling.

Julie Posetti:

David Irving:

I thought it was a very fair attempt.

Julie Posetti:

Although you were here eight years ago, you did attempt to come to Australia in 1993, but you were banned and while your trip was being planned, there actually was an outbreak of violence in Australia and a lot of threats against Jewish people. Synagogues were vandalised and one was actually daubed with the words "Irving was here - six million lies" and "White Power".

David Irving:

I like the way you use the passive voice. I always call it the cowardly passive voice. Synagogues were vandalised - whom by? We don't know who did that.

Julie Posetti:

But you were blamed as one of the catalysts for that unrest.

David Irving:

Well, maybe - can I be extreme enough to suggest that they were certain people who had an interest in daubing synagogues with my name in order to ensure that I'm kept out?

Julie Posetti:

David Irving:

I didn't say that. I didn't say that. I'm not saying that they're the only people organising the campaign to keep me out.

Julie Posetti:

At the same time, in 1993, you were reported as saying on radio in Melbourne, with reference to Holocaust survivors in Australia, "Now, I'm coming to hit back. I'm coming back and they're going to hurt". Did you say those words?

David Irving:

That's right.

Julie Posetti:

David Irving:

What I mean by that is these people have thought that, at a range of twelve thousand miles, they can smear as they like. I think that if they're here tomorrow, at one o'clock, that I'm going to be allowed into Australia, these people will begin to tremble in their boots because they know that I will be within striking range of them.

I can go and see the law courts, I can go and see my lawyers and say, "Let's set up the necessary action against these people within the law, to call them to order".

Julie Posetti:

Does it concern you, though, that wherever you go, there does seem to be outbreaks of violence and that you are connected with that violence?

David Irving:

Well, I understand that Jewish and Zionist Organisations in Australia have made it known that if they find out where I'm going to be lecturing, then there will be violence organised by them. But, in this case, they're the criminals and they're the ones who should be deported, not me. I shall be remaining strictly within the law. But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Compere:

The British Historian, David Irving, and he was speaking there, to Julie Posetti.

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