by Robert Faurisson
Some SS men have confessed that there were some „gas chambers“ at Auschwitz
or at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The three most important confessions are those of
Rudolf Höss, of Pery Broad and, finally, of Professor Doctor Johann Paul
Kremer. For a long time the Exterminationists have especially counted on the
first of these confessions: that of Rudolf Höss, which appeared under the title
Commandant of Auschwitz. I think that I noticed, on the occasion of a
recent historical debate in France, that the Exterminationists seem less sure
of the value of this strange testimony. On the other hand, the testimony of
Johann Paul Kremer has been very useful to them. Personally, I think that the
argument furnished by Kremer is in fact, from their point of view, a more
valuable weapon than the absurd confession of Rudolf Höss. I must say that
first the British and then the Poles made Höss speak in such a way that it is
easy to destroy his testimony by simply comparing Commandant of Auschwitz with
his numerous previous statements, among which I particularly recommend that of
14 March 1946 (Documents NO-1210 and D-749).
I will limit myself therefore to studying what the Exterminationists
themselves today seem to consider as the best of their weapons in respect to
the existence and the use at Auschwitz of homicidal „gas chambers.“ If I add
this adjective „homicidal,“ it is because there are, as you know, nonhomicidal
gas chambers which it is impossible to use to kill men as it is said that the
Germans did. All of the armies of the world have some buildings, hastily
equipped, for training their recruits in the wearing of gas masks. In France,
these buildings bear the name „chambre à gaz“ („gas chamber“); in
Germany, they are called „Gaskammer“ or „Gasraum“ („Gas Chamber“
or „gas room“). There are also gas chambers for the disinfecting of clothes, for
treating fruit, and the like.
I will therefore speak to you at some length of the testimony of Johann
Paul Kremer. You will see how, at first sight, it is troubling, and then how,
if you analyze it with a little care, it constitutes a terrible fiasco for the
Exterminationists. I prize the Kremer case very much. It shows how fragile are
the proofs that people offer to us, to what extent they allow themselves to be
easily deceived by appearances, how much the official historians have misused
the texts and how it is necessary to work if you wish, in the study of texts,
to distinguish between the true and the false, between the real meaning and the
misinterpretation. This is what is called text and document criticism. It
happens that it is my professional specialty. I am therefore going to inflict
upon you, to my great regret, a course in „text and document criticism.“ I ask
you to pardon me for the strictness of the demonstration that I am going to try
to carry out in front of you.
Before entering into the heart of the subject, I would like to share with
you two remarks. The first comes to us from Dr. Butz. I remember that, in a
letter of 18 November 1979 addressed to a British weekly (New Statesman)
about a long article by Gitta Sereny (2 November 1979) he made the observation
that it is quite strange to claim to base a historical thesis like that of the
formidable massacres of millions of human beings on ... confessions. That claim
is still harder to defend when you know that those confessions came from persons
who had been conquered and that the ones who obtained those confessions were
the conquerors.
My second remark is to recall that, in the cases from Ravensbrück where
people now know that there never was any „gassing,“ the British and French
courts obtained confessions which were particularly detailed on the alleged 11
gassings.“ People speak to us about the three principal confessions of
Auschwitz, but they no longer speak to us at all about the three principal
confessions of Ravensbrück: that of the camp commandant, Suhren, that of his
adjutant Schwarzhuber and that of the camp physician, Dr. Treite. Do you know
what was the size of that „gas chamber“ that never existed? Answer: nine meters
by four and one half meters. Do you know where it was located? Answer: five
meters away from the two crematory ovens. Do you know how many persons were
gassed there? Of what nationality? On what precise dates? Do you wish to know
on whose orders all of that was done, from the top to the bottom of the German
military and political hierarchy? Are you interested in learning how they used
a „gas capsule“ (sic)? You will find the answers to these questions and to many
others while reading, for example, the historian Germaine Tillion. That French
woman had been interned at Ravensbrück. After returning to France, she became
an official specialist in the history of the deportation. She worked at that
same famous CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research) in Paris where Léon
Poliakov also worked. Germaine Tillion enjoys in France, for reasons of which I
am unaware, considerable moral credit. Her honesty is a sort of established
fact. Nevertheless, several years after the war, she went before the courts to
overwhelm the persons responsible for Ravensbrück with her stories about the „gas
chambers.“ Even more than her book about the camp (Ravensbrück, Paris, Le
Seuil, 1973 reprinting, 284 pages), one must read her „Reflections on the Study
of the Deportation“ („Reflexions sur 1'étude de la d6portation,“ in the Revue
d'Histoire de la Deuxième Guerre Mondiale, July to September 1954, pp.
3-38).
Germaine Tillion begins by making some remarks regarding false testimony
about the deportation. She says that she has „known of numerous mentally
damaged persons, halfcrooks, half-fools, exploiting an imaginary deportation.“
She adds that she had known of other persons who were „authentic deportees,
whose sick minds had striven to go even beyond the monstrous things that they
had seen or about which people had spoken to them and which had reached them.“
She wrote further: „There were even some publishers to print certain of these
fabrications, and some more or less official compilations to use them, but
these publishers and editors absolutely cannot be excused, since the most
elementary inquiry would have been sufficient for them to expose the deception.“
While reading those lines which already date from 26 years ago, we realize
that the publishers and the editors of that kind have only increased in number
and that the Martin Grays and the Filip Miillers still have a good future
before them. Two of the three persons who confessed at Ravensbrück were hanged,
and Dr. Treite committed suicide. What is horrible is that without this he
about the „gas chambers“ they would perhaps have saved their lives. In regard
to Suhren, Germaine Tillion wrote, on page 16, that he began by displaying a „stubborn
bad faith“ in the course of his two trials (one at Hamburg, by the British and
one at Rastatt, by the French); she adds this terrible sentence: „But, without
that gas chamber created by him, on his own initiative, two months before the
collapse, he could perhaps have saved his life.“ In note 2 on page 17, she wrote
in regard to Schwarhuber, who confessed immediately, these still more terrible
lines, each word of which I ask you to ponder:
According to the English investigators, from the first moment he had coolly
faced his position, he judged himself lost and either to have peace (and the
small privileges to which the prisoners who do not deceive the examing
magistrates have a right, or else due to lassitude, indifference or to quite
another reason) he took his course and held to it, without regard for himself or
for his accomplices. He was not a brute (like Binder or Pflaum.); he had an
intelligent expression, the appearance and behavior of a psychologically normal
man.
Let us leave Ravensbrück and the confession of Schwarzhuber for Auschwitz
and the confession of Kremer, the other SS man who had „an intelligent
expression“ as well as „the appearance and the behavior of a psychologically
normal man.“ To begin with, let us look at some extracts from his private diary
written during his short stay at Auschwitz, and then at the explanations that
he gave to those extracts, after the war, to his Polish jailers, explanations
that he held to later on in 1960 at his trial which took place at Münster
(Westphalia) and at the trial of the Auschwitz guards, in 1964, at Frankfurt-on-Main.
The name of Professor Doctor Kremer should not be confused with that of Josef
Kramer. The latter had high positions successively at the camp of
Struthof-Natzweiler (Alsace), then at Auschwitz-Birkenau, and finally at
Bergen-Belsen. In his case also there were various confessions. All are
interesting to study. On the alleged homicidal „gas chamber“ at Struthof, I
would like to point out that the French did not wring out of him, as I until
recently still believed, only a single confession but, as I have recently
discovered, two totally absurd and wonderfully contradictory confessions. Of
the one people sometimes speak, while the other was carefully kept hidden. I
will some day speak about it, as well as about the two reports of the French
Military Courts on that „gas chamber“ at Struthof: the one, really childish,
which concludes on the existence of „gassings“; and another one, which has
disappeared from the archives of the military courts, which reaches the
opposite conclusion: this report, dated 1 December 1945, was done by the
eminent toxicologist, Professor Rene Fabre.
1. EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY OF DR. JOHANN PAUL KREMER (DOCTOR AT AUSCHWITZ
DURING THE SUMMER OF 1942), SELECTED AND PRESENTED BY THE OFFICIAL HISTORIANS
(LEON POLIAKOV, GEORGES WELLERS, SERGE KLARSFELD,...)
2 September 1942: This morning, at three o'clock, I was present for the
first time at a Sonderaktion. Compared to that, Dante's Inferno appears
to be a comedy. It is not without reason that Auschwitz is called extermination
camp. (the version of Georges Wellers, in Le Monde, 29 December 1978,
p8; the author explains beforehand that a Sonderaktion is a „selection
for the gas chambers.“)
At three o'clock in the morning, I was present for the first time at a „special
action“ (thus did they refer to the selection and murder in the gas chambers).
In comparison with the Inferno of Dante that seemed to me almost a comedy. It
is not without reason that they call Auschwitz an extermination camp.
(the version of Serge Klarsfeld, in Le Mémorial de ]a Déportation des
Juifs de France [Memorial to the Deportation of the Jews from France,]
1978, p. 245; the author has obviously reproduced page 48 of a book (not dated)
published in Poland by the International Auschwitz Committee under the title KL
Auschwitz; Arbeit Macht Frei (Concentration Camp Auschwitz / Work Makes
You Free), 96 pages.)
This morning at three o'clock, I was present for the first time at a „special
action.“ In comparison, Dante's inferno appeared to me a comedy. It is not for
nothing that Auschwitz is called an extermination camp.
(Léon Poliakov's version, in Auschwitz, Collection Archives
Gallimard/Julliard, 1973, p. 40).
For this first date of 2 September, I have cited three versions. For the
following dates, I will content myself with citing a single version: the
official version of the State Museum of O“wiecim (Auschwitz), such as it
appeared in Auschwitz vu par les SS (Auschwitz Seen by the SS),
French translation, 1974. I will confine myself intentionally only to what the
official historians have the habit of citing in their works and only to what,
in the eyes of the authorities of the State Museum of Auschwitz, would tend to
prove that Dr. Kremer had participated in the „gassings“ of human beings.
5 September 1942: This noon was present at a special action in the women's
camp („Moslems“) -- the most horrible of all horrors. Hscf. Thilo,
military surgeon, is right when he said today to me we were located here in „anus
mundi“ [anus of the world]. In the evening at about 8p.m. another
special action with a draft from Holland. Men compete to take part in such
actions as they get additional rations then-1/5 litre vodka, 5 cigarettes, 100
grammes of sausage and bread. Today and tomorrow (Sunday) on duty.
On the next day, Dr. Kremer said that he had had an excellent lunch. On
numerous occasions, his diary contains in that way some remarks about food.
Historians often cite these remarks to show the cynicism of the doctor; they
say that the atrocities of the „gas chambers“ do not hurt his appetite. Dr.
Kremer mentions a special action of Sunday, 6 September at 8 o'clock in the
evening, then on the evening of 9 September, then on the morning of 10
September, then in the night of the 23rd and on that of the 30th. He writes
then:
7 October 1942: Present at the 9th special action (new arrivals and women „Moslems“)
[ ... ]
12 October 1942: [ ... ] was present at night at another special action
with a draft from Holland (1600 persons).
Horrible scene in front of the last bunker! This was the loth special
action.
18 October 1942: In wet and cold weather was on this Sunday morning present
at the 11th special action (from Holland). Terrible scenes when 3 women begged
to have their bare lives spared.
8 November 1942: This night took part in 2 special actions in rainy and
murky weather (12th and 13th) [ ... ] Another special action in the afternoon,
the 14th so far, in which I had participated [ ... ]
Dr. Kremer is wrong in his counting. He has forgotten that on 5 September
there had been not one but two special actions, which made a total of 15
special actions for his stay at Auschwitz. This stay listed for 81 days, of
which only 76 were on duty (because of a five day leave).
The notes in the Polish edition say that the dates of these special actions
coincide with the dates of the arrival of the convoys of deportees.
2. EXTRACTS FROM THE SPONTANEOUS CONFESSIONS OF JOHANN PAUL KREMER IN THE
POLISH COURT, IN 1947, SELECTED AND PRESENTED BY THE POLISH COURT
Here is what one can read in KL Auschwitz seen by the SS, p. 214,
note 50:
In the official record of the interrogatory of 18 August 1947, Cracow,
Kremer stated as follows: „On 2 September 1942, at 3 a.m. I was already
assigned to take part in the action of gassing people. These mass murders took
place in small cottages situated outside the Birkenau camp in a wood. These
cottages were called 'bunkers' (Bunker) in the SS men's slang. All SS
surgeons, on duty in the camp, took turns to participate in the gassings, which
were called 'Sonderaktion' (special action-Editor's note). My part as surgeon
at the gassing consisted in remaining in readiness near the bunker. I was
brought there in a car. I sat in front with the driver and an SS hospital
orderly (SDG) sat in the back of the car with an oxygen apparatus to
revive SS men, employed in the gassing, in case any of them should succumb to
the poisonous fumes. When the transport with people, who were destined for
gassing, arrived at the railway ramp the SS officers selected from among the
arrivals persons fit to work and the rest- old people, all children, women with
children in arms and other persons not deemed fit to work-were loaded upon
lorries and driven to the gas-chambers. I used to follow behind the transport
till we reached the bunker [Faurisson note: the word is in the singular]. Here
people. were first driven to barracks where the victims undressed and then went
naked to the gas-chambers. Very often no incidents occurred, as the SS men kept
people quiet, maintaining that they were to bathe and be deloused. After
driving all of them into the gas-chamber the door was closed and an SS man in a
gasmask threw the contents of a Cyklon tin through an opening in the
side wall. Shouting and screaming of the victims could be heard through that
opening and it was clear that they fought for their lives [Lebenskampf].
These shouts were heard for a very short time. I should say for some minutes
but I am unable to give the exact span of time.“
On page 215 of KL Auschwitz seen by the SS, note 51 gives another
extract from the same interrogation transcript. Here is how Dr. Kremer is
supposed to have explained his entry on 5 September 1942 about the „Moslem“
women and the anus mundi:
Particularly unpleasant had been the action of gassing emaciated women from
the women's camp. Such individuals were generally called „Muselmänner“ („Moslems“).
I remember taking part in the gassing of such women in daylight. I am unable to
state how numerous that group had been. When I came to the bunker [Faurisson
note: „bunker“ is in the singular] they sat clothed on the ground. As the
clothes were in fact worn out camp clothes they were not let into the barracks
but undressed in the open. I could deduce from the behavior of these women that
they realized what was awaiting them. They begged the SS men to be allowed to
live, they wept, but all of them were driven to the gas chamber and gassed.
Being an anatomist I had seen many horrors, had to do with corpses, but what I
then saw was not to be compared with anything seen ever before. It was under
the influence of these impressions that I had noted in my diary, under the date
of 5 September 1942: „The most horrible of all horrors. Hauptsturmführer
Thilo -- was right saying today to me that we were located here in 'anus
mundi'. I had used this expression because I could not imagine anything more
sickening and more horrible.“
On the date of 12 October 1942, Dr. Kremer had mentioned a special action
concerning 1600 persons who had come from the Netherlands: in the margin next
to that mention he had written the name of Hössler, who at that time was one of
the SS men responsible for the camp at Birkenau. Here is how Dr. Kremer is
supposed to have explained that entry of 12 October (see page 224, note 77):
In connection with the gassing action, described by me in my diary under
the date 12 October 1942. 1 have to explain that circa 1600 Dutchman were then
gassed. This is an approximate number which I had put down after hearing it
mentioned by others. This action was conducted by SS officer Hössler. I
remember how he had tried to drive the whole group into one bunker. He was
successful except for one man whom it was not by any means possible to squeeze
inside the bunker. This man was killed by Hössler with a pistol shot. I therefore
wrote in my diary about horrible scenes in front of the last bunker and I
mentioned Hössler's name in connection with this incident.
For his entry of 18 October 1942, Dr. Kremer is supposed to have furnished
the following explanation (see 226, note 83):
During the special action, described by me in my diary under the date of 18
October 1942, three women from Holland refused to enter the gas-chamber
and begged for their lives. They were young and healthy women, but their
begging was of no avail. The SS men, taking part in the action, shot them on
the spot.
3. IN 1960, AT HIS TRIAL IN MÜNSTER, DR. KREMER PERSISTED IN THESE CLAIMS
The University of Amsterdam in 1977 published its 17th volume of Justiz
und NS-Verbrechen (justice and the Nazi Crimes). There we find the
text of the decision rendered against Dr. Kremer on 29 November 1960. On pages
19 and 20, the court sought to describe the operation of „gassing“ as well as
the part that the accused was supposed to have taken personally in that
operation. The court speaks of a single „gas chamber.“ It is a question of a
farm near the Birkenau camp made up of several separate parts. An SS medical
orderly went up on the roof and dumped some Zyklon through some
specially fitted shafts („durch Einwurfschächte“). He wore a gas mask.
The doors of the „gas chamber“ were all air tight. From outside they heard the
victims cry out. And the court continued:
When no more sign of life was shown, the defendant was taken back to his
lodging by the Health Service car. The gas chambers were opened a short moment
afterwards. (Faurisson note: I ask that you note well that the opening was made
A SHORT MOMENT AFTER the death of the victims). The bodies were removed by some
prisoners and were destroyed by cremation. During the events described above
(Faurisson note: The court here alludes to his description of the arrival of
the victims, their disrobing, etc.) the accused was seated in the Health
Service car, which was stopped in the immediate vicinity of the gas chambers.
Whether he had left his car and whether he had taken an active part in the
murderous action could not be proved. The accused kept himself however in the
car, in accordance with the mission that had been given to him, prepared for a
case where something would happen to the SS man certified by the Health Service
who was handling the Zyk1on B poison; he would bring him immediate help with
the oxygen inhalator. He [the accused] had himself admitted that in all good
faith. But that accident in reality never happened.
4. IN 1964, AT THE FRANKFURT TRIAL, DR. KREMER PERSISTS STILL IN HIS CLAIMS
On June 1964, Dr. Kremer, then 80 years old, appeared at the bar of the
court in Frankfurt as a witness for the prosecution against the former
Auschwitz guards. In order to know exactly what he said on that day, we are
reduced to pages 72-73 of Hermann Langbein's book Der AuschwitzProzess /
Eine Dokumentation (The Auschwitz Trial / A Documentation), Vienna,
Europäische Verlagsanstalt, 1965, 1027 pages). What is unfortunate is that
Hermann Langbein is the Secretary of the International Concentration Camp
Committee and that his works all show a biased and partisan spirit. The book by
Bernd Naumann says almost nothing on the deposition of Dr. Kremer (Auschwitz,
Frankfurt, Athenäum Verlag, 1965, 552 pages). Therefore, here is how, according
to Hermann Langbein, the deposition of Dr. Kremer went on the question of the „gas
chambers“; I am reproducing the text in its entirety:
Judge: Where did the gassings take
place?
Kremer: Some old farms had been
transformed into a bunker (Faurisson note: the German text indeed gives the
singular: Alte Bauernhäuser waren als Bunker ausgebaut) and provided with a
sliding door for secure closing. Upstairs was located a dormer window. The
people were brought in undressed. They entered quietly; only some of them
balked; they were taken aside and shot. The gas was released by an SS soldier.
For that he went up on a ladder.
Judge: And there were some special
rewards for those who participated in such an action?
Kremer: Yes, that was the custom; a
little schnaps and some cigarettes. They all wanted them. They allotted the
goods. I myself also received such goods -- this was quite automatic.
Representative of Co-Plaintiff Ormond: You wrote in your diary that the SS soldiers strove with each other for
service on the ramp [for the arrival of the convoys].
Kremer: That is humanly quite
understandable. This was war was it not, and the cigarettes and schnaps were
rare. When someone was eager for cigarettes ... They collected the goods and
then they took themselves to the canteen with their bottles.
The testimony of Dr. Kremer on the „gassings“ at Auschwitz is limited to
these few questions and answers. Here, in conclusion, is the commentary of
Langbein:
The man who described the process of gassing with these bland and
indifferent words is the former university professor Dr. Johann Paul Kremer of
Mfinster. He had already been condemned in Poland and in Germany for his
participation in mass murders. At Frankfurt he left the. witness stand smiling
softly.
5. EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY: MY EXPLANATIONS AND MY COMMENTARIES
I note first that these extracts contain neither the word „gassing“ nor the
expression „gas chamber.“
The diary of Dr. Kremer was a private diary. The doctor expressed himself
freely there. He frankly expressed his horror of the camp. He does not mince
words. He compares what he sees to a vision from Dante. One can therefore think
that, if he had seen those virtual human slaughterhouses which the „gas
chambers“ would have been, he would have mentioned that absolute horror.
Wouldn't Dr. Kremer, as a scientist, at least have noted some precise physical
details about these slaughterhouses which, in the history of science, would
have been an amazing invention?
But let us begin at the beginning. Did Dr. Kremer in fact write what they
say that he wrote? The answer to that question is no, absolutely not.
His text has been gravely distorted. This is even the work of a forger. As an
example I am going to reproduce the text in the version given by Georges
Wellers but I am going to insert in it, in capital letters in italic, what he
has omitted and I am going to insert in place of Sonderaktion and of extermination,
which are misinterpretations, the two words which fit; I will also put them in
capital letters. Therefore, here is the text translated from the original
German (see document NO-3408 in the National Archives):
2 September 1942: This morning, at 3 o'clock, I was present OUTSIDE for
the first time at a SPECIAL ACTION. Compared to that, Dante's Inferno
appears TO ME ALMOST LIKE a comedy. It is not without reason that
Auschwitz is called THE camp of THE ANNIHILATION!
Every text must be scrupulously respected, especially when the text is
supposed to serve as the basis for a shocking demonstration and for a terrible
accusation. The concealing of the word OUTSIDE is very serious. Why, after
having given us the indication of the time, has the indication of the place
been concealed? The German text says: DRAUSSEN. Dr. Kremer was not in a
closed place as a gas chamber would have been. He was „outside,“ „on the
outside.“ Without doubt that detail is not very clear, and perhaps it meant „out
of the camp itself,“ but one must not conceal that possibility.
For Sonderaktion, Wellers has kept the German word; in appearance,
this is evidence of scrupulousness and care; in reality, it is a clever trick.
As a matter of fact, this word, at least for a French reader, has a sound that
is disturbing, Germanic, barbaric, and can only conceal horrible things. But
there is even more: just before citing that entry by Dr. Kremer, Wellers, in
his article in Le Monde, wrote: „[Kremer] had participated in the
selection for the gas chambers (Sonderaktion).“ In other words, Wellers imposes
on his reader the following lie: in his diary, Dr. Kremer said in so many
words: „this morning at 3 o' clock I was present at a selection for the gas
chambers.“
We see very well now that it was nothing of the kind. Dr. Kremer was
contented to speak of a „special action.“ What is one to understand by that
expression? To some people who, like me, doubt the existence of the homicidal „gas
chambers“ it is absurd to answer, as does Wellers, by positing their existence
at once as an accepted fact. Suppose that someone does not believe in the
existence of flying saucers. To such a person one could not retort that those
saucers exist since, in such and such a report by the police, it is written: „A
witness declares that he saw something special in the sky“ -- „Some witnesses
noted in the sky some unusual phenomena.“ Therefore, for the time being, the
only honest -- if not very clear -- translation of Sonderaktion could only be „special
action.“ I will later come back to the probable meaning of this word about
which, for the moment, we have no right to speculate.
Dr. Kremer did not write next: „Compared to that, Dante's Inferno seemed to
be a comedy“ but: „Compared to that, Dante's Inferno seemed TO ME ALMOST LIKE a
comedy.“ Here, the concealing of three words by Wellers is perhaps not very
important, but it contributes in its modest way to doing violence to the
meaning of the text, always with a view to producing the same effect. There is
a shade of difference between „seemed like,“ in which one senses a softening,
and „seemed to be,“ which is more affirmative. Dr. Kremer has not transformed
an impression which was personal to him into an impression common to a whole
human group. In some sense, he did not state: „Dante's Inferno appeared here to
everyone around me like a comedy“; if he had stated that, one could suppose
that he was present at an unquestionably Dantesque scene. In reality, he
contented himself with a confidence of a personal kind and in effect he wrote: „Dante's
Inferno here appeared TO ME, who had just arrived (that impression is personal
to me, yet others can perhaps share it) ALMOST LIKE a comedy.“ In other words,
the scene is certainly horrible for this doctor who has just arrived for the
first time in his life in a concentration camp, but all the same not to the
point of decreeing that Dante's Inferno is obviously a comedy to everybody in
comparison with this scene.
But there is something very much more serious that Georges Wellers has made
the Kremer text undergo. Kremer did not say that Auschwitz was „called an
extermination camp,“ which, in the original German, would have been: „genannt
Vernichtungslager.“
In reality, we read in the original German:
„genannt DAS Lager DER Vernichtung“ („called THE camp of THE annihilation“).
If Wellers had respected the presence of the two articles and if he had
given to „Vernichtung“ the meaning of „extermination“ which is indispensible to
his exterminationist thesis, he would have gotten the following phrase: „It is
not without reason that Auschwitz is called the camp of the extermination.“
Thus constructed, the phrase sounds bizarre both in German and in French. That
has to be for us the sign that a word of the text undoubtedly has been badly
translated. That word, as will be seen later on, is „Vernichtung.“ The context
will reveal to us that that word is not to be translated as „extermination“ (a
meaning that it can very well have in other contexts) but by „annihilation.“
There is here no extermination, murder, assassination, killing, nor
massacre; there are not the results of an act, an action, or a will; there is
nothing here about a „camp where they exterminate,“ there is here no „extermination
camp“ (an expression invented by the victors, some years after 1942, to
designate camps allegedly endowed with „gas chambers“). What there is here in
reality is an annihilation; men and women are reduced to wasting away; they are
annihilated, reduced to nothing by the epidemics and notably by that illness
whose name „typhus“ (in Greek tupos) signifies precisely: torpor, stupor, a
kind of lethargy, a rapid destruction of the faculties, sometimes up to the
point of death. Auschwitz is not „an extermination camp“ (an anachronistic
expression, and we know that anachronism is one of the most reliable signs of
the presence of a falsehood) but the camp, yes, indeed, the camp par excellence
of general annihilation. Without doubt, just as the moment of taking his post at
Auschwitz, this newcomer, Dr. Kremer, had heard his colleagues say: „You know,
this camp, they call it the camp of annihilation. Look out for typhus! You
yourself also take the risk of contracting it and dying from it.“
And, at the end of his entry for 2 September 1942, Dr. Kremer puts an
exclamation point. That point indicates the doctor's emotion. If one conceals
it, as does Wellers, the phrase takes on another tone: one would perhaps
believe that the doctor is cruel and cynical. One would perhaps believe that
Dr. Kremer coldly thought: „The Auschwitz camp is called an 'extermination
camp.' So it is. It is indeed. Let us take things as they are.“ In reality, he
is overwhelmed.
Due to lack of time, I cannot devote myself to the criticism of the texts
given by Léon Poliakov, by Serge Klarsfeld, by the authorities of the State
Museum of Oswiecim, by the official translation of document NO-3408, etc. I
would only like to point out an especially serious fact. It concerns the German
courts. The court at Münster which, in 1960 tried Dr. Kremer, quite simply
skipped over the word Draussen when it reproduced the entry of 2
September 1942. It piled up other serious dishonesties. Here is an example of
them: to overpower Dr. Kremer, the tribunal appealed to the „Calendar of Events
at Auschwitz“ as it was drawn up by the Communist authorities in Poland. It is
already strange that a court in the western world thus shows confidence in a
document drawn up by Stalinists. But there is more. The courts have established
that, for most of the convoys that arrived in the camp, the Polish in their „Calendar“
indicated with extraordinary precision the number of persons „gassed.“ Since we
know that, according to the Exterminationist standard literature the people „gassed“
were not the object of any accounting, of any counting, an honest man could
only be astonished to read in this „Calendar“ that, from the time when Dr.
Kremer was at Auschwitz, they had, on such and such a day, „gassed“ 981 persons
and, on another day, 1594 other persons. Also, the court at Münster cynically
used a subterfuge. It reproduced in its text numerous citations of the „Calendar“
and while making it clear that it was a question of this „Calendar,“ but ...
each time that the „Calendar“ uses the word „vergast“ („gassed“), the court
itself substituted for that clumsy word the word „umgebracht“ („killed“). Thus
the reader of the judgment at Münster is deceived. Whoever might find it
suspect that they can talk to him about „981 gassed“ or about „1594 gassed“,
easily lets them talk to him about „981 dead“ or about „1594 dead.“
Finally, two remarks about the entries other than that of 2 September:
(1) The expression anus mundi would not be appropriate, it seems to me,
to scenes of „gassings“ but rather to a repugnant and nauseating scene of
groups of people fallen prey to disgusting diseases, to dysentery, etc. (2)
When Dr. Kremer says that he was present at a special action in rainy, cold
weather or in grey and rainy autumn weather, it is probable that those actions
took place outside in the open air, and not in a gas chamber.
6. THE TRUTH OF THE TEXTS: AUSCHWITZ AS PREY TO EPIDEMICS DURING THE SUMMER
OF 1942.
It is sufficient to read the diary with a minimum of good faith in order to
see the evidence. Here is the complementary information that this diary gives
us. I will summarize it. Dr. Kremer came to Auschwitz to replace a sick doctor
there. Typhus had ravaged not only the camp, but also the German-Polish city of
Auschwitz. Not only the internees
struck, but also the German troops. There was typhus, malaria, dysentery,
tropical heat, innumerable flies, and dust. The water was dangerous to drink.
Diarrhea, vomiting, stomach aches made the atmosphere stink. The scene of
people reduced to nothing by typhus was demoralizing. In that hell, Dr. Kremer
himself contracted what he called „the sickness of Auschwitz.“ However, he
underwent several vaccinations, at first against exanthematic typhus, then
against abdominal typhus (a name which, in itself, would explain very well the
term anus mundi). The principal bearer of typhus is the louse. On 1 September 1942,
he wrote: „In the afternoon was present at the gassing of a block with Zyklon
B against lice.“ Zyklon B is stabilized hydrocyanic acid.
That product is still used today throughout the entire world. Many documents
prove to us that that disinfection operation was delicate and could demand the
presence of a doctor to bring help, should the occasion arise, to certified
personnel charged with carrying out the gassing of a barrack and, 21 hours
after the beginning of the airing out of such a barrack, testing for the
disappearance of the hydrocyanic acid before permitting people to return to
live in their barracks. On 10 October 1942, the situation was so serious that,
for everyone, there was a quarantine of the camp. The wife of the
Obersturmführer or Sturmbannführer Cäsar died of typhus. All of the city of
Auschwitz was in bed, etc. It is sufficient to refer to the text of the diary.
For more details of that epidemic of the year 1942, one can also consult the
calendar of the Hefte von Auschwitz (year 1942). In the Anthology
of the International Auschwitz Committee, Volume I, second part, page 196
(in the French edition), we read that the SS physician Dr. Popiersch, head
doctor of the garrison and of the camp, had died of typhus on 24 April 1942
(four months before the arrival of Dr. Kremer). In Volume II, first part,
published also in 1969, we read on page 129 and in note 14 on page 209 that the
Polish physician Dr. Marian Ciepielowski of Warsaw also died of typhus while
caring for the Soviet prisoners of war.
The work of Dr. Kremer at Auschwitz seems to have been principally to
devote himself to laboratory research, to dissections, to anatomical studies.
But it was also necessary for him to be present at some corporal punishments
and some executions. He was not present at the very arrival of the convoys,
but, once the division between those fit for work and those not fit for work
had been made, he arrived, in a car with driver, from his hotel room in
Auschwitz (room #26 at the Train Station Hotel). What took place then? Did he
lead people into some „gas chambers“ or to disinfection? Let us see below what
they claim that he said first in 1947 to the Polish communists; secondly, in
1960 to the court at Miinster; and thirdly, in 1964 to the court at Frankfurt.
7. THE TRUTH OF THE TEXTS: NO „GASSING.“
We recall that, in his diary, on the date of 12 October 1942, Dr. Kremer
wrote:
[...] Was present at night at another special action with a draft from
Holland (1600 persons). Horrible scene in front of the last bunker! This was
the 10th special action.
In the same manner, on 18 October he wrote:
In wet and cold weather was on this Sunday morning present at the 11th
special action (from Holland). Terrible scenes when 3 women begged to have
their bare lives spared.
These two texts are easy to interpret. The „last bunker“ could only be the
bunker of barracks #11; it was located at the end of the camp of Auschwitz (the
original camp) and not at Birkenau or near Birkenau which is 3 km away. The
executions took place in what they called the courtyard of block 11. It is
there that is located the „black wall.“ It happened usually that persons
condemned to death were transported into a concentration camp to be executed
there. Such was probably the case with the three women who came from the
Netherlands. I suppose that it would be easy to find their names and the
motives for their condemnation either in the archives at Auschwitz or in those
of the Historical Institute in Amsterdam. In either case, these three women
were shot.
The Polish have been terribly embarrassed by this reference to the „last
bunker.“ By a sleight of hand they have converted this bunker which is in the
singular into ... peasant farms allegedly transformed into „gas chambers“ and
located near Birkenau. And there the absurdities pile up. What is the doctor
supposed to have done? NOTHING. He remained seated in his car, at a distance.
And what did he see of a „gassing“ of human beings? NOTHING. What can he tell
us about what took place after the alleged „gassing“? NOTHING, since he left by
car with his driver (and the medical orderly?). He is not able to talk either
about the installation, nor about the processing of putting to death, nor about
the personnel employed in this putting to death, nor of the precautions taken
to enter into an incredibly dangerous place. It is not Dr. Kremer who will tell
us how some men would be able to enter into this terrible place „A SHORT MOMENT“
after the alleged victims finished crying out. It is not he who will be able to
let us know by what secret means they were able to pull out some thousands of
bodies saturated with cyanide lying amidst vapors of hydrocynanic acid, and all
that done with bare hands (although that acid poisons by contact with the
skin), without gas masks (although this gas is overwhelming), while eating and
smoking (although this gas is inflammable and explosive). It is Rudolf Höss, in
his spontaneous confessions to the same Polish court, who recounted all of
those astonishing things. Let's be decent about this. Let us suppose that the
members of the Sonderkommando (Special Detachment) nevertheless did
possess some gas masks, provided with the particularly strong filter, the J
filter, against hydrocyanic acid. I am afraid that we are no further ahead. I
have in fact here, in front of me, a text from a technical manual of the
American army, translated from the text of an American manual dating from 1943
(The Gas Mask, technical manual No. 3-205, War Department, Washington, 9
October 1941, a manual prepared under the direction of the Chief of the
Chemical Warfare Service, U.S. Printing Office, 1941, 144 pages.) Here is what
is written on page 55 (I write the most important words in CAPITALS):
It should also be remembered that a man may be overcome by the absorption
of hydrocyanic gas through the skin; a concentration of 2 percent hydrocyanic
acid gas being sufficient to thus overcome a man in about 10 minutes. Therefore,
EVEN IF ONE WEARS A GAS MASK, exposure to concentrations of hydrocyanic gas of
1 percent by volume or greater should be made only in case of necessity and
then FOR A PERIOD NO LONGER THAN 1 MINUTE AT A TIME. In general, places
containing this gas should be well ventilated with fresh air before the wearer
of the mask enters, thus reducing the concentration of hydrocyanic gas to low
fractional percentages.
The spontaneous confessions of Dr. Kremer with those closures „provided
with a sliding door for secure closing“ make us laugh. The total airtightness
demanded by a homicidal gas chamber using hydrocyanic acid would be impossible
to achieve with a sliding door. But how could Dr. Kremer, who had never left
his car, describe that door as if he had seen it? And the SS man who released
the gas -- how did he do it? Did he release „the contents of a box of Zyklon
through an opening in the wall“ (version of the confession of 1947)? Or „by
some shafts (Einwurfschächte)“ (version of 1960)? Or indeed through a „dormer
window“ that he reached „above“ while going up „by a ladder“ (version of 1964)?
Everything in these confessions is empty and vague. One can simply deduce from
them with certainty two things which are quite probable:
1.
Dr. Kremer convoyed some
people who were led into some barracks in order to undress (and without doubt
they next went to disinfection or to the showers);
2.
3.
Dr. Kremer was present at some
gassings of buildings or of barracks for their disinfection by Zyklon B.
4.
It was while helping himself by the combining of these two real experiences
that he constructed for his accusers or his accusers constructed for him the
poor and absurd account of the „gas chambers.“ A very characteristic point of
the false testimonies regarding the homicidal „gassings“ is the following: the
accused says that he was at a certain distance from the place of the crime; the
most that one can find is a defendant who said that he had been forced to
release the Zyklon through a hole in the roof of the „gas chamber“ or
even one who „had helped push“ the victims into the „gas chamber.“ That ought
to remind us of the unfortunates who in the Middle Ages were accused of having
met the devil on such and such a day, at such and such an hour, in such and such
a place. They would have been able to deny it fiercely. They would have been
able to go so far as to say: „You know very well that I could not have met with
the devil for one excellent reason, which is that the devil does not exist.“
The unfortunates would have condemned themselves by such responses. They had
only one way out: to play the game of their accusers, to admit that the devil
was there without doubt, but ... at the top of the hill, while they themselves,
located below, heard the horrible noise (sobs, groans, cries, racket) made by
the victims of the devil. It is shameful that in the middle of the 20th century
there are found so many judges and also so many lawyers who will admit as
evidence the bewildering confessions of so many accused persons without having
ever had the least curiosity to ask them what they had really seen, seen with
their own eyes, without posing to them some technical questions, without going
on to some comparisons between the most obviously contradictory explanations.
Unfortunately I must say in their defense that even some intelligent
technicians and even some wellinformed chemists imagine that almost any small
place can easily be transformed into a homicidal „gas chamber.“ None of those
people has had the chance to visit an American gas chamber. They would
understand the enormity of their error. The first Americans who thought about
executing a condemned man by gas also imagined that it would be easy. It was
when they tried to actually do it that they understood that they risked gassing
not only the condemned man but also the governor and the employees of the
penitentiary. They needed many years to perfect a nearly reliable gas chamber.
As to the „special actions“ of Dr. Kremer, they are easy to understand. It
is simply a question of what, in the vocabulary of the French Army, is called
by the pompous name of „missions extraordinaires.“ I believe that the
American equivalent is „special assignment.“ A „special assignment“ does not
imply necessarily that there is a moving of the person. It is a question of a
sudden assignment which comes to break the habitual unfolding of his duties.
Dr. Kremer, for example, worked especially in the laboratory but, from time to
time, he was required for extra work: reception of a convoy to be led to
disinfection, sorting out the contagious or the sick in the hospital, etc. It
is thus that as a good military man and as an orderly man he noted in his diary
each of those tasks which were, probably, each time worth a supplementary
allowance to him, as to the SS volunteers who cleaned the railroad cars at the
arrival of each convoy. In any case, if Auschwitz appeared to him like a hell,
it was not at all because of frightful crimes like the executions of crowds of
human beings in the enclosures allegedly turned into „gas chambers,“ but
because of the typhus, malaria, dysentery, the infernal heat, the flies, the
lice, the dust. One can determine that by a slightly attentive reading of the
very text of his diary. That is what I, for my part, did first. And then, one
day, I fell by chance upon the proof, the material proof, that such was indeed
the correct interpretation.
8. TEXTUAL CONFIRMATION OF THE CORRECTNESS OF THE REVISIONIST
INTREPRETATION OF THE DIARY OF DR. KREMER
On page 42 of Justiz und NS-Verbrechen we learn that in the trial at
Münster, in 1960, Dr. Kremer had had someone appear as a witness for his
defense. That witness was a woman whose name began with G1a. (German law
authorizes that, in a public document, certain names may be revealed only in
abridged form.) That name was very probably that of Miss Glaser, the daughter
of Dr. Kremer's housekeeper; one about whom he speaks on several occasions in
his diary. The witness brought to the court some post cards and some letters
that the doctor had sent to her at the time of his stay in Auschwitz. The
witness said that the doctor „had not been in agreement with what took place at
Auschwitz“ and that he had hurried to leave the camp. Miss Gla[ser] then put
into evidence a letter of 21 October 1942 that Dr. Kremer had sent to her. The
content of it is of extreme importance, which apparently eluded the tribunal.
It proves that, when Dr. Kremer spoke of the Auschwitz camp as a hell, it was
indeed as I have said, because of the typhus and the other epidemics. Here are
the very words used by the doctor in his letter:
I don't really know for certain, but I expect, however, that I'll be able
to be in Münster before 1 December, and thus finally turn my back on this hell
of Auschwitz where, in addition to the typhoid, and so on, typhus has once
again broken out strongly...
Here is therefore that „Dante's Inferno“ from the entry of 2 September
1942! Professor of Medicine Johann Paul Kremer had seen the horrors of a
formidable epidemic at Auschwitz wiping out internees and guards; he had not
seen monstrous „gassing“ operations, exterminating crowds of human beings.
9. THE HUMAN CHARACTER OF DR. KREMER
In considering his fife and reading his diary, we perceive that Dr. Kremer
was absolutely not a brute, or a fanatic or a cynical human being. He was
human, too human; he was a free spirit but perhaps without great courage. He
had quickly become a sort of „old boy“ attached above all to his profession. In
the first pages of Volume XVII of Justiz und NS-Verbrechen his biography
is sketched out. Johann Paul Kremer was born in 1883 near Cologne of a father
who, after having been a miller, became a peasant. He did his advanced studies
at the Universities of Heidelberg, Strasbourg and Berlin. He obtained a
doctorate in philosophy and a doctorate in medicine. He worked in succession at
the Charit6 Hospital in Berlin, at the hospital of Berlin-Neuköln, at the
surgical clinic of the University of Bonn, at the anatomical institute of the
same university; finally, he became a deputy lecturer at the University of
Münster; he gave courses there up until 1945 (when he was 62 years old). Those
courses dealt with the doctrine of heredity, sports medicine, X-rays, and
especially anatomy. In 1932, at the age of 48, he joined the National-Socialist
Party. In 1936, at the age of 52, he was made SS-Sturmmann (soldier of
the first class). In 1941, at the age of 57, he was promoted to Untersturmführer
(second lieutenant) in the Waffen-SS. He served his active duty. He
was in the service only at the time of university vacations. In 1942 he spent
two months at Dachau as a doctor attached to the SS hospital; he had not
contact with the camp of the internees. In 1941, at the age of 57, he published
a paper on heredity which seems to have brought him some worries in regard to
the official authorities. In August of 1942, he was serving at the SS hospital
in Prague when, suddenly, he received an assignment for Auschwitz to replace a
doctor who had fallen ill there. He stayed at Auschwitz from 30 August to 18
November 1942, and then he resumed his activity at the anatomical institute of
the city of Münster. He was 58 years old. He served as the president of the
Discipline Commission of North Westphalia of the Union of National Socialist
Doctors. In 1943, he was named Lieutenant in the reserves of the Waffen-SS.
Here is how he was judged:
Calm personality, correct; sure of himself, energetic; above the average in
general culture; excellent understanding of his specialty. Lengthy education as
surgeon and anatomist; since 1936, deputy lecturer at the Univeristy of
Münster.
On 12 August 1945, he was arrested at his home in Münster by the British
occupying forces (the „automatic arrest“ of former SS men). They seized his
diary at his home. He was interned at Neuengamme, then turned over to the
Poles. He was imprisoned at Stettin, then in succession in fourteen Polish
prisons, then finally in the prison at Cracow. The preliminary investigation of
the case was carried out by the famous judge Jan Sehn, the same one to whom we
owe the interrogations of Rudolf Höss and the confession, „spontaneous“ no
doubt, of Rudolf Höss. In 1947, at the age of nearly 64 years, he was freed for
good conduct, because of his advanced age and since he was ill. He returned to
his home, at Münster. He was arrested on the order of the German court, then
freed on bail. At the time he was receiving a pension of DM 70 per week. He had
married in 1920, at the age of 37, but he was separated from his wife at the
end of two months since she suffered from schizophrenia. He had not been able
to obtain a divorce until twenty years later, in 1942. Dr. Kremer did not have
any children. A housekeeper took care of him. Unless I am mistaken, he was never
at the front nor did he ever fire a shot, except, without doubt, in training.
He kept his diary beginning at the age of 151/2. 1 have not read the part of
his diary prior to the Second World War. On 29 November 1960 Dr. Kremer, age
76, was condemned to ten years in prison but those ten years were considered as
purged. In consideration of his advanced age, his civil rights were only
cancelled for five years. He was condemned to pay the court costs, he was
deprived of his responsibility as course attach6, deprived of his title of
professor and deprived, I believe, of his two doctorates. On 4 June 1964 he
came to the witness stand in the „Frankfurt Trial“ to testify against the „Auschwitz
guards.“ I doubt that this old man of 80 years thus came spontaneously to make
charges against his compatriots in the hysterical atmosphere of this famous
witch trial. His „spontaneous confessions“ to the Polish communists were thus,
to the end of his existence, to cling to his skin like the tunic of Nessus. It
was thus that beginning in 1945 the existence of this professor had become a
drama. Here therefore is a man who had devoted his life to relieving the
sufferings of his fellow men: the drama of a war lost and then he was made
officially a sort of monster who had, it seemed, suddenly devoted two and
one-half months of his life to gigantic massacres of human beings according to
a truly Satanical industrial method.
The diary of Dr. Kremer is dull in style (at least that part that I have
read) but when one considers what was the destiny of that diary and of its
author, one cannot prevent oneself from thinking of it as a work which, very
much more than some highly valued historical or literary testimonies, is
profoundly upsetting. I think often of that old man. I think sometimes also of
his tormentors. I do not know what became of Dr. Kremer. If he were still alive
today, he would be 97 years old. I hope that one day a student will write a
biography of this man and that to do so he will visit the city of Münster
(Westphalia) where there certainly still five some people who knew-permit me to
return to him his titles -Professor Doctor Johann Paul Kremer.
Dr. Kremer certainly did not have National Socialist convictions. On 13
January 1943 he wrote in his diary: „There is no Aryan, Negroid, Mongoloid or
Jewish science, only a true or a false one.“ On the same date, he furthermore
wrote this:
[ ... ] I had never even dreamed there existed anything like „a gagged
science.“ By such manoeuvres, science has received a mortal blow and has been
banished from the -country! The situation in Germany today is not any better
than in the times when Galileo had been forced to recant and when science had
been threatened by tortures and the stake. Where, for Heaven's sake, is that
situation going to lead us to in the twentieth century!!! I could almost feel
ashamed to be a German. And so shall I have to end my days as the victim of
science and the fanatic of truth.
In reality, he was to end his days as the victim of the political lie and
as a poor man obliged to lie.
At the date of 1 March 1943, we read in his diary:
Went today to shoemaker Grevsmühl to be registered and saw there a leaflet
sent him from Kattowitz by the Socialist Party of Germany. The leaflet informed
that we had already liquidated 2 million Jews, by shooting or gassing.
The Exterminationist historians do not use the argument that this passage
of the diary seems to furnish them. On reflection, that is understandable.
Every one knows well that a thousand rumors of German atrocities circulated
during the war. The socialist opposition made use of them, as did all of the
opponents of Hitler. In this type of tract one says anything and everything.
That is the rule for that type of work. Dr. Kremer made no commentary on that
pamphlet. Perhaps he believed in what the author of the tract stated. It is
even probable since he took the trouble to note it. That is precisely what is
interesting about this incident. Dr. Kremer must certainly not have been a very
good Nazi, or otherwise his shoemaker would not have run the risk of making him
read a secret pamphlet, and especially a pamphlet „which had been addressed to
him.“ This last detail indeed proves that Dr. Kremer did not fear to confide to
his diary very delicate information.
On 26 July 1945, or about two and one half months after the German
surrender, Dr. Kremer witnessed the distress of his fellow countrymen. That
distress wrung from him nearly the same words as did the horrors of Auschwitz.
I present in italic type those words in the quotation that follows:
The weather is still very hot and dry. The corn ripens before
its time, gnats are pestering us more and more, the foreigners* are
still greatly worrying the starving, needy and homeless inhabitants.
People are crowded into goods trains like cattle pushed hither and
thither, while at night they try to find shelter in the stench of dirty and
verminous bunkers. Quite indescribable is the fate of these poor
refugees, driven into uncertainty by death, hunger and despair.
*(The Polish authorities here have altered the original German text, which
spoke not of „foreigners“ but of „Russians, Poles and Italians.“)
The fact that immediately after this passage Dr. Kremer spoke about the
gathering of berries does not mean that he was insensitive to the suffering of
his fellow countrymen. Anyone who keeps a diary passes in this way, without
transition, from the serious to the trifling. After the death of a person dear
to him, Goethe noted something to the effect: „Death of Christiane!! I slept
well. I feel better.“ And this „better“ referred to health -- his own health --
which up until then had given him some concern. As to Kafka, I believe that I
recall that on that day he had gone to the swimming pool. I am not sure of
these quotations and I propose to verify them one day.
10. FORCED CONFESSIONS
We all know that forced confessions are common coinage, especially in time
of war. The GIs in Korea, as in Vietnam, did not fail to confess „spontaneously“
to the worst absurdities. People often believe that „spontaneous confessions“
are a speciality of the Communist world. That ignores the fact that the French,
British and Americans made great use of torture towards, for example, the
conquered of the last war. As regards what the French did, I have carried out
an investigation of an almost surgical precision on the summary executions in a
whole small region of France at the time of the Liberation in 1944. It is
absolutely impossible to have my manuscript published, given the scandal that
it would cause and that would have repercussions, I can tell you, right up to
the Presidency of the Republic, which is opposed (imagine it!) to the
exhumation of people who were executed by units of the Maquis. Those people
were sometimes tortured. But experience has also taught me that it is necessary
to distrust some tales of physical torture. There are some perverted persons
who take a real pleasure in inventing all sorts of stories of that kind. In The
Hoax of the Twentieth Century, on pages 188-192, Dr. Butz presents a
profound and suggestive analysis of forced confessions and torture. His
brilliant intelligence, not to say his genius, dictates to him sometimes, as
you well know, observations of such great pertinence that one is astonished and
is ashamed not to have made them oneself. Here is an example of that, dealing
with physical torture; it is not lacking in humor:
Finally we should observe that almost none of us, certainly not this
author, has ever experienced torture at the hands of professionals bent on a
specific goal, and thus we might suspect, to put it quite directly, that we
simply do not know what we are talking about when we discuss the possibilities
of torture. (page 192)
It is, I think, easy to obtain forced confessions from a man whom one holds
at his mercy. Physical torture is not absolutely necessary. I mean to say that
it is not absolutely necessary to strike the victim. It is sufficient sometimes
to shout and to threaten. A seclusion and a prolonged isolation, as was the
case with Aldo Moro, can create a feeling of panic and lead to a sort of
madness. One will be prepared to sign any kind of declaration in order to get
out of there. If an officer refuses a confession, he can be threatened with
losing his men, and vice versa. They will threaten him with losing his wife and
his children. I am sure that all physical or mental resistance can be wiped out
by very simple means. For example, they will offer a prisoner conditions of
lodging worthy of a decent hotel and will give him as much as he wishes to eat,
but ... they will give him nothing to drink. Or indeed he will have enough to
eat and to drink, but they will light his cell day and night with such power
(see the example of Nuremberg) that he will no longer be able to sleep. Very
quickly he will become a human rag prepared to mutter any kind of confession.
One fearful effect of torture is to bring the victim closer to his
torturer. The panting victim detaches himself in thought from those whom he
ought to love in order to attach himself to the one whom he ought to fear and
hate. He no longer wishes to have anything in common with those whose ideas he
shares: he comes to hate those ideas and those people because those ideas,
finally, have cost him too much suffering and those people-his friends-appear
to him as a living reproach. To the contrary, there is everything to expect
from the torturer. He is in possession of power, which always, in spite of
everything, enjoys a certain prestige. The gods are on his side. It is he who
possesses the solution to all your sufferings. The torturer is going to propose
to you this solution when, if he wished, he could kill you on the spot or
torture you without respite. That torturer, who proposes that you sign a simple
sheet of paper on which some words are written, he is good. How can you resist
him when you feel yourself to be so weak and so alone? That torturer becomes
irresistible when, in place of demanding from you a confession that is precise
and totally contrary to the truth, he proposes to you a sort of compromise: a
vague confession based on a partial truth. In 19631965, at the Frankfurt trial,
the judge of the tribunal had as his first concern not the truth, since he
thought that the truth had already been completely found, but the measuring of
THE DEGREE OF REPENTANCE of each of the accused! On page 512 of the book by
Hermann Langbein, cited above, we see the judge show his preoccupation with
discerning to what degree the accused Pery Broad had a feeling of Evil: he
declared in all candor: „You see, an awarness of wrong doing plays a large part
in this proceeding.“ How many times must the German defendants have heard that
remark from the mouths of their jailers, their investigating magistrates, and
especially from their lawyers! After that, how would an intelligent and
sensible. man like Pery Broad refuse to tell the stupid story about an
anonymous SS man whom he is supposed to have noticed one day, from a distance,
in the process of releasing a mysterious liquid through the opening of the
ceiling of ... the „gas chamber“ of Auschwitz (the original camp)? Pery Broad
probably knew that no one would come to ask him, among other questions:
But how could you know that that was the ceiling of a „gas chamber“ and not
of a morgue? Did you enter into the place? If you did, can you tell us how it
was arranged? Is it not mad on the part of the Germans to have placed a „gas
chamber“ just under the windows of that SS hospital and under the windows of
the administrative building where you found yourself on that day? The
evacuation of vapor from the hydrocyanic gas would therefore have been directed
toward the SS men of the hospital or the SS men of the administration? Isn't
that so?
Such are the questions that the tribunal did not ask Pery Broad.
It would be inhuman to reproach Pery Broad, Dr. Kremer, Rudolf Höss, and
some SS men again for their absurd forced confessions. One must be astonished
at the laughable number of those confessions when one thinks of the hundreds of
SS men from the concentration camps who were imprisoned by the Allies. Among
all those who were hanged or shot or who committed suicide, how many left
confessions? A handful regarding the subject of the alleged „gas chambers.“ In
regard to other subjects, perhaps there are more numerous confessions. I am led
to believe that the Polish and the Soviets must have obtained a crowd of
confessions; the SS men had to charge each other as all the men of the same
lost-cause were more or less obliged to do. If there were very few confessions
from the SS men concerning the „gas chambers,“ it was not thanks to the courage
of the SS men-since, once again, it seems to me that no one can truly resist a
torturer who is something of a psychologist -but quite simply because, on this
subject, their torturers did not know very well what to make them state
precisely. Not having any material reality on which to construct their lies
about the „gas chambers“ -those slaughterhouses which in fact never existed-the
torturers were reduced to inventing some poor things and some stereotypes that
they attributed to people like Rudolf Höss, Pery Broad and Johann Paul Kremer.
11. A PRACTICAL CONCLUSION
In conclusion, if, in your presence, an Exterminationist should base his
thesis about the reality of the „gas chambers“ of Auschwitz or of any other
camp on the argument of some confessions, here, in my opinion, is the conduct
to follow:
1.
Ask if he will first enumerate
those confessions one by one;
2.
2.
Ask him to point out the
confession which, in his opinion, is the most convincing;
3.
4.
Agree to read that one
confession in the language (accessible for you) and in the form that, again,
your questioner will freely choose;
5.
6.
Compare the supposedly
original text of that confession with the text that your questioner will have
furnished to you;
7.
8.
Decipher that text line by
line and word by word, without making it say either more or less than it does
say; note carefully what the author of the confession alleges that he
personally saw, heard or did; a traditional trick of the German courts has consisted,
as was the case for the judgment of Johann Paul Kremer at Münster in 1960, in
slipping a weak confession that the accused made into a very long presentation
about „gassing“ in such a way that the reader believes that the whole report
comes from the accused; the reader imagines that the accused made a detailed
report of the events; it is nothing of the kind; it is necessary to „scour“
from the text all of the contributions of the judge in order to make the
judgment that the testimony is nearly as inconsistent as it is brief and vague.
9.
10.
See if the confession stands
up, if it is coherent, if it does not break any law of physics or of elementary
chemistry; be very materialistic, as if you had to study a miracle from
Lourdes; try to see the places where the action is said to have taken place;
see what remains of it; some ruins can be very instructive; seek out the plans
of the places or of the buildings;
11.
12.
See, possibly, if the text of
the confession is in the handwriting of the man who confessed; see if this text
is in his mother tongue or in another language; the Allies usually made the
Germans sign texts drawn up in French (Josef Kramer) or in English (Rudolf
Höss) and they added in all peace of conscience that they guaranteed that this
text had been translated to the accused in his own language, very faithfully
(and that besides in the absence of any lawyer);
13.
14.
Seek to know who obtained that
confession, when and how; ask yourself the question: upon whom did the man who
confessed depend for drinking, for eating and for sleeping?
15.
I do not think that I need to add other recommendations (for example, as to
the material or documentary authenticity of the text to be studied). You
understood that I am setting out a method of investigation that is elementary
and not at all original. It is a routine method that one would apply
automatically if it were a question of ordinary criminal matters which are
exceptional by their supposed nature, very far from redoubling prudence and
making appeal to a proven method, they display an incredible lightness. The
good method always consists when it is a question of an inquest, of an analysis
or of whatever work, of „beginning with the beginning.“ In fact, experience has
taught me that often nothing is more difficult and less spontaneous than „to
begin with the beginning.“ It is only after some years of research on the „gas
chambers“ and after having pronounced those words „gas chambers“ perhaps
several thousands of times that one fine day I woke up with the following
question: „But in fact, what indeed can those words signify? To what material
reality can they indeed relate?“ To ask those questions was to very quickly
find in them an answer. That answer you know: it is that the homicidal „gas
chambers“ of the Germans were only born in sick minds. It is time that the
entire world wakes up and realizes this. Germany, in particular, ought to wake
up from this frightful nightmare. It is time that a truthful history of the
Second World War be written.
NOTES
I reproduce here the text of the entry of 2 September 1942 (Diary of Johann
Paul Kremer) after the photocopy of the original as it is found in the National
Archives in Washington (Doc. #NO-3408). Some Exterminationist works reproduce
the photograph of this entry among other entries from the diary. But the reader
has little chance to go about deciphering each word of the German handwriting of
Dr. Kremer. He will be inclined to have confidence in the printed reproduction
that they will propose to him, for example, in the margin; that is the case
with KL Auschwitz, Arbeit Macht Frei, edited by the International
Auschwitz Committee, 96 pages (not dated). On page 48 there appears a
photograph of a manuscript page of the diary on which are found three entries
relating to five dates (1 through 5 September 1942). In the margin, you
discover the alleged printed reproduction of the single entry of 2 September.
That reproduction appears in French, English and German. In French and English
the text is outrageously distorted. In German, it was very difficult to distort
the text in a similar way since the photocopy of the manuscript is available to
the reader. But we must have unlimited confidence that the Exterminationists
will falsify texts that embarrass them. The International Auschwitz Committee
has found a solution thanks to a typographical trick. After the word Sonderaktion
the authors of the book have printed in the same typeface the following
parenthesis, as if it were from Dr. Kremer: „So wurde die Selektion und das
Vergasen genannt“ („Thus did they refer to selection and gassing“). Either
the reader, as is highly probable, will not notice the difference between the
manuscript text and the printed text and then will believe it to be a
confidence imparted by Dr. Kremer, which will appear to him to be all the more
normal since, according to an Exterminationist myth, the Nazis spent their time
inventing a coded language in order to cover up their crimes; or else the
reader will see the difference between the texts and then the authors will
plead a simple and innocent typographical error. Serge Klarsfeld, as I said
above, has used this fallacious page in his Memorial of the Deportation of
the Jews from France. It is thus that historical tricks are spread and
perpetuated. Here is the original manuscript text in its authentic form:
Zum 1. Male draussen um 3 Uhr früh bei einer Sonderaktion zugegen. Im
Vergleich hierzu erscheint mir das Dante' sche Inferno fast wie eine Komödie. Umsonst wird Auschwitz nicht das Lager der Vernichtung genannt!
Finally, here is the text of the passage from the letter of 21 October 1942
addressed to Miss Gla[serl:
[ ... ]Definitiven Bescheid habe ich allerdings noch nicht erwarte jedoch,
dass ich vor dem 1. Dezember wieder in Münster sein kann and so endgultig
dieser Hölle Auschwitz den Rükken gekehrt habe, wo ausser Fleck usw. sich
nunmehr auch der Typhus mächtig bemerkbar macht...
I reproduce the text with its errors in punctuation
and spelling.
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