Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day008.13 Last-Modified: 2000/07/20 Q. With the manuscript alteration, that is not Himmler's writing, an earlier draft, the speech is not made in those terms, it is recorded in these terms as they were recorded, were they not? . P-114 A. Sometimes they are recorded. Q. Yes. Then comes a transcript or a version anyway? A. Yes. Q. To be put before the Fuhrer? A. Yes. Q. And for some reason or another the page which we have here and which is in the draft is removed? A. Yes. Q. And replaced by something else? A. Yes. Q. What is the evidence for that? A. The fact that this page has clearly been retyped at some stage. Q. So what? A. And renumbered from there on. Q. Perhaps it was badly typed in the first place. A. That is another, third possible alternative, but it is the funniest thing, is it not, that this is the one page that it happens on. The one page that contains the pregnant sentence has clearly been retyped at a different date by a different hand on different paper. Q. Why do you say a different date? A. Well, because it is on different paper. It is not taken from the same wad of paper that the rest of the speech is typed on. Q. But suppose the secretaries do a shift job or something . P-115 later in the same day, perhaps the evening, I do not know what time of the day the speech is made, nor do we know what dates these were drafts were on, do we? A. No, we do not. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I am sorry, Mr Rampton, I hope you do not mind, can I just see where we have got to? This is a speech made by Himmler to a whole collection -- how many Gauleiters Reichsleiters? A. This is to top brass in the armed forces. Q. How many would there have been there? A. Probably in the order of 100. Q. And several of them would be seeing Hitler on a fairly regular basis? A. Yes. Q. And your hypothesis is that Himmler is telling the Generals that he has been ordered to take this drastic action ---- A. He is speaking ---- Q. --- as against Jews? A. Once again he is not reading from a prepared script. Q. No, but he is telling the generals that when it is not true he is inventing the order -- is this your hypothesis -- and that is the reason why he has to sanitize the version that goes to Hitler? A. If I can paraphrase the way I have put it in my book, my Lord, we have any number of speeches where Himmler made . P-116 the same kind of statement. This is the only one where he inadvertently, perhaps, talked about a Fuhrer order. He may very well have inadvertently, because the General has spoken of a Fuhrer order because they are accustomed to orders. I do not know what his motive for that was. Q. It is scarcely inadvertent. It is plainly a speech that was carefully prepared in advance. A. He is not reading from a script, my Lord. We have probably in this case, certainly in other cases, like on one page of paper he would write down 15 or 20 words on the basis of which he would speak. Q. I am bound to say that looking at the bit of paper Mr Rampton handed in a moment ago, that looks to me like a preparatory draft which was altered ---- A. No, my Lord, it is not. Q. --- for grammatical reasons. Well, you tell me that and I will accept it because I expect you have good reason for doing so. A. It very definitely is not, my Lord. This is a typed version taken from either the shorthand notes or, as Mr Rampton rightly says, from the sound recording which is then edited in handwriting by a third hand. From that is then prepared, as we can see by comparison, the large Fuhrer size typewriter. All I am saying, my Lord, is one has to comment on the fact that this page alone has been retyped at a different date and inserted, and ---- . P-117 Q. Yes, I follow that. A. It is significant. Q. But what I want to ask you is this, Mr Irving, was Himmler not taking an almighty risk in pretending to the Generals that he had an order when he had not, given that the Generals were going to be, or some of them, in communication directly with Hitler? A. This might be the very reason why he had that page retyped making no reference to a Fuhrer order. We do not know what is on the retyped version. I hesitate to venture out too far across that particular thin ice. We cannot speculate what was on the other version of that page, the one that was correctly typed and correctly indented. Q. I thought you were speculating that it might have been sanitized to delete the reference to an order. A. Yes, we cannot safely speculate really any more than I have done in the book. My Lord, the whole of this passage is in my book "Hitler's War" with the entire incriminating quotation, and in a footnote of three lines, two and a half lines, I have drawn attention to the fact that this page is for some reason or other retyped. MR RAMPTON: I am not sure you are right about it. It is a small point, but, to be clear, it is both this and the next speech of 24th are in Hitler's War 1977? A. On pages 630 and 631. Q. Yes. But I think you will find, if you look at page 630 . P-118 of 1991, I think 4th May has disappeared, has it not? I may be wrong about that. A. I would be very surprised indeed if they are. Q. I compared it with 1977. I think ---- A. I would be prepared to bet a substantial sum of money it has not vanished. Q. You find it in Hitler's War 1991 because I could not. I am not saying it is not there; I could not find it. A. Well, it will be on page 630. Oddly any, it is exactly the same page as the old version. Q. 630 of the old version. Let us compare the two, shall we? MR JUSTICE GRAY: I cannot see it on 630. A. I may have to withdraw my bet. MR RAMPTON: It is on 630 of 1977 ---- MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes. MR RAMPTON: --- sure enough, and 24th May is on page 631. I am baffled to know where to find it in the edition for 1991. MR JUSTICE GRAY: You can always come back to this, Mr Irving, because it is difficult to find something when you are on the hoof, as it were. A. I am slightly puzzled because I am just looking at the end notes and I see there are two pages of the end notes have vanished, three pages of the end notes have vanished from your photocopy and I wonder if it is in the end notes instead. . P-119 MR RAMPTON: That is not very likely, is it, Mr Irving? A. I am still on page 830. Q. If there were an end note about it, it would be in the same part of the text, would it not? A. But it would be on page 830 of the end notes which I do not have. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think I have. MR RAMPTON: I have lost mine too. A. Either that or it has been shovelled to a different part of the book which I -- there has been some major structural change to that chapter I can see with all the fresh material we have put in. MR JUSTICE GRAY: I do not think the note on page 630 ---- A. It does not contain it. MR JUSTICE GRAY: --- helps. MR RAMPTON: Your end notes in the 1991 edition are done by numbers, are they not? A. By page number. Q. Yes, I see. My fault. So I have to look to the end note to page 630? MR JUSTICE GRAY: Which is on page 830? A. I may have put it to a different part of the book, but it is not in the same place. We can say that anyway. MR RAMPTON: There is a real oddity here, Mr Irving. You have not got it, so I will read it out. A. Yes. . P-120 Q. The end note to page 630 says (and, no doubt, this is exactly what it says in the 1977 edition), I am reading at the end of the note: "His May 5th speech is on microfilm and that of May 24th", that is another microfilm reference? A. Yes. Q. It had been in the text in 1977, but there is no question, since this is a reference to page 630 of the text, that it has left the main stage by the time of the 1991 edition? A. As you can see, I am as baffled as you are by this. Q. No, it is quite easy. A. Yes. Q. You have edited it out of the text of the 1991 edition, but have forgotten to change the end note which is merely replicating what was said in 1977? A. Can I amend that statement to say it has been edited out? Q. OK. A. If it has been edited out, of course, many hands edit it. The American editors who produce this text may well have decided this was just repeating what the next paragraph said. I am as baffled as you are and I will look into it within the next 24 hours and see what I can make of it. MR JUSTICE GRAY: We will come back to it. MR RAMPTON: I will not push that any further for the moment until I hear, if you can produce it, what the explanation might be. You see, if we look at the history of the thing . P-121 (with which you are well familiar), you told us yesterday, I think, that by this time, May 1944, it is likely that Hitler was well aware of what Himmler had been doing? A. Yes. Q. And you also told us, I think, that if Hitler had been told or had known earlier in 1942, early 1943, he probably would not have minded very much? A. Yes. Q. So if you are right, what was Himmler so terrified -- I do not accept for a moment you are right; I have to say I think it is a fanciful suggestion -- what on earth was Himmler afraid of? A. Hitler had repeatedly issued injunctions against people who were issuing Fuhrer orders of which he had no knowledge. There is several examples of that in the files. There is one occasion when Albert Speer goes to see him and Hitler complains to him that the foreign workers are not getting enough to eat. Speer says: "But this was a Fuhrer order, mein Fuhrer", and this is recorded in the minutes of that conference, and Hitler says: "This is the first I have ever heard of any such order". So ---- Q. Not only did Himmler take a risk that what he said to that bunch of Generals on 5th May might get back to the Fuhrer and he, Himmler, get a rocket, he said it again on 24th, did he not? . P-122 A. Can we see in exactly what terms? Q. Yes, you can. It is the next document, 188. Here I do not think I have the whole document. The first three pages, well, let us look at the front of it, first of all. It is translated, my Lord, on page 74 of Longerich, Longerich 1, or the relevant part is. It is a speech in the Reichsfuhrer SS on 24th. The date has been altered suggesting that it was going to be on some other date, do you agree? This is interesting. We will come to that in a minute. You see the date at the top has been altered? A. What are you looking at? Q. Document 188 in the file, H4 (ii). It is the next following document. A. Yes. Q. It is the speech of 24th May 1944 again at Sonthofen? A. Yes. Q. Can you translate the rest of the heading, please? A. "Speech of the Reichsfuhrer SS on 24th May 1944 at Sonthofen to the participants in a political ideological course (Army Generals)". Q. Can you turn over the page to the next page in the file? A. In the document or in the...? Q. In the actual document we have? A. Yes. Q. Such part of it as we have? A. Page 2. . P-123 Q. Page 2 at the top. In brackets you have: "RF SS Sonthofen", I do not know, but it looks to me as if that date has been changed from 25th or some later date to 24th? A. The typist has it wrong on the first three pages and it has been subsequently amended in manuscript or corrected in manuscript. Q. In places it has been amended, in places it is correct. A. Because by the time she has got to page 4 or 5, she has realized what the right date should be. Q. What do you think the right date was is what I am asking. Can you read it? I cannot. A. 24th May. Q. No, I know what the handwriting says. The overwritten typescript looks to me like 25th. MR JUSTICE GRAY: Does it matter? MR RAMPTON: It might do, yes. A. We have Himmler's diary for that date, his calendar, which shows clearly the speech was on this date. Q. That is right. If you look at page 32 as it has at the top, again the page numbering has been altered by hand? A. Yes. Q. There it is typed correctly, 24.5.44? A. Yes.
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