Hardtalk - David Irving (BBC 2000)

the Holocaust became the focus of a trial in London last month when the historian David Irving sued an American writer for liel and lost Irving who claimed that there were no systematic gassings of Jews in aitz was branded by the judge as an active Holocaust denier anti-semitic and racist and an associate of right-wing extremists who promote Nazism why does he think he lost so badly David Irving welcome to the program yes hello in the introduction the new to the new edition of Hitler's War you quote what you call a scornful adage and you say to

historians is grounded a talent that even the gods are denied to alter what has already happened was that you giving the game away and telling us exactly what you've been doing well history since 1988 i' add a category to that not only historians can do it but apparently lawyers can also do it but you did it in this Cas according to the judge didn't you no I I don't agree and I had to be careful what I say about Inc commenting on the trial because we're going to go to appeal on this so I had

to be careful not to try and second guess the judge well the record of the judge already stands what he said doesn't he I mean Irving has for his own ideological reasons persistently and deliberately misrepresented and manipulated historical evidence yeah this isn't the view of a lot of historians but of course which is the view of a lot of historians isn't it a lot of historians is there's a consensus of historians who who obviously don't like me and I must admit that if I was invited to be an expert witness in this case as several

historians were for the defense and I've been offered £100,000 to testify against David Irving then I would find it difficult to refuse as well and that was the amount of money that was poured into this case so you're saying Professor Richard Evans professor of modern history at Cambridge deliberately lied and falsified his version of events or his record on you uh for money oh no I can't say that of course he was paid that's what you are saying he was paid £76,000 to write a report and that gave him the confidence that he needed did

in order to smear me from one end of the country and in fact around the world well he didn't smear you did he he said what he thought you know your record was like yeah with without without having heard me cross-examine him in the witness box and he turned out to be not exactly expert on the history of the third right in fact his knowledge of German was in on occasions lamentable um I I was astonished that a person of his qualifications can rise to be a a professor of history at Cambridge he was astonished

by you he said he wasn't prepared for the sheer depth of duplicity in your treatment of sources I wouldn't trust him about what he said Hitler had for breakfast yes he wouldn't throw me I throw grand piano either he's not learning that but if you read the judge's verdict you'll see the judge also says I don't agree with a lot of the negative things that Evans in particular has had to say about Mr Irving pity the judge wasn't specific about what he didn't agree with well you still lost didn't he found against you whatever nice

things the judge may have said as well he certainly didn't retract the other things he said for the same reason he's portrayed Hitler in an unwarrantedly favorable light particularly in relation to his attitude towards responsibility for the treatment of the Jews Miss interpreting and mistranslating documents I think when we come to misinterpreting and mistranslating documents the court of appeal would have something to say about the judge in this case I have to be very careful what I say if it doesn't and if it doesn't then then of course I go down J then I crash

in Flames we already have I'm we we're crashing infl but you got to realize I was a lone litigant in this case facing people who had poured about 10 million pounds into into defending the action that I had brought into finding out the truth if if the truth was there in the archives hidden for the last 55 years it shouldn't have taken 10 million to prove me wrong and at the end of the day the judge was rather scratching his head in his judgment the judge says I had always assumed that there was the evidence

that Asis had gas Chambers and I was surprised to find that there wasn't until this case came along it wasn't documentary evidence is where he said didn't say there wasn't any evidence yes he said there wasn't documentary there were eyewitnesses and he relies on half a dozen eyewitnesses and that's not good enough for me I'm afraid I want to see I want to see documents if all the shootings on the Eastern Front are documented there's no doubt that the Nazis killed millions of Jews on the Eastern front and we got any number of documents on

that but nothing for the gas Jam talking of relying on documents you seem to have relied for for your central thesis that there was no Mass gassing of Jews in aitz on a man called Frederick ler who had no formal training in engineering or forensic science but took some samples from brick work and plaster work in ashz and converted you overnight in 1988 to his findings I don't think the no formal training it stands against him as I pointed out in he wasn't the forensic scientist was in the cross-examination of their chief Professor Van Pelt

who's a professor of architecture in in Canada it turns out he never qualified as an architect he would be arrested if he called himself an architect and yet he was paid 109,000 to give evidence against me in this case this is the odd kind of case I found myself in I found myself baffled by the way the legal system works but you acknowledged there were flaws in the loyer report I mean you said criticism of the loyer report had to be taken on board these are your words and the probably concessions have to be made

at both ends of the scale so despite defending this man's integrity and his scrupulous methods you still acknowledged that there were errors in his report when I published his report in June 1989 in the introduction I said it's a Pity that uh there are things that forensically one would have liked to have seen done differently it's flawed and I said that at the time but the forensic test we you also said you were converted by it converted by a flawed report I was converted by the Laboratory test that the flawed report contained there had been

lab test conducted on the fabric of the so-called gas chams at asit which found no significant traces of cyanide which is what my mind thinking I have to admit leer claimed that the samples of concrete taken from the walls at aitz um gas Chambers contain qualities of quantities of hydrogen cyanide that were too low to kill human beings and thus he suggested the chambers were for delousing as it came out at the trial the truth was the reverse the real amount of hydrogen cyanide needed to kill humans is 20 times lower than that needed to

kill lice that's a convincing argument is it isn't it's it's a very clever kind of argument used by the defense lawyers but if you got a gas clever kind of argument used by you on if you've got a a so-called gas chamber a room about this size in which allegedly half a million people have been gased by Cyanide and you find there's no Trace no significant Trace whatsoever of cyanide left in the concrete now and there should be because it turns into a very permanent substance called prussi Blue that sets my mind thinking the tests

have been replicated since then by other reputable scientists and the same result has come up and there's other reasons also for doubting this not just the forensic tests how saddened are you by the state of your reputation I mean you went s not the word I'm horrified you went to court in a sense the Salvage of reputation that you no longer had I had no choice the the enemies of the truth as I call them were conducting a Mudslide and the mudslide was building up and it was being financed on a colossal scale around the

world with a single dedicated aim of destroying David Irving what about your colossal support I mean you've had what 4,000 supporters around the world not they don't have the kind of money that Steven Spielberg has how do how do we know well I can tell you they don't you don't tell us who they are I have I thr my records open to a journalist of Jewish Chronicle I said here you I have a look at the computer look at he sat there 15 minutes going through all the records and I said as long as you

don't write down names you can look into your house content I'm I'm not so where have you taken where have you taken money from we we have a very broad base of supporters around the world people who give me the smallest amount as suppose $2 the largest amount is $50,000 you take money from any group anywhere if if there's no if there's no strings attached to it I will take money from whoever will support my legal fight no money too dirty for you to take oh come on have you seen the kind of money been

into this case by my opponent this this I'm asking you the kind of money that you would take this is a really dirty fight being fought against me this is money being fought Mone they would say that you distorted the truth we've only just found out after the case was over how much money was paid to the witnesses we've only just found out after the trial was over where the money came from and paying expert Witnesses isn't unique to this trial is I'm I'm sad to hear I'm sad to hear this I I didn't pay

my Witnesses a penny they spoke because they spoke from their expertise they spoke from their knowledge as professors and as historians so you see this as a giant conspiracy and a Jewish conspiracy again against Irving I I'm sorry to say that this is cor Irving David David against Goliath yes for the for the last I suppose 20 years the various bodies it's not the Jews as such it's just certain self-appointed leaders of the Jewish Community who quite demonstrably because we have the documents they were in court they weren't relevant the judge quite rightly said these

aren't relevant to the case Mr Irving but I put them in just because I wanted the world to know what I've been up against for the last 20 years you've enjoyed the publicity attendance with this case um it had there were two exhilarating qualities the exhilaration of standing in the high court and cross-examining Witnesses and see them crumble in your best s row suit in my best s row suit which made you feel Superior which made me feel immensely superior to the kind of people I was up against there's no question I was I certainly

never felt inferior one moment to any of those expert Witnesses I ran rings around them I made them confess that they had no qualifications I made them confess they didn't know yet you still managed to lose you called the judge mine fur at one particular Point why look at the trans this one of those Legends I'm asking you why this is one of those Legends did you or didn't you I'm there's a passage in the in the transcript where I'm saying what the crowd is calling out to me the neo- narcis others I'm addressing in

hallow and they're calling out things like zeky and they're calling out things like M fura and I say this and if you look at that it's quite plain and if the journalist wanted to report it the other way I'm I can't be responsible for them one of the additional charges was that you misinterpreted evidence now a document crucial to you was the from Hitler's headquarters November 1941 requiring that one transport of Jews from Berlin to the east should not be liquidated the document refer to One Transport of Jews and you misconstrue this to mean that

no transports of Jews should be murdered why I'm sure you know German if you if if you see the German word uden transport just by itself with no context at all the word transport can mean Transportation the transportation of Jews or it can mean a single transport and without the text to know exactly what is going on I translated that back in 1977 when I I was the first person to transcribe him's handwriting that's why I found it I said the transports of Jews from Berlin have to stop no liquidation but very rapidly another expert

Gerald Fleming who's a British history in contact me he said no this refers to a particular train load David this is a well-known train load that went to riao and the next edition of the book I changed it these are the kind of misinterpretations that go on the whole time when you're when you're pioneering in history when you're reading somebody's handwritten documents nobody else has ever whether to read you make errors of interpretation you acknowledge errors of interpretation good Lord and mistranslations if if out of out of a desire to to get them to say

what you wish they would have said that's what the judge says that's what the judge said but that that interpretation I totally reject you got the two kinds of historians you didn't convince him did you no I didn't in in court and I said on on the last day in the court as when he finished reading I of judgment I stood up and I said my Lord I have to admit that I've obviously failed to convince you and I blame myself that I'm not able to persuade you that the historical documents have to be read

the way that they should be read and it's my fault and the next time around when we come to the court of appeal we will Rectify that you hope yes well no no question of course there's a question there's a huge question over it well there's a question whether the court of appeal even allows me to appeal that's the first hurdle we have to cross and there's a question whether we can raise the £100,000 is going to be necessary in order to to to establish the the security for for cost which will undoubtedly be required

by the defendants in this action on the allegation it's all about money you see it's about people with isn't about money it's about the truth and it's about your reputation it's about multi-millionaires fighting somebody who hasn't got the means to defend himself namely myself and I'm doing the best I a question of means it's a question of whether you actually told the truth or not yes it doesn't matter what's spent to try and prove the truth that's that's what this whole trial was about wasn't it it wasn't about money it was about the truth no

it wasn't it was about and you've done everybody a favor in many people's eyes by by proving that these theories of yours were were false was it was about money right from day one if the truth was as plain as plainly written as they made out they wouldn't have needed to have a courtroom filled with 30 lawyers and historians and experts and research assistants and all the rest of it who would spent 20 man years to try and prove me wrong you did the favor of of getting them to have it conclusively proved didn't you

no we didn't we we spent no money at all we paid no money at all on producing no I said you did them a favor of getting them you persuaded them to spend a lot of money to prove that your views were conclusive I don't think so I think if anybody reads the transcript they will say that's funny the eyewitnesses say there was holes in the roof where they poured the cyanide in through and yet the roof is there there's no holes people have argued that consistently I mean this is something you've come out with

it's been it's being comprehensively challenged in court yeah and time again I said to the defendants halfway through the tri you're winging about the money this Cas is is costing if you go to aitz tonight and scrape the mud off that roof and find the holes in the roof on the top side you can't see them from the bottom side if you find the holes in the roof then I will capitulate tomorrow I'll come to court and I'll wind up the whole action and they so why did why did the judge talk about overwhelming convergence

the judge said and I have to admit there are Englishmen like this the judge said I believe the eyewitnesses and not the roof and this is where I can only say well you paid your money and you take your choice David Irving when asked if you're a racist you talked about an emotional instinctive aversion to people from other cultures yes you have that you I'm that honest yes I mean I could just have stood in the witness box and said no I'm not a racist but I I you acknowledge being a racist I I don't

think I'm probably any more racist than than you are or anybody else not compare I'm talking about you you would classify yourself as a racist you have done you've said I'm a racist no I haven't I haven't said I'm a racist this is a typical thing taken out of out of context in in there's this film on Fred leer where the producer said Mr Irving put yourself in various positions now now imagine you're a you're a communist now imagine you're a Jew now imagine you're a racist and when we came to the one that began

with now I'm a racist I began I saying right now I'm a racist and I say that and that's all they quoted you said that in one of your comments about the Jews I would say that as a race they are better at making money than I am that's a racist remark this is you talking no this is you talking that's a racist remark if I was going to be crude I would say that not only are they better at making money but they are greedy so you write off the whole Jewish Nation as greedy

you don't think that's RAC that's my perception of but that is a racist comment isn't it I I don't think so it's a perception of the way the Jews are and the way that I see them in the newspapers and you see them as greedy you've written them off as greedy well as a result of their campaign over The Last 5 Years to lay their hand on all the Swiss gold and to beat up the French you don't just talk about the last five years you talk about the last 3,000 years they've been hated for

the last 3,000 years this is another problem uh I I agree this is a problem which they themselves are not addressing enough attention to if if I was a Jew and I frequently say this and I find myself being put into a pit and machine gun to death of my family I would want to know in my last few dying seconds why is why are they doing it to me why is it us Jews again and again who are being victimized like this there must be some reason for it there must be something in the

human micro ship which I think is to which you always wish to draw attention to as a stick to beat them I don't think I think it's xenophobia I think there's an element of xenophobia in everybody and and is your xenophobia when you say if you're a man and you go into a men's public toilet and there's a black man or Pakistani standing at one store then you go two or three stores possibly further away it's Instinct yes it's the little in it's a racist instinct is it the microchip kicks in and and I think

you probably find that millions of people around the world listening to this will say well why justify Yourself by saying well millions of other people feel the same thing there's no scientific evidence to suggest that millions of people feel the same thing do you feel do you feel in better company saying these things by thinking oh were there plenty of other people out there who feel the same way I've been around the world and does that somehow justify your views I've been I've been around the world and I've spoken to other human beings and I

know milons of them presumably no but a reasonable cross-section millions of reasonable cross-section of them and I suspect strongly there's millions of people out there who say yeah David are you suspect so it's not a scientific fact it's what you suspect you said um you told the independent once you record C uh a black man on a bicycle coming towards you in Florida the moment he became confused and couldn't decide whether to go this way or that he crashed into me and nearly broke my finger I screamed at him you stupid and I I told

the independent I'd never actually revealed that story before I told the independent that I was so ashamed of that having happened that when I went home to my little cottage on the island where I where I stay in America where no one could see I went down on my knees and I I I I I pleaded to God for forgiveness and it's it's it's it's I use it's it's just totally unforgivable I've never used that word before I've never used it since I I would find it difficult to say it even now it was pretty

close to hand when you wanted it wasn't it I mean it was just right there on inside your brain buried somewhere in in an ugly corner of your brain and in a moment of great pain it comes out and you wish you hadn't said it and and you know that he's seen you and he's heard you saying it and you go and apologize and that's all you can do what about the charge of inciting racial hatred well I think that's an odious charge and I don't know how anyone could possibly accuse me of well You'

you you've um you've acknowledged that you're tasteless I'm tasteless enough to say the people butting in rebutting stories about asht you've actually recommended being tasteless in 1991 a speech at Calgary you said the only way to overcome the pseudo religious atmosphere to use tastelessness yes yes is to treat these little with the ridicule and bad taste they deserve you've got to say things like more women died on the back seat of Senator Edward Kennedy's car chap atic than died in the gas Chambers at asit why is it the business of a historian to be so

tasteless and so hurtful to people who may have had relatives who suffered or died at asht to Ram your views down their throat suppose that particular statement is true that people died on the backseat of Senator that fake you know you know it's not the one they show the T yes the one they show the tourist was built in 1948 you know it's not the pols have admitted it was built in 1948 and nobody reped the repaired nobody said it was built for the first time it's a totally fake building they they built a chimney

behind it which isn't even connected to the main building a lot of as in as you know it's like Disneyland and the only way you can get people in ruins it was in Ruins there are plans that exist they have they have and even van you know that are plans to exist even ,000 expert admits that what they show the tourists is fake WR a whole chapter about it why so tasteless why so needlessly hurtful you have to be tasteless because it is the only way to bring this extraordinary fact home to the world that

what they show the tourists in aitz is largely fake they've destroyed the Integrity there's no doubt that tens or even hundreds of thousands of people died at arit from various causes and using language like this designed to hurt wound people to who else does you feel you have to because over the whole of the AIT complex has been put this this glass cheese cover so to speak no one's allowed to go near it and lift up the cheese cover and say I want to investigate that because they put this word holocaust over the top and

they made it a criminal offense in many countries around the world even to look at what happened in ashit look what happened to me when I started questioning ashit and that should make people suspicious well let look let's let's look what happened to you I mean speaking for right-wing organizations in Germany the DV the deuta F un um what's their Creed I mean you take it off their website denial of vermar crimes and of German war guilt in general mass murder of German civilians by the Allies the recreation of Greater Germany why do you speak

for people like that when I was first invited to go and speak to the German people's Union I was about 1984 I wrote a letter to the German Embassy being a a cautious person and I said I've been invited to speak to this body will you tell me are they lawful are they constitutional do you recommend me not to and the German Embassy wrote me back a very nice letter saying they are perfectly lawful I didn't say they weren't lawful I told you these were the views body and there are no reasons why you shouldn't

address this organization you you agree with the views they has passed no I don't but what I do why do you address them then it is useful that I go and speak to these people many of whom are encourageable many of many of whom even I would find encourageable so you can imagine how encourageable they are and I give them a taste of the truth I read out the truth that they like the truth that happens to coincide with their views why are you fated by these read I you're the darling of these rightwing GRS

because I'm regard as the bringer of truth and totally unpage I'm totally impartial between between the Waring parties that's why they F impartial enough to attend a dinner in 1990 to Mark Hitler's birthday totally totally untrue held by the wellknown neoni aval alans it's in your diary you talked about people rising and toasting have you never had people in your in your surroundings who on April the 20th say oh it's adol fitler's birthday let's drink a toast you probably haven't no I haven't no have you have clearly members of parliament in this country Alan Clark

once came to visit me does it does it make better you you always draw attention to what other people are doing I'm talking about what you do I'm talking about the kind of company that you keep I'm trying to draw attention to to to to normal people with with noral in the normal world that I red blooded sense of humor and red blooded oh so this is a sense of humor toasting Hitler's birth I find it totally tasteless and that's why I refused to join in well you said because you didn't have a glass well

that's that's the obvious proof that I didn't join in I found it that's why I wrot it in my diary I find it incredibly tasteless that they should do this you uh what do you think of Hitler it's a rather wide question it's like where do you stand on Jesus Christ um said there are two very different personalities you admire him um let me start at the other end of the question I I was in Johannesburg a few years ago being interviewed by the editor of the City Press which is a black newspaper and he

was black and his name was Adolf and I said how come your name is Adolf and he said Mr Irving people of the third world their parents fre called their children Adolf in in in memory of Adolf Hitler and I was astonished by this and I said why he said well because in third world countries they regarded him as the hero and the champion of the underdog and for a long time that was the case in the early 1930s he was that way when he came to power and until about 1937 1938 you can say

had he died then had he been Fallen victim to an Assassin's gun they would have erected a statue to him in Hitler in Germany did you admire him as a military commander unquestionably he he with with withstood the entire combined might of the the Allied Nations until well for six years um he very nearly won World War II if it if it had lasted seven years you probably would have because the Allies would have run out of steam we had no Manpower left and and the world of fire had gone but I think politically of

course he went wrong he was a bad leader he was a bad dictator he he allowed things at home to go to rot while he ran ran the war and you can't you can't do that that's the basic problem with all dictatorships how saddened are you by the fact that very members of your family have rejected your views this is what the newspapers say is totally untrue well they quote your daughter Paloma for instance saying I'm completely opposed to his beliefs in terms of women that's another issue what he says is a joke I think

she was referring to a description of women as mental chewing gun I I don't think I said that I have point out the fact that their brains are Marvel of miniaturization and your daughter P said My Views and my family's views are totally opposed to his and Anyone who reads what he says must find them totally laughable does that does that upset you these these daughters have been in touch with me over the last few days to say these quotations are fictitious and invented I've seen the same thing said about my twin brother so they

support you fully a national newspaper said that I'm I'm at loggerheads with my twin brother and this is also totally untrue and one wonders where the newspapers find these things but you as a journalist you know this is the way newspapers report that's why I find live television is has such an such an edge and such an advantage it's much more honest you can catch me out you can you can bring tears into my eyes by asking you certain questions but on the other hand I have a chance to say things as they are we'll

watch your appeal with interest David a thank you very very much indeed [Music]