Arthur R. Butz – The Hoax Of The Twentieth Century

Chapter 5: The Hungarian Jews
Jews, on account of their posing a security menace as the front came nearer. Now,
the documents reporting concentration and deportation of large numbers of Hungarian
Jews may be correct in regard to concentration alone; this was the policy in
neighboring countries. However, it seems unlikely that anywhere near 400,000
were concentrated. That would have been quite a huge operation.
It appears possible to get a fairly accurate picture of what happened in Hungary
by supplementing the story of the Red Cross with an examination of the
documents, rejecting the documents which are obvious forgeries. We are fortunate
in having the two-volume collection of reproductions of selected original documents,
The Destruction of Hungarian Jewry, edited by Randolph L. Braham;
these volumes offer the normally circumstanced reader a handy substitute for a
regular documents collection. Examining the documents included and rejecting as
forgeries those that pertain to alleged deportations of 400,000 Hungarian Jews, a
believable story unfolds. On April 14, 1944, Hungary agrees to the deportation of
50,000 employable Jews to Germany for labor (page 134, NG-1815). On April 19,
Veesenmayer requests freight cars, whose procurement is “encountering great difficulties,”
for the deportation of 10,000 employable Jews delivered by the Hungarians
(page 138, NG-5546). Finally on April 27, Veesenmayer reports on the
imminent shipment of 4,000 employable Jews to Auschwitz (page 361, NG-
5535). Also on April 27, Ritter reports on delays in the deportation of the 50,000
on account of rail shortages (page 362, NG-2196). Later in the year, July 11,
Veesenmayer reports on the difficulty of carrying out the Jewish policy in Hungary
because of the more lenient policies practiced in Romania and Slovakia
(page 194, NG-5586). On August 25, Veesenmayer reports Himmler’s offer to
stop deportations from Hungary (page 481, no document number), and on October
18, Veesenmayer reports on the new Jewish measures in Hungary (page 226, no
document number). A believable story, and one consistent with the Red Cross Report.
One may also remark that, on Hungary, the authors of the hoax have again
attempted to supply a dual interpretation to a perfectly valid fact. There were, indeed,
deportations of Hungarian Jews in the spring of 1944 to, among other
places, Auschwitz. However, the deportations, which were for labor purposes
only, were severely limited by the disintegrating European rail system and do not
appear to have been carried out on the approximate schedule originally contemplated
or aspired to.
A few words regarding the Joel Brand affair, the proposed swap of Hungarian
Jews for trucks and other supplies, are in order.
The pre-war German policy, which was also maintained to some extent early
in the war, was to encourage Jewish emigration by all means. However, after the
war had developed into a great conflict, the policy changed, and emigration from
countries in the German sphere was made very difficult for Jews. The principal
reason for this was, of course, that such Jews were manpower that could and
would be used against them. There were a variety of lesser reasons, one of the
most important being that, in an attempt to drive a wedge between Britain and the
Arabs, the Germans supported the Arab side on the question of Jewish immigration
into Palestine. Thus, the standard German attitude in the latter half of the war
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