Arthur R. Butz – The Hoax Of The Twentieth Century

Arthur R. Butz, The Hoax of the Twentieth Century
Development of the Controversy
Before the early Seventies, there was only a relatively minor amount of publicly
expressed questioning of the Holocaust legend. The most significant literature
was the work of the former Buchenwald inmate and French Resistance member
Paul Rassinier, who died in 1967. However, in reflection of the fact that there
existed little interest in the subject, English translations of the Rassinier books
were not published until very recently, i.e. in the past four years.
Around 1972 or 1973, there was an international development, by its nature
not noticed at the time, that remains fundamentally mysterious. What I am referring
to is the fact that a number of persons in several countries, virtually simultaneously
and completely independently of each other (in fact each was not even
aware of the existence of the others) resolved to question the received legend in
the manner that was appropriate to his own situation and to publish his conclusions.
Thies Christophersen’s booklet Die Auschwitz Lüge, based on his recollections
of his own stay near Auschwitz during the war and with an Introduction by
Manfred Roeder, was published in Germany in 1973, and it was soon followed
there by Dr. Wilhelm Stäglich’s short article in the monthly Nation Europa, also
based on his recollections of his wartime assignment near Auschwitz. The year
1973 also saw the appearance in the U.S. of Dr. Austin J. App’s booklet The Six
Million Swindle.
Richard Harwood’s booklet Did Six Million Really Die was published in
Britain in the spring of 1974, and later in the same year there was the uproar at the
Sorbonne over a letter by Dr. Robert Faurisson, so both were at work on this subject
in 1973, if not earlier. My work commenced in 1972, and my book was published
in Britain in the spring of 1976 and in German translation a year later.
In this review, I have not mentioned every relevant publication, and no value
judgments should be made purely from the inclusion or exclusion of anything
from the list. The purpose here is not to offer a bibliography or a critique but to
discuss the development of the controversy.
These developments of the early and mid-Seventies initiated reactions and a
controversy that still shows no sign of subsiding, as I think you are aware. In
Germany, Roeder was successfully prosecuted for his Introduction to the Christophersen
booklet, 480 and Stäglich was punished with a five year, twenty percent reduction
of his pension as a retired judge. 481 These acts of officially enforced censorship
did not daunt any of these persons. A new version of the Christophersen
booklet was issued with an Introduction by Stäglich substituted for Roeder’s.
Stäglich has recently published his fine book Der Auschwitz Mythos through the
Grabert-Verlag, and he has also co-published a shorter work with Udo Walendy.
The so-called liberal establishment in Germany has been in a dither over this lone
courageous man, and it has been openly asked in its press “is it really so difficult
480
481
370
Jewish Chronicle (London), February 27, 1976, p. 3; Patterns of Prejudice (London), January-
February 1977, p. 12.
Nation Europa (Coburg), August 1975, p. 39.