Arthur R. Butz – The Hoax Of The Twentieth Century

Arthur R. Butz, The Hoax of the Twentieth Century
gees. 127
The first extermination claim appears to have been made by the London section
of the World Jewish Congress in June 1942. It was claimed that one million
Jews had been killed in some undesignated and unlocated “vast slaughterhouse for
Jews” which had been established in Eastern Europe. The only attempt to provide
evidence for this claim was a remark that the Polish government in exile in London
had received confirming information. The allegation was carried in the New
York Times in a story that will be reviewed below.
The evidence for this London claim was obviously too flimsy to serve as effective
propaganda, so an effort was made to improve matters slightly. On August 8,
1942, Riegner and Guggenheim approached the U.S. Consulate in Geneva, which
had been cooperating with the World Jewish Congress to the extent of allowing it
to use diplomatic channels for messages, with a story that some anonymous German
industrialist had informed them that he had learned of a decision to kill all
non-Soviet Jews under German control. Discussions, which the industrialist had
overheard, were being held in the Führer’s Headquarters regarding the methods to
be employed. One method under discussion was gassing with Prussic acid (hydrogen
cyanide gas) after the Jews had been concentrated at camps in Eastern
Europe. This story was forwarded to Washington by the Consulate via U.S. diplomatic
channels and to London via British diplomatic channels. The “industrialist”
has remained anonymous to this day.
When the U.S. State Department received the message, it was evaluated and it
was decided that:
“[…] it does not appear advisable in view of the […] fantastic nature of
the allegations and the impossibility of our being of any assistance if such action
were taken, to transmit the information to Dr. Wise as suggested.”
The message was accordingly suppressed, but Wise learned of its contents
anyway. It is said that he learned from London, but it is also possible that he had
composed the message in the first place and learned of its transmission and suppression
through his various connections.
Wise immediately contacted Welles, who had approved the decision to suppress,
in order to protest the State Department’s handling of the matter. Welles replied
that the “information” was somewhat too unsubstantiated to be taken seriously
and that some confirmation should be obtained before any public announcement
was made. Welles then instructed the U.S. representative in the Vatican
to attempt to check the allegations with Vatican sources. At that time, almost
nobody in Washington pretended to take these claims seriously, and even President
Roosevelt assured Justice Felix Frankfurter that the Jews who had been deported
to the East were merely being used to help build fortifications.
In September 1942, two anonymous persons showed up in Geneva claiming to
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Unless otherwise noted, our treatment of the early extermination propaganda, related developments
in Washington and New York, and the conflicts between the State Department, on one
hand, and Zionists and the Treasury Department on the other, and the events leading up to the establishment
of the War Refugee Board, is based on Morse, 3-99; Feingold, 167-247; DuBois,
183-189; Blum, 207-227; Israel; 173-174, 216-217, 306-337; Morgenthau.