THE RUDOLF REPORT

GERMAR RUDOLF · THE RUDOLF REPORT11.2. The Naiveté of a Young RevisionistA Fleeting AcquaintanceIn February 1991, I attended a seminar in Bad Kissingen put on bya Sudeten-German youth organization—I was not a member but hadbeen invited. Toward the end of the seminar, I got to know anotherparticipant of about my age. He suggested that before we departed wepay a visit to Wehrmacht Generalmajor Otto Ernst Remer, who lived inthat town.Remer, I was told, was the person who had suppressed the Putschof July 20, 1944, against Hitler, and I was told he held fast to his viewsof that time. Our intended visit would be a little bit like a visit to a museumcontaining a living political fossil. I was curious, so I agreed andoff we went.To a young man from a bourgeois home who had been fed asteady diet of anti-fascism, the living room of General and Frau Remerwas creepy—Hitler busts, military decorations and all kinds of propagandahand-outs caused a shiver to run down my back. We were givena tour of the house by Frau Remer and then treated to a showing of avideo-film that portrayed the events of July 20, 1944, from Remer’sviewpoint. Thus ‘enlightened’, after an hour we left for home. 544Freedom to WitnessIn summer 1991, when I was requested by Remer’s attorney toprepare an expert opinion on the ‘gas chambers’ of Auschwitz for a544 Moreover, the Remer couple could remember as little from this chance meeting as from thetwo subsequent occasions on which I met them, when I appeared as an unknown, unimportantperson among a crowd. (Summer 1991: On the return from my first Auschwitz trip, I accompaniedKarl Philipp on a brief visit during a reception on Remer’s 80th birthday. Philipp wasRemer’s friend who had initially contacted me, who had driven me to Auschwitz and helpedme there, and who later helped me with all kinds of technical and infrastructural/logisticalsupport. Autumn 1992: Dinner of the defense team during the trial against Remer, after thecourt had refused to accept me as an expert witness.) The Remers came to know me personallyonly in January 1995, when the Stuttgart District Court went to Spain to interrogate theRemer couple as part of the trial against me on account of the commentary that Remer hadadded to the report without asking me. Even then in Spain they needed to ask who I was. Theygot to know me fairly well only after I had fled to Spain in early 1996, where I resided for fourmonths some 50 miles west of Remer’s residence in exile.316