 David
Irving, the Third Reich and the
Holocaust
by
Dr Joel S Hayward 
Dear
Forum readers, I
HAVE READ the
discussion on Irving with great interest.
As a professional historian who has
written a lot about Holocaust Revisionism
in general and Irving in particular (and
plenty on WW2), I can speak with some
confidence about the issues raised.
Although
I may discuss particular details of
David Irving's scholarship at a
later date (knowing a fair bit about it
but wanting first to plan my comments
carefully to reduce my chance of joining
Irving in the gun sights of his most
vitriolic critics), permit me at this time
to make one or two observations.
Irving's
enemies claim that he is not a 'real'
historian because he lacks higher
qualifications in history and has never
held an academic position. Consequently,
they state, his work should be discounted
or at least treated with greater
circumspection than that of established
historians. It
is certainly true he never completed his
Bachelor degree at the University of
London (where he read Physics), let alone
completed a post-graduate degree or
Doctorate. It is also true that he has
never held a university
position. However,
if those grounds are sufficient to call
his scholarship into question, then they
must also call into question the
scholarship of almost all the important
and influential writers of Holocaust
history from the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s,
upon which supporters of received opinion
on the Holocaust still rely. For
example, the late Gerald
Reitlinger, author of the very
influential and still-cited 'The Final
Solution: the Attempt to Exterminate the
Jews of Europe', was an art dealer with no
academic qualifications. Yet Reitlinger's
book had a profound impact on both
scholarly and popular perceptions of what
happened to Eastern European
Jews. A
number of those still writing on the
Holocaust also lack the 'proper'
credentials. - Georges
Wellers, a prominent French writer
on the Holocaust and a bitter opponent
of Revisionism, is the former director
of a medical research laboratory. He
has no historical training.
- Jean-Claude
Pressac, author of several
'seminal' books on the Auschwitz gas
chambers, has a diploma in pharmacy but
no historical training
whatsoever.
- Walter
Laqueur, former Kibbutznik and
author of many well-received and
best-selling books on the Holocaust and
modern European history, may be an
academic icon in Israel (the Jerusalem
Post has produced glowing full-page
feature articles on him, for instance),
and he may head his own institute and
edit his own journal, but he has never
completed a university
degree.
Clearly,
if Irving is unworthy of the title
'historian', then these Holocaust writers
(none of whom has written anywhere the
number of books Irving has) are also
unworthy. If Irving's works are to be
discounted or treated with unusual
circumspection because of his lack of
formal credentials, then so are theirs. Do
Irving's highly-partisan critics care that
their own favourite historians of the
Holocaust lack 'legitimacy'; that, like
Irving and his ilk, they are not 'real'
historians? |
OF
COURSE, titles
and qualifications mean little, as I wish
Irving's critics would realise. An
author's degree of formal historical
training and position within the academic
world are unimportant if he or she has
employed sound methodological principles.
Countless excellent works have been
written by so-called 'amateurs' whose
careful and systematic piecing together of
evidence has cast new light on their
objects of inquiry. University-dropout
Laqueur, one of my favourite historians,
is a case in point. His scholarship is
usually terrific and I buy most books he
writes. Unlike
many of Irving's detractors, I have
actually read his books. In fact, I have
critically examined - keeping issues of
truth, objectivity and bias at the
forefront of my mind --
ALL
his thirty-one
books,
from Und Deutschlands Städte Starben
Nicht (published in Zürich in 1961,
when Irving was only twenty-three) to his
recently-published biography of
Dr.
Goebbels.
"I
can't find serious flaws in his
methodology and I have never found a
single example of deliberate
falsification of
evidence."
I
have also conducted extensive research
into Irving's character and career, this
information forming a substantial part of
my Master's thesis on the historiography
of Holocaust Revisionism. Further,
in the course of my doctoral and
subsequent research on aspects of Third
Reich history, I worked in or obtained
documents from several of the archives
frequented by Irving, including the
Bundesarchiv in Koblenz,the
Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv in
Freiburg im Breisgau, the
Dokumentationsarchiv des oesterreichischen
Widerstandes in Vienna, the National
Archives in Washington and the United
States Air Force Historical Research
Agency. I have thus been able to check his
sources and they way he used
them. Therefore,
I can say with confidence that I am as
well positioned to comment on Irving's
scholarship as anyone. My judgement: I
certainly don't agree with all his
arguments and conclusions, and strongly
disagree with some, but I can't find
serious flaws in his methodology and I
have never found a single example of
deliberate falsification of
evidence. Yes,
I have studied all the books and articles
that attempt to prove that he has fiddled
with sources, but they are generally weak
and unpersuasive, reflecting the authors'
own biases, preconceptions and, saddest of
all, lack of familiarity with the
documents they purport to analyse.
Deborah Lipstadt's book is
hopeless. Very poor indeed. Gerald
Fleming's 'Hitler und die Endloesung;
Es ist des Führers Wunsch' (revised
ed., 1992?) is easily the best of the
anti-Irving books, but even that
ultimately fails to prove falsification or
improper consideration of
evidence. Regardless
of his attention-seeking antics and his
tendency to say dumb, insensitive
and sometimes inaccurate things to the
media (which don't appear in his books,
thank goodness), Irving is a researcher,
biographer and military historian of
outstanding aptitude. Many of his works
are excellent. (By the way, none of them
is specifically on the Holocaust or even
deals with it at length.) Some of his
books -- Churchill's
War,
vol. i, springs to mind -- are not as
strong, but, hey, very few scholars in any
discipline consistently attain
excellence. Irving
once told me by letter that, for financial
reasons, he would not travel to New
Zealand again unless it formed part of a
wider Australasian speaking tour. With the
recent decision
of the Federal Court in Perth, Australia,
to refuse a judicial review of Irving's
original ban from Australia, it seems that
Irving will never again travel to our neck
of the woods. This
is a pity. If Irving had come back to New
Zealand, I would have invited him to
'guest lecture' on Hitler's war leadership
or the Wehrmacht High Command to my
third-year modern German history class.
After all, he is a leading expert in that
field. I would not have invited him to
speak on the Holocaust or the Reich's
racial policies, however, because he has
no expertise in that field. Finally,
in case anyone accuses me of being one of
Irving's many groupies, let me add that I
consider him to be a very good historian
but
an unpalatable person.
I don't like many of the things he says.
Some of them -- on race and nationalism,
for instance -- offend me deeply. I would
not permit him to address my students on
those topics, but only because he is no
specialist in them, not because of my
personal feelings. Best
regards/Hochachtungsvoll, Dr
Joel
Hayward,
School
of History Philosophy and Politics,
Massey University, Private Bag
11222,
Palmerston North, New Zealand.
Phone: NZ (06) 350-4234 Fax: NZ (06)
350-5662
E-mail: J.S.Hayward@massey.ac.nz http://members.tripod.com/~WhitelightNZ/Hayward-3.html |
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MORE
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