Trovärdiga ögonvittnen från koncentrationslägren

Du kan tex läsa den engelske författaren rupert Butler (Legions of Death, Arrow Books Ltd, 1983, s 235)

I was in Nuremberg because Kaltenbrunner's counsel had demanded me as a witness for his defence. I have never been able to grasp, and it is still not clear to me, how I of all people could have helped to exonerate Kaltenbrunner. Although the conditions in prison were, in every respect, good -- I read whenever I had the time, and there was a well stocked library available -- the interrogations were extremely unpleasant, not so much physically, but far more because of their strong psychological effect. I cannot really blame the interrogators -- they were all Jews.

Psychologically I was almost cut in pieces. They wanted to know all about everything, and this was also done by Jews. They left me in no doubt whatever as to the fate that was in store for me.

On 25 May, my wedding anniversary as it happened, I was driven with von Burgsdorff and Bühler to the aerodrome and there handed over to Polish officers. We flew in an American plane via Berlin to Warsaw. Although we were treated very politely during our joumey, I feared the worst when I remembered my experiences in the British Zone and the tales I had heard about the way people were being treated in the East. (Commandant in Auschwitz, English translation, Weidenfeld and Nicolson,. 1959, p. 173-175.)

I have to openly confess that I never would have expected to be treated so decently and so kindly in a Polish prison as I have been since the intervention of the prosecutor's office.

"---Rudolf Hoess was the Allies' most important witness to the "Holocaust." His affidavit and his testimony were quoted extensively both by the prosecution and in the judgment of the IMT at Nuremberg, as well as by the press. It was his testimony which laid the foundation and validated the claim of the ". . . extermination of millions of people by gas at Auschwitz." Hoess's "confession" is heavily relied upon by historians like Raul Hilberg and others as a primary documentary source to this day.

It is true that Hoess witnessed at Nuremberg to horrendous "atrocities," and he also confirmed the "truth" under oath of an affidavit which he agreed to sign for the prosecution. In it, he confessed to having given orders for the gassing of millions of victims. The affidavit, by the way, was in English, a language he did not speak or understand, according to family members.

We now know from the book "Legions of Death" that Rudolf Hoess was beaten almost to death by Jewish members of the British Field Police Force upon capture and badly mistreated thereafter until he gave this very devastating "testimony" and "affidavit" used by the Allies propagandists ever since. You be the judge. Here is an excerpt from this book by Rupert Butler, published by Hamlyn Paperbacks, page 235:

At 5 PM on 11 March 1946, Frau Hoess opened her front door to six intelligence specialists in British uniform, most of them tall and menacing and all of them practiced in the more sophisticated techniques of sustained and merciless investigation.

No physical violence was used on the family: it was scarcely necessary. Wife and children were separated and guarded. Clarke's tone was deliberately low-key and conversational.

He began mildly: "I understand your husband came to see you as recently as last night."

Frau Hoess merely replied: "I haven't seen him since he absconded months ago"

Clarke tried once more, saying gently but with a tone of reproach: "You know that isn't true." Then all at once his manner had changed and he was shouting: "If you don't tell us, we'll turn you over to the Russians and they'll put you before a firing squad. Your son will go to Siberia."

It proved more than enough. Eventually, a broken Frau Hoess betrayed the whereabouts of the former Auschwitz Kommandant, the man who now called himself Franz Lang. Suitable intimidation of the son and daughter produced precisely identical information.

When they found Hoess, here is how the capture played out. Clarke, one of the participants, recalls it vividly:

"He was lying on top of a three-tier bunker wearing a new pair of silk pyjamas. We discovered later that he had lost the cyanide pill most of them carried. Not that he would have had much chance to use it because we had rammed a torch (flashlight) into his mouth."

Hoess screamed in terror at the mere sight of the British uniforms.

Clarke yelled: "What is your name?"

With each answer of "Franz Lang," Clarke's hand crashed into the face of the prisoner. The fourth time that happened, Hoess broke and admitted who he was.

The admission suddenly unleashed the loathing of the Jewish sergeants in the arresting party whose parents had died in Auschwitz following an order signed by Hoess.

The prisoner was torn from the top bunk, the pyjama ripped from his body. He was then dragged naked to one of the slaughter tables, where it seemed to Clarke the blows and screams were endless.

Eventually, the Medical Officer urged the Captain: "Call them off, unless you want to take back a corpse."

A blanket was thrown over Hoess and he was dragged to Clarke's car, where the sergeant poured a substantial slug of whiskey down his throat. Then Hoess tried to sleep.

Clarke thrust his service stick under the man's eyelids and ordered in German: "Keep your pig eyes open, you swine." . . .

The party arrived back at Heide around three in the morning. The snow was swirling still, but the blanket was torn from Hoess and he was made to walk completely nude through the prison yard to his cell. It took three days to get a coherent statement out of him.

This statement, tortured and terrorized out of him, was the one we are all familiar with--the "proof" for the so-called "gassing of the Jews."

Historians today are finally admitting that Hoess is a totally unreliable witness--and is it any wonder? He spoke of a concentration camp "Wolzek" which does not even exist. He swore that 2,500,000 people were gassed and burned at Auschwitz and a further half million died of disease, for a total dead of three million.---"

"---One of Höss' torturers told what happened during those three days:

We sat in the cell with him, night and day, armed with axe handles. Our job was to prod him every time he fell asleep to help break down his resistance," said Mr. Jones. When Höss was taken out for exercise, he was made to wear only jeans and a thin cotton shire in the bitter cold. After three days and nights without sleep, Höss finally broke down and made a full confession to the authorities.

He also spoke of his mistreatment in his memoir:

I was treated terribly by the [British] Field Security Police. I was dragged to Heide and, of all places, to the same military barracks from which I had been released eight months before by the British. During the first interrogation they beat me to obtain evidence. I do not know what was in the transcript, or what I said, even though I signed it, because they gave me liquor and beat me with a whip. It was too much even for me to bear. The whip was my own. By chance it had found its way into my wife's luggage. My horse had hardly ever been touched by it, much less the prisoners. Somehow one of the interrogators probably thought that I had used it to constantly whip the prisoners.

After a few days I was taken to Minden on the Weser River, which was the main interrogation center in the British zone. There they treated me even more roughly, especially the first British prosecutor, who was a major. The conditions in the jail reflected the attitude of the first prosecutor.

Surprisingly, after three weeks I was shaved, my hair was cut, and I was allowed to wash myself. My handcuffs had not been opened since my arrest. The next day [March 31-April 1, 1946] I was taken by car to Nuremberg together with a prisoner of war who had been brought over from London as a witness in Fritzche's defense.

That prisoner of war was Moritz von Schirmeister, the personal press attaché of Joseph Goebbels. During their journey together to Nuremberg, Von Schirmeister asked Höss about his confession, to which Höss replied:

Certainly, I signed [a statement] that I killed two and a half million Jews. But I could just as well have signed that it was five million Jews. After all, there are certain methods by which any confession can be obtained, whether it is true or not.---"