Toronto, Ontario
‑‑- Upon resuming on Wednesday, December 16, 1998
at 10:10 a.m.
RESUMED: ROBERT FAURISSON
THE CHAIRPERSON: Good morning. Mr. Christie, please.
EXAMINATION-IN-CHIEF RE QUALIFICATIONS, Continued
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. Dr. Faurisson, when we left off yesterday, we were just about to deal with your selected articles. I take it that these are not all the articles you have either written or published. Is that correct, sir?
A. That is correct.
Q. Although there are a number of titles written in French, I would like you to go down the list and identify those that specifically involve the analysis of text and documents, starting with the first one, "La Leçon de Bardamu."
A. I do not intend to say anything about this one.
Q. You had better say why.
A. Because I don't think with this article I could show anything really related to text and document analysis.
Q. Refer me to the next one down the list ‑‑ we should have numbered these. Count down the list to one that does refer to text and document analysis.
A. The text called "Traduction prosaïque de La Chanson du mal-aimé" from Apollinaire ‑‑ and I would like to comment on it together with "Notes sur Alcools" by Apollinaire also.
Q. That is four farther down.
A. It is more or less the same thing.
Q. To what extent was this an analysis of text and documents and what texts were you analyzing?
A. I was analyzing cryptic text of Apollinaire who is a poet at the beginning of this century; he died in 1918. His poems are rather complicated, and you must know that there is not even punctuation ‑‑ no periods, no commas, nothing.
His reputation is that he is illogical, already surrealist, and all that. By analyzing very carefully his writing, those ones at least, I realized that in fact it was more logical even than anything because, if there were no full stops, no commas and so on, he had to write phrases which could stand on their feet, if I may say so. It is extremely logical, and it is an illusion to say that it is illogical. If you read the words, you can see that it is extremely logical.
That is one first remark which I would make which is: Be careful when you read. Be careful of appearances. Apparently it is illogical. In fact, it is very logical, and even more than something with punctuation.
Q. You said beware of what?
A. Beware of...?
Q. You said just a moment ago, "Beware of...?"
A. Appearances. It looks like it is illogical; be very careful.
Q. Farther down can you refer to other ‑‑
A. I have many things to say about that.
Q. All right.
A. Especially about translation. A part of text and document analysis could be translation, all the problems of translation. For instance, I went to see how those very difficult poems were translated in English or in German and even in Bulgarian. I remember being in Sofia in 1974, and I found a poem of Apollinaire and I wanted to see how the Bulgarians had translated it. This is how I discovered the terrible mistakes that you may do if you do not read very carefully. We specialists of document analysis call this "pathology" of the text, because there is a pathology of the text.
I mean, you take a text and with the time going on people who want to reproduce it change it. I am going to take an example, back to the Latin.
You know that every Latin text that we have from Cicero or anyone ‑‑ we don't have, of course, the manuscript of Cicero. The oldest one that we may have came something like 10 centuries after, so there was a translation from one century to another, with changes. We call this pathology.
Let's take a very simple example. Those people of the 10th century or 11th century or 12th century were Christian people. When in a Latin text they would see the word "dei", it means "the gods." They didn't want to put "the gods", so they put "God" singular. They did it either with bad faith or with good faith but, by doing so, they are changing the text.
I am coming back to the question of translation. I am going to give you one example of a terrible mistake.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Witness, let me suggest to you that what we are involved in here is illustrating what you say is your expertise in the area of analysis of text and documentation. I don't want you to deliver a Ph.D thesis here. I want you to succinctly deal with each of these articles. For those that are pertinent, tell us what the article is about in the most succinct way you can without damaging what you want us to hear from you.
This is a preliminary process, and I wish to have you direct your mind more critically to what we are involved in here and not use any words in your dissertation here that are unnecessary.
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE CHAIRPERSON: I have spoken to you and to your counsel to see if we can't move along without doing any damage to what you want us to hear.
THE WITNESS: I think it would damage what I have to say since ‑‑
THE CHAIRPERSON: Well ‑‑
THE WITNESS: If I may give an example.
I understand very well that what you want is for me, perhaps, to say, if I am called an expert, something about, for instance, the texts attributed to Mr. Zundel or the comment of Mr. Prideaux.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Let me interrupt you for a moment. Listen to what I have to say. You heard what I had to say, and that's it. Your counsel will continue to question you.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. In respect of your processes of analysis, you have described what you did to publish these various works in regard to Apollinaire. Is that correct?
A. Yes.
Q. There is a great deal more you could say about the process; is that true?
A. And about the problem of translation.
Q. We don't need to get into that. What you are going to be speaking about here, if you are allowed to speak at all, will not have anything to do with translation, so we won't get into what processes you were involved in with regard to translation.
A. And about the fact that a text is transformed by an author?
Q. If you are allowed to testify, what you are going to be testifying about is not going to be something that has been translated a number of times or anything like that.
A. The changes of the text?
Q. We might deal with that.
A. One and the same text changing?
Q. Interpretation maybe, but that will be something we will have to deal with later.
In the next article, "El Desdichado" ‑‑
A. I do not intend to say anything about it.
Q. Does it have anything to do with text and document analysis?
A. Yes, but I don't want to talk about it.
Q. And "La Vie antérieure"?
A. Maybe I could say something.
Q. What processes were you involved in in terms of analyzing text and documents there?
A. I discovered something about that. It was said in my viva voce by one of the members of the jury that by analyzing very carefully this text of Beaudelaire, I had brought something new and for him exact.
Q. Exact?
A. Exact, meaning it was the exact meaning that people had not seen because it had not been carefully read. I could be more specific.
Q. We are not interested in those specifics; just the general terms of your analysis is what we are concerned about.
The next item?
A. It is about a very well-known text of Ronsard. I would have been pleased to explain how people used to read this and how I discovered that it was not read carefully, and it changes very much of the meaning of the text.
Q. Where was this published in 1971?
A. It was published in L'Information littéraire, which is a publication of the university. It is very difficult to have something published in it.
I may say something all the same about that. In every one of my articles in L'Information littéraire I avoided to give the name of the author. I mean, I studied the texts themselves as if they were written by an unknown author. Or, when I mentioned the name, it was not to show that this author has written this or that. It was only his name.
Q. And the next item is called "Les Divertissements d'Isidore".
A. I will not talk about this.
Q. Does it have anything to do with text and document analysis?
A. Yes, but I don't intend to talk about it.
Q. And the next is "La Belle Enigme des Deux Amis de La Fontaine."
A. I don't intend to comment.
Q. Did it have anything to do with text and document analysis?
A. Yes.
Q. "Les Faux-monnayeurs" ‑‑ does that have anything to do with text and document analysis?
A. Yes. No comment.
Q. "Lautréamont en perte de vitesse" ‑‑ does that have anything to do with text and document analysis?
A. I would not say so.
Q. You would not say what?
A. I would not say that it is too much related to text and document analysis.
Q. "A quand la libération de Céline?"
A. It has to do, but I am not going to comment on it. The next one is the same thing.
Q. It has to do with what?
A. Text and document analysis.
Q. The next article is "La Clé Chimères".
A. Yes, I could say something. It is about 17 very difficult texts of Nerval. The title means "The Key of" those poems. I pretend that I have found the key of all those very difficult poems by analyzing those texts.
To take the example of those 17 texts, one question was: Is it the real text of Nerval? I had to go and see the manuscripts and so on, and I found something like 100 mistakes ‑‑ little mistakes, of course ‑‑ in the text of Nerval as published in what we call Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, which is the most erudite publication in France of the text.
Q. You found errors in the most erudite text?
A. Yes, but this is not specifically my field of research. I am interested in authenticity, but I am more interested in veracity, which means that ‑‑
Q. We can't talk about veracity; it's irrelevant.
A. Veracity means is it coherent or not?
Q. Coherent meaning what?
A. When I am looking for the meaning of a text, is it coherent or not, which means: Could it be true or not, what is recounted.
Q. We are in trouble now.
A. It means that I take it at face value. I don't say: Is it authentic or not? I say: I take what you bring me.
Q. Do you find any method to establish meaning?
A. Yes, by careful analysis, a logical and grammatical analysis.
Q. The next item is "Céline dans de beaux draps".
A. I am not going to talk about all this.
Q. Was it text and documents analysis that you were involved in in that article?
A. This one not too much.
Q. The next one...?
A. The important one would be "La critique de textes (trois écoles)".
Q. Where is that? The next one down that I have is "Céline en joie."
THE CHAIRPERSON: Go down two more, "La critique de textes".
MR. CHRISTIE: Thank you.
Q. That did involve text and document analysis; is that correct?
A. Yes. I am not going to go into detail, but it was to explain my method. I took something that everybody could understand. I took this kind of ballpoint pen and I explained it according to the ancient method of critique and then to the new method of critique, and then to my own critique that I call the critique of, I would say, common sense. I tried to explain not a text but something material like that.
Q. Where was that published?
A. It has been published in a book by Serge Thion, the title being "Verité Historique ou Verité Politique?" which means: Historical Truth or Political Truth? ‑‑ the subtitle being the question of the gas chambers and another subtitle being l'affaire Faurisson.
Q. In respect of the block of text that is in French immediately above that, what do you have to say? Is there anything in there that indicates a study of text and documents?
A. Some of them, yes. I think perhaps what we should do is to go to the one entitled "Le Journal d'Anne Frank est-il authentique?"
Q. Where is that?
A. Five or six lines down. We have it in English.
Q. Is that a book or an article?
A. It is an essay. It is in a report that I made for a German tribunal.
Q. A German tribunal?
A. For someone who was accused and who had a trial in Hamburg. This man had been accused of saying that the Anne Frank Diary was not genuine.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Which one is it?
MR. CHRISTIE: It is six down from where you were.
THE WITNESS: "Le Journal d'Anne Frank est-il authentique?"
THE CHAIRPERSON: I have it, thank you.
THE WITNESS: The best perhaps would be to go to page 7. On the fourth line from the bottom you have "Is the Diary of Anne Frank genuine?" This is a translation in English of what I did in French.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. I would like to show you that and ask if this is what you published on the subject. Do you identify that as an article that you published, "Is the Diary of Anne Frank Genuine?"
Did it involve your method of text and document analysis?
A. From the beginning to the end.
Q. Is it a good example of your processes of analysis?
A. I think so.
Q. You published this article in the form in which it is now, which I showed to you? You may not have looked at it that carefully.
A. This is the English translation.
MR. ROSEN: Could we have copies?
MR. CHRISTIE: Actually, I was going to file it if no one objects.
MR. ROSEN: We would like to see it first.
MR. CHRISTIE: It is only a qualification process at the moment.
Q. Did you supervise and prepare this English translation or did you approve of it?
A. Yes, I approved it.
Q. When was it published?
A. It was published in June 1982 in English in the Journal of Historical Review.
Q. Did you publish it elsewhere?
A. In English, no, but I published it in French, in German, in Spanish, and so on.
Q. You said that you prepared this for a tribunal in Germany; is that correct?
A. That's correct.
Q. Was there any outcome to that tribunal?
A. Let me explain. The name of the man was Ernst Römer. This man had distributed a pamphlet at the door of a theatre where they were giving a representation of the diary of Anne Frank. In this pamphlet he said that the diary was not genuine or ‑‑ I don't remember exactly; perhaps he simply expressed doubts about it. He was sued by Mr. Otto Heinrich Frank, the father of Anne Frank, living in Basle, Switzerland. The trial was in Hamburg, Germany.
I made a study of the diary of Anne Frank. Not only that, but part of my inquiry was to go to Amsterdam, I think three times, to do research in a few countries about that. Also I went to visit Mr. Otto Frank in Basle for nine hours.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Witness, do you remember the question?
THE WITNESS: What was the outcome?
THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Can you answer that?
THE WITNESS: It means result.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. Of that case.
A. Ernst Römer was condemned, but there is another outcome which is that the tribunal decided to ask for expertise about the ink of the manuscript. I suppose that, if the tribunal did this, it is because the tribunal considered that my question was a serious one.
There had been many trials before about the same topic, and no German tribunal had decided so.
MR. ROSEN: Could we ask the witness to step outside, please. I have some submissions to make.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Will you step outside for a moment?
‑‑- Witness Withdraws
MR. ROSEN: In my respectful submission, first of all, Mr. Christie owes a duty to the Tribunal to control his witness and to lead him through evidence that is relevant to the issue of credentials.
Second, what the witness has to say now about a trial that took place in Germany and that the person was condemned, and he goes on to say, "I suppose that they asked that the ink be analyzed because they took my question seriously" is, in fact, an indirect comment on German law and fails to recognize the fact that somebody was being charged with a criminal offence and that they were perhaps concerned more about the issue of guilt or innocence than this witness' question about whether it was serious.
The point is that there is a lot of self-help going on here with this witness, a lot of self-serving statements that are completely irrelevant.
The third point I want to make is that this whole thing about Anne Frank ‑‑ I quite frankly don't understand how this has anything to do with his qualifications, but I leave that to you.
THE CHAIRPERSON: I suppose it is tendered on the basis that it is part of his credentials as an analyst of text and documents.
MR. ROSEN: Sort of as a sample of his work.
THE CHAIRPERSON: As a sample of his work, I suppose. I have a certain amount of sympathy for Mr. Christie because he is not an easy witness to keep on a strict track. In answering questions, he tends to explain in a somewhat prolix way.
If no one else has any comment, we will call the witness back. Mr. Christie, do you have anything else to say?
MR. CHRISTIE: No.
‑‑- Witness returns to the stand
THE CHAIRPERSON: Witness, would you listen very carefully to the question and try to answer just the question without wandering off too far to the left or the right or forward or backward. Do you follow me?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. I would like to direct you to the method of your analysis of the Anne Frank diary. I just want to ask you what things you did in order to conduct your analysis. If you wish to refer to the article you wrote about it, I don't think that is improper, unless anyone objects. If it helps you to remember what you did, go ahead ‑‑ if you can identify the specific processes that you used to analyze the Anne Frank diary.
What did you do first?
A. I read it in the French version.
Q. And...?
A. Then I went to Amsterdam.
Q. Why?
A. To see the place where Anne Frank is supposed to have lived with seven other people.
Q. What did you do there? Did you enter the place?
A. Yes, of course.
Q. Did you go anywhere else to examine anything about it?
A. I tried to find, and I found, a plan of the place as it was during the war.
Q. Where did you find that?
A. In a special office where you have the plans of all the buildings. When you have to ask permission to build something ‑‑
Q. At the City Hall?
A. At the City Hall, yes.
Q. Then what did you do?
A. Then I went and asked questions of Anne Frank's father near Basle, Switzerland.
Q. How did you get along with Mr. Frank?
A. He received me for nine hours on two or three and a half days.
Q. How did you get along? Do you know what I mean?
A. Yes. I should say very well. He was quite a charming man.
Q. And you had conversations with him?
A. Yes, in the presence of his wife.
Q. For the purpose of identifying your processes of analysis, what questions did you ask him?
A. I said, "Mr. Frank, there are many, many things that I do not understand in the diary of Anne Frank."
Q. Before you go any farther, if you are going to say anything that he said, we will have objections. Confine yourself to what you asked him, to identify your processes.
A. The best thing would be to take page 148 where I give one example ‑‑
THE CHAIRPERSON: We don't have a copy here.
MR. CHRISTIE: And I would like to give you one. I don't know if anyone objects to your seeing it.
THE CHAIRPERSON: We haven't heard any objection.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. This is from a booklet that you published on the subject; is that correct, sir?
A. It was an article, and it was then published as a pamphlet.
Q. Can you tell us what questions you asked of Otto Frank to investigate and study the Anne Frank diary?
A. On page 148, paragraph 4, I wrote:
"Internal criticism: the very text of the Diary (Dutch text) contains an inexplicable number of unlikely or inconceivable facts."
Then I said:
"Let us take the example of the noises. Those in hiding, ‑‑"
There were eight of them.
"‑‑ we are told, must not make the least sound. This is so much so that, if they cough, they quickly take codeine. The 'enemies' could hear them. The walls are that 'thin' ‑‑"
I give every time the reference where I find, for example, "The walls are that 'thin.'" It is in a so-called section of 25 March, 1943.
"Those 'enemies' are very numerous:"
I am not going to read it.
"It is therefore unlikely and inconceivable that Mrs Van Daan had the habit of using the vacuum cleaner each day at 12:30 p.m. The vacuum cleaners of that era were, moreover, particularly noisy. I ask: 'How is that conceivable?'"
Q. This is a question you asked of whom?
A. I asked this question to Mr. Frank.
Q. What else did you ask in terms of analysis that you made of the text?
A. I will give some other questions.
"That question could be followed with forty other questions concerning noises. It is necessary to explain, for example, the use of an alarm clock. It is necessary to explain the noisy carpentry work; the removal of a wooden step, the transformation of a door into a swinging cupboard, the making of a wooden candlestick. Peter ‑‑"
Who was a young boy living with Anne Frank.
"‑‑ splits wood in the attic in front of the open window. It involved building with the wood from the attic 'a few little cupboards and other odds and ends.' It even involved constructing in the attic ...'a little compartment' for working. There is a nearly constant noise from the radio, from the slammed doors, from the 'resounding peal', the arguments, the shouts, the yelling, a 'noise that was enough to awaken the dead.'"
Et cetera, et cetera.
Q. You were looking there for the internal consistency of the document?
A. Yes, the internal consistency of this document.
Q. These questions were raised with Mr. Frank personally?
A. Yes.
Q. What did you do with Mr. Frank, other than talk to him? Did you go anywhere?
A. Yes.
Q. Where did you go?
A. I would like to say something ‑‑
Q. Go ahead.
A. I want to show many other things which seem to be quite wrong. This is on the next page:
"At the time of their arrival in their hiding place, the Franks install some curtains to hide their presence. But, to install curtains at windows which did not have them up until then, is that not the best means of drawing attention to one's arrival? Is that not particularly the case if those curtains are made of pieces of 'all different shapes, quality and pattern'? In order ‑‑"
I think this is important:
"In order not to betray their presence, the Franks burn their refuse. But in doing this they call attention to their presence by the smoke that escapes from the roof of a dwelling that is supposed to be uninhabited!"
And so on and so on.
I went through very specific material arguments like that.
Q. Did you compare and analyze the various translations of the Anne Frank diary?
A. Yes.
Q. Are you competent in French and German and in Dutch?
A. I would not say competent, at least in Dutch, but I had the help of the French translation which I could check with two Dutch people. The French translation was quite close to the Dutch original. The English version was rather close. The German version was incredibly different. One may say that, when a German reads the Anne Frank diary and meets someone who has read the Anne Frank diary either in Dutch or in French, they don't talk about the same Anne Frank.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Are you literate in German?
THE WITNESS: I read German well; I have studied German for, I think, 20 years.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Are you literate in German?
THE WITNESS: Literate means...?
THE CHAIRPERSON: Are you proficient and literate in German?
THE WITNESS: Do you mean if I can speak German?
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. Literate could mean being able to read; it could mean speaking.
A. I can read.
THE CHAIRPERSON: I am trying to ascertain the proficiency of your skill in the German language.
MEMBER DEVINS: Are you fluent in German?
THE WITNESS: I would not say fluent, no. I am working on German texts every day; for many years I have done so. If I have the slightest doubt, I consult, I check and double check translation and so on.
In this report for the German tribunal, of course I mention the German text. I gave the references.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. What other subjects did you bring up with Mr. Frank?
MR. FREIMAN: May I just observe that, if we are here to decide the authenticity of Anne Frank's diary, I suppose these would be very helpful questions. If we are here to ascertain the witness' methodology, I am beginning to wonder what the benefit of asking this line of questions might be.
THE CHAIRPERSON: I suppose Mr. Christie is trying to illustrate the analysis he used in connection with this particular item. I would suggest, Mr. Christie, that we try to establish that through prinicple rather than through detail.
MR. CHRISTIE: I agree.
THE WITNESS: Mr. Pensa, may I have a conversation with Mr. Christie and Mr. Zundel?
THE CHAIRPERSON: No. You are under examination now. Just continue. You can speak to him at a break, if necessary.
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. Over what period of time did you conduct research into the Anne Frank diary?
A. It was in 1977-1978. Then I came back to Amsterdam, I think, later on.
Q. Have you done text and document analysis in terms of the words "final solution?"
A. Yes, I did.
Q. What processes did you use to conduct that research?
A. I found German words and German documents of the Nuremberg Trials, for instance. In some of those documents I saw that the "final solution" had an adjective which was "territorial" which means "territorial final solution." It does not mean an extermination; it is a solution by finding a territory.
Q. Where did you find that reference in the various documents you looked at?
A. In documents about the Martin Luther Office, of the German Foreign Ministry, and so on. They are well-known documents.
Q. When it comes to documents, have you studied the documents of the International Military Tribunal?
A. Yes.
Q. Were have you studied them and for how long?
A. I have at home the 42 volumes of the International Military Tribunal. I have them in French; I have them in German; and I have been working also in the American version of the 42 volumes.
Q. Have you studied and done text and document analysis of the Wannsee Protocol?
A. Yes, I did. May I explain what is the Wannsee Protocol?
Q. It wouldn't do any harm, I don't think.
A. It is a document of 15 pages in German about a meeting that 15 leaders of the Third Reich ‑‑ not big leaders except one ‑‑ had in Berlin-Wannsee, which is a part of Berlin. It was on the 20th of January, 1942. This is the document which was supposed to prove that the Germans intended to exterminate the Jews.
Q. When you say "was supposed to prove," why do you say that?
A. Because, since 1984-85, I see that the historians have renounced ‑‑
Q. When you say "historians," you have to name names of people, someone important.
A. The most important one being, to make it short, Raul Hilberg.
Q. What changed after that date?
A. I must explain that. They used to say that the decision had been taken in Wannsee and that it was in the Wannsee Protocol. I looked at the text, the German text, and in this text I saw that the part which is supposed to mean ‑‑ it is a question of meaning ‑‑ "We intend to deport the Jews and to kill them" did not say that at all.
Q. Can you recall exactly what it did say?
A. Yes, I remember.
Q. Say in German, first of all, what it did say.
A. It said: From now on, the Jews ‑‑ remember that it is the 20th of January 1942 ‑‑ will be deported to the east, men on one side, women on the other side, and that they would have to build roads; that, of course, they will have to suffer and that there will be a natural diminution of the births because men are on one side and women on the other side; and that at the end ‑‑ and this is very important. At the end, we shall have the best of the Jews and "upon release" ‑‑ those two words are very often omitted ‑‑ upon release, those people would be the germinative cell of the Jewish renaissance.
Q. What is the German word that they used in terms of that?
A. Auftbau, even the genitive, which is quite a Zionist idea. It was not at all an extermination. This is an example which tends to show that you have to read very carefully and not omit any word.
Q. In the course of analyzing the Wannsee Protocol, did you publish the results of your analysis?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that indicated in the list of publications?
A. There may be something about Wannsee; I think there is something about Wannsee.
Q. Did you publish that in the ‑‑
A. In the Journal of Historical Review?
Q. Yes.
A. Most probably.
Q. That appears on page 7. That is where the articles in the Journal of Historical Review begin.
A. Perhaps it is in the French list. Anyway, I published it.
Q. Was this a demonstration of the method that you use to analyze documents to determine their meaning?
A. Yes.
Q. In the course of that, was it your business to determine authenticity?
A. No, no question of authenticity.
Q. You don't analyze documents from that perspective?
A. I may do so, but not in that case. I took it as it was given to me, in the same way I analyzed the transcript of the Eichmann trials, the transcripts of so many trials.
Q. How many trials have you analyzed in that way?
A. I cannot tell you.
Q. Are you familiar with the NMT, the Nuremberg Military Tribunal?
A. Yes.
Q. That is not the IMT, is it?
A. It is not the IMT. The IMT is the International Military Tribunal; NMT is the Nuremberg Military Tribunal. In fact, it is 12 trials conducted by the Americans. It was not like in Nuremberg, in French, English, Russian. I had to read carefully not only the transcripts, but the documents, and to compare sometimes the change between the document itself and the document as quoted by the American prosecutors.
Q. And you did that over what period of time?
A. I am doing it every year. Constantly I go back to the Nuremberg trials. It is essential.
Q. What qualities do you use to analyze a document when you look at it? What aspects or qualities do you look for?
A. I try to understand them word by word. If they are in English or in German or in French, I have to compare, of course. If I am quoting in an article ‑‑ let's take an example.
If I am quoting a German saying this or that at the Nuremberg trials, I am not going to put in his mouth English words, although the translation is official; it is supposed to be true. I am going to the German version.
If it is an American prosecutor, I am going to the American version. If it is a French witness or prosecutor, I am going to the French version.
Q. In regard to your publications which followed your "Critique of texts", after April 12, 1978 you published an article in Le Monde. Is that correct?
A. Yes, an article in November 1978, I think.
Q. It says here April 12, 1978.
A. There may be one first; that is possible. The most important one was in November 1978 ‑‑ in December 1978, excuse me, and in January 1979. I can give you the precise dates: 29 of December, 1978 and, I think, 16 January, 1979.
Q. What were these articles? Were they letters to the editor or what?
A. No, articles as such.
Q. They were published by Le Monde at your request, or did they request the articles?
A. No, at my request. I had sent many, many letters to the journal, Le Monde, about a certain topic and I wanted it to be published. Finally, they published something of mine.
Q. In the course of your research, have you attended various concentration camps?
A. Yes.
Q. What camps have you attended?
THE CHAIRPERSON: I am not sure of the relevance of this.
MR. FREIMAN: Of what possible significance is this as a document analyst?
MR. CHRISTIE: I said at the outset that this witness would be tendered as an expert in text and document analysis with a background and experience and special training in the area of Holocaust history. That is relevant to show in context the remarks of Mr. Prideaux. He will be dealing with Mr. Prideaux' analysis.
My intention is to qualify him in this area as an expert in the subject of the Holocaust from extensive study and experience and analysis, to be able to comment on the context in which the Prideaux analysis is in error. That may involve some of the premises that Mr. Prideaux has expressed and would entitle the witness, hopefully, to say what in his opinion is correct and what is incorrect in the assertions of Prideaux. Of course, Prideaux makes remarks about the truth or falsity of some of the remarks ‑‑
MR. ROSEN: Could we have the witness excused, please?
MR. CHRISTIE: Just a minute. Before that happens automatically, let me say that in order to focus the witness' evidence in the area of his expertise, it might be helpful to allow him to know what I am trying to do. He is, after all, an expert we are seeking to qualify in a specific area.
As we progress in the process of eliminating experts, we have to tailor our experts to the remaining territory allowed to us. That may not be clearly understood by the expert at the outset. Unfortunately, we did not know when Dr. Faurisson wrote his curriculum vitae and statement of intended evidence whether he would be qualified or in what area he would be allowed to express opinion.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Let me suggest this. What we are dealing with is the principles that you seek to elicit from him in terms of the expertise that you hope to establish through the evidence.
One of the principles, it seems, is that in analyzing a text he visits the site. He went to Amsterdam, and now you ask him whether he visited the camps.
Can we not just establish, if it is not already established, that one of the principles in his analysis is that he tends to visit sites of these places. Whatever relevance that might have in the final analysis remains to be seen.
MR. FREIMAN: If that were all that Mr. Christie is trying to do ‑‑
MR. CHRISTIE: Let's not attribute to me any evil motives ‑‑ attempting to do. I am just attempting to do what I think I am entitled to do. If there is an objection, I would like to deal with one at a time. We have outstanding Mr. Rosen's objection and now we have a new one. Really, it is getting a little difficult.
MR. FREIMAN: I am asking that the witness be excused because there are matters that go right to the substance of his testimony.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Witness, would you please step outside.
‑‑- Witness Withdraws
MR. FREIMAN: As to the nature of the objection, I think I am merely developing what Mr. Rosen quite properly observed. We are now getting into something totally different.
Mr. Christie has candidly and, I guess, fairly stated that he wants to go beyond merely qualifying Mr. Faurisson as an expert in document analysis. He wishes to lay a groundwork which will allow the witness to criticize what he characterizes as historical underpinnings to Dr. Prideaux' conclusions. The reality is that those are imaginary historical contexts, but so it goes.
There is an objection to now going beyond that. It is clear now that it is no longer simply a question of document analysis. He is trying to qualify an expert in the truth about the Holocaust, the very issue that this Tribunal has on numerous occasions indicated is not an area that the Tribunal needs to consider, not an area that is raised by any matter in issue before it. This is only one of a number of circuitous ways that the Respondent has been trying to get around that very clear ruling.
MR. ROSEN: That is basically what I was going to say.
Mr. Christie is attempting to raise the issue not only during qualification but under the guise of expertise to challenge the truth of the historical event referred to as the Holocaust. This is not as it was before His Honour Judge Thomas where he took judicial notice of that historical fact, where the issue was the truth of the statements made in the article, "Did Six Million Really Die?" and he permitted expert evidence on the details to determine truth or not.
This is what Mr. Christie wishes to do under the so-called analysis that this witness says he does of texts and documents ‑‑ to say, "First I look at the words; then I look at the context." The context is that the Holocaust never happened; that there was no extermination policy; that there were no gas chambers, and so on. Therefore, when you go to the Zundel documents, there is no discrimination. That is the chain of reasoning I see developing.
In my respectful submission, there are only two ways to handle that. One is to cut it off at this point because it is not relevant given your previous ruling. The second is to do what I suppose Mr. Christie wishes ultimately to do, and that is to come face to face with the issue of how far you allow this evidence to go and whether you take judicial notice of that historical fact.
MR. KURZ: The area of Mr. Faurisson's expertise, as it were, is very little different from that of Mr. Weber whom you have already ruled on on many of the same points that Mr. Christie wishes to elicit, other than the text analysis part of it and what is described as his methodology.
What Mr. Christie is doing is trying, in effect, to do what he could not do with Mr. Weber by labelling the "historical" aspect of his evidence under the rubric of text analysis. The evidence that he is trying to bring is the same evidence that he tried to bring through Mr. Weber and on which you have already ruled about the propriety of doing it.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Mr. Christie, please.
MR. CHRISTIE: There is nothing particularly coherent about the various objections raised by all three typically obtuse Intervenants and party to this proceeding. I can't make a great deal of sense out of it, except that they don't like anything that approaches the subject of the Holocaust being raised.
Although the writings in evidence that are the subject of the complaint deal with the issue of the Holocaust, nothing that attributes any knowledge, skill or training to that subject can be allowed to be raised, for some strange reason.
It is, in my submission, not inappropriate to have persons with special training, skill and knowledge in the area of the subject matter of the item being condemned or being attacked by the Complainants to show that in the historical context of debate they are (1) serious, (2) careful, (3) methodical and give rational analysis of the subject. If they, in the course of their opinion, are able to express the view that the contents of the Zundelsite are part of an ongoing historical debate, it is essential to prove that this is not a chimerical debate, such as Dr. Schweitzer said it was.
If Dr. Schweitzer's opinion can stand that it is chimerical ‑‑ and, of course, it was allowed to stand ‑‑ why is it impossible for someone who has developed through careful analysis rational explanation, diligent research, a process of understanding that this is not a chimerical debate, that there is a real debate, that it has genuine substance?
I can well understand why none of the parties opposite would like that to be possible, but I don't think your ruling has gone so far in its determination that truth is irrelevant to make it impossible to say that a rational analysis of the Holocaust subject is not possible in the real world, that it is inherently chimerical simply because Dr. Schweitzer says it is. Dr. Schweitzer hadn't the foggiest clue about anything to do with Holocaust revisionism and, of course, would not have deigned to besmirch his impeccable record with the slightest consideration of it, being, as he was, above and beyond any rational consideration of the subject, having formed what he very clearly did, an a priori opinion that it was thoroughly and completely chimerical, which I understood to mean illusory, imaginary, unrealistic, totally unrelated to reality
‑‑ chimerical.
In the course of qualifying this witness who does text and document analysis in a careful manner, who has in the course of his study gone to the places to determine, to the best of his knowledge ‑‑ and he can be cross-examined on that ‑‑ the degree to which his comprehension of documents is confirmed by real, concrete things in this world, it would tend to show that he is (a) credible, (b) careful and (c) rational.
It should not be impossible to display in the process of qualifying a witness that he has made those inquiries and done those things which a rational human being would be expected to do in reaching whatever conclusions he does. The opposing parties would very much like to have him speak about French poetry and then they could ridicule him and toss him aside like they did Mr. Jacob. Then they could show, or pretend to show, that he has absolutely no conception of reality, that he is a phony expert. I can almost hear the echoes of their sarcastic attack which I am sure will be not too far away.
They would not want it to be known that this phony that they will attack has done more research and knows a great deal more than they would ever hope to find in the remaining years of their lives about the subject which they will ridicule him about. Naturally, they want to cut the inquiry short. They want to stop us from asking the simple question: What have you done in your research?
If they would undertake not to attack his credibility as a result, then go ahead and cut off the question. Then, the issue of credibility not being relevant, one could never say that it should be proven. I suspect, as my learned friend Mr. Freiman said, that everything will be attacked and everything is in issue, including, of course, credibility, honesty, integrity, rationality and anything that approaches intelligent analysis. All will be attacked.
Now they tell you that I should not be allowed to ask him what camps he has gone to, because that might involve something to do with truth. It had never got to that point at this point, and probably never will. That, of course, they hope. That, of course, you have assured them and that, of course, I have not contradicted here. I am simply endeavouring to show that this witness has done careful, systematic, rational analysis of a very emotional topic.
In qualifying an expert, it is inherently necessary to show the basis of his research. To be candid, Mr. Freiman and others have no right to prevent the full exposition of the processes of his research, and that is all I am endeavouring to do. Eventually, he should be entitled to show that there is a genuine, legitimate, realistic, rational debate in this world between people who are not insane, who are not committed, hard-core Nazis, who are not politically fanatical about the subject of the Holocaust. It might come as a surprise to some of my learned friends that even those who are advocates and full-fledged historical promoters of the Holocaust have changed their position.
If Dr. Faurisson, after careful research ‑‑ and if I can reveal that research ‑‑ could show you that indeed there have been developments in the historical theory of the Holocaust that make it a realistic, ongoing debate, not a chimerical debate, not an extension of antisemitism, but a real debate for the benefit of Jews, for the benefit of everyone
‑‑ not that truth has any relevance here, but that truth may be productive in the abstract in a historical debate, not exposing Jews to hatred and contempt, but promoting understanding, tolerance and goodwill between Jews and Gentiles; that even the most sacred issues of Jewish history can be debated and discussed rationally, coherently and respectfully. Sometimes that debate might not be as pure as it should be, but that does not change the character of it nor does it change the effect of it.
If it is a real ongoing historical debate, the effect of it, I could suggest, would be not that which is caught by section 13(1). It might be essentially the answer to a defamation, which produces greater tolerance and understanding and not those qualities that are prohibited by section 13(1).
That is the best I can do to explain why I want to ask the witness the basis of his research. I thank you very much.
If I have not addressed the specific complaints of the various Intervenants and party to this proceeding, it is simply because I cannot exactly comprehend, other than the strategic objective, why they would refuse to allow me to ask the simple question about this witness' research involved in the subjects that he has published on. He has published extensively on subjects related to the Holocaust.
His credibility is in issue, and surely, even if that were the only reason ‑‑ and I suggest that there is more reason than that. If that were the only reason, it would be a legitimate reason to raise with you and with all parties the factual basis of his research. To what extent is he serious, careful, honest and inquiring? Is he just a fanatic? Without explaining the basis of his research, the opposite parties will be able to say, without any contradiction, "Look, he is not a serious man. He just has fanatical beliefs." That would be much easier for them than if he could explain what he has done to research, what he has done to inquire, what he has done to find out why he believes what he believes. He might even have a reason. Heavens, we wouldn't want that to be revealed!
Frankly, if these proceedings are to have the slightest degree of impartiality, the same rules should apply to both sides. Dr. Schweitzer's views of chimerical history have far less basis in any form of empirical research than what I could inquire of this witness. He could demonstrate, if I am allowed to ask the simple question, "What have you done to find out the facts that you think exist? What have you done to research the question you have spent so much time writing about?" That is what I am trying to do.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Mr. Fromm, do you wish to comment?
We will take our morning recess.
‑‑- Short Recess at 11:28 a.m.
‑‑- Upon resuming at 11:46 a.m.
THE CHAIRPERSON: The process we are engaged in is hearing of evidence in support of the expertise of this witness. In our view, what is relevant there is evidence as to his formal qualifications, qualifications that may emerge from his own studies and experience.
In that regard, he has been tendered as an expert in analysis of text and documents. As I understood, that was the primary focus of what he intended to give evidence on if he is qualified.
In dealing with this evidence, however, I am suggesting, Mr. Christie, that you should question the witness about his experience and the principles upon which he conducts his analysis of text and documents and not go into the detail of his conclusions about certain matters.
We have heard that, as a matter of principle, part of his methodology is to visit the site. We have heard that. To the extent that it needs repetition, I would suggest that it would only be justified on some clear and rational purpose.
Let us proceed. The witness should observe that his answers should be responsive only to the question, with not a lot of digression.
Mr. Freiman, please.
MR. FREIMAN: Before we proceed, this is probably another instance of locking the barn door after the horse is long gone.
I am somewhat disturbed even by the Tribunal's direction to the witness when he asked to have a conference with Mr. Christie, suggesting that during the break it would be appropriate for them to confer.
My understanding of the rule is that, in principle, it is better not to have contact once a witness has begun to give evidence. If contact is necessary, it has to strictly avoid any topic about which the witness has already given evidence.
THE CHAIRPERSON: Perhaps I have not made that clear enough. I have visited that issue many times in my own experience. That issue, as a matter of law, seems quite clear. The witness is yours until he is under cross-examination. Consultation is permitted within ethical rules during examination-in-chief, as I understand it. That is my appreciation of the law, and I have had occasion to argue that at an appeal on more than one occasion.
I understand that it is inappropriate to consult with a witness for the purpose of repairing something that was said, but you can consult with the witness. For example, we have suggested how this evidence should be dealt with. If the witness needs some clarification, he can consult with the lawyer who has called him.
I am mindful of the fact, as well, that we are dealing with an expert witness.
I appreciate what you say, Mr. Freiman, but that is my understanding of the appropriate procedure to follow.
I might say in passing, Mr. Christie, that we did make a ruling last June, and it does not serve anyone's purpose to say anything that might reflect on the integrity of that ruling. The remedy for that ruling does not lie before us, but someone else.
‑‑- Witness returns to the stand
MR. CHRISTIE:
Q. When did your study of text and documents first take you into the realm of questioning issues with regard to the Holocaust?
A. In 1960.
Q. Why?
A. Because I read in a German newspaper called "Die Zeit" on the 19th of August, 1960 that finally, according to historian Martin Broszat, there were in fact no gas chambers either in Dachau or in Bergen-Belsen or in Buchenwald.
Q. Have you been studying in the area of the Holocaust since?
A. Yes. I did stop. I worked only on the Holocaust, or nearly only on the Holocaust, since 1974, which means that I was interested in the topic from 1960 to 1974. I made some research, but I had something else to do. From 1974 I could say that most of my time was dedicated to this ‑‑ I say "most."
Q. In the course of your studies, what has that to do with text and document analysis in respect of the study of the Holocaust?
A. It had to do with text, with documents and, therefore, with analysis of text and documents.
Q. In the course of your inquiries of text and documents, your practice apparently was to go to the site referred to in the document and look over the site.
A. This was one part of my research.
Q. In carrying out that research, did you go to Auschwitz?
A. Yes, I did.
Q. Auschwitz-Birkenau?
A. Yes, I did.
Q. How many times?
A. In 1975 and in 1976.
Q. Are there libraries there?
A. Yes, archives.
Q. Did you study texts and documents from those archives?
A. Yes, I did. I can give the name of the man in charge of the archives.
I found some documents that I was the first to publish. No historian had published those documents. It is extremely important that they are presently published, especially about the crematories.
Q. What were those documents?
A. The plans, different plans of the crematories in Auschwitz and in Birkenau. I was interested in essentially one question: Where are those gas chambers?
Q. So you looked at the plans, and that was the process you used.
A. Yes.
Q. Have you studied in various archives to compare texts and documents?
A. Many, many archives.
Q. Give the Panel an idea of how many and over what period of time.
A. I worked for years and years in the Centre of Jewish Documentation in Paris. I would say the first time I went into the place was in 1964, and for the last time in January 1977. I was chased from those archives.
Q. How often had you studied there?
A. I would say I was the principal reader; I was constantly in this centre, very, very often. I did not meet in this place someone coming back to this place as many times as I did.
Q. How about the archives in Washington, D.C.?
A. Of course, I worked first in the Library of Congress, then in the archives in Washington, D.C. and in the archives in Suitland, Maryland.
Q. What are those archives?
A. They depend from the National Archives in Washington.
Q. They depend?
A. They depend, yes. It is a dependent of.
Q. A subsidiary?
A. I would not say subsidiary; it's a section.
Q. What are those archives about that you studied?
A. World War II, all the part under the responsibility of Dr. Robert Wolfe whom I knew personally.
Q. How many texts and documents did you study in that archives?
A. Thousands, either myself directly or, when back in France, through some American people whom I asked to visit the place and to get for me such and such documents.
Q. Other than the archives in Washington, D.C. and Suitland, Maryland, have you studied in other archives?
A. Many others.
Q. Can you name them, please?
A. Yes. Federal Archives in Germany, in Koblas; in the Wiener Library in London; in the War Imperial Museum in London.
Q. How many documents did you see and analyze in that place?
A. A few documents in those places ‑‑ excuse me. In Germany many, but in the Imperial War Museum few of them. In the Wiener Library, a few.
Q. Anywhere else?
A. Of course, in Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. I saw documents in the Anne Frank Museum, of course, and I got many documents from many other places through people who helped me with providing all this.
Q. Have you been interviewed on the subjects of your texts and documents research by various media?
A. I have been interviewed, yes, but not very often.
Q. Have you published about the Holocaust and the text and documents analysis you have done?
A. Yes.
Q. In your curriculum vitae you were looking for something about the Wannsee Protocol. Did you find it?
A. Yes, I did. It is on page 6, two articles. The third one from the top is: Three French judges are tampering with the Wannsee Protocol, procès verbal.
Q. Verbal process is what?
A. It means protocol.
Q. And the next article about it...?
A. The next one is three articles after: "Wannsee: Une histoire inepte", Wannsee: A Silly Story. I am going to give the exact reference; it happens that I remember.
"The silly story of Wannsee" was said by Mr. Yehuda Bauer of Yad Vashem, a very famous Jewish historian, totally against the revisionist people. This was said in the Canadian Jewish News on, I think, the 30th of January, 1992: "People go repeating the silly story of Wannsee." In other words, they are still saying that in Wannsee the extermination of the Jews was decided. Those words are not mine.
Q. How did this relate to your own text and documents analysis of the Wannsee Protocol? Did it confirm it; did it deny it; what did it do?
A. It confirmed totally.
Q. When did you first come to the conclusion that the Wannsee Protocol did not verify a policy of extermination?
A. I suppose at the beginning of the 1980s.
Toronto,
Ontario ‑‑-
Upon resuming on Wednesday, December 16, 1998 at 10:10
a.m. RESUMED:
ROBERT FAURISSON THE
CHAIRPERSON: Good morning. Mr. Christie, please. EXAMINATION-IN-CHIEF
RE QUALIFICATIONS, Continued MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. Dr. Faurisson, when we left off yesterday, we were just about to
deal with your selected articles. I take it that these are not all the
articles you have either written or published. Is that correct, sir? A. That is correct. Q. Although there are a number of titles written in French, I would
like you to go down the list and identify those that specifically involve the
analysis of text and documents, starting with the first one, "La Leçon de
Bardamu." A. I do not intend to say anything about this one. Q. You had better say why. A. Because I don't think with this article I could show anything
really related to text and document analysis. Q. Refer me to the next one down the list ‑‑ we should
have numbered these. Count down the list to one that does refer to text and
document analysis. A. The text called "Traduction prosaïque de La Chanson du
mal-aimé" from Apollinaire ‑‑ and I would like to comment on
it together with "Notes sur Alcools" by Apollinaire also. Q. That is four farther down. A. It is more or less the same thing. Q. To what extent was this an analysis of text and documents and
what texts were you analyzing? A. I was analyzing cryptic text of Apollinaire who is a poet at the
beginning of this century; he died in 1918. His poems are rather complicated,
and you must know that there is not even punctuation ‑‑ no periods,
no commas, nothing. His
reputation is that he is illogical, already surrealist, and all that. By
analyzing very carefully his writing, those ones at least, I realized that in
fact it was more logical even than anything because, if there were no full
stops, no commas and so on, he had to write phrases which could stand on their
feet, if I may say so. It is extremely logical, and it is an illusion to say
that it is illogical. If you read the words, you can see that it is extremely
logical. That is
one first remark which I would make which is: Be careful when you read. Be
careful of appearances. Apparently it is illogical. In fact, it is very
logical, and even more than something with punctuation. Q. You said beware of what? A. Beware of...? Q. You said just a moment ago, "Beware of...?" A. Appearances. It looks like it is illogical; be very careful. Q. Farther down can you refer to other ‑‑ A. I have many things to say about that. Q. All right. A. Especially about translation. A part of text and document
analysis could be translation, all the problems of translation. For instance,
I went to see how those very difficult poems were translated in English or in
German and even in Bulgarian. I remember being in Sofia in 1974, and I found a
poem of Apollinaire and I wanted to see how the Bulgarians had translated it.
This is how I discovered the terrible mistakes that you may do if you do not read
very carefully. We specialists of document analysis call this
"pathology" of the text, because there is a pathology of the text. I mean,
you take a text and with the time going on people who want to reproduce it
change it. I am going to take an example, back to the Latin. You
know that every Latin text that we have from Cicero or anyone ‑‑ we
don't have, of course, the manuscript of Cicero. The oldest one that we may
have came something like 10 centuries after, so there was a translation from
one century to another, with changes. We call this pathology. Let's
take a very simple example. Those people of the 10th century or 11th century
or 12th century were Christian people. When in a Latin text they would see the
word "dei", it means "the gods." They didn't want to put
"the gods", so they put "God" singular. They did it either
with bad faith or with good faith but, by doing so, they are changing the text. I am
coming back to the question of translation. I am going to give you one example
of a terrible mistake. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Witness, let me suggest to you that
what we are involved in here is illustrating what you say is your expertise in
the area of analysis of text and documentation. I don't want you to deliver a
Ph.D thesis here. I want you to succinctly deal with each of these articles.
For those that are pertinent, tell us what the article is about in the most
succinct way you can without damaging what you want us to hear from you. This is
a preliminary process, and I wish to have you direct your mind more critically
to what we are involved in here and not use any words in your dissertation here
that are unnecessary. THE
WITNESS: Yes. THE
CHAIRPERSON: I have spoken to you and to your
counsel to see if we can't move along without doing any damage to what you want
us to hear. THE
WITNESS: I think it would damage what I have to
say since ‑‑ THE
CHAIRPERSON: Well ‑‑ THE
WITNESS: If I may give an example. I
understand very well that what you want is for me, perhaps, to say, if I am
called an expert, something about, for instance, the texts attributed to Mr.
Zundel or the comment of Mr. Prideaux. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Let me interrupt you for a moment.
Listen to what I have to say. You heard what I had to say, and that's it.
Your counsel will continue to question you. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. In respect of your processes of analysis, you have described what
you did to publish these various works in regard to Apollinaire. Is that
correct? A. Yes. Q. There is a great deal more you could say about the process; is
that true? A. And about the problem of translation. Q. We don't need to get into that. What you are going to be
speaking about here, if you are allowed to speak at all, will not have anything
to do with translation, so we won't get into what processes you were involved
in with regard to translation. A. And about the fact that a text is transformed by an author? Q. If you are allowed to testify, what you are going to be
testifying about is not going to be something that has been translated a number
of times or anything like that. A. The changes of the text? Q. We might deal with that. A. One and the same text changing? Q. Interpretation maybe, but that will be something we will have to
deal with later. In the
next article, "El Desdichado" ‑‑ A. I do not intend to say anything about it. Q. Does it have anything to do with text and document analysis? A. Yes, but I don't want to talk about it. Q. And "La Vie antérieure"? A. Maybe I could say something. Q. What processes were you involved in in terms of analyzing text
and documents there? A. I discovered something about that. It was said in my viva voce
by one of the members of the jury that by analyzing very carefully this text of
Beaudelaire, I had brought something new and for him exact. Q. Exact? A. Exact, meaning it was the exact meaning that people had not seen
because it had not been carefully read. I could be more specific. Q. We are not interested in those specifics; just the general terms
of your analysis is what we are concerned about. The
next item? A. It is about a very well-known text of Ronsard. I would have been
pleased to explain how people used to read this and how I discovered that it
was not read carefully, and it changes very much of the meaning of the text. Q. Where was this published in 1971? A. It was published in L'Information littéraire, which is a
publication of the university. It is very difficult to have something
published in it. I may
say something all the same about that. In every one of my articles in
L'Information littéraire I avoided to give the name of the author. I mean, I
studied the texts themselves as if they were written by an unknown author. Or,
when I mentioned the name, it was not to show that this author has written this
or that. It was only his name. Q. And the next item is called "Les Divertissements
d'Isidore". A. I will not talk about this. Q. Does it have anything to do with text and document analysis? A. Yes, but I don't intend to talk about it. Q. And the next is "La Belle Enigme des Deux Amis de La
Fontaine." A. I don't intend to comment. Q. Did it have anything to do with text and document analysis? A. Yes. Q. "Les Faux-monnayeurs" ‑‑ does that have
anything to do with text and document analysis? A. Yes. No comment. Q. "Lautréamont en perte de vitesse" ‑‑ does
that have anything to do with text and document analysis? A. I would not say so. Q. You would not say what? A. I would not say that it is too much related to text and document
analysis. Q. "A quand la libération de Céline?" A. It has to do, but I am not going to comment on it. The next one
is the same thing. Q. It has to do with what? A. Text and document analysis. Q. The next article is "La Clé Chimères". A. Yes, I could say something. It is about 17 very difficult texts
of Nerval. The title means "The Key of" those poems. I pretend that
I have found the key of all those very difficult poems by analyzing those
texts. To take
the example of those 17 texts, one question was: Is it the real text of
Nerval? I had to go and see the manuscripts and so on, and I found something
like 100 mistakes ‑‑ little mistakes, of course ‑‑ in
the text of Nerval as published in what we call Bibliothèque de la Pléiade,
which is the most erudite publication in France of the text. Q. You found errors in the most erudite text? A. Yes, but this is not specifically my field of research. I am
interested in authenticity, but I am more interested in veracity, which means
that ‑‑ Q. We can't talk about veracity; it's irrelevant. A. Veracity means is it coherent or not? Q. Coherent meaning what? A. When I am looking for the meaning of a text, is it coherent or
not, which means: Could it be true or not, what is recounted. Q. We are in trouble now. A. It means that I take it at face value. I don't say: Is it
authentic or not? I say: I take what you bring me. Q. Do you find any method to establish meaning? A. Yes, by careful analysis, a logical and grammatical analysis. Q. The next item is "Céline dans de beaux draps". A. I am not going to talk about all this. Q. Was it text and documents analysis that you were involved in in
that article? A. This one not too much. Q. The next one...? A. The important one would be "La critique de textes (trois
écoles)". Q. Where is that? The next one down that I have is "Céline en
joie." THE
CHAIRPERSON: Go down two more, "La critique
de textes". MR.
CHRISTIE: Thank you. Q. That did involve text and document analysis; is that correct? A. Yes. I am not going to go into detail, but it was to explain my
method. I took something that everybody could understand. I took this kind of
ballpoint pen and I explained it according to the ancient method of critique
and then to the new method of critique, and then to my own critique that I call
the critique of, I would say, common sense. I tried to explain not a text but
something material like that. Q. Where was that published? A. It has been published in a book by Serge Thion, the title being
"Verité Historique ou Verité Politique?" which means: Historical
Truth or Political Truth? ‑‑ the subtitle being the question of the
gas chambers and another subtitle being l'affaire Faurisson. Q. In respect of the block of text that is in French immediately
above that, what do you have to say? Is there anything in there that indicates
a study of text and documents? A. Some of them, yes. I think perhaps what we should do is to go to
the one entitled "Le Journal d'Anne Frank est-il authentique?" Q. Where is that? A. Five or six lines down. We have it in English. Q. Is that a book or an article? A. It is an essay. It is in a report that I made for a German
tribunal. Q. A German tribunal? A. For someone who was accused and who had a trial in Hamburg. This
man had been accused of saying that the Anne Frank Diary was not genuine. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Which one is it? MR.
CHRISTIE: It is six down from where you were. THE
WITNESS: "Le Journal d'Anne Frank est-il
authentique?" THE
CHAIRPERSON: I have it, thank you. THE
WITNESS: The best perhaps would be to go to page
7. On the fourth line from the bottom you have "Is the Diary of Anne
Frank genuine?" This is a translation in English of what I did in French. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. I would like to show you that and ask if this is what you
published on the subject. Do you identify that as an article that you
published, "Is the Diary of Anne Frank Genuine?" Did it
involve your method of text and document analysis? A. From the beginning to the end. Q. Is it a good example of your processes of analysis? A. I think so. Q. You published this article in the form in which it is now, which
I showed to you? You may not have looked at it that carefully. A. This is the English translation. MR.
ROSEN: Could we have copies? MR.
CHRISTIE: Actually, I was going to file it if no
one objects. MR.
ROSEN: We would like to see it first. MR.
CHRISTIE: It is only a qualification process at
the moment. Q. Did you supervise and prepare this English translation or did you
approve of it? A. Yes, I approved it. Q. When was it published? A. It was published in June 1982 in English in the Journal of
Historical Review. Q. Did you publish it elsewhere? A. In English, no, but I published it in French, in German, in
Spanish, and so on. Q. You said that you prepared this for a tribunal in Germany; is
that correct? A. That's correct. Q. Was there any outcome to that tribunal? A. Let me explain. The name of the man was Ernst Römer. This man
had distributed a pamphlet at the door of a theatre where they were giving a
representation of the diary of Anne Frank. In this pamphlet he said that the
diary was not genuine or ‑‑ I don't remember exactly; perhaps he
simply expressed doubts about it. He was sued by Mr. Otto Heinrich Frank, the
father of Anne Frank, living in Basle, Switzerland. The trial was in Hamburg,
Germany. I made
a study of the diary of Anne Frank. Not only that, but part of my inquiry was
to go to Amsterdam, I think three times, to do research in a few countries
about that. Also I went to visit Mr. Otto Frank in Basle for nine hours. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Witness, do you remember the
question? THE
WITNESS: What was the outcome? THE
CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Can you answer that? THE
WITNESS: It means result. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. Of that case. A. Ernst Römer was condemned, but there is another outcome which is
that the tribunal decided to ask for expertise about the ink of the
manuscript. I suppose that, if the tribunal did this, it is because the
tribunal considered that my question was a serious one. There
had been many trials before about the same topic, and no German tribunal had
decided so. MR.
ROSEN: Could we ask the witness to step outside,
please. I have some submissions to make. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Will you step outside for a moment? ‑‑-
Witness Withdraws MR.
ROSEN: In my respectful submission, first of all,
Mr. Christie owes a duty to the Tribunal to control his witness and to lead him
through evidence that is relevant to the issue of credentials. Second,
what the witness has to say now about a trial that took place in Germany and
that the person was condemned, and he goes on to say, "I suppose that they
asked that the ink be analyzed because they took my question seriously"
is, in fact, an indirect comment on German law and fails to recognize the fact
that somebody was being charged with a criminal offence and that they were
perhaps concerned more about the issue of guilt or innocence than this witness'
question about whether it was serious. The
point is that there is a lot of self-help going on here with this witness, a
lot of self-serving statements that are completely irrelevant. The
third point I want to make is that this whole thing about Anne Frank ‑‑
I quite frankly don't understand how this has anything to do with his
qualifications, but I leave that to you. THE
CHAIRPERSON: I suppose it is tendered on the basis
that it is part of his credentials as an analyst of text and documents. MR.
ROSEN: Sort of as a sample of his work. THE
CHAIRPERSON: As a sample of his work, I suppose.
I have a certain amount of sympathy for Mr. Christie because he is not an easy
witness to keep on a strict track. In answering questions, he tends to explain
in a somewhat prolix way. If no
one else has any comment, we will call the witness back. Mr. Christie, do you
have anything else to say? MR.
CHRISTIE: No. ‑‑-
Witness returns to the stand THE
CHAIRPERSON: Witness, would you listen very
carefully to the question and try to answer just the question without wandering
off too far to the left or the right or forward or backward. Do you follow me? THE
WITNESS: Yes. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. I would like to direct you to the method of your analysis of the
Anne Frank diary. I just want to ask you what things you did in order to
conduct your analysis. If you wish to refer to the article you wrote about it,
I don't think that is improper, unless anyone objects. If it helps you to
remember what you did, go ahead ‑‑ if you can identify the specific
processes that you used to analyze the Anne Frank diary. What
did you do first? A. I read it in the French version. Q. And...? A. Then I went to Amsterdam. Q. Why? A. To see the place where Anne Frank is supposed to have lived with
seven other people. Q. What did you do there? Did you enter the place? A. Yes, of course. Q. Did you go anywhere else to examine anything about it? A. I tried to find, and I found, a plan of the place as it was
during the war. Q. Where did you find that? A. In a special office where you have the plans of all the
buildings. When you have to ask permission to build something ‑‑ Q. At the City Hall? A. At the City Hall, yes. Q. Then what did you do? A. Then I went and asked questions of Anne Frank's father near
Basle, Switzerland. Q. How did you get along with Mr. Frank? A. He received me for nine hours on two or three and a half days. Q. How did you get along? Do you know what I mean? A. Yes. I should say very well. He was quite a charming man. Q. And you had conversations with him? A. Yes, in the presence of his wife. Q. For the purpose of identifying your processes of analysis, what
questions did you ask him? A. I said, "Mr. Frank, there are many, many things that I do
not understand in the diary of Anne Frank." Q. Before you go any farther, if you are going to say anything that
he said, we will have objections. Confine yourself to what you asked him, to
identify your processes. A. The best thing would be to take page 148 where I give one example
‑‑ THE
CHAIRPERSON: We don't have a copy here. MR.
CHRISTIE: And I would like to give you one. I
don't know if anyone objects to your seeing it. THE
CHAIRPERSON: We haven't heard any objection. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. This is from a booklet that you published on the subject; is that
correct, sir? A. It was an article, and it was then published as a pamphlet. Q. Can you tell us what questions you asked of Otto Frank to
investigate and study the Anne Frank diary? A. On page 148, paragraph 4, I wrote: "Internal criticism: the very text
of the Diary (Dutch text) contains an inexplicable number of unlikely or
inconceivable facts." Then I
said: "Let us take the example of the
noises. Those in hiding, ‑‑" There were eight
of them. "‑‑ we are told, must not
make the least sound. This is so much so that, if they cough, they quickly
take codeine. The 'enemies' could hear them. The walls are that 'thin' ‑‑" I give every
time the reference where I find, for example, "The walls are that
'thin.'" It is in a so-called section of 25 March, 1943. "Those 'enemies' are very numerous:" I am not going
to read it. "It is therefore unlikely and
inconceivable that Mrs Van Daan had the habit of using the vacuum cleaner each
day at 12:30 p.m. The vacuum cleaners of that era were, moreover, particularly
noisy. I ask: 'How is that conceivable?'" Q. This is a question you asked of whom? A. I asked this question to Mr. Frank. Q. What else did you ask in terms of analysis that you made of the
text? A. I will give some other questions. "That question could be followed with
forty other questions concerning noises. It is necessary to explain, for
example, the use of an alarm clock. It is necessary to explain the noisy
carpentry work; the removal of a wooden step, the transformation of a door into
a swinging cupboard, the making of a wooden candlestick. Peter ‑‑" Who was a young
boy living with Anne Frank. "‑‑ splits wood in the
attic in front of the open window. It involved building with the wood from the
attic 'a few little cupboards and other odds and ends.' It even involved
constructing in the attic ...'a little compartment' for working. There is a
nearly constant noise from the radio, from the slammed doors, from the
'resounding peal', the arguments, the shouts, the yelling, a 'noise that was
enough to awaken the dead.'" Et cetera, et
cetera. Q. You were looking there for the internal consistency of the
document? A. Yes, the internal consistency of this document. Q. These questions were raised with Mr. Frank personally? A. Yes. Q. What did you do with Mr. Frank, other than talk to him? Did you
go anywhere? A. Yes. Q. Where did you go? A. I would like to say something ‑‑ Q. Go ahead. A. I want to show many other things which seem to be quite wrong.
This is on the next page: "At the time of their arrival in
their hiding place, the Franks install some curtains to hide their presence.
But, to install curtains at windows which did not have them up until then, is
that not the best means of drawing attention to one's arrival? Is that not
particularly the case if those curtains are made of pieces of 'all different
shapes, quality and pattern'? In order ‑‑" I think this is
important: "In order not to betray their
presence, the Franks burn their refuse. But in doing this they call attention
to their presence by the smoke that escapes from the roof of a dwelling that is
supposed to be uninhabited!" And so on and so
on. I went
through very specific material arguments like that. Q. Did you compare and analyze the various translations of the Anne
Frank diary? A. Yes. Q. Are you competent in French and German and in Dutch? A. I would not say competent, at least in Dutch, but I had the help
of the French translation which I could check with two Dutch people. The
French translation was quite close to the Dutch original. The English version
was rather close. The German version was incredibly different. One may say
that, when a German reads the Anne Frank diary and meets someone who has read
the Anne Frank diary either in Dutch or in French, they don't talk about the
same Anne Frank. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Are you literate in German? THE
WITNESS: I read German well; I have studied German
for, I think, 20 years. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Are you literate in German? THE
WITNESS: Literate means...? THE
CHAIRPERSON: Are you proficient and literate in
German? THE
WITNESS: Do you mean if I can speak German? MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. Literate could mean being able to read; it could mean speaking. A. I can read. THE
CHAIRPERSON: I am trying to ascertain the
proficiency of your skill in the German language. MEMBER
DEVINS: Are you fluent in German? THE
WITNESS: I would not say fluent, no. I am working
on German texts every day; for many years I have done so. If I have the
slightest doubt, I consult, I check and double check translation and so on. In this
report for the German tribunal, of course I mention the German text. I gave
the references. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. What other subjects did you bring up with Mr. Frank? MR.
FREIMAN: May I just observe that, if we are here
to decide the authenticity of Anne Frank's diary, I suppose these would be very
helpful questions. If we are here to ascertain the witness' methodology, I am
beginning to wonder what the benefit of asking this line of questions might be. THE
CHAIRPERSON: I suppose Mr. Christie is trying to
illustrate the analysis he used in connection with this particular item. I
would suggest, Mr. Christie, that we try to establish that through prinicple
rather than through detail. MR.
CHRISTIE: I agree. THE
WITNESS: Mr. Pensa, may I have a conversation with
Mr. Christie and Mr. Zundel? THE
CHAIRPERSON: No. You are under examination now.
Just continue. You can speak to him at a break, if necessary. MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. Over what period of time did you conduct research into the Anne
Frank diary? A. It was in 1977-1978. Then I came back to Amsterdam, I think,
later on. Q. Have you done text and document analysis in terms of the words
"final solution?" A. Yes, I did. Q. What processes did you use to conduct that research? A. I found German words and German documents of the Nuremberg
Trials, for instance. In some of those documents I saw that the "final
solution" had an adjective which was "territorial" which means
"territorial final solution." It does not mean an extermination; it
is a solution by finding a territory. Q. Where did you find that reference in the various documents you
looked at? A. In documents about the Martin Luther Office, of the German
Foreign Ministry, and so on. They are well-known documents. Q. When it comes to documents, have you studied the documents of the
International Military Tribunal? A. Yes. Q. Were have you studied them and for how long? A. I have at home the 42 volumes of the International Military
Tribunal. I have them in French; I have them in German; and I have been
working also in the American version of the 42 volumes. Q. Have you studied and done text and document analysis of the
Wannsee Protocol? A. Yes, I did. May I explain what is the Wannsee Protocol? Q. It wouldn't do any harm, I don't think. A. It is a document of 15 pages in German about a meeting that 15
leaders of the Third Reich ‑‑ not big leaders except one ‑‑
had in Berlin-Wannsee, which is a part of Berlin. It was on the 20th of
January, 1942. This is the document which was supposed to prove that the
Germans intended to exterminate the Jews. Q. When you say "was supposed to prove," why do you say
that? A. Because, since 1984-85, I see that the historians have renounced ‑‑ Q. When you say "historians," you have to name names of
people, someone important. A. The most important one being, to make it short, Raul Hilberg. Q. What changed after that date? A. I must explain that. They used to say that the decision had been
taken in Wannsee and that it was in the Wannsee Protocol. I looked at the
text, the German text, and in this text I saw that the part which is supposed
to mean ‑‑ it is a question of meaning ‑‑ "We
intend to deport the Jews and to kill them" did not say that at all. Q. Can you recall exactly what it did say? A. Yes, I remember. Q. Say in German, first of all, what it did say. A. It said: From now on, the Jews ‑‑ remember that it
is the 20th of January 1942 ‑‑ will be deported to the east, men on
one side, women on the other side, and that they would have to build roads;
that, of course, they will have to suffer and that there will be a natural
diminution of the births because men are on one side and women on the other
side; and that at the end ‑‑ and this is very important. At the
end, we shall have the best of the Jews and "upon release" ‑‑
those two words are very often omitted ‑‑ upon release, those
people would be the germinative cell of the Jewish renaissance. Q. What is the German word that they used in terms of that? A. Auftbau, even the genitive, which is quite a Zionist idea. It
was not at all an extermination. This is an example which tends to show that
you have to read very carefully and not omit any word. Q. In the course of analyzing the Wannsee Protocol, did you publish
the results of your analysis? A. Yes. Q. Is that indicated in the list of publications? A. There may be something about Wannsee; I think there is something
about Wannsee. Q. Did you publish that in the ‑‑ A. In the Journal of Historical Review? Q. Yes. A. Most probably. Q. That appears on page 7. That is where the articles in the
Journal of Historical Review begin. A. Perhaps it is in the French list. Anyway, I published it. Q. Was this a demonstration of the method that you use to analyze
documents to determine their meaning? A. Yes. Q. In the course of that, was it your business to determine
authenticity? A. No, no question of authenticity. Q. You don't analyze documents from that perspective? A. I may do so, but not in that case. I took it as it was given to
me, in the same way I analyzed the transcript of the Eichmann trials, the
transcripts of so many trials. Q. How many trials have you analyzed in that way? A. I cannot tell you. Q. Are you familiar with the NMT, the Nuremberg Military Tribunal? A. Yes. Q. That is not the IMT, is it? A. It is not the IMT. The IMT is the International Military
Tribunal; NMT is the Nuremberg Military Tribunal. In fact, it is 12 trials
conducted by the Americans. It was not like in Nuremberg, in French, English,
Russian. I had to read carefully not only the transcripts, but the documents,
and to compare sometimes the change between the document itself and the
document as quoted by the American prosecutors. Q. And you did that over what period of time? A. I am doing it every year. Constantly I go back to the Nuremberg
trials. It is essential. Q. What qualities do you use to analyze a document when you look at
it? What aspects or qualities do you look for? A. I try to understand them word by word. If they are in English or
in German or in French, I have to compare, of course. If I am quoting in an
article ‑‑ let's take an example. If I am
quoting a German saying this or that at the Nuremberg trials, I am not going to
put in his mouth English words, although the translation is official; it is
supposed to be true. I am going to the German version. If it
is an American prosecutor, I am going to the American version. If it is a
French witness or prosecutor, I am going to the French version. Q. In regard to your publications which followed your "Critique
of texts", after April 12, 1978 you published an article in Le Monde. Is
that correct? A. Yes, an article in November 1978, I think. Q. It says here April 12, 1978. A. There may be one first; that is possible. The most important one
was in November 1978 ‑‑ in December 1978, excuse me, and in January
1979. I can give you the precise dates: 29 of December, 1978 and, I think, 16
January, 1979. Q. What were these articles? Were they letters to the editor or
what? A. No, articles as such. Q. They were published by Le Monde at your request, or did they
request the articles? A. No, at my request. I had sent many, many letters to the journal,
Le Monde, about a certain topic and I wanted it to be published. Finally, they
published something of mine. Q. In the course of your research, have you attended various
concentration camps? A. Yes. Q. What camps have you attended? THE
CHAIRPERSON: I am not sure of the relevance of
this. MR.
FREIMAN: Of what possible significance is this as
a document analyst? MR.
CHRISTIE: I said at the outset that this witness
would be tendered as an expert in text and document analysis with a background
and experience and special training in the area of Holocaust history. That is
relevant to show in context the remarks of Mr. Prideaux. He will be dealing
with Mr. Prideaux' analysis. My
intention is to qualify him in this area as an expert in the subject of the
Holocaust from extensive study and experience and analysis, to be able to
comment on the context in which the Prideaux analysis is in error. That may
involve some of the premises that Mr. Prideaux has expressed and would entitle
the witness, hopefully, to say what in his opinion is correct and what is
incorrect in the assertions of Prideaux. Of course, Prideaux makes remarks
about the truth or falsity of some of the remarks ‑‑ MR.
ROSEN: Could we have the witness excused, please? MR.
CHRISTIE: Just a minute. Before that happens
automatically, let me say that in order to focus the witness' evidence in the
area of his expertise, it might be helpful to allow him to know what I am
trying to do. He is, after all, an expert we are seeking to qualify in a
specific area. As we
progress in the process of eliminating experts, we have to tailor our experts
to the remaining territory allowed to us. That may not be clearly understood
by the expert at the outset. Unfortunately, we did not know when Dr. Faurisson
wrote his curriculum vitae and statement of intended evidence whether he would
be qualified or in what area he would be allowed to express opinion. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Let me suggest this. What we are
dealing with is the principles that you seek to elicit from him in terms of the
expertise that you hope to establish through the evidence. One of
the principles, it seems, is that in analyzing a text he visits the site. He
went to Amsterdam, and now you ask him whether he visited the camps. Can we
not just establish, if it is not already established, that one of the
principles in his analysis is that he tends to visit sites of these places.
Whatever relevance that might have in the final analysis remains to be seen. MR.
FREIMAN: If that were all that Mr. Christie is
trying to do ‑‑ MR.
CHRISTIE: Let's not attribute to me any evil
motives ‑‑ attempting to do. I am just attempting to do what I
think I am entitled to do. If there is an objection, I would like to deal with
one at a time. We have outstanding Mr. Rosen's objection and now we have a new
one. Really, it is getting a little difficult. MR.
FREIMAN: I am asking that the witness be excused
because there are matters that go right to the substance of his testimony. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Witness, would you please step
outside. ‑‑-
Witness Withdraws MR.
FREIMAN: As to the nature of the objection, I
think I am merely developing what Mr. Rosen quite properly observed. We are
now getting into something totally different. Mr.
Christie has candidly and, I guess, fairly stated that he wants to go beyond
merely qualifying Mr. Faurisson as an expert in document analysis. He wishes
to lay a groundwork which will allow the witness to criticize what he
characterizes as historical underpinnings to Dr. Prideaux' conclusions. The
reality is that those are imaginary historical contexts, but so it goes. There
is an objection to now going beyond that. It is clear now that it is no longer
simply a question of document analysis. He is trying to qualify an expert in
the truth about the Holocaust, the very issue that this Tribunal has on
numerous occasions indicated is not an area that the Tribunal needs to
consider, not an area that is raised by any matter in issue before it. This is
only one of a number of circuitous ways that the Respondent has been trying to
get around that very clear ruling. MR.
ROSEN: That is basically what I was going to say. Mr.
Christie is attempting to raise the issue not only during qualification but
under the guise of expertise to challenge the truth of the historical event
referred to as the Holocaust. This is not as it was before His Honour Judge
Thomas where he took judicial notice of that historical fact, where the issue
was the truth of the statements made in the article, "Did Six Million
Really Die?" and he permitted expert evidence on the details to determine
truth or not. This is
what Mr. Christie wishes to do under the so-called analysis that this witness
says he does of texts and documents ‑‑ to say, "First I look
at the words; then I look at the context." The context is that the
Holocaust never happened; that there was no extermination policy; that there
were no gas chambers, and so on. Therefore, when you go to the Zundel
documents, there is no discrimination. That is the chain of reasoning I see
developing. In my
respectful submission, there are only two ways to handle that. One is to cut
it off at this point because it is not relevant given your previous ruling.
The second is to do what I suppose Mr. Christie wishes ultimately to do, and
that is to come face to face with the issue of how far you allow this evidence
to go and whether you take judicial notice of that historical fact. MR.
KURZ: The area of Mr. Faurisson's expertise, as it
were, is very little different from that of Mr. Weber whom you have already
ruled on on many of the same points that Mr. Christie wishes to elicit, other
than the text analysis part of it and what is described as his methodology. What
Mr. Christie is doing is trying, in effect, to do what he could not do with Mr.
Weber by labelling the "historical" aspect of his evidence under the
rubric of text analysis. The evidence that he is trying to bring is the same
evidence that he tried to bring through Mr. Weber and on which you have already
ruled about the propriety of doing it. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Mr. Christie, please. MR.
CHRISTIE: There is nothing particularly coherent
about the various objections raised by all three typically obtuse Intervenants
and party to this proceeding. I can't make a great deal of sense out of it,
except that they don't like anything that approaches the subject of the
Holocaust being raised. Although
the writings in evidence that are the subject of the complaint deal with the
issue of the Holocaust, nothing that attributes any knowledge, skill or
training to that subject can be allowed to be raised, for some strange reason. It is,
in my submission, not inappropriate to have persons with special training,
skill and knowledge in the area of the subject matter of the item being
condemned or being attacked by the Complainants to show that in the historical
context of debate they are (1) serious, (2) careful, (3) methodical and give
rational analysis of the subject. If they, in the course of their opinion, are
able to express the view that the contents of the Zundelsite are part of an
ongoing historical debate, it is essential to prove that this is not a
chimerical debate, such as Dr. Schweitzer said it was. If Dr.
Schweitzer's opinion can stand that it is chimerical ‑‑ and, of
course, it was allowed to stand ‑‑ why is it impossible for someone
who has developed through careful analysis rational explanation, diligent
research, a process of understanding that this is not a chimerical debate, that
there is a real debate, that it has genuine substance? I can
well understand why none of the parties opposite would like that to be
possible, but I don't think your ruling has gone so far in its determination
that truth is irrelevant to make it impossible to say that a rational analysis
of the Holocaust subject is not possible in the real world, that it is
inherently chimerical simply because Dr. Schweitzer says it is. Dr. Schweitzer
hadn't the foggiest clue about anything to do with Holocaust revisionism and, of
course, would not have deigned to besmirch his impeccable record with the
slightest consideration of it, being, as he was, above and beyond any rational
consideration of the subject, having formed what he very clearly did, an a
priori opinion that it was thoroughly and completely chimerical, which I
understood to mean illusory, imaginary, unrealistic, totally unrelated to
reality ‑‑
chimerical. In the
course of qualifying this witness who does text and document analysis in a
careful manner, who has in the course of his study gone to the places to
determine, to the best of his knowledge ‑‑ and he can be
cross-examined on that ‑‑ the degree to which his comprehension of
documents is confirmed by real, concrete things in this world, it would tend to
show that he is (a) credible, (b) careful and (c) rational. It
should not be impossible to display in the process of qualifying a witness that
he has made those inquiries and done those things which a rational human being
would be expected to do in reaching whatever conclusions he does. The opposing
parties would very much like to have him speak about French poetry and then
they could ridicule him and toss him aside like they did Mr. Jacob. Then they
could show, or pretend to show, that he has absolutely no conception of
reality, that he is a phony expert. I can almost hear the echoes of their
sarcastic attack which I am sure will be not too far away. They
would not want it to be known that this phony that they will attack has done
more research and knows a great deal more than they would ever hope to find in
the remaining years of their lives about the subject which they will ridicule
him about. Naturally, they want to cut the inquiry short. They want to stop
us from asking the simple question: What have you done in your research? If they
would undertake not to attack his credibility as a result, then go ahead and
cut off the question. Then, the issue of credibility not being relevant, one
could never say that it should be proven. I suspect, as my learned friend Mr.
Freiman said, that everything will be attacked and everything is in issue,
including, of course, credibility, honesty, integrity, rationality and anything
that approaches intelligent analysis. All will be attacked. Now
they tell you that I should not be allowed to ask him what camps he has gone
to, because that might involve something to do with truth. It had never got to
that point at this point, and probably never will. That, of course, they
hope. That, of course, you have assured them and that, of course, I have not
contradicted here. I am simply endeavouring to show that this witness has done
careful, systematic, rational analysis of a very emotional topic. In
qualifying an expert, it is inherently necessary to show the basis of his
research. To be candid, Mr. Freiman and others have no right to prevent the
full exposition of the processes of his research, and that is all I am
endeavouring to do. Eventually, he should be entitled to show that there is a
genuine, legitimate, realistic, rational debate in this world between people
who are not insane, who are not committed, hard-core Nazis, who are not
politically fanatical about the subject of the Holocaust. It might come as a
surprise to some of my learned friends that even those who are advocates and
full-fledged historical promoters of the Holocaust have changed their position. If Dr.
Faurisson, after careful research ‑‑ and if I can reveal that
research ‑‑ could show you that indeed there have been developments
in the historical theory of the Holocaust that make it a realistic, ongoing
debate, not a chimerical debate, not an extension of antisemitism, but a real
debate for the benefit of Jews, for the benefit of everyone ‑‑
not that truth has any relevance here, but that truth may be productive in the
abstract in a historical debate, not exposing Jews to hatred and contempt, but
promoting understanding, tolerance and goodwill between Jews and Gentiles; that
even the most sacred issues of Jewish history can be debated and discussed
rationally, coherently and respectfully. Sometimes that debate might not be as
pure as it should be, but that does not change the character of it nor does it
change the effect of it. If it
is a real ongoing historical debate, the effect of it, I could suggest, would
be not that which is caught by section 13(1). It might be essentially the
answer to a defamation, which produces greater tolerance and understanding and
not those qualities that are prohibited by section 13(1). That is
the best I can do to explain why I want to ask the witness the basis of his
research. I thank you very much. If I
have not addressed the specific complaints of the various Intervenants and
party to this proceeding, it is simply because I cannot exactly comprehend,
other than the strategic objective, why they would refuse to allow me to ask
the simple question about this witness' research involved in the subjects that
he has published on. He has published extensively on subjects related to the
Holocaust. His
credibility is in issue, and surely, even if that were the only reason ‑‑
and I suggest that there is more reason than that. If that were the only
reason, it would be a legitimate reason to raise with you and with all parties
the factual basis of his research. To what extent is he serious, careful,
honest and inquiring? Is he just a fanatic? Without explaining the basis of
his research, the opposite parties will be able to say, without any
contradiction, "Look, he is not a serious man. He just has fanatical
beliefs." That would be much easier for them than if he could explain
what he has done to research, what he has done to inquire, what he has done to
find out why he believes what he believes. He might even have a reason.
Heavens, we wouldn't want that to be revealed! Frankly,
if these proceedings are to have the slightest degree of impartiality, the same
rules should apply to both sides. Dr. Schweitzer's views of chimerical history
have far less basis in any form of empirical research than what I could inquire
of this witness. He could demonstrate, if I am allowed to ask the simple
question, "What have you done to find out the facts that you think exist?
What have you done to research the question you have spent so much time writing
about?" That is what I am trying to do. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Mr. Fromm, do you wish to comment? We will
take our morning recess. ‑‑-
Short Recess at 11:28 a.m. ‑‑-
Upon resuming at 11:46 a.m. THE
CHAIRPERSON: The process we are engaged in is
hearing of evidence in support of the expertise of this witness. In our view,
what is relevant there is evidence as to his formal qualifications,
qualifications that may emerge from his own studies and experience. In that
regard, he has been tendered as an expert in analysis of text and documents.
As I understood, that was the primary focus of what he intended to give
evidence on if he is qualified. In
dealing with this evidence, however, I am suggesting, Mr. Christie, that you
should question the witness about his experience and the principles upon which
he conducts his analysis of text and documents and not go into the detail of
his conclusions about certain matters. We have
heard that, as a matter of principle, part of his methodology is to visit the
site. We have heard that. To the extent that it needs repetition, I would
suggest that it would only be justified on some clear and rational purpose. Let us
proceed. The witness should observe that his answers should be responsive only
to the question, with not a lot of digression. Mr.
Freiman, please. MR.
FREIMAN: Before we proceed, this is probably
another instance of locking the barn door after the horse is long gone. I am
somewhat disturbed even by the Tribunal's direction to the witness when he
asked to have a conference with Mr. Christie, suggesting that during the break
it would be appropriate for them to confer. My
understanding of the rule is that, in principle, it is better not to have
contact once a witness has begun to give evidence. If contact is necessary, it
has to strictly avoid any topic about which the witness has already given
evidence. THE
CHAIRPERSON: Perhaps I have not made that clear
enough. I have visited that issue many times in my own experience. That
issue, as a matter of law, seems quite clear. The witness is yours until he is
under cross-examination. Consultation is permitted within ethical rules during
examination-in-chief, as I understand it. That is my appreciation of the law,
and I have had occasion to argue that at an appeal on more than one occasion. I
understand that it is inappropriate to consult with a witness for the purpose
of repairing something that was said, but you can consult with the witness.
For example, we have suggested how this evidence should be dealt with. If the
witness needs some clarification, he can consult with the lawyer who has called
him. I am
mindful of the fact, as well, that we are dealing with an expert witness. I
appreciate what you say, Mr. Freiman, but that is my understanding of the
appropriate procedure to follow. I might
say in passing, Mr. Christie, that we did make a ruling last June, and it does
not serve anyone's purpose to say anything that might reflect on the integrity
of that ruling. The remedy for that ruling does not lie before us, but someone
else. ‑‑-
Witness returns to the stand MR.
CHRISTIE: Q. When did your study of text and documents first take you into the
realm of questioning issues with regard to the Holocaust? A. In 1960. Q. Why? A. Because I read in a German newspaper called "Die Zeit"
on the 19th of August, 1960 that finally, according to historian Martin
Broszat, there were in fact no gas chambers either in Dachau or in Bergen-Belsen
or in Buchenwald. Q. Have you been studying in the area of the Holocaust since? A. Yes. I did stop. I worked only on the Holocaust, or nearly only
on the Holocaust, since 1974, which means that I was interested in the topic
from 1960 to 1974. I made some research, but I had something else to do. From
1974 I could say that most of my time was dedicated to this ‑‑ I
say "most." Q. In the course of your studies, what has that to do with text and
document analysis in respect of the study of the Holocaust? A. It had to do with text, with documents and, therefore, with
analysis of text and documents. Q. In the course of your inquiries of text and documents, your
practice apparently was to go to the site referred to in the document and look
over the site. A. This was one part of my research. Q. In carrying out that research, did you go to Auschwitz? A. Yes, I did. Q. Auschwitz-Birkenau? A. Yes, I did. Q. How many times? A. In 1975 and in 1976. Q. Are there libraries there? A. Yes, archives. Q. Did you study texts and documents from those archives? A. Yes, I did. I can give the name of the man in charge of the
archives. I found
some documents that I was the first to publish. No historian had published
those documents. It is extremely important that they are presently published,
especially about the crematories. Q. What were those documents? A. The plans, different plans of the crematories in Auschwitz and in
Birkenau. I was interested in essentially one question: Where are those gas
chambers? Q. So you looked at the plans, and that was the process you used. A. Yes. Q. Have you studied in various archives to compare texts and
documents? A. Many, many archives. Q. Give the Panel an idea of how many and over what period of time. A. I worked for years and years in the Centre of Jewish
Documentation in Paris. I would say the first time I went into the place was
in 1964, and for the last time in January 1977. I was chased from those
archives. Q. How often had you studied there? A. I would say I was the principal reader; I was constantly in this
centre, very, very often. I did not meet in this place someone coming back to
this place as many times as I did. Q. How about the archives in Washington, D.C.? A. Of course, I worked first in the Library of Congress, then in the
archives in Washington, D.C. and in the archives in Suitland, Maryland. Q. What are those archives? A. They depend from the National Archives in Washington. Q. They depend? A. They depend, yes. It is a dependent of. Q. A subsidiary? A. I would not say subsidiary; it's a section. Q. What are those archives about that you studied? A. World War II, all the part under the responsibility of Dr. Robert
Wolfe whom I knew personally. Q. How many texts and documents did you study in that archives? A. Thousands, either myself directly or, when back in France,
through some American people whom I asked to visit the place and to get for me
such and such documents. Q. Other than the archives in Washington, D.C. and Suitland,
Maryland, have you studied in other archives? A. Many others. Q. Can you name them, please? A. Yes. Federal Archives in Germany, in Koblas; in the Wiener
Library in London; in the War Imperial Museum in London. Q. How many documents did you see and analyze in that place? A. A few documents in those places ‑‑ excuse me. In
Germany many, but in the Imperial War Museum few of them. In the Wiener
Library, a few. Q. Anywhere else? A. Of course, in Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. I saw documents
in the Anne Frank Museum, of course, and I got many documents from many other
places through people who helped me with providing all this. Q. Have you been interviewed on the subjects of your texts and
documents research by various media? A. I have been interviewed, yes, but not very often. Q. Have you published about the Holocaust and the text and documents
analysis you have done? A. Yes. Q. In your curriculum vitae you were looking for something about the
Wannsee Protocol. Did you find it? A. Yes, I did. It is on page 6, two articles. The third one from
the top is: Three French judges are tampering with the Wannsee Protocol, procès
verbal. Q. Verbal process is what? A. It means protocol. Q. And the next article about it...? A. The next one is three articles after: "Wannsee: Une histoire
inepte", Wannsee: A Silly Story. I am going to give the exact reference;
it happens that I remember. "The
silly story of Wannsee" was said by Mr. Yehuda Bauer of Yad Vashem, a very
famous Jewish historian, totally against the revisionist people. This was said
in the Canadian Jewish News on, I think, the 30th of January, 1992:
"People go repeating the silly story of Wannsee." In other words,
they are still saying that in Wannsee the extermination of the Jews was
decided. Those words are not mine. Q. How did this relate to your own text and documents analysis of
the Wannsee Protocol? Did it confirm it; did it deny it; what did it do? A. It confirmed totally. Q. When did you first come to the conclusion that the Wannsee
Protocol did not verify a policy of extermination? A. I suppose at the beginning of the 1980s.