Here is Part II of the Zundel-Leuchter Saga - which took place in the midst of the Second Great Holocaust Trial in the late winter and spring of 1988. This is to be the backdrop to tomorrow's commentary regarding the New Yorker article on Fred Leuchter.
At that time the Great Holocaust Trial of 1988 took place, Fred Leuchter was a highly respected professional in the United States "execution industry". He was regarded as the Number One Expert in the designing and operating of execution equipment for criminals sentenced to die for their crimes. As he later admitted, even though he should have known better, he had never given any thought to the technical impossibility of what was claimed so loudly and universally as having been the "genocidal gassings" of millions of Jews by the Germans.
In fact, how he felt prior to his fateful visit to the Zundel-Haus, and how he changed his mind, is summarized in an IHR article posted on the Zundelsite titled "Inside the Auschwitz Gas Chambers." (Use your search engine; my computer is balking this morning...)
Prior to getting involved and entangled in the Revisionist movement - largely much against his will, since he was thoroughly apolitical and certainly without any inkling of the serious consequences to his reputation and career - Leuchter's expertise and integrity had never been questioned. Little did he know what was awaiting him.
Let's see how it all started. Put yourself right in the middle of the highly dramatic Holocaust Trial Number Two as Dr. Faurisson flew to Boston to check out and, hopefully, try to engage Fred Leuchter as an expert witness for the defense in this historical struggle.
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It turned out that Leuchter believed in the Holocaust and that he did not doubt the gas chambers, insofar as he had heard about them. However, everything else about him indicated that here was a man who knew what he was doing, that he understood his job - and that he was honest and professionally ethical.
Dr. Faurisson flew back to Toronto to report to Zündel.
Leuchter was asked to come to Toronto himself to meet with Doug Christie and speak with the other experts - to analyze and to familiarize himself with the documents and testimony of both sides, especially Dr. Raoul Hilberg's trial transcripts of the 1985 trial and the statements in his books.
The models of Auschwitz and Birkenau, which the Zündel team had constructed to scale from German blueprints, discovered by Dr. Faurisson, were also shown and explained to him.
Zündel asked Leuchter for a cost estimate for his expert report and testimony. The price was steep; but the testimony was extremely important.
Now what to do? Zündel made a bold decision. Leuchter would not merely testify. He would go after evidence first-hand! But from where was the extra money for Leuchter's trip to Auschwitz, the on-site inspection, the taking of samples and their subsequent analysis in a US laboratory to come?
Zündel examined bank statements and current income from donations. He compared the constantly accruing expenses and considered tapping his strategic financial reserve. He sounded out his supporters to see whether any extra donations might be obtained. It was tough going - the funds were just not there.
Meanwhile, Leuchter flew back to Boston.
Time was of the essence, since the trial was already approaching half-time. Zündel spent entire nights on the telephone and explained the situation to donors both large and small. In the end, some larger contributions from several elderly German women and men became the deciding factor in this historically so exceedingly important decision.
Together with a small, quickly-assembled group of translators, draughtsmen, video- and cameramen, Leuchter would fly to Auschwitz and Majdanek in what was then still Communist Poland!
He would examine and measure the facilities and draw up precise technical building and construction plans. Working meticulously to prevent contamination, he would take material samples, wrap them up carefully, and smuggle them back to the United States, where a well-known laboratory would examine and analyze them for their Zyklon B content.
This dramatic expedition was to be carried out clandestinely while the trial still continued in Toronto!
At the Zündel-House it felt like at the General Staff's Headquarters during wartime! People were busy planning, testing, measuring, weighing, packing. Work plans were drawn up. Visas, passports and plane tickets were arranged in a great hurry.
And then the word was: "Silence!"
The Zündel-Leuchter-Holocaust-Expedition left North America and Europe at different times and via different airports. Friendly Poles awaited them to be of assistance at the other end. Everything went off without a hitch.
The rest is Revisionist history!
Leuchter's investigation was first rate pioneering work! Today millions of people around the world already know that the forensic evidence of Leuchter's report and Professor Roth's sample analysis have acquitted Germany of the genocide of the Jews by means of "gas chambers."
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On April 20, Hitler's birthday, Zündel introduced the witness Leuchter and his report to the Court.
Panic! Horror! The faces of the Jewish representatives showed total disbelief!
The Judge and Crown attorney were also visibly shocked and speechless at this development! The Judge ordered a lengthy break to try and recover his composure.
Then the jury members were sent from the courtroom. In their absence, and under orders of strict secrecy, negotiations were conducted to determine what the extremely important "witness Leuchter" could or could not not testify to - and what the Court would graciously "accept"!
The media, not too incidentally, could not report about these negotiations!
What happened next was a legal disgrace!
***Leuchter was forbidden to say anything about his findings in the presence of the jury!***
The Crown and the Judge wanted to rescue what could still be rescued, and felt that they would be able to embarrass the defense by demanding the personal appearance, for cross-examination, of the expert chemist who performed the analysis in the American laboratory - the analysis which would consign the mass murders by Zyklon B myth to the dust heap of history.
This could indeed be dangerous to the defense, since the man in question worked thousands of kilometers away in the United States. No-one could force him to fly to Toronto to testify.
Everything was touch and go!
Zündel was on the phone for hours! But in the end, late at night, everything was arranged! Professor Dr. Roth, for ten years "Professor for Chemistry" at the famous Cornell University in the United States, would testify! Personally! The very next day!
Of course he demanded a horrendous fee - US $300.00 per hour! - from the instant he left his house until he returned! These funds, too, were somehow raised.
When you ask Zündel nowadays how it was done, he will say quietly: "I pray these people to me who will help me, again and again!"
The next morning, the Court was more than a little amazed when Christie stood up and calmly informed the Court that he intended to call as his next witness the chemistry expert, Dr. Roth, who had analyzed Leuchter's brick sludge and concrete samples from Auschwitz in America!
The Judge and Crown attorney were flabbergasted! Again, they had shot themselves in the foot!
Later on, when Leuchter was dragged before a U.S. court with respect to his engineering credentials and was publicly attacked and defamed in the media, Dr. Roth's sample analyses stood firm - to bear witness to the scientific facts and thus the truth against historical lies! <end>
Tomorrow: The New Yorker article and other significant breakthroughs in the Leuchter Saga.
Thought for the Day:
"When a dog bites a man, that is not news, because it happens so often. But when a man bites a dog, that is news."
(John B. Bogart, city editor of The Sun, New York, 1873-1890)