The Case Against Revisionism
"However this war may end, we have won the war against you, none of you will be left to bear witness, but even if someone were to survive, the world will not believe him. There will perhaps be suspicions, discussions, research by historians, but thee will be no certainties, because we will destroy the evidence together with you. And even if some proof should remain and some of you survive, people willl say that the events you describe are too monstrous to be believed: they will say that they are the exaggerations of Allied propaganda and will believe us, who will deny everything and not you. We will be the ones to dictate the history of the Lagers *Simon Weisenthal:The Murderers are Among Us; cited in Primo Levi'sThe Drowned & the Saved
The Israeli Police in quiestioning Eichmann upon his arrest in 1960; asked him about a Death march from the Camps at the end of the war in which only 10% of 50,000 survived. Eichmann said, 10,000. " Fifty-thousand" , replied the interrogator. Eichmann said, I remember "10,000." " Fifty-Thousand", the officer replied. "All right", replied Eichmann, " 50,000 then." Historical Revisionism is not new. It has been around since the dawn of time.
Those who commit historical crimes, at first love to glory in them and then, deman their importance and numbers to a cynical world. Historical Revisionism, [Holocaust Denial] as it applies to the Shoah, is the attempt to re-write the history of the events of the Shoah to lessen the reports of the millions of deaths, to demean the numbers and suffering, as though those events were non-critical as though the only thing that mattered was the justification of cruelty.
Historical Revisionism
While Revisionists posit many historical positions they are primarily known for their ameliorative efforts in describing the war crimes of the Nazis. In other words, Revisionists believe that history should be re-written to reflect a less horrific view of the Shoah, or Holocaust. They almost exclusively have an Anti-Semitic bias, and they often negate the physical evidence and accounting of the Nazis themselves, paradoxically. In the media, Historical Revisionists are more frequently referred to as "Holocaust Deniers" because they 'deny' or strongly disagree with the historical evidence that has been made available. They often use thier own texts and websites to promulgate their views and promote their ideals. It is important to note that almost all Revisionists share certain beliefs: (See Table 1) Additionally, thier arguments tend to center around certain topics and issues. (See Table 2)
© 2001 Elizabeth Kirkley Best, PhD, all rights reserved
of the Israeli Police;1983. NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.