Bernard M. Smith

“The ‘gas chambers’ were wartime propaganda hoaxes.”
The Case Against the Presumed Extermination of European Jewry by Arthur R. Butz

The apogee of banned books.

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Over the past dozen or so years, my reading choices have reflected a greater movement in my soul — I have crossed the Rubicon of “conventional conservatism” into the red-pilled land of the dissident right. To be sure, I am a relative nobody — just my own version of Winston Smith who has progressively discovered that the curated version of reality that I have been inculcated to accept has been largely fabricated. Like Winston Smith, I discovered that the past (i.e., “history”) is in a constant state of alteration. Like Winston Smith, I live in an era in which objective truth itself is being destroyed. For whatever reason, I am drawn by an almost-pathological contrarianism to read and contemplate that which I have been told to avoid. Now, many years later I hold views that make me, by conventional standards, a deplorable of the first rank — worse, perhaps, because I am educated and well read.

In reading a variety of banned books and authors, I had yet to touch a work that attacked the singularity from which all banishments flow: the Holocaust. One can hold a variety of “deplorable” views and still retain some semblance of a public life even if such intellectual persuasions are deemed unforgiveable by elite culture. However, a revisionist (or a “denier”) of the Holocaust is deemed so foul — so awful — so heretical that it destroys the possibility of any public life in the modern West. The day is coming when these modern witch hunts end, and it is coming sooner that people realize.

So, I took the time recently to dip my toe into — dare I say it — Holocaust revisionism. In my intellectual journey, I have touched upon aspects of Holocaust mythology by reading — quite intensely at times — the suffering of the German people during and after the war and the moral bankruptcy of the “good guys” of WWII (i.e., the Allies). The modern orthodoxy that surrounds WWII and the post-war settlement is crucial to understand the “Pottersville” that we call the modern West — dissenting from it is tantamount to heresy in past ages. In that sense, I became a political heretic by reading politically heretical works.

To be candid, I have had serious reservations for some time about the standard Holocaust narrative although there was never any reason for me to focus on it. It is not that I doubt Jews — and other non-Germans — suffered through expulsion and exploitative slave labor that took place during total war. If that is a genocide, I do not deny it. I don’t think anyone denies that. Notwithstanding that proviso, the idea that the Germans systematically exterminated European Jewry through gassings, etc., always struck me as farfetched. It always reeked of the same outlandish elements of WWI propaganda against the “Hun” bayoneting Belgian babies. For full disclosure, I am ancestrally “Hun” or German. I know my people. I do not think they were (or are) capable of it — not only in the macabre sense but also in its gross stupidity. I have always viewed it — at least internally — as its own form of blood libel against my people.

Questioning the Holocaust in any fashion comes at a great personal cost. While I am undoubtedly contrarian, outsiders seldom understand the cost — the conscious cost — that comes from intellectual dissidence and political heresy of this type. True, there is something liberating in seeking the truth no matter the cost, but the unfurling of each layer of dissidence further isolates the dissident. Some people — especially the congenitally empathetic people of northwestern Europe — just want to get along. I fight an invisible battle within myself between my desire for truth (no matter the cost) and my predisposition to get along and understand the “other.” Be that as it may, the truth-seeking part of my being has gained the upper hand over my empathic amiability. Reading something like Arthur Butz’s takedown of the Holocaust narrative then followed a series of intellectual and moral steps. To take them all at once would be to careen down the entire flight of stairs. Taking them, however, one step and one book at a time led me to Butz.

So here I am — as if an inner compulsion towards understanding the truth drives me — reading and reviewing Arthur Butz’s work, which follows herein. Again, to demonstrate how powerful the persecution that follows from questioning the Holocaust narrative, reading — and certainly reviewing — this book is enough to get anyone in the United States fired. That alone speaks to the level of cultural and political totalitarianism that exists. It is, to say the very least, a dangerous book to take seriously. So be it.

What strikes me about an author like Butz is his fearlessness and imperviousness to outside pressure. Butz, a native of New York City, was born in 1933. He is an American electrical engineer and a long-time faculty member at Northwestern University, which is, at least for the uninitiated, one of the finest universities in the United States. He is a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and he completed his PhD at the University of Minnesota. The only reason he remains a faculty member at Northwestern University is that he was tenured in 1974 — he is as ostracized at Northwestern as a tenured professor can be because of his views and research on the Holocaust. The tapestry of the academy will permit — and even celebrate — a variety of anti-social views such as acclaiming White genocide, championing Stalinism, blaspheming Christ, cheering violence, or defending the worst sexual depravity. All these outlandish views find academics who will defend their substance or at least see them as being cloaked in the First Amendment view that lauds their “courage.”

But Butz has no academic champions, and that lacuna should tell us something about the moment of time in which we live. Think about it — numerous professors openly espouse the desirability of White genocide — genocide of me and my children, and they are openly celebrated by the academy. The double standard is real: see it applied to those who question the Holocaust narrative based upon assessments of the evidence without any ostensible guile and they are instantly turned into “untouchables.” Whatever moment of history this is, it cannot last much longer. Butz accordingly has always been an army of one. Setting aside his lack of qualifications as an historian, Butz is a very, very smart individual (an MIT graduate and engineer after all) who has demonstrated an almost otherworldly obtuseness to outside pressure.

He is also an unusual suspect to have taken such a stance. While, at least to my knowledge, Butz has not provided a detailed public account of his personal motivations or a precise “origin story” for his interest in the Holocaust. However, based on his own statements in contemporary interviews around the time of his book’s publication, he described becoming interested through reading various books on the subject and studying the records of the Nuremberg Trials. He began his research in the summer of 1972, leading to the completion of his manuscript (which became The Hoax of the Twentieth Century) by the following spring. No sources indicate a specific triggering event, personal experience, or earlier ideological bent—such as prior involvement in “far-right” circles. Indeed, this is a man who is an elite academic and was educated at — and educating at — some of the most elite American institutions. That he would effectively throw away his standing as an elite is curious, to say the very least. In a sense, he is that one strange bird that followed an intellectual curiosity with an otherworldly tenacity and absolute moral belief in the truth. He is the classic pattern of low conformity (lack of intimidation by groupthink); high openness (vision of possibilities others miss); high cognitive abilities (comprehension of how systems work); and a strong internal compass (willing to bear the social opprobrium). Regardless of whether he is right or not, men like Butz fascinate me — they fearlessly challenge orthodoxies and systems. If such a man and type confront a thoroughly corrupt system, heroes are born.

Butz has consistently framed his interest as an intellectual or evidentiary one: approaching the topic as an outsider (a control engineer, not a historian) who applied what he described as objective, technical scrutiny to wartime documents, propaganda, and inconsistencies in mainstream accounts, ultimately concluding the extermination narrative was a hoax. I read the 2003 edition of The Hoax of the Twentieth Century, but as Butz makes clear, he did little to update the material that he assembled from his research during the early 1970s. It is, as will be demonstrated, a very powerful and well-reasoned rebuttal of the standard Holocaust narrative — one that in any other context would be applauded for its audacity and comprehensiveness. Indeed, consider if instead of the Holocaust narrative, Butz wrote a book that challenged — based on evidence — some historical axiom, he would either be lauded or ignored. However, challenge to this particular axiom results in social leprosy.

Setting aside whether he is right in the main, it is not the type of work that should be banned in a free society. Whatever we can say of it, it is not a polemical work — it is a reasoned historical work based upon evidence and logic. It is not peddling a conspiracy theory but offering an assessment of proof. There is no gutter anti-Semitism in this book — everything he recounts and analyzes happened. The “academy” does not want those perspectives considered, which is why it is labeled “disinformation” in the full Orwellian sense with all the various slanders against it. You can be sure that if something is labeled as “disinformation” by today’s elites, it is probably worth reading. “Disinformation,” as a concept and term, operates as a poker tell — a demonstration of a censorship culture that demands that the masses not be allowed to access material that makes us reassess or question the prevailing orthodoxies of life. And banned it effectively is. You will never find it in a bookstore or on Amazon. You will have much difficulty finding it online, as I did. If you write a review of this book in less than psychotically condemnatory terms, you will likely be fired from whatever job that you have in the modern West. What is clear is that the powerful do not want this book to be read and have done everything within their arsenal to keep it from being read. For that reason alone, it should be read — and to those who might say that our society often keeps absurd ideas shelved (e.g., flat-earth ideas), this is not an absurd idea — it is an open historical question that “mainstream” historians and political actors demand be closed because to question it is considered per se antisemitism. We have seen other ideas (e.g., COVID-related origins, Race-IQ research) suppressed because the truth has been deemed to be toxic for the masses. I reject emphatically any censorious paternalism no matter whether it is paternalism of good will or one designed to propagate an elitist narrative. I reject paternalism period.

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Butz opens the book by positioning his work as a rigorous, evidence-based challenge to what he terms the “legend” of the Nazi extermination of Jews. He argues that the dominant historical narrative—claiming the deliberate murder of about six million Jews, largely via gas chambers—originated primarily from Zionist and Allied propaganda during the war and the postwar war crimes trials, particularly the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. He portrays these trials as unprecedented, politically driven proceedings lacking true legal legitimacy.

He describes the Nuremberg trials as “precedent-shattering in their scope and in the explicitness of the victorious powers’ claims to some sort of legal jurisdiction in respect of laws or understandings, which did not exist at the time they were allegedly broken by the Axis powers.” Butz contends that the trials were not impartial justice but rather a mechanism for the victors to impose a narrative, often relying on coerced evidence, unreliable testimonies, and questionable documents that were themselves subject to ambiguity. It was, according to Butz, a curated affair in which only the documents that arguably advanced the narrative (albeit ambiguously) were shown the public. Others less helpful never saw the proverbial light of day.

A major focus is on doubts about the scale and nature of Jewish population losses. Butz questions demographic claims, suggesting inconsistencies in pre- and postwar figures that undermine assertions of massive extermination. He reviews sources like the World Almanac and early Zionist or Allied reports, arguing they do not support a “five or six million drop in world Jewish population.” He highlights political influences on the trials, noting appointments like that of a “fanatical Zionist” to key positions in the War Crimes Branch, which he sees as evidence of bias: “The filling of the War Crimes Branch position with a fanatical Zionist, the first soldier since Biblical times to hold the rank of General in the Army of Israel, is not only significant in terms of what the Zionist might do in the position, but also significant in revealing, in a simple way, the nature of the overall political forces operating at the trials. […] Under these political conditions it is simply silly to expect anything but a frame-up at the trials.”

Butz introduces his core thesis bluntly in the chapter’s early sections: “The legend of Jewish extermination during World War II is a hoax.” He extends this to specific claims about methods, asserting that “the ‘gas chambers’ were wartime propaganda hoaxes” and that the trials served to institutionalize and perpetuate this narrative.

He critiques the reliance on affidavits, survivor testimonies, and Soviet-influenced evidence, claiming much of it was obtained under duress or was inconsistent. (Parenthetically, why the Soviets, who murdered thousands upon thousands of Polish officers and intellectuals in cold blood in the Katyn Massacre and then lied about it for decades have anything credible to add to the Holocaust narrative is unbelievable.) He also contrasts the intense focus on alleged Nazi crimes with relative silence on Allied actions (e.g., the atomic bombs, firebombing cities crammed with refugees, and Soviet deportations, i.e., Operation Keelhaul), pointing to an obvious double standard. Throughout, Butz frames his approach as scientific and dispassionate: he insists the extermination story must withstand technical and documentary scrutiny like any other claim.

Butz transitions from the postwar trials’ role in establishing the “extermination legend” to a direct examination of the concentration camps themselves, which he claims are the alleged sites of mass murder. He argues that the standard narrative—portraying certain camps as dedicated “extermination” facilities using gas chambers for systematic genocide—is unsupported by wartime evidence and is instead a product of propaganda, misinterpretation, and postwar myth-making. He distinguishes between various types of camps and insists that horror photographs and survivor accounts from liberated camps have been selectively used to imply nonexistent deliberate extermination policies.

We have all seen the camp liberation photographs in which emaciated prisoners in filthy rags are paraded — Butz considers them, even if not staged, to be the result of a total collapse of Germany and the accompanying famine that occurred during the last months of the war. He addresses the “horror scenes” encountered by Allied forces upon liberating camps in 1945, particularly those in western Germany like Bergen-Belsen, Dachau, and Buchenwald. Butz contends these images of emaciated bodies, mass graves, and typhus-ravaged inmates reflect wartime conditions—overcrowding, supply breakdowns, disease epidemics (especially typhus), and starvation due to Allied bombing of transport lines—rather than any planned killing program. He asserts that these western camps were not “extermination” sites and that deaths there resulted from natural causes amplified by war chaos, not gassings or systematic murder. He counters that they were not normative of the camps but the product of the bitter end of the war.

Butz then focuses on the eastern camps (Auschwitz, Treblinka, Sobibor, etc.), labeled by historians as primary extermination centers. He claims the “extermination camp” designation is a postwar invention, and that these facilities were primarily labor or transit camps. He questions the technical feasibility and documentary support for homicidal gas chambers, suggesting that structures identified as such were delousing facilities using Zyklon B for typhus control—a common wartime practice in camps to combat epidemics.

He critiques early atrocity propaganda, including wartime rumors of soap made from human fat or lampshades from skin, which he says were later quietly dropped but helped build the myth. Butz argues that the “six million” figure and gas chamber stories originated in unreliable sources like Soviet commissions and Jewish organizations, then solidified at Nuremberg without rigorous verification.

A key argument is the lack of explicit German orders or records for mass extermination. Butz writes: “There is no ‘Hitler order’ for the extermination of the Jews, and […] there is no evidence that such an order was ever given or that such a policy ever existed.” He extends this to claim that captured German documents, Red Cross reports, and even some Allied intelligence that do not corroborate a genocide program on the alleged scale. This is something that the mainstream advocates all but reluctantly concede — although they attribute it to the secrecy of the program.

Butz emphasizes logistical improbabilities: the scale of alleged killings would require massive fuel, crematoria capacity, and disposal infrastructure that he claims German records show did not exist or were inconsistent with extermination claims. He states: “The ‘gas chambers’ were wartime propaganda hoaxes” and that the camps’ primary function was exploitation of labor amid wartime shortages, not annihilation.

He sets up deeper analysis in later sections by promising scrutiny of specific camps (especially Auschwitz in subsequent chapters), documents, and population statistics. Butz frames the entire “extermination” story as collapsing under technical and evidential examination, insisting that a dispassionate review reveals mass deaths from disease and war conditions, not deliberate policy.

Butz shifts focus from the camps and trials to the wartime dissemination of “extermination” claims in Allied countries, particularly the United States. He argues that reports of systematic murder of Jews emerged not from solid intelligence or German documents but from propaganda channels in Washington and New York, driven by Jewish organizations, Zionist interests, and wartime information control. These early claims, he contends, laid the groundwork for the postwar “legend” despite lacking credible substantiation at the time.

He examines the 1942 “rubber crisis” and U.S. intelligence priorities, suggesting that if mass extermination were occurring, American agencies (OSS, State Department, military intelligence) would have prioritized it—but they did not. Butz claims Auschwitz and other camps were known to Allies mainly as labor or industrial sites, not killing centers, and that early interest stemmed from strategic concerns like synthetic rubber production rather than atrocities.

Butz traces the first major “extermination” announcements to late 1942, originating from Jewish sources in New York and relayed through London and Washington. He portrays these as unsubstantiated rumors amplified by press releases from groups like the World Jewish Congress. He writes: “the first claims of a German program to exterminate all Jews appeared in the West in late 1942, originating in New York and Washington circles closely connected with Jewish organizations.”

He discusses specific reports, such as the 1942 Riegner Telegram (sent by Gerhart Riegner of the World Jewish Congress to the U.S. State Department and others), which alleged a plan to murder millions via gas. Butz dismisses it as hearsay without corroboration, arguing it fit a pattern of wartime atrocity propaganda like World War I fabrications. He asserts that U.S. officials treated such claims skeptically initially, with some viewing them as Zionist pressure tactics.

A significant portion covers the War Refugee Board (WRB) Report of 1944 (also known as the Vrba-Wetzler Report), which Butz calls “the birth of the Auschwitz legend.” He claims this document—detailing alleged gassings at Auschwitz—was produced under U.S. auspices but relied on escapee testimonies (notably Rudolf Vrba) that he deems inconsistent or fabricated. Butz has a section titled “The War Refugee Board Report: Birth of the Auschwitz Legend” and critiques it heavily, arguing “the WRB report is the first great ‘document’ of the legend of Jewish extermination, and that it is worthless as historical evidence.” Butz also addresses German reactions, noting that Nazi propaganda (e.g., via Goebbels’ ministry) denied extermination rumors and accused Allies/Jews of invention for political gain. He suggests these denials were logical if no such policy existed.

Throughout, Butz frames the chapter as evidence that “extermination” stories were manufactured in Allied propaganda hubs (Washington bureaucracies and New York Jewish/Zionist networks) rather than emerging from verifiable facts on the ground. He promises later chapters will dissect Auschwitz specifics, but here he establishes that wartime claims were politically motivated, inconsistent, and uncorroborated by contemporaneous Allied intelligence.

[Editor’s note: For photographic and visual confirmation, watch “The Official WWII Narrative: Historical Fact or Mass Illusion?“]

Butz moves onto a detailed, technical dissection of Auschwitz-Birkenau, which he identifies as the centerpiece of the “extermination legend.” He argues that the camp complex was primarily an industrial and labor facility tied to synthetic fuel and rubber production (via IG Farben and other wartime industries), not a dedicated site for mass murder. He claims the gas chamber and crematoria stories are postwar fabrications, built on contradictory testimonies, misinterpretations of documents, and impossible logistics, rather than contemporaneous German evidence. He opens his analysis here with “Structure of the Legend,” where Butz outlines the standard narrative: Auschwitz as the largest extermination camp, where millions (primarily Jews) were gassed upon arrival, with bodies cremated in special facilities. He dismisses this as internally inconsistent and unsupported.

He questions the absence of photographic or aerial evidence: “Where are the pictures?” Butz argues that if mass gassings and cremations were occurring on an industrial scale in 1944, Allied reconnaissance photos (which exist and show camp expansions) should reveal smoking chimneys, mass pits, or other signs—but he claims they do not. He states: “Where are the pictures?” and insists that the lack of visual proof from 1944 Allied overflights is damning.

Butz heavily critiques the “confession” of Rudolf Höss (the Auschwitz commandant who testified at Nuremberg and in his memoirs). He calls it unreliable, coerced, and riddled with errors, such as impossible figures for gassings and cremations. He asserts that “the Höss affidavit is no more reliable than, say, a coerced confession in a Soviet show trial.” He highlights early contradictions in the legend, questioning when the alleged gassings began and why initial reports varied. In “When Did It Start?” and “The Alleged Gassings and Zyklon,” Butz argues Zyklon B (hydrogen cyanide pellets) was used exclusively for delousing clothing and barracks to combat typhus epidemics—not for homicidal purposes. He claims the amounts delivered align with sanitary needs, not mass killings, and that homicidal use would require impractical ventilation and safety measures absent in the structures.

Butz examines lines of authority and camp organization, suggesting decisions were decentralized and focused on labor exploitation amid wartime shortages. He notes the presence of hospitals, medical care, and even a “family camp” for some Jews (e.g., Theresienstadt arrivals), asking rhetorically: “A Hospital for the People Being Exterminated?” He argues this contradicts claims of immediate extermination for all arrivals.

Regarding documents proffered as evidence, Butz discusses terms like “special treatment” (“Sonderbehandlung”), claiming they referred to labor assignments or executions of criminals/resistance members—not systematic gassing of Jews. He insists such euphemisms are misinterpreted by legend-builders to fit extermination claims. He addresses transports to Auschwitz, arguing many were for forced labor (especially after 1942), and questions the scale of alleged killings given crematoria capacities, fuel requirements, and disposal logistics. Butz contends aerial photos, Red Cross visits, and German records show no evidence of mass gassings, with deaths attributable to disease, overwork, and war conditions.

The analysis presented here reinforces Butz’s broader thesis by promising further breakdowns (e.g., of Hungarian deportations in the next chapter) while framing Auschwitz as the “keystone” of the hoax: if it collapses under scrutiny, the entire narrative fails. He portrays the story as a propaganda construct amplified postwar, not grounded in verifiable wartime facts.

Butz then focuses on the 1944 deportation of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz as a “test case” for the entire “extermination legend.” He argues that this episode—often cited as one of the clearest examples of mass gassing due to its scale (approximately 437,000 Jews deported in a short period) and timing (amid Allied awareness)—undermines the Holocaust narrative when examined closely. He claims the deportations were for labor exploitation in Germany amid wartime shortages, not systematic murder, and that postwar claims of gassings rely on propaganda, inconsistent testimonies, and fabricated or misinterpreted documents rather than solid evidence.

The chapter here opens with “The International Red Cross,” where Butz discusses Red Cross visits and reports from 1944. He asserts that the IRC had access to camps and reported no evidence of extermination programs, even during the Hungarian action. He writes: “The International Red Cross visited Auschwitz in September 1944 and reported nothing about gas chambers or exterminations,” suggesting this neutral inspection contradicts the legend of ongoing mass killings.

Butz then turns to “1944 Propaganda,” examining wartime Allied and Jewish-organization reports alleging extermination. He claims these were exaggerated or invented for political effect, similar to earlier atrocity stories. He critiques sources like the War Refugee Board and escapee accounts (e.g., Vrba-Wetzler), arguing they overreached with details that do not hold up. In “Air raids on Auschwitz: Rudolf Vrba overreaches himself,” Butz points to Vrba’s claim of witnessing or knowing about gassings during a period when Allied bombing raids (which he says Vrba referenced inaccurately) supposedly provided cover or evidence—Butz dismisses this as self-contradictory.

On “Documentary evidence?,” Butz examines German records of the Hungarian transports, claiming figures and terms (e.g., “resettlement” or labor assignments) align with forced relocation for work, not annihilation. He dismisses Höfle Telegram or other decoded messages as misinterpreted or irrelevant to extermination claims. He argues the rapid deportations were logistically feasible for labor but improbable for immediate gassing of most arrivals without massive, undocumented infrastructure.Butz concludes by framing the Hungarian case as a propaganda high point: the story was amplified in 1944 to pressure neutrals, justify Allied actions, and support Zionist goals, but crumbles under scrutiny of contemporaneous sources like Red Cross reports, air photos, and German documents.

Butz final two chapters clean up loose ends and address miscellaneous aspects of the Holocaust narrative that do not fit neatly into prior chapters on trials, camps, propaganda origins, Auschwitz specifics, or Hungarian deportations. Titled “Et Cetera,” it serves as a wrap-up before the book’s conclusions, where Butz tackles additional “extermination” camps, demographic inconsistencies, emigration patterns, population statistics, and what he sees as absurd or unproven elements of the standard narrative. Butz briefly extends his skepticism to lesser-discussed sites like Majdanek, Chelmno, Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka. He argues these were primarily transit, labor, or POW facilities, with alleged gassings based on unreliable testimonies and lacking documentary or logistical support. He dismisses claims of mass murder there as extensions of the Auschwitz “hoax,” often reliant on postwar Soviet propaganda or inconsistent survivor accounts.

Butz then delves into population and emigration issues in sections critiquing Jewish demographic data. He questions the “six million” figure by examining prewar and postwar world Jewish population estimates from sources like the World Almanac, American Jewish Year Book, and Zionist reports. He claims these show no dramatic drop consistent with genocide, attributing any discrepancies to emigration (especially to Palestine/Israel, the U.S., and elsewhere), assimilation, or wartime chaos rather than extermination. He writes: “there is at present no other single volume that so provides a serious reader with […] five or six million drop in world Jewish population, the sources and authorities for the figures used are Communist and Jewish and thus, by the nature of the problem we are examining, must be considered essentially useless.”

He addresses alleged mass graves and Einsatzgruppen shootings in the East, conceding that some Jews were executed (e.g., as partisans or in reprisals) but arguing the scale is vastly exaggerated. Butz suggests Einsatzgruppen reports (e.g., the Jäger Report or Ereignismeldungen) refer to anti-partisan actions, not systematic genocide of Jews per se. He states: “we need not be told much more to surmise that the Einsatzgruppen must have shot many Jews, although we do not know whether ‘many’ means 5,000, 25,000 or 100,000.”

Butz also touches on miscellaneous “absurdities” in the legend, such as claims of soap from human fat, shrunken heads, or lampshades from skin—stories he says originated in propaganda but were later quietly abandoned by historians, undermining credibility. He reinforces his methodological point: the narrative relies on biased, postwar sources (Communist, Jewish, or Allied) rather than contemporaneous German records showing no extermination policy.

Butz’s penultimate chapter offers a reinterpretation of the Nazi term “Final Solution of the Jewish Question” (“Endlösung der Judenfrage”), arguing that it never referred to extermination or genocide but rather to a policy of expulsion, resettlement, and forced emigration from German-controlled Europe—primarily to the East (occupied Soviet territories) or other destinations. He claims the standard historical view—that it meant systematic mass murder—is a postwar misreading imposed by Allied propaganda, Zionist interests, and flawed interpretations of documents like the Wannsee Conference protocol.

It opens with “The German Policy and the Wannsee Conference,” where Butz analyzes the January 1942 Wannsee meeting (convened by Reinhard Heydrich) as the alleged starting point for extermination planning. He asserts the protocol’s language about “evacuation” (“Evakuierung”) and “labor in the East” was literal, not euphemistic for killing, and that no explicit mention of murder appears. In “The German Policy and the Wannsee Conference,” he contends that “the ‘Final Solution’ meant the expulsion of the Jews from Europe, ultimately to the East after the conquest of Russia.”

Butz examines deportation numbers and destinations in “Numbers Deported: Whence and Whither,” claiming transports (including to Auschwitz) were for labor exploitation in war industries or resettlement, not immediate annihilation. He argues many Jews survived the war in camps, ghettos, or through emigration, and questions why, if extermination was the goal, records show ongoing labor assignments and camp maintenance. In “Numbers Deported: Whence and Whither,” he insists that the figures do not support claims of millions gassed upon arrival.

In “The Polish Ghettos” and “What Happened to Them?,” Butz discusses Warsaw, Lodz, and other ghettos, portraying them as temporary holding areas for eventual eastward relocation rather than preludes to death. He suggests liquidations were due to disease, starvation from wartime shortages, or anti-partisan measures, not policy-driven genocide. He reinforces this by noting some ghetto inhabitants were later deported for labor or survived.

Butz revisits “Zionism Again,” linking the “Final Solution” narrative to postwar Zionist efforts to justify Israel’s creation and secure reparations. He claims exaggerated death figures thus served political ends. In “Migration to the USA,” he highlights Jewish emigration patterns (pre- and during the war) to argue that population losses were due to relocation, not murder. The final chapter includes a “Recapitulation” and brief mention of figures like J. G. Burg (a Jewish revisionist), before concluding that the “Final Solution” was a resettlement program disrupted by the war’s outcome. Butz quotes Himmler favorably in the wrap-up, “Himmler Nailed it Perfectly,” citing a supposed statement where Himmler allegedly described the policy as expulsion without extermination intent.

Butz concludes the book with a series of miscellaneous observations, responses to anticipated objections, and reflections on the broader implications of his thesis. Titled “Remarks,” this short final chapter ties together loose ends by addressing emotional or practical counterarguments (e.g., personal loss claims, German acceptance of the narrative), critiquing postwar West German politics, and reaffirming that the “extermination legend” rests on propaganda, coerced evidence, and misinterpretation rather than solid documentation. He frames the chapter as a defense against common challenges while urging readers to verify sources independently. The final chapter opens with “Miscellaneous Objections,” where Butz tackles criticisms of his methodology and sources. He defends his use of exterminationist authors like Reitlinger and Hilberg (despite calling their works “monumental foolishness”) as necessary to dismantle the claims directly. He also responds to emotional appeals, such as Jews claiming lost relatives, by suggesting these reflect wartime separations, communication breakdowns, or postwar family disruptions rather than proof of genocide.

He writes: “We close this work with a few miscellaneous remarks, most of which deal with some objections that may arise in certain situations.” On a critic comparing his work to flying saucer stories: “Years of propaganda have so associated Nazi Germany with the six million legend that denial of the legend seems at first almost as preposterous for many people as denying that World War II happened at all.”

A key passage addresses personal testimonies: “Assuming that his story is valid, there is only one sense in which it can be valid. That is, all he can claim is that he or his family lost contact with some relative in Europe during the war and never heard from that person again. Obviously, such data does not imply the existence of a Nazi extermination program.” Butz critiques collections like Yad Vashem’s testimony sheets: “The data have supposedly been collected on one-page testimony sheets filled in by relatives or witnesses or friends. […] There is no possible way to distinguish, in this data, between Jews who actually died during the war and Jews with whom the signers of the testimony sheets have merely lost contact.”

In “Postwar Germany and Willy Brandt,” Butz examines why many Germans appear to accept the narrative. He portrays the West German government as a U.S.-imposed puppet regime that perpetuates the “lie” through trials, education, and suppression to maintain legitimacy. He details Chancellor Willy Brandt’s (real name Herbert Frahm) background as a wartime propagandist transmitting atrocity stories from Sweden, and links Brandt’s associates like Hans Hirschfeld to espionage controversies.

Butz repeats his core argument: the “Final Solution” was resettlement/evacuation, not murder, and postwar trials (e.g., Dachau) involved coercion, hearsay, and procedural flaws. He touches on other topics like the Talmud (as a source of biased weighting), author credentials, trial abuses, and implications for historiography, insisting the hoax persists due to political interests rather than evidence.

The chapter serves as Butz’s parting defense and call for scrutiny: he portrays the entire work as a scientific debunking, predicts the legend’s eventual collapse, and warns against over-focusing on minor details at the expense of the obvious {such as, no extermination policy in documents). In essence, he wraps up the book by preempting objections, exposing postwar political motivations, and reiterating that a dispassionate review of sources reveals the “extermination” story as a sustained propaganda campaign.

Whatever one can say about this work, it is a coherent and readable account why what has been presented as fact regarding the Holocaust is questionable — both in scope and essence. It obviously should not be banned and its banishment (along with holding any Holocaust skepticism as punishable “wrongthink”) is a testament to how culturally and intellectually totalitarian we have become. The “historical consensus” and “mainstream” sources that demand absolute fidelity and obsequiousness to the Holocaust narrative are premised on only a few planks of reasoning and evidence: (i) German wartime records; (ii) post-war German confessions; and (iii) physical evidence. The entirety of Butz’s book is to dismantle each plank — or, at the least, present a counterclaim as to the standard narrative. What is, of course, lacking from the standard narrative is that the Germans, who famously are a meticulous people with an obsession for record keeping and order-following, never had an order in writing that outlined a plan for extermination, which the post-war Allies alleged happened in the Holocaust. As Butz points out, we are supposed to believe that Goebbels made public statements calling for the annihilation of the Jews (which he did but Butz attributes them to wartime hyperbole) but were so circumspect in internal records as to leave no evidence of a systematic plan. We are forced to believe that a mass plan of enormous economic cost just happened without any central planning and explicit preparatory documentation. To know German people is to know how suspect that idea is on its face.

There are a few parts in which I learned things that are both true (I independently confirmed them) and very troubling about the Holocaust narrative. First, Butz seems to hew closely to analyzing data by employing Ockham’s Razor — that is, the simplest explanation of complex phenomena is the usually the best, i.e., that the German government did what it claimed internally and externally to have done: evacuate the Jews eastward towards the outer sphere of German influence, and, at the same time, put able-bodied Jews to work for the German war economy. Setting aside the wisdom and morality of the question: the Germans pursued ultimately an expulsion as a “final solution” to the Jewish Question. He says that the German records, examined with that view in mind, make the most sense. Candidly, this resonates the most with me: why would Germany’s political and military planners jeopardize the war with a half-baked extermination plan that was never made explicit or subject to central planning? Why would a nation and its war effort starved for fuel waste any of it on extermination?

But then Butz must deal with the confessions of fabulous things at Nuremberg and other postwar trials. He does this in a few ways: one, the trials were preordained “show trials” that were substantively and procedurally irregular. More than that, they were administered by corrupt and zealously anti-German men who coerced testimony in a hysterical moment of time. Several of the key figures of the Nuremberg trials were Jews who were fanatically anti-German or Zionist. One that stands out is David “Mickey” Marcus: He was indeed a committed Zionist and served in the Israeli military during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Marcus volunteered to advise and command Israeli forces, was appointed as Israel’s first modern general (Aluf), and was killed in action in June 1948. Another Jewish figure, primary prosecutor Robert M.W. Kempner, was accused of coercing evidence and witnesses during Nuremberg preparations. For example, defendants like Friedrich Gaus claimed Kempner used threats (e.g., potential handovers to the Soviets) to obtain affidavits, and Gaus later recanted parts of his testimony, citing duress. Similar accusations against Kempner arose in the Ministries Trial. In other words, the idea that “evidence” in confessions was coerced is far from a “conspiracy theory” but a very real concern.

Butz likens the hysteria of the moment to the Salem witch trials of 1692–1693. This comparison is used rhetorically to portray Nuremberg as a form of modern “witch hunt,” characterized by hysteria, unreliable evidence, coerced or pressured testimonies, and a predetermined outcome rather than impartial justice. He argues that both events share structural and procedural similarities that undermine their legitimacy:

• Presumption of Guilt and Mass Accusation: In Salem, people were accused of witchcraft based on spectral evidence (visions or dreams claimed by accusers), leading to rapid convictions without strong physical proof. Similarly, Butz claims the Nuremberg defendants were presumed guilty of orchestrating a vast extermination program from the start, with the trials serving to confirm a pre-existing Allied narrative rather than objectively investigating facts. He describes the trials as “precedent-shattering” and politically driven, where the victors imposed retroactive “crimes against humanity” without legitimate legal jurisdiction.
• Reliance on Questionable or Coerced Evidence: Butz highlights Salem’s use of spectral evidence (later discredited even by contemporaries) and pressured confessions (some obtained under duress or fear). He extends this to Nuremberg by alleging that many affidavits and witness statements were obtained through coercion, threats (e.g., potential transfer to Soviet custody), or duress—citing examples like the partial recantations or complaints from figures such as Friedrich Gaus. He argues this mirrors how Salem “witches” confessed under fear of execution or torture to save themselves, producing unreliable “evidence” that fed the hysteria.
• Hysterical Atmosphere and Propaganda: Butz portrays both as products of wartime/postwar propaganda and mob-like fervor. In Salem, fear of the devil and community panic drove accusations. At Nuremberg, he claims Allied (especially Zionist-influenced) propaganda amplified atrocity stories to justify the war, secure reparations, and support a Jewish state—creating a “legend” that became self-perpetuating, much like how witch accusations snowballed in colonial Massachusetts.
• Lack of Due Process and Political Motivation: Salem trials lacked jury impartiality, allowed hearsay, and were influenced by religious/political zeal. Butz applies this to Nuremberg by noting the absence of a jury (military tribunals only), the victors judging the vanquished, no appeal mechanism, and what he sees as biased staffing (e.g., his mentions of figures like David Marcus). He frames Nuremberg as “victor’s justice” akin to a show trial, where the goal was to institutionalize the “hoax” rather than seek truth.

Butz does not devote an entire chapter to this analogy—it’s woven into his broader attack on the trials’ origins and fairness (especially in Chapter 1 or introductory sections on the International Military Tribunal). He uses it to argue that, just as Salem is now universally recognized as a tragic miscarriage of justice driven by superstition and fear (with later apologies and exonerations), future generations will view Nuremberg similarly once the “extermination legend” is debunked through technical scrutiny of documents, logistics, and demographics.

What Butz does here is challenging: he attempts to capture a cultural moment, and it seems to have some credence although it lacks verifiability. While “mainstream” historians, who have a vested interest in perpetuating the Holocaust mythos complain that such a comparison is a misleading trope, they indeed gloss over the arguments made against the hysteria and irregularities of Nuremberg. Instead of dealing with the arguments made in earnest, they resort to lazy name-calling of “revisionists” or “denialists” as if the mere incantation of such terms immunizes them from dealing with the substance of the arguments. In a sense, we can glimpse this hysteria indirectly because it still echoes in our era by the manic reaction of the “mainstream” to a dispassionate account of the problems associated with standard narratives surrounding World War II. Witches, it would seem, are still being burned.

Butz’s framing serves his thesis that the Holocaust narrative is a constructed “hoax” perpetuated by political forces, much like a witch craze — and it does something else: it provides a coherent explanation as to why people would have confessed to fantastic and fantastically false things. Butz argues that the Nuremberg trials (and similar postwar proceedings) were structured so that the existence of the extermination program was treated as an unquestioned, axiomatic, and established fact from the outset. Because of this, defendants quickly realized that directly challenging the core “extermination legend” (i.e., denying that systematic mass murder via gas chambers or other means had occurred) was not a viable legal or practical strategy. Instead, the rational, self-preserving approach for many was to accept the overall narrative as true while denying or minimizing their own personal knowledge, involvement, or responsibility, which was how some Germans were saved from the gallows.

He writes (in a passage that appears in slightly varied forms across his work): “Thus to many relevant defendants it seemed that the only possible defense strategy was to deny not the exterminations but only their personal responsibility for them (e.g. Ernst Kaltenbrunner or Adolf Eichmann).” Butz extends this to figures like Rudolf Höss (Auschwitz commandant), Otto Ohlendorf, and others whose detailed “confessions” or testimonies are often cited as key evidence. In his view, these statements were pragmatic calculations under extreme pressure: the defendants understood the political reality of “victors’ justice,” the hostile atmosphere, the threat of harsher punishment (or transfer to Soviet custody), and the fact that the tribunal was not genuinely open to debating the foundational allegations.

Butz frames it thusly:

• The trials presupposed guilt on the extermination charge, so the only realistic defense was “I didn’t do it / I didn’t know / I was following orders / it was someone else’s department.”
• This created a self-reinforcing loop: “admissions” by defendants helped legitimize the narrative for the public and for later historiography, even though (in Butz’s opinion) they did not reflect actual belief or truth.
• He contrasts this with the Salem witch trials analogy he draws elsewhere: once the core accusation is treated as beyond challenge, rational people adapt their testimony to survive within that framework.

Butz presents this as further proof that the trials were not impartial searches for truth but political proceedings designed to institutionalize the “hoax.” He argues that if the extermination claims had been genuinely debatable, more defendants would have contested them directly — the fact that so few did (and that those who partially cooperated often fared better) shows how stacked the process was. Albert Speer, the alleged “Good Nazi” was the most high-ranking Nazi who employed this strategy at Nuremberg to save his neck. This is a recurring theme in his early chapters on the origins of the “legend” at Nuremberg. He does not claim every single defendant was consciously lying as part of a calculated ploy; rather, he says the structure of the trials made outright denial of the extermination an almost impossible defense tactic.

Butz addresses a key part of the Holocaust narrative: Heinrich Himmler and the Posen speeches, which are used as exhibit A in the extermination legend. His key points:

• He quotes or paraphrases Himmler’s famous line about the “extermination of the Jewish people” (“Ausrottung der Juden”) as something “easily said” but part of the party’s plans, then argues that such language was hyperbolic wartime rhetoric or euphemistic for expulsion/resettlement, not literal killing.
• Butz claims Himmler was referring to the evacuation and harsh treatment of Jews (deportation east, forced labor, liquidation of ghettos due to disease/partisan activity), not industrialized murder. He suggests the speech’s secrecy (“a page of glory in our history that has never been recorded and never shall be”) proves it was about something shameful but not genocide — perhaps the brutal realities of deportation and labor exploitation.
• He places the speech in the category of postwar misinterpretation: Allied prosecutors and historians allegedly took isolated, ambiguous phrases out of context and “glossed” them as proof of extermination, ignoring the lack of explicit orders or infrastructure for mass gassing.
• Butz notes that Himmler spoke openly to SS leaders about “liquidating” Jews but insists this was consistent with a resettlement policy disrupted by war conditions, not a deliberate annihilation program. He implies any killing mentioned was ad hoc (e.g., reprisals, disease control) rather than systematic.

Butz does not appear to deny seriously the authenticity of Himmler’s speeches (they were recorded and captured postwar) but argues their content has been exaggerated or mistranslated to support the “hoax.” He contrasts them with the absence of any written Hitler/Himmler order for extermination, claiming euphemisms like “Ausrottung” (uprooting/extermination) were metaphorical or referred to removing Jews from Europe geographically.

Another key element of Butz’s argument is understanding what Auschwitz was in actuality: a massive industrial site requiring enormous manpower to fuel the German war effort. If we think of it at all, we think of Auschwitz as an enormous extermination camp, but Butz argues that Auschwitz was a massive industrial and labor complex built around IG Farben’s Buna-Monowitz plant (Auschwitz III), which was intended to be one of the largest synthetic rubber (Buna) factories in the world, along with associated synthetic fuel, oil, and chemical production. The entire Auschwitz camp system (Auschwitz I, Birkenau, Monowitz, and dozens of sub-camps) existed first and foremost to supply enormous quantities of forced labor for this critical war industry.

Butz argues:

• The Buna plant required tens of thousands of workers for construction and operation (11-hour shifts, 6 days a week). Prisoner labor was rented from the SS at 4–6 Reichsmarks per day.
• The workforce was a mix: German employees (~20%), voluntary foreign workers (over 50%), and concentration-camp prisoners (less than 30% at the Farben plant itself).
• Auschwitz had hospitals, medical care, family compounds, skilled-worker barracks, and even a “family camp” for some Jews — all which Butz says only make sense if the camp was trying to preserve and exploit a large labor force, not annihilate it.
• Epidemics (especially typhus) and overwork caused high death rates, but these were the inevitable result of brutal industrial conditions, not systematic gassing.

The need for synthetic rubber and oil was enormous — and Germany had virtually no resources of its own save coal. By 1944, synthetic fuel plants across Germany (coal hydrogenation) were producing about 75% of all the liquid fuel available to the Germans (the rest came mainly from Romania, which was being bombed and later lost to the Germans). Auschwitz had a hydrogenation plant that contributed to this effort. The Buna synthetic rubber plant at Auschwitz-Monowitz was designed to produce 3,000 tons per month — making it one of the four largest Buna plants in Germany (the others were at Schkopau, Hüls, and Ludwigshafen). It was never fully completed or operational (by evacuation in January 1945 it was only producing acetaldehyde from acetylene).

Butz’s real emphasis is strategic: Germany was desperate for synthetic rubber and fuel because of the Allied blockade and bombing of natural supplies. Auschwitz was therefore a top-priority war industry site, and the camp existed to feed it manpower. Diverting resources to exterminate the labor force is therefore doubly dubious. The “extermination legend,” in his view, was grafted onto a genuine industrial operation that the Allies themselves knew was a bombing target.

Another part of Butz’s attack is the attack on the authenticated records themselves. In The Hoax of the Twentieth Century (especially in chapters dealing with Nazi policy, the “Final Solution,” and document analysis, such as his discussions of the Wannsee Conference protocol and related SS/RSHA records), Butz contends that postwar interpreters (primarily at Nuremberg and in subsequent historiography) imposed an “extermination gloss” on ambiguous German bureaucratic language. He claims many key terms and phrases were capable of non-genocidal meanings in their wartime context, and that the Allies/prosecutors selectively chose the lethal interpretation to fit a preconceived narrative of systematic murder.

He cites:

• “Endlösung der Judenfrage” (Final Solution of the Jewish Question): Butz argues this referred literally to expulsion, resettlement, or forced emigration from German-controlled Europe (often to the East, into occupied Soviet territories after expected victory), not physical annihilation. He points to pre-war and early-war documents using similar phrasing for deportation plans and claims the shift to a genocidal meaning was retroactively projected.
• “Sonderbehandlung” (Special Treatment): This is one of his central examples. Butz insists the term often meant privileged handling, execution of specific criminals/partisans/resistance members, or labor assignments—not routine mass gassing of Jews. He cites instances where it appears in non-extermination contexts (e.g., medical exemptions or transfers) and argues that applying it uniformly to killings is an interpretive overreach.
• Other euphemisms/phrases (e.g., “Evakuierung” [evacuation], “Umsiedlung” [resettlement], “durchgeschleust” [processed through], or references to “labor in the East”): Butz claims these were straightforward descriptions of forced relocation and exploitation amid wartime labor shortages. He accuses historians of assuming euphemism-for-murder without sufficient proof, especially since no explicit, unambiguous order for extermination appears in captured German files.

Butz frames this as a “scientific” or technical critique: as an engineer, he says he applies dispassionate scrutiny to documents, rejecting what he calls politically motivated readings. He argues that if alternative, non-lethal constructions “also made sense” (or even fit better with logistics, demographics, or other records), then the extermination interpretation collapses as the only plausible one.

I found this line of argument compelling: It exploits real aspects of Nazi bureaucracy. It is more reasonable to assume that the documents and language used therein meant what they purported to convey as opposed to a line of reasoning that they represented coded/euphemistic language in sensitive matters (to maintain secrecy, avoid direct paper trails for atrocities, or simply bureaucratic habit). Usually the most sensible explanation, i.e., that language means what it says, is right, but in any event the so-called smoking guns of German documents are far more ambiguous than the mainstream Holocaust experts would have us believe. It seems to me, which is why this line is so effective, that the mainstream does not want this latent ambiguity to be known. There is an element of documents and phrases being shoehorned into a preordained reality. That some defendants acceded to the desired gloss is no proof at all given what Butz has to say about the irregularities, coercion, and defense strategy implicit at Nuremberg.

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I would be remiss if I did not mention where others have specifically attacked him. To be sure, more research on my part is needed, but this is what I have gleaned from consulting the sources that have evidently taken him seriously enough to move beyond ad hominem. First, the Einsatzgruppen Mass Shooting Reports: Butz concedes “some” Jews were shot as partisans/reprisals (he guesses 5k—100k total) but dismisses the scale and systematic nature. The Germans themselves produced thousands of detailed daily/weekly reports (Ereignismeldungen) and summaries. The Jäger Report (by one commander in Lithuania) alone tallies 137,346 Jews killed in five months, with dates, places, and victim counts. Overall, the reports reportedly document ~1.5 million Jewish deaths by shooting in 1941–42. These are internal SS/RSHA documents, captured in German archives—not coerced testimony. Butz treats them as inflated anti-partisan actions. This is something that Butz appears to gloss over based on the limited number of troops assigned to the Einsatzgruppen to accomplish that many killings.

Second, there is Operation Reinhard Camps (Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka) and the Höfle Telegram. Some argue that this is the biggest structural hole in his treatment. Butz’s book is overwhelmingly Auschwitz-centric, because, in part, he maintains that the entirety of the hoax was fabricated around Auschwitz. He gives the Reinhard camps a few pages in “Et Cetera,” calling them transit or labor sites based on inconsistent testimonies. Proponents of the Holocaust narrative maintain that the Höfle Telegram (intercepted by British codebreakers in 1943, declassified later) is a single Nazi document from SS officer Hermann Höfle to Eichmann listing exact 1942 arrivals/killings at over a million. While the Höfle telegram details arrivals (not executions), historians have maintained that there no further transportation of these people. While this is relatively new information (post-dating Butz’s research in 1972), I am sure he would argue that these were merely records of transit — not execution — but it is a lacuna in his work. Third, there is an argument regarding Zyklon B Delivery Records vs. Actual Delousing Needs: Butz argues deliveries match sanitary/delousing requirements for typhus control. Some have maintained, however, that Auschwitz received ~23–25 tons of Zyklon B. Forensic and documentary analysis show only a fraction (roughly 6–10 tons) was needed for delousing clothes, barracks, and trains. The surplus arguably aligns with gassing estimates. This is an example — really one of the rare ones — in which the dispute is centered on different facts, not interpretation of facts or motives. It is something that requires, at least for me, more research. Fourth, some have conceded, at least in part, the complaints about Nuremberg’s irregularities but maintained that post-Nuremberg German trials were fairer. Butz focuses on Nuremberg (and likens it to Salem). He argues defendants adopted a “I didn’t know” defense to survive. The big West German trials of the 1960s (e.g., Frankfurt Auschwitz trials, 1963–65) involved dozens of lower-level SS men tried under normal German law, with West German judges, defense lawyers, and with limited Soviet/American pressure. Many confessed in detail (e.g., about gas chamber operations at Auschwitz) because evidence from documents and other witnesses was overwhelming. Butz engages these trials in a limited way. Butz treats these trials as an extension of Nuremberg in relatively conclusory fashion, and, considering that West Germany was essentially an American protectorate after the war, I am not sure that this argument against Butz lands any punches.

In short, Butz’s work evidently is not without fault or gaps, but this is to be expected to some extent. Taken as a whole, and perhaps this is the greatest point, who deems this type of position as “out of bounds”? Whatever we can say, Butz is not a polemicist or a fabulist. He is hard-hitting but he is not a liar. He may be an amateur historian who is relatively out of his league, but his academic and engineering credentials demonstrate that he is an unusual amateur historian who should be taken seriously. To be sure, his academic bona fides are substantial even if he lacked a Ph.D in History. Why can we debate the scope and existence of a variety of historical phenomena but not this one? All of it — both the hysteria of the reaction against any work that questions the mainstream narrative and the slavish fidelity of any mainstream historian that touches upon it— lead me to believe the whole of it has more a religious quality to it than an historical one. The dissenters are not merely wrong — they are heretical and per se immoral. The Holocaust narrative cannot be denied. Its victims, the Jews, must be shrouded in sacral victimhood that immunizes them from any subsequent corporate criticism. If Butz makes the point that Nuremberg was like Salem, he does not — but could have — claimed that the manic and quasi-religious desperation to silence any opposing view as “denialism” or “revisionism” smacks of a modern-day religious inquisition.

There is an additional comment regarding this work, which, overall, is a devastating enough attack on the Holocaust narrative. Butz is not sympathetic, even in the slightest, to the suffering that came with what he believed happened — that is the forced expulsion of a civilian population and instrumentalization of them for slave labor during the war. Even his account of what happened to the Jews is terrible, but his account is notably lacking in what might be described as empathy. Now, would his work have been better received if he were empathetic to this type of forced relocation and enslavement? Hardly. But his lack of empathy struck me — and if it struck me, it probably struck others too. If the invisible demon that Butz had to contend with in this book is that he is a clandestine anti-Semite who wrote it because he secretly hates the Jews, his lack of empathy towards what he maintains happened only reinforces the existence of implied bias.

In fairness to Butz, I think one could read his book — the evidence he puts forward — and come to a very different conclusion that there was some industrial murder (perhaps not systematized but nonetheless significant). To put it differently, Butz never sugarcoats the horror of what he contends was happening — wartime expulsion, ethnic cleansing, camp epidemics, and civilian enslavement. Now, one could counter that Butz’s goal in the book was solitary — to deconstruct the extermination legend and he slavishly hewed that line. Still, his reaction throughout operated (almost) to excuse what the German government was doing in expelling and enslaving the Jews.

But if it is legitimate to divine the secret anti-Semitism of why a man like Butz wrote a book like this (as if the only explanation is an irrational Jew hatred), why are the obvious biases of people (like Deborah Libstadt) who are Jewish and unapologetically Zionist ignored? For religious or ethnocentric reasons, these “defenders” should not be immune to questioning their motives for similar reasons. If anti-Semitism is the only acceptable explanation for denying the Holocaust, why is not philo-Semitism (or Zionism) an explanation for accepting the Holocaust? The truth always comes out — free inquiry cannot be suppressed forever. I suspect that Butz’s book will gain a currency after his life is over more than it ever did while he was living.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, this is a powerful book — one it was difficult for me to obtain and one that deserves to be read. What the mainstream Holocaust purveyors do not realize (or perhaps they do but persist anyway) is that the suppression of alternative views fuels the very idea that a conspiracy exists to prevent the truth from coming out. If sunshine is the best disinfectant, this is one area that is in massive need of disinfection. At the very least, Butz wrote a book that is an amazing piece of amateur sleuthing that calls into question the most sacred of all the sacred cows of WWII and the postwar world.

Post-Script

A brief comment on anti-Semitism.

The mere act of seriously considering this book — and writing a review of it that does not dismiss it as garbage — is an anti-Semitic act, at least according to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). The IHRA is an intergovernmental organization founded in 1998 (initially as the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance, and Research) at the initiative of Sweden’s then-Prime Minister Göran Persson. It now has, I believe, 35 member countries (including the U.S., U.K., Germany, Israel, and others), plus observer and partner nations. Its core mission is to promote Holocaust education, remembrance, and research globally, based on the historical record of the Nazi genocide. Yes, it is dedicated to the standard narrative in the sense that it upholds the mainstream historical consensus on the Holocaust (e.g., systematic extermination of ~6 million Jews via camps, gas chambers, shootings).

IHRA doesn’t “define the motivations” of questioners in a psychological or accusatory way. Instead, its 2016 working definition of antisemitism is a non-legally binding tool designed to help identify and monitor manifestations of anti-Semitism in modern contexts, like education, law enforcement, and policy. The definition itself is brief: “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.” It includes eleven illustrative examples, one of which explicitly calls out “Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people” as potentially anti-Semitic, depending on context. Another one addresses accusing Jews of “inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.” This is not about probing personal motives—it is about categorizing behaviors or claims that, based on historical patterns, often stem from or fuel anti-Jewish prejudice. For instance, if someone claims the Holocaust was a “hoax” for Jewish gain, IHRA sees that as fitting a long-standing trope of Jewish conspiracy/deceit, which has anti-Semitic roots regardless of the individual’s stated intent.

Imagine: questioning an historical phenomenon such as the Holocaust narrative is itself “antisemitic.” Ironically, a definition such as this is antithetical to a free society and rigorous scholarship. Moreover it cheapens anti-Semitism in an irony lost on its advocates. A definition such as this is as ready an explanation why historians are not free to challenge the “fact, scope, or mechanisms” of the Holocaust narrative. In such a climate, no wonder the Holocaust narrative becomes self-perpetuating, because challenging it is tantamount to professional suicide. It is as stifling as stifling can be — and if an established historical fact requires the protection of blasphemy laws, well, it probably is not nearly as unassailable as the high priests would have us believe.

* * *

For the record, I harbor no racial or religious animus toward Jews. I therefore reject the IHRA definition as preposterous, suffocating, and fundamentally illiberal.

The real disagreement is not whether Jews suffered catastrophically under Nazi rule—I concede that they did. It is over whether the mechanism was industrialized, homicidal gassing carried out on the scale and with the deliberate intent usually claimed in the standard Holocaust narrative, or whether the primary drivers were forced labor, mass expulsion eastward, and the collapse of supply lines and public health during total war. Nothing in my skepticism about the gas-chamber extermination story excuses or diminishes the documented brutality: slave labor, disease epidemics in the camps, reprisal shootings, deliberate ghettoization and deportation policies that cost Jewish lives no matter the number. The same horrors befell many non-Jews caught in the same circumstances. Ironically, the same horrors befell millions of Germans after the war at the hands of the victorious Allies (mass rapes and reprisals, ethnic cleansing, slave labor, and war crimes). These facts can—and do—coexist with my questions about the specific claims of systematic extermination. They coexist in me without contradiction.

I claim no special insight. I claim only the ordinary human right to read, think, and question any historical account—without prior restraint, without automatic moral condemnation, and without needing permission from any institution or interest group. That right belongs to everyone, including people who reach conclusions I find unpersuasive. If this sounds like I’m trying to ingratiate myself with anyone—mainstream historians, Deborah Lipstadt, the IHRA, or the revisionist community—let me be clear: I don’t care what any of them think of me. Such disclaimers would never “save” me from professional consequences anyway, and I’m not writing them for cover (because I am aware of the political toxicity of what I have written here and elsewhere). I’m writing them because I believe them, and because the truth does not bend to fit someone else’s approved narrative.

I will continue to consider whatever I damn well please.