David H. I think you are on the money. In school in the ’50s I was taught that 6,500,000 Jews perished at hands of Nazi’s. End of argument! Not a soul fewer. Even then it rankled to have someone else tell me what I had to believe, or else. A book I later read argued in a detailed manner the total was 4.9 million. The events are nearly 70 years ago so we will never be much the wiser. The propaganda of the “Holocaust Industry”, caused me for several decades to be anti-semitic, until I grew older and came to realise that it was just the MSM doing its usual (crappy) thing. The only people they present are the most outspoken, loudest, and angry, or those who are after something. Perhaps many Jewish people reflect on their loss and appreciate that these “spokespeople” cause much resentment. I have known post-WWII migrants from Poland and Baltic states. They loathe Jews, and much of it is a perception that the “Holocaust Industry” went too far and over-reached in its demand that 100% of sympathy be for Jews and none at all for the others who perished. Of course, the Jewish failed to integrate in Eastern Europe and the SS had little difficulty in recruiting helpers in its “final solution”.
I read a long book by David Irving about Erhard Milch. I could sense his sympathy and admiration for his subject, but found his book easy to read. If the Austrian Gov’t wants to chase deniers of WWII events it is their affair but they set themselves up as hypocrites and for ridicule. Many years ago Kurt Waldheim was pilloried by the “Holocaust Industry” because he served as an intelligence officer for the Wehrmacht. He had been drafted into the army, and after 1942 saw service in Balkans in a guerrilla war. I felt sorry for him as it was fate that led to his birth in 1918 in Austria and an intelligence that caused his selection as an officer. Waldheim, later Sec. General of United Nations and diplomat probably never wished to participate in the maelstrom of the Balkans insurgency, but the outraged screams of the harridans of the “Holocaust Industry” incline me to give him a free pass. As an English speaker I resent groups appropriating words from my language. Is is spelt holocaust. I hope that the witch hunt for WWII war criminals has had it’s day. The real criminals, in positions of power are probably all dead! And Pope Benedict. He was 16 and had no say in it-get over it please!
