Some Holocaust deniers might have had high expectations that Carlo Mattogno would address his critics in the English translation of his Einsatzgruppen book, after Germar Rudolf's earlier comment that "we have submitted a long list of open issues -- including remarks made by the HC Blog -- to the author for his review". But deniers who had crossed their fingers that Mattogno would show a fierce reaction would have to be deeply disappointed. Rudolf's foreword tried to excuse Mattogno's decision not to consider internet critiques, lest if forced him to postpone publishing the book; a rather questionable strategy for Holocaust denial, willfully ignoring the HC blog, given that anyone searching in the internet on the book would likely end up here and learn more about his dilettante treatment of the subject.
They would learn about his total failure on Sonderkommando Lange: placing its headquarters to Soldau in East-Prussia, when it was in Posen in the Warthegau, as any relevant monograph published in the 90s and 2000s or even a document quoted by himself explain (see Figure 1).
The headquarters-in-Soldau claim was scrapped from the English edition, yet he keeps arguing with the false premise that SK Lange was stationed in Soldau in 1941 (p.295), so the deletion does not make much difference. Was this a last minute attempt by somebody to polish the English edition, which just failed because the underlying argument was not touched?
Or that he did not realize that Sonderkommando Lange was a killing commando according to contemporary German documents well known in the literature and published on this blog more than one and half years ago in May 2017. The documented nature of SK Lange as mass murder unit is an existential threat to Mattogno's Holocaust denial, as the commando operated Kulmhof extermination camp liquidating about 150,000 Jews in 1941-1944, a point emphasized again when Mattogno was supposed to review the blog's critique (and which were enough to pull the emergency cord and to postpone the publication until the evidence has been explained away with the usual methods of denial).
On the intended dispatch of Sonderkommando Lange to Novgorod according to German radio signals intercepted by the British, Mattogno shouts to his readers on p. 295 that "There is no mention of Sonderkommando Lange, or gas vans, or Novgorod, or mental patients to be killed!" (because he was confused by an incomplete reference in Longerich, Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews) - however, twice on this blog, in January 2016 and then again in May 2017 the relevant decode was published, which indeed requested "Sonderkommando Lange with suitable [apparatus] for the clearing of three of their asylums near Novgorod".
There are more curious differences between the Italian and the English edition of Mattogno's Einsatzgruppen book. In the former, he wrote that "it is worth noting that the only character mentioned in Becker's letter to Rauff, SS-Untersturmfuhrer Ernst, is completely unknown. He is never mentioned either in the Ereignismeldungen, nor in the Meldungen, or in other known documents" (Mattogno, Gli Einsatzgruppen nei territori orientali occupati, Parte I, p. 341; my translation). It was of course ignorant to ask why some SS-Untersturmführer is not mentioned in the Ereignismeldungen UdSSR and the Meldungen aus den besetzten Ostgebieten, as those set of documents do not mention most of the Einsatzgruppen personnel, or in stray documents on Einsatzgruppe C, if he knows any at all.
The paragraph disappeared from the English translation (Figure 2). Did he find out about SS-Untersturmführer Ernst himself? Certainly not, because apart from that he would have needed to perform some archival research, which he clearly did not, it would have been something to report in this section.
Did he realize the point was not really bright? Such critical self reflection is not likely as we know him and he did keep a similar argument in the book. On p. 430, he writes on a British decode on a Sonderkommando Spacil that "no 'Sonderkommando Spacil' has ever been known to exist, and the name of the person involved is completely unknown". In fact, he found the argument so brilliant that he repeated it again on p. 683 "there was no known 'Sonderkommando Spacil,' and the name of the person is quite unknown" (an indication that Mattogno has passed his peak long time ago: he copies himself in the very same book and cannot search the Wikipedia entry of a Third Reich figure). Given that there is no indication for a sudden brainwave, perhaps the paragraph on SS-Untersturmführer Ernst was merely lost in translation.
Who was SS-Untersturmführer Ernst, then? As expected, since he was mentioned in an authentic contemporary German document on homidical gas vans, he is a true historical person; an RSHA car mechanic and head of garage workshop commanded to the East from mid 1941 to mid 1942 according to his SS files (BArch R 9361-III/523333 & 40094). As with Spacil above or SS-Obersturmführer Huhn in Auschwitz, it is meaningless that SS-Untersturmführer Ernst "is completely unknown" to Mattogno, since this is based on his very limited research on the matter (Major Friedrich "not a Major in any way" Pradel can tell you a thing or two about it, too).
By the way, it is pathetic how in Figure 2 Mattogno addresses this HC-posting without mentioning Holocaust Controversies ("Some writers have therefore theorized...") on the post-war mentioning of "SS-Hauptsturmführer Rühl" by the gas van inspector August Becker. We should take it as a compliment that we made it on his list of forbidden references (in the English edition, Mattogno - perhaps only at the pressure of the editor, if not submitted by the editor himself - added a citation to the HC reference section on p. 653, but notably still not to the blog).
Back to "SS-Hauptsturmführer Rühl" - apparently Mattogno considers it okay to address something published in the internet if he just thinks it does not do him any harm. Indeed, the issue who was meant by Becker requires another explanation than proposed in this blog posting. Most likely, Becker had SS-Hauptsturmführer Heinz Trühe from the Commander of the Security Police and Service in Riga in mind with the person he talked to in Riga and who he told to request further gas vans from the motor pool department of the Security Police at the RSHA in Berlin, because this is precisely what Trühe did in June 1942 (Becker falsely associated him as the "head of the extermination camp at Minsk").
On the killing of mentally ill people in Mogilev and Minsk by members of Einsatzgruppe B and the Criminal Technical Institute at the RSHA, Mattogno discusses Albert Widmann as single witness - citing an archival file he has certainly never checked out and with a reference plagariazed from the book Archives of the Holocaust, volume 22 - but numerous more sources on this event have been featured on this blog in May - July 2016 and in September 2017.
The headquarters-in-Soldau claim was scrapped from the English edition, yet he keeps arguing with the false premise that SK Lange was stationed in Soldau in 1941 (p.295), so the deletion does not make much difference. Was this a last minute attempt by somebody to polish the English edition, which just failed because the underlying argument was not touched?
| Image may be NSFW. Clik here to view.  |
| Figure 1 |
On the intended dispatch of Sonderkommando Lange to Novgorod according to German radio signals intercepted by the British, Mattogno shouts to his readers on p. 295 that "There is no mention of Sonderkommando Lange, or gas vans, or Novgorod, or mental patients to be killed!" (because he was confused by an incomplete reference in Longerich, Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews) - however, twice on this blog, in January 2016 and then again in May 2017 the relevant decode was published, which indeed requested "Sonderkommando Lange with suitable [apparatus] for the clearing of three of their asylums near Novgorod".
There are more curious differences between the Italian and the English edition of Mattogno's Einsatzgruppen book. In the former, he wrote that "it is worth noting that the only character mentioned in Becker's letter to Rauff, SS-Untersturmfuhrer Ernst, is completely unknown. He is never mentioned either in the Ereignismeldungen, nor in the Meldungen, or in other known documents" (Mattogno, Gli Einsatzgruppen nei territori orientali occupati, Parte I, p. 341; my translation). It was of course ignorant to ask why some SS-Untersturmführer is not mentioned in the Ereignismeldungen UdSSR and the Meldungen aus den besetzten Ostgebieten, as those set of documents do not mention most of the Einsatzgruppen personnel, or in stray documents on Einsatzgruppe C, if he knows any at all.
The paragraph disappeared from the English translation (Figure 2). Did he find out about SS-Untersturmführer Ernst himself? Certainly not, because apart from that he would have needed to perform some archival research, which he clearly did not, it would have been something to report in this section.
Did he realize the point was not really bright? Such critical self reflection is not likely as we know him and he did keep a similar argument in the book. On p. 430, he writes on a British decode on a Sonderkommando Spacil that "no 'Sonderkommando Spacil' has ever been known to exist, and the name of the person involved is completely unknown". In fact, he found the argument so brilliant that he repeated it again on p. 683 "there was no known 'Sonderkommando Spacil,' and the name of the person is quite unknown" (an indication that Mattogno has passed his peak long time ago: he copies himself in the very same book and cannot search the Wikipedia entry of a Third Reich figure). Given that there is no indication for a sudden brainwave, perhaps the paragraph on SS-Untersturmführer Ernst was merely lost in translation.
| Image may be NSFW. Clik here to view.  |
| Figure 2 |
By the way, it is pathetic how in Figure 2 Mattogno addresses this HC-posting without mentioning Holocaust Controversies ("Some writers have therefore theorized...") on the post-war mentioning of "SS-Hauptsturmführer Rühl" by the gas van inspector August Becker. We should take it as a compliment that we made it on his list of forbidden references (in the English edition, Mattogno - perhaps only at the pressure of the editor, if not submitted by the editor himself - added a citation to the HC reference section on p. 653, but notably still not to the blog).
Back to "SS-Hauptsturmführer Rühl" - apparently Mattogno considers it okay to address something published in the internet if he just thinks it does not do him any harm. Indeed, the issue who was meant by Becker requires another explanation than proposed in this blog posting. Most likely, Becker had SS-Hauptsturmführer Heinz Trühe from the Commander of the Security Police and Service in Riga in mind with the person he talked to in Riga and who he told to request further gas vans from the motor pool department of the Security Police at the RSHA in Berlin, because this is precisely what Trühe did in June 1942 (Becker falsely associated him as the "head of the extermination camp at Minsk").
On the killing of mentally ill people in Mogilev and Minsk by members of Einsatzgruppe B and the Criminal Technical Institute at the RSHA, Mattogno discusses Albert Widmann as single witness - citing an archival file he has certainly never checked out and with a reference plagariazed from the book Archives of the Holocaust, volume 22 - but numerous more sources on this event have been featured on this blog in May - July 2016 and in September 2017.
In summer 1944, the Secret Field Police in Mogilev (GFP 570) operated a self-made Ford gas van. Mattogno dismisses its historical reality by mumbling something incomprehensible about the RSHA-Gaubschat correspondence (p. 339), but he does not discuss the actual evidence cited in December 2015 and June 2016 on this blog.
The most comical part is how Mattogno's insinuates on the acquittal of one of the perpetrators in 1974 (he misspells as 1947) that "[i]t is also conceivable that the judges did not take the story of the home-made 'gas vans' too seriously" instead of doing what any researcher or just any person truly interested would have done: simply reading the published judgement. Predictably, the insinuation turns out as unsubstantiated, the judgement concludes that "at least two months ...before end of June 1944 the accused had converted a Russian truck of the make Ford with gasoline engine into a gas van" (Justiz und NS-Verbrechen, Bd.39, Nr. 809).
Just few years ago, Mattogno argued on the Einsatzgruppe B report mentioning Saurer "gas vans" that "all Saurer trucks had diesel engines, the exhaust gases of which were totally unsuitable for murder" (Mattogno, Inside the Gas Chambers, 2014, p. 113). He kept the same statement in the 2nd edition dated October 2016.
Also in October 2016, he published his Einsatzgruppen book in Italian and largely repeated his discussion of the Einsatzgruppe B report from Inside the Gas Chambers, except for the difference that the Diesel issue is now missing, as it is also throughout the whole book (same for the English translation, Figure 3).
The most comical part is how Mattogno's insinuates on the acquittal of one of the perpetrators in 1974 (he misspells as 1947) that "[i]t is also conceivable that the judges did not take the story of the home-made 'gas vans' too seriously" instead of doing what any researcher or just any person truly interested would have done: simply reading the published judgement. Predictably, the insinuation turns out as unsubstantiated, the judgement concludes that "at least two months ...before end of June 1944 the accused had converted a Russian truck of the make Ford with gasoline engine into a gas van" (Justiz und NS-Verbrechen, Bd.39, Nr. 809).
Just few years ago, Mattogno argued on the Einsatzgruppe B report mentioning Saurer "gas vans" that "all Saurer trucks had diesel engines, the exhaust gases of which were totally unsuitable for murder" (Mattogno, Inside the Gas Chambers, 2014, p. 113). He kept the same statement in the 2nd edition dated October 2016.
Also in October 2016, he published his Einsatzgruppen book in Italian and largely repeated his discussion of the Einsatzgruppe B report from Inside the Gas Chambers, except for the difference that the Diesel issue is now missing, as it is also throughout the whole book (same for the English translation, Figure 3).
| Image may be NSFW. Clik here to view.  |
| Figure 3 |
The answer, as to why he dismissed between 2014 and 2016 that "all Saurer trucks had diesel engines", lies most probable in a HC-blog posting from late 2015, which showed that the assertion is patently false and that the Nazi homicidal gas van were running on gasoline engines. But Mattogno did not dare to admit that Holocaust Controversies had refuted him and the choir of Holocaust deniers (with Santiago Alvarez probably holding the record in troublesome Diesel claims, on every 24th text page of his gas van book, statistically) on such a vital point (considered by them) and so he silently dropped the whole issue without correcting himself and other deniers and like elsewhere without acknowledging and taking responsibility for his error.
Mattogno claims that the term "Gaswagen" (gas van) "in the sense of 'mobile homicidal gas chamber,' was coined only after the end of the Second World War" (p. 324), but in September 2016 we posted a report from an SD insider to the Swiss intelligence of February 1944 calling the mobile gas chambers precisely "Gaswagen" (plus multiple perpetrator testimonies confirming that the term was used at the time). The posting also debunks Mattogno's hypothesis that the "gas vans" in the motor pool of Einsatzgruppe B were "in all probability just Generatorgaswagen" (p. 326).
A fundamental limitation in Mattogno's chapter on the gas vans is that the testimonial evidence studied by him is not mere than a tiny drop from the pool of those actually known. He looks at some 10 perpetrator testimonies (I've counted 8), when I have obtained more than 400 testimonies, mostly eyewitnesses from West-German investigations, from members of the military and paramilitary forces - without having examined all potentially relevant files yet and without considering those on Kulmhof extermination camp (illustrated in Figure 4). Some of these testimonies have been quoted and cited in gas van postings at this blog (it's planned to publish the full list in the future).
| Image may be NSFW. Clik here to view.  |
| Figure 4 |
At such order of magnitude difference - Mattogno leaves out numerous detailed accounts of gas van drivers and people involved in the actions -, he could not have studied the technique and operation of the Nazi homicidal gas vans in any other than a dilettante way. It's a subject barely studied by him, certainly not good and deep enough to feature it as a chapter and to draw any founded major conclusion on something big as "The Genesis of the 'Gas Vans' and Their Use by the Einsatzgruppen".