Today is the 90th birthday of the great revisionist pioneer Professor Arthur Butz, whose classic book The Hoax of the Twentieth Century: The Case Against the Presumed Extermination of European Jewry was first published in 1976. The first edition was published in England, four years after its author began research into the alleged ‘Holocaust’ of six million Jews in supposed homicidal gas chambers.
Professor Butz received his PhD from the University of Minnesota in 1965. He has been associate professor of electrical engineering at Northwestern University (in Evanston, Illinois) for almost half a century, having first joined the faculty in 1966.
Perhaps the most valuable aspect of The Hoax of the Twentieth Century – and the reason why it remains an essential text in 2023 – is that its author does not simply address the scientific minutiae of whether gas chambers existed (or indeed whether it was possible for them to have functioned in the manner described by purported ‘witnesses’ to the ‘Holocaust’).
Butz sets the legend of the Shoah in its historical context, demonstrating the roots of the hoax – and the reasons why (for example) concentration camps existed, as opposed to the hoax version of ‘extermination camps’.
As Butz put it, in a phrase that should be repeated to every single student as a preparation for teaching them about what really happened to Jews and others during the 1940s: “There was a war going on during World War II.”
During the years immediately following publication of The Hoax of the Twentieth Century, revisionist scholarship expanded, until a wave of legal repression and extra-legal intimidation, typified by the recent extradition hearings against Vincent Reynouard.
In a preface to the most recent edition of his book, Butz reflected:
“A final proof, if needed, of our success is the fact of laws passed in recent years, in several European countries, criminalizing the publication of revisionist views on the Holocaust. Such literature circulated freely in Europe until the present revisionist movement started making its impact in the late ’70s.”
As European revisionists prepare for a new campaign of resistance, utilising new archival revelations to resist the latest wave of repression and Holocaustian propaganda, Arthur Butz’s book from 1976 remains a constant inspiration and guide.
Happy birthday, Professor Butz! We are confident that you will live to see further revisionist victories inspired by your courageous scholarship.
[The Hoax of the Twentieth Century was banned by Amazon in 2017, following the personal intervention of the director of the Holocaustian propaganda centre Yad Vashem. But the latest edition remains available as part of the Holocaust Handbooks series.]
