London, Tuesday, July 6, 2004 Himmler book publisher was jailed for extremism By Ben Fenton and Kate Connolly THE German publisher of a book which claims that British intelligence officers murdered Heinrich Himmler is a Right-wing extremist who has been jailed for publishing revisionist history.   David Irving comments: ROLL that phrase around your tongue, Americans, and savour it,: Jailed in modern Germany "for publishing revisionist history." Words committed to paper without any comment, in all seriousness, by this broadsheet journalist and traditional enemy of free speech Ben Fenton.    Note that he has failed to respond to requests for access to the rest of the forensic tests on the Himmler documents which he and his newspaper commissioned -- he has published only extracts so far.    We do not doubt that his quotations are accurate -- as accurate as his reference to Traudl Junge as Hitler's "surviving" secretary (she died last year). Nor can even the Germans jail somebody for "extremism"; Sudholt was prosecuted under Germany's laws for the suppression of free speech. Galileo was extreme in his day, as was Copernicus. BUT what about this odd paragraph: "A year later when the controversial British historian David Irving lost a libel action against an American professor who had called him a Holocaust denier, Mr Sudholt, 62, was described as one of the author's leading contacts in the world of German Right-wing extremism." What was the purpose of this paragraph, for Heavens' sake, unless it originally contained another sentence that the newspaper's lawyers no doubt wisely struck out.    In fact Gerd Sudholt is about as extreme as Woody Allen. The hate- filled German authorities eventually grabbed him, outraged at his publication of books that the mainline publishers had been warned to suppress. He is a mild-mannered, educated, and hard-working family man, but unfortunately easily tricked and misled.    I refused to allow publishers to sell my books to him (which did not prevent Herbert Fleissner of Langenmüller Verlag from "selling him rights" to my flagship work "Hitler's War" for 5000 euros some years back, and telling him to keep it quiet from me!    Such is the state of German law that when I got wind of the planned Sudholt edition, my Munich lawyer Heinz Lebrecht Herrmann failed to act to obtain an injunction preventing it ("too late to stop it") and I was never paid a penny by either publisher.    Visiting London, Sudholt later apologised to me that his publishing firm Druffel had asked Dr Fleissner for a proper contract, but Fleissner would only give him a receipt for the cash payment (because in fact Fleissner had long lost the rights he was purporting to own and sell, and they had reverted to us).    What a gang of crooks! For a long time Sudholt would not speak with me, because I warned him that the Heinrich Müller "interrogations" he was publishing were forged by Gregory Douglas, aka the American counterfeiter and forger Peter Stahl, aka etc., etc., etc. Sudholt thought I was spoiling his scoop; I was trying to save his skin.    Seems there are more sharks in the publishing world than in the waters just south of here (Panama City, Florida). The claims, in Himmler's Secret War, by Martin Allen, have been debunked by an independent forensic analyst working on behalf of The Daily Telegraph. The analysis showed that at least four of the documents used to substantiate them were forgeries smuggled into the National Archives in Kew, west London. Almost all historians accept that Himmler, the head of the SS, committed suicide soon after being captured by British soldiers in May 1945. Yesterday Gert Sudholt, the head of the Druffel Verlag printing house in Munich, suggested that the forgeries may have been perpetrated by British agents. "We know that the Russians had a massive system of forgeries - why not the British?," he said. His publishing firm is renowned for its support of former Nazis and "revisionist" historians. Mr Sudholt, whose stepfather, Helmut Sündermann, was deputy to Otto Dietrich, the Nazi press chief, has been prosecuted at least three times for printing far-Right material. He was jailed for six months in 1993 and received a suspended sentence in 1999 for similar offences. A year later when the controversial British historian David Irving lost a libel action against an American professor who had called him a Holocaust denier, Mr Sudholt, 62, was described as one of the author's leading contacts in the world of German Right-wing extremism. In addition to his publishing business, Mr Sudholt also runs the Society for Free Communication [Gesellschaft für freie Publizistik] which offers former Nazi Party members and their families a platform for their opinions. In the acknowledgments to Himmler's Secret War, Mr Allen's third book, the author thanks Mr Sudholt for his "great assistance in my search for testimony from eyewitnesses of Germany's past". These are thought to include Gudrun Burwitz, Himmler's daughter, and Traudl Junge, the last surviving personal secretary to Adolf Hitler. Mrs Burwitz is regarded by most historians as an unrepentant Nazi. Mr Sudholt said that despite the furore over the documents he would still publish Mr Allen's book, even if the "three relevant pages" were cut. He published Mr Allen's first book, Hidden Agenda, under the title Dear Herr Hitler, and his second, The Hitler/Hess Deception, under the title Churchill's Peace Trap. He said he had not spoken to Mr Allen about the documents and was not prepared to say if they were forgeries. "The most pressing questions for us now are, if the documents were forged, where did they come from, and who put them there and why were they in the National Archive? Can we trust anything in the National Archive at all for the last 500 years? Can we indeed trust anything in any national archive? This could lead to the review of contemporary history and turn it on its head. "I am sure though that Mr Allen will not have forged these - that's significant to us. We just want to know how they ended up in the archives. Who put them there? "If Mr Allen looked at them, someone must have put them there. It's very exciting. You never know, they might have been swapped for the real ones by the British secret service - if that's the case the story is even more spectacular." Mr Allen said last week that he had not realised the Mr Sudholt had such extreme connections when agreeing to let him publish his books in Germany. He also claimed that Mr Sudholt guided him towards Himmler as a subject. But Mr Sudholt said yesterday: "I gave him contacts to people who knew Himmler and that was helpful to him. But we didn't tell him to go to the documents in the National Archive. I don't know of them at all."   Himmlers Secret Sir - I AM amazed that the manner of Himmler's death is still being debated. My father (the late Dr C J L Wells) was Medical Officer at the British Army HQ in north Germany when Himmler was arrested and brought in. He was asked to examine him, and when he was about to look into his mouth, Himmler bit on the concealed cyanide capsule and died immediately. My father was annoyed that the authorities, who were aware that this was a risk with high-profile Nazis, did not warn him of the problem. These facts, I am sure, were well known at the time. Dr A. L. Wells, Beccles, Suffolk   Our dossier on the suspect and genuine documents on Himmler's death   Daily Telegraph claims that forged documents were planted in British archives | Daily Telegraph Opinion: Faking our history | The forensic tests [650k pdf ] | Reader's Letters to Daily Telegraph: Intelligence and style clues point to fake Himmler documents Historian calls for an inquiry over fake Himmler documents Reader's Letters to the Daily Telegraph The suspect 'Himmler Liquidation' documents: Our position at this point: David Irving statement Conformist Churchill Historian Andrew Roberts calls for inquiry and arrests - with readers' letters The Sunday Times accuses Martin Allen was involved in forgery row over his book on Duke of Windsor too Glasgow Herald: Himmler papers labelled forgeries

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