David Irving - History is Politics and 'Free Speech' Comes With a Price

Excerpts from the interview with David Irving below:

“My blood runs cold even now when I think about it. A hundred thousand people being burned alive in one night. I had written an article for The Daily Telegraph, which they had published a few weeks earlier, and I thought I’m going to write an article about this one, too. And I sat down and I began researching by writing letters to people and learning everything I could from that man, from other people, about what happened that night in Dresden. 

When I left the steelworks I began to write and I realized this wasn’t just an article, this was a book. And I began advertising in the German newspapers and in the Times in England for people who had been in that raid, either in the air or on the ground. I advertised in American newspapers any American airmen who had taken part in the raid in Dresden the following midday. And eventually I filled a file of about 600 letters from people who had written to me. I went all around Germany. I did television programs. I was a bit of, shall we say, freak. This was an Englishman who was going to write about the bombing war. In Germany the subject was taboo, nobody talked about it. They weren’t allowed to talk about it. 

So here was an Englishman who was breaking the taboo and people sent letters to the tv stations how could they tell me what they knew, they’d been there too that day in Dresden. So I had built up this fantastic file of letters from people who had been there or been in the air.

Eventually I went to speak with the Marshall of the Royal Air Force Bomber Harris. A great man, a great commander. I know people don’t like him, I know people call him a war criminal, but you’ve got to admit, that a man who is capable of sending 30,000 of his 50,000 airmen to their deaths, which they did unflinchingly, must be a great commander. I think he deserves that statue that he now has. Bomber Harris told me that he didn’t want to carry out the air raid either, but he had been ordered to it as a political decision by Churchill himself. I remember interviewing him back in April 1962. A great man. And I interviewed his deputy as well. And the book that was finally published became a bestseller.”

“When I came out of that prison in Vienna, December the 21st 2006, the following day I was at the BBC in White City and I was being interviewed by John Humphrys for the Today programme. And he said ‘What will you do now, are you going to change?’ And I said no, I shall continue to write what I find in the archives. He said, ‘You’re going to write what you find in the archives? What’s that?’ I said the truth, real history. And he said, ‘But no one is going to believe what you write now because you are David Irving, you have a criminal record now.’ And I said yes, that is the intention of my enemies, that shallow minded journalists should describe me as that, but let me tell you what’s going to happen in future years. 

In future years people buying books are going to have a choice between books written by David Irving, or by Andrew Roberts, or by Ian Kershaw, or by some other run of the mill historian, and they’ll say ‘well, David Irving has been to prison for what he writes, so, on balance, were going to believe what he has written rather than what they write.’ I think a hundred years from now my books will be the bedrock of history which people draw back on when they want to find out what went wrong in the 20th century.”

Video Title: David Irving – History is Politics and ‘Free Speech’ Comes With a Price. Source: Peter J. Date Published: August 9, 2022. Description:

I’ve read many books on WWII, visited many places and museums on the subject over the years and find that many countries have their own version on the subject – conveniently leaving out certain elements and high lighting others. Making history conform to fit the local narrative of a certain political inclination (Soviet Union) or national perspective (Japan, Poland etc.). Growing up in the western side of the Iron Curtain during the Cold War I find that most people not into WWII history have a politically correct and conform picture of the war, in many aspects colored by historians of the time. 20 – 30 years after the end of WWII, along came an historian who spoke and wrote fluent German and gained the trust of the participants on the losing side of the war ie. of the the Germans and Austrians. Publishing non-biased accord of wartime Axis participation 20 – 30 years after the war, ie. after that hundreds of books had been published by non-German speaking authors. To base those publications on facts derived from own relevant research which brings new light on many aspects of the subjects which amends and sometimes contradict already cemented and accepted understandings of the War. As these new facts not always meet or correspond to the narrative of the war up to date or can sometimes be inconvenient information to some parties and politically incorrect in other instances, is painful to all parties: This author will certainly receive critique from the establishment since the new information put forward may contradict the information and published books already put out there. The establishment can or will go to great lengths to miss credit this person and in some cases try to destroy him perceived as a threat to the established narrative that has been put out there to be true – not to be questioned even though not backed up by facts. 

David Irving is a living proof of this. He has been subject of persecution from the “Traditional Enemies of Free Speech”, Obstructed him from researching, from writing, from publishing what he found to be true from interviews and original manuscripts and documents, dug up from at location research. Contrary to most of his peers he speaks fluent German and had gained the trust of German survivors of the war after having published books on crimes the allies committed against German civilians on a massive scale by deliberately bombing women, children and civilian refugees. His work as given him a unique insight into Germany 1930s and 40s, paralleled by none. Listen to his story as he gives us a very personal portrait of his life in his own words. Many are those who believes Mr. Irving doesn’t deserve the fate that he has been served by the PC-Fascists and Traditional Enemies of Free Speech. Luckily Mr. Irving stands above these forces of evil and remain intact as a human being and his publications will survive them all. 

// Peter // A reader of David Irving Books, a WWII buff, a Swede and believer in democracy, free speech, a Christian and believer of that all people are born Equal, and that there is only one truth and that it should always be pursued – the lie and false testimony will be revealed in time.