::209.29, David Irving was trashed as an historian during the trial. Please read the full judgment and Lying about Hitler by Richard J. Evans, the Cambridge historian who was an expert witness. Evans calls the judge's remarks you cited "sugaring the pill." The judge concluded that Irving had been highly selective in the documents he chose to discuss, was not even-handed, had taken no account of the circumstances in which documents had been produced, had deliberately misrepresented and distorted evidence, had made assertions about the Nazis that were irreconcilable with the available evidence, that he is anti-Semitic, that he is racist, that he has associated with neo-Nazis, that he himself is a right-wing pro-Nazi polemicist, that he manipulates the historical record, and that he incontrovertibly qualifies as a Holocaust denier. But yes, apart from the above, Irving is a great historian.