From: stojanov@husc10.harvard.edu (Milan Stojanovic)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.yugoslavia,soc.history
Subject: Tudjman numbers of Jewish victims and other things
Date: 16 Aug 92 22:58:24 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc3.1992Aug16.185825.14800
Organization: Harvard University Science Center


Well, I will continue here with historical writings of the 
Croatian President, Dr.Franjo Tudjman.  Up to now, I covered
his writings about Jasenovac "labor" camp internal "self"-
management of prisoners, and his thoughts about what made 
Germans to give up their thoughts about territorial 
settlement of the Jewish question.  In this part I will 
post about his thoughts on number of Jewish victims and some 
other things.  
Three more postings are comming.  One about his thoughts on
historical and philosophical basis of Holocaust, one about
behavior of the Jews through history, and more generally what
could a minority expect if it tries to influence majority.
( This is relevant for the Serbian armed rebellion). The last
posting on this issue would be on number of victims in 
Jasenovac, and would be relevant to the discussion Mr. Simic
and Mr. Loncaric ( initiated by rewriting of the history by the
later) are leading on soc.culture.jewish, for some
unknown reason. 

Regards, 

Milan N. Stojanovic

Translation in [] is done by the professional translator.
The bad part is done by me. 

"Wastelands of Historical Reality"
Dr. Franjo Tudjman, 1989


"Concerning the overall number of Jewish victims ( in WWII), 
in the world literature there are no even closely scientifically 
proven facts. On one side, we have estimates from 4,000.000
to ( G. Reitlinger, 1953) to 6,000.000 ( J. Lestchinsky and 
American Jewish Congress 1946, and N. Levin 1968 and 1973). 
Raul Hilberg, whose book ( 1961 and 1973 ) comes before, as far
as amount of data and information is concerned, N. Levin's book,
estimates the number of victims about 5,000.000, or around one 
third of the entire pre-war Jewish population.  But in his 
statistical review, R. Hilberg states that from 5,100.000 Jewish
victims, 900.000 are written down, and questions, by putting the
question marks, some other numbers within the overall estimates. 
Those are probably the reasons why he feels it is necessary to mention
that, on the other side some people consider the number of 6,000.000
as very much " exaggerated," mentioning the 1,000.000 as "objective
estimate [Norbert Muhlen, The Return of the Germany, Chicago, 1957].

{ My comment: one side: from 4-6,000.000; other side: 1,000.000}

[ That the estimated loss of up to 6 million dead is founded too
much on both emotional biased testimonies and on exaggerated data
in the post-war reckonings of ar crimes and squaring of accounts
with the defeated perpetrators of war crimes, can be concluded
among other things by the fact that even in serious books (such as
N. Levin's unquestionably is) is evidenced, for example, a highly
Multiplied data on Jasenovac with the assertion that of the
allegedly 770,000 killed there, 20,000 Jews were killed even though
it is stated that the Jews from Croatia under German orders were
deported to the East and partly that they found salvation in the
Italian zone. And when the Jasenovac mythic figure seemed to be
realistic, than it is no surprise that even Malaparte's invented
basket of eyes becomes duplicated probably for the sake of greater
authenticity of such data and testimonies. (p. 156)]

{ I am skipping the passage where he describes incapability of serious
historians to determine the exact number of vicims in concentration
camps in Germany. His conclusion is that that speaks how unreliable 
those data are.  He states, that those examples do not "question
the size of the war victims of the Jewish, Polish and other people, and
then he goes:}

They ( examples of the incapability to determine the number of victims)
warn us how difficult is to come to the historical truth.  And the 
giving up the truth has never led to the removal of the historical
violence, on the contrary.  This rule is constantly forgotten by those
who could,  by spreading lies or by refusing to give rights even to 
live to others, make some, even temporary, gains.
 
That this is true, we could see from the history of any, of course,
also Jewish people, from their "Old Testament" to the present days. 
Depending upon the given, or the changing historical circumstances, 
some people are becoming, from the "victims of the burning," those 
who commit the genocidal violence, or vice versa.  While doing this, 
they assign violent events, and especially their causes, from their 
own history, only to the others." 

{My comment:  This translation might sound cumbersome, but
the whole text is written in such a style. This opinion might be 
further clarified in the following quote:}

p. 289

" For its own destiny while being spread all over the world, 
Jewry would blame mostly and overhelmingly the others.  At the 
same time, forgetting that in their own state, Jewry would 
behave in no different way to the others, in the both past and 
present days. They ( Jews) also forget that they stayed the 
foreign body in the middle of other nations, because they became
servants of the foreigners ( foreigners relative to the nation
they live with, ie. spies, servants of the occupiers, my comment),
or those spreading various above-national and universal utopias 
( my comment: he refers here to Marxism, mostly.  Using 
the word above-national ( nadnacionalan) instead of international
has a bad connotation in our language, for it denotes behaviour 
where ones own nation is risked,  because of the higher interests ). 
Of course, such behaviour of Jewry was conditioned by its essence 
and position.  This very behaviour has been deepening 
differences, provoking hatred and challenging the fate." 
  

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Newsgroups: soc.culture.yugoslavia