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moderate drinking to lower rates of heart disease. According to the poll, consumers
had returned to drinking levels not seen since the mid-'80s. Although beer remained
the preferred drink of Americans, wine preference increased from 22 to 27 percent.
Five months after the 1992 poll, "60 Minutes" re-broadcast the "French Paradox"
segment. Sales of red wine shot up 49 percent over the previous year. Safer was
honored in France with a special "communication" prize from LVMH Moet Hennessy-Louis
Vuitton.
During the next few years, the Wine Institute lobbied officials of the U.S.
Department of Health to reflect studies confirming the "60 Minutes" side of French
drinking in the U.S. Dietary Guidelines, which the industry subsequently used to
market wine as a health elixir. Food and Wines from France, which promotes Gallic
products overseas, placed full-page newspaper ads announcing that French consumption
of fatty food was counteracted by drinking French red wine.
"[Health] announcements are increasing consumption more than anything else," said
Stephanie Grubbs, marketing manager for Robert Mondavi Coastal, in Impact magazine in
1997. That same year, three out of four readers in the January Consumer Reports on
Health survey believed that moderate red wine consumption is more beneficial than
drinking beer or liquor.
Recently, the San Francisco-based Wine Institute helped some California wineries get
permission from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) to add a label
referring consumers to the federal dietary guidelines to learn the "health effects"
of alcohol. But anyone who actually sent for the document would discover that the
government's advice on alcohol is mostly cautionary.
Inflamed by the belief that the wine industry was using the label to make it appear
that the government was suggesting Americans drink for their health, Senator Strom
Thurmond (R-SC), whose daughter was killed by a drunk driver, recently won a battle
for the BATF to hold hearings on whether the "health effects" label can legally be
affixed to every wine bottle. They're scheduled to take place in a number of U.S.
cities in late spring.
Today the Wine Institute touts its product on its website with studies and press
releases. One quotes David Pittman, Ph.D., researcher at Washington University in
St. Louis: "In societies such as France, Italy, Spain and Portugal, where wine and
overall alcohol consumption is higher than in the United States, they just don't have
as many alcohol-related problems such as drunk driving and underage drinking."
That would be news to France.
The world view that the French are able to control their drinking habits is untrue,
according to Pierre Kopp, professor of economics at the Sorbonne. Kopp recently
released the first French study estimating the cost of legal (alcohol and tobacco)
and illegal drugs. Kopp estimates that alcohol costs France $18.5 billion (U.S.)
each year. Drinking is responsible for nearly 53 percent of overall social costs of
alcohol, tobacco and illegal drugs, he reports. (Annual cost to the state is $14.3
billion for tobacco and $2 billion for illegal drugs.)
But even these high alcohol economic cost figures are underestimated, cautions the
researcher, because he left out alcohol-related crime and accidents, which comprise
some of the largest costs to society in the United States. Kopp focused on public
and private money spent on medical treatment, lost productivity, absenteeism,
uncollected taxes, unpaid health contributions, and preventive measures.
[...]
"Consumption is exceptionally high and the final bill is extremely heavy. Alcohol
accounted for 42,963 deaths in France in 1997."
[...]
When "60 Minutes" introduced the French Paradox to America, Morley Safer featured
only one French scientific authority - Serge Renaud, a trendsetter in alcohol
research who still maintains that "there is no doubt that a moderate intake of wine
(one to three glasses per day for a man) is associated with a 30- to 40-percent
reduction in mortality from all causes." In its first issue of the new millennium,
the prestigious British journal Lancet noted in a short profile of Renaud that his
enthusiasm for alcohol and the French Paradox is hardly unanimous today among his
French peers. In fact, at least two of the scientists instrumental in early French
Paradox research today disagree with Renaud's belief in the central role of alcohol
in a lower coronary heart disease rate.
[...]
What's new for both men is the MONICA Project established by centers around the world
to MONItor trends in Cardiovascular diseases and relate them to risk factor changes
over a 10-year period. Established in the early 1980s by WHO, its final data were
highlighted last September at the European Society of Cardiology in Barcelona. De
Lorgeril reported there that the WHO data were 75 to 90 percent higher than France's
statistics for coronary heart disease deaths.
The cardiologist said he scrutinized alcohol-related deaths and found that French
men, "who drink too much," have the highest rates of liver disease and - by far
more upper gastrointestinal cancer, and were more likely to die in accidents, by
suicide, or as a consequence of crime than men of other nationalities. While men in
Sweden can expect to live 76.5 years on average, a French man's average lifespan,
said de Lorgeril, is 74.1 years.
Dr. Ian Graham, a professor of epidemiology at Trinity College in Dublin, said that
de Lorgeril's statistics suggest that the lower rate of coronary deaths in France are
due "to competing causes of death" - many more French men might die early from
alcohol-related causes before they have the opportunity to die of heart disease.
[...]
In 1998, a pharmacist who is a director at the French counterpart of the U.S.
National Institute of Health handed then French Health Minister Bernard Kouchner a
report that had the effect of "a sort of a bomb." In what has become known as the
Roques Report, Bernard Roques classified drugs on the basis of their danger to the
public rather than their legal status. Based on scientific data, alcohol took first
place along with heroin and cocaine; tobacco took second place with amphetamines and
LSD; and marijuana was in the third, least dangerous group.
[...]
Written by Hilary Abramson; edited by James F. Mosher; copy edited by Pam Glenn
Copyright 2000 Marin Institute for the Prevention of Alcohol Other Drug Problems
The original article from which the above excerpts were taken can be found on the
Marin Institute web site at www.marininstitute.org/NL2000.html.
Drink Like the French,
Die Like the French
by David Jernigan
The truth is finally starting to come out: If Americans drink alcohol like the
French, we will die like the French.
[...]
Nearly 43,000 French people die each year from alcohol-related causes, roughly the
equivalent of 200,000 American - double the number who currently die annually of
alcohol-related causes in the United States.
According to the World Health Organization's Global Status Report on Alcohol, the
French drink 54 percent more alcohol than Americans, and die of liver cirrhosis 57
percent more often.
Yes, fewer French people die of heart disease than would be expected given their
fatty diets. However, French men in particular die prematurely in disproportionate
numbers, and alcohol-related problems are often the cause.
In 1991, Morley Safer's "60 Minutes" report on the possible heart protective effects
of drinking red wine led to a 44 percent increase in red wine sales among Americans.
Assiduous lobbying by wine makers prompted the Department of Agriculture (USDA) for
the first time to make positive mention of alcohol consumption in its Dietary
Guidelines for Americans.
Now wineries want to label their products as health food. In 1999 several wineries
convinced the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) to permit an
ambiguous label on wine bottles suggesting that people write the USDA to learn more
about the "health effects" of drinking alcohol.
Further pressure from the Wine Institute and complaints from Senator Strom Thurmond,
author of the warning label currently on alcohol bottles, prompted BATF to open the
entire issue of putting health claims on alcohol bottles for public comment. The
BATF is expected to hold hearings on the topic around the nation this spring.
To date, no U.S. government agency has recommended that Americans drink alcohol to
protect themselves against heart disease.
[...]
The push to put a health benefits label on alcohol bottles is a marketing ploy, pure
and simple.
[...]
David Jernigan directs international programs for The Marin Institute. He is the author of
Thirsting for Markets: The Global Impact of Corporate Alcohol.
Copyright 2000 Marin Institute for the Prevention of Alcohol Other Drug Problems
The original article from which the above excerpts were taken can be found on the
Marin Institute web site at www.marininstitute.org/NL2000a.html.
What you are obligated to do
(1) Retract and correct The French Paradox. You must bring to public attention two
things: that the evidence presented in your two French Paradox broadcasts was
insufficient to justify your conclusions to the effect that drinking wine prolongs life
(as explained in my letter to you of 21Apr99, already cited above); and that broader
scientific evidence than you reported in your broadcasts, or since, contradicts your
conclusions (as illustrated in the Marin Institute excerpts above). Your unwarranted
and false conclusions advocating wine consumption cannot be left to continue inflicting
harm upon the public as they do today. Your obligation to journalism, to 60 Minutes, to
the public, and to your conscience, demands that you issue such a retraction and
correction without reservation and without delay.
(2) Disclose any conflict of interest relating to The French Paradox. Please
disclose any consideration that you may have received, or that 60 Minutes or CBS may
have received, from the wine or alcohol industries for your two French Paradox
broadcasts. In the absence of affirmations on your part that no such consideration has
traded hands, your broadcasts may tend to be viewed less as defective reporting than as
infomercials. Of particular interest would be the nature of any relationship between 60
Minutes and Edgar Bronfman Senior, chairman of liquor giant Seagram.
(3) Retract and correct The Ugly Face of Freedom. Every day, growing numbers of
people become convinced that you owe a similar retraction and correction for your
similarly incorrect and damaging 23Oc94 broadcast, The Ugly Face of Freedom.
(4) Disclose any conflict of interest relating to The Ugly Face of Freedom. Please
disclose the degree to which your broadcast The Ugly Face of Freedom was requested by
external sources, who these sources were, and what benefits to 60 Minutes or to CBS
accrued from complying with such external requests. Of particular interest would be any
request originating from the direction of Edgar Bronfman Senior. You need to take some
such step in order to disarm the suspicion that your broadcast was no better than an
eruption of the hatred toward non-Jews, and particularly of the special hatred toward
Ukrainians, which is endemic to Jewish culture.
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 747 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 14 Sep 4/97 The forgotten Bodnar
September 4, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In your testimony on the 60 Minutes broadcast of October 23, 1994 "The Ugly Face of Freedom" I notice a startling
omission:
MORLEY SAFER: I get the impression from people that the actions of the Ukrainians, if anything,
were worse than the Germans.
SIMON WIESENTHAL: About the civilians, I cannot say this. About the Ukrainian police, yes.
That's all you said! You just left it at that! But in that case, there is something very big missing from your
statement, isn't there Mr. Wiesenthal - something very interesting, very important, very relevant? Something that the
60 Minutes viewer would have found to be quite remarkable? Do you know what it is?
It is the story of the Ukrainian policeman with the surname Bodnar the one who saved your life? Remember him?
Don't you think that this forgotten Bodnar is someone who should have been mentioned in your statement? And doesn't
the story of the forgotten Bodnar somewhat contradict your unqualified statement that the Ukrainian police
collectively were worse than the Germans? And if among what you say is the worst of the Ukrainians (the auxiliary
police) some are saving Jews, then what heroic acts can we expect among the rest of the Ukrainian population?
To refresh your memory about this story which seems so forgettable to you now, I may remind you that you were
about to be executed, but:
The shooting stopped. Ten yards from Wiesenthal.
The next thing he remembers was a brilliant cone of light and behind it a Polish voice: "But
Mr. Wiesenthal, what are you doing here?" Wiesenthal recognized a foreman he used to know, by
the name of Bodnar. He was wearing civilian clothes with the armband of a Ukrainian police
auxiliary. "I've got to get you out of here tonight."
Bodnar told the [other] Ukrainians that among the captured Jews he had discovered a Soviet
spy and that he was taking him to the district police commissar. In actual fact he took
Wiesenthal back to his own flat, on the grounds that it was unlikely to be searched so soon
again. This was the first time Wiesenthal survived. (Peter Michael Lingens, in Simon
Wiesenthal, Justice Not Vengeance, 1989, p. 8)
But the story of the forgotten Bodnar is even better than that - Bodnar not only saved you, not only risked his
life to save you, but possibly gave his life to save you. I say that because Bodnar must have known that the
punishment for saving a Jew from execution and then helping him escape would be death. And how could he get away with
it? In fact, I ask you now, Mr. Wiesenthal, whether the forgotten Bodnar did get away with it, or whether he paid for
it with his life, for as you were tiptoeing out, you were stopped, Bodnar offered his fabricated story, and then:
The German sergeant, already a little drunk, slapped Bodnar's face and said: "Then what are you
standing around for? If this is what you people are like, then later we'll all have troubles.
Report back to me as soon as you deliver them [Wiesenthal along with a fellow prisoner]." (Alan
Levy, The Wiesenthal File, 1993, p. 37)
These passages invite several pertinent conclusions which a man of integrity and conscience would have insisted
on bringing to Morley Safer's attention:
(1) You yourself, Mr. Wiesenthal, can see a Ukrainian police official having his face slapped by a German
sergeant, which serves to remind you that Ukraine is under occupation, to show you who is really in charge, to suggest
that the German attitude toward Ukrainians is one of contempt and that the expression of this contempt is
unrestrained.
(2) You yourself see also that Bodnar's flat is subject to searches, indicating that although he is a participant
in the anti-Jewish actions, he is a distrusted participant, and a participant who might feel intimidated by the
hostile scrutiny of the occupying Nazis.
(3) But most important of all, you see that the German sergeant is waiting for Bodnar to report back. Alan Levy
writes that "Bodnar was ... concerned ... that now he [Bodnar] had to account, verbally at least, for his two
prisoners" (p. 37). If Bodnar reports back with the news that you, Mr. Wiesenthal, escaped, then how might Bodnar
expect the face-slapping German sergeant to respond? For Bodnar at this point in the story to actually allow you, Mr.
Wiesenthal, to escape is heroic, it is self-sacrificing, it is suicidal. And yet the forgotten Bodnar does go ahead
and effect your escape, probably never imagining that in later years this will become an event unworthy of notice
during your blanket condemnation of Ukrainians.
What I urge you to do now, Mr. Wiesenthal, is the following:
(1) Conduct a search to determine the fate of the forgotten Bodnar, and bestow upon him the recognition that he
deserves for his heroic action. Hopefully, Bodnar is still alive, so that the recognition will not be posthumous.
Hopefully, Bodnar did not sacrifice his life to save yours, as then your ingratitude would be truly black.
(2) Bring the forgotten Bodnar to the attention of Morley Safer at 60 Minutes, and ask for some correction of the
negative image created of the Ukrainian police.
(3) Search your memory long and hard and determine a version of the story which appears to be closest to the
truth, and then publish it as the official account, because at present, the wildly different versions in your several
biographies create the negative image of someone who just spews tall tales off the top of his head, without any
consideration for making them consistent with earlier versions of those same tales. For example, Mr. Wiesenthal, what
impression do you imagine is created in the mind of a reader who is told in Justice Not Vengeance that Bodnar saved
you alone and took you to his apartment, but then is told in The Wiesenthal File that Bodnar saved you together with
another prisoner and took the two of you to the office of a "commissar" which office the two of you spent the entire
night cleaning? I will tell you what impression is created, Mr. Wiesenthal - it is that of a person lying so
clumsily, that one almost imagines that he does so in order to be caught and exposed so as to finally be able to
confess and to purge his conscience.
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 879 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 15 Sep 8/97 The elusive Lviv pogrom
September 8, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
According to your testimony on the 60 Minutes broadcast of October 23, 1994, "The Ugly Face of Freedom," in three
days following the evacuation of the Communist forces and before the arrival of the German troops, Ukrainian police
killed between five and six thousand Jews:
SAFER: He [Simon Wiesenthal] remembers that even before the Germans arrived, Ukrainian police
went on a 3-day killing spree.
WIESENTHAL: And in this 3 days in Lvov alone between 5 and 6 thousand Jews was killed.
...
SAFER: But even before the Germans entered Lvov, the Ukrainian militia, the police, killed 3,000
people in 2 days here.
Now before going beyond what was actually said in the broadcast, we already see a discrepancy which I ask you to
comment on. Specifically, you are the expert on the Holocaust who is testifying on 60 Minutes, and more than that you
are the eyewitness to the Lviv pogrom - the only eyewitness - and you tell Morley Safer that 5 to 6 thousand Jews were
killed in three days - but then Mr. Safer turns around and changes it to 3 thousand killed in two days. This does not
seem fair - after all you were there and Morley Safer wasn't, and whereas for Mr. Safer, this is just a story that he
is covering, for you it is the pivotal experience which determined the course of your life, the experience which in
the words of Mr. Safer, "compelled Wiesenthal to seek out the guilty, to bring justice."
So I wonder why Morley Safer changed your numbers? As you are the only witness adduced, Mr. Safer seems to have
lowered your figures on his own initiative. I wonder if you have contacted Mr. Safer concerning his revision of your
estimate, or if in your subsequent discussions with Mr. Safer, you might have by now arrived at a mutually-agreed
estimate? If you have, I wonder if you would be able to tell me whether Mr. Safer has agreed to raise his estimate,
or if you have agreed to lower yours?
Be that as it may, it must surprise you to learn that when I consulted Leni Yahil's The Holocaust: The Fate of
European Jewry, Oxford, New York, 1990 for further information on the Lviv pogrom, I found nothing. There is no
indication in Yahil's book that such a pogrom ever took place. If Yahil's book were cursory or carelessly researched,
then the oversight of the single largest pogrom of the War might be understandable, but if we are to believe the
book's dust jacket, then it is one of the best works on the Jewish Holocaust ever written:
When The Holocaust first appeared in Israel in 1987, it was hailed as the finest, most
authoritative history of Hitler's war on the Jews ever published. Representing twenty years of
research and reflection, Leni Yahil's book won the Shazar prize, one of Israel's highest awards
for historical work.
Well, in my continuing quest to learn more about the Lviv pogrom which you describe on 60 Minutes, I turned next
to Raul Hilberg's The Destruction of the European Jews, Holmes Meier, New York, 1985. This work too cannot be
accused of being either cursory or carelessly researched. For example, the publisher's promotional material claims:
This landmark work, now substantially revised and expanded, is destined to remain the foremost
source to which historians and others must turn in any exploration of the most infamous crime in
history.
...
This definitive edition of THE DESTRUCTION OF THE EUROPEAN JEWS is the most complete,
comprehensive, and authoritative account of the Nazi Holocaust.
As well, this same promotional material cites critical acclaim for Hilberg's work in Michael R. Marrus's review in The
Times Literary Supplement which ends in the words:
No single book has contributed more, even to its critics, to an understanding of Nazi genocide.
In its originality, scope, and seriousness of theme, this is one of the great historical works
of our time.
But what does Hilberg say about the Lviv pogrom, this most massive pogrom of the Second World War; what does he
say in his "most complete, comprehensive, and authoritative account of the Nazi Holocaust"? Why he says ... exactly
nothing! He too seems to be totally unaware of it.
Worse than that - much worse - Hilberg makes statements to the effect that no such pogrom ever took place. I
reproduce below three quotations from Hilberg, the last of which is particularly troubling, as it is his summary of
all anti-Jewish activity in Ukraine, and it flatly contradicts the possibility of the pogrom that you describe:
From the Ukraine Einsatzkommando 6 of Einsatzgruppe C reported as follows:
Almost nowhere can the population be persuaded to take active steps against
the Jews. This may be explained by the fear of many people that the Red
Army may return. Again and again this anxiety has been pointed out to us.
Older people have remarked that they had already experienced in 1918 the
sudden retreat of the Germans. In order to meet the fear psychosis, and in
order to destroy the myth ... which, in the eyes of many Ukrainians, places
the Jew in the position of the wielder of political power, Einsatzkommando
6 on several occasions marched Jews before their execution through the
city. Also, care was taken to have Ukrainian militiamen watch the shooting
of Jews.
This "deflation" of the Jews in the public eye did not have the desired effect. After a few
weeks, Einsatzgruppe C complained once more that the inhabitants did not betray the movements of
hidden Jews. The Ukrainians were passive, benumbed by the "Bolshevist terror." Only the ethnic
Germans in the area were busily working for the Einsatzgruppe. (Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of
the European Jews, 1961, p. 202 - in this case, I am quoting from the 1961 edition)
The Slavic population stood estranged and even aghast before the unfolding spectacle of the
"final solution." There was on the whole no impelling desire to cooperate in a process of such
utter ruthlessness. The fact that the Soviet regime, fighting off the Germans a few hundred
miles to the east, was still threatening to return, undoubtedly acted as a powerful restraint
upon many a potential collaborator. (Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews, 1985,
p. 308)
First, truly spontaneous pogroms, free from Einsatzgruppen influence, did not take place; all
outbreaks were either organized or inspired by the Einsatzgruppen. Second, all pogroms were
implemented within a short time after the arrival of the killing units. They were not
self-perpetuating, nor could new ones be started after things had settled down. (Raul Hilberg,
The Destruction of the European Jews, 1985, p. 312)
It would seem, Mr. Wiesenthal, that you were an eyewitness - the only eyewitness - to the largest pogrom of the
war, and that at the same time, at least two of the foremost chroniclers of the Jewish Holocaust have quite overlooked
this program, and in the case of Raul Hilberg, flatly deny that any such pogrom ever took place. According to
Hilberg, all Ukrainian pogroms took place after the arrival of the Germans, were instigated by the Germans, were small
in scale, and had no momentum of their own.
In view of this oversight on the part of the historians, Mr. Wiesenthal, shouldn't you get in touch with them and
recount your experiences to them so that the story of the Lviv pogrom is not lost to future generations, and so that
Jewish hatred of Ukrainians is not diminished by the loss?
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 906 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 16 Sep 9/97 Shifting date for the Lviv pogrom
September 9, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In my letter to you of September 8, I demonstrated that two prominent historians seem to be unaware of the
pre-German Lviv pogrom which killed 5 to 6 thousand Jews, at least as claimed by Morley Safer and yourself on the 60
Minutes broadcast, The Ugly Face of Freedom of October 23, 1994. I will remind you that in that 60 Minutes broadcast,
Morley Safer twice asserts - once seemingly in your hearing - that the Lviv pogrom antedated the arrival of the
Germans, thus placing culpability squarely at the feet of the Ukrainian perpetrators.
In a continuing effort to learn more about this Lviv pogrom, I turned to your biographical Justice Not Vengeance,
only to discover you claiming that this pogrom postdated the arrival of the Germans:
Thousands of detainees were shot dead in their cells by the retreating Soviets. This gave rise
to one of the craziest accusations of that period: among the strongly anti-Semitic population
the rumour was spread by the Ukrainian nationalists that all Jews were Bolsheviks and all
Bolsheviks were Jews. Hence it was the Jews who were really to blame for the atrocities
committed by the Soviets.
All the Germans needed to do was to exploit this climate of opinion. It is said that after
their arrival they gave the Ukrainians free rein, for three days, to 'deal' with the Jews.
(Simon Wiesenthal, Justice Not Vengeance, 1989, p. 36, emphasis added)
As the timing of the Lviv pogrom is critical to assigning blame, I would have expected this timing to have been
verified with care and to be either consistent between the two reports, or else with an explanation offered for any
inconsistency. Instead, I find that you along with Morley Safer have broadcast a version in 1994 that directly
contradicts a version that you published five years earlier in 1989.
I look forward to hearing your clarification of this discrepancy.
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 2113 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 18 Sep 11/97 Questions concerning the Waffen SS
September 11, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
Your accusation that Canada harbors a large number of war criminals has been
incessant over the years, and at one point led to the creation of Canada's Deschenes
Commission on War Criminals. This accusation seems to be based primarily on Canada's
presently being home to some former members of the Ukrainian Galicia Division, combined
with the fact that the Galicia Division was categorized by the Germans as belonging to
the Waffen SS.
The first question that I would like to put to you, Mr. Wiesenthal, is whether you
are aware that the Waffen SS was a combat unit that played no role in the management of
concentration camps, and carried out no SS functions? I wonder if you are aware of
this, as you typically - perhaps always? - drop the qualification "Waffen" and refer to
members of the Galicia Division simply as members of the "SS," which gives the
misleading impression that combat soldiers were administrators of concentration camps.
If you are already aware of the distinction between the SS and the Waffen SS, then I
wonder that you would allow yourself to present the misleading picture that you have
been presenting. If you are unaware of this distinction, then I wonder how it came to
be that you are accorded the status of an expert witness on World War II events, as you
were on the 60 Minutes broadcast The Ugly Face of Freedom on October 23, 1994. Would
you be able to throw any light on this question?
But on top of that, you must have become aware during your long career as a Nazi
hunter that Ukraine was not unique in providing the German armed forces with Waffen SS
troops. Below, I reproduce a quote from an interview by Slavko Nowytski of Professor
Norman Davies, historian at the University of London, and author of the recent Europe:
A History, published by Oxford University Press:
In discussing the question of collaborating with Germany Prof. Davies
noted that, "A large number of the volunteers for the Waffen SS came
from Western Europe. The nation which supplied it the largest number
of divisions was the Netherlands [four]. There were two Belgian
divisions, there was a French Waffen SS. To my mind, it's rather
surprising that Ukraine, which is a much larger country [than the
Netherlands or Belgium] supplied only one Waffen SS Division.... It's
surprising that there were so few Ukrainians [in the German Army].
Many people don't know, for example, that there were far more Russians
fighting alongside the Wehrmacht or in the various German armies than
there were Ukrainians.... Thanks to Soviet propaganda, the Russian
contribution to the Nazi war effort has been forgotten, whereas the
Ukrainian contribution has been remembered, I think, too strongly."
(Andrew Gregorovich, Forum, No. 95, Spring, 1997, p. 34)
And so the information in the above quotation leads to several more questions:
(1) As the population of The Netherlands is small, and as it contributed the
largest number of Waffen SS divisions, this gives The Netherlands the largest per
capita contribution to the Waffen SS of any country. Would you conclude from this that
the people of The Netherlands are the most anti-Semitic in the world? And following
the same line of reasoning, would you conclude that the people of Belgium are the next
most anti-Semitic? And also that as the population of France is approximately equal to
the population of Ukraine, and as each of these contributed one Waffen SS division,
that the French are approximately as anti-Semitic as the Ukrainians?
(2) As you have expended considerable energy attacking the former members of the
Galicia Division as war criminals, I wonder if you have expended any similar energy
attacking former members of The Netherlands, Belgium, and French Waffen SS divisions in
the same way? For example, have you demanded any investigation of The Netherlands
Waffen SS, and as a result has the government of The Netherlands ever created a
commission on war criminals comparable to Canada's Deschenes Commission on War
Criminals? And have you done so in Belgium? In France?
If not, then why not? Why do you single out the Galicia Division? How is the
Galicia Division different from the other Waffen SS divisions?
(3) If in comparison to several other countries, Ukraine contributed
proportionately fewer numbers to the Waffen SS, or to any of the German armed forces,
then shouldn't you as a Nazi hunter, commend or thank Ukrainians for their relatively
small contribution to the German war effort?
(4) Are you aware that the chief motive behind the creation of the Galicia
Division was to prevent the Soviet re-occupation of Ukraine? Are you aware that in
consequence, the Galicia Division was organized with the proviso that it not be used
against the Western allies, but only against the Soviets on the Eastern front; and that
in fact, the only use to which the Galicia Division was ever put was against the
Soviets in the Battle of Brody? If you are aware of this, then why did you not mention
it on the 60 Minutes broadcast in which you were the chief witness and the Galicia
Division the chief subject of discussion? If you are not aware of this, then why does
60 Minutes consider you an authority on World War II?
Would you happen to know if the Waffen SS divisions of other countries were
created under the same proviso?
(5) Given that Canada's Deschenes Commission on War Criminals failed to identify
even a single member of the Galicia Division as calling for further investigation; and
given that neither you nor anyone else has ever had any member of the Galicia Division
convicted of any crime, or even tried for any crime; and, most importantly, given that
neither you nor anyone else has ever even specified any crime of which the Galicia
Division as a whole, or any member of the Galicia Division, might have been guilty
given all this, I wonder if the time has not finally come when you have to admit that
your obsession with the Galicia Division has been misplaced?
And would you happen to know if the Waffen SS divisions of The Netherlands,
Belgium, and France have proven to be as free from blame as has the Ukrainian Galicia
Division?
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 840 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 19 Sep 12/97 Testimony of Erwin Schulz
September 12, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In my letters to you of September 8 and 9, 1997, I have questioned your assertion
made on the 60 Minutes broadcast The Ugly Face of Freedom of October 23, 1994 to the
effect that in the few days before the arrival of the Germans, Ukrainians killed some 5
to 6 thousand Jews in Lviv. I have recently come across some testimony that indicates
that your assertion is correct on all of the details of this event save one.
The fresh testimony that I am referring to is that of Erwin Schulz, Commander of
Einsatzkommando 5 (a subunit of Einsatzgruppe C), from May until 26 September, 1941.
From Schulz's testimony, it appears that several of the details of your assertion are
correct: namely that the number murdered was 5,000, which is within the bounds of your
own estimate; that the location was indeed Lviv (identified as Lemberg); that the time
was indeed during the few days prior to the arrival of the Germans; and that the chief
participants were indeed Ukrainians and Jews, although Schulz does mention the
secondary involvement of others.
The point on which Schulz differs from you is that whereas you say that the
slaughter consisted of Ukrainians killing Jews, Schulz says that it consisted of Jews
killing Ukrainians:
We learned that, before the Russian troops had left, a very great
number of Lemberg citizens, Ukrainians and Polish inhabitants of other
towns and villages had been killed in this prison and in other
prisons. Furthermore, there were many corpses of German men and
officers, among them many Air Corps officers, and many of them were
found mutilated. There was a great bitterness and excitement among the
Lemberg population against the Jewish sector of the population. (Erwin
Schulz, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The Holocaust: Selected Documents
in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New York, 1982, Volume 18, p. 18)
On the next day, Dr. RASCH informed us to the effect that the killed
people in Lemberg amounted to about 5,000. It has been determined
without any doubt that the arrests and killings had taken place under
the leadership of Jewish functionaries and with the participation of
the Jewish inhabitants of Lemberg. That was the reason why there was
such an excitement against the Jewish population on the part of the
Lemberg citizens. (Erwin Schulz, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The
Holocaust: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New York,
1982, Volume 18, p. 18)
I wonder if you would care to comment on this discrepancy between Schulz's
testimony and your own?
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 1435 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 20 Sep 13/97 Jews killing Ukrainians in Lviv
September 13, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In my letter to you of September 12, I presented the testimony of Erwin Schulz to
the effect that in the few days prior to the arrival of German forces in Lviv in 1941,
some 5,000 inhabitants of the Lviv region, predominantly Ukrainians and Poles, had been
killed, and that the killing had been conducted "under the leadership of Jewish
functionaries and with the participation of the Jewish inhabitants of Lemberg."
The continuing question before us can be broken down into two parts: (1) Were
such large numbers of Ukrainians and Poles killed? (2) What ethnic groups were most
responsible for the killing?
On the first question, there does not appear to be much doubt - every one of the
half-dozen sources that I consulted agree that the slaughter did take place. In fact,
in the last quotation of the following set of six, you yourself, Mr. Wiesenthal, can be
seen to agree:
Before fleeing the German advance the Soviet occupational regime
murdered thousands of Ukrainian civilians, mainly members of the city's
[Lviv's] intelligentsia. (Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Volume 3, p. 222)
The Bolsheviks succeeded in annihilating some 10,000 political
prisoners in Western Ukraine before and after the outbreak of
hostilities (massacres took place in the prisons in Lviv, Zolochiv,
Rivne, Dubno, Lutsk, etc.). (Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopaedia, Volume
1, p. 886)
The Soviets' hurried retreat had tragic consequences for thousands of
political prisoners in the jails of Western Ukraine. Unable to
evacuate them in time, the NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en masse
during the week of 22-29 June 1941, regardless of whether they were
incarcerated for major or minor offenses. Major massacres occurred in
Lviv, Sambir, and Stanyslaviv in Galicia, where about 10,000 prisoners
died, and in Rivne and Lutsk in Volhynia, where another 5000 perished.
Coming on the heels of the mass deportations and growing Soviet terror,
these executions added greatly to the West Ukrainians' abhorrence of
the Soviets. (Orest Subtelny, Ukraine: A History, 1994, p. 461)
Right after the entry we were shown 2,400 dead bodies of Ukrainians
liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck at the city jail of
Lemberg [Lviv] by the Soviets prior to their marching off. (Hans Frank,
In the Face of the Gallows, p. 406)
In Lvov, several thousand prisoners had been held in three jails. When
the Germans arrived on 29 June, the city stank, and the prisons were
surrounded by terrified relatives. Unimaginable atrocities had
occurred inside. The prisons looked like abattoirs. It had taken the
NKVD a week to complete their gruesome task before they fled. (Gwyneth
Hughes and Simon Welfare, Red Empire: The Forbidden History of the
USSR, 1990, p. 133)
When the German attack came on 22 June the Soviets had no time to take
with them the people they had locked up. So they simply killed them.
Thousands of detainees were shot dead in their cells by the retreating
Soviets. (Simon Wiesenthal, Justice Not Vengeance, 1989, p. 35)
The first question having been settled - I trust - to the satisfaction of all, we
turn now to the second question: Is there any ethnic group that might have been
particularly responsible for the killing? Well, if the slaughter was conducted by the
NKVD or was directed by the NKVD, then the question reduces to What was the ethnic
composition of the NKVD?
The evidence that I have come across points to the conclusion that the NKVD was
dominated by Jews. Here is one such piece of evidence. The speaker is Yoram Sheftel,
John Demjanjuk's Israeli defense attorney, describing his visit to the Simferopol,
Ukraine, KGB headquarters in 1990 - what Sheftel seems to be saying is that out of a
sample of some 30 members of the wartime NKVD, every last one was a Jew:
On the right-hand wall was a stone memorial plaque engraved with the
names of about thirty KGB men from Simferopol who had fallen in the
Great Patriotic War, as the Soviets call World War II. I was shocked
and angry as I read the names: the first was Polonski and the last
had returned to drinking levels not seen since the mid-'80s. Although beer remained
the preferred drink of Americans, wine preference increased from 22 to 27 percent.
Five months after the 1992 poll, "60 Minutes" re-broadcast the "French Paradox"
segment. Sales of red wine shot up 49 percent over the previous year. Safer was
honored in France with a special "communication" prize from LVMH Moet Hennessy-Louis
Vuitton.
During the next few years, the Wine Institute lobbied officials of the U.S.
Department of Health to reflect studies confirming the "60 Minutes" side of French
drinking in the U.S. Dietary Guidelines, which the industry subsequently used to
market wine as a health elixir. Food and Wines from France, which promotes Gallic
products overseas, placed full-page newspaper ads announcing that French consumption
of fatty food was counteracted by drinking French red wine.
"[Health] announcements are increasing consumption more than anything else," said
Stephanie Grubbs, marketing manager for Robert Mondavi Coastal, in Impact magazine in
1997. That same year, three out of four readers in the January Consumer Reports on
Health survey believed that moderate red wine consumption is more beneficial than
drinking beer or liquor.
Recently, the San Francisco-based Wine Institute helped some California wineries get
permission from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) to add a label
referring consumers to the federal dietary guidelines to learn the "health effects"
of alcohol. But anyone who actually sent for the document would discover that the
government's advice on alcohol is mostly cautionary.
Inflamed by the belief that the wine industry was using the label to make it appear
that the government was suggesting Americans drink for their health, Senator Strom
Thurmond (R-SC), whose daughter was killed by a drunk driver, recently won a battle
for the BATF to hold hearings on whether the "health effects" label can legally be
affixed to every wine bottle. They're scheduled to take place in a number of U.S.
cities in late spring.
Today the Wine Institute touts its product on its website with studies and press
releases. One quotes David Pittman, Ph.D., researcher at Washington University in
St. Louis: "In societies such as France, Italy, Spain and Portugal, where wine and
overall alcohol consumption is higher than in the United States, they just don't have
as many alcohol-related problems such as drunk driving and underage drinking."
That would be news to France.
The world view that the French are able to control their drinking habits is untrue,
according to Pierre Kopp, professor of economics at the Sorbonne. Kopp recently
released the first French study estimating the cost of legal (alcohol and tobacco)
and illegal drugs. Kopp estimates that alcohol costs France $18.5 billion (U.S.)
each year. Drinking is responsible for nearly 53 percent of overall social costs of
alcohol, tobacco and illegal drugs, he reports. (Annual cost to the state is $14.3
billion for tobacco and $2 billion for illegal drugs.)
But even these high alcohol economic cost figures are underestimated, cautions the
researcher, because he left out alcohol-related crime and accidents, which comprise
some of the largest costs to society in the United States. Kopp focused on public
and private money spent on medical treatment, lost productivity, absenteeism,
uncollected taxes, unpaid health contributions, and preventive measures.
[...]
"Consumption is exceptionally high and the final bill is extremely heavy. Alcohol
accounted for 42,963 deaths in France in 1997."
[...]
When "60 Minutes" introduced the French Paradox to America, Morley Safer featured
only one French scientific authority - Serge Renaud, a trendsetter in alcohol
research who still maintains that "there is no doubt that a moderate intake of wine
(one to three glasses per day for a man) is associated with a 30- to 40-percent
reduction in mortality from all causes." In its first issue of the new millennium,
the prestigious British journal Lancet noted in a short profile of Renaud that his
enthusiasm for alcohol and the French Paradox is hardly unanimous today among his
French peers. In fact, at least two of the scientists instrumental in early French
Paradox research today disagree with Renaud's belief in the central role of alcohol
in a lower coronary heart disease rate.
[...]
What's new for both men is the MONICA Project established by centers around the world
to MONItor trends in Cardiovascular diseases and relate them to risk factor changes
over a 10-year period. Established in the early 1980s by WHO, its final data were
highlighted last September at the European Society of Cardiology in Barcelona. De
Lorgeril reported there that the WHO data were 75 to 90 percent higher than France's
statistics for coronary heart disease deaths.
The cardiologist said he scrutinized alcohol-related deaths and found that French
men, "who drink too much," have the highest rates of liver disease and - by far
more upper gastrointestinal cancer, and were more likely to die in accidents, by
suicide, or as a consequence of crime than men of other nationalities. While men in
Sweden can expect to live 76.5 years on average, a French man's average lifespan,
said de Lorgeril, is 74.1 years.
Dr. Ian Graham, a professor of epidemiology at Trinity College in Dublin, said that
de Lorgeril's statistics suggest that the lower rate of coronary deaths in France are
due "to competing causes of death" - many more French men might die early from
alcohol-related causes before they have the opportunity to die of heart disease.
[...]
In 1998, a pharmacist who is a director at the French counterpart of the U.S.
National Institute of Health handed then French Health Minister Bernard Kouchner a
report that had the effect of "a sort of a bomb." In what has become known as the
Roques Report, Bernard Roques classified drugs on the basis of their danger to the
public rather than their legal status. Based on scientific data, alcohol took first
place along with heroin and cocaine; tobacco took second place with amphetamines and
LSD; and marijuana was in the third, least dangerous group.
[...]
Written by Hilary Abramson; edited by James F. Mosher; copy edited by Pam Glenn
Copyright 2000 Marin Institute for the Prevention of Alcohol Other Drug Problems
The original article from which the above excerpts were taken can be found on the
Marin Institute web site at www.marininstitute.org/NL2000.html.
Drink Like the French,
Die Like the French
by David Jernigan
The truth is finally starting to come out: If Americans drink alcohol like the
French, we will die like the French.
[...]
Nearly 43,000 French people die each year from alcohol-related causes, roughly the
equivalent of 200,000 American - double the number who currently die annually of
alcohol-related causes in the United States.
According to the World Health Organization's Global Status Report on Alcohol, the
French drink 54 percent more alcohol than Americans, and die of liver cirrhosis 57
percent more often.
Yes, fewer French people die of heart disease than would be expected given their
fatty diets. However, French men in particular die prematurely in disproportionate
numbers, and alcohol-related problems are often the cause.
In 1991, Morley Safer's "60 Minutes" report on the possible heart protective effects
of drinking red wine led to a 44 percent increase in red wine sales among Americans.
Assiduous lobbying by wine makers prompted the Department of Agriculture (USDA) for
the first time to make positive mention of alcohol consumption in its Dietary
Guidelines for Americans.
Now wineries want to label their products as health food. In 1999 several wineries
convinced the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) to permit an
ambiguous label on wine bottles suggesting that people write the USDA to learn more
about the "health effects" of drinking alcohol.
Further pressure from the Wine Institute and complaints from Senator Strom Thurmond,
author of the warning label currently on alcohol bottles, prompted BATF to open the
entire issue of putting health claims on alcohol bottles for public comment. The
BATF is expected to hold hearings on the topic around the nation this spring.
To date, no U.S. government agency has recommended that Americans drink alcohol to
protect themselves against heart disease.
[...]
The push to put a health benefits label on alcohol bottles is a marketing ploy, pure
and simple.
[...]
David Jernigan directs international programs for The Marin Institute. He is the author of
Thirsting for Markets: The Global Impact of Corporate Alcohol.
Copyright 2000 Marin Institute for the Prevention of Alcohol Other Drug Problems
The original article from which the above excerpts were taken can be found on the
Marin Institute web site at www.marininstitute.org/NL2000a.html.
What you are obligated to do
(1) Retract and correct The French Paradox. You must bring to public attention two
things: that the evidence presented in your two French Paradox broadcasts was
insufficient to justify your conclusions to the effect that drinking wine prolongs life
(as explained in my letter to you of 21Apr99, already cited above); and that broader
scientific evidence than you reported in your broadcasts, or since, contradicts your
conclusions (as illustrated in the Marin Institute excerpts above). Your unwarranted
and false conclusions advocating wine consumption cannot be left to continue inflicting
harm upon the public as they do today. Your obligation to journalism, to 60 Minutes, to
the public, and to your conscience, demands that you issue such a retraction and
correction without reservation and without delay.
(2) Disclose any conflict of interest relating to The French Paradox. Please
disclose any consideration that you may have received, or that 60 Minutes or CBS may
have received, from the wine or alcohol industries for your two French Paradox
broadcasts. In the absence of affirmations on your part that no such consideration has
traded hands, your broadcasts may tend to be viewed less as defective reporting than as
infomercials. Of particular interest would be the nature of any relationship between 60
Minutes and Edgar Bronfman Senior, chairman of liquor giant Seagram.
(3) Retract and correct The Ugly Face of Freedom. Every day, growing numbers of
people become convinced that you owe a similar retraction and correction for your
similarly incorrect and damaging 23Oc94 broadcast, The Ugly Face of Freedom.
(4) Disclose any conflict of interest relating to The Ugly Face of Freedom. Please
disclose the degree to which your broadcast The Ugly Face of Freedom was requested by
external sources, who these sources were, and what benefits to 60 Minutes or to CBS
accrued from complying with such external requests. Of particular interest would be any
request originating from the direction of Edgar Bronfman Senior. You need to take some
such step in order to disarm the suspicion that your broadcast was no better than an
eruption of the hatred toward non-Jews, and particularly of the special hatred toward
Ukrainians, which is endemic to Jewish culture.
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 747 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 14 Sep 4/97 The forgotten Bodnar
September 4, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In your testimony on the 60 Minutes broadcast of October 23, 1994 "The Ugly Face of Freedom" I notice a startling
omission:
MORLEY SAFER: I get the impression from people that the actions of the Ukrainians, if anything,
were worse than the Germans.
SIMON WIESENTHAL: About the civilians, I cannot say this. About the Ukrainian police, yes.
That's all you said! You just left it at that! But in that case, there is something very big missing from your
statement, isn't there Mr. Wiesenthal - something very interesting, very important, very relevant? Something that the
60 Minutes viewer would have found to be quite remarkable? Do you know what it is?
It is the story of the Ukrainian policeman with the surname Bodnar the one who saved your life? Remember him?
Don't you think that this forgotten Bodnar is someone who should have been mentioned in your statement? And doesn't
the story of the forgotten Bodnar somewhat contradict your unqualified statement that the Ukrainian police
collectively were worse than the Germans? And if among what you say is the worst of the Ukrainians (the auxiliary
police) some are saving Jews, then what heroic acts can we expect among the rest of the Ukrainian population?
To refresh your memory about this story which seems so forgettable to you now, I may remind you that you were
about to be executed, but:
The shooting stopped. Ten yards from Wiesenthal.
The next thing he remembers was a brilliant cone of light and behind it a Polish voice: "But
Mr. Wiesenthal, what are you doing here?" Wiesenthal recognized a foreman he used to know, by
the name of Bodnar. He was wearing civilian clothes with the armband of a Ukrainian police
auxiliary. "I've got to get you out of here tonight."
Bodnar told the [other] Ukrainians that among the captured Jews he had discovered a Soviet
spy and that he was taking him to the district police commissar. In actual fact he took
Wiesenthal back to his own flat, on the grounds that it was unlikely to be searched so soon
again. This was the first time Wiesenthal survived. (Peter Michael Lingens, in Simon
Wiesenthal, Justice Not Vengeance, 1989, p. 8)
But the story of the forgotten Bodnar is even better than that - Bodnar not only saved you, not only risked his
life to save you, but possibly gave his life to save you. I say that because Bodnar must have known that the
punishment for saving a Jew from execution and then helping him escape would be death. And how could he get away with
it? In fact, I ask you now, Mr. Wiesenthal, whether the forgotten Bodnar did get away with it, or whether he paid for
it with his life, for as you were tiptoeing out, you were stopped, Bodnar offered his fabricated story, and then:
The German sergeant, already a little drunk, slapped Bodnar's face and said: "Then what are you
standing around for? If this is what you people are like, then later we'll all have troubles.
Report back to me as soon as you deliver them [Wiesenthal along with a fellow prisoner]." (Alan
Levy, The Wiesenthal File, 1993, p. 37)
These passages invite several pertinent conclusions which a man of integrity and conscience would have insisted
on bringing to Morley Safer's attention:
(1) You yourself, Mr. Wiesenthal, can see a Ukrainian police official having his face slapped by a German
sergeant, which serves to remind you that Ukraine is under occupation, to show you who is really in charge, to suggest
that the German attitude toward Ukrainians is one of contempt and that the expression of this contempt is
unrestrained.
(2) You yourself see also that Bodnar's flat is subject to searches, indicating that although he is a participant
in the anti-Jewish actions, he is a distrusted participant, and a participant who might feel intimidated by the
hostile scrutiny of the occupying Nazis.
(3) But most important of all, you see that the German sergeant is waiting for Bodnar to report back. Alan Levy
writes that "Bodnar was ... concerned ... that now he [Bodnar] had to account, verbally at least, for his two
prisoners" (p. 37). If Bodnar reports back with the news that you, Mr. Wiesenthal, escaped, then how might Bodnar
expect the face-slapping German sergeant to respond? For Bodnar at this point in the story to actually allow you, Mr.
Wiesenthal, to escape is heroic, it is self-sacrificing, it is suicidal. And yet the forgotten Bodnar does go ahead
and effect your escape, probably never imagining that in later years this will become an event unworthy of notice
during your blanket condemnation of Ukrainians.
What I urge you to do now, Mr. Wiesenthal, is the following:
(1) Conduct a search to determine the fate of the forgotten Bodnar, and bestow upon him the recognition that he
deserves for his heroic action. Hopefully, Bodnar is still alive, so that the recognition will not be posthumous.
Hopefully, Bodnar did not sacrifice his life to save yours, as then your ingratitude would be truly black.
(2) Bring the forgotten Bodnar to the attention of Morley Safer at 60 Minutes, and ask for some correction of the
negative image created of the Ukrainian police.
(3) Search your memory long and hard and determine a version of the story which appears to be closest to the
truth, and then publish it as the official account, because at present, the wildly different versions in your several
biographies create the negative image of someone who just spews tall tales off the top of his head, without any
consideration for making them consistent with earlier versions of those same tales. For example, Mr. Wiesenthal, what
impression do you imagine is created in the mind of a reader who is told in Justice Not Vengeance that Bodnar saved
you alone and took you to his apartment, but then is told in The Wiesenthal File that Bodnar saved you together with
another prisoner and took the two of you to the office of a "commissar" which office the two of you spent the entire
night cleaning? I will tell you what impression is created, Mr. Wiesenthal - it is that of a person lying so
clumsily, that one almost imagines that he does so in order to be caught and exposed so as to finally be able to
confess and to purge his conscience.
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 879 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 15 Sep 8/97 The elusive Lviv pogrom
September 8, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
According to your testimony on the 60 Minutes broadcast of October 23, 1994, "The Ugly Face of Freedom," in three
days following the evacuation of the Communist forces and before the arrival of the German troops, Ukrainian police
killed between five and six thousand Jews:
SAFER: He [Simon Wiesenthal] remembers that even before the Germans arrived, Ukrainian police
went on a 3-day killing spree.
WIESENTHAL: And in this 3 days in Lvov alone between 5 and 6 thousand Jews was killed.
...
SAFER: But even before the Germans entered Lvov, the Ukrainian militia, the police, killed 3,000
people in 2 days here.
Now before going beyond what was actually said in the broadcast, we already see a discrepancy which I ask you to
comment on. Specifically, you are the expert on the Holocaust who is testifying on 60 Minutes, and more than that you
are the eyewitness to the Lviv pogrom - the only eyewitness - and you tell Morley Safer that 5 to 6 thousand Jews were
killed in three days - but then Mr. Safer turns around and changes it to 3 thousand killed in two days. This does not
seem fair - after all you were there and Morley Safer wasn't, and whereas for Mr. Safer, this is just a story that he
is covering, for you it is the pivotal experience which determined the course of your life, the experience which in
the words of Mr. Safer, "compelled Wiesenthal to seek out the guilty, to bring justice."
So I wonder why Morley Safer changed your numbers? As you are the only witness adduced, Mr. Safer seems to have
lowered your figures on his own initiative. I wonder if you have contacted Mr. Safer concerning his revision of your
estimate, or if in your subsequent discussions with Mr. Safer, you might have by now arrived at a mutually-agreed
estimate? If you have, I wonder if you would be able to tell me whether Mr. Safer has agreed to raise his estimate,
or if you have agreed to lower yours?
Be that as it may, it must surprise you to learn that when I consulted Leni Yahil's The Holocaust: The Fate of
European Jewry, Oxford, New York, 1990 for further information on the Lviv pogrom, I found nothing. There is no
indication in Yahil's book that such a pogrom ever took place. If Yahil's book were cursory or carelessly researched,
then the oversight of the single largest pogrom of the War might be understandable, but if we are to believe the
book's dust jacket, then it is one of the best works on the Jewish Holocaust ever written:
When The Holocaust first appeared in Israel in 1987, it was hailed as the finest, most
authoritative history of Hitler's war on the Jews ever published. Representing twenty years of
research and reflection, Leni Yahil's book won the Shazar prize, one of Israel's highest awards
for historical work.
Well, in my continuing quest to learn more about the Lviv pogrom which you describe on 60 Minutes, I turned next
to Raul Hilberg's The Destruction of the European Jews, Holmes Meier, New York, 1985. This work too cannot be
accused of being either cursory or carelessly researched. For example, the publisher's promotional material claims:
This landmark work, now substantially revised and expanded, is destined to remain the foremost
source to which historians and others must turn in any exploration of the most infamous crime in
history.
...
This definitive edition of THE DESTRUCTION OF THE EUROPEAN JEWS is the most complete,
comprehensive, and authoritative account of the Nazi Holocaust.
As well, this same promotional material cites critical acclaim for Hilberg's work in Michael R. Marrus's review in The
Times Literary Supplement which ends in the words:
No single book has contributed more, even to its critics, to an understanding of Nazi genocide.
In its originality, scope, and seriousness of theme, this is one of the great historical works
of our time.
But what does Hilberg say about the Lviv pogrom, this most massive pogrom of the Second World War; what does he
say in his "most complete, comprehensive, and authoritative account of the Nazi Holocaust"? Why he says ... exactly
nothing! He too seems to be totally unaware of it.
Worse than that - much worse - Hilberg makes statements to the effect that no such pogrom ever took place. I
reproduce below three quotations from Hilberg, the last of which is particularly troubling, as it is his summary of
all anti-Jewish activity in Ukraine, and it flatly contradicts the possibility of the pogrom that you describe:
From the Ukraine Einsatzkommando 6 of Einsatzgruppe C reported as follows:
Almost nowhere can the population be persuaded to take active steps against
the Jews. This may be explained by the fear of many people that the Red
Army may return. Again and again this anxiety has been pointed out to us.
Older people have remarked that they had already experienced in 1918 the
sudden retreat of the Germans. In order to meet the fear psychosis, and in
order to destroy the myth ... which, in the eyes of many Ukrainians, places
the Jew in the position of the wielder of political power, Einsatzkommando
6 on several occasions marched Jews before their execution through the
city. Also, care was taken to have Ukrainian militiamen watch the shooting
of Jews.
This "deflation" of the Jews in the public eye did not have the desired effect. After a few
weeks, Einsatzgruppe C complained once more that the inhabitants did not betray the movements of
hidden Jews. The Ukrainians were passive, benumbed by the "Bolshevist terror." Only the ethnic
Germans in the area were busily working for the Einsatzgruppe. (Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of
the European Jews, 1961, p. 202 - in this case, I am quoting from the 1961 edition)
The Slavic population stood estranged and even aghast before the unfolding spectacle of the
"final solution." There was on the whole no impelling desire to cooperate in a process of such
utter ruthlessness. The fact that the Soviet regime, fighting off the Germans a few hundred
miles to the east, was still threatening to return, undoubtedly acted as a powerful restraint
upon many a potential collaborator. (Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews, 1985,
p. 308)
First, truly spontaneous pogroms, free from Einsatzgruppen influence, did not take place; all
outbreaks were either organized or inspired by the Einsatzgruppen. Second, all pogroms were
implemented within a short time after the arrival of the killing units. They were not
self-perpetuating, nor could new ones be started after things had settled down. (Raul Hilberg,
The Destruction of the European Jews, 1985, p. 312)
It would seem, Mr. Wiesenthal, that you were an eyewitness - the only eyewitness - to the largest pogrom of the
war, and that at the same time, at least two of the foremost chroniclers of the Jewish Holocaust have quite overlooked
this program, and in the case of Raul Hilberg, flatly deny that any such pogrom ever took place. According to
Hilberg, all Ukrainian pogroms took place after the arrival of the Germans, were instigated by the Germans, were small
in scale, and had no momentum of their own.
In view of this oversight on the part of the historians, Mr. Wiesenthal, shouldn't you get in touch with them and
recount your experiences to them so that the story of the Lviv pogrom is not lost to future generations, and so that
Jewish hatred of Ukrainians is not diminished by the loss?
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 906 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 16 Sep 9/97 Shifting date for the Lviv pogrom
September 9, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In my letter to you of September 8, I demonstrated that two prominent historians seem to be unaware of the
pre-German Lviv pogrom which killed 5 to 6 thousand Jews, at least as claimed by Morley Safer and yourself on the 60
Minutes broadcast, The Ugly Face of Freedom of October 23, 1994. I will remind you that in that 60 Minutes broadcast,
Morley Safer twice asserts - once seemingly in your hearing - that the Lviv pogrom antedated the arrival of the
Germans, thus placing culpability squarely at the feet of the Ukrainian perpetrators.
In a continuing effort to learn more about this Lviv pogrom, I turned to your biographical Justice Not Vengeance,
only to discover you claiming that this pogrom postdated the arrival of the Germans:
Thousands of detainees were shot dead in their cells by the retreating Soviets. This gave rise
to one of the craziest accusations of that period: among the strongly anti-Semitic population
the rumour was spread by the Ukrainian nationalists that all Jews were Bolsheviks and all
Bolsheviks were Jews. Hence it was the Jews who were really to blame for the atrocities
committed by the Soviets.
All the Germans needed to do was to exploit this climate of opinion. It is said that after
their arrival they gave the Ukrainians free rein, for three days, to 'deal' with the Jews.
(Simon Wiesenthal, Justice Not Vengeance, 1989, p. 36, emphasis added)
As the timing of the Lviv pogrom is critical to assigning blame, I would have expected this timing to have been
verified with care and to be either consistent between the two reports, or else with an explanation offered for any
inconsistency. Instead, I find that you along with Morley Safer have broadcast a version in 1994 that directly
contradicts a version that you published five years earlier in 1989.
I look forward to hearing your clarification of this discrepancy.
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 2113 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 18 Sep 11/97 Questions concerning the Waffen SS
September 11, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
Your accusation that Canada harbors a large number of war criminals has been
incessant over the years, and at one point led to the creation of Canada's Deschenes
Commission on War Criminals. This accusation seems to be based primarily on Canada's
presently being home to some former members of the Ukrainian Galicia Division, combined
with the fact that the Galicia Division was categorized by the Germans as belonging to
the Waffen SS.
The first question that I would like to put to you, Mr. Wiesenthal, is whether you
are aware that the Waffen SS was a combat unit that played no role in the management of
concentration camps, and carried out no SS functions? I wonder if you are aware of
this, as you typically - perhaps always? - drop the qualification "Waffen" and refer to
members of the Galicia Division simply as members of the "SS," which gives the
misleading impression that combat soldiers were administrators of concentration camps.
If you are already aware of the distinction between the SS and the Waffen SS, then I
wonder that you would allow yourself to present the misleading picture that you have
been presenting. If you are unaware of this distinction, then I wonder how it came to
be that you are accorded the status of an expert witness on World War II events, as you
were on the 60 Minutes broadcast The Ugly Face of Freedom on October 23, 1994. Would
you be able to throw any light on this question?
But on top of that, you must have become aware during your long career as a Nazi
hunter that Ukraine was not unique in providing the German armed forces with Waffen SS
troops. Below, I reproduce a quote from an interview by Slavko Nowytski of Professor
Norman Davies, historian at the University of London, and author of the recent Europe:
A History, published by Oxford University Press:
In discussing the question of collaborating with Germany Prof. Davies
noted that, "A large number of the volunteers for the Waffen SS came
from Western Europe. The nation which supplied it the largest number
of divisions was the Netherlands [four]. There were two Belgian
divisions, there was a French Waffen SS. To my mind, it's rather
surprising that Ukraine, which is a much larger country [than the
Netherlands or Belgium] supplied only one Waffen SS Division.... It's
surprising that there were so few Ukrainians [in the German Army].
Many people don't know, for example, that there were far more Russians
fighting alongside the Wehrmacht or in the various German armies than
there were Ukrainians.... Thanks to Soviet propaganda, the Russian
contribution to the Nazi war effort has been forgotten, whereas the
Ukrainian contribution has been remembered, I think, too strongly."
(Andrew Gregorovich, Forum, No. 95, Spring, 1997, p. 34)
And so the information in the above quotation leads to several more questions:
(1) As the population of The Netherlands is small, and as it contributed the
largest number of Waffen SS divisions, this gives The Netherlands the largest per
capita contribution to the Waffen SS of any country. Would you conclude from this that
the people of The Netherlands are the most anti-Semitic in the world? And following
the same line of reasoning, would you conclude that the people of Belgium are the next
most anti-Semitic? And also that as the population of France is approximately equal to
the population of Ukraine, and as each of these contributed one Waffen SS division,
that the French are approximately as anti-Semitic as the Ukrainians?
(2) As you have expended considerable energy attacking the former members of the
Galicia Division as war criminals, I wonder if you have expended any similar energy
attacking former members of The Netherlands, Belgium, and French Waffen SS divisions in
the same way? For example, have you demanded any investigation of The Netherlands
Waffen SS, and as a result has the government of The Netherlands ever created a
commission on war criminals comparable to Canada's Deschenes Commission on War
Criminals? And have you done so in Belgium? In France?
If not, then why not? Why do you single out the Galicia Division? How is the
Galicia Division different from the other Waffen SS divisions?
(3) If in comparison to several other countries, Ukraine contributed
proportionately fewer numbers to the Waffen SS, or to any of the German armed forces,
then shouldn't you as a Nazi hunter, commend or thank Ukrainians for their relatively
small contribution to the German war effort?
(4) Are you aware that the chief motive behind the creation of the Galicia
Division was to prevent the Soviet re-occupation of Ukraine? Are you aware that in
consequence, the Galicia Division was organized with the proviso that it not be used
against the Western allies, but only against the Soviets on the Eastern front; and that
in fact, the only use to which the Galicia Division was ever put was against the
Soviets in the Battle of Brody? If you are aware of this, then why did you not mention
it on the 60 Minutes broadcast in which you were the chief witness and the Galicia
Division the chief subject of discussion? If you are not aware of this, then why does
60 Minutes consider you an authority on World War II?
Would you happen to know if the Waffen SS divisions of other countries were
created under the same proviso?
(5) Given that Canada's Deschenes Commission on War Criminals failed to identify
even a single member of the Galicia Division as calling for further investigation; and
given that neither you nor anyone else has ever had any member of the Galicia Division
convicted of any crime, or even tried for any crime; and, most importantly, given that
neither you nor anyone else has ever even specified any crime of which the Galicia
Division as a whole, or any member of the Galicia Division, might have been guilty
given all this, I wonder if the time has not finally come when you have to admit that
your obsession with the Galicia Division has been misplaced?
And would you happen to know if the Waffen SS divisions of The Netherlands,
Belgium, and France have proven to be as free from blame as has the Ukrainian Galicia
Division?
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 840 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 19 Sep 12/97 Testimony of Erwin Schulz
September 12, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In my letters to you of September 8 and 9, 1997, I have questioned your assertion
made on the 60 Minutes broadcast The Ugly Face of Freedom of October 23, 1994 to the
effect that in the few days before the arrival of the Germans, Ukrainians killed some 5
to 6 thousand Jews in Lviv. I have recently come across some testimony that indicates
that your assertion is correct on all of the details of this event save one.
The fresh testimony that I am referring to is that of Erwin Schulz, Commander of
Einsatzkommando 5 (a subunit of Einsatzgruppe C), from May until 26 September, 1941.
From Schulz's testimony, it appears that several of the details of your assertion are
correct: namely that the number murdered was 5,000, which is within the bounds of your
own estimate; that the location was indeed Lviv (identified as Lemberg); that the time
was indeed during the few days prior to the arrival of the Germans; and that the chief
participants were indeed Ukrainians and Jews, although Schulz does mention the
secondary involvement of others.
The point on which Schulz differs from you is that whereas you say that the
slaughter consisted of Ukrainians killing Jews, Schulz says that it consisted of Jews
killing Ukrainians:
We learned that, before the Russian troops had left, a very great
number of Lemberg citizens, Ukrainians and Polish inhabitants of other
towns and villages had been killed in this prison and in other
prisons. Furthermore, there were many corpses of German men and
officers, among them many Air Corps officers, and many of them were
found mutilated. There was a great bitterness and excitement among the
Lemberg population against the Jewish sector of the population. (Erwin
Schulz, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The Holocaust: Selected Documents
in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New York, 1982, Volume 18, p. 18)
On the next day, Dr. RASCH informed us to the effect that the killed
people in Lemberg amounted to about 5,000. It has been determined
without any doubt that the arrests and killings had taken place under
the leadership of Jewish functionaries and with the participation of
the Jewish inhabitants of Lemberg. That was the reason why there was
such an excitement against the Jewish population on the part of the
Lemberg citizens. (Erwin Schulz, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The
Holocaust: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New York,
1982, Volume 18, p. 18)
I wonder if you would care to comment on this discrepancy between Schulz's
testimony and your own?
Sincerely yours,
Lubomyr Prytulak
HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 1435 hits since 18Jan98
Wiesenthal Letter 20 Sep 13/97 Jews killing Ukrainians in Lviv
September 13, 1997
Simon Wiesenthal
Jewish Documentation Center
Salztorgasse 6
1010 Vienna
Austria
Dear Mr. Wiesenthal:
In my letter to you of September 12, I presented the testimony of Erwin Schulz to
the effect that in the few days prior to the arrival of German forces in Lviv in 1941,
some 5,000 inhabitants of the Lviv region, predominantly Ukrainians and Poles, had been
killed, and that the killing had been conducted "under the leadership of Jewish
functionaries and with the participation of the Jewish inhabitants of Lemberg."
The continuing question before us can be broken down into two parts: (1) Were
such large numbers of Ukrainians and Poles killed? (2) What ethnic groups were most
responsible for the killing?
On the first question, there does not appear to be much doubt - every one of the
half-dozen sources that I consulted agree that the slaughter did take place. In fact,
in the last quotation of the following set of six, you yourself, Mr. Wiesenthal, can be
seen to agree:
Before fleeing the German advance the Soviet occupational regime
murdered thousands of Ukrainian civilians, mainly members of the city's
[Lviv's] intelligentsia. (Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Volume 3, p. 222)
The Bolsheviks succeeded in annihilating some 10,000 political
prisoners in Western Ukraine before and after the outbreak of
hostilities (massacres took place in the prisons in Lviv, Zolochiv,
Rivne, Dubno, Lutsk, etc.). (Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopaedia, Volume
1, p. 886)
The Soviets' hurried retreat had tragic consequences for thousands of
political prisoners in the jails of Western Ukraine. Unable to
evacuate them in time, the NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en masse
during the week of 22-29 June 1941, regardless of whether they were
incarcerated for major or minor offenses. Major massacres occurred in
Lviv, Sambir, and Stanyslaviv in Galicia, where about 10,000 prisoners
died, and in Rivne and Lutsk in Volhynia, where another 5000 perished.
Coming on the heels of the mass deportations and growing Soviet terror,
these executions added greatly to the West Ukrainians' abhorrence of
the Soviets. (Orest Subtelny, Ukraine: A History, 1994, p. 461)
Right after the entry we were shown 2,400 dead bodies of Ukrainians
liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck at the city jail of
Lemberg [Lviv] by the Soviets prior to their marching off. (Hans Frank,
In the Face of the Gallows, p. 406)
In Lvov, several thousand prisoners had been held in three jails. When
the Germans arrived on 29 June, the city stank, and the prisons were
surrounded by terrified relatives. Unimaginable atrocities had
occurred inside. The prisons looked like abattoirs. It had taken the
NKVD a week to complete their gruesome task before they fled. (Gwyneth
Hughes and Simon Welfare, Red Empire: The Forbidden History of the
USSR, 1990, p. 133)
When the German attack came on 22 June the Soviets had no time to take
with them the people they had locked up. So they simply killed them.
Thousands of detainees were shot dead in their cells by the retreating
Soviets. (Simon Wiesenthal, Justice Not Vengeance, 1989, p. 35)
The first question having been settled - I trust - to the satisfaction of all, we
turn now to the second question: Is there any ethnic group that might have been
particularly responsible for the killing? Well, if the slaughter was conducted by the
NKVD or was directed by the NKVD, then the question reduces to What was the ethnic
composition of the NKVD?
The evidence that I have come across points to the conclusion that the NKVD was
dominated by Jews. Here is one such piece of evidence. The speaker is Yoram Sheftel,
John Demjanjuk's Israeli defense attorney, describing his visit to the Simferopol,
Ukraine, KGB headquarters in 1990 - what Sheftel seems to be saying is that out of a
sample of some 30 members of the wartime NKVD, every last one was a Jew:
On the right-hand wall was a stone memorial plaque engraved with the
names of about thirty KGB men from Simferopol who had fallen in the
Great Patriotic War, as the Soviets call World War II. I was shocked
and angry as I read the names: the first was Polonski and the last