American Free Press / Barnes Review:
neo-Nazi originator of some 9/11 complicity hoaxes
The American Free Press is an ultra-right-wing Holocaust denial publication, the successor organization to the "Liberty Lobby," a longtime ultra conservative organization.
In 2004, the "AFP" unveiled one of the most absurd hoaxes yet floated to distract the 9/11 truth movement
-- the claim that the crash of Flight 93 never happened. Presumably, the eyewitnesses
to the flight are all Mossad operatives keeping "the truth"
from the American public, although their "article" claiming
"no plane" in Pennsylvania does not address the eyewitness testimony
and the obvious physical evidence that shows their claims are mere "chaff,"
a distraction from the real story. These sorts of distractions seem to
get more and more bizarre with each passing month -- and few of these
distractions dare talk about the 9/11 wargames, NORAD and the role of
Dick Cheney. Who benefits from redirecting the discussions about 9/11
complicity to blurry photos, evidence-less science fiction theories, and
no plane stories that are absolutely refuted by eyewitness testimony and
abundant physical evidence?
American Free Press sometimes promotes itself as "AFP," which
can cause confusion, since one of the world's leading news organizations
shares the same acronym (Agence France-Press).
American Free Press: the Nazi connections
The American Free Press publishes "The Barnes Review," a neo-Nazi
holocaust denial site that shares the same mailing address as AFP. The
"Barnes Review" page www.barnesreview.org/Nobel_Prize/nobel_prize.html
included this gem
Adolf Hitler: An Overlooked Candidate for the Nobel Prize
By Alex S. Perry Jr.
If anyone deserved the Nobel Peace Prize, it was Adolf Hitler. Hitler
did not want war. World War II was forced on Germany.
Barnes Review offers a wide variety of neo-Nazi holocaust denial literature
that severely tests any sane person's committment toward tolerating the
First Amendment. It is interesting to see how AFP carefully "segregates"
their Nazi literature onto the "Barnes" site, so that their
AFP newspaper seems somewhat legitimate if you don't look closely at the
organization.
Who was Barnes?
http://holocaust-history.org/denial/abc-clio/index.shtml
Holocaust Denial, a Definition
by Andrew E. Mathis
This entry on Holocaust denial appears in Conspiracy Theories in American
History: An Encyclopedia. Written by a member of The Holocaust History
Project, it discusses the history of this conspiracy belief in Europe
and America.
... At the same time, antiwar historians, notably Harry
Elmer Barnes, began to suggest conspiratorial motivations
on the part of the major powers at war [note: World War I]. As historian
Deborah Lipstadt has noted, Barnes and his colleagues were correct in
many of their assumptions, for example, Germany was not solely at fault
for the war (Serbia had, after all, fired the opening salvo); much anti-German
propaganda spread during and after the war was, in fact, false; and
there were war profiteers who made fortunes on the slaughter of the
war (Lipstadt, (33-34)01). However, this did not change the essentially
imperial nature of the war itself. Nevertheless, with the doubts of
Barnes and his cohorts borne out through historical method, reports
of German atrocities committed during World War II (this time true)
would be treated with even greater skepticism. Barnes, who lived
into the late 1960s, was among the first Americans to embrace Holocaust
denial. [emphasis added]
www.ctka.net/djm.html (Citizens for Truth about the Kennedy Assassination)
Beware: The Douglas/Janney/Simkin Silver Bullets
By James DiEugenio
[excerpt]
... Carto ran a small media conglomerate called the Liberty Lobby for a number of years. But there was a split in the ranks and the dissidents founded the IHR, while Carto's main publication was The Barnes Review. This is important because the TRB in TRB News, stands for The Barnes Review. As one commentator has noted about the site, although its archives contain some Holocaust revisionist material, a lot of the other stuff comes off as anti-Bush liberalism. But here is the problem. A lot of the material appears to be about as genuine as Regicide. Further, as that book was aimed at a target audience, and the Muller book also appeared aimed at a target audience, some of the "stories" on the site seem aimed at the growing resentment towards President Bush. To the point of making up false stories which are picked up by legitimate outlets but are later discredited. For instance, there was a story there saying that the Pentagon is grossly underreporting the number of casualties in Iraq. The story's by-line was by one Brian Harring who was supposed to have found a PDF file with the real numbers on them. And this story then spread to places like the liberal Huffington Post. Well, there is a Brian Harring, but as one can see by reading this entry (scroll down to the section entitled "Riots in the Streets"), he had nothing to do with this story and it appears that Stahl/Douglas is using his name against his will.
I could continue in this vein , but the point is that not only does Stahl/Storch/Douglas partake in what seem to be fraudulent books and stories, but -- like a classic confidence man -- he seems to aim them at certain audiences he knows will be predisposed to accept them. The latter stories I mentioned seem to be targeted at left/liberal sites in order to fool and then discredit them by the eventual exposure of false information. To stretch a parallel, in intelligence realms, this concept is called "blowback".
AFP / Barnes created
"No Plane crash in
Pennsylvania" hoax
www.americanfreepress.net/html/9-11_mysteries.html
Updated September 17, 2004
9-11 Mysteries Remain Three Years After Terror Attacks, Public Still
Doubts ‘Official’ Story
By Christopher Bollyn
AFP also promotes the fiction that there was a giant explosion at WTC
Building 6 http://www.americanfreepress.net/07_14_02/Unexplained_9-11_/unexplained_9-11_.html
- which has been ably refuted at
www.911review.com/errors/wtc/b6_explosion.html
flight93crash.com
has the real story of Flight 93, including convincing evidence
that the plane was shot down.
What's next -- the "no building"
theory?
AFP / Barnes used to discredit 9/11 skepticism
American Free Press / Barnes Review used to smear investigations into
9/11 as anti-semitism by Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC is a group
that focuses on fringe fascists but ignores corporate and military-industrial
complex fascism). Having fringe fascists like AFP/Barnes focus on 9/11
conspiracy serves to discredit real evidence of official complicity.
www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=32&printable=1
'Risking Their Freedom'
A group of 'internationally renowned scholars' probes 9/11. And, to the
surprise of no one, identifies a familiar enemy.
Intelligence Report
Fall 2002
from Jim Hoffman, webmaster of wtc7.net
and 911review.com
(highly respected 9/11 truth websites)
For all I know Chris [Bollyn] is a sincere (despite apparently
embracing some amazing Holocaust revisionist views) hardworking investigative
reporter. If that's true, howerver, he doesn't seem to apply a very
good critical filter to the information he gathers. For example, he
appears to be the source of some of the more deeply ingrained errors
in the 9/11 skeptics' literature, such as the Building 6 explosion myth:
http://911review.com/errors/wtc/b6_explosion.html
and the idea that seismic spikes preceded the
collapses:
http://911review.com/errors/wtc/seismic.html
I recently spoke at an event in Los Angeles: "Solving
the 9/11 Crime - A Citizens' Grand Jury", in which Chris
was promoting "In Plane Site",
and presenting dozens of ideas for which I see no basis in evidence.
I was so disturbed at the damage he was doing to the credibility of
careful research that I spent half of my talk debunking the more nonsensical
ideas he advanced in his talk just before mine.
Barnes Review floats fake story as bait
to anti-war movement
A story floated on tbrnews.com - the Barnes Review -
in spring 2005 claimed that 9,000 American troops had really been killed
in Iraq, but the truth was being covered up. This claim was made at a
time when Bush's approval ratings and military recruiting levels reached
new lows, and the empire is on the defensive with growing disgust domestically
and internationally. This story is almost certainly disinformation, but
like all good lies there is some truth to it. The official lists of killed
in action do not include mercenaries (euphemistically called contractors)
and soldiers from allied nations (mainly Britain). There are a number
of probably true stories alleging a large contingent of "Green Card"
soldiers - illegal immigrants caught at the border and promised legal
residence or citizenship if they fight for Uncle Sam. The number of these
troops in Iraq, and the numbers wounded and killed are unlikely to ever
be confirmed precisely. It is also worth noting that the US military has
declined to make any public statements about the number of Iraqis killed
during the invasion and occupation, but a true figure is likely to be
well over 100,000 -- and millions suffer from the privations, fear, humiliation,
and other consequences of being a stranger in your own homeland.
www.dailykos.com/story/2005/5/4/15748/99064
WARNING: Beware the "Voice from the White House"
(TBR News is "The Barnes Review")
www.dailykos.com/story/2005/6/20/24437/8204
The "Daily Kos" blog has a long discussion about the "9,000
dead" story - here are three of the most insightful comments:
- one could entertain the notion that this
idea is being passed around to bait liberals into false claims
as an attempt to discredit our movement.
- Another thing to consider:
CHECK YOUR SOURCES. CHECK YOUR SOURCES' SOURCES.
Learn to question motives & presentation of information.
Even a cursory review of the available (on the web in general and dKos
in particular) info on tbrnews.org
(antisemitic conspiracymongers) would have raised several red flags
(not to mention finding the previously debunked diaries on this).
It is my hunch that a large part of especially
the openly antisemitic stuff (as opposed to Ray McGovern's
legitimate comments on POLITICAL connections between US rightwingers
and Israels loony religious right) is
pushed here and in comments threads on other lefty sites by plants wishing
to discredit the sites in question.
Then of course you have the terminally stupid "leftists"
who either push this shit themselves or comment approvingly.
- How's this for a conspiracy with history to it?
The US Government has had a history of
"infiltrating" left-wing groups to sow dissent. They would
appear as fanatical supporters but would use inflammatory rhetoric to
radicalize or discredit the group. Perhaps they are doing it in the
blogosphere and the trolling, insulting, magic-minded
folk are phonies.
So, do I really believe this is true? In reality, there are always enough
fuzzy-mind (and sometimes rude) folk out there that it certainly doesn't
have to be true to have such posts. On the other hand, I find believing
that it just might be true, that this person with this far-out theory,
or that this person who seems hell-bound to insult and divide might
be a fake - I find this oddly comforting. It allows me to not be upset
by divisiveness.
The bare-bones truth is bad enough without the need to flesh it out
with exaggerations.
AFP/Barnes used to be the Liberty
Lobby:
www.mtsu.edu/~baustin/revision.htm
Deniers in Revisionists Clothing
Ben S. Austin
Holocaust Denial in an Age of Skepticism
The impact of these deniers in "revisionist" clothing is greatly
abetted by certain characteristics of our times. As we approach the
close of the 20th century, we find ourselves living in an age of skepticism
-- about everything. There are clear signs that Americans have lost
trust in government. This is not so much a result of scandalous, or
alleged scandalous, behavior on the part of highly visible political
leaders. It goes much deeper than that. In fact, it appears that American
citizens have a remarkable capacity to overlook and forgive personal
mistakes of political leaders. ... At a much deeper level, however,
a prolonged and senseless war in Southeast Asia, the ramifications of
Watergate, Koreagate and arms deals with Iran may have shattered faith
in government beyond redemption.
A popular bumper sticker reads, "Ignore the media, think for yourself."
It also appears that we have lost faith in the public media to tell
us the truth about domestic and world events. News programs are presented
to us in the format of a talk show where every question has at least
two and usually many more sides. The end result is the conviction that
there is no truth about anything. ....
The combined effect of these trends may well be that the general population
no longer believes that anything is right or, for that matter, wrong.
Everything is relative, including truth. Every story has "another
side. It seems to me that the postmodern deconstruction strategies of
recent years has created an intellectual climate in which it is (a)
easy to level questions against any historical construction and (b)
easy to believe that history is a matter of perception, language, and
political agenda. It seems to me that revisionism is part and parcel
of this whole movement.
In 1979, the Institute for Historical Review, at its annual convention, offered a $50,000 reward to anyone who could
step forward and prove that there were gas chambers at Auschwitz and
that any Jews were gassed there. In 1980, a Jewish survivor of Auschwitz-Birkenau,
Auschwitz prisoner A-4685, answered the challenge by presenting affidavits
detailing the deaths of his mother, father, brother and two sisters
at the camp. The IHR refused to pay the reward so Mr. Mermelstein sued
the Institute. The case never actually went to trial. Both sides agreed
to a summary judgment by the court, and the court decided for Mel Mermelstein.
DATED: AUG 5, 1985
ROBERT A. WENKE, JUDGE
SUPERIOR COURT
APPROVED AS TO FORM AND CONTENT:
G. G. BAUMEN
Attorney for Defendants
INSTITUTE FOR HISTORICAL REVIEW,
LEGION FOR SURVIVAL OF FREEDOM,
ELISABETH CARTO and NOONTIDE PRESS
VON ESCH & ASSOCIATES
Attorneys for Defendants
LIBERTY LOBBY and WILLIS CARTO
The Court then issued the following order to the defendants as an official:
STATEMENT OF RECORD AND
LETTER OF APOLOGY TO MEL MERMELSTEIN
"WHEREAS, the Legion for Survival of Freedom, and
the Institute for Historical Review, sent by letter dated November 20,
1980, directly to Mel Mermelstein, a survivor of Auschwitz-Birkenau
and Buchenwald, an exclusive reward offer in a letter marked "'personal'"
dated November 20, 1980, offering Mr. Mermelstein a $50,000 exclusive
reward for "'proof that Jews were gassed in gas chambers at Auschwitz'"
"and further stating that if Mr. Mermelstein did not respond to
the reward offer "'very soon"', "the Institute for Historical
Review would ' publicize that fact to the mass media' ..."
"WHEREAS, Mr. Mermelstein formally applied for said $50,000 reward
on December 18, 1980; and
"WHEREAS, Mr. Mermelstein now contends that the Institute for Historical
Review knew, or should have known, from Mr. Mermelstein's letter to
the editor of the Jerusalem Post dated August 17, 1980, that Mr. Mermelstein
contended he was a survivor of Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald; knew,
or should have known, that Mr. Mermelstein contended that his mother
and two sisters were gassed to death at Auschwitz; and knew, or should
have known, of his contention that at dawn on May 22, 1944, he observed
his mother and two sisters, among other women and children, being lured
and driven into the gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau, which he later
discovered to be Gas Chamber No. 5; and
"WHEREAS, on October 9, 1981, the parties in dispute in the litigation
filed cross-motions for summary judgment resulting in the court, per
the Honorable Thomas T. Johnson, taking judicial notice as follows:
"'Under Evidence Code Section 452(h), this court does take judicial
notice of the fact that Jews were gassed to death at the Auschwitz Concentration
Camp in Poland during the summer of 1944'" and "'It just simply
is a fact that falls within the definition of Evidence Code Section
452(h). It is not reasonably subject to dispute. And it is capable of
immediate and accurate determination by resort to sources of reasonably
indisputable accuracy. It is simply a fact.'"
"WHEREAS, Mr. Mermelstein and other survivors of Auschwitz contend
that they suffered severe emotional distress resulting from said reward
offer and subsequent conduct of the Institute of Historical Review;
and
"WHEREAS, the Institute for Historical Review and Legion for Survival
of Freedom now contend that in offering such reward there was no intent
to offend, embarrass or cause emotional strain to anyone, including
Mr. Mermelstein, a survivor of Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald Concentration
Camps of World War II, and a person who lost his father, mother and
two sisters who also were inmates of Auschwitz;
"WHEREAS, the Institute for Historical Review and Legion for Survival
of Freedom should have been aware that the reward offer would cause
Mr. Mermelstein and other survivors of Auschwitz to suffer severe emotional
distress which the Institute for Historical Review and Legion for Survival
of Freedom, now recognize is regrettable and abusive to survivors of
Auschwitz.
http://squawk.ca/lbo-talk/0304/2395.html
report on a neo-nazi conference in Europe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willis_Carto
profile of Willis Carto, famous American neo-Nazi who founded AFP/Barnes
... In 1955, he founded the organization called Liberty
Lobby, which remained in operation under the control of Willis Carto
until 2001, when the organization was forced into bankruptcy as a result
of a lawsuit. Liberty Lobby was perhaps best known for publishing the
newspaper, The Spotlight, between 1975 and 2001, which is also now defunct.
Willis Carto and other people who were involved with The Spotlight
have since started a new newspaper, called the American Free Press,
which is similar in tone.
Carto was also the founder of a publishing company called Noontide Press,
which published a number of books on white racialist subjects, including
Yockey's Imperium. Noontide Press later became closely associated with
the Institute for Historical Review (IHR), and fell out of Carto's hands
at the same time as the IHR did. The IHR was founded by Willis Carto
in 1979, with the intent of promoting the proposition that the Nazi
Holocaust never happened - a view known as Holocaust revisionism or
Holocaust denial. After losing control of Noontide Press and the IHR
in a hostile takeover by former associates, Carto started another
publication, the Barnes Review, which is also dedicated to denying that
the Holocaust happened.
Willis Carto has had a long history of attempting to take the remains
of existing groups and publications, and turning them into vehicles
for his ideology. In 1966, Willis Carto acquired control of the American
Mercury, a magazine which was once a highly respected periodical associated
with H.L. Mencken, but which was on its last leg by the time Carto acquired
it, and quickly went defunct. After the failed third-party Presidential
campaign of George Wallace in 1968, Carto acquired control of what was
left of the Youth for Wallace organization, and transformed it into
an openly white supremacist youth organization called
the National Youth Alliance. Carto eventually lost control of the National
Youth Alliance to a rival on the far right, William Pierce, who transformed
it into the National Alliance, which is today the most notorious neo-Nazi
organization operating in the United States. Willis Carto also acquired
the Sun Radio Network in the early 1990s, and attempted to use talk
radio as a vehicle for spreading his views. That network also became
defunct under Carto's control.
In 1984, Willis Carto was among those involved in starting a new political
party called the Populist Party. As with many other Carto creations,
this group quickly fell out of the hands of Carto in a hostile takeover
from disgruntled former associates. This Populist Party, which
critics charged was an electoral vehicle for current and former Ku Klux
Klan and Christian Identity members, was not a continuation of the earlier
Populist Party of the late 1800s, which was a left-wing party. The Populist
Party started by Willis Carto was a party of the far right, and is best
known for running David Duke as its Presidential nominee in 1988,
and former Green Beret officer Bo Gritz in 1992. It disbanded by 1996.
In 2004, Carto joined in signing the New Orleans Protocol on behalf
of American Free Press. The New Orleans Protocol seeks to "mainstream
our cause" by reducing violence and internecine warfare, and was
written by David Duke. There are few movements on the American far right
that have not been influenced in one way or another by Willis Carto
in the last 50 years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Orleans_Protocol
New Orleans Protocol
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
The New Orleans Protocol (NOP) was signed in New Orleans,
Louisiana, on May 29, 2004 David Duke, then recently released from prison,
organized a weekend gathering of the euphemistically entitled "European
Nationalists", in the vein of White nationalism, which is often
confused with White supremacy. Following the death of William L. Pierce
in 2002, White racial movements had become splintered and divided. At
the gathering Duke presented his unity proposal for peace within the
movement and a better image to the outside world, to "mainstream
our cause."
The NOP calls for "Zero tolerance for violence.
Honourable and ethical behaviour in relations with other signatory groups.
(In other words, no enemies on the racialist far-right.) Maintaining
a high tone in our arguments and public presentations." Commentary
by Paul Fromm clarified that violence in "self-defense" is
permitted.
The signatories on that date were:
David Duke,
European-American Unity and Rights Organization (EURO)
Don Black, Stormfront
Willis Carto, American Free Press
Dr. Ed Fields, Truth at Last
Sam G. Dickson, Council of Conservative Citizens
Kevin Alfred Strom and David Pringle, National Alliance
Paul Fromm, Canadian Association for Free Expression
John Tyndall, of the British National Party, signed as an individual,
not as a representative of his party.
http://homepage.mac.com/lsf/
Willis Carto Information Site
http://holocaust-history.org/questions/ihr.shtml
Carto and the Institute for Historical Review (denial publication)
www.nizkor.org/features/qar/qar62.html
Holocaust Deniers and neo-Nazis
www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/adl/embattled-bigots/background.html
Holocaust denial depends on the embrace of a mass conspiracy
theory -- the allegation that Jews, academics, historians and others
falsified or maliciously distorted all testimonies, reports and pictures
of the Holocaust. Holocaust deniers explain Jewish motivation behind
the "Zionist conspiracy" as a means to gain power and influence.
In Carto's opening speech to the 1981 IHR convention, he asserted that
"Zionists" are "predators" who exploit the "guilt"
of Western society and "offer us expiation for the sins of our
fathers by giving us the magnificent opportunity to contribute to the
building of God's promised land for God's chosen people with our tax
money." The IHR's game plan is simple; by legitimizing "debate"
over the settled historical veracity of the Holocaust, deniers hope
to sow the seed of doubt, which in turn will foster anti-Semitism in
the form of resentment against those who have promoted this "hoax":
the Jews.
www.revisionists.com/revisionists/carto.html
other Nazi nutters consider Carto a disruptive influence (warning: revisionists
is a pro-Nazi Holocaust denial site)
For nearly five decades Willis Carto has been an important
but often contentious and polarizing figure in the American "right
wing" and the historical revisionist movement. ...
In 1955 Carto founded Liberty Lobby, a "populist" organization
that for years published a nationally-circulated tabloid weekly, The
Spotlight. Following its collapse in 2001, Carto and former
Liberty Lobby employees launched American Free Press (AFP),
a weekly tabloid similar to The Spotlight in style, tone and content.
He has since played an important role in running AFP.
Carto also supervises The Barnes Review, a revisionist history
journal he founded in 1994 that targets a middle-brow readership.
The Barnes Review and AFP have jointly sponsored several conferences.
Carto has a long record of bitter and litigious fights with persons
or groups that he regards as rivals. During the 1980s, for
example, he was involved in launching the Populist Party. But soon he
was embroiled in conflict with the group's other leading figures, who
accused him of misappropriating many tens of thousands of dollars of
Party funds. The bitter dispute accelerated the Party's decline and
collapse.
For some years Carto and his wife were associated with the Institute
for Historical Review, a leading "revisionist" publishing
and educational center that was founded in December 1978 by David McCalden
with support from Carto and several other persons.
In September 1993 the staff and management of the IHR and its parent
corporation terminated all ties with the Cartos after evidence came
to light that they were embezzling funds. (This theft was later proven
in court.)
Carto responded with an aggressive smear campaign against the
IHR and persons associated with it, accusing them of being agents of
the Zionist ADL, the CIA, and the Church of Scientology. He
also initiated a series of lawsuits against the IHR, its parent corporation,
and persons associated with the IHR.
Carto's costly and protracted campaign was not successful. Liberty Lobby
was forced into bankruptcy and went out of business. The Cartos likewise
filed for bankruptcy, and in early 2002 they lost their home in Escondido,
southern California. Since then they have been reportedly been living
in semi-hiding in northern Virginia.
A Brief History of Holocaust Revisionism
By Willis A. Carto
barnesreview.org/Revisionism/revisionism.html
Auschwitz: The Final Count
By Michael Collins Piper
A thought-provoking new anthology edited by English historian Vivian
Bird casts stark new light on what really happened at Auschwitz during
World War II. As the evidence shows, the official "facts"
just don’t add up.
www.barnesreview.org/auschwitz.htm
link moved to www.barnesreview.org/html/tocsept1999.html
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