JUST WHEN you thought he had gone away for good … UPFRONT was as surprised as you would be to learn that a new history of foodstuffs giant and, ahem, “Kiwi icon” Watties was written by one David Irving.

David Irving! Surely not the notorious David Irving of the pro-Nazi school, the historian who has variously denied both Hitler’s knowledge of the Holocaust and the very existence of the Holocaust itself?

Surely not the David Irving whose revisionist views have sent a collective shudder through the entire postwar Jewish community?

No, not that one, actually – this David Irving is the former chief executive officer of the Heinz-Wattie outfit, a man who worked his way up from company secretary (he went, you could say, from acting under orders to giving orders). Still, something about that name Heinz … (Irving’s book, It Must Be Watties!, is published this week by David Bateman.)

“Upfront, September 5, describes British historian David Irving as ‘the notorious David Irving of the pro-Nazi school … who has denied … the very existence of the Holocaust.’

“I’ve read some of Irving’s books. ‘Of the pro-Nazi school’ is a odd turn of phrase, but I don’t believe it is accurate. Do you have any evidence to justify the label? And in an interview with Australian radio station 2GB in July 1995 Irving estimated the number of Jews killed in concentration camps during the war years as between 1 and 4 million (see http://old.fpp.co.uk/Australia/Legal/Radio2GB250795.html).

Hardly a denial.”

Phil Robinson,
Hamilton, New Zealand.

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