Dissembling the Holocaust

“Dissembling” is a relatively new political term. It means obscuring the truth or falsification of appearances. In earlier times, it was often described as “putting lipstick on a pig”. When governments want to distort facts and represent a false narrative, they often hire professional public relations organizations to craft careful responses to “dissemble” messages, i.e., to write a message that appears to say something, but rather, carries little to no legitimacy. They are masterful propagandists. Lithuania is a case in point. After generations of honoring Nazi collaborators and murderers of Jews as their national heroes, Lithuania has been internationally exposed for their frauds.

Lithuania inundates local Lithuanians within Lithuania with a (fraudulent) message, and attempts to present a civilized facade to the remainder of the world, using sophisticated propaganda tools to make their message appear credible. That facade has now collapsed and the country has been exposed here, here, here, here, here, here, here and in so very many more international publications. The revelations of Lithuanians’ frauds have barely begun. Just as an onion is slowly peeled, only the first few layers have yet come to the world’s attention.

The outside-facing Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has entered full crisis management to try to convince the world not to believe their eyes or ears, but rather, to believe the carefully constructed deceptions prepared by media professionals. The most recent distortions were issued in a defense put forth by the Lithuanian Embassy in Pretoria as in the article here. Apparently believing that most readers are unaware, uninformed or unintelligent, the Lithuanian government obscures facts in their attempts to “dissemble”, for those that need assistance in understanding how this works, the explanation follows. The Lithuanian government’s comments per their statement are italicized; the explanation follows in regular text.

I pick out the flaws, deceptions and disingenuousness in the Embassy’s statement

We appreciate your request very much, as well as the opportunity to provide information to balance the story. – Lithuania considers that there are “balancing” factors for their honoring of genocidal Jew murderers. Honoring genocidal murderers is by its very nature – “not balanced”. Would Germany honor Adolph Hitler and provide “balancing factors”?

Controversy is caused by a memorial plaque on the wall of the building in Vilnius in which Noreika worked from December 1945 until his arrest in March 1946 by the Soviets for his involvement in organizing anti-Soviet resistance. Nowadays this building houses the Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences. – The Controversy is not caused by the plaque – the controversy is caused by Lithuania’s Holocaust distortions about their Holocaust hero. They refer to one plaque. They do not mention that there is a school named for this murderer, nor that the country is littered with monuments for him, as well as many other mass murderers of Jews. Too many in fact to ever be considered accidental. Mentioning only one single “plaque” is designed to diminish the magnitude of their agenda to honor murderers of Jews.

They also refer to the period after the war, deflecting from attention the period during the war when Jews were annihilated. This message is carefully constructed with the intention to confuse and deceive.

Not only Mr Gochin, but also the Lithuanian Jewish Community and certain intellectuals have been calling for taking down the commemorative plaque for years. – They do not mention that when the intellectuals called for the removal of monuments, the Lithuanian government publicly labelled them as “Agents of the Kremlin”, enemies of the State, Jews, and stupid people. Lithuanian also do not mention that the government uses intimidation strategies to silence those intellectuals (and anybody else) from speaking out, and in fact, the Government has stated that they are investigating me for (unspecified) criminal charges for speaking out against honoring murderers. The Lithuanian Government is also suing me for their costs in defending the murderers.

The position of the ministry of Foreign Affairs is clear – The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the government selling agency designed to market a positive image of the country to foreigners. This is the ONLY government ministry that has called for removal of monuments, and did so only after the case had been proved beyond any possibility of any doubt. They mention only this one government ministry while ignoring all internal-facing government departments who are currently calling for the maintenance of the monuments, including the State President, the State Security Department, and the State Supreme Court. This sentence is designed to make the reader infer the government wishes the monument taken down – an attempt to deceive the reader.

there should be no monuments in Lithuania to the people who participated in wartime atrocities. –says the Lithuanian Foreign Minister – however, The Minister has no control over any of these monuments, and his words here have no meaning or impact inside the country. These are platitudes designed for foreign viewers. When this Minister spoke out that ONE monument for ONE murderer should be removed, there were public demonstrations calling for his ouster.

We condemn all forms of collaboration with the Nazi regime during Lithuania’s occupation. – murdering Jews began before the Nazi occupation. Does the Minister also condemn the murders perpetrated by Lithuanians, who committed these on their own volition?

The same applies to the evaluation of Noreika’s work in Civil Administration in Šiauliai. – This sentence is meaningless. The Foreign Minister condemns Nazi Collaboration to foreigners. The murderers are glorified within the country.

Lithuanian foreign minister Linas Linkevičius personally has called upon Lithuanian institutions to remove a plaque honoring Jonas Noreika recently – Here the propaganda is designed to feature one man in the government, and try to portray him as a representative of the entire government. However, he stands completely alone and in opposition to the remaining members of government. It is the Lithuanian government as a whole that is going to Court to defend Lithuanian’s national heroes that murdered Jews. The message Mr. Linkevicius conveys to foreigners is in direct contravention to that promoted to domestic Lithuanians. This is Orwellian doublespeak.

He said an honest assessment of history will aid in countering propaganda against the small Baltic country and attempts to blacken the reputation of Lithuanian freedom fighters. “We shouldn’t be helping the propagandists. We should respond in principle when undisputed facts are raised about immoral behavior and Nazi collaboration by separate individuals,” Linkevičius told BNS news agency. – The term “Nazi collaboration by separate individuals” used is of particular deception. The interim Provisional Government and Lithuanian National Leadership were instrumental in the annihilation of Lithuanian Jews. It was Lithuanian leadership calling for the annihilation of Jews before Hitlerists decided on the “Final Solution”. This sentence is designed to make the reader think it was a few degenerate individuals. It was not. The Foreign Ministry also say that criticizing facts are aiding propagandists. When undisputed facts about Nazi criminals have been raised in the past, the weight of the government has been brought to bear against those people, using all forms of intimidation, meaning that locals live in fear of addressing the truth.

“Specific individuals who have committed criminal acts need to be judged accordingly. If we don’t do this, we are contributing to the propaganda machine which seeks to ruin the reputation of all,” he said. It is the Lithuanian Government itself that is committing fraud about the perpetrators operating the propaganda machine. It is the Lithuanian Government that is defending the reputation of the murderers.

We would like to draw your attention that the memory of the Holocaust is one of the key topics of Lithuania’s state policy in education and heritage protection. Is this “heritage protection” or “tourism promotion” because it appears these might be linked. These lines seemed to be blurred, with the opportunity to attract foreign tourists seemingly determining what heritage they care about.

What Holocaust education is provided?, Has it been studied by external and objective educators? After all, an education that hypothetically teaches that Jews deserved to be murdered would not be acceptable. Presenting vacuous statements without backup in an environment of deceit is not compelling evidence. It is simply Public Relations professionals crafting a message.

Due to the declared neutrality in 1939 and 3 occupations (1940 – Soviet, 1941 – Nazi, 1944 – Soviet) Lithuanian state didn‘t participate in World War II and was just a victim. We are talking about murdering Jews – not participation in WW2. This statement lacks context and deflects from the question. They also dismiss the reality of the Interim Lithuanian Provisional Government which makes this a deliberately fraudulent statement. They bring in extraneous non-related facts to abrogate responsibility when it was in fact Lithuanians themselves that committed the majority of the murders of the Jews.

During the Holocaust, approximately 95 per cent of Lithuanian Jews perished. “Perished” or “murdered”? Did they “perish” of old age, the flu, or measles? These are carefully crafted words.

At whose hands did they “perish”?

This is a stand-alone comment without context. It is designed to convey tragedy, but not responsibility. Responsibility is deliberately obscured.

It was a catastrophe for the state and society of Lithuania and it is very distressing that Lithuanian citizens also directly participated in the mass murder of Jews organized by the Nazis. If it is “distressing”, why will Lithuania not release the names of murderers as they have promised to do for so many years? Why do they deliberately honor murderers of Jews as their heroes? How many Lithuanians participated in the slaughters? The government says: “in the mass murder of Jews organized by the Nazis” – but mostly, Lithuanians did the murdering on their own without Nazi involvement or instigation. This is a blatant attempt to deceive and to deflect responsibility for Lithuanian crimes onto others.

The Government of Lithuania condemns in the strongest possible terms those Lithuanian citizens who collaborated with the Nazi regime and were involved in this horrible crime against humanity – atrocities of the Holocaust. This is a blatant lie. Murderers did not only “collaborate”, they enthusiastically and opportunistically murdered. Blaming Nazis is sweeping responsibility under the Nazi rug, and a dishonest statement. This deliberately abrogates responsibility.

If they condemn the murderers, why do they defend so many of the murderers, honor them and commit fraud about their deeds? The Government cannot condemn a criminal and simultaneously build a monument to them.

The murders began before the Nazi regime – do they only condemn the murders by Nazis, and ignore the murders by Lithuanians?

At the same time, more than 900 Lithuanians hold the honorary title of “Righteous Among The Nations”, awarded by the State of Israel to gentiles who risked their lives to save Jews. Who did these 900 have to protect Jews from? Lithuanians? Nazis? Space aliens? After the war, those 900 had to hide from their neighbors because they became the new persecuted in Lithuania. This Lithuania government statement is deflection from the facts. Why keep bringing up the 0.045% of the population who acted appropriately and negate the murderers and bystanders? This statement is an agenda to misinform. Between 20-30,000 Lithuanians participated in active persecution, almost 2,000,000 Lithuanians stood by and watched – akin to a spectator sport – and 900 rescued. Why mention ONLY those 900?

On official visit to the State of Israel in 1995, Lithuanian President Algirdas Brazauskas apologized to the Jewish people on behalf of Lithuania for the actions of its countrymen who had participated in the Holocaust. Yes, he did. And for this apology, he was utterly vilified upon his return to Lithuania.

He also recognized the need to tell words of truth about the Holocaust in Lithuania. But Lithuania does not, and Lithuania now has an active disinformation campaign to distort facts.

This moral position became a clear guideline for civil society and long-term policy in relation to Holocaust of the reborn Republic of Lithuania. This is not a “guideline”. This statement is an outright lie. The Lithuanian Government is an active Holocaust distorter and Lithuanians use intimidation tactics against those that will not participate in their frauds.

There has been a tremendous amount of academic research and public debate on the Holocaust in Lithuania in recent decades. This horrifying period of Lithuanian history is being thoroughly researched by the Genocide and Resistance Research Centre of Lithuania. – The Genocide and Resistance Research Center is a locus of Holocaust fraud and is the very Government center that is defending Noreika and promoting him and other Jew-murderers as heroes of the nation. Here, Lithuania is using a Center of fraud as their defense against the identification of fraud. This statement takes dishonesty to unparalleled heights. This is similar to placing a fox in a henhouse and then claiming the fox was there for the hens’ protection. It is a fraudulent, insulting statement.

With the support of the Sub-commission of the International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes on the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi Occupation Regimes and the Holocaust. Again, a fact without context. The first Commission closed when the Lithuanian Government tried to accuse Jewish Holocaust Survivors of having possibly committed war crimes in order to survive. The second Commission has not met in my memory. This is deliberate misinformation.

Over 200 works on the subject of the Holocaust in Lithuania have been published. Some of these works have been internationally rejected by Holocaust academics. Building a library of propaganda is not a defense against facts.

Teaching of the Holocaust is included in schools’ curriculum. – These are a couple of lines that negate the complicity of Lithuanians. Omitting facts and lying about others is not teaching history, it is deliberate miseducation of the youth. This is how Soviets educated the youth of the Soviet Union to become good loyal foot-soldiers for their regime. Lithuania should publicly produce what they teach students in schools for international assessment.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged during his official meeting with Lithuanian Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis important steps Lithuania has undertaken to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust, to speak openly about this horrible crime and for commitment to fight anti-Semitism, as well as for the preservation of Lithuania‘s Jewish heritage. PM Netanyahu was roundly rejected by Jewish groups for “selling” historical deception to Lithuania for their UN vote. Lithuania presents this one line of information in the hopes of reaching only the uninformed. The rest of the world has adequately responded to this distortion in articles such as here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Lithuania depends on the unintelligent, misinformed and miseducated to read their messages and believe them. There is not enough lipstick in the world to cover up the stench of their Holocaust dissembling.

220,000 murdered Jews lie restlessly in Lithuanian death-pits. Until truth is told, there is no possibility of rest for them.