Wannsee Protocol

Several scholars have raised doubts about the authenticity of the so-called Wannsee Protocol. This document is alleged to have been written by Adolf Eichmann after the so-called Wannsee Conference of 20 January 1942. For a discussion of the contents of the Wannsee Conference as laid out in its protocol, see the previous entry.

The point of departure for claims that this protocol may be a forgery is the fact that the person who claimed to have discovered this document – Robert Kempner – reproduced a copy of it in one of his books. However, the version published by Kempner is different than the one which today is claimed to be the original. Furthermore, several participants of the conference testified after the war that the content of the alleged protocol was incorrect, because quite a lot was missing which had been discussed, while things were mentioned which had not been topics of the meeting.

Others have pointed out many stylistic and formal errors. A central point of contention is the use of the runic “”-symbol, which had its own key on official typewriters of the Third Reich. The only extant copy of this protocol claims to be the 16th copy of 30 copies altogether. However, this 16th copy exists in at least five different versions, some with a normal “SS” and some with a runic-formed “.” All these versions show some minor deviations in the text as listed in the table. At best, only one of them can be authentic; all other copies are not.

The cover letter belonging to the “Wannsee Protocol” likewise exists in two versions, one with normal “SS” and one with runic-formed “.” Here, though, the situation is even more unmistakable: not only was an attempt made to leave the typewritten area unaltered, but the handwritten notes of some official, which are found on the version with the normal SS key, have been copied onto the second version with runic-formed “” symbols. But the forgers did not manage to completely erase all traces of the old typewritten text. Some of these traces are still there. Compared with the first version, the identical handwriting has also slipped a few millimeters with respect to the machine text. The forgery is plainly obvious and recognizable to anyone. The proof of the forgery, at least of one version of the cover letter, has thus been furnished for a long time now.

For now, we can only be mystified about the reasons for these manipulations. After all, the protocol’s contents do not prove that the Third Reich was planning to exterminate the Jews, as the previous entry shows; indeed, quite the contrary.

(For more details, see Rudolf 2023, pp. 132-135.)