Menachem: “The Rebbe never said this about himself. The Rebbe said this about his father-in-law, the Rebbe Rayatz.”
I feel some sneaky backtracking here. He said it about the Rayatz and not about himself. So did he or did he not mean to imply it about himself? If yes, it’s as good as him saying it. And if not, who decided that he himself was Atzmus umehus melubash beguf? The chassidim? Can chassidim decide something so radical on their own without an explicit statement from the rebbe himself.
Wasn’t it R Yoel Kahn who said after 3 Tammuz that the mistake of the chassidim is that they decided the rebbe was Mashiach when he didn’t say so explicitly, even though it was the logical conclusion? I believe he said by way of illustration something along the lines that chassidim can’t come to the conclusion that 2 plus 2 equals 4 if the rebbe doesn’t say so.