Washington Post Book Reviews
For You
Wednesday August 4, 2010
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HUNTING EVIL: The Nazi War Criminals Who Escaped And the Quest to Bring Them to Justice
Guy Walters
Broadway
ISBN 978 0 7679 2873 1
518 pages
$26.99
Reviewed by Deborah E. Lipstadt
"Hunting Evil" is not the book Guy Walters originally planned to write. He intended to produce a study of Odessa, the sinister post-World War II organization composed of leading Nazis and their sympathizers. According to conventional wisdom, Odessa enabled numerous Nazi war criminals to flee to Latin America, where they lived securely, often with the full knowledge and sympathy of their host country. Their well-being was periodically threatened by Nazi hunters, among them Simon Wiesenthal, whose heroic status was so great that he was repeatedly nominated for a Nobel Peace prize. The statement accompanying his Congressional medal of honor lauded him for capturing over 1,000 Nazis, including Adolf Eichmann.
This is the story Walters planned to tell. The truth, he discovered, was quite different from the legend. Odessa, he contends, was a figment of people's imagination. While there were undercover agencies helping Nazis escape, there was no Odessa.
He also found that Wiesenthal (1908-2005) falsified much of his record, claiming credit for things he never did. Walters is hardly the first person to raise questions about Wiesenthal, whose unreliability is evident to any reader who compares his various autobiographies. On significant points, they repeatedly contradict one another. Walters, who concludes that Wiesenthal had "scant regard for the truth," estimates that he found only a dozen war criminals, at most. Even if this is accurate -- and according to a forthcoming biography by Tom Segev, the number is probably far higher -- it is more than most other people found. Walters devotes a disproportionate amount of space to Wiesenthal's misdeeds, though acknowledging that he was on the side of the angels.
Of far greater significance is the story Walters tells of how democracies worldwide, including the United States and Britain, welcomed Nazi war criminals in the postwar period. Several countries coddled known genocidal murderers because the criminals could supposedly provide important intelligence. In many instances, however, they actually had no valuable information to offer.
Britain engaged Friedrich Buchardt as a secret agent, even though he had been one of the leaders of the Einsatzgruppen, the mobile killing units. These units shot hundreds of thousands of men, women and children. To enhance their work, they devised a system called sardine-packing: Victims were forced to lie down head to toe prior to being shot, thereby making more room in the pit for another layer of victims.
The Vatican also went out of its way to protect criminals and murderers. It provided passports, safe refuge and other means of support for them. While the Church's record during the war may be still open to some debate, its record in helping the murderers escape responsibility afterward is clear, as has been documented by both Michael Phayer in "The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 1930-1965" and Gerald Steinacher in "Nazis auf der Flucht."
Much of what Walters tells is not new, but it bears retelling, and he does so in a gripping, well documented fashion. One of his most powerful anecdotes comes at the end of the book. He interviewed Erich Priebke, who had been a key player in the March 1944 massacre at Rome's Ardeatine Caves. There the Nazis murdered over 300 innocent men because partisans had killed 33 German policemen. With the assistance of the Church -- bishops, nuns and priests -- Priebke managed to escape to Argentina. When Sam Donaldson of ABC News tracked him down in 1994, Priebke demonstrated decidedly little remorse. Embarrassed, Argentina allowed him to be extradited to Italy, where he was tried and sentenced to house arrest. He lives there in relative comfort. When Walters spoke to him in 2007, Priebke complained that the Vatican had not responded to the many letters his supporters had sent to the new pope, hoping to get his sentence set aside. "They (the Vatican) are afraid of the Jews," Priebke explained. His worldview had not changed since his days as a Nazi murderer.
Ultimately, "Hunting Evil" reminds us that there must be a moral limit to how much a country dirties its hands, even when pragmatism tempts it to ignore war criminals' misdeeds. The United States should keep this in mind as it tries to bring the war in Afghanistan to an end. For a good country to ignore wrongs committed by even its allies is to compromise the cause for which it has been fighting and for which its forces have given their lives.
Deborah E. Lipstadt teaches Holocaust history at Emory University. Her most recent book is "History on Trial: My Day in Court with a Holocaust Denier."
Copyright 2010 Washington Post Writers Group
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FLY AWAY HOME
Jennifer Weiner
Atria
ISBN 978 0 7432 9427 0
401 pages
$26.99
Reviewed by Debra Leithauser
As chick-lit masters go, Jennifer Weiner has certainly proved she can write a compelling beach read. She's published witty and irreverent books about disastrous boyfriends, struggling new moms and scheming sisters. But her eighth book is centered on a much less appealing character: a cheating politician.
The story unfolds through a series of chapters named for their narrators, a device about as original as the idea of a senator lured by the wiles of another woman. First up, we meet the wronged wife, Sylvie, who met Richard Woodruff in college and has loved him and sacrificed for him ever since, even putting his career before their children. Then there's daughter No. 1, Diana, a perfectionist caught in a very imperfect marriage. And finally we meet the younger sister, Lizzie, the consummate wild child, who has never met a loser or a prescription drug she didn't like.
When Sen. Woodruff's little affair becomes big news, his wife and daughters retreat to find themselves, to face up to their pasts and to chart new futures. For Sylvie, that means not only figuring out what went wrong but whether to take him back. "After all, this was her life falling apart, the life she'd believed was a happy one, this was sadness mixed with visceral shame at not being enough of a woman for her man, because wasn't that, ultimately, what cheating meant?"
Sylvie takes refuge by holing up in her family's beach house. She eats what she wants and lets her hair spring back to its naturally curly state. She skips the girdles and power suits, teaches herself to cook and reflects on her life and how to help her now-grown daughters. Diana is facing divorce after stepping out on her incredibly dull husband ("his kisses were the dry pecks of a maiden aunt") for a tryst with a medical student. Lizzie, meanwhile, finally seems to be getting her act together, dating a great guy she really connects with.
Of the three, Sylvie is the most fleshed out and interesting. Diana and Lizzie each have some fun moments -- such as when Diana plays "doctor" with her younger lover, or when Lizzie bonds with Diana's son by letting him consume lots of TV and (the horror!) foods with high-fructose corn syrup. But the sisters end up being a bit too cliched, a disappointment all the greater because Weiner is known for creating compelling characters.
"Fly Away Home" might not live up to those Weiner favorites "Good in Bed" or "In Her Shoes," but it's not a total disappointment. Take it to the beach; just don't expect the characters to linger in your mind after you travel back home.
Debra Leithauser is the editor of The Washington Post Magazine. She can be reached at leithauserd(at symbol)washpost.com.
Copyright 2010 Washington Post Writers Group
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