Che fine hanno fatto i nazisti sfuggiti alla cattura e al processo di Norimberga? Andrew Nagorski - giornalista pluripremiato e grande esperto della seconda guerra mondiale (fonte: Google Books)

The Nazi Hunters by Andrew Nagorski is a non-fiction book which tells of the people who took it upon themselves to bring former to Nazis to justice. Mr. Nagorski was an editor for Newsweek and is an award wining journalist and author.

The Nazi Hunters by Andrew Nagorski tells the story of the people who hunted Nazis to bring them to justice after World War II. Those of us who finished high-school probably know about Hitler committing suicide in the bunker, those of us who take the time to educate ourselves (or took some college history courses) we heard or read about the Nuremberg trials, but not much afterwards.

After the Nuremberg trials the world moved on, but not the people the author writes about. The Nazi hunters were seeking justice against those in charge of killing millions of innocent people systematically, all this while their hunt fell out of headlines and out of people’s minds who simply wanted to move on after a decade of horrors.

Mr. Nagorski makes it a point, throughout the book, that we should be careful not to label the Nazi leadership as “monsters”, but as committing “‘monstrous acts in the name of a monstrous system, but labeling him a monster lets too many others off the hook and ignores how easily tyrannical regimes can enlist average citizens in their criminal behavior.”

This is an important book, a history book which is well researched and brings forth the efforts of many people to bring justice, and not induce vengeance. The author expertly presents the reasons for each Nazi hunter to continue their difficult, and often ungrateful, task. The author profiles the Nazi hunters themselves, as well as some of the Nazi leaders who they’ve been hunting.

The book does not skip around or tell the story chronologically, but is factual, sometimes dry and academic. That is not a criticism, the book is much like reading great investigative journalism articles in newspapers, gathered together into a book. The author did a great job researching, but this is not a thriller.

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The Nazi Hunters by Andrew Nagorski will be released in May. I had the opportunity, through NetGalley, to read an advance copy. It was fascinating and disturbing. Two themes run through the book, understanding and justice. The need to understand why people acted in the way they did and then refused to take responsibility for their actions. The need for justice as opposed to revenge. One of the Nazi Hunters profiled in the book, Serge Klarsfelds, stated, “Justice, in its essence, is not effective: it cannot resuscitate people who were killed. So it’s symbolic.”

The Nuremberg Trials focused the world on the war crimes committed by the Nazi regime. The big trial was originally slated to have twelve defendants but one eluded capture. Adolf Eichmann was responsible for the deportation of the Jewish populations. It was in 1960 that Eichmann was finally captured in a secret operation by the Israeli Mossad. One of the Mossad agents who helped capture Eichmann is quoted as saying “What makes such a creature, created in the likeness of man, into a monster?” The author explains how political theorist Hannah Arendt objected to labeling Eichmann a monster. As the author stated, “He committed ‘monstrous acts in the name of a monstrous system, but labeling him a monster lets too many others off the hook and ignores how easily tyrannical regimes can enlist average citizens in their criminal behavior.”

Once the trials were over, the world moved on to the quickly escalating Cold War. The number of guilty parties brought to trial was very small. For the most part, they were the leaders. The lower level functionaries, brutal camp guards and others whose savagery was documented were left to leave their lives in peace. It was due to the relentless hard work of the individuals who were committed to bringing the Nazi’s to justice for all the victims who could not seek it for themselves. The author does an excellent job of detailing each hunter's personal reason for pursuing this difficult path. The intensive investigations required to track down each criminal was also detailed.

So much of this book is relevant to our world today. The author, discussing Sinclair Lewis’s 1935 novel It Can’t Happen Here, stated “the greatest danger facing mankind is not represented by monsters but by those who blindly obey their monstrous orders.” This is exactly what we are facing with terrorism.

I received a free copy of The Nazi Hunters from NetGalley in exchange for a honest review. ( )

If you wanted me to tell you, based on what I learned in high school, what happened to the Nazi leadership after the war, I wouldn't have had much to offer besides that Hitler and his mistress killed themselves. This isn't to tear down public school curriculum or teachers or insinuate that I was taught poorly or anything like that. World and even US history are such broad topics that you kind of have to focus on the highlights or you'd never get through it. But the fact remains that I (and I imagine many others) are largely clueless about what actually happened to the Nazis. Now that it's 2016 and many of the major players are very old or gone, there is perspective to look back at how it all played out: both with the Nazis and the people who sought to bring them to justice. Hence, Andrew Nagorski's The Nazi Hunters.

If you're like me and you have only a vague understanding of the topic but find it interesting, this book is a good choice. It's very comprehensive. Nagorski begins by discussing the immediate aftermath of liberation of the camps, including military personnel literally looking the other way on some occasions in which survivors assaulted and killed their former tormentors, then the Dachau trials and the Nuremberg trials. This was largely (but not totally) the end of judicial proceedings against former Nazis, and Nagorski covers why that was, with the rising tide of the Cold War cited as a particular distraction for the international community.

It might have been the effective end of the trials, but it was not the end of people seeking justice against senior members of the Nazi party. The most high-profile story is the abduction and Israeli trial of Adolf Eichmann, but there's also the stories of former Nazis Klaus Barbie, Latvian pilot Herbert Cukurs, and former UN Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim, among many many others, and their hunters, like Simon Wiesenthal, Tuvia Friedman, Isser Harel, and Beate and Serge Klarsfeld.

I'm not sure quite what I was expecting going in, but I think it was more along the lines of a narrative/non-fiction novel style book. This is not that. It's very factual...not quite as dry as true academic writing, but more like newspaper reporting. It's very well-researched and thorough, but if you're looking for a thrilling true life pageburner, this will probably disappoint you. ( )

After reading the description, I knew I had to read this book. Unlike other books on the topic, this is a comprehensive book at 416 pages long. It has been more than 70 years since the end of WWII and the great hunt for Nazi criminals is nearing its culmination now, "as they (the hunters) and the hunted die off. Their saga can now be told in its entirety." Author, Andrew Nagorski feels that now is the time to tell their stories, before they get lost in the annals of time.

I feel that it's about time we read the true, nonfiction book about who the Nazi hunters really were. I cannot believe that most people, governments and parties involved, did not care to catch these monstrous criminals. To want to let them walk among the general public is unthinkable to me. And I have no ties to Europe during those times. I can't even begin to imagine the impact that had with survivors of the war, and most importantly of the concentration camps. "Oh, let's leave the past in the past." And some of the criminals were actually living in the United States during the search, and no one seemed to care! I did like how some of the Nazis were found and captured such as Adolf Eichmann.

Thank you to Simon and Schuster and NetGalley for giving me a free ARC of this book to read and give my honest review. ( )