Killing The SS: The Hunt For The Worst War Criminals In History Quotes
"I am not occasionally insubordinate. I am usually insubordinate. I don’t take orders that I know are stupid or illegal."
"My mind would not accept what my eyes saw. It built a protective barrier to enable me to go on with my work in what seemed an incredible nightmare. I had peered into Hell."
"I watched it happen and did nothing. It was not my duty to stop it, even if I could have. And frankly, I was not inclined to try."
"I’ve never been cruel. I’ll admit I’ve been hard. I do not deny that I haven’t been bashful about shooting 1,000 men for reprisal, or hostages, or whatever you please. But cruel? Torturing women and children… that is so far removed from my nature."
"There is no doubt that I was indelibly traumatized by my experiences as a war crimes investigator of Nazi extermination centers."
"He told his men never to use infants for target practice nor smash their heads against a tree. He ordered his men to allow the mother to hold her infant to her breast and to aim for her heart. That would avoid screaming and would allow the shooter to kill both mother and infant with one bullet. It saved ammunition."
"One of the more interesting and repulsive arguments in defense of genocide was put forth by the lead defendant, SS General Otto Ohlendorf."
"The only motive which guided me was my ardent love for my people, its happiness, its freedom, and its life. And for this I call on the Almighty and my German people to witness."
"But the arrogant Göring was deeply bitter about Germany’s defeat, believing that Jews and a weak German government had betrayed the German people."
"Isser Harel knows that capturing Eichmann, Mengele, or Bormann would be an enormous triumph. Capturing all three, however, would be even better."
"He has been married for sixteen years to the former Gerda Buch, who has given him ten children. But Bormann rarely sees his family—his loyalty has been to Hitler alone."
"The older Jews of Cologne are wary. They recall that horrible night before the war, when the Roonstrasse Synagogue was defiled for the first time."
"We had reached the land of our dreams—our Holy Land. Here, being a Jew was normal. We were not an unloved minority."
"I am of the opinion that we should now begin with the next phase of the operation. I have no doubts that I have seen Eichmann."
""If we succeed," Isser Harel has commented to one of the operatives, "this will be the first time in history that a court of justice of the Jewish people will judge a man who slaughtered multitudes of Jews."
"I had no special positions or privileges. They gave me instructions."
"Long live Germany, long live Argentina, long live Austria."
"You have nothing to fear. I am going with you voluntarily, and I will keep my promise."
"When I have a bird in my hand, I don’t start looking for the bird in the bush."
"Everything was in the first person, i.e., I order, I say, and I cannot."
"We rarely saw them as individuals. It was always a huge mass."
"I am not sure whether Eichmann recognized me. He looked directly at us several times, but did not give any sign that he knew who I was."
"I was still unable to relax. Then the aircraft began to move. The runway was clear."
"I hope, very much, that it will be your turn soon after mine."
"Gentlemen, we shall meet again soon, so is the fate of all men."
"I am a convinced Nazi. I admire the Nazi discipline. I am proud of having commanded one of the best corps of the Third Reich. If I should be born one thousand times I would be one thousand times what I have been. I am not a fanatic. I am an idealist." - Otto Skorzeny
"When history looks back I want people to know the Nazis weren’t able to kill millions of people and get away with it." - Simon Wiesenthal
"I cannot say where he is, but he has been seen five times recently. I am much closer to capturing him than I was a year ago. His capture could come in the next few weeks." - Simon Wiesenthal on Josef Mengele
"There are no judges, only avengers." - Josef Mengele
"I tried to tell him that his presence in Auschwitz alone was unacceptable to me." - Rolf Mengele on his father, Josef Mengele
"My job was only to classify those able to work and those unable to work. I was as generous in my assessments as I needed to be." - Josef Mengele
"For seven hours I have been subjected to physical and moral torture. I know that today I reached the limits of resistance. I know that if it starts again tomorrow, I will sign in the end. The dilemma remains: to sign or to disappear." - Jean Moulin
"We are not Nazis, and even if we were, it wouldn’t be a crime." - Statement by a member of a neo-Nazi group in Argentina
"The Nazi spirit is merely sleeping in a good number of inhabitants of this region. All it needs to be awakened is one intelligent leader." - A Wehrmacht soldier in Brazil
"Forget it, there is nothing to say." - Elfriede Huth Rinkel, former Ravensbrück concentration camp guard