Michael Greve, Der justitielle und rechtspolitische Umgang mit den NS-Gewaltverbrechen in den sechziger Jahren [Legal and Political Dealings with Nazi Crimes in the 1960s] * Marc von Miquel, Ahnden oder amnestieren? Westdeutsche Justiz und Vergangenheitspolitik in den sechziger Jahren [Punishment or Amnesty? West German Justice and the Politics of History in the 1960s] * Annette Weinke, Ene Gesellschaft ermittelt gegen

Abstract

Within the vast German language literature published on the prosecution of Nazi crimes, few books have been translated into English. Only two of these, authored by Ingo Müller,1 and Norbert Frei,2 are widely quoted in general works in English.3 Müller, who does not attempt a balanced presentation of facts, sees an unbroken continuity between the judiciary of the Nazi period and the post-war Federal Republic of Germany (BRD), which supposedly ensured that Nazi crimes were whitewashed. Frei deals with the first five years of the BRD and the politics of the conservative Adenauer government to reverse Allied measures of so-called ‘de-Nazification’ and enable the reintegration of former Nazis. While Frei's work is superior to Müller's, he does not sufficiently differentiate between political players and their respective stands on the Nazi regime, creating the impression of general pro-Nazi leniency. In Germany, Frei's book has been influential, presumably because his conclusions coincide with an important narrative forming part of German post-Nazi identity, containing the following elements. First, in the post-war period, denial of Nazi crimes was dominant, with only the subsequent generation holding a critical point of view. Interestingly, post-Nazi German society is not seen as containing pro-Nazi, anti-Nazi and neutral elements, in conflict with one another, as in most transitional societies, but a chronological sequence is assumed — what may be termed a ‘bad’ period followed by a ‘good’ one. This change is often timed to the 1960s. Second, the prosecution of Nazi crimes was a failure, due to the lack of political will and the continuity of Nazi jurists in the post-war legal system. A curious aspect of this political will paradigm is a black and white divide, comprising the (many) bad and the (few) good. Prosecutors, with exceptions such as the Jewish emigrant and Attorney General in Frankfurt, Fritz Bauer, are commonly depicted negatively, while outsiders, such as self-styled ‘Nazi-hunters’, represent the good side. This narrative is found in numerous media publications and, as will be shown, also in literature.