The Importance of Bringing Families Together

Koffner is right when he says that the ally justice was not sufficient. After the war, allied officials identified 13.2 million men in Western Germany alone as eligible for automatic arrest because they had been deemed part of the Nazi apparatus. Fewer than 3.5 million of these were charged and of those, 2.5 million released without trial. Most faced no greater sanction than a temporary fine or restriction on future employment. By 1949, four years after the war, only 300 Nazis were in prison from an original list of one to 13 million. Because it would have never been a serious task, says David Cesarini, professor at Royal Holloway University of London.