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Oral history interview with Serge Klarsfeld and Beate Klarsfeld

Oral History | Digitized | Accession Number: 2017.295.37 | RG Number: RG-50.957.0036

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    Oral history interview with Serge Klarsfeld and Beate Klarsfeld
    Transcript
    Nobody in our family is anymore a lawyer.
    No?
    Our daughter has two children, five and four,
    so she's stopped to be a lawyer.
    And I stopped because I did not need anymore to be a lawyer,
    being more or less in the crimes against humanity.
    And it's behind us.
    And Arno is a conseillar d'etat a state counselor.
    State counselor, so he works for the government now?
    No, not for the government.
    It's a conseillar d'etat, its a highest
    administrative administrator.
    Civil servant.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    So what does he do then as a conseillar d'etat??
    Big files, which makes the law in the administrative field.
    And secondly, to counsel the government with projects of law
    to see if a law is constitutionally--
    is the project is positive or not.
    And your daughter is?
    And my daughter stopped.
    Taking care of the kids, OK, two children.
    Her husband works.
    Yes.
    And what is her name?
    Lida.
    L-I-D-A.
    Lida, OK.
    And she has two children.
    Arno has no children.
    Not married, not now.
    Not married?
    Uh-huh.
    OK.
    Yet.
    Maybe one day.
    [LAUGHS]
    [? I see. ?]
    All right, well--
    [INAUDIBLE]
    Wonderful.
    Yes.
    Thank you.
    OK, thank you.
    So I wanted to start just with a few more biographical details,
    which you, for instance, here you wrote some about your--
    of course, what happened in 1943.
    So let me start with that.
    In this brief introduction, it says that when the SS came in
    in 1943, that it was--
    you say it was Brunner, but you do not mean directly Brunner.
    He was not in the room, was he?
    Sure.
    Was he in the room?
    You don't know.
    Yeah.
    I don't know.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    I don't know but he was used to--
    Giving order--
    --to be-- it was during three months in Nice,
    and the French authorities did not
    cooperate with Gestapo in Nice.
    Oh, they did not?
    And so he had a small team of SS.
    And at the beginning, they had the support during a few weeks,
    of the army, so they could have army
    surrounding buildings and--
    but then even the army stopped the support of--
    The SS?
    No, of the soldiers to surround.
    And he was used to work with a team of Austrian SS
    and with several Frenchmen paid by Gestapo.
    All right.
    So he could have been there personally,
    but I have no proof of that.
    Right.
    And your family had come-- your parents had
    come from Romania originally?
    Yes, they have come, but [FRENCH]..
    They wanted to live in France.
    This was in '33, I think.
    No, they came-- my mother came in 1920.
    Oh.
    That's it.
    Oh, I see.
    1920, and she was very young, but she came
    to study in France, chemistry.
    And my father came in '24.
    And then they went back to East Europe, to Romania.
    But they were used to live in Paris.
    I was born in Bucharest because my mother was, each year, going
    to Romania to see her family.
    So it's really on a visit you were born.
    So they were already living in Paris.
    Yes.
    My sister, who is older, was born in Paris.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And is your sister still alive?
    Oh, yes.
    And she still lives in Paris?
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    She's a, how could I say?
    An Russian professor.
    She was a professor--
    Professor of Russian?
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    And she is older or younger?
    Older.
    Older, yeah.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Three years.
    What is her name?
    What is her first name?
    Georgette.
    Georgette.
    That's nice, Georgette, a nice name.
    According to Clemenceau--
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    That died not so long ago.
    In fact, before she was born.
    Right.
    And one other thing--
    after your father was taken away,
    and I understand you went to a village
    in Haute-Loire or somewhere?
    Yes.
    After a few months, we succeeded to leave Nice
    and to go in Haute-Loire.
    And there there were not many problems.
    Because this was still occupied territory then.
    Yes, occupied territory, but without--
    how to say?
    Much supervision?
    For Jews, it was a safe place.
    And did the villagers know you were Jews,
    and that was not a problem?
    We were not declared as Jews.
    But we-- my mother sent us to clerical schools
    in order to hide.
    They wanted me to become Christian because they
    believed that we were Orthodox.
    Oh, they believed you were Orthodox.
    Romanian Orthodox.
    But my mother said that my father is a war prisoner
    and that she has to wait until his return.
    Right.
    But in Nice, after the Gestapo came, the SS came--
    So we had three--
    five months very hard.
    You were hiding?
    We were hiding-- hiding, going from hotel to a--
    [CROSS TALK]
    --to you know, there are in Nice,
    at that time, many pension famille,
    where you could rent a room.
    And so we moved from one place to another place.
    And in the street, we had to move my sister
    and I on one side of the street and my mother on another
    because she had a Russian accent.
    So she believed that if they, the controller of identity,
    she will be arrested and as children on the other side,
    we can--
    so we knew what to do.
    And after a few months, two months I believe,
    my mother had enough.
    We came back in the same apartment.
    And my mother told us that if the Germans will come,
    you will go in the hiding place and I will open the door.
    Meaning both you and your sister in the hiding place.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    But your mother had a Russian accent, not Romanian accent?
    No, no.
    She was from Bessarabia.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    I see.
    She was a Russian, completely a Russian.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    My father was Romanian, but he spoke also Russian.
    His mother was Russian.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Well, in that part of the world, everybody spoke--
    You spoke eight languages.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And my mother five or so.
    Yes, I know.
    It was an amazing generation of people.
    Yeah.
    Yesterday, a friend from the family, a cousin came.
    Her cousin came from Brazil, and we
    saw that he speaks only one language, Portuguese.
    And I thought that's--
    And a little English.
    --lost because his grand-grandparents
    spoke five languages, and he spoke only one.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    And then, you are growing up in Germany.
    And I know in Berlin.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    And I know, in your autobiography,
    you write that growing up, even though your father had
    been in the Wehrmacht and so forth, you really
    had little idea of what had happened
    during the war and the Holocaust.
    Also [INAUDIBLE] at this time, because in school the teachers
    did not teach a lot about the experience.
    It was not on the program, you know.
    Yeah.
    If the parents did not want to teach the children,
    for example, if they [INAUDIBLE] but my father
    hasn't been a Nazi.
    But all the others belong to the silent majority,
    voting for Hitler.
    And after the war, the enemy became the Russians.
    We had the chance to live in the part occupied by the Western,
    by the British.
    But on the other side, the Russians were.
    That's right.
    This was the new enemy.
    And also, most of the Germans, as my parents
    didn't know why the war was lost.
    They were complaining about the loss of apartment
    and so on and so on.
    Yeah.
    The fact that there had been so many victims
    due to the crimes of the German, it was not--
    it was not a discussion.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    But yes, your father was in Wehrmacht,
    but he was never in the party, right?
    No, no, no, no.
    He wasn't in the party.
    No, no.
    And he was not very happy to be in the army.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Well--
    And he had the chance not to go to Russia.
    He became sick, so he was--
    [CROSS TALK] he finished finally in an office,
    in the office of Wehrmacht.
    He finished in an office of the Wehrmacht.
    He was liberated by the British, so he didn't go to
    for a prisoner of the Russians.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    This was a long time before they were liberated,
    the German prisoners in Russia.
    So then, I know your story, how you became an au pair.
    And then you two met in the metro.
    Where in the metro?
    Do you remember?
    Which station?
    Oh, yeah.
    Yes, because we live exactly--
    I was in a building which is on--
    if you make a hole, you're right on the point where we met.
    Oh, really?
    Really?
    On the [PLACE NAME].
    Wait, the [PLACE NAME] is right under here?
    No, no, then.
    Then.
    [INTERPOSING VOICES]
    Oh, I see.
    It's on the line.
    It's the same line.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Same line, yes.
    Close to Boulogne is separate.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    That's very romantic that you live there now.
    So, and then, in terms of the--
    I think I saw somewhere it said in one of the articles
    about you, that if it had not been for you,
    then you would not have started down this whole path because it
    really started when you were fired
    from your job in the OFAJ.
    Is that correct?
    You had not thought about getting involved before?
    No.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    No.
    At the time, what were you doing?
    No.
    Involved, it could be because I was in Auschwitz in 1965.
    And I felt a responsibility to involve myself,
    being from a generation who saw the threat of the destruction
    of all Jews and a generation who saw also
    the revival of a Jewish state.
    So I came to--
    I went to Auschwitz in '65, during the Cold War.
    And nobody from the West was going to Auschwitz.
    But I felt that I had to go to keep the link with my father.
    And I had that feeling that I must be involved.
    And in '67, I went as a volunteer in Israel
    during the Six Days War.
    Oh, you did?
    So you enlisted at the time?
    No, they did not enlist, but they took me
    because they appreciated that I went from France, because I
    took my ticket.
    I didn't wait.
    I took my ticket with a friend working in the same company.
    And we arrived as the plane was sent.
    It had to go to Tel Aviv, but it was Air France,
    so they stopped in Athens.
    And the day after they sent the plane from Israel
    to take people like us who arrived as volunteer.
    And they took me to Jerusalem.
    The first day.
    And also to go to Syria.
    I arrived in Kuneitra.
    And 15 years after, our son made his, like, bar mitzvah,
    you see, in the Merom Golan kibbutz,
    which was created by the people of the unit who
    arrived in Kuneitra, which is in front of Merom Golan.
    So Kuneitra is in front of the Golan Heights?
    No, Kuneitra is in Syria, but in the Golan.
    Yes.
    So he did it in the Golan Heights?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And I am also--
    my son is Israeli nationality.
    He has a two national--
    And I am also.
    You are?
    He is Israeli because I am Israeli.
    They gave me, by a special--
    An honorary citizenship.
    The government, they gave me the Israeli nationality.
    Yeah.
    Citizenship-- for my French and my Israeli passport.
    And Romanian.
    And Romanian too?
    You have a Romanian passport too?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    And your son was born here, not in Israel?
    No, no, in Paris.
    Yeah.
    To [FRENCH] in Paris.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And did you actually see any fighting
    when you were in Israel?
    There were fighting, but one hour before we arrived.
    Yes, there were fighting.
    I saw everything, but--
    Yes.
    You were not involved personally.
    I was not involved personally.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Mignon?
    Right.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Well, we love dogs, so--
    I have a dog at home too.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    So, when you look back at--
    I would like to talk--
    [CROSS TALK]
    What to do?
    Oui.
    Push the button on.
    We never had it.
    Push the button?
    Yes, just push that.
    As you will see.
    As long as you see her, and just push.
    Yes, that's on.
    Very good.
    [INAUDIBLE]
    It's camera.
    When you touch it, it takes picture.
    So when you look back-- and I want to talk about some
    of the cases--
    but there were so many times where both of you took risks.
    I mean, you took risks in terms of confrontations
    which, of course, could have turned out differently.
    What do you think were--
    well, first of all, what was the motivation
    for taking those kinds of risks in terms of why did you feel--
    sometimes you didn't-- took very what would be sensational
    actions.
    What was-- why did you feel that route was necessary?
    Because we were weak.
    So we had to take strong actions.
    And the strongest action, I believe, to go on the spot
    where the enemies is powerful and to say the truth
    on the spot.
    That's what we can do.
    We could do.
    Right.
    Right.
    So which--
    I hope, on the 9th of November, to be in Algiers
    and to make a speech about the Holocaust in Algeria.
    In Algeria?
    Wow.
    Yes.
    Oh, it's not very risky, but it was not done.
    So why not to say the truth in Algeria?
    Do you have a place where you're doing this?
    You have [CROSS TALK]
    There is a book fair in Algeria between, I believe,
    the 1st and the 10th of November.
    And so I gave my passport to--
    and I'm waiting for a visa because there
    is a need of a visa.
    But I spoke three years ago in Tunisia, in Cairo, in Baghdad,
    in Amman, in Kurdistan about the Holocaust
    because it's necessary to tell them that it happened.
    And if nobody tells them that it happened, so the reason,
    those who say that it did not happen.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    So if I can go to Tehran, I will go to Tehran.
    That's normal.
    I went.
    You went once to Tehran, right?
    In '79 was it?
    Yes, in '79.
    Yeah.
    And what happened then?
    This is during the Ayatollah?
    I want to tell them that they have not
    to kill Jews because they are Jews,
    and they killed the head of the Tehran community.
    And I wanted--
    I told to the minister of foreign affairs,
    to the minister of justice, I want the file of Mr. Elghanian
    because I want to know why he was killed.
    He had already been killed when you had come.
    So it was unexpected.
    And so when they gave me the file, I went to the jail
    in Tehran.
    They were shooting people and that.
    But I got the file.
    And the file that he was corrupted on [INAUDIBLE]
    because he met Mr.-- how to say--
    the first minister of Israel and made a speech about the Aliyah,
    telling that more Jews have to go from Iran to Israel.
    So he was killed, not because he was a corrupted man,
    but he was killed because he was a normal Zionist
    leader of a Jewish community.
    So I spoke with some ayatollah, and I did my best
    in order to convince them not to kill Jews in Iran.
    In fact, I believe that after a few years after,
    Israel gave them support in the war against Iraq.
    And they didn't kill the Jews.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Yes.
    But I was not absent.
    So you cannot go after Nazi who kill Jews in the '40s and not
    to try to protect the Jews--
    Of today.
    So they actually did that in South America,
    in Argentina, in Uruguay, in Syria.
    [INAUDIBLE]
    Algeria.
    Algeria.
    Algeria--
    [INTERPOSING VOICES]
    Yes.
    Yes.
    You protested at the summit, right?
    The-- yes.
    Distributing leaflets for Israel.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    What year was that?
    That was-- well I think it's on your website.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Is it Algérie.
    [FRENCH] 1990.
    1990 in Algeria.
    This was you, right?
    Being in Algeria.
    Yes.
    Yes, her.
    [INAUDIBLE]
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    But getting back to my question, what do you feel
    was the most dangerous moment?
    Because I mean, you had the Lischka affair, you had,
    of course Kiesinger, the slap.
    And you had things with Barbie.
    I mean, well, Lischka, when you pulled the gun on him--
    No, the notion of risk is very complex
    because when we are in a car going too fast, we say stop.
    Please, don't go so fast.
    Right.
    When you cross the street, also you can be--
    so the notion of risk is very--
    Relative?
    Yes.
    You cannot evaluate very well.
    And for that, I believe when the bodyguards of-- you
    know, in '68, Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy,
    so they took their guns in, but they could not shoot.
    When you slapped the chancellor.
    Yeah, that's right.
    They had to, but they could not because many people
    were surrounding.
    So they couldn't do.
    But they had their guns out?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Not like today, but there was a security.
    So that was risky.
    Yeah.
    It was.
    And you never know when it's risky
    because a small policeman can take an initiative.
    Sure.
    Sure.
    And it's not-- not all time [CROSS TALK] superior.
    His own decision, and sometimes stupid.
    Yeah.
    It's very spontaneous sometimes.
    When Beate was in Beirut to be--
    to try to obtain something for the Jewish hostages,
    the Lebanese--
    For the Lebanese Jews?
    So after one month, you know, it was
    impossible to get something.
    So she came back.
    And a few were killed.
    Immediately, I went to Beirut.
    And I made an interview at the airport,
    saying that those who kill a hostage because they are Jews,
    while they liked Lebanon, they didn't want to go to Israel.
    One was the doctor of the poor people,
    and they killed such people, so they are exactly like the Nazi.
    So when I arrived in the hotel, there was a civil war.
    So we are very surprised that you got--
    you arrived in the hotel because we believed that normally I
    had to be kidnapped between the airport and the hotel.
    You never know in--
    Was this the 1980s?
    Yes, '84.
    '84, yes.
    Well, that was a very dangerous time.
    Yeah, in Beirut.
    And the day after, the French ambassador
    called me and told me you will not survive the day.
    Remain in the lobby of the hotel.
    And he sent across--
    because there was a border, in fact,
    a green line between the Christian and the Muslims.
    And he sent two cars full of--
    Bodyguards.
    --of gendarme, with the guns and all.
    And they succeed to bring me back to the Christian.
    So you were-- which hotel?
    Were you in the Commodore Hotel by any chance?
    No, Cavalier.
    Cavalier Hotel.
    Hotel Cavalier.
    [CROSS TALK] where, you know, the French owner is,
    I met them too, there.
    But nobody wanted to take care of my planning and all.
    Yeah.
    So the Cavalier Hotel was on the Muslim side?
    Yes.
    Oh.
    Uh-huh.
    Yeah.
    But in terms of-- yes, I mean, I know
    it's very hard to calculate the risk.
    You know situations are risky.
    But was there one particular episode
    you felt in the middle of it you realized
    the risk was particularly high, that it
    was more so than others?
    No?
    To feel something in as--
    personally, I went to Sarajevo and to the Republic of Bosnia.
    Bosnia, yeah-- in the '90s.
    In the '90s.
    And I was asking Karadzic and Mladic
    to go free voluntarily to be arrested
    and to go to The Hague, saying that anyhow
    they will be arrested one day.
    And so I was alone, and it was very cold and snow.
    And it was the exode from the Serbs
    from Sarajevo to the Pale, to the city.
    And so I was sent to a hotel.
    And in the night, they came, policemen came in civilian.
    And they took me in a car in the forest.
    So it was not--
    so I was asking myself, will I go to a police station
    or will I remain--
    In the forest.
    And happily, I went to a police basement,
    and they interrogate me.
    And the next day, they expelled me from the Serbia.
    But did you--
    Republic of Bosnia.
    Yeah.
    Did you meet with Mladic and Karadzic?
    Yeah.
    No.
    No.
    No.
    No, they were all
    They were hiding, hiding, yeah.
    So this was about--
    We started to-- it was in 1995, I should say.
    Yeah, '95 or '96.
    '95.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    So they just expelled you.
    At the end of the Serb presence in Sarajevo.
    In Sarajevo, yeah.
    Because when I arrived, they were--
    I followed the exode to-- the exode used to--
    Pale.
    Pale, yeah.
    Yeah.
    I was in Sarajevo briefly in that period too.
    Yeah.
    Now, and in terms of when you talked
    about how if you are weak you have
    to take strong action against the enemy,
    did you always feel that the people you were taking action
    against were the enemy?
    I mean, when you say "the enemy," everybody--
    I mean, obviously the big war criminals, yes.
    But how did you feel about them personally?
    We know what they have done.
    And as we had met some of them in Germany
    and they were very normal citizen, with families
    that the sons and daughters.
    And so we had to make the separation because finally
    the German public opinion said, they
    are good people today, never committed a crime
    after the war.
    But they always had to view that they had committed
    this type of crimes, and then they
    lived a quiet life protected by the German political society.
    Yeah.
    And when you thought about why it was important to do these,
    to find these people and to end their quiet life, what--
    I mean, in terms of was this, I mean, partly obviously,
    for the victims, I assume.
    But what other reasons were there for doing this?
    Oh, to change this society, also to--
    Justice.
    --to improve the society.
    So we don't happen again.
    I'll give you only one example.
    In 1968, Beate slapped Kiesinger.
    She got one year jail without suspension.
    In 2012, she was one of the two candidates
    to be president of state.
    That means that the German society improved
    and quite a lot.
    So we were part of that improvement.
    So you feel there has been a real change
    for the better in that.
    Yes, of course.
    Of course.
    Do you feel that Germans are proud of you?
    Oh, yeah, quite a lot.
    Not all were.
    Did you get any German awards?
    I mean, some recognition.
    Not a real one from the state, No.
    No.
    No.
    No.
    That's understood.
    But when we went for the election, so the first one,
    there was hundreds of leaders of all
    the leaders of the Germany, presidents of lenders
    and so on.
    So the first to shake hand was Beate and myself, by Merkel.
    She came, and Gauck also, the man who became president.
    So it's a fight-- a fight's a fight.
    It was a fight between somebody who
    was defending the rights of man in East Germany
    and somebody was [? impurating ?] West Germany
    from the Nazi prestige, I would say.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    And of course, East Germany is more important for Germans.
    But when Beate slapped Kiesinger, I told her,
    when you will be old, you will have the gratefulness
    of the German people.
    So now it's always France, which--
    how to say-- is thankful to us, that if we
    are to live long enough, she will
    have the recognition of that.
    Official recognition she had because she was a candidate.
    But she will have the official recognition of Germany.
    Do you think that young people know about you in Germany?
    Oh, yeah.
    It's in schoolbooks.
    It's is schoolbooks?
    Yeah.
    Oh, yeah.
    I'm better known in the old generation,
    sure, because when they had to the book
    fair in Frankfurt, the people who
    came to say, oh, Mr. Klarsfeld, but mainly people in my age,
    you know?
    Right.
    Right Right.
    So the youngsters-- but still, it's taught in schoolbooks.
    We had there in schoolbooks.
    So they are teaching that, right, in school
    There had been twice or three times
    school classes make a project on a person.
    And I was twice or three times chosen.
    So, not [INAUDIBLE].
    Are you the only German woman who stand like this?
    Were there other women who were also looking for Nazis?
    Or you don't know about?
    No.
    No one, [INAUDIBLE]
    And on the honors, I heard--
    I was wondering.
    I know that the--
    I forget what is the highest honor in Germany, the--
    [GERMAN]
    [GERMAN] But I know that Westerwelle was opposed,
    but Fischer was opposed to-- do you know why they say--
    Well, generally it's not the--
    it doesn't respond to the--
    Questions?
    --to the questions, you know.
    I don't know what it was.
    But anyway it was not to.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And then also, throughout this you had these episodes where--
    there was the one, the car bomb, and where they discovered,
    I think in '72 also, an explosion.
    Were there are other, more than these two incidents?
    Were there are many threats?
    Many, many threats, but we don't care about threats.
    We had police cars here downstairs.
    We had the police car [INAUDIBLE] also for sometimes.
    But you know--
    There were, in Germany, some neo-Nazi wanted of their list
    and--
    but attempts against life, two times.
    Yeah.
    Two real attempts.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And one against my sister because, as you know,
    perhaps our address, so they put a Molotov cocktail--
    Oh really, in your sister's?
    --on our apartment.
    And in total, how much time have each of you spent in prison?
    How many times?
    Because I know you've had several.
    [INAUDIBLE] in Germany, we were in Cologne once three times--
    three weeks then two weeks, and then
    arrested in my actions in Arab countries,
    in South America for one day mainly.
    Yeah, usually--
    But generally, being arrested to be questioned
    and then very often is expelled.
    Expelled, yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And you, Serge?
    Oh, in Germany, two times.
    And elsewhere
    Two times for how long?
    Oh--
    Short.
    A few days.
    A few days, yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    A few days.
    This was when--
    Even welcomed by the-- like, in a great hotel,
    by the director of the prison, a guy with great prison.
    I had the honor to have your wife.
    And--
    [LAUGHTER]
    And even they didn't look what I had in my suitcase.
    And they could bring you--
    I don't know-- a bomb with a suitcase.
    But they didn't look.
    No, they were quite--
    no, they knew that it was something symbolic.
    And so it was not--
    at a high level, they understood what was going on.
    And I was judged.
    So they told you, you will--
    they obliged me to be judged.
    That means that I didn't want to be judged.
    I wanted to remain in jail.
    So they told me that you have to be judged.
    And when I was judged, I was on trial.
    So the judge told me, you will be free
    if you say that you will stop.
    I say, no, I will not stop.
    I will come back.
    I will do the same.
    But anyhow, they didn't want me to be
    remaining in jail because here my friends were putting--
    Pressure.
    --pressure, quite a great pressure.
    And we were quite clever enough to choose one week
    to do something, one week before the meeting
    between the French president and the German president,
    in order to--
    to put the pressure on them.
    So this was in the '70s still then.
    In the '70s.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Well, during the Lischka business?
    Or--
    Yes, during-- not the Lischka, but during the--
    yes, Lischka, to obtain the, first,
    a law, and secondly, a trial right of Lischka, Hagan,
    and Heinrichsohn.
    And so-- how to say--
    I never remained in jail.
    Yeah.
    And when-- in the Lischka affair, I know at one point
    you pulled an empty pistol and showed it at him.
    But did he pull--
    I saw some-- did he actually pull a gun in one of the cases
    when you came in?
    He had a gun.
    He had a gun?
    Did he pull it in his office?
    Did he?
    And you went into his office?
    Yeah, he a gun.
    Not Beate, no friends of us came--
    went in once--
    Into her--
    --went into his office.
    And he had the normal license to--
    --have a gun.
    Yes.
    And he pulled it out?
    He pulled it out, yes, to--
    But never at you personally.
    No.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    So when you confronted--
    I knew that he had a gun, but it was 20 degrees under zero,
    so he had--
    Had gloves.
    Yes.
    And I had also.
    And he knew that he could not have time to take with--
    To take it out.
    So I didn't risk--
    You did not feel he would--
    I didn't feel risking to be killed by my victim.
    Yeah.
    But he was very frightened when you pulled the gun.
    Yeah.
    Yeah, it's normal.
    Yes.
    Absolutely.
    I will not reproach him, but no, I put a gun on his--
    Head?
    Between his--
    Eyes?
    --the two eyes.
    So he believed that he will--
    Be killed.
    --killed, Killed.
    So--
    And you felt that was necessary in order just
    to attract the publicity to the case.
    Yes, because I told them.
    I told to the president of the tribunal
    and to the head of the parliament
    that, you see that if we want to kill you, we can kill you.
    And that is not only like Lischka.
    There are others.
    But we do not want to kill.
    But if you do not--
    ah, the second cat.
    [LAUGHS]
    [? Micah ?]
    That's the cat from Jerusalem.
    The black one?
    The black one.
    We don't know if he is Israeli or [LAUGHS] Palestinian.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    That's so funny.
    Now, there was one case where, in the Barbie case,
    wasn't there a moment where you seriously thought if you cannot
    succeed in getting him out legally,
    that you might try to kill him, to use violence?
    [DOG BARKING]
    To kidnap him first also.
    Kidnap him.
    First, we tried to make a kidnapping.
    It was a complex operation with Bolivian opponents
    and Regis Debray, who was a philosopher, who
    was saved when he was sentenced to death in Bolivia
    and then liberated thanks to General de Gaulle.
    But after the kidnapping, which could not--
    Succeed?
    Yes.
    So in 1982, a Bolivian who lived in France
    told us that I want to kill Barbie,
    and I am going back to Bolivia.
    So we told him--
    Go ahead.
    Yes, we are in favor because when you have a dictatorship
    and he is protected by the dictators,
    and he is operating in the police, special police,
    like Barbie did, so you can do that.
    In a Democratic country, no.
    But in that regime, it's possible.
    And when he arrived in Bolivia, he told us-- he called us,
    and he told us there is a hope.
    But because dictatorship is falling,
    and so we started again our campaign with Mitterrand
    in order to ask him to back our efforts to get Barbie.
    And Regis Debray, at that time, was no more terrorist,
    no more philosopher only, but--
    and that he was special counselor to--
    Mitterrand.
    --to Mitterrand.
    And we could convince him to be active
    and to give a support to the Bolivian government,
    the new Bolivian government of Siles Zuazo,
    and also our friend in Bolivia, who in 1972 came to Paris
    to organize the operation of kidnapping,
    became a member of the government.
    And at the last moment, he got the office
    of minister of security.
    And he arrested Debray, and he put him in the plane
    to Guiana--
    Where the French could--
    --which was our first--
    in 1973, we believed that he will be--
    from Chile, we will send him to Bolivia--
    to Guiana, and from Guiana--
    To France.
    It's complicated.
    Yes.
    But you were really convinced, if that had not happened,
    you would have still supported assassinating him.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Both of you feel that way?
    Quite.
    It's not easy to kill somebody.
    It would have been the same for Brunner,
    but Brunner, in Syria, if somebody would do that,
    he would be killed.
    Immediately.
    So the life of Brunner was not worth of the life
    of somebody, anybody.
    Now, do you think Brunner is still alive?
    No.
    He's definitely dead.
    Age and sickness also.
    He died surely 20 years ago.
    Right.
    Yeah.
    What do you think was your--
    I mean, looking back, what was the most--
    maybe the biggest either mistake or missed opportunity
    or anything you look back on and regret at all?
    No?
    No.
    No.
    We did our best, you know, and if we couldn't succeed--
    No.
    Yeah.
    We have no--
    No regret.
    And even Brunner, he was sentenced in absentia in Paris
    by a French tribunal.
    Do you regret--
    The regret is that East Germany, they
    were convinced, when they admit Honecker in '87 or '88.
    And they asked finally the expulsion of Brunner
    because we always explained to East Germans
    that in Syria they have only to put Brunner in the plane
    to East Berlin.
    And he will be arrested arriving in East Berlin.
    And that East Germany will not ask anything to Brunner
    about what happened after the war.
    In Syria, in Syria.
    To put Syria outside the case.
    Just make it about his war record.
    Yeah.
    Yes.
    But in the beginning of the '80, we could not convince--
    The East Germans--
    --East Germany.
    And in 1988, they were too weak.
    Assad was stronger than--
    East Germany.
    --than East Germany so you met Honecker in '88, or here--
    In Paris-- it was a dinner, and with Mitterrand invited us.
    So this was '87 or--
    '87 or '88.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    We have the correspondence, and we could
    recuperate [? other. ?] You know,
    but even they were not so in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
    and Ministry of Justice, they were not so going very fast
    after the demand of Honecker.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    I wanted to ask you, do you remember this particular moment
    in your life when you both decided that you
    are going to hunt the Nazis?
    Where was it, at home, in the kitchen, in the bedroom,
    during dinner time?
    How was it.
    We did not decide to go after the Nazis.
    First we decided to campaign against the Kiesinger
    [BACKGROUND NOISES].
    That was not Nazi criminal because he didn't kill.
    He didn't give orders to kill.
    And I met Wiesenthal a few days--
    not days, weeks after because it was normal for me
    to go to see Wiesenthal.
    And how to go against the former Nazi criminals
    when somebody who was at the head of the radio propaganda--
    at the time, radio was important--
    the head of radio propaganda towards foreign countries,
    so saying that Germany is clean, Germany et cetera.
    At the same time, he was at the head of the [FRENCH]..
    So he knew what the foreign radios
    were saying about Germany and camps and treatment of Jews
    and so on.
    So if such a man is at the head of the government,
    so why to go on after Nazi criminals?
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    So, the first--
    It started Kiesinger.
    So it started with Kiesinger.
    --step was not Nazi criminal.
    It's only after two years or three years
    even, those two, three years, in 1970--
    at the end of '70, is that we learned
    the situation about Nazi criminals
    who were active in France and who
    were the only Nazis in the world who could not
    be prosecuted because they could not be extradited to France.
    And they could not be judged in Germany.
    But how did you learn this?
    How did you learn--
    After the slap, everybody said Mrs. Klarsfeld,
    you can't stay home.
    And I was fighting for Brandt, you know.
    And there was a new coalition, Brandt and the FDP.
    So what did Brandt?
    He promised the FDP to put to Brussels,
    so a [NON-ENGLISH] who Mr. Achenbach.
    Yes.
    Mr. [PERSONAL NAME],, at that time he was not a criminal.
    It was also a political man, a political man.
    He sent him to Brussels, you know?
    Yes.
    But it was not a political-- it was not a Nazi criminal.
    It was like Kiesinger.
    A Nazi functionary.
    We showed that criminal--
    Was a reason to act.
    We showed that Kiesinger was involved in the Nazi politics.
    We showed that Achenbach was involved in Nazi diplomacy.
    And then we learned that the Nazi criminals who operated
    in France are the only one--
    Who can not be--
    --to be completely quiet, completely quiet.
    So we decided that, as Willy Brandt was signing
    a new agreement with France giving the possibility
    to Germany to judge these criminals,
    and we learned also that the parliament,
    the German parliament, will not ratify that agreement, which
    will not become a law.
    So we decided to--
    and the French authorities were--
    how to say-- important in a way.
    And they say that we cannot do anything against the will
    of two of the three parties who were in the parliament,
    the Christian Democrats and the liberals.
    So we decided that, if the French authorities cannot do
    anything, we will do.
    Yeah.
    But the idea was because the French could not
    extradite the Germans, right?
    There was no extradition?
    No, the German could not extradite to France.
    The German could not extradite nationals to France.
    And also, the Germans could not judge
    because the French did not allow them in 1954
    to judge Nazi criminals.
    The French did not allow them that.
    Yes, because the French decided that--
    Andrew Nagorski, very nice to meet you.
    Yes, a pleasure to meet you.
    [CROSS TALK]
    You saw the cats?
    Yes, yes, yes.
    The cats have visited.
    [FRENCH]
    [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]
    The French saw that many judges in Germany are former Nazi.
    Yes.
    So they were afraid that--
    So they let them go.
    --will let them go.
    So they did not allow, they forbid
    them to judge Nazi criminal for Nazi criminals whose files was
    not classified in France.
    And when these criminals came back at the open light,
    France asked the extradition of one of them.
    And there was a refusal.
    He's a German.
    We do not extradite.
    So judge then.
    No, because you have--
    he has been on trial in absentia in France.
    In France.
    And a trial in absentia is a non-classified file.
    So we cannot judge him because--
    and all were tried in absentia.
    So they could not be tried again.
    That was the theory, right?
    In Germany.
    And that law was changed in '75?
    In '71.
    '71?
    Yes, in '75 it was--
    Ratified.
    Yeah, it was ratified, yes, by the parliament.
    And we started in '71, a few days
    after the signature of the agreement, which
    the German Bundestag didn't want to ratify.
    At first, yeah.
    So the law changed because of you?
    Yeah.
    So the law was changed because of your campaign.
    Yes, it was called, in the German press, Lex Klarsfeld
    because we fought during four years to obtain the law,
    and then we fought again during four years
    to obtain that the law be applied.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    So, it took a long time.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    I want to get back to-- you mentioned Wiesenthal and that
    you--
    I know you met with him many times.
    Of course--
    Not many times.
    I met him once in--
    Oh, you only--
    Several time, yeah.
    --once in Prague, [CROSS TALK].
    And in Vienna, during the Waldheim affair, or did you?
    No, no.
    I met him once before.
    I went to a manifest against Zionism in Prague, you know.
    Ah, right.
    Oh, that's right.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    During the anti-Jewish-- antisemitic campaigns there.
    In Waldheim no, because he was more or less
    supporting Waldheim, you know?
    Yeah.
    Well, I remember.
    I was there as a correspondent for Newsweek.
    So I was there.
    I remember when you came to Vienna.
    Did you feel-- I know, Wiesenthal has many--
    can be very controversial.
    They're very divided opinions.
    What is your feeling about Wiesenthal and his role.
    Oh, he did a lot, as you know.
    He has survived the camps and lost family.
    I think what he did after the war
    to collect all the information from the--
    Yes, he was alone during a long time.
    He was alone.
    And his work--
    In Australia, now to be a Jew is not easy, you know.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Many Jews were fighting for Israel at that time.
    And so he was alone during the '50s.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And it was a difficult time, I believe, for him
    because many great, great criminals, Einsatzgruppen
    and so on, they went out from jail
    because Cold War on the two sides.
    And so I am grateful.
    But we had not the same ideas, you know.
    Wiesenthal, you saw him hand in hand with Helmut Kohl,
    who is a--
    and we were not in the same--
    we had to fight.
    I believe he had a very great ego.
    Do you think he was more forgiving?
    No.
    More forgiving?
    No, I don't believe.
    [INAUDIBLE] campaign by his Wiesenthal Center still today,
    to--
    [INTERPOSING VOICES]
    I know they are still [CROSS TALK]..
    Forgiving?
    No.
    But first he was not going in a place to--
    we never saw him in South America,
    in situations like the situation in which we were.
    And did you, during the Waldheim affair, of course,
    there was a-- you had very different tactics
    than Wiesenthal.
    But he would do anything, you know.
    Wiesenthal knew, certainly, about Waldheim.
    But he was close to his party.
    But he was a supporter of the Conservative Party.
    So he didn't say anything.
    And as he didn't say anything against Waldheim,
    so Israel didn't move, and nobody moved at that time.
    And then when the truth about Waldheim came out,
    but Wiesenthal tried to explain why he didn't say anything.
    And finally he was quite defending Waldheim,
    and the World Jewish Congress was attacking Waldheim.
    Well, he called Waldheim an opportunist and a liar
    but not a major war criminal.
    No, he was not a major war criminal.
    He was a member of the--
    how to say--
    Of the team.
    --member of the team.
    But the general was hanged.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    The general was hanged.
    And surely-- but we have not definitive proof,
    but surely he was active in the choice of hostages
    and perhaps even in the case of Jews in Greece.
    Yeah, as you say, there was never any definite--
    Anyhow, the situation was that he was the head of the World
    diplomacy.
    And in the basement, you had his file as a war criminal.
    But do you think that--
    because this is part of it.
    Some people say that Wiesenthal--
    they claim Wiesenthal knew about his past
    very well when, in fact, in the Berlin Document Center,
    I think the original, when he made an inquiry,
    they said he was clear.
    And he did not investigate as much.
    That was the story.
    Yes, but in-- we learned that, in Vienna,
    many people say that the story of Waldheim,
    that he was wounded immediately then he studied,
    that he was not in the Balkans and--
    Yeah.
    Well, that was all.
    He kept that out of his autobiography.
    Well, that was known by many people.
    And Waldheim could not--
    yes, he was so much about against Kreisky
    and the Nazi who was taken by Kreisky and his government.
    Wiesenthal, yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    He was very-- he hated Kreisky.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And he had the right because Kreisky took--
    Nazis into his government.
    Yasser Arafat is the first one, no?
    Yes, and I remember.
    I remember.
    Yes, Kreisky, which was one of the ironies.
    So you-- I mean, I guess my question is,
    do you feel you just had an honest disagreement with
    the Wiesenthal on this, or do you feel Wiesenthal was--
    or you still respect Wiesenthal's legacy
    and his history.
    No, we respected him, but we didn't like his comments
    about us or because he said that it's
    childish to go to Chile against Pinochet or something
    like that.
    While Beate organize a first protest, public protest,
    in front of the Moneda, of the presidential palace.
    So it's not childish.
    It's only that he didn't do such actions.
    And he was, in fact, he didn't like that somebody else was
    active in his field.
    And also, we knew that.
    And he knew that we knew that in the Eichmann case,
    the Mossad was the operative and not Wiesenthal.
    But he liked the legend that--
    that his men were killing Nazi criminals
    while no Nazi criminal was illegally
    killed during these 50 years, you know.
    Not killing, you mean, hunt--
    capturing, or--
    No, but in the movies, in--
    Oh, in the movies, yeah--
    Boys from Brazil, yeah.
    Fiction.
    In fiction, yeah.
    No, you had that.
    But in fact, it was an office like our office.
    Yes, I was in that office.
    I know the office.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    No, no illegal actions.
    And in fact, Jews wanted justice and not vengeance
    because they had the possibility to kill Nazi criminals,
    and no one was killed.
    Not no one it's not--
    well, a few cases at the very end of the war, yeah.
    At the end of the war, you know, the deportees
    could kill some kapo or some head of camps and--
    but after, I would say after the rest of the war--
    Yes.
    You had no--
    Even Eichmann was taken to be--
    Tried, yeah.
    Tried and not killed.
    Right.
    Right.
    And I always say, if there were criminals killed,
    tell them the names of the criminal, but no names.
    There's no name.
    You mentioned Honecker, of course, during the especially
    during the campaign for the presidency,
    the discussion about the Stasi and how many
    files you got from the Stasi or the East Germans,
    and payments came up.
    Could you say-- what exactly--
    how close was your involvement with them
    in terms of getting documents and then Yes,
    we've got file of Kiesinger, part of the file
    because we got another part in Washington.
    And other documents, but we had the support.
    [INAUDIBLE] told immediately that they
    will support our campaign.
    And it's in the book.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    I know.
    The book, we-- in that book, you have much more than what is
    developed, reproach to Beate.
    And--
    Although I never remember, did you talk about the payments?
    It was a large payment of one article.
    For an article?
    That's first an article.
    They published even books for us, you know.
    [MUMBLING] We published always that we published--
    we printed such books in East Germany
    and so the support of East Germany, we do not deny at all.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    But you were never--
    and there was also candidate, '69,
    for the election in Germany.
    So I was supported by the East German Communist Party.
    It was a Communist Party in Germany,
    but if I was number one on the list
    in the same circumscription as Kiesinger invited me
    near the border of Switzerland because the East
    German supporter pushed me to be the candidate,
    you know, in the Swiss.
    That was a--
    But also, they after Beate went to Prague and to Warsaw,
    so they cut the border.
    And then they, when there was, again, in '74, '75,
    so they said that Beate was right in Prague and Warsaw.
    And that they sent the best lawyer to--
    Defend.
    --to defend Beate.
    But do we keep--
    took the Israeli lawyer.
    Not the East German lawyer?
    Not the East--
    It the beginning [INAUDIBLE],, I was sentenced
    for the kidnapping, you know.
    So in my trial that [INAUDIBLE]
    In '74.
    For the kidnapping of Lischka.
    Of Lischka, yeah, because I was sent for that,
    I went back to Germany.
    And I said--
    But you, in your autobiography, for instance, you write--
    you're talking about being supportive
    of a unified socialist Germany and also,
    when you write about '68, I mean later in '69, '70,
    when the antisemitic campaigns, you had those actions.
    But how did you feel about the system?
    I'm curious because I spent time in, especially in Poland then,
    about the communist system in East Germany, in Poland,
    and Czechoslovakia before the antisemitic,
    the so-called anti-Zionist campaign?
    You did-- were you uncomfortable with that support in any way?
    Well, East German, I don't--
    I mean, we saw them.
    Serge went to-- we went to those archives.
    He said, you know I'll put you a vote in the United Nations,
    that Zionism is a kind of racism you know?
    But at that time, it was less uncomfortable because it was--
    It was not the [CROSS TALK].
    Because the conditions of life were not
    so far from West and East at that time,
    at the end of the '60s.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    West Berlin was still not that prosperous.
    Yeah.
    So it is the fact that there was no--
    freedom was important.
    The fact that I was used to go often
    to Romania, to Moscow, to--
    by my work, between 1966 and '70.
    So I was like, I would say, a bird going in there.
    But for your work, which work?
    I was working at the Continental Grains.
    Oh, Continental Grains.
    And in the finance department.
    And we were used to have, as you say, to work in discounts.
    We were buying-- how to say--
    $5 million from Brazil to the--
    Commodity trading.
    Yes.
    And then we sold the $5 millions with a discount
    to Bulgaria in order to--
    well, it's complicated, but I even do not remember.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    So I was used to go quite often to--
    I was not shocked by anything except freedom.
    Freedom.
    But when I went to see East Germans in 1967, after Beate
    was revoked from the offer.
    So I told them we need allies.
    You are enemy.
    I am not--
    I have not your ideals.
    I come from--
    I was a volunteer in the Six Days War and so.
    But we have the same enemy.
    And we need the documents and so on.
    Well, and they say yes.
    So we kept our freedom of thinking.
    Thinking, yeah.
    We kept.
    That was the support, but we had the support of France also.
    In a way, nobody asked us anything never in France,
    in 45 years.
    We had no pressure at all from any government.
    So and but so we kept our freedom.
    And sometimes we had, as you know, fights with East Germany,
    like in with Prague or Warsaw and so on.
    And sometimes they were in better relations with us.
    But the cooperation was more with the fact
    with case of Kiesinger, which was important for them.
    And the case of Lischka was not so important for them.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    And did you, in the '60s, did you ever have any contact with
    Fritz Bauer, the--
    No.
    No?
    No, no.
    But you know of his--
    I know Fritz Bauer is a tutor.
    Yeah, right.
    Right.
    Or in Poland, did you ever hear of young Zen who
    is this investigating judge in Poland.
    He was in the first Auschwitz trial in '47.
    But he worked with Bauer on the second Auschwitz trial.
    I was just curious whether you'd have heard of him.
    No, we were not involved at all before--
    Before this.
    Yeah.
    Before.
    Yes.
    Right.
    Right.
    But very quick question.
    I mean, most of your work was done at the time when we didn't
    have computers, no internet.
    How did you find all those documents?
    Did you have a lot of help from other people?
    No, no, not at all.
    But we had the help of the fact that in France exists
    a Jewish documentation center.
    So that's were--
    --which was created in 1943, and before Yad Vashem,
    before Washington, before [INAUDIBLE]..
    And they kept the archives of the Gestapo in France.
    They succeeded to keep them so--
    But for example, when you said that when you went to Chile,
    and you knew that there is going to be
    a meeting or some kind of event with--
    --Nazis.
    How did you know about this?
    Sometimes I had known somebody in advance.
    But if not, I organized on the spot, you know.
    No, the meetings of what--
    In Chile and Santiago de Chile.
    No.
    Those are the--
    What kind of meeting?
    The protest, when for example, when you went
    to protest in Chile, right?
    So how did when to go, at what months?
    To who?
    No, to protest in front of the Moneda in Chile.
    No.
    How'd we organize, where?
    So Beate [INAUDIBLE]
    I don't know the dates.
    Yes, but that was just when the dictatorship had started.
    [FRENCH] I'm sure that you--
    [FRENCH] we had connections with a journalist before also.
    That is what I'm asking.
    [CROSS TALK] that information.
    I sing in-- well, no, because also in Chile I sing a lot.
    So now I had somebody contact also with somebody [CROSS TALK]
    Give me the new Bolivie
    Oui, Bolivie was on the spot.
    But also, when I met the people of--
    some politicians, you know--
    Because it had to be very difficult. Because now
    you can just Google and--
    Yeah, but if you are--
    So much--
    The groups I met, they had also people behind.
    So I was invited to speak on the teaching
    in the university in Chile.
    And then there was a group of those
    who had lost their relatives, you know, they disappeared.
    So it was a big, big movement.
    They came and protested with us in front of the Moneda.
    Also, when we went to protest in front of a home,
    there was quite a kind of mixture of all those
    who were against Pinochet.
    Right.
    And those former supporters of [? Molenda. ?]
    Right.
    And a quick question about a couple more people, Tuviah
    Friedman, did you ever know him?
    Did you ever work--
    He probably was from on Israel and [CROSS TALK]..
    Yeah, but he's not someone you ever worked with in--
    He was--
    Yeah, he's no longer alive.
    Yeah.
    He died not too long ago.
    Yeah.
    The trial.
    [FRENCH] he made many statements--
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    He was very--
    --without--
    Backing.
    He also made a lot of claims about Eichmann and all that.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    [FRENCH]
    Oh, they did.
    Yeah, he showed up in the trial.
    [INTERPOSING VOICES]
    And he disappeared.
    Due to him, the [INAUDIBLE].
    [FRENCH]
    Thanks to me, he's at trial.
    So I told him, go away.
    And he didn't.
    He came back.
    Yes, he liked publicity.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    And do you know Efraim Zuroff, who is now in the--
    [INTERPOSING VOICES]
    We met him several times.
    Yeah.
    And what impression?
    It's difficult to say because I have the sense of--
    a special sense of justice.
    I cannot go after somebody when I am not sure that he is
    guilty.
    And you think--
    I know it's been told that, in some cases, Zuroff actually--
    It's difficult with the last one because--
    the last ones were the youngest ones.
    And for small people, it's harder than for high positions
    because they didn't sign any document, except their cards.
    And now I have a trial, some man called
    Lipschis, who was an SS guard.
    And he was a guard. .
    The accusation act says that he was a guard when
    arrived a train from Drancy.
    So if it is a train from Drancy, I have to be there.
    But it's different if the man was in the kitchen,
    or if the man was on the ramp.
    Sure.
    And he was in Auschwitz?
    He was in Auschwitz.
    And the accusation act says that he was on the run.
    But I didn't see until now the accusation act.
    So I have to see on what basis they accuse him because there
    were several guards in Auschwitz who were acquitted
    by Poles because they were not inhuman
    but, the deportees said that they helped us or something.
    So it's difficult with small agents of the Final Solution
    to know if they were guilty or not.
    And I like better to be sure And Demjanjuk--
    Yeah, what do you think?
    Demjanjuk was sentenced to death in a way
    because he was a war prisoner, Soviet war prisoner.
    So he had to die.
    So to go on the side of the Germans
    was quite natural for somebody who want to live.
    And secondly, it is shown that he was in Sobibor.
    And we gave to the French--
    It is not sure.
    Oh, sure he [CROSS TALK].
    Sobibor is sure.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And we gave to the French judge the testimony
    of Danilenko, who said that he was on the ramp,
    and I pushed the--
    and they asked who else was there.
    I knew Demjanjuk, so it was quite sure.
    But Demjanjuk himself said nothing during his trial.
    He wasn't lying.
    It was not-- when somebody is 93, 93,
    he cannot defend himself very well.
    So if there is a document, in the case of that Lipschis,
    so you risk only five years of jail.
    And he is in jail.
    So he will be removed from his jail after the verdict,
    if he sentenced to five years.
    And if we have the proof that he was on the run.
    So we will go on against him, but not with great pleasure.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Is that trial here or in Germany?
    No, no.
    In Germany.
    [NON-ENGLISH]
    In France he wouldn't have been judged.
    It's an extension of the law.
    Of the law.
    Of the interpretation of the law.
    And I am not sure that the federal court will not--
    Say.
    Such a moment in the court with--
    it was not accepted, the trial was not
    accepted for the moment.
    For the moment it's not accepted.
    But we will see.
    But the federal court also has to decide.
    It's an extension to--
    if somebody was guarding the camps for that--
    for those who defend that notion,
    even if he was in the kitchen, he
    was at a place in a structure, which was a criminal structure.
    And being in the kitchen, he helped that criminal structure.
    Yes.
    So it's ascribed.
    It's an extension of.
    Of it, yeah.
    Which you are not quite--
    Which is quite Sovietic.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    I was-- yes, it does feel that way.
    Because, those-- you know in my family, we were--
    in Romania, they were sentenced because they were capitalists.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And being even a small capitalist,
    you help capitalist structure, which
    is a criminal one, of which was a criminal one.
    And now it's not so far from--
    From that.
    So you think these last trials--
    No, [CROSS TALK] they want to have several more.
    I know.
    Yeah.
    Ludwigsburg is talking.
    Do you think it makes sense to do so?
    Did it go to say, you know, you can not--
    No, you have to look at the case by himself, by itself.
    If somebody was a volunteer to be an SS,
    that Lipschis lives in Lithuania.
    He came to Germany.
    And he became a SS.
    I would like to see the file.
    How he became an SS, and if he was really a volunteer or not.
    Yeah, what is his first name?
    Do you remember?
    Hans.
    Hans.
    Hans Lipschis-- L-I-P-S-C-H-I-S.
    I-S?
    Oh, that way.
    So it's a Lithuanian spelling.
    Yeah.
    So he's an ethnic Lithuanian probably.
    Yeah.
    And also, I believe that the judges in Germany,
    in Ludwigsburg, they want to keep their office.
    Yeah, you think-- yeah.
    Frankly, it's a difficult question.
    But there are some people who are invested.
    This has become a career.
    I mean--
    Yes.
    And if they move from that office to another one,
    it will be less interesting.
    Yeah.
    Well one--
    But there is also the will of the German society
    to see Nazi criminals being judged until they die.
    Do you think that will exist?
    That's positive.
    That shows that the society has changed.
    But at the same time, at the same time,
    there is no more important criminal, only small executors.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    So-- And I believe that the judges of today
    have the same behavior than 50 years ago.
    50 years ago, the German society asked not to judge,
    and they didn't judge.
    There were important criminals who
    were free because they were unable to stand their trial
    physically.
    Some also-- many were not judged.
    And today, the German society asked judge the Nazi criminals.
    And so they find.
    They obey to the German society.
    They do what the society wants.
    Right.
    Well speaking of judging high criminals versus low criminals,
    I'm sure you read the book.
    I remember [GERMAN] I'm Kyle Kraut, about Barbie--
    Finkielkraut.
    Oh, Finkielkraut, yes, Finkielkraut,
    yeah, about Barbie.
    Finkielkraut, remember?
    I remember that he was against the--
    Well, he had-- it was a very complicated French intellectual
    argument.
    But he said that Barbie, even Barbie,
    was a small cog in the machine.
    But that is what made him significant,
    that you had to show that even the smaller cogs in the machine
    are--
    I assume you treated Barbie at the--
    We saw Barbie and [FRENCH] normally in our view.
    The limit of those who can be put on trial, it's a limit.
    Has the limit.
    Yeah.
    Normally.
    But I understand that--
    I understand the will of those who
    suffered to see the policeman who arrested,
    the SS who was on the ramp, and so on.
    I understand.
    But personally, I find that there is a limit for me to--
    there is a limit, which is at [FRENCH]
    So long after-- immediately, of course,
    they could be judged because they
    were testifying witnesses of what they had done,
    and many witnesses.
    Today, you have no more witness.
    So this is--
    A trial with documents give you the insurance
    that the decision is a good one.
    And the trial which relies on witnesses
    do not give that insurance.
    And today, you have trials without witnesses
    and without documents.
    Which is not OK.
    Which is not OK for me.
    But it's OK for many people.
    It's OK because he was an SS, so he's guilty.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    But if there is a proof that he took a part,
    but of course, if SS was during the war in the kitchens,
    I do not see the same responsibility.
    He said he had been in the United States.
    He was extradited from the United States.
    So there's is a big files about him.
    I don't know.
    Yeah, this is the OSI in the United States.
    Yeah.
    I don't know what documents are.
    Yeah.
    I know there's still some cases in the United States for--
    No, for him, for Lipschis.
    Lipschis, yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    So I guess if they give some to the Germans,
    they have given them already.
    So I don't know.
    And let me ask.
    I know I've taken a lot of your time,
    but let me ask also, for you, as someone who grew up in Germany,
    I mean, it's one thing--
    I mean, your original story makes it very clear.
    Do you think sometimes people say, well, you almost
    have that feeling of the converted
    because you grew up in one environment,
    then your eyes were open to it.
    Is that a fair characterization that you
    feel that you have-- because you are a German,
    you feel particular responsibility in your life
    to do this?
    Well, because and Jim and I did it, you know.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    It's the reason, as I always said,
    having been raised in Berlin, already
    in a city separated in one capitalist and communist world,
    so knowing what happened, what was the things of the Second
    World War, a city in ruins.
    And then coming to Paris, a country
    occupied, where some of even their friends
    were a little-- there was a kind of bad feeling against Germans
    at this time.
    Right.
    And you felt that personally?
    But also because Serge started to teach me also.
    But German teachers didn't do, so I
    had known what happened between '33 and '45.
    And I started to be interested in what was going on
    in Germany, you know.
    And I think this is the reason was, as we said before,
    the war from the French-German office, Youth office.
    But I think, as a German, I have a big goal, you know.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Many slaps at something in everybody, their minds.
    Yeah.
    And did your mother ever-- your parents ever--
    I don't remember how long your parents lived.
    But your mother, I think, was very opposed.
    Yeah, she died in 2000.
    So she was very much against because all the neighbors was
    against me and shouting.
    So but later, when he she met my mother-in-law,
    they were very close.
    My mother-in-law, Serge, totally spoke fluent German.
    And also, when she saw the grandchildren--
    my father died quite before the slap, so--
    Yes.
    But no, she changed her mind.
    She did change her mind?
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And when you look back just at the whole struggle
    of your struggle, of other people who try
    and the efforts from Nuremberg, do
    you feel justice was done after the War
    Yes.
    Yes.
    You do feel?
    Yeah.
    [INAUDIBLE]
    Even though the percentage of real criminals who was tried
    or made to pay was very small?
    But against all the people who had
    an importance in the Final Solution,
    all had an investigation against them, all of them.
    Sometimes it didn't went to a trial
    due to the behavior of the German justice between 1950
    and 1970.
    But there was an investigation.
    They had the Ludwigsburg, you know, all the files
    at Ludwigsburg.
    All the files at Ludwigsburg.
    Right.
    Right.
    Yes, there was an investigation in Ludwigsburg,
    and an investigation also in the land where--
    the tribunal, were Ludwigsburg send a file.
    And there were many who were sentenced
    in their own countries and the accomplices of the Nazi.
    Right.
    And Nuremberg was a success, not only Nuremberg the great trial,
    but--
    The subsequent trials.
    The American trials of the diplomats and Einsatzgruppen
    and because--
    Einsatzgruppen, yeah.
    Because it's a question in--
    when there is an historic killing,
    it's a question of justice and also of history.
    And all these trials brought an immense documentation
    about what happened.
    And I believe that the victims would have hope that their fate
    being known, not only the criminals being judged,
    but also the fate being known everywhere it took place.
    And that the fact, in 50 years ago,
    you had 300 books about the Final Solution.
    Today you have 100,000.
    And you have huge documentation centers
    with millions of documents, like Washington and Yad Vashem and--
    Yeah, the Holocaust museums.
    Yeah.
    You have Holocaust centers.
    We were, in 1970--
    in '69, in Berlin.
    We saw a small garden being dedicated to the victims.
    And today you have the Holocaust [INAUDIBLE]..
    You have the Wannsee Conference.
    You have the Institute of the Zeitgeschichte in Munich.
    You have, in each city, a book about the Jews
    in that city before the war.
    So--
    In Warsaw, there is this new museum.
    In Russia, they started again.
    In Europe, you have a memorial center and documentation
    center in each country where the Final Solution took place.
    So I am satisfied completely with the history and justice.
    Justice by essence is not effective.
    They cannot resuscitate people who were killed.
    So it's always symbolic.
    At the same time, it's something true.
    But also, it's something symbolic.
    And so we believe that justice was
    done, and for the first time in the history of humanity.
    It's the first time.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    It's true.
    Yes.
    And if you compare--
    I mean, of course these are different situations.
    In Russia, for instance, the Stalinist period is still--
    justice has not been done.
    No, but they gave a--
    There were--
    [INTERPOSING VOICES]
    But general measures-- general measures.
    I'm not satisfied with the fact that it did not
    prevent other genocides.
    But it's in another planet.
    It's not in the Western world.
    In the Western world, today in Europe,
    you have a complete peace.
    And that was the first time since the Roman Empire.
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    That's true.
    Right.
    So it is important.
    And Germany is very important now again.
    And all the Jews also are--
    all the Jews are now in the Western world
    because Russia also, in a way, it's in the Western world also,
    even if it's an authoritarian state.
    They have to take into consideration the pressures
    of the Western world.
    And even the Soviet pavilion was dedicated by Putin
    in Auschwitz.
    And he came to Auschwitz to speak also.
    And so I must say that, in fact, we
    are satisfied with the line of history in that field.
    Yeah.
    But do you feel that, among young Germans,
    sometimes you hear that this awareness sometimes feels more
    distant, for obvious reasons.
    Do you worry about that at all?
    No.
    The schools, they are teaching, and they
    are going to Auschwitz.
    But no, it's on the program.
    And I guess it has all the possibilities
    to see the museums and the documents and that.
    And just also every time there's a role of the teacher,
    you know, they try to attract the students with this subject.
    But no, I would say there is also
    the exchange of the culture and youth office.
    No, I think that--
    And Germany--
    --it's very important.
    --is also the supporter of Israel.
    Right.
    Right.
    Right.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    Right.
    Well, thank you so much.
    This has been fascinating.
    And I hope when I'm writing later,
    this will be a while, if I can occasionally, by email,
    even check a few facts or anything,
    if there are any questions.
    There's a book which will be--
    I don't really know that.
    [FRENCH]
    It's a book about--
    ah.
    Well--
    Is it gone?
    OK, this is--
    No, that's [INAUDIBLE]
    So this is your book.
    No, no, no.
    It's not my book.
    I made a very long foreword.
    Foreword.
    A very long foreword.
    It's articles of the Lex Klarsfeld.
    Yes, can I buy this from you.
    No, you can keep it.
    Oh, really.
    Well, thank you so much.
    And I do want to get you to sign your book.
    And I will sign mine.
    If you wouldn't mind, I'd be very honored.
    Go on and do the [INAUDIBLE].
    So, I'm supposed to go here?
    [BACKGROUND NOISES] here, please.
    Two writers.
    Take this baton.
    Oh, I'm sorry.
    OK.
    Should have brought the glasses.
    We went to Budapest not too long ago to see the Museum of Terror
    in Budapest.
    They opened a Museum of Terror.

    Overview

    Interviewee
    Serge Klarsfeld
    Beate Klarsfeld
    Interviewer
    Andrew Nagorski
    Date
    interview:  2013
    Credit Line
    Permanent Collection. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Gift of Andrew Nagorski

    Physical Details

    Language
    English
    Extent
    1 digital file : MP3.

    Rights & Restrictions

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    Administrative Notes

    Legal Status
    Permanent Collection
    Provenance
    Andrew Nagorski donated the interview with Serge Klarsfeld and Beate Klarsfeld to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2016. Nagorski recorded the interview during his research for his book "The Nazi Hunters: How a Team of Spies and Survivors Captured the World's Most Notorious Nazi."
    Record last modified:
    2023-11-16 09:40:10
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    Also in Andrew Nagorski collection

    Materials related to research conducted by Nagorski into topics related to the history of the Holocaust and World War II. Includes the extended draft of an article about Auschwitz written by Nagorski, 1995, and published version of same as it appeared in Newsweek, 16 January 1995, sound recordings of interviews of historical eyewitnesses, historians, and others interviewed by Nagorski during his career at Newsweek, and while writing his books “Hitlerland” and “The Nazi Hunters,” transcripts of interviews, and other related research (and other) materials.

    Andrew Nagorski papers

    Document

    Collection consists of transcripts of interviews conducted by Nagorski, primarily in preparation for a cover story on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, written for publication in Newsweek magazine in January 1995. The collection consists of a typescript of the full version of the article; the shortened, public version as it appeared in Newsweek; and transcripts of related interviews that Nagorski conducted in the years following this article. In addition to interviews with Polish and Russian former prisoners of Auschwitz, mostly conducted in the early 1990s, the collection of transcripts also includes interviews with German president Richard von Weizsäcker; Manfred Rommel, the son of General Erwin Rommel; and Niklas Frank, the son of Hans Frank, the Nazi administrator of occupied Poland who was tried and executed by the Allies at the International Criminal Tribunal in Nuremberg.

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