It is 1939. The Nazi invasion of Poland has started World War II. Three ordinary, decent, young Germans join the elite Nazi force, the SS. Johann Helmuth. a Bavarian farmer's son, does so primarily to please his authoritarian, anti-semitic father, but also out of a vague sense of patriotism and a need to belong to a larger group. Herbert Winkler's father runs a small automobile repair shop in a village in the mountains of the former Austria. The son is a confirmed Nazi, willing to sacrifice his life for the Thousand Year Reich and its glorious Fűhrer. The third, Werner Kohler, comes from a sophisticated and very wealthy Berlin family. He is neither an ideologue nor particularly patriotic, but bored, looking for excitement. The three become friends during the rigorous and demanding SS training that transformed ordinary citizens into members of what became arguably the most potent fighting force in all history. After the German invasion of Russia, they are sent to the eastern front, Johann and Werner in a Waffen-SS division, Herbert in a penal unit. In Russia they experience the monstrosity of modern warfare and the bestiality of the Nazi terror that is unleashed against the local populations and particularly against the Jews. They witness and participate in actions of indescribable horror. Can their background explain their different reactions to these events?

They sat at a small table in the priest’s bedroom. The room was sparsely furnished: a small bed, a wardrobe, a chest with two drawers and an extra chair were the only other pieces of furniture. Johann could not get himself to start the conversation. “How is your father? I haven’t seen him in some time. I am afraid that he is too busy with political affairs to come to church.” “My father… We have had a terrible fight.” “That doesn’t surprise me too much. Your father is a stubborn man with very strong opinions, and he has a nasty temper. What do you want me to do? Try to talk sense into him? What was the fight about?” “No, I don’t want you to make peace. I just want to talk to someone I can trust.” “Johann, I have known you all your life. You know that with me you can discuss anything.” “Perhaps you won’t like what you’ll hear.” “After twenty-two years as a priest in this village I have heard about everything that goes on behind the doors and in the beds of my parishioners’ homes. Nothing shocks me anymore. It doesn’t matter whether or not I like things that I hear. I am here to allow you to make peace with God.” “Peace with God,” Johann repeated, almost derisively. “My father called me a traitor, a liar. He threatened to turn me over to the Gestapo. Because of things that I told him.” The priest was quiet for a while. He had his hands folded in front of his chest almost as if he were praying. “Johann, I must warn you. This is not part of the confessional. Our conversation is therefore not protected. And this government requires me to inform police of criminal activity. So perhaps you want to end this conversation now.” It was really the priest who wanted to end it. Johann shook his head. ‘Then tell me what you told him”. “I told him what I saw.” Father Anton opened his hands, his thumbs pointed outward, in a questioning gesture. “It was in the Ukraine. Near a town called Dubno.” Johann paced in the small room like a caged animal. “Early last October. A comrade and I were driving a car back to regimental headquarters. We took a wrong turn.” “I don’t want to hear any military secrets”. The Father would have preferred not to hear any of this. ‘It’s not a military secret.” The priest’s hands were again folded over his chest. “Go on if you must. But remember, I am not bound by secrecy.” Johann ignored the implied threat. “We came to a hilly area. There were several SS men in uniform and with machine pistols standing around what looked like a pit. We got out of the vehicle to ask for directions. There was an indescribable smell in the air. Shit, blood, vomit, I don’t know what else.” Johann had difficulty continuing. Tears streamed from his eyes. His voice became almost inaudible. “Near the pit there were mounds of clothing, neatly piled. Underclothing, top clothing, piles of shoes. There must have been more than a thousand pair. The pit itself was full of naked bodies. Men, women and children. I asked one of the SS men, they were police SS, not military, what had happened. ‘Nothing’, he said, shrugging. ‘These are only Jews. We are cleaning up Dubno.’ The man actually laughed. ‘There are still five thousand of them in town, so if you want to shoot a few…´” Johann had to stop for a while. He continued his pacing in the small room, but kept his tear filled eyes locked on the priest. “Johann...” “Let me finish.” He picked up the chair pushed it aimlessly, and then sat down. He stared at a picture of the Virgin above the Father’s bed. “Just then several Wehrmacht trucks came up the same road we had just taken. The trucks were packed with people. With Jews wearing their yellow stars. SS men with whips forced them off the trucks. The Jews, men, women and children, had to take their clothes off and add these to the piles. Top clothes here, underclothes there. Some refused. These were whipped mercilessly. They would not have whipped animals like that.” He looked at the priest. “It was, it is a nightmare. The naked Jews were forced to stand at the edge of the pit. Some of the women held the hands of their children, or carried small ones. It was a sight I will never forget. The SS men who held the machine pistols lazily walked behind them; some were still smoking their cigarettes when the shooting began. I couldn’t watch. I started to throw up. Werner, my friend, my comrade, pulled me by the arm and almost dragged me to our vehicle. He pushed me into the front seat, went around to the driver’s side and quickly drove off. I think that without him I might have started shooting at the murderers. To stop the horror of the scene. Driving away, we could hear the staccato of the machine pistols for quite a while. At night now I can still hear it.” He paused for a while. “How can God permit this?”

The author lived in Vienna, Austria, until the Germans occupied that city in 1939. He then emigrated to the United States, but returned to Europe five years later as an agent of the U.S. Counter Intelligence Corps, charged with the interrogation of several war criminals. As he questioned these individuals, some of whom had committed acts of incomprehensible bestiality, he kept asking himself one question over and over again: HOW DO SEEMINGLY NORMAL PEOPLE TURN INTO MONSTERS WHILE OTHERS, EXPOSED TO SIMILAR ENVIRONMENTS, MAINTAIN THEIR HUMANITY ? Later in life he became a biophysicist, an internationally recognized scientist, and was appointed Professor at Stanford University. He has authored or co-authored over two hundred scientific papers and his book, 'Hyperthermia and Cancer', although published in 1982, is still widely read. But in all those years the question of how can ordinary people commit acts of extra-ordinary cruelty was never far from his mind. Since retiring from Stanford, George Hahn and his wife have divided their time between Carmel Highlands, California, and Guatemala.