Customer Reviews

Hunting Eichmann: How a Band of Survivors and a Young Spy Agency Chased Down the World's Most Notorious Nazi

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Bascomb's "Hunting Eichmann" is a revelation, a light shone in dark and hidden corners, for those of us who were electrified by the news of his capture back in 1960. Israel was little more than a decade old at that point, and the stunning victory of June 1967 remained in the future. Bascomb's access to the dwindling band of operatives who planned and executed this master stroke of international justice is a real service to modern history. These actors were both dedicated and self-effacing in their service to justice for the slaughtered millions. It is good to know their names and see their faces.

Their persistence in the face of many false trails and of skepticism that justice would or could ever be done, their self-control in bringing Eichmann to trial, the loathing and dread they felt in his presence, banal as that presence was (whether taking his picture in close-up surveillance or sitting next to him on the El Al escape flight) -- these and much more are compellingly conveyed by Bascomb. I was particularly struck by Bascomb's ability to hold so many narrative threads in his hand and to play them out so clearly and in a way that left the reader engaged. One got a sense of both operational detail and high politics: The dreary, cold, rainy surveillance outpost on the railroad embankment above Eichmann's house; dealing with capricious banana-republic police; pushing the technical limits of the aircraft that spirited the criminal out of Buenos Aires; the scenes with Ben-Gurion and Meir; the Nazi underworld and its enablers in Peronist Argentina; the indifference of the Adenauer government in Bonn (indifference to everything but maintaining its myth of de-Nazification); the high dudgeon in Germany and Argentina over the supposed defects of a trial that neither state had any interest in initiating; and finally Eichmann's trial and the execution of sentence and disposal of Eichmann's corpse -- one could go on, but the point is that Bascomb has gathered these disparate element, structured them as a compelling narrative, and grips his reader from the very first page. I had the simultaneous feelings that I wanted to read pell-mell to the end and at the same time I didn't want to reach the final page and the end of the book's revelations of what really happened.

In a larger sense, Bascomb has written an overdue tribute to these daring Israelis and their personal self-restraint (many lost their families in the Holocaust) and to the dignified sense of high justice the Israeli State brought to the whole affair. He does not use colorful or emotive prose, but lets the facts speak for themselves -- speak they do.

Please don't be put off by S.McGee's review, which seemed to me to miss most of the book's many virtues. (McGee is, in fact, right to use the words "subjective" and "quibble" about his review of the book.) I'm glad I read the book before I read that review, because it might have put me off.

I loved Hunting Eichmann. Bascomb has taken a subject that itself is both universally recognizable and relatively interesting, but has taken it to the next level by crafting a narrative that jumps off the page and keeps you up reading in a way that rivals the best spy thrillers. He has also researched the heck out of this - talking with people in four languages on three continents and getting the fascinating first-hand details that make a very good book into an unquestionably great one. One of the two or three best books I've read in the last year. Highly recommend.

I'm a great fan of historical narratives, but it's rare that an author has access to the primary research that allows him to inject the book with real novelistic detail. Bascomb interviewed Mossad agents, El Al staff and combed through the archives of the CIA and other agencies, unearthing all kinds of new, exciting information, including the passport Eichmann used to escape Europe under the name Klement. While all this information in and of itself is interesting (and newsworthy), in Bascomb's hands it becomes the foundation for a rich, nuanced, taut thriller with relentless pacing. I could not put this book down, even though the conclusion is well-known to the world. Part of that was because Bascomb did a fantastic job of bringing the "characters" to life. The Mossad agents were all survivors in one way or another and their personal motivations and struggles were imprinted on every page of the manhunt, capture, and deliverance of the monster known as the architect of the Holocaust. I give this book my highest recommendation. I hope there's a movie, too! I assume they'll be one -- you can certainly see it in the book.

"THE ACCUSED, DURING THE PERIOD FROM 1939 TO 1945, TOGETHER WITH OTHERS, CAUSED THE DEATHS OF MILLIONS OF JEWS AS THE PERSONS WHO WERE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE PLAN OF THE NAZIS FOR THE EXTERMINATION OF THE JEWS, A PLAN KNOWN BY ITS TITLE *"THE FINAL SOLUTION OF THE JEWISH QUESTION.*"... this was part of the indictment brought by the State Of Israel against Adolf Eichmann on April 11, 1961 at 8:55 A.M. This intricately... historically detailed book tracks Eichmann from his days during the Holocaust as he despicably and callously... and with great personal pride... sets forth to wipe out every Jew in Europe. In a Hungarian ghetto Eichmann announced to Jewish prisoners: "JEWS: YOU HAVE NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT. WE WANT ONLY THE BEST FOR YOU. YOU'LL LEAVE HERE SHORTLY AND BE SENT TO VERY FINE PLACES INDEED." Those Jews were then forced into freight cars in which one entire village of one-hundred-three Jews were crammed into a single car that would have fit eight cows." The train of course led to one of many concentration camps where families were separated... and most... never saw each other again... as the chimneys of the crematoriums belched the smoke of Jewish death.

At the war's end Eichmann and many other Nazi's escaped from Germany and some were helped on their escape route by the Vatican. The author comprehensively re-creates the many twists and turns that lead to Eichmann's numerous living arrangements... under many different aliases... that eventually culminate in Argentina under the name of Ricardo Klement. During this time period the Nuremberg Trials take place... and there is a great deal of damning testimony regarding Eichmann that will be used against him down the road... such as the testimony by Lieutenant Colonel Brookhart who when asked "WAS ANY QUESTION ASKED BY YOU AS TO THE MEANING OF THE WORDS "FINAL SOLUTION" AS USED IN THE ORDER?" Brookhart answered: EICHMANN WENT ON TO EXPLAIN TO ME WHAT WAS MEANT BY THIS. HE SAID THAT THE PLANNED BIOLOGICAL ANNIHILATION OF THE JEWISH RACE IN THE EASTERN TERRITORIES WAS DISGUISED BY THE CONCEPT AND WORDING "FINAL SOLUTION." "Was anything said by you to Eichmann in regard to the power given him under this order?" "EICHMANN TOLD ME THAT WITHIN THE RSHA HE PERSONALLY WAS ENTRUSTED WITH THE EXECUTION OF THIS ORDER."

After almost fifteen-years of false leads and near misses Israel finally tracks Eichmann down... and here is where the author and story is relentless. Israel and the Mossad knew Argentina would not extradite Eichmann to Israel so Israel had to sneak an entire capture team into Argentina. The agents had to have multiple fake identities... one to get in from other countries... one to get out... and all the paperwork that would entail. They couldn't come in together... and how would they get him out? El Al airlines didn't fly into Argentina and it would be too risky by sea. When they captured Eichmann they had to keep him in a "safe-house" until the date of their ultra-risky exit strategy.

Being that I am part of the first post-Holocaust Jewish generation... I was raised with first hand stories of the Holocaust from my family and members of my community who bared the concentration camp serial numbers on their arms... so to me... one of the most chilling parts of the story is the fact that every member of the Jewish capture and "extradition" team had lost a large part if not all of their family... or were in concentration camps themselves... as a direct consequence of Eichmann during the Holocaust. The personal demons... and hatred... and revulsion... that each of them... though they already carried the horrors with them every day of their life... had it all multiplied by a million... in every pore of their body... when they were in the presence of the devil incarnate himself. Each individual had to restrain themselves from their immediate animal hunger of killing this genocidal debauchery of a thing G-d somehow put on earth. If you are Jewish you feel what they felt... that can't be given justice by mere words. One of the Mossad members who was tasked with grabbing Eichmann off the street and throwing him into a car... wore gloves... because he couldn't stomach touching his skin.

The reason the Israeli's did not simply execute him on the spot... is because... "HE WILL BE TRIED BY A JEWISH COURT IN A JEWISH STATE. HISTORY AND OUR PEOPLE'S HONOR... BOTH ARE AT STAKE."

Two or three generations have now grown up to whom the name Adolf Eichmann, and indeed the whole ghastly 12-year Nazi era, are just chapters in history textbooks.

It is good, though, to be reminded of these horrors and to draw lessons from them. Journalist and author Neal Bascomb has accomplished both ends in this narrative of the escape, pursuit, capture, trial and execution of Eichmann, the Nazi officer charged with carrying out the "final solution to the Jewish problem." That "final solution," of course, involved the roundup, deportation to concentration camps and summary execution of as many Jews as possible in Nazi-occupied central Europe. The now-accepted figure of six million victims has never been seriously challenged.

Eichmann escaped from Germany in the chaotic last days of the defeated Third Reich and was sent under an assumed identity to Argentina, a country whose government and population were both infested with Nazi sympathizers. He hid there successfully for 15 years, joined by his wife and sons, keeping out of the limelight by holding a series of nondescript jobs. The victorious Allied governments, preoccupied with postwar occupation problems, had no real interest in tracking him down. Private-enterprise Nazi hunters like Simon Wiesenthal worked fruitlessly at finding him, dealing with unfounded rumors that he was living in places like Kuwait, New Zealand, the United States and even Israel.

Israel did not exist when Eichmann dutifully supervised sending those millions to the gas chambers. But the Israeli intelligence service, of course, had special motivation for going after him. They assembled, from within their own ranks and elsewhere, a band of a dozen expert operatives who went to work in deep secrecy. The group included a master forger, a doctor, an expert in disguises, people who knew Argentina well, an experienced interrogator of prisoners, and people with both the physical strength and the will to subdue Eichmann when the time came. Most team members had themselves been scarred one way or another by the Holocaust.

It was a ticklish business --- in effect kidnapping a German citizen on Argentine soil and spiriting him off in secrecy for trial in Israel. It involved forged documents, deceptive identities, false cover stories, the whole repertoire of cloak-and-dagger tactics. They even developed a means of instantly changing license plates on the cars they were using in order to elude pursuit.

Inevitably, a key element was sheer luck. The big break in locating Eichmann came when one of his sons bragged to a girlfriend about his father's major role in the Nazi death machine, not realizing that the girl's father was half Jewish and a passionate Nazi-hater. Learning about this, the man alerted the Nazi-hunting network in Europe, and the chase was on.

Neal Bascomb tells this story in straightforward, almost journalistic style. He has a large cast of characters to manipulate --- the pursuit team itself, the several European governments that were involved, Eichmann's abettors and protectors --- but the attentive reader can still follow the complex plot clearly.

Simply apprehending Eichmann was only part of the problem; the pursuers had to find covert means of getting their people into Argentina, keeping Eichmann in secret captivity after his capture, getting him onto a plane and getting him to Israel, all without many of the people directly involved knowing what was going on. It was a beautifully planned operation and masterfully executed. There were a few cliffhanger moments when things threatened to unravel, but the team had backup plans for most of them.

At his trial, Eichmann famously claimed that he was only following orders from superiors. He styled himself a faithful soldier proud to do his duty for his country and showed no real regrets (he had even told one of his captors "In a way, I love Jews."). Bascomb covers the famous trial itself only cursorily, since many of its themes had been touched upon in his main narrative of pursuit and capture.

There is enough drama --- and enough characters --- in this book to flesh out a Dickens novel, but Bascomb wisely does not try to be Dickens. He is simply a good reporter, telling us a story that needs to be told, and also needs to be remembered and learned from.

--- Reviewed by Robert Finn

A great book that 'reads like a spy novel.' I read it in one night. Just enough info about the holocaust to set the stage, and then a blow by blow description of the preparation and frustration of finding and capturing a man who was truly asocial, amoral, and evidently simply had no feelings whatsoever about the death of millions. God Bless the Israelis.

Bascomb's book is a great read and probably the best coverage of the capture of Adolf Eichmann, the WWII war criminal and one of the worst perpetrators of the Holocaust. The story of tracking down Eichmann and his capture is one of the most fascinating and breath taking adventures out there. The best part of it is that it's a real story that ends with Eichmann's capture.

There are several other books written on the subject, all of which have their own merit. For example, Isser Harel, the former MOSSAD chief in charge of the operation wrote a book "House on the Garibaldi Street," which gives an interesting insider's view of the operation, such as planning, weighing risks, making contingency plans, communication methods, execution of the plan, etc. Peter Malkin, one of the agents who actually physically captured Eichmann in front of his house wrote a similar book, "Eichmann in my hands," which is also very interesting. Malkin's book also reads very well and has a very personal touch to it as Malkin lost immediate family members in the Holocaust. His account adds an interesting perspective of the field agent and his duties and participation in the operation. A final example is Uki Goni's work, namely his seminal work "The Real Odessa: Smuggling the Nazis to Perón's Argentina." In it, Goni presents results of his research on how the Peron's government and Vatican (and with the knowledge of CIA which turned a blind eye to this) created "rat lines" or smuggling routes to help Nazis escape to Argentina after WWII.

What I really liked about Bascomb's book is how he used these and other accounts to combine them into a single, cohesive story. I thought he did a very nice job filling in the blanks and adding a lot of supplemental material to expand on the subject. Not only he covered the actual operation of Eichmann's capture, he also researched various archival documents from WWII, either from other captured Nazis, Nurnberg War trial investigations, Eichmann's own biography, documents from his trial, etc. to illustrate Eichmann's intent on destroying European Jewry even after being told by his superior to stop. Bascomb also includes Eichmann's account of his whereabouts at the end of WWII when the collapse of the Reich was imminent and how his own troops tried to distance themselves from him. Other interesting "fillers" included are Eichmann's correspondence with his family, his intentions and family affairs, etc. as well as Eichmann's escape to Argentina via Vatican's rat line.

All of it put together makes for a fascinating read. If this topic interests you and you only want to read one book on the subject, this is the book to read. I highly recommend this book.

This is a fast moving, historically accurate book on the capture of Adolf Eichmann, the 'architect of the Holocaust'. There was much at stake for the new nation of Israel, and especially for its intelligence agency, the Mossad; any missteps, and an international incident would occur. Eichmann had been captured a few times after the war, but escaped and eluded further detection posing as a forest ranger and chicken farmer in the Alpine wilderness. He learned, in 1950 of the network (ODESSA,although this moniker is not used in the book ) open to former top Nazis to escape to Argentina thru Italy, with the help of priests and cardinals, hiding in monasteries and convents(which is a story on its own). He then bought his wife and three sons over two year later, which turned out to be crucial in leading to his capture, due to their immigration records. At this time, the two likely authorities in the Nazi hunt were the West Germans and the US, but their resources (and maybe interest )was thin due the the impending Cold War, and the success of the Nuremberg Trials. It was up to Simon Wiesenthal's organization to provide the impetus to track the clues. Finally a team of eight Israeli agents was formed, all of whose short bios are given, and all shared the common bitter, personal experience of the Holocaust. Exciting details are given of their surveillance of Eichmann in a foreign and hostile land. Argentina at that time was pro-facist, since the leader Juan Peron admired the Mussolini and Hitler regimes, and after the war, encouraged their renegades to escape to his country. Several questions remain unanswered-As the leading technician of the Holocaust, the secretary of the Wansee Conference (where the Final Solution was announced), one of the most complicit participant of the `six million murdered', why was he only a lowly Lt Col and not a top Nazi, ranking with Speer and Goebbels. This is why he was able to elude immediate capture. And, upon settling in Argentina, he lived in abject poverty, in a house without utilities, while other top Nazis were in luxury. Even the agents could not believe his appearance. They thought, `this is the man who held the power of life and death over so many of our people?' But the operation was a total success and contributed vitally to the international stature of Israel and the Mossad.

Even 26 pages of end notes and 10 pages of bibliography cannot explain Neal Bascomb's remarkable mastery of his subject. He combines a dedication to historic accuracy with a lively presentation of historic detail. He brings us conversations and actions which heretofore existed only in archives and in the memories of the participants. He draws together fifteen years of Eichmann's hiding and fifteen years of his victims' searching into a tense and passionate story. Most incredible is the planning and execution of Eichmann's actual capture in Argentina by Mosad, the intelligence agency for the new state of Israel. The way the Mosad agents spirited Eicmann out of Argentina, drugged and aboard a diplomatic El Al flight, is the stuff of theater.

The most dedicated Nazi hunters had given up on finding Eichmann. He had proven himself a resourceful escape artist and, amazingly, had actually worked as a lumberjack for some eighteen months under an assumed name in British-occupied northern Germany. He changed his identity regularly, and eventually managed to get a Red Cross passport and passage to Argentina where he started a new life. Relocating his family to Argentina ultimately led to his downfall. When one of his sons, who unaccountably still used the Eichmann name, let loose an anti-Semitic torrent in the presence of his girlfriend's father, the end game started. The girl's father was half Jewish and had been beaten to blindness by the Nazis.

When the lead German investigator couldn't get his own government interested in trying to deport Eichmann, and with Peronist Argentina providing a sanctuary for Nazis and their sympathizers, it was time to turn the investigation over to Israel. Even so, the first investigator Israel sent came back empty-handed. Only when Mosad became involved was the game up for Eichmann. The complexity of the operation was stunning and the tension stays high throughout the book, even for a reader familiar with the outcome.

This is a truth-is-stranger-than-fiction story about the search for a man who built and managed a business around the mass murder of innocents, who planned the brutal murder of millions and left millions more bereft at the loss of their loved ones. It is the story of a man who never showed the slightest trace of remorse for the most grisly of crimes. And he came so very close to getting away with it. But fifteen years after the last of his victims died, his trial brought fresh light to his atrocities and brought the world face to face with the man who more than any in human history personified inhuman cruelty.

It's absolutely spellbinding, and all the more remarkable for being true.

I was introduced to the writing of Neal Bascomb when I read his best seller, The Perfect Mile. Usually, I read novels and current events books, but I love track and field and the story of Roger Bannister's breaking the 4-minute-mile barrier intrigued me. That's when I got hooked on the writing of Neal Bascomb. Since then I've read all his books and just finished his fourth book, Hunting Eichmann.

Like all his books, Hunting Eichmann reads like a well written novel. Bascomb organizes his trademark, extensive research into a riveting read. He takes a historical figure and surrounding events that I probably would have never read a full book about, Adolph Eichmann and his capture, and makes them fascinating and difficult to put down. Because of his excellent writing style and attention to accuracy, I pre-ordered Hunting Eichmann. Bascomb nails it again! It is excellent.

I highly recommend this book. Then again, I highly recommend any of his books. Bascomb makes all his subjects interesting. Whether it's a race to build New York's highest skyscraper, training for and running a record mile, leading a mutiny on a Russian battleship, or hunting down a notorious Nazi, Bascomb brings history to life.