WEBVTT - S1-E03: The Man of 100 Identities 0:00:06.320 --> 0:00:14.240 Diversion podcasts. A note this episode contains descriptions of graphic 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:28.000 violence and scenes of genocide. Listener's discretion is advised. Herbert 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:32.320 Zuker's The Butcher of Latvia, had made a terrible mistake. 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:37.919 He'd agreed to be profiled in a major Brazilian magazine, Okrauzero. 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:42.640 The article called from the Baltics to Brazil hit newsstands. 0:00:43.000 --> 0:00:50.800 J I wanted to talk to someone who could put 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:54.520 this article in context for me, someone who could explain 0:00:54.800 --> 0:00:59.040 Zuker's popularity and has adopted home of Brazil. I am 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:03.240 Dr saraphile To. I am a visiting assistant professor currently 0:01:03.400 --> 0:01:06.240 at the Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies at the University 0:01:06.280 --> 0:01:09.640 of Texas at Dallas. Dr Valenti studies the legacy of 0:01:09.680 --> 0:01:13.400 World War Two in the Holocaust in Brazil. In other words, 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:18.160 she definitely studies Herbert Sukers. I asked Dr Valenti about 0:01:18.160 --> 0:01:21.440 this magazine article. Suckers allowed himself to be interviewed for 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:27.280 She explained how it completely whitewashes Zuker's Nazi passed. The 0:01:27.400 --> 0:01:30.720 article talks about the family story, how they were poor 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:35.200 war refugees. It identifies them as war refugees who all 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:38.600 of the sudden four years are not massively successful. It 0:01:38.640 --> 0:01:42.520 talks about his beautiful Arian children literally against the backdrop 0:01:42.680 --> 0:01:45.600 of the famous sugirl of mountains of Rio de Janato, 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:49.680 and this article really praises him and how quickly it says, 0:01:49.720 --> 0:01:52.920 you know, a family from Latvia flees from the horrors 0:01:53.000 --> 0:01:57.320 of war lands in Rio on Carnival Sunday, sells a 0:01:57.400 --> 0:02:01.480 small camera and rebuilds their future. It was five pages long, 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:04.440 and it showed the beautiful life that the Zuker's family 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:07.880 had carved out for themselves since leaving Latvia and settling 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.720 in Rio. The Zookers, they look like actors in the 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:17.040 nineteen fifties speech movie. One of the things that really resonates, 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:20.080 especially when we see the descriptions of the children and 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.799 the photographs of the children, especially the photograph of the daughter. 0:02:24.080 --> 0:02:27.079 She has this kind of little bikini top on and 0:02:27.160 --> 0:02:31.080 she's this beautiful girl with blond hair. The family is quite, 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:35.239 you know, physically, esthetically speaking, beautiful, right. There is something 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:40.160 that is desirable about their look, their ability to raise 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:43.440 themselves up, and they're great contributions to the country. And 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:46.160 the description is very much this idea of you know, 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:48.880 these are the kinds of people we want in this country. 0:02:49.280 --> 0:02:52.000 Herbert Sukers came across as a go getter who built 0:02:52.040 --> 0:02:56.800 up a nice business from nothing. He is described as 0:02:56.960 --> 0:03:02.880 this embodiment of tenacity, this very industrious man who is 0:03:03.000 --> 0:03:08.160 bringing new type of technology for water skiing, which is 0:03:08.200 --> 0:03:10.800 something that Brazilians had only seen in films at that time, 0:03:11.320 --> 0:03:15.120 and here he is creating this kind of new recreational sport. 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:18.760 But the article went further. It said that Zukers should 0:03:18.760 --> 0:03:21.679 be an inspiration. Here was a guy who would face 0:03:21.800 --> 0:03:25.440 war and exile, gone through extreme poverty, and yet was 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:33.120 succeeding when all seems lost. The story read the human 0:03:33.120 --> 0:03:36.840 species can find within itself the same energies and ability 0:03:37.200 --> 0:03:41.480 to forget the past and reshape its own destiny. It 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:43.880 was such a great story. Who was going to prove 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:52.280 it wrong? Well? By this time, years after World War Two, 0:03:52.720 --> 0:03:55.160 it was a small group of Nazi hunters who were 0:03:55.200 --> 0:03:59.160 on Suckers trail. They knew he was a monster, but 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:02.080 they had to prove bit. What if they announced the 0:04:02.120 --> 0:04:05.920 world that they'd located the statistic killer, the Butcher of Latvia, 0:04:06.680 --> 0:04:08.840 and then found out it was the wrong guy. It 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:11.440 would set the entire cause back, would be a blow 0:04:11.480 --> 0:04:16.479 to Jewish activists everywhere, It would be a disaster. They 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:30.760 had to be right. I'm Stephen Talty and this is 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:37.680 good assassin's hunting the butcher. So the first was so 0:04:38.279 --> 0:04:42.320 fine and not end moving forwards, rival the second promine 0:04:42.360 --> 0:04:48.560 and large killing. We must thwart this shameful pass, the 0:04:48.680 --> 0:04:51.200 end of a trail of blood and horror, the end 0:04:51.200 --> 0:04:53.719 of a man whose name will be written in information 0:04:54.160 --> 0:04:58.640 every step but to be closer to Joker stock And 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:01.760 it was the inevitive, be face to face and counts. 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:16.440 Episode three, The Man of one Hundred Identities. I don't 0:05:16.480 --> 0:05:19.520 know if you're a fan of the nine movie Marathon Man, 0:05:19.960 --> 0:05:22.479 but it's one of my favorites. It's about an escape 0:05:22.560 --> 0:05:26.200 Nazi played by the famous British actor Lawrence Olivier, who 0:05:26.200 --> 0:05:29.039 comes to New York years after the war to retrieve 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:33.640 some diamonds. Of course, he's terrified being discovered and arrested 0:05:33.920 --> 0:05:36.359 or even killed, so he goes to great lengths to 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:41.839 ensure that he won't be identified. There's a famous scene 0:05:41.839 --> 0:05:45.640 where Olivier's character tortures the young Dustin Hoffman, who plays 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:49.040 the brother of a ci age. The Nazi asked him 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:55.360 over and over, is it safe? Is it safe? It's 0:05:55.360 --> 0:05:58.279 one of the great thriller scenes. If you haven't watched it, 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:02.159 you owe it to yourself to check it out. But 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:05.560 Marathon Man also makes an interesting point that relates to 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:09.920 our story. Why is this escaped Nazi character so afraid 0:06:10.160 --> 0:06:13.840 of exposing himself? In part, it's because he's in New 0:06:13.920 --> 0:06:16.440 York City and he has to go to the neighborhood 0:06:16.800 --> 0:06:20.000 known as the Diamond District. The Diamond District is where 0:06:20.040 --> 0:06:24.120 thousands of Jewish merchants work even today. In the seventies, 0:06:24.200 --> 0:06:26.279 which is when the movie set, it would have been 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:31.040 hundreds of Holocaust survivors there. That's why Olivier's character is 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:34.520 afraid because in a time before the Internet or Google 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:38.080 or social media, the best way of identifying an escape 0:06:38.160 --> 0:06:41.880 Nazi was through an eye witness, someone who knew him, 0:06:41.920 --> 0:06:45.040 someone who could recognize him. For Nazi on the run, 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:47.320 New York was one of the most dangerous cities in 0:06:47.360 --> 0:06:51.440 the world because people there would remember his face and 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:59.599 those people do all the terrible things he'd done. So 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:02.000 in the vie, the Nazi gets the Diamonds and he's 0:07:02.040 --> 0:07:05.600 walking down the street. He's feeling good. Then an older 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:09.080 woman spots him. She can't believe what she's seeing, this 0:07:09.160 --> 0:07:11.760 monster actually right in front of her. It's like a 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:15.520 memory from a different world. She starts screaming his name. 0:07:16.160 --> 0:07:19.320 She follows him, shouting and calling for help, and he 0:07:19.360 --> 0:07:23.560 almost gets caught. But this is the difference between the 0:07:23.560 --> 0:07:27.080 Diamond District in New York City and Rio, where Zukers 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:30.040 was living at the time. There was a significant Jewish 0:07:30.080 --> 0:07:33.040 community in Rio, some of whom Zukers had already met, 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:37.400 but very few Holocaust survivors and almost none from Latvia. 0:07:38.280 --> 0:07:42.320 From seven to nineteen fifty, Brazil had a secret policy 0:07:42.600 --> 0:07:46.559 that denied visas to Jews fleeing Hitler. It turned away 0:07:46.680 --> 0:07:51.360 sixteen thousand requests Jewish refugees who wanted to immigrate there. 0:07:52.000 --> 0:07:57.160 The reason simple anti Semitism. This secret policy cut down 0:07:57.160 --> 0:07:59.120 on the numbers who eventually were able to make it 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:03.760 to Brazil. That's why the magazine article was such a mistake, 0:08:04.320 --> 0:08:08.160 because Okra zero was distributed far and wide, not only 0:08:08.200 --> 0:08:12.080 in Brazil but across South America, and the right people 0:08:12.080 --> 0:08:16.920 saw it. Or from Zuker's point of view, the wrong people. 0:08:20.360 --> 0:08:22.880 But before Zukers could be placed on a list, and 0:08:22.920 --> 0:08:25.400 before Massad and Mio could begin to track him down, 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:28.400 zukers pursuers had to be sure he was the right guy. 0:08:29.120 --> 0:08:32.040 Was this really the Butcher of Latvia? Maybe there was 0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:35.000 another Herbert Sukers. We had nothing to do with the Nazis. 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:39.560 Maybe he was innocent. That was problem number one. Problem 0:08:39.600 --> 0:08:42.920 number two had to do with other people. By the 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:45.920 early fifties, the world was starting to lose interests in 0:08:46.000 --> 0:08:49.840 Nazi war criminals. The few survivors and activists who saw 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:52.600 the magazine article and thought this might be the Butcher 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:56.839 contacted the authorities. They wrote the British Foreign Office, who 0:08:56.880 --> 0:09:01.040 had prosecuted war criminals from Latvia. The British basically blew 0:09:01.080 --> 0:09:04.360 them off. The Cold War was underway, the Brits needed 0:09:04.360 --> 0:09:07.440 the Germans as allies. They were tired of the whole 0:09:07.480 --> 0:09:13.880 issue of the Holocaust. They wanted to move on. There 0:09:13.920 --> 0:09:16.400 were a small group of Jewish activists who didn't want 0:09:16.440 --> 0:09:19.360 to move on. They couldn't forget what they'd seen during 0:09:19.400 --> 0:09:22.880 the war. They dedicated their lives to finding people like 0:09:22.960 --> 0:09:26.360 the Butcher. These men and women were scattered around the 0:09:26.400 --> 0:09:30.720 globe New York, Vienna, Tel Aviv. A few of them 0:09:30.720 --> 0:09:35.440 were famous. Simon Wiesenthal, the legendary Nazi hunter, was the 0:09:35.480 --> 0:09:39.760 most famous. That many were anonymous. Beginning in the mid 0:09:39.840 --> 0:09:43.120 nineteen forties, they spent their time writing letters to survivors, 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:48.560 poring over archives, searching for clues. One committee of these 0:09:48.640 --> 0:09:51.520 Nazi hunters tried to get the Russians interested in the butcher. 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:54.880 After all, Russia had taken over lab Via after the war, 0:09:55.520 --> 0:10:00.360 surely they would do something. But the Russians said that 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:03.480 the nation of Latvia no longer existed, so they couldn't 0:10:03.520 --> 0:10:07.040 prosecute anyone who committed crimes there. They washed their hands 0:10:07.040 --> 0:10:09.960 of the whole deal. So even if the Nazi hunters 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:13.000 proved this guy in Brazil was the butcher, so what 0:10:13.679 --> 0:10:16.120 who was going to do something about it? The hunters 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:18.240 decided to cross that bridge when they got to it. 0:10:19.200 --> 0:10:22.800 First they had to I D. Suckers confirmed he was 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:25.720 the butcher. Then they would find someone to do something 0:10:25.720 --> 0:10:30.120 about it. But again, no Google, no camera phones, how 0:10:30.120 --> 0:10:33.000 do you confirm this is the guy? So this is 0:10:33.000 --> 0:10:38.880 how they did it. Step one, they had to get 0:10:38.880 --> 0:10:42.280 photos of Herbert Suckers before the war. That was the 0:10:42.320 --> 0:10:47.240 starting point. But how a young man named Joseph Schneider 0:10:47.480 --> 0:10:51.360 went to the central Library in Riga, the capital of Latvia. 0:10:51.800 --> 0:10:54.440 We don't know a lot about Schneider. He may have 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:56.800 been part of a Nazi hunter network, or he may 0:10:56.840 --> 0:10:58.559 have been asked to do a favor for a friend. 0:10:59.640 --> 0:11:02.800 In any case, he went to the aviation section and 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:06.760 started going through the newspaper archives. This was Herbert Suckers 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:10.760 Achilles Heel. Most Nazis had been anonymous before the war, 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:14.680 but Suckers had been a publicity hound. He loved the attention, 0:11:16.000 --> 0:11:19.280 so the young researcher started coming across articles on this 0:11:19.360 --> 0:11:23.520 brilliant young aviator. And along with the articles were photos. 0:11:24.360 --> 0:11:27.120 Here's Herbert Suckers in a leather coat. Is one of 0:11:27.200 --> 0:11:31.040 him in profile, smiling and smiling in a plane outside 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:36.200 the plane. There were tons of pictures. Great, but one problem. 0:11:36.240 --> 0:11:38.839 There were no xerox machines, not only in the regal 0:11:38.880 --> 0:11:42.760 library but anywhere. They weren't on the market yet, and 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:44.920 the photos had to be copied so they could be 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:49.560 compared to ones with the guy in rio. Schneider knew this. 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:53.439 He came prepared. In his hand, he held a small 0:11:53.559 --> 0:11:57.400 razor blade, and when the librarian wasn't looking, he bent 0:11:57.480 --> 0:12:01.280 down and started cutting first one article, then the next. 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:05.000 He chose the ones with the clearest photos, and when 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:07.480 he was done, he brought the bomb newspapers back to 0:12:07.480 --> 0:12:11.520 the desk. Then he walked out. In his pocket was 0:12:11.559 --> 0:12:16.400 the crucial evidence. Okay, step one was a success. They 0:12:16.400 --> 0:12:18.559 had a baseline photos of the man they knew to 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:21.440 be Herbert Suckers. Now they needed pictures of the guy 0:12:21.440 --> 0:12:24.920 in Rio. If the two matched, they had their man. 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:29.760 This part was a little harder. The Nazi hunters wrote 0:12:29.760 --> 0:12:33.240 their contexts. In Brazil, a young man named Victor that's 0:12:33.240 --> 0:12:35.880 all we know about him his first name, agreed to 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:40.920 try to get a current photo of Zukers. He went 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:43.160 to the dock where the man from the magazine article 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:46.320 was working. He asked the guy, who was wearing an 0:12:46.320 --> 0:12:48.440 old captain's hat, if you could take him and his 0:12:48.480 --> 0:12:51.559 friend on a boat tour of the lake. The man agreed, 0:12:52.280 --> 0:12:54.480 so Victor and his friend and this man who was 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:58.280 maybe Herbert Suckers got into the boat. Victory had brought 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:01.280 along a camera, naturally, and he started taking shots of 0:13:01.320 --> 0:13:04.920 the scenery, water, skiers, sailors, he clicked whenever he saw 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:08.040 something interesting, and then he turned and tried to get 0:13:08.040 --> 0:13:10.320 a shot of the mystery man and the captain sat 0:13:11.240 --> 0:13:15.040 but no, the guy was jumpy. Whenever Victor pointed the 0:13:15.040 --> 0:13:18.440 camera in his direction, he would duck down, or turn 0:13:18.480 --> 0:13:22.000 his head or look away. Victor could not believe it. 0:13:22.320 --> 0:13:24.679 He was taking all these photos and he hadn't gotten 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:27.480 a single decent shot of the guy. He always tried 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:30.800 to hide his face, he later said. Finally, Victor took 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:32.920 a few last shots as the boat returned to the dock. 0:13:34.720 --> 0:13:36.959 Once he had left the marina, Victor brought the roles 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:40.240 of film to be developed, and he waited. When the 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:43.120 photos were ready, he picked them up and they were 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:46.360 pretty much as he thought, disappointing, but he sent them 0:13:46.360 --> 0:13:48.800 off to the Nazi hunters anyway. He said if they 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:51.679 weren't good enough, he'd go back to the dock, this 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:56.000 time with a movie camera. The Nazi hunters got the photos, 0:13:56.280 --> 0:13:59.000 he sorted through them and found one they thought might work. 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:01.920 It showed and Supers in profile as he was ducking 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:05.679 down to avoid the camera. Not ideal, but worth a shot. 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:08.880 The team took Victor's photo and put it next to 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:12.640 one from the Regal Library, and they compared. Within a 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:15.800 few minutes they had an answer. The man in the 0:14:15.800 --> 0:14:19.320 Captain's hat and the Latvian Lindburg were the same man. 0:14:20.560 --> 0:14:31.760 They found the Butcher of Latvia. M h. If you're 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:34.760 this far into the story, we're assuming you're enjoying Hunting 0:14:34.760 --> 0:14:38.560 the Butcher. If you're listening on Apple podcasts, would you 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:40.360 be able to take a minute to give the show 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:43.520 a rating and a review. Just find the show's page 0:14:43.800 --> 0:14:47.040 on Apple Podcasts, scrolled down to the section called Ratings 0:14:47.040 --> 0:14:50.120 and Reviews and tap one of those purple stars to 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:52.840 give it a rating. Then tapped a little purple link 0:14:53.200 --> 0:14:55.680 that says write a review and leave a few words 0:14:55.840 --> 0:14:58.760 about what you think of Hunting the Butcher. It really 0:14:58.800 --> 0:15:01.200 helps get the word out and let other listeners know 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:05.120 about the podcast. Much appreciated. Now on with the show, 0:15:07.240 --> 0:15:10.720 an organization called the World Jewish Congress announced that the 0:15:10.760 --> 0:15:13.760 Butcher of Latvia had been found was living in Brazil, 0:15:14.720 --> 0:15:17.560 and despite the growing indifference towards the hunt for Nazis, 0:15:17.600 --> 0:15:20.960 it had an effect. There were headlines in Brazilian newspapers. 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:24.520 Sucre's business was ruined. He had to move several times 0:15:24.840 --> 0:15:28.600 to avoid angry protesters. Eventually he ended up in the 0:15:28.640 --> 0:15:32.040 city of sal Paolo, running another small boat rental business. 0:15:32.880 --> 0:15:36.000 This was not what Sucers had imagined for himself. His 0:15:36.120 --> 0:15:39.360 dreams of building a glorious new life in Brazil. They've 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:44.760 been shattered. The Jews had seen to that. He was bitter, paranoid, 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:49.600 and lonely, but he was still free. The efforts of 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:53.280 the Nazi hunters had failed. They tried to get governments 0:15:53.320 --> 0:15:56.280 around the world to pay attention. They'd lobbied Brazil to 0:15:56.320 --> 0:16:00.640 deport him. They'd asked America and Great Britain get involved. 0:16:01.400 --> 0:16:05.680 Nothing had worked. So in the mid sixties, Zukers was 0:16:05.720 --> 0:16:08.360 holding his own He still hoped for a grand third 0:16:08.360 --> 0:16:11.920 act of his life. He believed in himself. He just 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:15.680 had to convince the world that he'd been misunderstood in 0:16:15.800 --> 0:16:18.280 order to get all the fame and the money back. 0:16:19.240 --> 0:16:26.160 That was the dream. We found some incredible tapes from 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:30.400 a man named Jack Anderson. Anderson was a legendary and 0:16:30.480 --> 0:16:35.720 controversial investigative reporter who died in two thousand five. Anderson's 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:39.880 papers resided at George Washington University, and his personal archive 0:16:39.960 --> 0:16:43.880 of recordings have just recently been on sealed. This will 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:47.600 be the first time anyone has heard these tapes, and 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:52.080 they're striking. I'm an American newspaper man that just want 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:56.160 to be interested in talking to some of these Nazis 0:16:57.320 --> 0:17:01.080 and hearing their side of the story. Anderson traveled to 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:04.919 Brazil in nineteen sixty to track down Nazi fugitives for 0:17:04.920 --> 0:17:08.560 an article he eventually published in Parade magazine, and that 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:12.480 was his cover. Occurred to me that if they found Aikman, 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.320 there are probably other war criminals down there in hiding. 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:18.359 In fact, I knew there were other war criminals, and 0:17:18.359 --> 0:17:20.520 I thought it might even be possible to find a few. 0:17:20.560 --> 0:17:23.360 And I thought it would be a great story for Parade. 0:17:23.440 --> 0:17:25.760 So told Parade I was gonna go down and look 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:29.359 for him. It sounds unbelievable to just hop on a 0:17:29.400 --> 0:17:32.560 plane and go interview Nazis, but Anderson was good at 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:35.040 his job, and he met a crucial contact at the 0:17:35.040 --> 0:17:39.240 airport immediately upon his arrival. I felt that there was 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:41.800 a stroke of luck, and if I do say so myself, 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:45.240 good reporting that I got him in a hurry. I 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:47.240 just sold him on the idea that I was a 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:49.679 friendly newspaper man who would like to talk to some 0:17:49.840 --> 0:17:56.439 of them. He got talking, he explained how they operated. Mario, 0:17:56.560 --> 0:17:59.600 as I remember, was his name. His first name you're 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:02.280 taking wasn't his real name. He had taken on a 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:07.200 Brazilian name, had been a major in the s s 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:13.640 and Uh was living a different life now as a 0:18:13.640 --> 0:18:19.480 airline employee. This lower level management guy, Anderson wanted a 0:18:19.520 --> 0:18:23.600 big exclusive and he came prepared. Before his trip. He 0:18:23.680 --> 0:18:27.680 contacted Simon Wiesenthal, and Visenthal sent him reams of research 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:30.880 on all the Nazi fugitives he thought might be living there. 0:18:31.560 --> 0:18:34.000 But Anderson was focused, and he made a list of 0:18:34.000 --> 0:18:38.359 the most infamous Nazis still at large. He wanted to 0:18:38.359 --> 0:18:42.080 find the next Aikman, and this man he was sitting with, 0:18:42.280 --> 0:18:45.879 Mario seemed to know them all. Told me about Mangle. 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:48.879 He knew all about Mangley, but he said after the 0:18:48.960 --> 0:18:53.280 kidnapping him Mangley was in Buenos Aires in Argentina, and 0:18:53.359 --> 0:18:57.639 new right where he was said that he had fled 0:18:57.720 --> 0:19:03.080 though after the Aikemen kidnapping. That was after the big ones, 0:19:03.160 --> 0:19:06.080 and and he wasn't very helpful on any of the 0:19:06.080 --> 0:19:09.240 big ones. They were either inaccessible or they had disappeared 0:19:09.280 --> 0:19:12.320 after the Aikman had scared them all into hiding. He 0:19:12.960 --> 0:19:17.399 said that they had a ring of a rather loose 0:19:17.440 --> 0:19:22.080 association of kind of co conspirators, people who were in 0:19:22.119 --> 0:19:25.480 the same boat and therefore helped one another. And then 0:19:25.520 --> 0:19:30.280 he told me about He said they had hideout deep 0:19:30.320 --> 0:19:33.560 in Brazil where they would go when they felt threatened 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:36.199 when they were on the run. Anderson was hitting a 0:19:36.240 --> 0:19:40.240 wall after the very high profile kidnapping and trial of Aikman. 0:19:40.720 --> 0:19:44.760 Ex Nazis were more paranoid than ever. After all, they 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:47.960 weren't hiding. It made sense that they wouldn't want to 0:19:47.960 --> 0:19:52.280 talk to a quote unquote American newspaperman, no matter how 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:56.480 friendly he claimed to be. But there was this one 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:59.920 Nazi Mario brought up who sounded different from the rest. 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:04.880 This Nazi wasn't on Anderson's radar and his name didn't 0:20:04.880 --> 0:20:07.080 even ring a bell. That led him to tell me 0:20:07.119 --> 0:20:13.440 about Suckers, who had three seaplanes on the lake outside 0:20:13.440 --> 0:20:18.040 of South Apollo. He said he ran his sightseeing business there, 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:21.280 but he said he's very useful to us because he 0:20:21.320 --> 0:20:25.040 can fly our people into the interior. So Suckers was 0:20:25.080 --> 0:20:27.439 a guy who flew who was a key guy in 0:20:27.520 --> 0:20:31.920 their operation, and if they needed quick because somebody needed 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:35.240 a fast getaway into the interior Brazil, he would fly 0:20:35.359 --> 0:20:38.719 them into the seaplane. And apparently there were a series 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:40.840 of lakes that he knew where to land on. He 0:20:40.880 --> 0:20:44.320 said Zookers was still operating, because Zookers was a lesser 0:20:44.359 --> 0:20:50.960 war criminal, although much of a war criminal. Anderson made 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:53.920 a mental note of the unusual name and reced back 0:20:53.960 --> 0:20:56.240 to his hotel to come through the research feast and 0:20:56.280 --> 0:20:59.320 Thal had given him. So I looked through these files, 0:20:59.400 --> 0:21:02.000 and happily I had a file on him. So I 0:21:02.040 --> 0:21:04.359 went over his file and decided he was a pretty 0:21:04.400 --> 0:21:08.919 bad son of the bits. The file I remember described 0:21:08.960 --> 0:21:12.399 how he on one occasion had locked Jews in a 0:21:12.480 --> 0:21:15.600 synagogue and then set it on fire and just burned 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:19.360 him alive in a synagogue. They told about Jews leaving 0:21:19.440 --> 0:21:23.600 in these big fat blue busses for the forest, and 0:21:23.640 --> 0:21:27.199 then they busses came back empty. So the assumption was 0:21:27.240 --> 0:21:31.880 that he was slaughtering him. And he was described in 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:34.320 some of the Affi Davits. I saw three or four 0:21:34.320 --> 0:21:37.680 descriptions of him, and they were all this consistent. They 0:21:37.720 --> 0:21:41.480 described it as a big, stocky fellow who always wore 0:21:41.520 --> 0:21:43.840 out a leather jack and always carried his pistol in 0:21:43.920 --> 0:21:46.639 his back pocket. It was just curious place to carry 0:21:46.640 --> 0:21:49.399 a pistol. And anyhow, he was brutal. They said that 0:21:49.440 --> 0:21:52.399 he was. One of his favorite pastimes was bursting in 0:21:52.480 --> 0:21:57.320 a Jews who had beautiful daughters twelve and one in 0:21:57.359 --> 0:22:01.480 the morning, and and HollyHood daughters off for his own 0:22:01.520 --> 0:22:05.040 pleasure and that kind of stuff. He was really and ugly, vicious, 0:22:05.400 --> 0:22:07.840 main son of a bitch. And so I said to Morrow, 0:22:08.160 --> 0:22:11.320 can you get through to him? Yes, he said he could. 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:15.760 I said, would you arrange for me to go see him? 0:22:15.800 --> 0:22:18.080 Tell him that I I just want to talk to 0:22:18.160 --> 0:22:22.720 him about his story, the harassment that he's under in 0:22:22.800 --> 0:22:24.920 that sort of made it sound as friendly as I could. 0:22:26.119 --> 0:22:27.920 Got the word back that he had agreed to see 0:22:27.960 --> 0:22:32.200 me later. I'll tell you about what Anderson encountered when 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:40.359 he went to meet with Sukers. But meanwhile, Israel was 0:22:40.400 --> 0:22:44.159 focused on South America too, and the Nazi fugitives hiding 0:22:44.160 --> 0:22:48.200 out there. The Israeli government kept a list of important 0:22:48.320 --> 0:22:51.760 Nazi criminals who had escaped justice. We don't know how 0:22:51.760 --> 0:22:54.359 many people were on it, but we do know a 0:22:54.400 --> 0:22:58.000 few of the more famous names. At A Bikman, one 0:22:58.040 --> 0:23:01.320 of the main architects of the Holocaust. The Massad captured 0:23:01.400 --> 0:23:04.399 him in nineteen sixty. He was put on trial and 0:23:04.400 --> 0:23:08.919 then executed two years later. Doctor Joseph Mengela, known as 0:23:08.920 --> 0:23:11.639 the Angel of Death, who had murdered Jewish children at 0:23:11.640 --> 0:23:16.280 Auschwitz and had conducted ghastly experiments on Jewish prisoners, was 0:23:16.400 --> 0:23:20.199 high up on the list, and after the article appeared 0:23:20.200 --> 0:23:27.439 in the Brazilian magazine Zuker's had made it too. In 0:23:27.480 --> 0:23:30.840 the early nineties sixties, the Israelis became concerned about a 0:23:30.880 --> 0:23:35.200 possible amnesty for Nazis. Remember, the German government was seriously 0:23:35.240 --> 0:23:38.800 considering giving a free pass to Nazi murderers who hadn't 0:23:38.840 --> 0:23:41.920 been indicted yet. The Israelis wanted to stop this from 0:23:41.960 --> 0:23:44.919 happening at all costs, and they had decided to go 0:23:45.040 --> 0:23:49.840 after a Nazi. A few months later, Armissad agent Mio 0:23:50.080 --> 0:23:52.720 was in Paris getting ready to assume the role of 0:23:52.720 --> 0:23:55.760 a lifetime He had left the apartment after his meeting 0:23:55.800 --> 0:23:59.639 with his boss, convinced that the mission was justified. He 0:23:59.720 --> 0:24:03.560 had target. Now he had to prepare to meet him, 0:24:03.600 --> 0:24:08.399 to befriend him. It's kind of a seduction. Mio had 0:24:08.400 --> 0:24:10.760 played his part to four a missions that made history. 0:24:11.560 --> 0:24:14.480 He was in Argentina for the most famous Massad operation 0:24:14.560 --> 0:24:18.840 of all, the nineteen six kidnapping of Adolf Aikman, one 0:24:18.840 --> 0:24:23.159 of the senior organizers of the Nazi Holocaust. Neo had 0:24:23.160 --> 0:24:25.880 flown to South America, rented the cars the team used 0:24:25.920 --> 0:24:29.399 during the surveillance and the kidnapping. He'd actually guarded the 0:24:29.480 --> 0:24:33.199 Nazi and the apartment that Massad used before bundling Aikman 0:24:33.359 --> 0:24:37.800 out of Argentina and back to Israel. He'd studied Aikman closely. 0:24:38.920 --> 0:24:43.360 You have no idea what the small, nervous man he was, 0:24:44.040 --> 0:24:48.040 how he signed the document agreeing to be tried in Israel, 0:24:48.640 --> 0:24:52.480 and how he behaved this man who sent millions to 0:24:52.600 --> 0:24:56.520 their death. So Mio had played a supporting role when 0:24:56.520 --> 0:24:59.160 it came to Aikman, but now he faced a much 0:24:59.160 --> 0:25:03.440 more confident, tough minded man, one who wouldn't go so quietly. 0:25:04.280 --> 0:25:07.320 He had to plan the mission himself without explicit directions 0:25:07.600 --> 0:25:11.040 from Massade headquarters, and for that you had to get 0:25:11.040 --> 0:25:14.400 inside the butcher's head, find out what he wanted discover 0:25:14.520 --> 0:25:18.880 his weak points. Who was the kind of an operation 0:25:19.000 --> 0:25:26.200 built for someone like Mia. If you want James Bond 0:25:26.359 --> 0:25:30.000 or Auto spy movies, you'll find a lot of cliches. 0:25:30.520 --> 0:25:34.800 And the spy agent looks very very smart, very tall, 0:25:34.920 --> 0:25:40.080 beautiful into real life. Its other agents how very far 0:25:40.200 --> 0:25:44.320 away from this. Some of them looks like great people, 0:25:44.080 --> 0:25:47.560 little people behind the desk. And the mad Dad was 0:25:47.760 --> 0:25:52.159 even more than this. He was a mastermind. That's after Abraham, 0:25:52.520 --> 0:25:56.080 the ex massad agent who studied the Zuker's operation. He's 0:25:56.080 --> 0:25:59.760 talking about meals genius at playing roles. Like any good actor, 0:26:00.240 --> 0:26:03.880 MEO's first thoughts were about looking the part. After leaving 0:26:03.880 --> 0:26:06.680 the apartment in Paris, he set out to become a 0:26:06.720 --> 0:26:11.800