Oskar Gröning, the “book-keeper of Auschwitz” who was jailed this week , escaped prosecution in Britain in 1947, it has been revealed.
Gröning, now aged 94, was sentenced to four years imprisonment for his role in the murder of 300,000 Jews during the Holocaust.
But the Guardian newspaper has revealed that he avoided criminal charges almost 70 years ago as a result of the United States’ determination to fight the Cold War.
According to his UN War Crimes Commission file (UNWCC), dated March 6, 1947, the former SS guard was one of 300 Auschwitz officials intended to be prosecuted by Poland.
He was captured in Germany at the end of the war and imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp. According to historian Laurence Rees, he was transferred to England in 1946.
UNWCC researchers have discovered that officials were preparing to charge Gröning – until the process against Germans accused of committing war crimes ceased after intervention from senior Whitehall figures.
According to the file, Sir Robert Craigie, a Foreign Office official, said the commission should not consider any more cases – and should release SS suspects.
“The dangerous myth is that nothing was ever done except against the Nazi leadership at Nuremberg war trials, but there was a huge effort by many countries that would have seen the likes of Gröning face trial, had it not been for the shift in policy from America,” explained Dan Plesch of Soas, University of London, who obtained the UNWCC file.
