Britain released “hundreds” of suspected Nazi war criminals after the Holocaust, according to a leading historian.
Dan Plesch uncovered United Nations War Crimes Commission documents which prove that former Nazi officers — including the “Bookkeeper of Auschwitz” Oskar Gröning , who was jailed for four years earlier this month — were released by the UK after the Second World War.
Dr Plesch, director of the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy at Soas, University of London, discovered that the UK freed the Nazis under pressure from the US, which was keen to recruit Germany as a new ally in the Cold War against the Soviet Union.
Dr Plesch, who said Britain also released notorious Nazis Erich von Manstein, Gerd von Rundstedt and Albert Kesselring, explained: “There was a political argument at the time in which those opposed to international criminal justice succeeded… There were lots of people who were either released without much investigation — and then there were people who were actually in prison camps and let out.
