Hunt for Nazis is the first comprehensive account of the post-1945 efforts to bring Nazi war criminals who had escaped to South America to justice. The author shows that the Nazi hunt -- which resulted in spectacular cases like the kidnapping of Adolf Eichmann -- should not only be understood as part of the afterlife of the Third Reich, but that it also became an integral aspect of dealing with repression at the hands of authoritarian regimes in South America. Dissidents and human rights activists assumed that the escaped Nazi perpetrators and collaborators continued to be involved in violent crimes in the service of these new dictatorships.

Daniel Stahl is Research Associate at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena. For the German publication of Hunt for Nazis Daniel Stahl received the Opus Primum award of the Volkswagen Foundation, Germany's largest private research funder.

Introduction I. The 'Fourth Reich' 1. World War II: The Particularity of Argentina 2. Nazi Flight: From Anticipation to Reality 3. Politicizing the Nazi Flight 4. European Amnesty Policies II. Reluctant Manhunt 1. The Capture of Eichmann 2. West German Reactions 3. Mengele and the Statute of Limitations Debate 4. Extradition Proceedings During the 1960s III. Nazi Hunting as Political Opposition 1. Recidivists in the Service of South America’s Dictators 2. Military Junta and Nazi Extradition 3. Klaus Barbie and Bolivia’s Democratization 4. Democrats and Nazi Hunters IV. Two Ways of Dealing with State Atrocities 1. Menem's Amnesty Laws and the Nazi Past 2. Argentina and the looted Gold Debate in the 1990s Conclusion Acknowledgements Overview of the Most Important Manhunts and Extradition Proceedings Sources and Literature Abbreviations