The Nazis Next Door: Eric Lichtblau on How the CIA & FBI Secretly Sheltered Nazi War Criminals
Investigative reporter Eric Lichtblau’s new book unveils the secret history of how the United States became a safe haven for thousands of Nazi war criminals. Many of them were brought here after World War II by the CIA and got support from then FBIDirector J. Edgar Hoover. Lichtblau first broke the story in 2010, based on newly declassified documents. Now, after interviews with dozens of agents for the first time, he has published his new book, "The Nazis Next Door: How America Became a Safe Haven for Hitler’s Men."
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TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We end today’s show with investigative reporter Eric Lichtblau, author of a new book that unveils the secret history of how America became a safe haven for thousands of Nazi war criminals. Many of them were brought here after World War II by the CIA and got support from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. Lichtblau first broke the story in 2010, based on newly declassified documents.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, after interviews with dozens of agents for the first time, he has published his new book. It’s called The Nazis Next Door: How America Became a Safe Haven for Hitler’s Men. You can read the prologue on our website. Eric Lichtblau was last on Democracy Now! in 2008, after he and fellow reporter James Risen won the Pulitzer Prize for exposing the NSA’s warrantless wiretapping, despite White House pressure to kill the story. He joins us now from the New York Times D.C. bureau.
Welcome back, Eric, to Democracy Now! This is—it is a fascinating book. You open the book by telling us the story of a man in New Jersey. Why don’t you tell us about him?
ERIC LICHTBLAU: Sure. His name was Tom Soobzokov. He was a guy who had many bosses over the years. He worked for the FBI. He worked for the CIA. And before that, he worked for the Nazi SS. And that opening scene that you’re talking about takes place in the mid-1970s, when people at the Justice Department were starting to first become aware that there were ex-Nazis in the United States. And Soobzokov was one of the people who had come under investigation. He had been living in the United States for 20 years at that point. And he went back to his old handlers at the CIA, somewhat frantically, because the heat was really being put on him over his past and these accusations that he was in fact a Nazi, which he vehemently denied. And in the declassified documents that I looked at from the CIA, there’s memo after memo where the CIA is recounting these frantic phone calls and conversations with Soobzokov, where he’s saying, you know, "What am I going to do?" And the CIA is almost as frantically then meeting amongst themselves to say, "We’ve got a little problem on our hands here, and it’s going to get worse."
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Eric, talk about the CIA head, Allen Dulles, brother of John Foster Dulles, the secretary of state under Eisenhower, and his role in shaping this policy.