Why them?  Why there? What prompted a state of 'Dichter und Denker' to be reworked into certainly one of 'Richter und Henker'. Höttlland makes an attempt to reply to these questions by way of studying the lifestyles and occasions of Wilhelm Georg Höttl, a former high- rating member of the Austrian SS and SD. the path begins in Vienna in 1915, relocating up via a tradition of envy, earlier humans and occasions that motivated a tender man to make a fateful jump aboard the Nazi bandwagon on the age of nineteen. Tracing his swift enhance in the ‘seething ranks’ of the SS, which observed him grow to be a heeded consultant within the SD intelligence service at 24, Höttlland files Höttl's involvement in quite a few wartime intrigues that incorporated every little thing from a counterfeiting operation, the abduction of Mussolini, the rescue of Hitler's art treasure, and the career of Hungary, to call quite a few. With priorities transferring in overdue 1944, the ebook follows Höttl as he dons the mantel of peacemaker to consult with American officers a few separate peace and the sabotaging of the a lot feared 'Alpenfestung'. Arrested at war's finish, Höttl diligently polishes his prior to salvage a destiny, evading post-war justice via offering interrogators at Nuremberg with designated info at the internal workings of the Nazi intelligence gear, parts of which later helped incriminate such former colleagues as Ernst Kaltenbrunner and Adolf Eichmann. half I concludes as Höttl resurfaces in Austria in overdue 1947, able to resume plying his wares with quite a few firms clamouring for intelligence less than the collection clouds of the chilly War.