Chapter Eleven
Those Who’ll Never Forget

In early September 1964, a bald, sturdy man in his mid-forties, wearing sunglasses, arrived in the Rotterdam railway station in Holland on the express train from Paris. He checked into the luxurious Rheinhotel in the city center under the name “Anton Kunzle,” an Austrian businessman. He then went to the nearby post office and rented a P.O. box under the same name. From the post office, he went to Amro Bank, opened an account, and deposited $3,000. At a printer’s shop, he ordered business cards and stationery in the name of Anton Kunzle, manager of an investment company in Rotterdam. From there, he hurried to the Brazilian consulate and filled out forms for a tourist visa to Brazil. At a doctor’s clinic, he underwent a perfunctory checkup and got a medical certificate about his health, then visited an optometrist, cheated during the test, and ordered thick magnifying glasses, even though he didn’t need them at all.

The following morning, he made a short trip to Zurich and opened an account in the Credit Suisse bank, in which he deposited $6,000. Then he returned to Paris, where a makeup artist attached a bushy mustache to his face; a photographer took his pictures with his new glasses and handed him a set of passport photos. Back in Rotterdam, he brought the photos to the visa clerk at the Brazilian consulate, and the tourist visa to Brazil was stamped in his Austrian passport. Now he could buy his plane tickets to Rio de Janeiro and, from there, to São Paulo and Montevideo, in Uruguay. Wherever he went, the loquacious Kunzle spoke of his flourishing business in Austria. The generous tips that he spread on his way, his choice of the best hotels and the most exclusive restaurants spoke for themselves—Kunzle, indeed, was a rich and successful businessman.

By these seemingly simple actions, Mossad agent Yitzhak Sarid (not his real name) built a foolproof cover for himself. Somewhere between Paris, Rotterdam, and Zurich, Yitzhak Sarid evaporated into thin air and a new man emerged in his stead: Anton Kunzle, an Austrian businessman, with an address in Rotterdam, bank accounts, business cards, a visa, and a plane ticket to Brazil.

Only a few days earlier, on September 1, Yitzhak Sarid had been summoned to a meeting in Paris. Sarid was a member of the Mossad operational team code-named “Caesarea.” In a safe house on Avenue de Versailles, he met with Caesarea’s commander, Yoske Yariv, a sturdy, muscular man admired by his subordinates. Yariv, a former army officer, had replaced Rafi Eitan as the head of the operational team; Eitan had been appointed head of Europe station, based in Paris.

Yariv started by saying that in a few months, the West German parliament would adopt a statute of limitations regarding war crimes, which meant that Nazi criminals—living now undercover—would be able to reemerge from hiding and resume normal lives, as if they had never committed their atrocious acts. Yariv said that many Germans wanted to turn the page and leave Germany’s horrid past behind them. Even other nations that had suffered under the Germans were not eager to keep searching for Nazi criminals. Since Eichmann’s capture four years before, awareness about Nazi crimes had diminished, as if Eichmann’s trial and execution had closed a chapter in the world’s history. It was imperative, Yariv said, to make sure that the statute of limitations on Nazi crimes did not become law. The world needed to be reminded that monsters were still at large.

“We should kill one of the greatest Nazi criminals,” Yariv said to Sarid. And a Mossad agent on a mission in South America had found the one. “The Butcher of Riga,” a Latvian Nazi, guilty of massacring thirty thousand Jews, had been positively identified. He was living in Brazil under his real name, Herberts Cukurs. The ramsad, Meir Amit, had given the green light for the operation.

Yariv now turned to Sarid. And not only because of Sarid’s record as a smart and resourceful agent, who had participated in the Eichmann operation. He also knew Sarid was born in Germany, and both his parents had died in the Holocaust. Sarid had escaped to Palestine, but had sworn to fight Hitler and had been one of the first Palestinian volunteers in the British Army during the war. Yariv did not have to worry about Sarid’s motivation.

“I want you to build yourself a cover as an Austrian businessman,” the Caesarea commander said to Sarid. “Your job will be to fly to Brazil, find Cukurs, and win his confidence. That is the first step toward his execution.” In the detailed briefing that followed, Yariv gave Sarid his new name: “Anton Kunzle.”

Ten days after the meeting in Paris, Anton Kunzle boarded a Varig plane to Rio de Janeiro. He was excited and yet troubled by his mission. He had never been in such a situation before. He had to operate, completely alone, in a foreign country, and try making friends with a monster with sharp senses who certainly expected that one day somebody would try to kill him. Kunzle knew well that a single mistake could cause the failure of the entire operation; just one misstep could cost him his life.

During the flight, Kunzle perused a voluminous file of documents, testimonies, and press cuttings about Herberts Cukurs. He had become famous in the thirties as a gifted and bold pilot, who had flown from Latvia to Gambia, in Africa, in a small plane he had built with his own hands. Overnight, the young, handsome pilot had become a national hero in Latvia. He was awarded the international Santos Dumont medal in honor of the Brazilian aviation pioneer; the press called him “the Eagle of Latvia” and “the Latvian Lindbergh.” The War Museum in Riga was assailed by multitudes eager to see Cukurs’s plane, on display there.

Cukurs was a right-wing Latvian nationalist, yet he had many Jewish friends. He even traveled to Palestine and came back deeply impressed by the Zionists’ achievements. His enthusiastic speeches about the pioneers in Palestine made him seem an ally to Latvian Jews.

Yet when World War II erupted, things suddenly changed. Latvia was first occupied by the Soviets, who quickly won the people’s hatred and who persecuted those like Cukurs. But the Red Army retreated after Hitler’s invasion of Russia—and Latvia was conquered by the German Army. Cukurs now transformed completely. As staunch nationalist and a leader of the fanatic Fascist organization Thunder Cross that volunteered to serve the Nazis, Cukurs became the most cruel and sadistic murderer of the Riga Jews. Early on, he and his soldiers herded three hundred Jews into a local synagogue and set it on fire, murdering everyone inside. He arrested Jews, beat them to death with his revolver, shot hundreds of others, humiliated and killed Orthodox Jews, smashed babies’ heads on the city walls. One night, he made a Jewish girl undress in front of a group of Jewish prisoners, then forced an old rabbi to stroke and lick her, to the drunken laughter of the Latvian guards. In the summer, he ordered the drowning of twelve hundred Jews in the Kuldiga Lake, and in November 1941, he led thirty thousand Riga Jews to the killing field in the Rumbula forests, where they were undressed by German soldiers and shot in cold blood.

Reading the depositions of some Jews who miraculously survived, Kunzle was deeply shocked. The documents in the file described Cukurs’s flight to France with forged papers at the end of the war. Posing as a “farmer,” he managed to get on a boat bound for Rio de Janeiro. He took with him a strange “insurance policy”—a young Jewish girl, Miriam Keitzner, whom he had protected during the war. Miriam, who served as his champion now, was speaking throughout Brazil about her noble “savior from Riga.”

In Rio, Cukurs quickly established warm relations with many Brazilian Jews. He loved describing to his audiences Miriam’s fascinating story. “The Nazis caught her in Latvia,” he used to say. “She was to die a horrible death, but I saved her, risking my life.” Such a valiant hero and a savior of Jews didn’t come to Rio every day, and the city Jews did their best to show the brave Latvian how much they valued his noble deeds.

Cukurs became very popular in the Jewish community—till the night when the brave Latvian had too much to drink. The alcohol loosened his tongue, and the inebriated Cukurs told now a very different story to his audience. He spoke of Jews indeed, but now he called them pigs and scum. He spoke with enthusiasm of the means he and his Nazi friends had used to slaughter the Jews of Europe, of Jews who were burned, drowned, shot, and beaten to death . . . The Latvian’s Jewish friends were stupefied; they started investigating—and the results of their research were horrifying.

When his real identity was exposed, Cukurs vanished. He didn’t leave Rio, only moved to a distant neighborhood of the sprawling city. He abandoned Miriam Keitzner, whom he didn’t need anymore. Miriam would later marry a local Jew and assimilate in the Brazilian society. As for Cukurs, he brought over his wife and three sons.

Ten years went by. Cukurs had become the respected owner of the Air Taxi company. But then, by chance, he was discovered again by the Rio Jewish community. They marched to raise public awareness. Students broke into the Air Taxi offices, smashed windows, destroyed equipment, and emptied files . . . Cukurs left Rio with his family right away and settled in São Paulo.

Even though nobody bothered him there, Cukurs felt he was still in danger. He was haunted by fears and suspected every approaching stranger. In June 1960, a few days after Eichmann’s capture, Cukurs came to police headquarters in São Paulo and asked for police protection. His request was granted—but it was also publicized in the media, and relatives of Cukurs’s victims all over the world now knew where he lived.

As years passed, Cukurs’s fears only grew. He told his wife and sons that Jewish avengers could discover his whereabouts and come to murder him at any time. He even prepared a list of his most dangerous enemies, most of them important Brazilian Jews from Rio. At the top of the list were Dr. Aharon Steinbruck, a senator; Dr. Alfredo Gartenberg; Dr. Marcus Constantino; Dr. Israel Skolnikov; Mr. Klinger; Mr. Pairitzki.

Cukurs kept his real name, but built his houses like fortresses and apparently paid substantial bribes for protection by the police and the security services.

He launched several business ventures, but they all failed. According to Kunzle’s file, his last address was a marina on an artificial lake outside São Paulo. Cukurs used to rent a few boats, and take tourists on aerial promenades over the city in his seaplane.

Kunzle knew well that if he tried to approach Cukurs directly, he would certainly arouse his suspicions, so, first, he spent a few days in Rio. His stay in the stunning Brazilian city stood in sheer contrast to the dark mission he had undertaken. He walked on the Copacabana and Ipanema beaches, staring at mulatto beauties in minimal bikinis, gazed at the breathtaking Sugarloaf and the huge statue of Christ on top of the Corcovado, watched a Macumba (the Brazilian voodoo) ceremony, absorbed the warm sunshine and the rhythms of samba. He was a typical tourist, but he got acquainted with several senior officials and private investors in the tourism business, met with the local minister of tourism, and introduced himself as an investor interested in tourist enterprises in Brazil. He got a few letters of recommendation to major figures in the tourism business in São Paulo.

Kunzle arrived in São Paulo and immediately found Cukurs’s marina. By the pier, a little apart from the pleasure boats, he saw an old seaplane and, beside it, a tall, lean man wearing a pilot’s overalls. Herberts Cukurs.

 

Kunzle approached the pretty German girl who sold tickets for Cukurs’s boat excursions, and asked her for information about tourism in that area. He didn’t know then that the young woman was the wife of Cukurs’s oldest son. She admitted she didn’t know very much about tourism, but pointed at the man in the overalls. “Ask him, he will help you.”

Kunzle walked to the pilot and introduced himself as an Austrian investor. He asked a few professional questions and Cukurs reluctantly answered; but his attitude changed when Kunzle asked to hire him and his plane for a tour over the city. A few minutes later, they were high in the air. The two men had a long, friendly chat; Kunzle knew how to make friends. On their return, Cukurs invited him to his boat, for a shot of brandy.

While they were drinking, Cukurs suddenly erupted in a furious diatribe against his accusers. “I was a war criminal?” he shouted. “I saved a Jewish girl during the war.” Kunzle suspected that Cukurs’s indignation was fake and the Latvian only wanted to provoke his reaction.

“Did you serve in the war?” Cukurs asked.

“Yes,” Kunzle said, “on the Russian Front.” But the tone of his answer seemed to indicate the opposite, to imply that Kunzle had served in the army but certainly not on the Russian Front. He also unbuttoned his shirt and showed Cukurs a chest scar. “From the war,” he said, without elaborating.

Kunzle made a quick assessment of his host. Cukurs was in a bad economic situation; the frayed overalls, the ramshackle plane, the sorry state of the boats—all of which indicated a low standard of living. Kunzle realized that he had to make Cukurs believe that he, Kunzle, was his chance to overcome his troubles; he was the man who could bring him large profits. He therefore kept talking about his company and his partners, and their grandiose projects to invest a lot of money in tourism in Latin America. He hinted that Cukurs could perhaps join their group, as he knew the Brazilian tourist scene well.

Cukurs seemed interested in his guest’s words, but Kunzle suddenly got on his feet. “Well,” he said, “I shouldn’t be bothering you anymore. You must be very busy.”

“No, not at all,” Cukurs said, and suggested that Kunzle come to his home one of these days, after work, “so that we could discuss our common interests.”

The contact was established. The bait was cast. Now Cukurs should be persuaded to swallow it.

That evening, Kunzle dispatched a coded telegram to Yoske Yariv. For the first time, he used the code name that Yariv had chosen for Cukurs: “the Deceased.”

Cukurs, too, did some writing that night. He took the list of his most dangerous enemies and added another name to it.

Anton Kunzle.

 

A week later, a taxi stopped by a house in the Riviera neighborhood in São Paulo. The house was modest but protected like a fortress: it was surrounded by a wall and barbed wire, the entrance was barred by an iron gate, and beside it stood a young man and a fierce-looking dog.

Kunzle asked the youngster—who turned out to be one of Cukurs’s sons—to inform the pilot of his arrival. Cukurs welcomed him warmly, walked him through the house, introduced him to his wife, Milda, then pulled out a drawer and showed Kunzle about fifteen medals from the war days; many of them were adorned by a swastika.

Cukurs opened another drawer and showed the amazed Kunzle his private armory: three heavy revolvers and a semiautomatic rifle. Cukurs proudly revealed that the Brazilian secret service had given him permits for all these weapons. “I know how to defend myself,” he added.

Kunzle took Cukurs’s words as a veiled threat. If you try to hurt me, his host seemed to say, you should know that I am armed and dangerous.

Cukurs suddenly had an idea. “Why don’t you come with me on a trip to my farms? They are in the country; we can spend a night there.”

Kunzle readily agreed. But on his way to his hotel, he stopped at a hardware store and bought a switchblade. Just in case.

A few days later, the two of them got into Kunzle’s rented car and headed for the mountains.

It was an eerie, tense trip. Here was Anton Kunzle, armed only with a knife, fearing Cukurs and yet determined to tempt him with the prospects of easy money, and lead him to his death.

And sitting in the car beside him was Herberts Cukurs, strong, sober, but poor, suspicious of his new friend, armed with a heavy handgun but unable to resist the bait Kunzle was dangling before him.

Kunzle thought that perhaps he was the victim in this cat-and-mouse game; perhaps Cukurs did not believe his cover story, perhaps he was taking him to the mountains to murder him there?

Along the way, they visited a neglected farm. All of a sudden, Cukurs drew his semiautomatic rifle out of his bag. Kunzle started. Why did Cukurs bring over both a handgun and a rifle?

“What about a shooting contest?” Cukurs asked him. Kunzle understood right away: Cukurs wanted to test his abilities as a former fighter on the Russian Front and see if he knew how to shoot. The Latvian fixed a paper target to a tree, loaded his rifle, and fired ten bullets in rapid succession. The hits formed a cluster ten centimeters in diameter. Cukurs took from his bag a second paper target, loaded the rifle again, and handed it to Kunzle. A veteran of the British Army and the IDF, Kunzle was an excellent marksman. He picked up the weapon and without any delay fired ten bullets, making a cluster of three centimeters. Cukurs nodded with approval. “Excellent, Herr Anton,” he said.

The two of them got back in the car and traveled to a second farm. It was much larger, and included a dense forest and a river, where alligators lazily lingered. Cukurs led the way into the forest, and Kunzle again was assailed by fears. Was this a trap? Did Cukurs bring him here so he could murder him without leaving evidence?

He kept walking at Cukurs’s side. All of a sudden, he stepped on a rock; a nail got loose in his shoe and deeply punctured his heel. Doubling over in pain, Kunzle kneeled and removed his shoe. Blood was dripping from a wound in his heel.

Cukurs bent over him and drew his gun. Kunzle was exposed, completely defenseless. That’s it, he thought, his last moment had arrived. The Latvian would shoot him as a dog. But Cukurs handed him the gun. “Use the butt,” he said, “hammer it down.”

Kunzle took the gun. All of a sudden, the roles were reversed. They were all alone in a mountain farm. There was not a living soul for miles around. The gun was loaded. He could terminate Cukurs that very moment. Just point the gun and press the trigger.

Instead, he bent down and forcefully pounded the nail’s sharp end, then returned the gun to its owner.

At nightfall the two of them reached a ramshackle hut and improvised dinner with some food they had brought with them. They spread their sleeping bags on two old iron beds. Kunzle saw Cukurs slipping his gun under his pillow. Troubled by ominous thoughts, he pulled his knife out of his pocket and held it ready, but he couldn’t sleep.

In the middle of the night, he heard a noise coming from Cukurs’s bed. The Nazi got up, took his gun, and quietly stepped out. Why? Kunzle thought. He tried to listen to the sounds outside, and suddenly he heard an easily recognizable noise. Cukurs was standing outside and urinating. There were probably wild animals prowling around.

The following day, they returned, safe and sound, to São Paulo. Kunzle let out a sigh of relief when he walked into his hotel.

During the following week, Kunzle invited Cukurs to gourmet restaurants, expensive nightclubs, and bars. He noticed Cukurs’s hungry stare and realized that it had been years since the man last tasted all those pleasures that money could buy. His next move was to ask Cukurs to join him in several domestic flights—on Kunzle’s expense account, of course. They visited some major tourist locations, and Cukurs enjoyed the best food and lodging.

Now Kunzle suggested that they flew to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay. His partners, he said, wanted to establish their South American business center there and he wanted to check the availability of office buildings and other facilities. He even paid for Cukurs’s new passport.

Kunzle flew to Montevideo, and a few days later, Cukurs joined him. But the Latvian’s suspicions had not faded away; he had brought his camera. As he came out of the plane in Montevideo airport, he saw Kunzle, who was waiting for him. Cukurs took out his camera and snapped several photos of Kunzle, catching him by surprise. His friend, his partner, and his funder had become in Cukurs’s eyes the major suspect in a plot to assassinate him.

In the meantime, Kunzle had rented a big American car. He was quite embarrassed by its color—shocking pink—but that was the only car available at the rental agency. He also had reserved rooms for both of them in the best hotel in town, the Victoria Plaza. They spent a few days in Montevideo, looking for a building that could serve as headquarters for Kunzle’s company. They didn’t find a place, but enjoyed a dreamlike vacation. Again, Kunzle invited Cukurs to the best restaurants, took him to nightclubs, on sightseeing tours, to the casino, where he shared his winnings with his guest. Cukurs was delighted. Finally they parted, and Kunzle left for Europe, after promising Cukurs he would be back in a few months to continue developing their project. Cukurs went back to São Paulo, but told his wife that in Montevideo somebody had been following him, so now he had to stay alert and be ready to defend himself.

 

In Paris, Kunzle again met Yariv and his friends, and they immediately started to prepare the operation. It was decided that Cukurs would be executed in Montevideo, for a few reasons: in Brazil, Cukurs was protected by the local police, and that could create some problems; in Brazil, the large Jewish community was vulnerable to attacks by neo-Nazis or Germans seeking revenge; and finally, Brazil still had the death penalty, and if a hit team was caught and tried, they could be killed.

The hit team consisted of five agents and was headed by Yoske Yariv himself. One of the agents was Ze’ev Amit (Slutzky), a cousin of the ramsad, Meir Amit; the other members were Kunzle, Arye Cohen (not his real name), and Eliezer Sudit (Sharon), who also got an Austrian passport in the name of Oswald Taussig.

The team members arrived in Montevideo in February 1965. Oswald Taussig rented a green Volkswagen; he also rented a small house, the Casa Cubertini, on Cartagena Street, in the Carrasco neighborhood. At the last moment, Yariv charged him with a chilling task: to buy a large trunk, like the travel trunks that were used in the nineteenth century. The trunk would be used as a makeshift coffin for the Nazi’s body when the operation was over.

Kunzle invited Cukurs to Montevideo again.

On February 15, 1965, Cukurs went to police headquarters and was received by an officer, Alcido Cintra Bueno Filho. “I am a businessman,” the Latvian said. “For several years I’ve been under the protection of the Brazilian police, because I have good reason to fear for my life. Now a European business partner is asking me to travel to Montevideo to meet him. What do you think, can I travel to Uruguay? Isn’t it risky?”

“Don’t go!” the officer firmly said. “Here you live in peace because we protect you. But don’t forget—the moment you leave Brazil, you aren’t protected anymore. You expose yourself to your enemies. And if you’ve got enemies, I assume that they haven’t forgotten you.”

Cukurs thought awhile, seemed to hesitate, but finally got up and said: “I was always a brave man. I am not afraid. I know how to defend my life. I always carry a gun. And believe me—in spite of all the years that have passed, I am still a fine shot.”

 

Kunzle met Cukurs in Montevideo on February 23. The trap was set. Kunzle drove Cukurs in a rented black Volkswagen toward the Casa Cubertini, where the hit team was waiting. On the way, they stopped several times “to check” some other houses that could serve as an office for the company. Finally, they reached the Casa Cubertini. They saw some men at work, repairing the neighboring house. Taussig’s green car, also a Volkswagen, was parked by the house. Kunzle turned off the engine, got out of the car, and walked purposefully toward the door. Cukurs followed him. Kunzle opened the door and saw a terrifying sight: in the dark house, the members of the hit team stood by the walls, wearing only their drawers. They knew they couldn’t overcome Cukurs without a bloody fight, and had undressed so their clothes wouldn’t be soiled by his blood. There was something appalling in that sight of a group of people in drawers, waiting in the dark for their victim.

Kunzle moved aside and Cukurs entered the house. As soon as he stepped in, Kunzle slammed the door behind him. Three men leaped on Cukurs. Ze’ev Amit tried to grab him by the throat, as he had been trained in Paris. The others jumped him from both sides.

The Latvian fought back. He succeeded in shaking off his attackers and made for the door. He yanked the door handle, then tried to draw the gun he was carrying in his pocket, while shouting in German: “Lassen Sie Mich sprechen!” (“Let me speak!”)

During the fight, Yariv tried to cover Cukurs’s mouth with his hand, to prevent him from shouting. Cukurs fiercely bit his hand and almost tore off one of Yariv’s fingers. Yariv cried in pain. At that moment, Amit grabbed a heavy construction hammer and landed a blow on Cukurs’s head. Blood spurted from the wound. The bodies of the attackers and their victim turned into a convulsing heap on the floor, while Cukurs desperately tried to draw his gun. It was a matter of seconds. Arye pressed his gun to Cukurs’s head and fired twice. The silencer muffled the sound of the shots.

Cukurs’s body collapsed. His blood flowed on his clothes and the floor tiles. The hit team members were covered with blood.

Oswald Taussig hurried to the yard and turned on the main water pipe. His friends washed the blood off their bodies, then cleaned the floor and the walls; yet some large bloodstains remained on the house tiles.

One of the members of the hit team claimed afterward that their intention had been to capture Cukurs alive and make him stand for an improvised court-martial before executing him. But flawed planning or a gross underestimation of the Latvian’s physical strength turned the mission into a repulsive bloodbath that was unplanned and unnecessary. The Mossad agent had rented the house on Cartagena Street at the very last moment; the travel trunk was bought at the last moment as well. Instead of jumping their victim in their drawers, the Mossad agents could have shot him right away. But, as some of the hit team members told us, the mission was accomplished.

The agents placed Cukurs’s body in the trunk, to make the police believe that they intended to abduct him and smuggle him out of Uruguay. Then they left a typewritten letter in English on the body, which had been prepared beforehand: “Considering the gravity of the crimes of which Herberts Cukurs was accused, notably his personal responsibility in the murder of thirty thousand men, women, and children, and considering the terrible cruelty shown by Herberts Cukurs in carrying out his crimes, we condemned the said Cukurs to death. The accused was executed on February 23, 1965, by ‘those who will never forget.’ ”

The team left the building and departed in the two rented Volkswagens. In the neighboring house, the workmen kept pounding and hammering; they had not heard a thing. Yariv suffered terrible pain in his hand; till his death, he wouldn’t be able to properly use one of his fingers. Taussig and Kunzle returned the cars and left their hotels; the entire team left Montevideo and went back by complex routes to Europe and to Israel. Ze’ev Amit returned to Paris “wounded in his body and hurt in his soul.” Terrible nightmares haunted him for many months and he couldn’t overcome his shock and pain.

When all the hit team members had left Latin America, a Mossad agent called the news agencies in Germany and reported the execution of a Nazi criminal in Montevideo by “those who will never forget.”

The reporters who got the message discarded it right away, believing it was a prank. Seeing that nothing happened, the Mossad agents prepared a much more detailed and credible message and dispatched it to the news agencies and to a reporter in a Montevideo newspaper, who alerted the police. On March 8, more than ten days after Cukurs was killed, the police finally arrived at Casa Cubertini.

The next day, the world press announced, in banner headlines, the discovery of Cukurs’s body in an empty house in Montevideo. In the media reports, two names were singled out as suspects in the killing: Anton Kunzle and Oswald Taussig. A few days later, a Rio de Janeiro weekly published a huge photo of Anton Kunzle that had been taken by Cukurs. The magazine called Kunzle “the smiling Austrian.” The photo was reproduced on the front page of the Israel newspaper Maariv. Some friends of the Mossad agent immediately identified Anton Kunzle.

After a few more days, a letter arrived to Cukurs’s house. It was a rather poor effort by Anton Kunzle to cover his tracks.

 

My dear Herberts,

With God’s help and that of some of our compatriots, I have safely reached Chile. I am now resting after a tiring journey, and I am sure that you, too, will very soon be back home. Meanwhile, I’ve discovered that we were followed by two people, a man and a woman. We must be very careful and take every precaution. As I’ve always said, you are running a great risk in working and traveling under your own name. It could be disastrous for us, and also lead to my real identity being discovered.

So I hope that the complications in Uruguay have taught you a lesson for the future, and that you’ll be more prudent now. If you notice anything suspicious in or around your house, remember the advice I gave you: go and hide among Von Leeds’s men (a Nazi leader who had escaped to Cairo with a group of German exiles) for a year or two, until the question of an amnesty is settled.

When you get this letter, reply to the address you know of, in Santiago, Chile.

Yours, Anton K.

 

The letter, of course, did not fool anybody. Cukurs’s wife, Milda, was adamant: Kunzle was the murderer.

Most of the participants in the Cukurs killing are dead. Ze’ev Amit, whom the authors of this book knew well, was killed in the Yom Kippur War in 1973.

Their mission paid off. The parliaments of Germany and Austria rejected the statute of limitation on the Nazi crimes.

Years later, former ramsad Isser Harel called one of the authors of this book and told him that a good friend of his wanted to meet. He didn’t give any details, just an address in North Tel Aviv. The author found there a neat little house. A sturdy, bald man wearing glasses opened the door. The author recognized him right away.

He said to the man: “Guten Abend, Herr Kunzle.”