LESTER HOLT, anchor:
A dark chapter in
America
's past is getting new attention tonight with the disclosure of a never-before-seen
Justice Department
report on what the
US government
did to hunt down
Nazis
after
World War II
, in some cases, giving them protection in the US. Now
Jewish
groups are calling for a full disclosure. We get more from our justice correspondent
Pete Williams
.
Unidentified Man #1:
Liftoff. We have a liftoff.
PETE WILLIAMS reporting:
The never-disclosed report details the government's complicated dealings with former
Nazi
scientists, including one of the experts behind the
1969
launch that put
a man on the moon
.
Unidentified Man #2:
Magnificent sight out here.
WILLIAMS:
Arthur Rudolph
, who had worked on rockets for
Hitler's Germany
, was brought to the US after the war under a secret program to keep other countries from getting their hands on German scientific breakthroughs. That program, says
Holocaust survivor
Jerry Wartsky
, was appalling.
Mr. JERRY WARTSKY:
We paid too much of a price for it, I think.
WILLIAMS:
Though the US knew
Rudolph
had been a
Nazi
, he was not considered complicit in atrocities. He became the father of the mighty
Saturn rocket
that made the
space program
possible. But in
1984
, as the
Justice Department
, armed with new evidence, prepared to prosecute him for involvement in the
Nazi
use of slave labor, he left the US and renounced his citizenship. It's among dozens of cases detailed in a
Justice Department
report never made public but obtained by
The New York Times.
Mr. ERIC LICHTBLAU (The New York Times):
The government knows much more about the history of American collaboration with the
Nazis
than was previously acknowledged in this remarkable post-
World War II
period.
WILLIAMS:
The report describes internal
US government
battles over, for example, whether it could be proven that
Swiss banks
bought gold looted by the
Nazis
from
Jewish
victims.
Jewish
groups that do their own
Nazi
hunting say the
Justice Department
should make the report public.
Rabbi MARVIN HIER (Simon Wiesenthal Center):
They wind up deep sixing and sitting on the report, which only leads to guesswork. Why are they doing that? What are they hiding?
Mr. ABRAHAM FOXMAN (Anti-Defamation League):
We're still covering up, we're still hiding the role that some in our
country
played by some perverse sense of national interest. I think it's time that our
country
knew.
WILLIAMS:
But a former director of the
Justice Department
's
Nazi
hunting unit says whatever comes out must be accurate for the sake of history.
Mr. NEAL SHER (Former Justice Department Official):
We're talking now about the issues of the
Holocaust
and justice. And, it seems to me, imperative that what is released be accurate.
WILLIAMS:
But it may never be formally released at all. Tonight the
Justice Department
says the report is a draft that contains some mistakes. It was never finished, the government says, because prosecutors decided they had higher priorities, chasing current cases.
Pete Williams
,
NBC News
, at the
Justice Department
.
“ ”