Extract

This edited volume seeks to dispel the confusion between what was the International Military Tribunal (IMT) and the subsequent court proceedings which took place from October 1946 until April 1949 and are known collectively as the Nuremberg Trials. The departing chief prosecutor, Brigadier General Telford Taylor, viewed the trials as tools of history, stating ‘Nowhere can these records be put to more immediate or better use than in German schools and universities, and in German books and magazines. It is true, to be sure, that the reorientation of German thought along democratic lines must ultimately be accomplished by the Germans themselves. But the least we can do is to insure that the documents which expose the true nature of the Third Reich are circulated throughout Germany. The Nuremberg documents must be utilized to the full in writing German history, if the Germans of today are to grasp the truth about the past’ (p. 290). Taylor’s remarks are the starting-point for the volume as it explores the long-lasting influence of the Nuremberg Military Tribunals (NMT).

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