Bernie Gunther

I have finished two more of the Bernie Guther novels and can confirm both worth reading. 

The One From the Other starts with a prologue in which Gunther travels to Palestine in 1937, in order to help a Jew get money out of Germany. One of Gunther's companions on this trip is a young Adolf Eichmann.

The story then jumps to 1949 post-war Germany.   Gunther is living in a rundown hotel in Dachau which his wife inherited from her father. As one can imagine, there is not a lot of tourist trade in Dachau and Bernie is no hotelier. Worse, his wife has had a mental breakdown and is a sanatorium in Munich.  His life is a drift.     

One morning an American car drives up with two passengers. The one, is a well dressed, medium sized American and the other is a dejected-looking German. It appears the German buried Jewish valuables in the hotel garden some years back and the American has brought him to Dachau in order to find the treasure. After unearthing the loot, the American advises Bernie that he is in the wrong business, and departs. Gunther figures the American is right and decides to go back to his old work as a private detective.   

Looking for missing persons is still a good business and Gunther starts spreading his business cards around Munich to the various types who might need a good sleuth. One day, a stunningly beautiful woman appears at his office asking Bernie to confirm whether her monster-of-an SS husband is alive or dead because she has met someone else she would like to marry. Being a Catholic, she cannot remarry until her husband is declared deceased. 

The search for this man leads Bernie into some very dangerous and painful situations. The final result is Bernie must go underground and flee Germany as a war criminal. He is helped in this endeavor by a group of ex-Nazis and Catholic priests. Once he has received fake identification he will be shipped to Argentina. On the way, Gunther is stored in a safe-house near Garmish-Partenkirchen. There he runs into Adolf Eichmann, who is also destined for Argentina.  The book closes with both men in a Bavarian monastery, waiting to leave Germany behind.  

"The One From The Other" is a very good read. It is fast-paced and full of action. Kerr has cut back on the number of wise-cracks made by Bernie, which is a great improvement over the first book. The only thing which I could find fault with was the major premise around which the story revolves. It is pretty unlikely that such a thing could happen, but it is not out of the realm of possibility. (You will have to read the book to find out what this premise is.) 

Kerr includes a lot of historical information in his books. If one doesn't know a fair amount of German history, one will probably miss the meanings of some of the remarks made by the various characters. Thankfully, these are like insider jokes thus not so important for enjoying the novel. 

"The One From The Other" is definitely worth the time it takes to read. 

In 1973 I was in Santiago Chile. The primary mission was undermining the government of Allende but we also worked closely with elements of Mossad and Shin Bet who were very engaged in findin either of these two thugs. Kammler was rumored to be dead but until Mossad could verify the body he was assumed to be alive. Menegle was known to be alive and had actually returned to Germany to visit family (1963/4?). His son was supplying him with funds.

Our basic deal with the Mossad case officer, Meir Dagen later director of Mossad, was exchange of intelligence. They gave us intelligence on Chilean military and we gave them all we had on Nazis in South America. Meir was a good friend to me personally and to the US, when we visited Israel several years ago we stayed with him. As an Israeli citizen I was allowed to openly carry a weapon. Meir told me the same thing our chief of station told me in 73. "The government of Israel and the government of the US will be very unhappy if you get killed here." My response was the same, "it won't make me happy either". 

While most of the old nazis are finely dead, hell must be overflowing, every once in a while some 90 year old comes out of the sewer. Mossad is always on the lookout. 

I have no knowledge of that, but I doubt it. My boss James Angleton, would have had knowledge of it and I don't think he would have allowed CI to be involved. He was in Europe during the war as was Colby so I just have strong doubts. Besides the US was buying up German scientists by the barrel full in 45-50 so if they wanted to get a nazi out that would have been the route. 

And that is the question. I know that for over 20 years every piece of mail going to or coming from the Soviet Union was opened, copied and kept by CI. In todays world I would not dismiss agencies working directly with foreign intelligence, and criminals. However, the 40s, 50s, 60s and even 70s it was a different world. 

I am about 3/4 of the way through If The Dead Rise Not and it is even better than the previous three Bernie Gunther books I have read. Philip Kerr puts some very interesting words into the mouths of various characters in the book. I thought these examples might interest readers.  

Gunther is talking to an American journalist who has just had a meeting with Hans von Tschammer und Osten, the "Reich's Sports Leader" who is in overall charge of the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. By this time the Jews have been largely excluded from taking part in German sports. The reporter goes on to tell Gunther that the Nazi's plans for sports goes further that just excluding the Jews.

The reporter says:

There's more. Von Tschammer und Osten said that all Roman Catholic and Protestant youth organizations are, like all Jewish organizations, to be expressly forbidden to pursue any sport. As far as the Nazis are concerned, people are going to have to make a choice between religion and sports. The point being that all sports training is to be done under Nazi auspices. He actually said that the Nazis are conduction a cultural war against the church.....

Any Catholic or Protestant athletes who don't join Nazi sports clubs will lose their chance of representing Germany.

Gunter replies, "So let them. Who cares about a few idiots running around a track anyway?"

To which the reporter says:

"You're missing the point, Gunther. They've purged the police. Now they're purging sports. If they succeed, there will be no aspect of German life in which they won't be able to exert their authority. In all aspects of German society, Nazis will be preferred. If you want to get on in life, you will have to become a Nazi.

Is there any difference between the above scenario and what is happening in American today? I think not. The present day Nazis in America are simply following the play book composed for them by the German Nazis of the 1930s.

Sometime later, Gunther is a "guest" of Wolf-Heinrich Graf von Helldorf, a high-ranking Nazi police official who tries to get Gunther to sign a form allowing the government to put Gunther in a concentration camp under "protective custody."  Gunther has had a long day, is tired and after some discussions with von Helldorf he thinks:

It all sounded so reasonable I was actually tempted to sign his D-11 just in order to actually be able to return home and go to bed. I had to hand it to von Helldorf. He was a smooth operator.... Perhaps he had also learned how to persuade people to do something they didn't want to do. Such as signing a document saying that you agreed to be sent to a concentration camp. Maybe that just made von Helldorf a typical Nazi. Quite a few of them-Goebbels, Goering, and Hitler, most of all-seemed to have a flair for persuading Germans to go against their own common sense.

Again, that sounds very similar to what is happening today.

After spending some horrible time on the Eastern Front, in A Man Without Breath, Bernie Gunther is back in Berlin. He is now working for the War Crimes Bureau, which is part of the Wehrmacht's legal department. The bureau is run by old Prussian judges who generally despise the Nazis and are responsible for investigating serious crimes committed during the war.

It is March of 1943 and Stalingrad has just cost Germany its 6th Army. Goebbels and his "Total War" meme are picking up steam and Das Vaterland needs something of a morale boast.

There are rumors of some possible against Polish Officers, which might have been committed by the Soviets and Bernie is sent to Smolensk to investigate. He inspects the scene at a place called the Katyn Forrest and quickly concludes the case deserves further investigation. Bernie plans to return to Berlin asap and make his report, but before he leaves, he is asked to look into a murder scene in which two German enlisted men have had their throats cut. This happened just a stone's throw from a brothel and some suggest it might have been partisans. Gunther quickly concludes that the murderer is probably another German soldier. The local signal corps colonel in charge asks Bernie to solve the case, but Bernie has not appetite for it, simply wanting to get away from Smolensk. This does not please the colonel.

Back home in Berlin, Bernie thinks he is rid of the Katyn investigation when much to his dismay he is ordered to return to Smolensk and assist an international group of forensic experts to determine if the mass of bodies found were murdered by the Soviets.

Again in Smolensk, while assisting the commission of forensic experts, Bernie can't let go of the previous murders of the two German enlisted men. He is warned off, but as is his wont, he keeps digging and get's in very deep waters for his trouble. While wandering through the book, the reader encounters NKVD murderers, a plot to assassinate Hitler, (the NKVD have nothing to do with this) Feldmarshall von Kluge, Admiral Canaris and, oddly enough, a Jewish Hospital in the middle of Berlin which treated Jews throughout the war.

As with books 1, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8, I can strongly recommend this 9th novel in Kerr's Bernie Gunther series.

I have come to the end of Philip Kerr's Bernie Gunther series, having finished Greeks Bearing Gifts and Metropolis . I am not embarrassed to admit I am saddened there will be no more future installments as Kerr died in 2018 before the final book, "Metropolis" was published.

The way Kerr develops Gunther's character and lays out his biography is masterful. Perhaps the only other books I have read, which are as good at this, are C.P. Snow's "Strangers and Brothers" series. They are a very different type of writing, being something of an autobiography of Snow.  Interestingly, they mainly cover the first half of the twentieth century, but from a British perspective, instead of a German one. 

Bernhard Gunther represents something of a Jedermann (every man) from the first half of 20th-Century Germany. He is a product of forces over which he has no control, and the decisions he makes when buffeted by these forces. Gunther is the perfect example of the truth that we are what the sum of what our experiences and decisions make us.

From the beginning of the series, it is clear that Gunther is somewhat broken. Anyone who survived four years in the trenches during WWI probably couldn't help being less than perfect. He has his own code and is certainly more honest and moral than many he encounters, both in and out of the police force. But as time goes by, he is unable to hold to the straight path he believes he sees in front of him. Gunther is not a criminal, but he is not the Lone Ranger either. Above all, he is a survivor.

He has two major weaknesses, women and booze. Most of the occasional silly mistakes he makes originate from one or both of these weaknesses.

"Metropolis is the last book which Kerr wrote, but it covers the beginnings of Gunther's time in the Berlin Police Force. It goes back to 1928, (when Bernie is 31-32) the time he was in Vice and asked by Bernhard Weiss and Ernest Gennat to join the Murder Squad. It might be the best book of the series. For this reason, as well as the fact that is gives a good introduction to Gunther, I think it should be the first book which a reader should seek out.

There are many good lines in the book, but I found this one, spoken by Gennat to be very timely. He is referring to newspaper articles printed about a serial killer. 

This is something people would do well to remember at all times. 

"Greeks Bearing Gifts" is the second-to-last book Kerr wrote, but is, date-wise, the last in the series taking place in 1956-57. The settings are in Munich and Greece. Gunther, now known as Christof Ganz, works as an insurance adjuster for Munich Re, a large German insurance company.

He is sent to Greece to investigate a large claim for a sunken yacht. Of course, there is more to things than meets the eye and he is forced to face up to the Nazis' horrible war-time treatment of Greece and the Jews of Saloniki. The insurance claim puts him on the trail of a couple of war criminals.  While investigating the claim, he steps on the toes of a Greek police lieutenant who makes Bernie's life difficult.

Perhaps most interesting is Bernie's encounter with a female Mossad agent who threatens to have him shot. The book closes with Gunther's decision to try and atone for some of his past and do something good. He agrees to work with the Mossad in the future.

It is doubly regrettable that Kerr passed away as, with this new twist, Bernie Gunther's life could have become even more fascinating. Now, we will never be able to enjoy his future attempts to help Israel.

Like all of the Gunther series, the "Author's Notes" at the end of the book, give brief biographies of the real characters who Kerr sprinkled throughout his novel.

Perhaps more than anything, I am extremely impressed with Kerr's wonderful command of the German language and encyclopedic knowledge of twentieth-century German history. I have never before encountered anything quite like it. 

As I said, I will miss Bernie Gunther. He will be hard to replace. I may have a look at some of the other books Kerr wrote and see how they compare. I am, like Bernhard Gunther, something of a cynic, so I have my doubts as to how well the books will stand up against the Bernhard Gunther series.