through famine and starvation and so forth. it became in these settings, you know, communities of violence started to develop, you know, at the scenes. very much included women in these different roles. so with this large number, right, i are to then kind of bring it down to individual faces to put faces on the perpetratorrers. since in the history books, they are often very demonized and presented as kind of freebs -- freaks of nature or sadistic figures even pornographically so. i want to present the reality, these women when they came of age, they were people we could relate to. they were likable figures. the book kind of you warm up to them in the beginning, then you start to see how they are transformed by being moved to the east, and confronting witnessing the violence. then we see, you know, different reaction. the spectrum of that behavior. this is really the main story of

it. >> were women supportive of the nazi regime as it came to power in the early '30s. >> they were. they were involved in -- there was a political awakingen and explosion. they were involved in a communist movement and a number of people's movements what would be right-wing movements. and moderate social democratic party, they were largely represented, so they were really, you know, active in all. place are placed to the role of chancellor. strongly represented in germany, female kind of participation in

that. and in participation in the movement as such. as aids to the start troopers and so forth. that supports the history. these women would go completely 100% nazi and rush off to the east and become killers. if they process a transformation that i'm trying to delineate through the biography. >> whose picture on the front of the book? >> that is -- [inaudible] it's a very chilling photograph. just the stare is quite -- it's still grabs me. still startles me. she was a young woman, a baby boomer, born right after the first world war i. who grew up in a working class family in bizarre land which was a contested territory, a border

region. there was a lot of attempts to rejoin the league of nations mandate with germany. in the '30s. she worked on a chicken farm, she had a, you know, kind of graceful education. trying to get out and see the world, you know, these am brigses -- ambitions stirred by the women in particular. and trying to find her way. and what she does is finds her way to a nazi newspaper office, and working as a typist there. she has a clerical skills, and she meets her husband there who is a thug. a street fighter. he's got even throwing -- showing off the scars and bruises. she's somehow enchanted by that. by his brutality. he's in the ss, so he's got, you know, a rising career. he's going to be part of the elite. and she attach hertz to him. that's from the marriage

application. the ss marriage application filed. their marriage had to be approved by hitler himself. >> because he was ss. >> yes. they had to pass a racial examination. very invicive for the women. very invasive to pass the test of the rational not only the ancestry going back to the 18th century by the biological feature. that's the front shot. the rest of the application has profile and full body image of her. her husband is eventually made the camp commander of one of the most known sites in ukraine. the biggest concentration camp in ukraine. western ukraine. a site where hundreds of thousand of jews were transported to the gassing center. and many died in the camp as well as laborers. and they set up the villa outside the camp perimeter, and

when she got there, she said i would like a balcony. i need a terrace, a bilk any and brought jewish slave labors in and had to lay the tile and make it nice for her. what did she do with her 3-year-old daughter? was also there and she brought the daughter -- the whole family was there. well, in a setting of this villa, sitting on the balcony, where they would have their ritual afternoon ritual of coffee and cake, she would pull out the pistol, which was an typical weapon domesticked weapon, a parlor room, you would shoot turn of the century victorian parlor room. it was -- recreational weapon. they had one of these. she pulled it out and shoot at the jewish labors in the garden

and shoot across over the wall of the camp in to labors themselves who were making their way through the camp. and this was a routine for her. it was not a one-time kind of incident she developed a reputation for these balcony shootings. and many women in these sites -- we have testimony of shootings from balconies. which is an interesting kind of pattern, but it also just brings really literally home the fact that these are women killing in these intimate domestic settings. it's not the official task but they are in the places where they realize this is possible. everything is possible here. and, you know, -- >> wendy, how did you find her story? >> i found her story -- i first came across her story in the testimony of a very, very

important collection of essays by a scholar who was a survivor philip freeman, a pioneer scholar who was from the region and heard about it during the war through other survivors. and he wrote about this, i think it was as early as the '50s, and i was shocked by this. he identified her and -- and even quoted some survivors who had were astounded by her violence. that got me on the leave here is someone an outstanding figure. let me test out whether or not it was true. let me try to corroborate this particular testimony with other materials. and i got documentation and found in fact her marriage application and verified who she was and what her biography she

was and she was in fact sent there. she was a real person. she was there with the daughter. we could see in the german documentation and continued to collect more victim testimony about her. and that's really related to primary sources in this case. and there are other cases in my book, of the thirteen biography, i identify people through memoirs, i mean, they came out and had the audacity to write the memoir and leave out some of the history. i use it as a starting point and start to dig. and make phone call and send letters and do all of that. >> where do the women go after the war? what happened to them? >> most of them went back to west germany. austria, i have women from have vienna who were secretary in the gas gus stop pow there. one couple in particular from

what became east germany and that figure -- prominently in the book and responsible for this it plantation she and her husband were running a farm an estate another case in ukraine, and they were jews that were trying to flee from the railway transport, the boxcars to -- so people would end up on their stay trying to find refuge. this couple -- on the balcony serving coffee and cake and overheard the men talking about what should be done with the jews. and the details of how they should be killed. the proper method, so one day

some jewish boys, six boys -- she found them along the side of the road leading to the state. brought them back to the house, calmed them down. feed them some, you know, something to eat. they kind of gain their trust. then she escorted them tout the campsite and shot them in the back of the neck. that was -- that was a pretty detailed story because -- and i can tell you that story because they were arrested bit east german and suggested to pretty harsh integration in 1960, '61. with her husband. and so they confess to the crimes. and since corroborated her confession with other testimony on to the site and matched up what she said with the actual layout of the place and talk to the witnesses there. her husband was given a death

penalty and she was given a life sentence. so when the women went back to the different places during the context of the cold war, their face varied quite a bit. she got a life someone. this is not what happens in west germany, for instance, i have another case of a secretary who with her boss, was indicted for the murder of 9,000 jews and both acquitted in the '70s. or the case of the perpetrators who go back to vienna and don't even -- , i mean, their cases are heard and kind of closed court but they are treated with the out most respect as being ladies and told to go home. >> so most of these women worked with the nazis kind of faded back to so-called normal life. >> yes. >> this is another astounding piece of the story. how much context and how much the settings were brought out this horrific behavior and how

after the war they slip back in to society. you could say they got away with murder. they did. it's what i would call a kind of scholar refer to psychologists that refer to in the book the chameleon effect. the ability for the perpetrators to slip back in and everything normal. they don't go on -- they're not sky -- psycho paths who don't kill. homicide man yaks that continue to kill. they are no longer threat to society. it's a different system. a system that kind of nur nurtured and insighted that kind of behavior has been defeated. they move to the earlier roles. they slip back in to the housewife, the mother, the secretary, the nurse. >> wendy is chair of the history department at collar month mcken that college. >> i'm the j k. roth professor

of history. a chair of the history. not the chair of the department. >> there we go! this is her new book coming out in september. "hitler's furries: german women." visit booktv.org to watch any of the programs you see online. type the author or book title in the search bar on the upper left sides of the page and click search. you share anything you see on booktv.org easily by clicking share on the upper left side of the page and selecting the to mar. book stream live every weekend with top non-fiction book and authors. booktv.org. it was essential to remove france canada for the united as it became to have the opportunity to achieve the independence. they -- and a few people lead by frack lynn recognized the possibility

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twitter. kevin williamson is next on booktv. mr. williamson argues that the collapse of the modern welfare state in the u.s. presents an opportunity for market-dprifn alternative to be explored. it's about an hour twenty. >> good afternoon, everyone. i want to thank you for coming out, and to welcome you all to the auditorium at the cato institute. my name is michael tanner. i'm a senior fellow here at the cato institute. of course, i'm not the person you are really here to see. we are here, actually, to talk about new book by kevin williamson, "the end is near" it's going to be awesome. we have kevin, who will be talking to us a little bit and talking about the book in a few moments. we'll have some commentary on