How did it happen that the mass killing of people was carried out by fellow citizens—or at least with their direct participation? Why, after the war, did antisemitism not fade away, but instead blended naturally into everyday life? The author tried to include in a discussion of the Holocaust the participants themselves—including executioners and their helpers, eyewitnesses whose statements can be found on the pages of criminal case files that were examined by Soviet courts and tribunals during the war and the postwar years.
The publication is based on declassified documents and sources that are hard to access. Its author is known not only as a professor of law, but also as a writer. Interest among readers was sparked by his previous book, “An Hour and a Half of Retribution” (about Alexander Pechersky, the hero of the uprising in the concentration camp “Sobibor”), as well as excerpts from this book that were published in the journals “Novy Mir,” “Znamya,” and “Snob,” and in historical periodicals.