What’s so noble about being a briquet?
Unlike many others, Arpad Kovacs was ready to do everything possible to survive and save others. He “got himself false papers and joined the Hungarian S.S” and what a Nazi he was! This notorious man was a truly gifted actor, for no one could even imagine that he was a Jew. Not to mention, that he managed to take lives of many Nazis. Arpad Kovacs was sympathetic with Campbell, for “what’s so noble about being a briquette?” If one wanted to survive, he/she had to step over themselves, over their morality and whatnot. He said Campbell once, “tell them the things man does to stay alive!” People like Arpad Kovacs make us ask questions, “what we really know about the right and the wrong” and whether we should judge those, who committed crimes for victory’s sake during the war.
Every job was a job to do, and no job was any better or any worse than any other.
There is a common misconception that revenge is something sweet and capable of bringing joy or a feeling of triumph. Bernard Mengel can prove it wrong, for he knows for sure. This Polish Jew had managed to survive the horrors of the World War II and started a new life in a country where nothing would threat him. One would think that the day when he helped to hang Hoess was the luckiest day of his life, for he got a payback on him. The reality was different, he didn’t feel anything, that was just “a job to do, and no job was any better or any worse than any other”. This quote showed that all those stories about sweet revenge were just fictions. The war deprived people of all feelings.
Where do I fit?
O’Hare used to be a real hero, he came to Europe to fight Nazis and destroy the evil. He was young back then. When the war ended, he came back to the USA and returned to his old life, not of a hero, but of a simple man. His business “went bust” and “all the time the wife was having more kids, and the damn car breaking down, and bill-collectors coming around, and the termites boiling out of the baseboards every spring and fall”. That was routine, the usual life he wasn’t prepared to live and then he asked himself, “where do I fit?” Like many other veterans, O’Hare couldn’t find his place in that new world, where justice and injustice, the good and the bad coexisted. To understand how a new veteran might feel, look at the story of O’Hare.
It might be helpful to say that I broke into a cold sweat, or some such nonsense. But I have always known what I did.
Campbell is an embodiment of the good and the bad, he works on Nazis and he also works against them. There is no need to justify his actions, for it is his choice and he is clearly aware of his role in this war. Campbell isn’t frightened to tell his guards about the crimes he commits and even wants them to read the speeches he wrote. He says that, “I have always known what I did” and doesn’t pretend that the mere thought of his crimes makes him break “into a cold sweat”. He is an example of a man who is not afraid of his sins. He also shows that it is possible to live with the thought that he is partially responsible for death of 6 million people, although it sounds horribly.
