Transcripts For CSPAN2 Panel Discussion Of Robert Edsels The Monuments Men 20140302

Content. Next a Panel Discussion about robert edsels the Monuments Men about recovering and protecting european cultural artifacts that the nazis stole during world war ii. This is about an hour and 30 minutes. [applause] [inaudible conversations] there we go. Okay. Roberts second book is entitled the Monuments Men allied heroes, nazi thieves, and the greatest Treasure Hunt in history. This panel tonight will discuss those allied heroes the monuments named, the nazi thievebut not thethieves and tht Treasure Hunt in history. With the ambassadors staff on the panel on the legal also touch on some of the more contemporary efforts by the United States government to address the loss and return of what in the late 19 90s we began calling the holocaust era assets. In a way whats been done since the 1990s is following in the steps of the monuments named. Using the records they created as the guide past and using them to help turn history into the justice and expression that i stole from the ambassadors staff and have used frequently but how that tradition. We know that world war ii witnessed the greatest murder in history, the holocaust. It also witnessed the greatest step in history. The nazis and their Access Partners took what they wanted, monetary goal, property, movable property, intellectual property, communal and religious property. They also took the Cultural Property in numbers that staggered the imagination. They even took gold fillings from their victims. Much of what was taken was from the European Jewish community. And the fact it was often in direct as we learned in the 1990s as witnessed by what happened to the jewish accounts in swiss banks and insurance policies issued to jews by german and italian insurance companies. Stu was greatly involved in these issues beginning in the 1990s and perhaps you can tell us a little bit about this and insurance issues and whether theres been any resolution of the issues. Thank you, greg and for hosting this event. As greg said, the holocaust was not only the greatest genocide in history, but it was the greatest theft in history. It was a war within the war in which nazi germany diverted enormous amounts of resources down to the very last days of the war to stri start everythine had including bell labs. In a way, the theft of art and other properties is as old as warfare, to go back to the 70 conquest of jerusalem insignia that we see on one of napoleons ventures, but what distinguished this fact was a threat to nato depths and efficiency and organization. With respect to artworks it is estimated that 600,000 pieces of art were stolen. For the museum that he planned after the war in his hometown, but the artwork was only a part of it. So for example, the homes and businesses, jewelry, insurance policies and Bank Accounts. And let me just mention the Bank Accounts and insurance policies we estimate will come back a little later. What we found through the article in the journal that i read when i was the ambassador it is a front page article, and it said there were dormant swiss Bank Accounts, that is accounts that have been set up during the war primarily about jews trying to shield their money from the onslaught of the third reich and that of those that survived were if they didnt come with penalties that tried to recoup their Bank Accounts were told they couldnt be found. What happened is the accounts were drawn down month after month to charges were taken into the private banks. So, i got permission from the state department and since we were already working on holocaust issues to go to switzerland and i met with the Swiss Bankers Association and i gave him a copy of this wall street journal article and i said is this true and they said yes it is to the extent we have had our own on but then and we found that there are 732 doormen to think accounts which should have been returned and were not. And if we plus that up to the values that would be 32 million we are going to return every one. Not taking it for face value we appointed a commission that worked for five years and got major Accounting Firms in the church over 200 million in accounting and we found there were 54,000 possible accounts and 21,000 certain accounts. And a settlement was reached for 1. 52 billion. With respect to insurance, the companies did the following. There were injuries policies on the lives of individuals, and what happened after the war is the families of those that were killed in the Life Insurance policies tried to recoup, and they were told that the policies that had lapsed because the premiums were not there while people were in auschwitz and this was only discovered again by us in the late 1990s and we created something called the International Commission of the holocaust insurance claims under former secretary of state. And in a consensual way after we got everyone together there were 19,000 policies paid over 4 million. So, the dimensions of this were so peeling back the layers of an onion. One thing led to another. Slave labor ended up getting almost 8 billion in compensation from german private companies and the government ended the slave labor and by the way the majority of the poor for the non jewish force leaders ended up 1. 5 Million People got compensation as a result of that. So, it was a very extensive effort of which again it was a piece that only a piece. Going back before and during world war ii can you tell us what they took in terms of art, who did the taking and what did they do with what they took. The common phrase that gives you an idea of the active opportunistic leading like a power outage and people break into the television and Electronic Store and while im sure that did occur, what we are talking about in the compensation was much more systemic and bureaucratic from the leadership gallon and it was targeting certain categories of individuals have certain countries, and it was enacted by various bureaucratic arms of the nazi regime and a varied from country to country but then germany and austria was much more through the taxation offices having to pay certain taxes. And later as we move into the occupied countries, poland and holland and working with the banks that were taking over the jewish assets, and i think the most well known organization is easily referred to as the er or and that is an arm that was originally to be confiscating the propaganda that would be something the nazis were trying to subdue and it turned into an arm for confiscating the assets in france and belgium. So i think its important you do is the term nazi try to keep inp in mind it is a bureaucratic effort from the top down. From where it was going to go as we all know hitler had to go and then the other leaders were collecting because they thought it showe showed them to be civid people and they were collecting them for themselves. But like any regime, i think that like many other nighties really not seized. Could you stick to their advantage. Did they support the war effort . They definitely saw the currency of the art, so the art that was to the regime and that you are familiar with what he used on the collectors who did that. He would select the heat traded it for things he would prefer, so it was the kin that kind of y and it is and will be. But it is a particularly by malevolent fashion. Having an Extensive Knowledge of gold, art and other property, in january of 1943, the allies issued what was called the london declaration to stop the looting and they reserve the right to not recognize the force field of property or the property made under the rest. At the same time, they became increasingly concerned about the damage to and the disruption of the property. And in america this can serve many concerned many. It was thwith the creation of te American Commission for the protection and salvage of the artistic and Historic Monuments in the area. Its called the Roberts Commission because it is the chairman was a spin Court Justice roberts. The second thing was the creation of the military establishment, the specialist to deal with the protection of the property. So, robert, can you tell us about the commission and the creation of the monuments . Yes. [laughter] look, its actually a little bit boring because we get into some very long names that you have heard greg name and some acronyms, but he sensually it really begins three or four years earlier. There is a man that is a pioneer in the conservation of works of art who was so old he thought in the last year of world war i he was in your pitiful the disruption and damage their and went into the Art Conservation ienemy is begun at harvard and e had a vision in between the war watching the extraordinary damage in spain from the civil war and the advent of new technologies and bombings that were causing fires, and the conviction due to the correspondence that he had with friends that worked in the german museums and that were going to england to try to get away from the bad times that they foresaw. He was convinced there was going to be a second world war. Matching that with what he was observing in spain for disaster on the horizon. The United States might become in gauging the war ended in the process of trying to beat nazi germany destroyed so much of the civilization that it would be a permanent stain on the military and the United States. So even before the japanese attack on pearl harbor from 1741, he started preparing these pamphlets that had the treasurers during the war before they were even engaged in a war and following december 7, very much like following september 11, 2001, the fear is there was going to be an invasion on the east coast or bombing or a west coast by the japanese. And American Museum directors were asked to convene at the metropolitan museum about the third week in december, 1941, to discuss initially the protection of the works of art in this country at the main museums including the National Gallery of art, which largely in the dead of night on december 31, evacuated the most important factors to the state and North Carolina where they sat out the war. As happened with september 11 it became clear pretty quickly that what had happened was all that was going to happen in the short term, and the focus shifted from being concerned about how to protect things in this country to how we go about avoiding destroying so much a band kind mankind greatest achievements in europe. And he proposed this concept of cultural preservation as a new kind of soldier when charged with saving rather than destroying and cad and envisioned a much more elaborate setup with secretaries and assistants at typewriters and vehicles of which was manifested by the time this unfolded. He was very suspicious of the Museum Directors and he was convinced and referred to them he was convinced that by the time they got a hold of these ideas, they so massive that it wouldnt end up going anywhere. And at some point in time in the next year or so he kind of gave up on the idea and went into working with Something Else he knew about such in the military was the camouflage of the aircraft not too far from the Restoration Works of art. But his great supporter was paul who is the pioneer introducing the first Museum Studies course in the United States at harvard than as the studies course, and it was a farm club for Museum Directors, curators of the cultural country that we know today. There were some 20 days referred to that can monuments offices and for those of you that are old enough to have seen the old Mission Impossible tv series peter was sit down after the lengthy assignment and look at the experts to decide which ones he wanted to deal with the challenges of that mission. While, he performed this responsibility while working with the commission starting with all of the students he graduated from 1928 and there were some things that were architects, linguists, most of them had been educated in europe as a factor was who was already in the military coming even in the reserves because they quickly realized that it was going to be easier to transfer somebody in the military than it was to get somebody. So this is the origin where this idea comes from, and as greg said, late 1942 the idea comes from a lot of different groups, American Council of societies, a lot of very well intended people including those on this lengthy name known as the Roberts Commission, but it is georges idea that is largely represented in this edit reaches president roosevelts desk in late 1942 and in april of 1943 he says pretty simply it makes a lot of sense to me, good idea. And they are off and running and getting the formalities set up for the selection of officers dont really begin until the summer of 1943. And of course, sicily, the invasion of sicily has already happened. Thats the interesting explanation rather than the complicated version. The u. S. These monuments were assigned to work old monuments, fine arts and archives, and the archivist always felt like third class citizens compared to their fine arts and museum. But in any event, besides establishing these Monuments Men and the Roberts Commission, parallel activities were going on with the british, and part and parcel of this whole cultural protection program, and also in terms of the looting was intelligence gathering. You have to know whats actually happening. Much of this was accomplished by american diplomats and the officers basic Services Operatives in switzerland, turkey, sweden, spain and portugal as well as the dealings with the government in exile in london. And also gathering intelligence about what the 90s were doing in terms of the Cultural Property where individuals like rose played by Kate Blanchet in the movie. Robert, can you tell us a little bit about her . Die by way of thinking, she is one of the great heroines of world war ii and for all of you ladies in the audience that have put up with us dragging you to the world war ii movies, this is your film. You have a hero in this film and she is a remarkable woman and Kate Blanchet its hard to believe she could transform herself into appearing, but she does it quite successfully. Rose is a woman the french considered a custodian in the maledominated environment, but in our country we would have considered her a curator of the small museum which if any of you had been to paris and walked from the concorde to the lewd, you walked right past this building as was the kind of early stage Indoor Tennis Court in the 17th century, and it became the central headquarters for the operation in france and paris in particular, and it wass there bu that the tens of thouss of words stolen from the great collectors and fans and others so many of whom were also dealer families were brought in and they were often photographed in inventory to sign and this is a particularly evil or pernicious element of what they did they puwould assign inventory code to these works of art so rothschild is an example, the number next to it would be the number of items that they had stolen, andd ive seen in the tory numbers up almost 6,000, and even that is an understatement because any of the things the monuments officers found, which michael has done a great job in the 80s writing about a lot of this were jewelry chests that might have hundreds of objects that count as one, or tomas the monuments officer who was a director of the legion in San Francisco referred to a claim collection that was one object on the inventory that there were 10,0010,000. The germans know thr there to make sure the lights are working but she understands german and they dont know this and her boss whos who is a dir of the French Museum has placed her there with the responsibility of spying on the activities it is so shes making secret notes over a fouryear period and as they are each of the 20 times on the expeditions and that isnt being playful in the terms. They use these exhibits they set up with tapestries, furniture, stewart reference to things that were stolen if there was any value to it than not these stole it and these would be a symbol and there woul their wouldbe cd have a cigar with any of the 20 Michael Jackson outfits, whether it is the naval uniform or its just amazing the number of different photographs we have coming in and out and make selections of things knowing some of these things had to go to the collection and those that he wanted to have himself, and rose hit these notes in her address and sometimes they were written on the back of envelopes digging through trash cans looking for photographic negatives, manifests and over the course of the ford years, she knows largely the number that have come through and recognizes many of them because they are so famous, and she knows the location where many of them have been taken. A lot of times we hear about the secret diary. It not really a diary. It is an album that all of these different pieces of notes and scraps of paper have been taken to one document for People Like Us to go look at where they are all in one place. But at the end of the war in france in the liberation period of august, 44, she survives this. Shes very suspect by the people of france tha that shes survivt and shes considered a collaborator and she doesnt turn over the information, all of the information she has too her boss on his advice because there is so much collaboration and no one in france really knows who to trust and her loyalty is to the work of art, and she is encouraged to work with the officer named jim who is the curator of the museum and goes on to be the director after the war and they do this dance over a period of about six months of what i really referred to as kind of a dance of courtship not in the romantic sense, that trying to see if he can be trusted with this information. And there are two people of destiny each holding path of the same key. Rose is determined to find every single thing taken from her country and she persists with this until 1981 when she dies and never gives up on it. It becomes a pain in the side to the people in france but want the subject to go away but she is a woman in a mans world. She had no transportation. And on the other hand, jim wants to fulfill his destiny and do something great and realizes he can play a role in the work of art recovered in france but he has transportation hub as part of the Second Lieutenant in the army that he doesnt know where to go. So, this is the dynamic between the two of them back and forth. Her testing to see can you be trusted, will he return these things to france . It is a fascinating dynamic and story in the much bigger story, and i think it is one of the great parts of the film that Kate Blanchet really teased out of the story. You mentioned sicily. In 1943 of course the allies are in sicily and the main one in italy at this stage of the war there were very few monuments. They had some success and failure. And all of this is explained in roberts third book saving italy. Robert, could you briefly talk about some of the challenges, do they have transportation, do they have maps . It was a pathetic beginning. It was an army of one at the beginning. President roosevelt who realized this is a good idea also a dearth stood out they needed to buy time for the Selection Process to occur and the bureaucracy to overcome to get some of these guys over there. And on his orders, a man named mason in fact what we see the show of hands of people that either graduated from harvard or have been to a harvard commencement . You all know who he is because he read at the commencement at harvard every year the late 1920s until 1999 when he died with the exception of war years and he was a classics professor at harvard and he was selected by president roosevelt and flowing into theater they knew they were that far behind and he arrives in sicily three weeks after the American British led invasion. But he actually is flowed to algeria thinking he is good to be a monuments officer in africa when they tell him though you are only here briefly until we take you to sicily and he said i dont know anything about that area, and he didnt come about he gets there and there is no vehicle, there is no operation. I mean, they dont they are just winging it. But the thing is the monuments officer its all men at the beginning that are in combat and they are average age about 40yearsold and they have accomplished careers. Most have families and kids and they are used to these big jobs with no resources, so they didnt find it incredibly intimidating and they were pretty clever and resource will try to figure out how to do things and while the army didnt helhelp than they did and t. Muh attention to him either us or the extent they could come up with solutions, they were effective but at the beginning for the first five months the operation fell on its face over and over again to the point of general marshall wrote his protege general eisenhower in october of 43 and said you need to be very careful because people here are reading horrible newspaper accounts of damage in italy by asp, by the allies and proceed cautiously. General eisenhower at the offset didnt leave any special orders were necessary. He thought the n. And when men are part of the Civil Affairs division and they had a job to do and the military structure will work and people will Pay Attention to them but time and time again it wasnt working. They would post buildings out of bounds so british troops couldnt live in them and damage them and take things into the monument of Army Officers and troops just ignored them. So by the time of november and december, when the operations were clearly failing the general eisenhower choose in my view the face of war and issues a directive on december 29, 1943, albeit 6 months after the war in italy down. But it says that its the responsibility of all of the commanders and troops to respect the cultural treasure so much as the war a lousy and if it comes down to the lives of our name, the lives of the men killed more. However im often times it is used as an excuse of convenience, and that will not be tolerated. And this was the change in how the war was fought because the monuments officers never really got much more help than that. They didnt have vehicles and they were hitchhiking their way around the country making it up as they go. But the senior monuments officer in italy said it was the first solid ground under our feet and they could go out and see the military commanders and to show the directive and they had currency with them and we should say that the genital eisenhower and his commanding staff went to school on the mistakes they made and by the time of the normandy landings, that same order similarly worded is issued two weeks before the normandy landings. We are way behind schedule so i ask fo the colleagues to try o keep their answers short but once the allies landed in france in june of 1944 and they increased their bombings in germany, the germans began hiding their own Cultural Properties and the property that they looted. Primarily in southern germany. The monasteries, castles, bunkers and some germans at this point, especially in late 44 believed they would lose the war and the smartest thing to do is get all of this is to a safe haven outside of germany and the United States government initiated something called Operation Safe haven. Basically it would bring the intelligence gathering capability of the Treasury Department and state department that the Economic Administration to find out where these assets were going. In 1997 and 98, ambassador oversaw the production of the two government reports about the looting and Operation Safe haven, the monetary gold and victim gold. And these reports were quickly produced and were not well received in some places, so ambassador, can you tell us what prompted the Clinton Administration to want to have these reports produced and what was the outcome of the reports click here i done an enormous service in his book that i want to try to put it in an even broader context. And that is is a great job you do not only to the monument to the United States army. And the United States of america. Contrast this enormous effort to the Cultural Property to get it returned to its rightful owners. With the action of the soviet union coming from the east to berlin, and they were intent on doing just the opposite, stripping germany, stripping its museums of everything that they could. It was movable and taking it back to russia as the competition for the enormous losses. So here we are doing exactly the opposite of trying to preserve and get it back to its original owners when the soviets are trying to compensate themselves for their losses. With respect to the report, we had lawsuits being brought against the swiss banks and we began to realize there was a broad story then the amount put in the swiss banks by victims. And that story was how did the germans finance the effort for 12 years when the currency was not accepted as international currency. May he rest in peace was in the history and state department came to me and said we ought to look into this. We have an interagency study and more than that of the same agencies involved including the cia and others and we did a landmark study on what happened to the gold that was looted by the germans and went to switzerland got the private swiss bank account, but as the germans swept through europe they stole this from jews and primarily in larger amounts from the Central Banks of the governments that they occupied. And in order to get the hard currency to finance the war, they took that gold and gave it to the central bank of switzerland, which knew exactly what the real reserves of the bank were, they realized early this was in excess of the reserves the German Central Bank hit and they converted that into space which they used to finance the war effort and we disclosed this in the report. It caused of course an explosion in switzerland, and then we did a followup report for next year of that other neutral countries, portugal, spain pentagon. To that great credit, they ended up taking the report and if anything improving on it. They appointed professor to do their own report and it was a landmark examination and as a result of the report ar we endep getting 20 countries to setup sp their own commissions to look at their role during the war. We are really running behind at this point. I knew that everything will question what pa one day answer or one book and for. [laughter] so, lets skip over basically and you can read this in the book the whole movement in 1944 and 45 the greatest Treasure Hunt in history or you can see the condensed version in the movie. But it was dangerous and hard work and advance the officers were killed and the british nature these were scholars putting their lives on the line and in both cases they were killed actually trying to rescue the property that was in harms way. This Treasure Hunt came from all these different sources but as it was ending, there was a lot of questions who is involved in taking the loot and of the latter part of the war the Strategic Services created something called the Investigation Unit staffed by monument. Can you tell us about the Investigation Unit, what they did and what they produced . I will try to do it not in a day. Its really amazing how much is owed sometimes to a very small group. This is just ten individuals. Three of them were the principal investigators and historians. Professor at Williams College and james from the museum in harvard. And that their task was to try to identify where this network of assets was hit in on the cultural materials, art archives, libraries. So there was a lot of concern that this material would become for sale in the black market and finance the nazi resistance. So there was a lot of concern in 1944 and 45 that there would be but not the resistant in the defeat. And so, during the war in the counter agents the effort by the allies there were about 10,000 individuals that had been marked as people who were involved somehow in this aardvark at art market. From the spring of 1945 day go into germany and austria and they do basically two things. They do an enormous amount of research because the records as nancy mentioned were located, so they were looking at that and they were looking at the records that were found about a new munich and also the key individuals who were the players and i think these three were disappointed actually because after the war while rosenberg was held accountable, the second tier actually got away without any indictments, without any sentences, and they started the business again. But nonetheless, they were able to map out where all of this material was and they saved an enormous amount of time and saved the material from being looted by others and being lost. And they produced a detailed interrogation report, 12 individuals, and also special studies of the project and on the personal collection and also on rosenbergs organization. So this group, this small group of investigators did an enormously critical job of groundwork at the end of the war. [inaudible] opinion frequently to the collecting point. These were all operated by monument men with ms qualities of art trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. While i was writing my dissertation on the revolution, michael had the sense to write his own what happened to the policy and what were the policies and procedures for returning it. How to get it back to the rightful owners. There were 1300 repositories. They set up these operations. In the monument activity and the operations on the ground. And it is amazing that these officers were able to just created these spaces. Germany is devastated and they do not have a lot of support from the army. But using the collecting point of what needed to be rested to the plant, and in two weeks time either middle of june the whole thing is refurbished into the security is set up at their there is coal for heat. Many of the items came in and they had mostly art from the Prussian State Museum and maternal art. It was the site for the jewish material archives and other religious items and so forth. So, the innovation was actually critical to the ultimate restitution. Robert frequently reminds us that it was unfinished and as the ambassador and others will tell you, the mission is unfinished. One important activity in fulfilling the mission of the monument was the 1998 conference on the holocaust assets. This conference was called the washington principles, and each of you should have in your program a copy of these principles which were adopted in 1998 and then reaffirmed again in lithuania in 2,000 in 2,009. How above principles come about and how about various countries were going following them. Its really important to understand that there was a huge gap through no fault of the monument. The basic principle was that the art would be returned to the countries for which it was taken, rather than try to go through in an Impossible Task of finding to be individual owners. And so art was returned for example to france and many other countries. On the theory that they would set up their own claims processes to a louder claimants to recover their individual art and that didnt happen in part because much of the art was airless, they were all killed. But in part because they simply wanted to keep the art of themselves. To be in the Art Collection for example. And then a major activity occurred that added to this, the cold war. All of the attention of the allies that had as robert brilliantly has described, they focused on this collection and restitution was properly focused on the new soviet threat. And so, in the end of the war essentially until 1997, 1996, there was almost no attention to this issue. If there were a number of scholars and others and michael who wrote about this, there was a in 1995 that elevated the issue and then what brought it to the attention was the catalyst that no one would have expected. There was an exchange, a typical exchange that occurred with a museum in austria to the u. S. To the museum of modern art. And they had forgotten remarkably to go through the simple process of filling out the form for the state department that protects from being seized an and they didntd they were claimed by the holocaust family. And robert morgentha morgenthaua manhattan attorney, then a subpoena to the art, and it sent a shock wave through the American Museum community. And that resulted in the amd, the american associate of directors under pressure creating a series of guidelines for researching art, for publishing potentially do not see art and for establishing a process. And what we did is we came behind that and we internationalized it with our conference in december of 1998 with 44 countries. And we were able to get them to agree to a set of principles which was research to see suspect in the publish any that may be and establish mechanisms and claims processes and make sure that you shall processes based on decisions on the merits and not on the technical bits and. And there was a great burst of activity in the american community. The National Gallery nancy returned a piece of art which they found which was well done of the chicagat the chicago artd others. But then what happened after a terrific momentum creating a Search Engine so the claimants wouldnt have to go 100 different museums and the united date they could file one claim and it would go to all of the museums, so all of this was done. They established and still have fulltime employees who look for any suspect art and i would say in any given year a dozen were returned but heres what happened and its a shame is that momentum was lost. The leadership of the u. S. Showed really began to dissipate into the museums started to us for technical differences when the claims were made for example the statute of limitations. They even filed an injunction suit to prevent the claims before they were made. They said they did it after researching it themselves and determining that it wasnt but t there was no objective measure of that and then we ended up ironically having started this whole process falling behind and finding that the dutch, the germans, the austrians, the british establish their own commissions and they were functioning better than we. They incorporated the wall and returned a 250 paintings. For sure those conditions are muccommissions aremuch criticizt they exist. We do not have a commission. Partly it is because our museums accept the private museums and in europe they are public museums, but we can do as it was suggested that we set up for example Harvard Service with no u. S. Government money at all in that panel so that these disputes could be done without the technical defenses. I am sad to say that after the passage of 50 years of the event revived it through the washington principles that we have really fallen back, stagnated and we need to get back into fulfilling what the monument data. That would be the attribute to the monument is to get back to where we were then. What is the committee doing and can you make it short please . Ddmac i would respectfully disagree and i just thought we needed a commission in the United States and those that are set up in your car for a totally different category that were recovered after the war and were known to have some kind of issue and in the custody of those countries. The objects in the american collection are hereby happenstance and what the community has done since the conference, which the ambassador was so instrumental in is adopting these guidelines for the Research Publications that they are misleadingly simple guidelines into the research for it sample in the museum this specific research into the world war ii period using the records here at the National Archives are very complicated and different. Im proud to say the community has partnered with the archive many times over the past decade to do multiple training sessions for curators around the country on how to access the materials. We have done to Major Conferences and an International Conference in 2007 and then we did it two years ago in this very room on the remarkable resources. Coming up in june we have another partnership coming. We are trying to research our collections and we are open to anyone who has questions. And no American Museum i can say this forcefully wants to have anything on their wall that doesnt belong to them. The first is that the museums did raise technical offenses. And what of the decisions being made on the program and your own only attorney has suggested having a commission would be a good way of trying to get this out of the courts come out of litigation, getting the lawyers out. I have a few questions for robert and i will turn the question. This isnt a typical goal but wboy butwe will try it out. [laughter] did you actually enjoy doing the Research Writing was that your own Treasure Hunt . Yes. It wont come as a surprise to any of you all im very impatient, guilty as charged, but i like to see things happen, and yet this is the big when i am with one of these elderly veterans and it usually only takes me two or three questions and they know i care, they know that im deeply passionate about this, they will talk for hours and hours and hours and i will sit there and feel like i have the greatest job in the world having the chance to listen to what their experience is, so often times never shared with anybody else and ive had a similar in many cases with spouses of the week the deceased officers, some of the officers we found one particular case a woman got married and we had no idea what her name was, so we didnt know how to find her. It is a process that has allowed us to tell the story in a way that i dont think its been told and i think this is part of why its resonating with you all which is your sitting here talking about works of art and this is important and when we see works of art, library books, jewelry, tapestry, stainedglass paintings, theres a whole spectrum of the arts. Really it is the people story. Why did these men and women who had wife made risk their lives to walk away from established careers and risk their lives in combat to do something that wasnt necessarily going to fit the United States but benefit civilization . We havent seen anybody do that in the war before. That is the change that weve never done anything like that since some top to bottom. Weve had cultural preservation officers very important to point out in the nose. Today who have the best of intentions, but what we had in world war ii that made it work was leaders doing what only theaters can do and that is leading. President roosevelt decided this is an important idea and endorsed it, general eisenhower issued orders that and how were these men and women to go do their job very yet we havent had any leaders do that since world war ii on a public basis about respecting the cultural treasure and thats what we need to have happened today. So i submit i agree with the things stewart said and nancy said. The museums can become easy scapegoats, and i spoke to the association of directors earlier this year and i made the comment to them it is not okay to have a 40 or 50 million is the on budget and in the poverty not being able to afford the researchers. You cant do that. On the other hand, its easy to pick on the museums as a why havent you done this and why havent you done it faster. The work is complicated and they are not millions of researchers out there floating around, and this issue are questions that we are going to have to debate today. Its more complicated when you go to europe and have the statute of limitations in various countries that are going to need to be revisited, but i would submit that the best place to adjudicate this isnt the most powerful in the world and that is the court of Public Opinion. And i cannot enlist the Public Opinion unless you all know the story and its been my efforts to try to tow the story im not a trained historian or write her or anything. I just have been passionate about this 15 or 16 years now. I have the chance to love these men and women as i have by knowing their story and by knowing what they did and why is so important to the treasury we have today and why these efforts to honor them with congressional gold medal, which is before the house and the senate today. And the work of the Monument Foundation with our tollfree number 1866 wwiiart. If you have a veteran that brought something home as a souvenir, i dont care how it got back, come forward. No one has had a chance to do it like this. [ applause ] we can spend day masterpieces talking about the past, present and future of the topic. But i would like to thank the panelist for coming out. And i would like to thank your boss for this presence and his interest in the record masterpieces of the Monuments Men. We are lucky to have a boss who has an interest in the subject we do. I can direct you to micropho were there people who were there and was that brought out to the world . The work was critical and garing was interrogated while he was there. So a lot of documents that were entered in the evidence as it related to the art theft and so forth came prom the work of the unit. It came from their research as they went through the german files and located documents and had them verified by various interrogations they did. They brought nazis to give testimony as well. What was the most effective was taking the photographic albums and showing them what they took and put them in front of the eight judges. There is file footage of that from the National Archives you can watch. It is all online. Do we have current Monuments Men for the wars that have gone on like iraq and afghanistan . We do. We have wellintended people that have advised the state and Defense Department and they did so prior to the invasion in iraq in 2003. For a variety of reasons, and the principle one being the other half of this dyad that that has to work and in our country, it is the ceo, the president of the United States, and i say this apolytapolyticald there was a woman that said it isnt enough we be with virtue, but we must appear so as well. So we didnt have Monuments Men officers there because the priorty of protecting nation treasures was there. We didnt protect the interNational Archives in iraq or the National Libraries which these nut jobs were trying to destroy, flood, damage and that becomes the american armys problem. I think what we have to have to today is we need to be training people and we are doing that. People are doing a tremendous jobs. But in the absence of the president of the United States restating that the United States will respect the culture treasure of the other countries. If it comes down to the men and women, the lives of them will account for more. The best efforts work their way up and stall and fail at some point in time. We had people in 2004 going over there to fix the problems and they did a terrific job. What does everybody remember from it . What we did in 2003, but 2004 because First Impressions matters. If we can make voters know about this, i dare say a political leader is going into combat again and not say do we have Monuments Men officers i was out of office. When he bombed there Defense Ministry in baghdad, when we did that, the pipes burst. When our troops came in, they found jewish treasures going back hundreds and hundreds of years, and they called me and said given your experience, what should we do with it. I said get it out of the water, get it to the National Archives where it can be cureerating curator this jewish property looted from the Jewish Community. There is a congressional interest in this now. So what robert exposed is a Current Issue very much. I would like to point out that my wife and dorris hamburg went over there to help bring stuff back and overseen it ever sense. My wifes mother called and said do you think she is safe over there . And i would say compared to the belt way, she is probably safer there than here. Yes, maam . Germany is considering changing their 30 year stature in light of the man with the art from the father. It looks like he maybe able to keep it. But do you think 69 years after the war, there is going to be a way for countries to end those statues of limitation. That is a great question. The amount of loots nazi art in the United States is minimal. The greater amounts are in europe, in germany and in particular russia which has the greatest treasuretrove of art. They passed law saying they are going to keep the art, but we are willing to return the art the red army took and in turn which was taken by the nazis from jews. They are never implemented that. The real focus should be on europe. The girl at case is an incredible case. A guy goes from switzerland to munich and asked if he has anything to declare. 9500 euros in cash and he said i sold a piece of art. He looked in the apartment and there are 1200 pierces of art ad lots was nazilooted art. The guy sold and didnt report it. We intervened, we the state department, based on the washington principles and on what robert and michael did and nancy did and we said this isnt a tax evasion case. Look at the washington principles and publish the art. There is great credit because 450 people have been published on the internet so claims could be made. But then the issue is the statue of limitations. I cannot guarantee this is going to happen. But we urged that technical defenses not be used. That is why i feel the museum should set that example. And they are considering creating a new wave that would wave the statue of limitations as to the art in that department. Whether they do it or not remains to be seen. But they have indicated they are looking at it. It would be a wonderful thing. This story never ends. Let me say about this, i hate to predict the future, it is perilous thing to do, but i believe we will see changes and i believe it is because the court of Public Opinion is going to know what the heck everybody is talking about. It has been stuck with legislators and lawyers debating this and using fancy terms and the general public doesnt know what they are talking about. This case hits the front page of the papers and there is a billion and half euros assigned to this value. No one has seen the work, no one has a lust list of the art, but im happy because everyone in the world is paying attention. Is it worth hundreds of millions . Probably. This is a complicated case and i think people around the world are governed by law and for the most part, people think no passage of time makes it okay to keep something, including german museums, if it was stolen and we can identify who it belongs to. If we can massage this process by making sure legislators in germany and when we were at the berlin film festival, we were there for 30 minutes and we were their favorite people, if they realized the voting public understands the story. It isnt just a big discovery, but the whole theft unfolding. If you get google alerts, there is discoveries in the paper like this every day. They are all the same story. 80yearold guy, tax evasion and etc. The film reachess an audience in the way no one can tell us. Are their there adjustments . Yes. But it is bringing attention to the nazi germany and the museum built to discuss it but that same transparency isnt evident in how the countrys approached discussing the works of art. If the public that goes to the museums and electric elects th politicians goes to the movies, and the politicians go to the movies. And people of good will feel it isnt going to keep things because the passage of time, we will see the laws change. The girls father was an offense of the german and given art by gravals to take to switzerland and get hard currency and return it. He obviously kept some for himself. After the war, he convinced the allies he was a victim of the nazi and not nazi by himself. He allows the jews to get out by selling art, probably at discounted price. And this is his son. He kept them in a dusty room in munich with trash around. Five people to ask questions and four minutes we have discussed europe with a similar action to preserve art in asia. There are Monuments Men officers in Southeast Asia but 56. And 56 in japan but they can not get there until after the war is over. So it is a different operation. Whereas the americanbritish effort in western europe is about trying to preserve works of art and effect temporary repairs. In japan, that effort has to be skipped as the results of the bombs i want to raise the question of providence with regard to berlin, specifically the art museum, it is eerie to go through room after room and thousands of works of art and no providence and it is just artist title. You dont know impression state or anything. And that is the principle art hi histo historic theme. Comments . France had looted jewish art they made minimal efforts to locate the owners. But to their credit, what they did with their art is they sanded and it was a question of whether the Jewish Community should claim the art and have a museum of their own and they said no, it belongs to the french state if there is no error. What we want and what they got was the history. Someone who sees that a hundred years from now will see and say what is that about. Even when art is airless art it is important to identify where it came from. To their credit, the germans have a wonderful process. There are 40,000 socalled ri risers outside of apartments where the jews were killed and it is about an inch above the sidewalk. And you have to look down. It is all over the blecountry. It is way of seeing a jewish family was expelled from here and a way of teaching lessons for the future. There are websites wiobjects with missing information and there is information on the published form in the internet or books. I really hate to cut off the questioning at this point well, how much time do we have . Ten minutes oh great yes, maam. This is for mr. Edsel, i notice in the books you very mention the monuments women and i was wondering why you have not told their story as well as the men. [laughter] i havent been busy enough. The women play an important role. During these times, women were not in combat. So the effort of the women plays a role more behind had scenes helping assemble maps and early intelligence work by important curators. They play and their story comes into focus at the conclusion of the war with the integral war they play at the collecting points helping get them set up and the sorting process for the retrobution. And my books tell the story from the idea and in the case of saving italy discussing history back ground of the officers going back at a the world war i up until the end of 1945. The answer not yet. But i am not unaware of it. It is on my list to to. My colleague will have a playing on a monuments women. There were 14 of them. We found one of them in 2009. My labor day was spent at a va hospital interviewing a remarkable bronze star recipient we met. We had a great experience with her. Hers was a story you will have a chance to know about in the time ahead a member of the audience raised the point about why there are Monuments Men now and they are in the special civil army affairs group. There was plan to save the artifacts but ms. Wagoner was only part of the special team. And there were other efforts to save the treasure in the city of iraq in the city stinking of sewage. They moved to save the treasures of modern iraq as well. The ambassador might like to know there was ceramic artifacts. The army was still interested in preserving the actifacts wherever we go. It would be one thing if the iraq government had shown interest in saving the a actifacts. I want to point out if everyone feels like they are sitting on a gold mine tonight. They really are. I am steve cats, and in 1985, two elderly jewish gentlemen came into the sydney yate office and told the sore story of germany having artifacts. I was a young staffer. He sent me over to what was the collection in suit land but if it were not for the fine work of the archives we would never have forced the austrians into the plan. In austria we had to get the laws recreated. The list were frightening in terms of the pressure it took. We had a jewish ambassador in viav vienna. We need champions. But for the National Archives, they couldnt make their case. We have the blue prints for the lens of hitler. For his birthday hitler would produce four color brochures about his favorites looted art and send it to the frontline of the troops. I want to ask how the archives got all of the stuff. Sfwl it is due to the National Archives we know this. Back in the late 99s, you asked me for a report you were producing how many pages of material do you have. And i said ten million . Sounds like a good number. But i think i under estimated probably as we uncover more and more material that was created and rcs from our enemies. Yes, maam . Oh, you want to respond so . The National Archives are the receiver of the records from the army. We microfilmed all of the records to preserve them. And then we sent the microfilm to germany. We have all of the records of the United States army as it relates to all of the functions of combat and post war operations. When i started the research in 1979, there was no google or greg finding aid. And so now i would like to mention the United States National Archives following up on what they are trying to achieve with the washington principal principles has created a portal for nazis era property. It is treasure mine. If you need to as a Family Member trying to trace a work of art, you will be able to study what is available online. If you are doing research or a historian and due to the work of the National Archives, there are 19 other institutions in europe that participate in this. You can do a great deal of research that would have been impossible prior to 510 years ago. Two of the best things about being a citizen in this country passport and the right to go to the National Archives and see these documents and photographs. It is great privilege of seeing the labor of people that assembled this and made it available. I think i will let Closing Remarks be made and then we will adjourn to where robert is signing the books. Susan, perhaps you can address one of us afterwards. I can say on a personal note that we should all be very proud to be americans because what the National Archives has as a great resource, what robert disclosed about the Monuments Men, what it demonstrates about the determination of the United States army, which in 43 the war was hardly won. Normandy had not occurred even. And general takes it upon himself to issue this directive. These men and women risk their lives because they think the prove nonce of art is important. It is that spirit we need get back to to continue the momen m momentum. I would say one wished half of the effort was put into the saving the jews of europe we might not have had the output. But that should not detract from this story. Only the United States of america could have taken this upon itself in the midst of the war. It is great tribute to the country, to the archives and to robert for having brought this to us. [ applause ] well, thank you for coming, and we will see you outside. [ applause ] [inaudible discussions taking place] robert edsel is the author of the the momuments men and he sat down for