Pencil sketch of a Nazi by Dr K Prabhakar Rao

KNITTEL GUSTAV

He was a SS waffen officer in the armored formation that took part in battle of bulge in the final stages of WW II.it was a decisive battle most fiercely fought . Jochim Peiper , SS lt Col was the commanding officer of the Waffen regiment that formed the leading formation of the panzer corps. At Malmedy during the battle , Eighty US soldiers who Surrendered from a artillery reconnaissance battalion were gunned down by Peipers unit While few escaped.There has been some confusion about the incident. It was claimed that the prisoners tried to escape and fired from their dropped guns and waffen SS soldiers had to retaliate. After the war , the allies arrested the members of the unit and they were tried for war crimes at Dachau camp  by US military tribunal and he was one of the accused in a group of 74 members and he was given  death  sentence that later reduced to  15 years prison sentence . This trial created great stir and Amercian justice was blamed and highest courts of USA were involved apart from International Court on the way this trial was conducted. All death sentences were reduced to life term and few year prison terms and defendants were released by 1956.His trial no was 31