We're drifting , but drifting into interesting areas.

I see from this article about that case that "there have been an estimated 100,000 Germans assuming false identities in the immediate aftermath of the war".

And the question asked in this article is not all that simple. "Once a criminal, always a criminal? Or should we allow people to return to the democratic process who forsake the path of violence and advocacy of a bloody ideology? Can we take such people seriously, or will their conversion always remain tainted with what they did in the past?"

I have in mind the catastrophic consequences in Iraq of the occupation authorities to impose a total purge on Baathists, and on all Baathist officialdom, civil and military.