The Butcher’s Company

Did Klaus Barbie receive the defense he deserved? Before his trial in Lyon last summer for war crimes fades entirely into history, the question ought to be posed.

One imagines that the cynical old Nazi was aware that his acquittal was unlikely from the start. He even declined attendance at the proceedings; what right had French courts to try such a man as he? But surely the ex-SS chief must have enjoyed the attempt by his lawyers to shift attention from his deeds to the violence of col...