24. American Officials Saved This Evil Doctor From Paying For His Crimes
Dr. Schieber’s American friend, Brigadier General Charles Loucks, was a repellent figure in his own right. He was drawn to Scheiber not despite his Nazi connections, but precisely because of those connections. Especially because Schieber had been close to SS chief Heinrich Himmler. Luckily for Schieber, while the US Army might have been repelled by him, US intelligence was not. Loucks was given covert funds to hire Schieber to work for the US Army’s Chemical Corps for scientific research purposes. He did that for 10 years, and was instrumental in helping develop America’s sarin gas capability.
What was fortunate for Schieber was unfortunate for justice. Because he was useful to the US, he was shielded from accountability for his wartime misdeeds, and was never prosecuted for his war crimes. As a 1947 official memo stated: “Dr. Scheiber’s talents are of so important a nature to the US that they go far to override any consideration of his political background“. In addition to his work for the Army’s Chemical Corps, Scheiber became a CIA asset for the remainder of his life.