History records that the extermination of the Jews was stopped six months before the war was over, when Reichsfuehrer Himmler, realizing all was lost and contemplating his own survival, ordered the killing machines dismantled. In our conceit of what might have been, not only the Holocaust but perhaps the war itself would have ended sooner. Such an outcome would undoubtedly have rippled through the rest of history, changing it day by day, we dare not ask to what – the Ambrosian murkiness of history’s outer space being the price of admission to our game.
Snippets
Short quotes, captions, and sidebars extracted from the old site.
The further out one moves from the single event, historian Stephen Ambrose wrote in his essay in the first volume of the What If series, “things get extremely murky, as they always do in what-if history…” But, like Professor Ambrose, that shouldn't keep us from taking one last look in our clouding crystal ball.
In end, true, one must speak of a holocaust, but the Final Solution has failed. We will not be too far from truth if we adopt an estimate that of the six million Jews it would have claimed and the five million non-Jews – Gypsies, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Russian prisoners of war and political, homosexual and other declared pariahs – who would die with them, as much as ninety percent have survived.
Testimony before the Vatican secret tribunal examining the case for Pius’s sainthood provides a vivid account of the first of these two crises. It was given by Mother Pasqualina, the German nun who played a major role in Pius’s life both before and during his papacy.
Rather more information is extant, for example, about the two known crisis-moments in which it appeared that Pius XII, taking pen in hand, would in fact speak out, only to revert to silence in the end. If ever public protest would have made a significant difference in the outcome of events, its greatest impact would have probably been felt in either of those two situations.
hat if, in the darkest days of World War II, the Vicar of Christ had raised his voice against the perpetrators of the horror of horrors of this or any other age?
Could the wartime pope have prevented the Final Solution?
The following essay by Robert Katz first appeared in the popular anthology What If? 2: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been, edited by Robert Cowley. The second in a best-selling series, the book, published in 2001, is collection of 25 essays on what has come to be called counterfactual history. The Time magazine review summed it up: "Counterfactual supposes, would-haves, could-haves, might-haves, could-haves, possiblys, perhapses, probablys, and maybes, in all their dizzying permutations."
Second Sabbath: The Journey Ends Saturday, Oct. 23, 1943, exactly one week after the roundup of The Jews of Rome, the 1,000 deportees reach their destination: Auschwitz. By nightfall nearly all have been turned to ashes lying on a river bed and smoke wafting in the sky. more >>>
Pope Pius XII Protests... an Essay in What Might Have Been The decades-long "great debate" over the papal Silence in the face of the Holocaust goes on, each side more certain of its cause than ever. Yet Pius himself had painful doubts, strongest, it seems, in two agonizing moments of the war when what might have been, almost was. Read Robert Katz's counterfactual essay from the international bestselling anthology series What If? more >>>
C'era una volta l'America... a Roma liberata L ’esercito che aveva sganciato migliaia di bombe su Roma era stato bombardato da tutti i fiori di primavera, salutato da due milioni di persone, La gratitudine dei romani sarà eterna, ma per quell 'America. Per l'altra America, quella del presidente Bush ospitato a Roma sessant'anni dopo, ci sono perplessità... vai >>>
Diario di un viaggiatore . . . osservazioni di un mondo rurale destinato a morire sotto il giogo ancora senzo nome ma che si chiamerà "globalizzazione". Resto per un quarto secolo nell'A.R.K. virtualmente inedito, il Diario riemerge oggi come una vera e propria time-capsule in quanto è un oggetto che rappresenta una cultura ormai sparita. vai >>>
The Complete Death in Rome Updates, 1994-2004 Adding the 3rd and most recent update to the two posted earlier this year, completes the set of English-language originals. Until now they had been published only in translation, respectively, in the 1994, 1996 and 2004 Italian editions of Death in Rome . The English originals are currently available only on TheBoot. more >>>
The Death of a Statesman: Aldo Moro and the Unspoken Terrorism On May 9, 1978, five-time Prime Minister of Italy Aldo Moro, after 54 days in the hands of the Red Brigades, was slain. The government declared war against terrorism - and won. But the lessons of history in this case may be too chilling for words. more >>>
. Gli anni dell'ira: il caso Moro e il terrorismo nascosto Il 9 maggio di ventisei anni fa venne ucciso dalle Brigate Rosse Aldo Moro. Erano gli anni di piombo, un epoca passata alla storia, ma oggi tornata attuale per il terrorismo internazionale. Cercando le lezioni di storia presentiamo un brano del libro di Robert Katz, I giorni dell'ira.. vai >>>
The Talented Doktor Dollmann Sometimes a mere shadow, sometimes an audacious commander, he was always a chronicler, storing in his mind the stuff of tales for tomorrow. He had the uncanny talent of being everywhere in Nazidom whenever history was being made
#1 The Shady Deals of God's Banker What the Vatican bank was doing with such a dizzying sum of money, was a secret only Roberto Calvi knew, and he had told his lawyers, "If the whole thing comes out, it'll be enough to start the Third World War."
I giorni del complotto: Il caso Moro e l'Americano che venne dal freddo Nella Roma del 1994 si di lui, l’uomo dietro il complotto, l’uomo dei misteri. Si chiamava Dr. Pieczenik — al tempo del sequestro Moro mandato da Washington per motivi mai chiarite e il silenzio di Pieczenik è rimasto impenetrabile. Ora però al Viminale spuntano fuori documenti orrendi, scritti con l’arroganza di chi gode un potere illimitato.porta il nome dell’autore, lo stesso Dr. Pieczenik ...
The Man Who Killed Aldo Moro Aldo Moro's political allies let him die. Why? The question asked by The New York Times a decade ago still seeks an answer.
The Unquiet American When Rome’s massive nationwide manhunt failed to rescue Aldo Moro, the search began for an imagined mastermind. By 1994, the conspiracy scenarists were sure they had their man, snared in his own diabolical web. If he seemed a character straight from the Tom Clancy school of international thrillers, that was because he was –and thus wise to the ways of their game.
Kirkus Reviews: In the best tradition of Harrison Salisbury and Cornelius Ryan, novelist/historian Katz ( Days of Wrath , etc.) captures a tumultuous nine months in Rome's long history, with plenty of circumstantial detail and incidents having many actors... Katz's account of the tangled politics that accompanied [the Allied campaign to liberate Rome] is one of the best parts of an already strong, swiftly moving narrative. An episodic reconstruction, complete with a dazzling dramatis personae, of Rome under the Nazi occupation and the Allied drive to free it."
Library Journal : Using recently released OSS records, Katz ( Death in Rome ) has produced a riveting account of the struggle for Rome in 1943-44. Katz examines the actions of the Germans, Allies, partisans, and the Vatican and highlights the internal struggles within each. He reveals a Pope Pius XII driven by two overriding fears: of communism and that Rome would be destroyed. These fears would undermine his own considerable moral authority with his silence and led to near collaboration with the Germans. The vanity and animosity among the Allied leaders is stunning ... an excellent work providing a rare look inside the Italian resistance movement. Recommended for all libraries.
Read the complete review by military historian Carlo D'Este in The New York Times Book Review >>>
Read The Battle for Rome excerpt on the First-Chapter feature of The New York Times On the Web >>>
Booklist : Based overwhelmingly on U.S. intelligence files, Katz's history navigates the elaborate Roman underground of spies and counteragents, and even unearths a few surprises… This is challenging research presented fluidly, and Katz's fascination with a key moment for a fascinating city shines through.
Fort Worth Star-Telegram : This detailed, almost day-to-day history of the six months when Rome was teetering between fascism and liberation turns out to be a gripping account that will satisfy anyone remotely interested in World War II. …While it might seem that a book this detailed would interest only professional historians, the gripping piece of world history should delight anyone with even a casual interest in the subject matter.
Commonweal: Katz is a gifted reporter and something of a brilliant sleuth. … Although there have been many books on the period, he has unearthed important new material. … and has land[ed] extraordinary interviews.
The New Republic: Robert Katz's very fine book...is rich in dramatic accounts and challenging analyses. Written with great journalistic verve, Katz's book is also remarkably well documented....[W]hat is needed...is an attempt to create a new international law for the more efficient regulation of this type of horrible warfare. Robert Katz's book provides fine arguments for this necessary debate.
Chicago Tribune : Important revelations … in a timely book. [Robert] Katz, who has lived in Italy for years, has made use of recently released wartime archives and has reinterviewed some of his old sources to put together an account of the 270-day German occupation that is dramatic, revealing and in many instances disturbing. … Katz’s evidence that the pope was forewarned of German atrocities will reignite a long-running controversy. … a compelling narrative that combines tales of heroism, treachery, cowardice and appalling brutality.
New Statesman: A fascinating blow-by-blow account of the battle for the city between daring leftist partisans, grand but brave Italian monarchists and a whole cast of German occupiers, some appalling thugs and bigots, others sensitive men seeking out the shades of gray in a black-and-white situation. Katz brings the daily grind of the occupation vividly alive … Katz has the novelist's gift for narrative… this is popular history at its best.
The Sunday Times of London: [A] moving account of Rome under Nazi occupation ... meticulous scholarship.
More Reviews and Praise... for the Battle for Rome
di Sgt. JACK RAYMOND (Stars and Stripes Staff Writer)
La folla festante si allineava in ogni transito. …
Gli inevitabili bambini saltavano su a chiedere le caramelle. Le ragazze baciavano ogni soldato su cui potevano mettere le mani e una biondina è riuscita a salire sulla torretta di un piccolo carro armato.
Due isolati più avanti il primo carro armato, comandato dal tenente Henry Schoberth (Versailles, Kentucky), era una montagna di braccia, gambe e corpi umani. Bambini e vecchi (perfino una signora anziana, di almeno sessantacinque anni) si arrampicavano a bordo, dimentichi del pericolo dei cingoli in movimento [...]
Erano le 19.30. Una donna ha detto in inglese, ad alta voce, che ci stava aspettando dalla mattina. Un soldato ha risposto: "Abbiamo aspettato di più noi".
I carri armati che hanno resistito all'artiglieria nemica, i Mark VI e i cannoni semoventi sono stati obbligati ad arrestarsi sulla via Appia per tema di mettere in pericolo la vita dei civili che berciavano attorno, urlando, gridando, piangendo, ridendo in un delirio di eccitazione.
ROMA, 4 giugno - Le potenti colonne blindate dell'ultima divisione corazzata, che per tutto il giorno hanno calcato la Statale 7 e sbaragliato ogni tentativo dei crucchi di ritardare la nostra avanzata, sono state infine fermate per le strade di Roma dalla popolazione pazza di gioia.
UNA POPOL AZIONE PAZZA DI GIOIA ACCOGLIE LA V ARMATA AMERICANA
He told Wachsberger to inform the others that as medical director of the camp he was now going to choose those who in his judgment were physically fit for work. He sat on the table. All of the Jews were to approach him, he said, and he would divide them into two groups, one of which was to mount the trucks and the other to remain standing on the railroad tracks, women apart from the men.
At this point, Dr. Mengele, a dapper, handsome, young SS lieutenant of thirty-three, waved Wachsberger to his side. Mengele had a gentle manner and a quiet poise that almost always lay in a delicate balance between the edge of smugness and the height of charm. He liked to whistle Wagnerian airs and did so incessantly.
While the Jews of Rome were assembling beside the train, Camp Commandant Höss and Dr. Mengele arrived with several SS officers. One of them asked of the escort that had accompanied the group who could act as an interpreter. Wachsberger was brought forward. As had been done at the Collegio Militare exactly one week ago, he was instructed to get up on a table and transmit the German commands. When the group saw him, they understood that they were about to be addressed. They fell silent and listened attentively. Wachsberger was to recall that moment as follows:
Some of the Roman Jews stared at their coreligionists from other lands. To the Italians it seemed they were incredibly thin, their eyes empty and unseeing. Wachsberger tried to speak with them in German, French, Yiddish, and even the Hungarian he had learned from his mother. But they neither replied nor gave any sign of recognition. At last, one of them, a French Jew, mumbled quickly, “If they ask how old you are, tell them that you’re under thirty.” Wachsberger wondered what he meant.
There were Germans everywhere shouting and gesturing confusedly. Men in striped uniforms moved silently though the growing mass of people. They began to remove the luggage, the garbage, and the dead from the open cars. Sewn to their shabby uniforms were two triangular pieces of cloth that formed the hexagram Star of David. To this was attached a letter indicating their nationality and a number of up to six digits.
Day had not yet fully broken, but the platform upon which the Roman Jews descended was brilliantly illuminated. Huge reflectors drove out every shadow. The bewildered prisoners squinted at the brightness and stumbled onto what appeared as a set where a film was being made.
" Alle aussteigen! " the guards began to demand repeatedly, and while the words were not understood, it was clear enough that they were orders to detrain.
USCHWITZ BEGAN TO stir. Passengers inside the waiting train could hear a great deal of activity outside, and before long the cars were being opened.
"After such an act of barbarity against that tiny harmless human being," her father would later say, "I finally understood that we had arrived on the threshold of hell."
Sometime near dawn, he awoke. Reclining on the floor of the car, he could look through a crack in the wall. He could make out the contours of a building. High flying balloons were attached to it. They swayed at the end of long wires and served as a protection against strafing from enemy aircraft. His little daughter awoke, too. He lifted her to the window of the car in order to point out the balloons in the lightening morning sky. Outside an SS man saw the child. He suddenly bent to the ground, picked up a large rock, and threw it directly into her face. The girl drew back, frightened but unharmed, as the missile crashed against the bars of the window and dropped.
The passengers, however, were unaware that they had reached their destination, although many guessed as much. From their windows they could see the bright lighting that flooded the camp each night, a spectacular squandering of electricity that could be observed a great distances. The sky itself was lighted with a reddish glow, and they could smell a faint, strangely sweetish odor, as if something unfamiliar were burning. Many of the passengers were asleep.
ROUND 11:00 P.M. the train stopped. Though the passengers were not informed, it was standing at the front door of Auschwitz-II, the extermination camp, Birkenau. The transport had arrived too late to enter the camp this day. Except for the distant sound of barking dogs, and the chug of an occasional passing train, Auschwitz was silent. The Jews of Rome wold have to wait until the morning to enter.
Finalmente vedevo lesercito tedesco, sconfitto, che si ritirava. Cerano camion e vagoni talmente carichi che i soldati si addossavano a grappoli; carri con soldati, militi a cavallo, veicoli agricoli stipati di uomini stanchi morti. Poi cerano i soldati a cavallo dei buoi e infine la fila infinita di quelli a piedi. Avevano la faccia spenta dalla fatica, gli occhi fuori dalle orbite, le bocche spalancate, zoppicavano a piedi nudi, trascinandosi i fucili. Ricordo lo stesso esercito quando entrò in Francia: sprezzante, onnipotente, calpestava i deboli. Ricordo di essere stata gettata in un fosso da loro. Adesso vedevo la loro sconfitta. Strinsi le labbra.
De Wyss osò per la prima volta tirar fuori la sua macchina fotografica e scattò alcune foto:
Elsa Morante avrebbe scritto di una fila interminabile di camion da piazza Venezia a via del Corso: Una processione sterminata di camioni stracarichi di soldati germani, tutti neri di fuliggine e sporchi di sangue. La gente li guardava e non diceva niente. Loro non guardavano nessuno.
I soldati si ritirano con ordine, ma appaiono stanchi e avviliti [...] Hanno requisito tutti i mezzi possibili: automobili private, carrozzelle da piazza con il vetturino, perfino carri con i buoi. Una sequenza interminabile. Alcuni marciano con lo zaino tremendamente affardellato, armi in mano. La popolazione guarda e non dice nulla. Qualche ragazzo offre da bere. Soldati che si sono battuti valorosamente per nove mesi a sud di Roma in condizioni di inferiorità [...] passano segnati dalla tremenda lotta. Quanti di essi credono ancora nella promessa hitleriana del Reich millenario?
In Vaticano, monsignor Giovannetti non perdeva docchio quel che succedeva fuori:
Gli unni si stanno ritirando!, registrò la giornalista svizzera de Wyss con entusiasmo poco giornalistico. Gli unni stanno lasciando la città! Aveva ascoltato un servizio radiofonico alleato in cui si diceva che erano state sfondate le linee tedesche sui Colli albani e che si era aperta la strada per Roma. Corsi di sopra, sul terrazzo, da cui, con il binocolo, godevo di una vista eccellente. Non cè dubbio, si stanno ritirando! Il mio cuore batte. Finalmente se ne vanno! Si stanno ritirando!
Elefante! Il nome in codice per il primo giorno della liberazione era stato diffuso da Radio Londra il 2, ma ora era il 4 giugno, duecentosettantesimo giorno di occupazione. Dalle prime ore di quella domenica, il 4, fino allaurora, Carlo Trabucco, che non riusciva a dormire a causa dei rumori e dellagitazione, osservava alla luce della luna piena migliaia di automezzi tedeschi convergere e allinearsi verso ponte Milvio per attraversare il Tevere. Proseguirono per la Cassia e la Flaminia, le vie consolari che avevano guidato gli antichi romani verso i trionfi nelle terre in cui non vedevano lora di tornare questi soldati, magari sconfitti.
Weizsäcker, per nulla turbato dalla reprimenda papale, si attenne al copione e disse che non cera fretta: Kesselring era calmo, impassibile. Quando lambasciatore lasciò il Vaticano era quasi mezzanotte. Nello stesso momento, come notò monsignor Giovannetti nel suo resoconto dellincontro, vicino a piazza San Pietro, alla confluenza con via della Conciliazione, i carri armati tedeschi rimbombavano sul selciato, ulteriore violazione della città smilitarizzata. Ma, per la prima volta in tutti quei mesi di traffico verso il fronte, cera una differenza: andavano in direzione opposta.
Come tutti, Clark non sapeva se i tedeschi si sarebbero ritirati senza combattere Non so se i crucchi si difenderanno, scrisse nel telegramma ai suoi uomini che si preparavano allassalto finale. A Roma, consigliamo caldamente di non danneggiare la proprietà pubblica e privata. In città, il fuoco dipende dai crucchi. In caso di opposizione, i comandanti superiori e quelli dei battaglioni hanno la facoltà di schiacciarla con il fuoco e con il movimento.
I romani, che avevano saputo del furore hitleriano, credevano a ciò che vedevano e udivano, i boati che facevano tremare le finestre e lampeggiavano nel cielo limpido, o i lontani fuochi che già circondavano la città. I tedeschi intendevano resistere a oltranza correvano le voci citate da Elsa Morante, e comunque prima farebbero saltare tutte quelle famose mine; e pure il papa si preparava a fuggire con la flotta vaticana su un aereo blindato, verso lignoto.
oma sarebbe bruciata? E sarebbe crollato il Colosseo, avverando così lantica profezia: Quando cadrà il Colosseo, cadrà Roma / E quando cadrà Roma, finirà il mondo? Pochi credevano che Hitler avrebbe perdonato la capitale della nazione traditrice, che si era ripromesso di punire, ma certo non mentre la propria capitale stava bruciando e crollando, bombardata quasi ogni notte dalle forze aeree nemiche.
C'era una volta l'America... a Roma liberata le forze americane che avevano bombardato i romani furono loro stesse bombardate dai fiori dei romani liberati
The soldiers were retreating orderly [he would later recall], but they looked spent and humiliated. They had requisitioned anything with wheels, private cars, horse-drawn taxis, even oxcarts with the oxen. It was an interminable procession. Some were marching with huge, overstuffed backpacks, carrying their weapons in their hands. The people stood by and watched them, saying nothing. A few boys offered them something to drink. Soldiers who for nine months had fought with valor against a superior enemy passing by, showing all the signs of a terrible battle. How many of them still believe in the promise of Hitler's Thousand-Year Reich?18
In the Vatican, Monsignor Giovannetti kept an eye trained on what was unfolding outside.
"The Huns are retreating!" Swiss journalist de Wyss recorded with unjournalistic elation. "The Huns are leaving the city!" She had heard an Allied Radio report that the German lines in the Alban Hills had been breached and that the road to Rome was open. "I ran upstairs to the terrace, from which, with binoculars, I had an excellent view. There is no doubt. They are retreating! My heart beats. Finally they go away! They are retreating!"
From the first hour of Sunday, June 4, to daybreak, Carlo Trabucco, unable to sleep because of the noise and his excitement, watched thousands of German vehicles converge under a brilliant full moon, lining up at the Ponte Milvio to cross the Tiber. They rolled onto the Via Cassia and the Flaminia, the consular roads that had carried the Romans of olden times to triumphs in the land where these soldiers yearned to return even in defeat.
Elefante! Italian for the code word "Elephant" - signifying the Allied entry into Rome - had been radioed from London on the 2nd, but the liberators were yet to be seen.
Weizsäcker, unruffled by what amounted to a papal scolding, stuck to the script, saying that there was no urgency. Kesselring was calm, unhurried. It was nearing midnight when the German ambassador left the Vatican. At that hour, as Monsignor Giovannetti, the junior man at the meeting, noted in his account, just beyond Saint Peter's Square where it gives onto the Via della Conciliazione, German Tiger tanks rumbled on the pavement, in yet another violation of the Open City. But for the first time in all those months of traffic to the front, there was a difference: they were going the other way.
Kesselring's exit strategy supports this pragmatic approach. The moment he decided to pull out was the same moment that the guessing game of whether he would defend or not intensified. All day of the 3rd, while many Fascists were burning documents, gathering their nest eggs, and slipping out of town, Kesselring continued to move men and materiel to the front. It was to look like occupation business as usual, and pleasure too: that evening General Mälzer, at Kesselring's beckoning, led a showy entourage to the opera for a performance by the world-renowned tenor (and Nazi-fraternizing) Beniamino Gigli in Un Ballo in Maschera.
Like everyone else, Clark was unaware of whether the Germans would withdraw without a fight. "Do not know if the Krauts are going to defend," he said in a telegram to his men as they began the final approach. "It is urgently desired that private and public property in Rome not be damaged. Firing into Rome depends upon Krauts. If opposed, Battalion Commanders and higher Commanders have power to eliminate same by fire and movement."
The Romans, who had come to feel the Führer's wrath, believed what they saw and heard, the window-rattling thunder coming out of perfect skies, the distant fires already encircling Rome. "The Germans would resist to the extreme," went the rumor cited by Elsa Morante, "and anyway they would first blow up all those famous places they had mined, and the Pope was getting ready to flee along with the Vatican's fleet of armored planes to someplace unknown."
ould Rome burn? Would the Colosseum fall - as in the ancient prophecy "When falls the Colosseum, Rome shall fall / And when Rome falls - the world"? Few people believed that Hitler would pardon the capital of the traitor-nation he had vowed to punish - not while his own capital was burning and falling, bombarded almost nightly by enemy air power.
With President Bush in Rome for the 60th anniversary of its liberation from Nazi occupaton, the Eternal City was literally the Talk of the Town - a weekly feature of the world-famous New Yorker magazine. The writer, John Seabrook, found undying gratitude among Romans toward the America of old, but not a kind word for Bush's "liberators" of America today. Seabrook drew on Robert Katz's The Battle for Rome for his sketch of the 1944 liberation, but here for the first time, from those same pages, is an extensive excerpt from the book. recounting of the perilous changeover from occupied to liberated Rome. 1
Once Upon a Time in Liberated Rome When flowers showered on freedom's army
The Plague (1992) (Narration) ... aka La Peste
Sweet and Savage (1983) (Documentary) ... aka Dolce e Selvaggio ( Italy )
Blood Ties (1986) (Story) ... aka Il Cugino Americano ( Italy )
The Salamander (1981) (Screenplay) ... aka La Salamandra ( Italy )
Kamikaze 1989 (1982) (Screenplay) ... aka Kamikaze 89 ( Germany )
Il Caso Moro (1986) (Screenplay/ Book: Days of Wrath ) ... aka The Moro Affair
La Pelle (1981) (Screenplay) ... aka La Peau (France) ... aka The Skin
The Cassandra Crossing (1977) (Screenplay/Story/ Book: The Cassandra Crossing ) ... aka Cassandra Crossing ( Italy ) ... aka Treffpunkt Todesbrücke ( Germany )
Massacre in Rome (1973) (Screenplay/ Book: Death in Rome ) ... aka Rappresaglia (1973) ( Italy )
Author of screenplays "Massacre in Rome" (based on his book Death in Rome ), 1973, "The Cassandra Crossing" (based on his book of the same title), 1977, "La Pelle," 1981, "The Salamander," 1983, "Kamikaze 1989," 1983, "Hotel Colonial," 1983, "Il caso Moro" (based on his book Days of Wrath ), 1986, and "Blood Ties" (story only), 1986;(click to see complete Filmography ); author of sound recording "The Great Population Explosion Hoax," Pacifica Tape Library, 1973. Former consultant to PrimeTime Live, American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. (ABC), 60 Minutes, Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc. (CBS), The History Channel, and Italian television's RAI networ news magazine, Mixer.
The Battle for Rome : the Germans, the Allies, the Partisans and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944 , Simon & Schuster, 2003.
Naked by the Window: The Fatal Marriage of Carl Andre and Ana Mendieta, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1990.
Love is Colder than Death: The Life and Times of Rainer Werner Fassbinder , Random House, 1987.
Il caso Moro (with G. Ferrara and A. Balducci) , Pironti, 1987.
Days of Wrath :The Ordeal of Aldo Moro, the Kidnapping, the Execution, the Aftermath , Doubleday, 1980.
The Cassandra Crossing , Ballantine, 1976.
A Giant in the Earth , Stein & Day, 1973.
The Fall of the House of Savoy , Macmillan, 1971.
Black Sabbath : A Journey through a Crime against Humanity , Macmillan, 1969.
One-click biography Source Marquis Who's Who, 2006
Click-buster version Writings "Sidelights" a bio-essay Further readings about the author Source Contemporary Authors Online, 2006
The Battle for Rome: The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944 , Simon & Schuster, 2003
Dossier Priebke: Anatomia di un processo , Rizzoli, 1997
Naked by the Window: The Fatal Marriage of Carl Andre and Ana Mendieta , Atlantic Monthly Press, 1990. Sculptor Andre was accused of murdering artist Mendieta, throwing her out of the bedroom window of their 34th-story apartment in Greenwich Village. The setting is the New York art world, but the die was cast in Rome, where the couple lived in the early Eighties and our paths intersected.