To better understand the nature of fanaticism, retrace the bloody history of the young volunteers who joined the SS, the Schutzstaffel. Hitler created these ‘protection squadrons' in 1925 to assure his personal security before using them to manage the repression of the regime's real or imagined enemies and then, from 1942, the death camps. Several SS members, still alive today, bear testimony to their membership of the ‘Black Order'.