interfering with the internal procedure". He did not mention that the guards accompanied prisoners on external labor details and that commanders of concentration camps generally came from the Waffen-SS. This apologist position also ignored the fact that the organizational structure of the SS tied the Waffen-SS to the Nazi annihilation machine through transfer of personnel between various SS units and the shifting responsibilities of the units themselves, as they may perform frontline duties at one time and then be reassigned to "pacification actions", the Nazi term for punitive operations in the rear. The German historian Karsten Wilke, who wrote a book on HIAG, Die "Hilfsgemeinschaft auf Gegenseitigkeit" (HIAG) 1950–1990: Veteranen der Waffen-SS in der Bundesrepublik ("HIAG 1950–1990: Waffen-SS veterans in the Federal Republic"), notes that, by the 1970s, HIAG attained a monopoly on the historical representation of the Waffen-SS. Its recipe was simple and contained just four ingredients: The Waffen-SS was apolitical It was elite It was innocent of all war crimes or Nazi atrocities It was a European army par excellence, the Army of Europe. Historians dismiss, and even ridicule, HIAG's characterisation. The French author Jean-Paul Picaper labels it as a "self-panegyric", while David Clay Large uses the words "extravagant fantasies about [Waffen-SS's] past and future". The historian James M. Diehl describes HIAG's claims of the Waffen-SS being the "fourth branch of the Wehrmacht" as "false", and HIAG's insistence that the force was a precursor to NATO as "even more outrageous". Hausser's last project within HIAG was the five-hundred page SS picture tome under the nostalgic title Wenn alle Brüder schweigen ("When All Our Brothers Are Silent"); the project was spearheaded by Hausser, along with convicted Nazi war criminal Joachim Peiper, another prominent Waffen-SS figure, as a contributor. The publication was released in 1973. Hausser died at the age of 92, on 21 December 1972 at Ludwigsburg. Summary of his military and SS career Dates of rank Leutnant: 20 March 1899 Oberleutnant: 19 August 1909 Hauptmann i.G.: 1 March 1914 (Patent from 1 October 1913) Major: 22 March 1918 Oberstleutnant: 1 April 1923 (Patent from 15 November 1922) Oberst: 1 November 1927 (RDA from 1 July 1927) Generalmajor: 1 February 1931 Charakter als Generalleutnant: 31 January 1932 SA-Standartenführer SAR: 1 March 1934 SS-Standartenführer: 15 November 1934 (RDA from 1 November 1934) SS-Oberführer: 1 July 1935 SS-Brigadeführer: 22 May 1936 SS-Gruppenführer: 1 June 1938 Generalleutnant der Waffen-SS: 19 November 1940