Dachau

[C]

A strange place, and the first concentration camp. Almost a mix between a PoW camp, a normal prison and a death camp. I hadn't realised before I visited how many people had either become permanent residents (released upon liberation having stayed for most of the war, such as a British SIS Officer kidnapped in Holland in 1939) or how many had been released at various times before and during the war (including the sons of Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand). Such a harsh regime though, and if you were Jewish or Russian you had little hope of leaving...

The point of no return

[-sam-]

I visited Dachau some years ago. Probabely the most scarry place I

[Craig.]

Brilliant photos:)

[beaky]

Creepy. Not sure, but it wouldn't surprise me to find out that some of my Polish or (Jewish) Ukrainian kinfolk met their doom in a place like that... :-/

[Fozzer]

While stationed in Germany in 1956, (British Army: REME), we visited Belsen concentration camp...
...another very scary place...!

Paul ...Royal Electrical and Mecanical Engineers... ...!

[Medevac71]

yes, that's the worst part of our history.............

[F3Hadlow]

Very atmospheric photos indeed.

[ozzy72]

Reminds me of our trip to Belsen when I was in W.Germany in '89

[Fitter]

yes, that's the worst part of our history.............

We need to forget that...to start a new history...

[C]

We need to forget that...to start a new history...

Always be willing to make new history, but man forgets the past at his peril...

[Romulus111VADT]

We need to forget that...to start a new history...

As the old say goes, "Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it"

It is better to remember the past and not to let such atrocities happen again. Then look forward to a bright future secure in the knowldge that they won't happen again.

[Omag 2.0]

Visiting one of those camps should be enough to make even the worst joker silent... This may never be forgotten! It gives me the creeps while passing the Breendonk-camp in Belgium, which acted as a transit-point during the war... the real camps must be even more overwhelming...

[Ijineda]

As the old say goes, "Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it"

Thats true but the thing is that the 1000 years of german history are reduced to the 12 years from 1933 to 1945...everone knows hitler, but what about bismarck? goethe? mozart? only to name a few...

The holocaus is far far far from beeing forgotten, no danger from that side! germany has a lot more to offer than those 12 years and I think its time to focus on the other parts of history after 60 years. After all, how should Germany become a "normal" country if always and everywhere confronted with his nazi-past?

Even in England the schools are now beginning to relocate their main focus on the years before 1933 in history lessons.

[C]

Even in England the schools are now beginning to relocate their main focus on the years before 1933 in history lessons.

To be fair, when I did history at school (in England) we did very little (if any) history post 1930. This probably explains the ignorance of recent history that many of my peers have now...

[ozzy72]

Visiting one of those camps should be enough to make even the worst joker silent

Didn't in our case, we had a Welsh pillock in our unit who tried to crack off some v.bad taste jokes. Oddly enough the officers didn't see anything when he was turned into the base of a 90 man bundle and was taken to the back of the bus on the way home and used as a football. The rest of his tour was hell.... things like stripping him naked one night and covering him from head to foot in boot polish and handcuffing him outside the guard house on a cold and stormy night