The last post...

So back in Blighty after four weeks plus of touring. A very humbling experience. Time to reflect and to think about what it all meant. It was rewarding to be able to bring to life my great uncle's story in World Wat One. The suffering and sacrifice in that conflict is beyond adequate description. I still have the sense that this conflict above all others was such a waste of human talent and ability. I still have the sense that World War Two was a more understandable conflict and one with more of the 'righteousnous' to it. Anyone who has stood in a concentration camp museum or been to the Museum of Jewish History in Berlin would probably agree with that.

Without the First war would be have had the Second? My personal view is probably not. The wider conditions for discontent would not have been there. The impact of World War One on Hitler himself would have been missing. Hopefully he would have remained a struggling artist with an unfortunate tendency to rant in beer halls. We should not underestimate though the long, long history of anti-semitism in Europe that would still have been in the background.

A couple of closing thoughts - I saw nothing in my historical journey that convinced me to change my mind that it is often your own government you should really be afraid of and not a foreign one. And intolerance of immigrants and minorities really can lead to to some pretty awful consequences.

Back in the UK

Amazingly its sunny . Post tomorrow on final thoughts .

Berlin - Great City

The remrkable Bundestag building, a wonderful resurection of the old Reichstag building with it's famous dome reimagined in a brilliant new way. You can see some of the dome at the top. You can get up to it, walk around a spiral ramp inside the dome and get spectacular views out over Berlin but also down onto the Bundestag floor!

This is looking down inside the Dome to the seats of the government!

A more conventional view - the previous picture was taken inside this from the spiral ramp looking down the internal cone structure you can make out.

The famous Brandenberger Tor - from the Unter den Linden side.

Great city - more to come on the positive side of Berlin.

German cuisine

Curry wurst. It tastes better than it looks

A lone voice of protest

How much courage did this worker have to make his little protest ?

Totalitarianism - Gestapo, the Topography of Terror

The Germans are very open and remorseful about the Nazi history that has tainted their recent experiences as a people. After re-unification they chose to redevelop a once infamous area of the city into a devastating reminder of just what can happen when a people deliberately choose to follow a leader like Hitler and the Nazis. They did choose - they voted almost overwhelmingly for the Nazis and then supported the Parliaments self-destruction.

What emerged from that was state within a state that is represented at its worst by the activities of the Reich security services and one one element of that apparatus in particular - the Geheime Stats Polizei or Gestapo for short.

This is one of the original underground cells at Prinz Albrecht Strasse - the HQ of the Reich Security services. The whole area is now a museum (the Topography of Terror) that forensically details how the Nazis got into power, the organisations they used to maintain power and the results.

This is looking back along the length of the underground chambers - in the background is part of the Berlin Wall, another reminder of totalitarianism.

A shot of two unfortunate inmates clearly showing the terror that such an environment created. The Nazis and the Gestapo started initially by liquidating known political opponents - so members of the Communist party, trade unionists etc. They then moved onto to other 'undesirable' groups. The best know being the Jews of course. But there were hundreds of thousands of others. Gypsies, religious leaders, homosexuals, resistance fighters. Patients of asylums, handicapped individuals - the Nazis introduced the word 'euthanasia' to describe the systematic elimination of elements that would contaminate their twisted view of perfection.

It started with a populist political viewpoint that people supported. It ended with a World War and the Holocaust.

A view of the unsettling Memorial to the Holocaust. A vast field of massive granite 'stelle' or blocks. You walk in between them and the path goes up and down. You can disappear into the memorial. It is powerful and thought provoking.

As I said at the start, the Germans are remorseful.

Totalitarian regimes two - concentration camps

Sachsenhausen - the first purpose built Nazi concentration camp. These were the words that came to be so closely associated with the industrialised extermination of whole groups of people under the Nazis. Heinrich Himmler was very proud of this new approach to terror. The camp was built to detailed designs to ensure maximum control and efficiency of execution of their warped ideas about who was on the right side of the Nazi project and who was on the wrong side.

If you were unfortunate enough to walk through those gates this is the panorama that greeted you. In front is the roll call area - scene of daily counts of the inmates, appalling abuse of power and cruel and summary punishments.

There is a 'boot testing' walkway around it. Some inmates were forced to march over 30km a day loaded down with weights to test new boot designs. You were deliberately given boots that did not fit. Many died doing this.

One example of the partnership that emerged between German industry and the Nazi's to use forced labour to pursue their individual aims. Many of these companies are still around - VW, BASF, Siemens, Krupp to name just four.

If you were lucky you got to share a bunk with one or two others. Room was regularly created by death.

The prison within the prison - to quote one inmate "if you ask me was it really that bad I will tell you it was a 1000 times worse".

The punishment posts in the prison - you would be hung up from these by your arms tied behind you. Dislocates the shoulder in most cases.

No way out - the electrified fence. In front of this would be a killing zone - cross it and get shot. Many just walked into it to end the suffering.

The Execution trench - mostly for shootings. You would be marched out around a circuitous route. Loud music may be playing to drown out the shots to prevent you realising you are marching to death.

The mortuary - this is only one small part of it. The bodies would be piled up in here early on in Sachsenhausen's history - later they went straight to the crematorium.

The Crematorium at Sachsenhausen. Built once the 'Final solution' was agreed in 1942 at the Wannsee conference.

Contemporary photograph of the entrance to Sachsenhausen - the 'Arbeit Macht Frei' gate is under the watch tower in the centre.

Sachsenhausen was liberated in April 1945. They were still executing prisoners right up to the day if was freed. 300 died of illness after it was liberated.

The Soviets cynically took it over and reused it - this accounts for most of its survival as a site to visit and reflect on.

It is a chilling experience. It is the methodical, organised approach that disturbs me the most. This was the first of a huge and well organised killing machine. I don't know who said this but I think it was one of the leading Nazi's

'If you kill 6 children everyone is appalled. If you kill 60,000 they cannot comprehend it'

So if there are any things that are worth fighting for I would have to say preventing people who are capable of that sort of thinking getting into power and staying there is one of them.