SMOKED BEER AND THE GHOSTS OF NUREMBERG
HE SAYS:
After visiting Bamberg yesterday, we have now arrived in
Nuremberg where Eleanor and I have decided to pursue our different interests: she by
singlehandedly supporting the declining Eurozone economy by shopping, while I go on a World War Two tour to visit a
number of sites related to Germany’s Nazi past, including the parade grounds
where the infamous Nuremberg rallies took place, the Palace of Justice’s famous
Room 600 where the Nuremberg trials were
held, and the new Documentation Centre with its museum.
Yesterday, we briefly visited Bamberg, a bustling city of
80, 000 people, with timbered houses, founded in 902 AD. The city had a Jewish
community dating from at least medieval times, but it was destroyed during the
Nazi era. Today, it has a small Jewish population of 1, 000 people, replenished
from Eastern Europe, with a Reform temple and a woman rabbi.
The town is famous for its smoked beer which tastes
something like smoked ham. Actually, it isn’t all that bad and has a frothy, malty
taste, and after the first gulp it tastes like any other beer. Yummy….
Half of our trip down the Main-Rhine-Danube Rivers through Central Europe is spent in Germany. Therefore, it is entirely appropriate that we visit Nuremberg, one of Germany’s most famous, or infamous, cities. The city was originally founded because of its centrality to trade routes and was the capital of Germany from the 12th to 16th centuries. It was also known as an artistic center for the Northern German Renaissance; Albrecht Durer lived and worked here, and his famous etching of the Four Men of the Apocalypse would portend the future.
In the popular mind, Nuremburg is perhaps best remembered for the infamous torchlight Nazi rallies. Less well known it the fact that a young German worker by the name of Eisner attempted to assassinate Hitler during a Nazi party dinner there by blowing up the beer hall. Eisler was immediately captured but wasn’t executed until just before the end of the war. (She says: A plaque was erected in the town in his honour. Yesterday, a huge bouquet of fresh flowers had been placed right underneath, with a note in German, dedicating them to Herr Eisner with many thanks.) Prior to the war Nuremburg had a Jewish population of 8, 000, 80% of whom survived. Today Nuremburg is a modern and interesting Germanic city, with severe architecture, and a population of 500, 000 people.
During our World War Two tour in Nuremburg we saw:
O The incomplete Nazi Kongresshalle (Congress Hall), which was intended to be the Nazi party HQ and marching field for the party leadership cadre;
O The Palace of Justice, Room 600, where the first and
best known of the 12 Nuremburg trials took place. The first trial saw 21
leaders of the Nazi Party tried on four (4) charges, 18 defendants were found
guilty of various charges, note below, and 11 were executed. The well- known
film, Judgement at Nuremburg, with Spencer Tracey, recounted a later trial of
Nazi judges.
O The newly completed Documentation Center with its well
curated museum. Some of the exhibitions, such as the original trial indictments,
were fascinating.
O Regarding the
Nuremburg trials what is not ordinarily known is that Churchill and Stalin had
reached an agreement whereby 70, 000 German officers would be tried by summary
court martial to circumvent formal trials. FDR objected and told the US Dept.
of Justice to take over the prosecutions; an exiled German lawyer developed the
contentious doctrine of crimes against humanity.
Four sets of charges were brought against the Nazi defendants:
O Conspiracy to commit murder;
O Violation of international agreements;
O War crimes; and
O Crimes against humanity – this as a legal concept, or a
criminal charge, didn’t exist until the Nuremberg trials; effectively the Allies
made the law as they went. The German defense was that they couldn’t be tried
on a charge that didn’t exist (“unknown to the law”) in law. In short, a person
can’t be tried on a charge that doesn’t exist, or after the fact. In terms of a
formal defense they were quite right in terms of longstanding common law legal tradition.
Prima facia the Allied judges violated this precept, but then the victors write
history and the law. Legal historians still debate this issue and the propriety
of using the doctrine of crimes against humanity at that time before it was
incorporated into international law. All the defendants, however, were found
guilty on all four charges and executed by hanging two weeks later.
But I am introspective: Today the Zeppelin Field is overgrown
with weeds and covered with debris; it looks like a set from a bad western. It
has been allowed, deliberately, to deteriorate. The marching field itself has
been covered over with concrete with pylons and fences. It cannot be used. The
granite review stands which formerly were used by Hitler and Nazi party
officials that overlooked the field, today have weeds and small shrubs growing
from the stonework. Most of the world’s best rock bands have played here, and
on weekends skateboarders and amateur racing car drivers come out. This puts a
new meaning to dancing on someone’s grave.
It would be nice to say something profound like, “ashes
to ashes”, but the setting is actually quite surreal. And this monument to
barbarity which was to survive for a thousand years now seems like Coney Island
or a dilapidated theme park. No one really cares any longer what happened here,
and that truly is the “banality of evil.”
The erratic and overcast weather that we have been
experiencing has now become sunny and 27C - great weather for spending all day
tomorrow in Regensburg. The wine and cheese are great on this cruise, as is the
cuisine in general; and we seem to have found our social niche with our two Southern
Belles two California babes and a really nice gentleman (American turned Australian). Today for lunch we had pasta with three
different types of sauce. Mozart wafts in the ship’s hallways with their old maritime
maps. Sucks to be us….
Hopefully, the new venues will allow me to focus on and
enjoy less weighty subjects in the future.
(She says: I guarantee it. We’re heading into chocolate cake with
whipped cream territory.)
We have just entered the Danube, and our adventure
continues….
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