In Pictures: President Obama tours Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany

[BirminghamExaminer]

Excerpt:

President Obama toured the former Nazi concentration camp, Buchenwald, near Weimar, Germany Friday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and two Buchenwald survivors, Elie Wiesel and Bertrand Herz. The pictures tell a poignant story. President Obama said he wouldn't forget what he had seen there.



See the rest of the photographs here.

[Ian David]

1. Contrast and compare...

Reagan Joins Kohl in Brief Memorial at Bitburg Graves
By BERNARD WEINRAUB, Special to the New York Times

Published: May 6, 1985

<snip>

White House aides have acknowledged that the Bitburg visit is probably the biggest fiasco of Mr. Reagan's Presidency. The visit, which was made at the insistence of Mr. Kohl, was overwhelmingly opposed by both houses of Congress, Jewish organizations, veterans' groups and others.

Up to the last moment, White House officials sought to minimize the effect of the visit. As Mr. Reagan left Bonn this morning for Bergen-Belsen, officials disclosed that the President and Mr. Kohl would be joined at Bitburg by two prominent retired American and German military officers.

The two were Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway, 90 years old, who led the 82d Airborne Division in Europe and later fought in the Battle of the Bulge, and Lieut. Gen. Johannes Steinhoff, 71, a World War II flying ace who later rose to the highest ranks of the West German Air Force. After the brief ceremony at the military cemetery, the two men shook hands.

Visit to Adenauer's Grave

Mr. Reagan, starting an official visit to West Germany after the end of the seven-nation economic summit conference in Bonn on Saturday, began his day with an unscheduled drive in the hills overlooking the Rhine to place a wreath at the grave of Konrad Adenauer, West Germany's first Chancellor. White House officials said the idea for the visit had come from Billy Graham, the evangelist.

More:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=8393331&mesg_id=8393356

Also:

Reagan honors Hitler's SS in Bitburg, Germany, May 5, 1985
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x1739696

Old Nazis, the New Right and the Reagan Administration
www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2720540 - Similar pages

[BirminghamExaminer]

3. wow thanks for posting that, I never saw that.....

in May 1985, my first child had just been born and I was oblivious to the world outside my newborn. I missed this completely. Thanks. Geez, Reagan...what a dope.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Thanks for the link

It had to be hard for those survivors to go back there, I'd think. The concentration of misery and pain of those long ago days must linger around the site.