The Eagle’s Nest was still on fire early on Saturday
By Patrick Jackson
Published
3 hours ago
Police in the southern German state of Bavaria have detained a suspect during a fire at Adolf Hitler’s Alpine mountain retreat, the Kehlsteinhaus, also known as the Eagle’s Nest.
Dispatchers in Traunstein received a fire alarm from the building at 21:15 local time (19:15 GMT) on Friday and firefighters found it engulfed in flames.
Difficult terrain was hindering efforts to extinguish the blaze and it was still burning early on Saturday, police said, with some 200 emergency personnel deployed. There were no reports of injuries.
The Nazi dictator used the retreat, which lies above the town of Berchtesgaden, as a part-time seat of government and met commanders there to plan the invasion of the USSR in 1941.
Hitler also used the area as a backdrop for propaganda films portraying him as a lover of animals and nature.
A criminal investigation is under way to determine whether the suspect is connected to the fire.
The Eagle’s Nest (file photo)
Completed by the Nazis in 1938, the Eagle’s Nest escaped destruction after their defeat in 1945.
Since then, it has become a popular tourist destination and houses a mountain inn.
It serves as “a cautionary reminder of the abysses of the inhumane Nazi dictatorship”, according to its official website, external.
During World War Two, Hitler and his followers were responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people, including the mass murder of European Jews.
Two hundred people deployed to save an historical building that had an exhibition about the crimes committed there. Every opportunity to remember all the faces of evil is important.
I don’t understand why people celebrate history going up in flames.
As long as you’re careful to distinguish actual historical monuments (e.g. this) from propagandistic fake ones built long after-the-fact (e.g. Confederate statues built in the 1950s).
I don’t explicitly think it should be burned down, but I do know of specific examples of modern day Nazis who still venerate it and just don’t have the equipment to process that it’s intended to be cautionary and not a shrine to hitler.
Fascists watch Starship Troopers and come away impressed by the cool soldiers shooting bugs. those people are not going to be shamed by a scoldy exhibition with pictures of concentration camp dead. They want more of that!
Real talk, you don’t casually pop out for dinner to hitlers remote mountain bunker that has been converted to a restaurant. That is a very specific, politically filtered clientele.
maybe you can’t
TWO HUNDRED fucking personnel deployed to save the hitler dacha?
Two hundred people deployed to save an historical building that had an exhibition about the crimes committed there. Every opportunity to remember all the faces of evil is important. I don’t understand why people celebrate history going up in flames.
As long as you’re careful to distinguish actual historical monuments (e.g. this) from propagandistic fake ones built long after-the-fact (e.g. Confederate statues built in the 1950s).
Of course. But I would still see value of preserving those in the right context - for example, a Rewriting History Museum instead of a public square.
I don’t explicitly think it should be burned down, but I do know of specific examples of modern day Nazis who still venerate it and just don’t have the equipment to process that it’s intended to be cautionary and not a shrine to hitler.
Fascists watch Starship Troopers and come away impressed by the cool soldiers shooting bugs. those people are not going to be shamed by a scoldy exhibition with pictures of concentration camp dead. They want more of that!
There’s such a thing as ‘Erinnerungskultur’ in Germany, in which it’s considered important to remember the history so we don’t repeat it.
Otherwise this place has been basically a restaurant for years that doesn’t really capitalize on the historical aspect iirc.
Real talk, you don’t casually pop out for dinner to hitlers remote mountain bunker that has been converted to a restaurant. That is a very specific, politically filtered clientele.
maybe something else nearby could catch fire
That’s a valid point.