Webloggin » Hitler Still An Honorary Citizen At Bad Doberan, Site Of G8 Summit

I am not sure which is more embarrassing, that the left is using this as a stepping stone to protest the upcoming G8 summit or the silly excuses being offered up to explain how this could have happened.

It was common practice for towns to make Hitler an honorary citizen after the Nazis took over Germany. But since the end of WWII and after the reunification of Germany in 1990 most towns have revoked that status. Bad Doberan, site of the upcoming G8 summit, however had it as an agenda item since the fall of the Berlin wall but never got around to doing it. According to town elders they couldn’t dissolve such an honor because “the paperwork was missing”.

Following the fall of the Berlin wall, it was on the town council’s agenda but, according to local leaders, was not dealt with “due to missing documents”.

Attempting to explain the town’s lack of action, one clerk said: “You can’t dissolve a marriage if you don’t have the marriage certificate”. But critics have said all that is needed is a statement by the town’s representatives. - (src - Guardian UK)

Now that a large economic stake is an incentive they have either found the missing documents or decided that they weren’t all that necessary in the first place.

The town council will hold a special meeting shortly to officially remove Hitler from the roll of honour.

Leaders from the world’s major industrial nations will meet in one of the town’s districts, Heiligendamm, in just over two months’ time.

The small resort by the Baltic Sea was previously part of East Germany.

Heiligendamm has been visited by many statesman since its return to classic German elegance after businessmen bought up most of the seaside resort buildings in the early 90’s. The G6 Interior Ministers actually held closed door meetings at Heiligendamm in 2006.

I suppose that anything is possible and that many people have handled Germany’s role in he Holocaust in various ways. But some excuses are more silly than others. From the BBC’s perspective it was a matter of trying to forget the past.

After 1945 most revoked that honour, but not Bad Doberan. It spent more time under communism trying to forget the past than dealing with it.

So, quietly, and rather embarrassingly, Hitler remained a figure of honour until now.

But with the G8 summit looming the local council has suddenly realised that having the Fuehrer in the book of honour does not reflect well on the town.

Really? They actually lived in quiet embarrassment, unable to muster enough time over the last 15 years to dishonor the man that was responsible for the deaths of millions of people in WWII? (not just those tiny millions mind you, estimates are between 11 and 17 million murders directly attributed to Hitler’s actions)

This is an embarrassment beyond embarrassments. Do I think they should be shunned from the world for all eternity, never to hold sway to economic riches again for their “forgetfulness”? No, but they can do a bit better than saying the equivalent of the dog ate the paperwork.