It's a legacy Germany has struggled to erase by re-purposing or razing Nazi-era structures. The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, for example, was placed in an old SS barracks in Nuremburg, while the German Finance Ministry took over the Nazi aviation building in Berlin.
The Berlin bunker where Hitler spent his final days was reduced to a parking lot.
Usually there's little or no complaint about these refurbishments. But one government-sanctioned plan for a Third Reich landmark is sparking a public outcry — a commercial exploitation of the biggest Nazi relic on the Baltic Sea coast.
It's a resort Hitler built between 1936 and 1939 along sandy, white beaches for working-class Germans, one that was grandiose even by Nazi standards. Concrete dormitories that are six stories high and 550 yards wide were erected side by side over 2.8 miles of pristine coastline on the northern island of Ruegen.[...]
Awareness of the site's grim history is something museum director Lucke and other critics of the project believe will dissipate with the conversion. Many historians and some former residents of the site during East German times feel it glosses over a dangerous part of German history that shouldn't be forgotten.
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