Dachau days

A concentration camp memorial is a powerful reminder of our vulnerability to psychological manipulation.

- Marc Wilson

The lad in front of us is stomping his feet in the dust as our tour guide directs us to the main entrance. The guide sighs and says that too often, school groups that come through aren't well supervised; that kids don't appreciate the lesson they're getting.

He tells me he needed specific and lengthy training before approval to take tours through the Dachau concentration camp memorial, and it shows. Whether it's the gas chamber, the crematorium, or the shower rooms, he's used very precise language to stress that the atrocities carried out here were murder.

In Germany, all children aged 14 and over are required to visit a concentration camp memorial. Under-14s aren't allowed into many parts of the memorial site because it's grim and uncompromising in what it shows.

I learnt several things on my visit, and not just a more-concrete appreciation of what the misery of being at Dachau must have actually been like.

First, our guide described the training that guards went through before being assigned to Dachau. They were trained to beat a man, weeding out weakness like empathy. Only the most callous guards need apply here.