Hotel chain portrays Hitler's retreat as idyllic resort

The Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a protest Thursday to InterContinental Hotels Group over an article in the British-based hotel chain's magazine, which portrayed Adolf Hitler's former mountain retreat as an idyllic vacation resort.

Hitler built his retreat and southern headquarters near the town of Berchtesgaden in the scenic Bavarian Alps. The complex included a large home for the Nazi leader, a mountaintop conference center, and a bunker.

Debate has raged in recent years over the extent to which the area should be re-invented as a destination for vacationers.

InterContinental Hotels intends to open its new Berchtesgaden Resort hotel in March of 2005, according to its Web site.

'Thigh-slapping and yodeling'The winter 2005 edition of the hotel chain's magazine Highstyle included an article entitled "Berchtesgaden: It's not just a peak, it's a treat," in which the resort is advertised as among other things, a "cozy spot for a display of thigh-slapping local dancing" and "a particularly fine spot for yodeling."

"Unfortunately, Berchtesgaden holds a rather more sinister significance," said Wiesenthal Center director for international liaison Dr. Shimon Samuels, in a letter to InterContinental Hotels Group chairman David Webster.

"It was the seat of evil, where Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, Joseph Goebbels and the Nazi leadership took most of the decisions that cost the world 70 million lives."

Based in Los Angeles, the Simon Wiesenthal Center aims to preserve the memory of the Holocaust and combat intolerance through educational outreach and social action.

"A decade ago," continued Samuels, "I visited Berchtesgaden with BBC television and engaged in a debate with the German Institute for Contemporary History in Munich on how best to prevent the banalization committed by your magazine and, thereby, ensure that every visitor include in his itinerary the Berchtesgaden Documentation Center and the memorial to the victims of Nazism."

'Tomorrow's murderers'Samuels noted the irony of the timing of the article, which coincided with commemorations of the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau and the other extermination camps.

Citing a section in the article urging visitors to 'descend into the bowels of the earth' in a tour of the nearby Salzbergwerk salt mines, Samuels said the death camps were "a place in which millions, indeed, descended 'into the bowels of the earth', never to return."

Samuels took the hotel chain to task for publicizing the hotel as 'the ideal spot for a bit of relaxation' while ignoring the wartime role of the site.

"This dishonors the memory of all the victims of Nazism, offends the survivors and teaches tomorrow's murderers that scenic beauty can camouflage and efface their atrocities."

	The Eagle's Nest, one of the last remaining structures in Hitler's former headquarters. A new resort hotel on the site has sparked outcry. (File)