website at state dot com. on this day in 1905 with the nazi war machine in its final throes british and american planes began dropping bombs on the eastern german city of dresden igniting a fire storm that would last for days 25000 people die 75 years later as the witnesses are dying out resurging neo nazis and far right politicians are attacking the facts of history waging war on what and how we remember tonight the battle over dresden the battle that still rages on in berlin this is the day. when we remember today the history of the bombing about a country then we remember both. the suffering of people in german cities and

the suffering that germans inflicted on others. leaves actually bastion of the nazis along the eastern front spot and do it so it was germans who began this cruel war 800 are you lancaster's large 650000 incendiary bombs on germany the 7th largest city when we remember today the victims in german cities that it's not an accusation nor is it an attempt to avenge. fear of death the claustrophobic sela the pounding of the bombs. that burned people . the city. obviously the.

ones who are viewers on p.b.s. in the united states and all around the world welcome we begin the day on the anniversary of one of world war 2 smokes terrific moments and a warning for the future if we miss remember what happened today 75 years ago british and american planes began blanketing the eastern german city of dresden with firebombs 25000 people died in what was and remains one of the war's most controversial allied attacks and mediately after the bombing nazi propaganda incorrectly claimed that 250000 people had been killed today one of the leaders of germany's far right party says that 100000 died it's important to note that the party is now the largest opposition party in germany's federal parliament and with all of that in mind you can understand the delicate balancing act the german president faced today at the official commemoration ceremony in dresden vultures

steinmeyer spoke of the suffering and loss of the people on the ground the germans on the ground that public acknowledgment of the victims unthinkable just a couple of decades ago speaks to the role of time in the evolution of a nation's remembrance culture the president also issued a warning for the present and the future saying the memory of the bombing of dresden must not become a weapon for extremists he urged germans to defend the accuracy of history saying that in and of itself is an act of defending democracy. 75 years on that tristen bombing still home city a funeral mounts. by mozart set the tone for a somber ceremony interest in the palace of culture. the message from germany's president never forgets. all 50 year in the long.

list once in a series member it's enables us to see and understand the familiar as well as the unfamiliar it enables us to empathize with the fates of all the victims of war and violence across national borders. steinmeyer reportedly struggled with writing this speech how to balance remembering those killed by the allies while at the same time acknowledging nazi atrocities. you see when we think back to the history of the bombing was in our country we remember 2 things we remember the suffering of the people in german cities and also the suffering germans inflicted on others. over a period of 3 days british and u.s. planes dropped nearly 4000 tons of explosives on kristen the attacks killed some 25000 people and totally wiped out the city's historic center what happened in dressed in has been seized on by the far right to portray germany as

a victim. said crimes shouldn't be measured against each other there's a very hard to doggedly certainly i wish to say clearly today anyone who still cults the dead of dresden against the dead of auschwitz anyone who tries to downplay german wrongs anyone who tries to falsify historical facts we must stand up to them as democrats and contradict them loudly. louds want and she'd be just like management. i try my own farm to warn of threats against democracy the far right alternative to germany the 3rd biggest party in germany's parliament plans to hold its own event in dresden. we are also experiencing in our country how anti semitism and racism are beginning to poison public life again how states governed by the rule of law and democratic

institutions of being scorned. if elected members of parliament or mocked and ridiculed in the parliaments in which they said this is an attempt to destroy democracy from within. thank you. christine these physical scars have long since he of the psychological ones are taking longer. and my colleague correspondent leone from hammerstein she is in dresden where those commemorations have been taking place good evening to you. 75 years since the city was destroyed by bombings what has been the tone of the commemorations today. yeah they have was serious off events marking this coming ration in the city of today and i'm just

standing in front of. off a commemoration service by the far right past the the a d. just behind me just. a couple of minutes ago and in the back the. people from the far left or the left wing see. here in jason who are protesting against a feast commemoration service saying they are downplaying germany's role in the 2nd world war and. basically denying history from happening day 50 has been known to inflate the numbers of victims who were killed here 75 years ago but this is not an official events obviously there was a serious official event events marking the 75th anniversary today from. held a speech at the palace of culture. that was attended by guests from patna

cities also by the duke of kent. obviously was there as well and steinmeier stressed the importance of standing up for peace standing up. for humanity and that's what thousands of people in the city did they said this afternoon when they came out into the season even though it's raining and it's very cold out at 6 o'clock to stands hand in hand in a human saying this is a whole city center of jason to stand up to show and demonstrate the commitment to democracy to tolerance and to humanity our rights my colleague leon even have assigned there in dresden the only thank you very much. i'm going to be here the big table tonight to help us put dresden the bombing and its commemoration in a in a broader context as my colleague frank kaufman good to see you frank would you say that the role of the drugs did in the bombing would you say it's more important to today's politics than it has ever been and i would say that maybe the context is

a different one in times when right wing populists trying to gain ground when it comes to the essence of history of the darkest parts of history of this country then liberal democracy of of this country is challenged and the idea of an open society that it was a step list after world war 2 1st off the unification 30 years ago in the whole of the country is challenged and the context is different and i think what we see now is a moment various this open society is really capable to defend itself you have reported extensively on germany's moments of remembrance reconciliation with the past what does today's commemoration in dresden what does it tell the world about germany i think the president. was really aware that

he needs to find the exact tone. on the one side to commemorate the victims these 25000 that were killed during this. and in the same time bring it into the context of the other commemorations i was in auschwitz for example on the 26 and 27 both of generally. already hold a very strong speech i was in the small city of veto in southeast poland will what will to stall to in september. 13539 also here he was very aware that he has to be very clear and i have the feeling that at the moment he's very much focusing on this serious of speeches that will be more in the in the upcoming year and this year and in the months to come and this is also happening

this is all happening in a moment where right wing extremists and right wing populist are trying to rewrite this and what we're looking at many would say is the evolution of remembrance culture and the words of the german president how they fit into that i want you to take a listen to a part of what frank walter steinmeier said today if i guess nish we do not forget it was germans who began this cruel war and after role millions of germans are fortunate not all of them but many did so out of conviction it was the nazis and their willing execution is who carried out the mass murder of european jews. and then you would know what. we just heard there the president used the term the willing executioners now that is a loaded term the author daniel goat hog and we were talking about this earlier he had he wrote a book that came out in 1906 hitler's willing executioners it was controversial because he claimed that the german mindset is what made the horrors that off hitler

possible the german president did today he used that phrase is there a message in the fact that he appropriate that term and. the message is that it's a different message when a german president of this democracy saying it i think this is very important i can very much recall i can very well recall this discussion from of the mid of the 990 s. i was studying history by myself here in berlin. and the discussions we had at the time was hey if all these germans that you know voted for hitler and that you know were willingly moving into this nazi era what about the other ones the people this minority yes but these people that legally try to hide their jewish neighbors in this very very city of poland by the way so. i think the message is it's different when the president is saying because he's trying to focus on these terms of

a following fitness path the far right party as we heard there from leoni is holding its own commemoration in dresden and he claims to represent the true history of the allied bombing the a.f.d. as i said earlier is the largest opposition group in parliament should the world be a long arm that a party with this much power is pushing an alternative a competing narrative with the truth i think the world should always be sensitive and aware when something like this is happening and it's happening different countries all over europe interesting ideas how this is sites a country of the perpetrators is dealing with this now and these are indeed interesting moments they are indeed for kaufman is always right we appreciate your insights thank you thanks for having me well it is known that as many as 25000 people died in the bombing of dresden those who survived were left traumatized d.w. new spoke with one survivor about his memories of those horrible days.

when aaron's tears comes to the new mark's public square and sees the restored church of our lady or fallen cure here he is reminded of the dresden bombings 75 years ago. here. and everything was destroyed and this was where most of the people were killed in the firestorm then on the next day the taste and following kisha collapsed yes the square was reduced to rubble. on the evening of february 13th 1945 over the span of just 15 minutes the allied forces dropped bombs containing 900 tons of explosives on dresden during the next 2 days 3 more attack waves followed after that the baroque old town lay in ruins at the time and tears was 9 years old when the bombs were dropped on dresden he and his parents he had in

a bomb shelter in the cellar of their house seen here in the former you hungry organ alley. after the 1st attack we left the apartment while everything was burning i can still see it before my eyes the flames creeping over the rooftops of neighboring houses and. that's what it looked like afterwards that was my parents' apartment on the top of that's what the ruins looked like you can see the facade was still in good shape but inside the building everything was burned out and that's what the whole wonderful street looked like. ants tears and his parents were lucky they were able to flee the city as many as 25000 people died during the air raids many of them suffocated during the firestorms. in my eyes this was

a war crime many things happened on all sides but this was an act of destruction directed at the civilian population. and steere started working as a camera man in the 1950 s. his nickname was the eye of dresden he documented the reconstruction of the destroyed city and has been collecting photos and videos of dresden dating back to the 19th century for his film archives. documentary film can be brutally honest if you do not edit or change the footage and i never did this then for me it is the most impressive historical witness. today the rebuilt cityscape of dresden betrays few signs of the destruction that took place here 75 years ago. the most wonderful thing of all is that the dresden for our own care here has been restored

that is really the biggest miracle and after the destruction i experienced in my childhood and youth i never hoped or expected this to happen i hope it will stay this way forever and. the dresden for one cure here is where aaron steers was baptized before the war today he sees it as a symbol of peace. this is an abuse of power that the president is again trying to manipulate federal law enforcement to serve his political interests. in the united states majority leader nancy pelosi she has once again accused the president drunk of you heard abuse of power now that is an impeachable offense and it raises once again the possibility of impeachment this comes after comments on his former advisor roger stone trump criticized u.s. prosecutors who recommended a prison sentence of up to 9 years for stone stone was convicted for

a lying to congress just hours later the department of justice changed its recommendation to a much more lenient term for u.s. prosecutors working on the stone case resigned in protest calling the president's intervention a 5 alarm fire for us democracy nancy pelosi agree to give us american people must have confidence in their nation system of impartial justice. and with a job on the floor of career prosecutors the case but in action on their part it must be commended that the actions of the justice department justice department has this should had this are at something so a political fell above the political fray that people have confidence in the whole of the law and that country are there was this below sea there to talk about this i'm joined now by sam braverman he is a criminal defense attorney he joins me from new york city so it was good to have you on the show you heard nancy pelosi there saying that the department of justice

should have this aura of impartiality about it after what we've seen this week do you see do you still since that or. one of the problems of course in all of this is that the rule of law begins with the president it has to be respected by the people who rule and anything that out of their credibility of the court systems undermines the entire rule of law i guess it was caesar probably said 2000 years ago how divisions has the pope you know the fact is that most politicians are bullies and most rule of law is about something more grant than that and what truck has done has really been a black eye for the rule of law the u.s. prosecutors who resigned this week they say that this is a 5 alarm fire for us democracy i mean that's that's that's quite a statement to make do you agree. well i absolutely agree that what the president interferes in

a 3rd branch of government here he has it attorney general who is a partisan the attorney general represents the president's interests but that he is still a party and as we say equal justice under law means that both parties appear on equal footing if one party now has such a substantial unfair advantage over another party that it's not equal justice anymore the scales of balance have been tipped and where the president puts his thumb on one of the scales he has an incredible power to alter the entire political system it is a terrible event that what he's done here is a bit of a massacre nixon i'm not sure it's that bad because it is still one case but it is a dramatically bad move you are vice president of the bronx bar association that's the association of attorneys there in the bronx in new york what are you hearing about the impact of the president's intervention in a federal court case what kind of impact has that had or is it happening.

well i think in a small county it's 1700000 people who rocks i think in a small county like the bronx where they are worried about the imposition of power on court people i think that this is an example of it i'm not sure that this interferes with their d.n.a. lives you know a lot of the people that rocks are trying to make economic ends meet but it is still an example of when the executive decides to do something everybody around him shutters because what he can't do with a shrug of the shoulders has enormous impacts of the attorney general interferes in a particular case the perception is that all cases and those could include people whose sons and daughters the brocks have been arrested and charged their system of justice is grossly unfair because it doesn't get the presidential seal who will and that fundamentally all cultures this is not justice for everybody but the way fortunately i was the president you know your president the baro i stand corrected there but the president is good good to know that this shrugging of the shoulders

that you that you mentioned. we know that the 4 u.s. prosecutors who resigned they certainly didn't shrug their shoulders i mean they were just outraged by what had happened but should we be seeing more reach especially among your your colleagues about what has happened in washington. so you know i think that people who are paying attention and outraged for years and i think you know when you talk about the rule of law so the rule of law joy it's 800 at her saree of the magna carta one of the seminal moments in the rule of law when the codified powers of the people matched in some small way the power of the solver and that was you know just about 8 years ago so where are we now have we accomplished anything you know the rule of law on the run in every country in the world you see the rise of fascism everywhere you look in every country in europe there's a fascist party by whatever name there's there's brutal dictators in every part of the world it's always been

a balance of power between the sort of the owens and this is just another day of that war it's an endless war and people who are paying attention should be terrified you know as think that the the greatest part of the president has is to make war and to appoint judges and really that is his greatest strength when he appoints judges who don't respect the rule of law you get an opportunity for the president to balance the system this is a terrible events but it's a continuum it is a series of events where the president believes he's above the law his famous and it's i could should anybody get away with i can't be impeached for abuse of power and have you know why should he care because he's rigged the jury system and so the jury system said no crime there's no evidence well no grudge or no evidence surfaces no crime i think it's a terrible thing i understand why these prosecutors resign because every single day they depend on their credibility when they stand before a judge from the stand before a jury they're telling the judge trust me i am not going to lie about anything else

really undermines their credibility in watching these of his male side of the u.s. you know i have to wonder what what what are the trickle down effects of what we're seeing in washington i mean just as you say it's only as impartial as those who practice and deliver it so you know in a small town for example where you have a judge making important decisions about the fates of people's lives could you could he be more willing to put his thumb on the scales. absolutely and then of course that it goes in every single state in every place so i don't know that the president himself affects the small town but the idea that the president can affect the justice in the cases that he likes with impunity or with immunity either want that head comes to another judge at another level and says what the president can do it i can do it and it goes down to the next it what the middle judge can do it then i can do it then the small town where it dramatically effects a person you know whether it's the town court on their liberty or it's only border

on their home or their business if nobody thinks that that system is fair there why have a rule of law it defaults to the rule of the strong and that that's an arche. yeah a sobering assessment there sam braverman tonight joining us from new york sam we appreciate your time in your insights tonight thank you. go do your due go to our goals are right the day is almost done and the conversation continues online you'll find us on twitter either d.w. news you can follow me at bring golf t.v. don't forget to use the hash tag the day every member whatever happens between now and then tomorrow is another day we'll see the book.

to the point of strong opinions clear positions international perspectives. germany's not known for disruptive politics but regional lection has set off a political earthquake that is shaking the christian democratic party to its foundations will be a hefty destroyed man whose legacy find out onto the point. to pinpoint

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history of the slave trade is of africa's history. just tribes how the greed for power and profit plummeted an entire continent into chaos and violence. this is the journey back into the history of slavery. our documentary series slavery routes starts march 9th on g.w. . what's wrong with germany in a country not known for disruptive politics a regional election has set off a political earthquake that is shaking uncle merkel's christian democratic party to its foundations the crisis erupted when the party's local branch in the eastern german state of the rich voted side by side with the far right and you have tea party to anoint a political outsider as states.