Virtual reality is an amazing technology. While we don’t claim to
know if it’ll succeed in the gaming world outside of a narrow niche,
the demos and games we’ve seen have been impressive, particularly
when it comes to creating a sense of “being there.” Now, German
prosecutors have created an advanced VR simulation of the German
concentration camp Auschwitz, in an effort to model exactly where
specific Nazi war criminals were and what they saw.
To understand why the prosecutors
built this model, it helps to understand how Germany chose to
prosecute Nazi war criminals over the past 70 years. From the 1950s
to the present day, West Germany (and later reunited Germany)
indicted 16,767 individuals as war criminals for their actions
during the Holocaust. In the 1950s, however, Germany had decided to
prosecute these crimes as murders under the ordinary criminal code.
This meant many war criminals were able to skate on the “I was only
following orders” defense. Absent specific, direct proof that a
given individual had organized and carried out the murders, it was
difficult to convict many people.
The Nuremburg trials might have given the impression that the
Nazi party was destroyed. But these high-profile cases focused on
the worst of the worst. Historians estimate that in 1945, some 10%
of the German population had been active in the Nazi party, which
meant the civil administration (including judgeships) lay in the
hands of the same people who had been complicit in the Nazi regime.
No serious, concerted attempt was made to strip these people out of
the civil service.
In the last few years, German courts have changed their approach.
Rulings have stated it’s no longer required to prove an individual
culprit is directly responsible for attacks. Rather, the act of
serving at a place like Auschwitz has been treated as being a
component of a killing machine — and that the guards themselves knew
what was happening and took no action to stop it. The
VR model referred to
above has been positioned as a vital tool for demonstrating what
guards and personnel did and did not see based on records of how the
camp functioned and where its work details were, and the positions
and stations of the guards and other camp staff. Even the trees
within the simulation have been modeled to correspond to records of
where they once stood.
The infamous front gates. The “Arbeit Mach Frei” sign is not
visible here.
“The model can be used in trials to counter the objection of
suspects who claim that they did not witness executions or marches
to gas chambers from their vantage point,” said Jens Rommel, head of
Germany’s federal office for the investigation of Nazi war crimes.
Creating the model was the work of multiple years, with the forensic
team poring over details of Auschwitz gleaned from old records,
aerial photos, modern
forensic
scientists, and the written recollections of survivors. “Because
the former crematoriums and other installations had been completely
destroyed, we had to remodel them with the help of old construction
plans,” 43-year-old Ralf Breker, a forensics software developer
told NBC.
With World War II having ended 71 years ago, it might seem like
chasing down accused war criminals is a lost cause. But these cases
continue to matter a great deal to the Holocaust survivors still
remaining and to their descendants. Germany continues to grapple
with this particularly ugly chapter in its own past, and bringing
former Nazis to trial for the crimes they committed decades ago is
still seen as important work.
The other reason for building a model like this may be as
insurance if the newer German ruling on prosecutions for involvement
with the Nazi regime is overturned. The single individual convicted
under that decision died while his case was on appeal, which puts
the approach in a bit of legal limbo. This seems to suggest that
German prosecutors still have good interest to build the most secure
case they can. That way, if the courts return to the older method of
conviction, they still have strong cases to make.
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