Article Limburgs Dagblad (newspaper)
Thursday March 31, 2016
Article Limburgs Dagblad
www.limburger.nl
Author: Stefan Gillissen
Gravediggers in the Meat Grinder
The Second World War is still a hot topic. Amateur archaeologists risk life and limb during searches. Unfortunately, it turns out not all of them have the best intentions.
Lights float above the ground. In the darkness, they dance through the labyrinth of pine trees. Voices sound, whispers in the night. The men dying in 2016, rumored to be in the German forest, know damn well they must be silent. But sound carries far.
Soldiers who fought in the Battle of the Huertgen Forest during World War II listened damn well. A cracking twig, a slight tinkling. It could mean a death sentence.
The searchers walking around seven decades later don’t have to fear that. At most, they can receive a hefty fine because what they’re doing is strictly forbidden.
They search Second World War remnants, but at the same time, the largest cemetery on the European front.
More than 35,000 people died in and around the Huertgen Forest. Hundreds of soldiers remained in the forest, which has earned it several nicknames: The Meat Grinder. Or the Death Factory.
What the soldiers left behind is worth its weight in gold to many collectors. With a certain sense of exaggeration, you could call the searches in the Aachen Forest, but also in the Ardennes, a gold rush. More and more people are going out armed with metal detectors. Sometimes this results in special finds, such as dog tags (identification plates). Searchers usually try to return the items to relatives, but that doesn’t always happen. A considerable number of items end up on online auction sites. For prices starting at 25 euros, parts of the equipment such as helmets, weapons, and emblems end up in the hands of anonymous collectors. This is a sore point for the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), for example. This division of the US Department of Defense searches the world for missing soldiers. And every clue that is lost hinders that investigation. JPAC has 400 employees and a budget of 35 million euros. To give an idea of their task: after World War II, over 78,000 American soldiers whose bodies were lost were lost. Body parts obtained by JPAC are examined at the Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii. This often allows a soldier to be buried by their family.
There are also initiatives on the Dutch side. For example, the Gelderland-based Missing in Action (MIA) foundation has gradually gained the trust of government authorities. The foundation is currently trying to find the remains of Cliffe Wolfe, Raymond Blanton, William Roller, and Virgil Carson. These men are commemorated on the Wall of the Missing at the Margraten American Cemetery.
The Missing in Action (MIA) foundation warns against searches in former war zones. They are risky, as many weaponry is still live. In the years immediately following World War II, hundreds of civilians were killed as a result. Most amateur archaeologists are aware of this and report important or dangerous finds to the government. One problem is that there are always bad apples, like the man who displayed his illegal finds on a forum. The postscript is telling: the sharp sheiss has gone back into the ground!
