A personal reflection on the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Nazi concentration camps, the urgency of remembrance, and the enduring value of American connections with local communities across Europe.
In early April, we mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora concentration camps by American soldiers. For the world, these anniversaries are somber reminders of the darkest chapters of the 20th century. For me, they are deeply personal.
I had the honor of serving for three years as the U.S. Consul-General in Leipzig, Germany, in the very region where these two camps were located. During that time, I visited both memorials on many occasions, including on the 75th anniversary of liberation. Each visit left a profound mark on me. Buchenwald, perched on the Ettersberg near Weimar in central Germany, is a place full of ghosts. On a cold, grey November day, walking through the remains of the camp, you can feel an eerie stillness — as if the air itself carries the weight of what happened there.
One particular encounter at Mittelbau-Dora will stay with me forever. As I toured the site, a middle-aged man from Belgium approached and asked gently, “Are you American?” When I introduced myself, he began to sob. He told me his father had been imprisoned there, forced to work in the underground tunnels where V-2 rockets were assembled under unimaginable conditions. By what he called “a miracle,” his father survived — liberated by American soldiers in April 1945. “Without America,” he said through tears, “I would not be here today.” Then he asked if he could give me a hug.
Over the three years, I have laid wreaths on behalf of the American people at many memorials across eastern Germany — in Torgau, where U.S. and Soviet forces famously met at the Elbe River; in Leipzig, which was liberated by American troops before the postwar order placed it behind the Iron Curtain; and at Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora themselves. These moments have never felt like routine ceremony. They’ve been quiet affirmations of what it means to remember — and to stand for something.
There are few survivors left today. The responsibility to carry their stories — and the moral lessons that come with them — now rests with all of us. This 80th anniversary comes at a time when antisemitism is once again rearing its head in dangerous and insidious ways all around the world. Holocaust denial and distortion have found new audiences online. Extremism and conspiracy theories are on the rise. As memory fades, threats return.
That is why the preservation of memory is more vital than ever. It is why commemorations like this matter — not as exercises in nostalgia or grief alone, but as reaffirmations of our shared responsibility. The Holocaust did not begin with gas chambers; it began with words, with propaganda, with dehumanization. We must be vigilant for it not to happen again.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower, after visiting the newly liberated Ohrdruf camp, a subcamp of Buchenwald, wrote: “The things I saw beggar description. … The visual evidence and the verbal testimony … leave me no room for doubt. … I made the visit deliberately, in order to be in a position to give firsthand evidence of these things if ever, in the future, there develops a tendency to charge these allegations merely to propaganda.”
Eisenhower understood what we must remember today: truth needs witnesses.
Germany has made extraordinary strides in Holocaust education and remembrance. Memorials like Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora are not just historical sites — they are moral anchors. German schoolchildren visit them regularly. Local communities take pride in preserving them, not to dwell in shame, but to ensure such crimes never happen again.
In honoring that commitment to memory, we are reminded that the values American soldiers carried with them in 1945 — freedom, human dignity, and justice — must be continually renewed through action, not assumption. The partnerships forged in the aftermath of liberation were never guaranteed; they were built, step by step, through trust, shared purpose, and mutual respect. As we face new challenges to democratic principles and historical truth, the work of remembrance becomes not only an act of reflection, but a call to sustain and strengthen the values that once brought liberation — and that still offer a path forward.
In Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora, the past is not past. It speaks to the present — and warns us about what comes next.
This article is by Tim Eydelnant, Senior Diplomatic Fellow at the Wilson Center and a career Foreign Service Officer at the U.S. Department of State. He served as U.S. Consul-General in Leipzig from 2017 to 2020. All photos included were taken by the author during his time in Germany.
Please note: The views expressed in the op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Department of State.
