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Post by DAS (formerly BushAdmirer) on Sept 21, 2009 22:57:12 GMT
We're in France on vacation for two weeks and happen to have rented an apartment in Lorient on the coast of Brittany. One of the interesting things about this area is that Lorient was headquarters for Nazi U-Boat operations. During 1941 and 1942, when U-Boats were most successful in the North Atlantic, Admiral Donitz had his headquarters here. In case you don't remember, Donitz rose to prominence in the Third Reich based on U-Boat successes early in the war. He succeeded Hitler as Fuhrer for a short time after Hiter's death and was in charge when Germany surrendered. When they captured Lorient in June 1940, Donitz had his pick of locations. He chose an absolutely gorgeous French Chateau on a magnificent beachfront property. It's now been opened to the public as a museum which we toured today. What a life. The Nazi Admiral spent his days on the beach in perhaps the nicest chateau in the area. The ground floor of the chateau is elegantly furnished and doesn't have a military look. All the wartime communications equipment, bomb shelters, etc was underground where they expanded the basement into a series of interconnected rooms and tunnels. Donitz could sit there enjoying the surrounding while sending hundreds to their deaths. What a guy.
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