Echoes of WWII still can be heard

Neo-nazis rising up to create fear and chaos:

"Right-wing extremism is part of everyday life and only attracts attention when the crimes are especially horrific," says Wolfgang Thierse, the Social Democrat vice-president of the lower house of the German parliament, the Bundestag.

The statistics are alarming. In 2007, the number of reported arson attacks committed by right-wing extremists climbed to 24 from 18 in the previous year. The targets are foreigners, including immigrants' mosques, cars and cafés.

"These are crimes that pose a threat to public safety and that could lead to people getting killed," warns Heinz Fromm, president of Germany's domestic intelligence service. The upward trend (more...) seems to be continuing this year. The numbers in March were higher than they had been in years. Throughout Germany, the police documented a total of 1,311 right-wing extremist and racist crimes, an increase of 458 over the year-earlier month. The incidents included 72 acts of violence, the government said in response to an inquiry from the Left Party vice president of the Bundestag, Petra Pau.

New Trend of "Anarchist Nationalists"

Intelligence agents have identified a new, right-wing extremist phenomenon: so-called anarchist nationalists who are "significantly more likely to commit acts of violence against political rivals and the police." After the May riots in Hamburg, the police are keenly aware of the threat posed by this new group of extremist thugs. In Hamburg, they joined in the fray wearing the same black outfits and showing a similar level of aggression as leftist anarchists. It took a massive police effort to prevent the situation from spinning out of control. What happened in Hamburg, says Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, a Christian Democrat, attests to a "new quality."

And talk about ticking time-bombs:

Barely a week goes by in Germany without wartime bombs and weapons being found during construction work.

On Monday, much of the city of Potsdam near Berlin was brought to a standstill after an unexploded 250 kilogram British bomb was found at the site where a tram bridge is being built.

Some 3,000 people were evacuated from nearby homes and a hotel, and the main train station was closed along with key streets and tram lines.

The detonator was still live and the bomb could easily have gone off when it was accidentally touched, a spokeswoman for the city said. A bomb disposal expert gingerly unscrewed the detonator and the all clear was given nine hours after it was found.

Even kids find them:

A 10-year-old boy in the German city of Kassel is lucky to be alive after playing with a new "toy" that turned out to be a high-explosive shell from World War II.

[snip]

Gossens said that in the state of Hesse alone, 230 tons of World War II-era weapons and munitions were found in 2007 -- over 60 years after the end of the war.

Not to activate Godwin's Law, but how many unexploded bunker busters and cluster bombs will be in Iraq for decades to come? (I'm not even addressing the depleted uranium that we've released into the Iraqi environment to poison all forms of life for centuries.)