The memory of bone-chilling cold is as fresh today as it was on that March morning 23 years ago, when I stepped from the warmth of my Munich hotel on to the frozen streets of the Bavarian capital.

The jet lag awakened me at 4 a.m. My wife, for some unknown reason, was still sound asleep. The year was 1969, and we were 23 years old. A day earlier we had set out on our dream of bumming around Europe. In the wonderful innocence of youth, we had boarded our flight out of San Francisco, with a one-way ticket and no real idea of what was to come. After all, we had $100 a month -- from my wife's trust fund -- to live on.

I walked the two blocks to the central banhof. It was about 6 a.m., and the commuter trains were pulling in to unload their cargo. I looked up at the huge board that announced the arrivals and departures. There it was; the train to the village of Dachau was leaving every 20 minutes. I purchased my ticket and boarded the correct train. Having always been a student of the Great World War II, I was already struck with the sight of the uniforms worn by the soldiers I had seen at the airport upon arrival the night before. Now here was the train conductor walking toward me, looking for all the world like an SS officer, with a red sash, a bout to ask me for my papers. He was, of course, just punching my ticket.

The trip to the village took a short 15 minutes. I never realized how close to Munich the camp had been. As I alighted to the platform, it dawned on me that I had to ask directions to the camp. I was embarrassed. How would they react to this American reminding them of something they must have wanted to forget? I stood there looking around sheepishly when I was approached by an older woman who, to my disbelief, asked me in perfect English, "Are you looking for the camp?" "Yes," I stammered. How had she known? "You just take that bus over there and tell the driver to drop you off at the main gate." I thanked her and she walked away with a slight shake of her head.

The bus was standing at the stop, and I boarded. The driver smiled and said "guten tag." I again felt the flush of embarrassment as I asked him if this bus went to the camp. "Ya, sure, but the gate does not open 'til 8 a.m." I told him that was fine; I would wait the hour outside the gate until it opened. He told me that the bus really didn't stop at the camp, but he would drop me off there and would keep an eye open for me during the morning to pick me up for the return trip.

A few minutes later, I stepped from the bus onto the crunch of freshly fallen snow. As the bus pulled away, there before me stood KZ-GEDENKSTATTE DACHAU. It was the Nazis' first concentration camp. Although small in comparison to what would follow in the east, in its time it held some 200,000 prisoners. Of these, approximately 32,000 would lose their lives before liberation. I waited by the roadside totally alone. Alone except for the 32,000 spirits who waited for me on the other side of the wire.

In time, a man came to the gate. He unlocked it and looked around. He seemed surprised to see anyone waiting to come in. As I entered, I noticed that I was completely alone. It seemed very strange to me that I was free to explore this place on my own. But explore it I did. For the next four hours I went to every corner of the camp. I saw ashes still in the ovens. It had been a short 24 years since this place of death had been alive. As I entered the gas chamber, though it had never been used, I felt the presence of those who had been there before me. I experienced an overwhelming feeling of panic and need to get out of that room. Not being a person given to flights of fancy, this came as a most shocking realization to me.

I took it all in. As much as I could absorb. I tried to imagine, as best I could, what it must have been like to be here, then. Of course there was no way, but I tried. It was the most overwhelming experience I had in my then short life. Which brings me to the reason for this story.

Twenty-two years later, in June 1991, I returned to the European continent. Often I had been to the United Kingdom in the intervening years, but never back to the continent.

Earlier in 1991, I had been to Israel. I had gone there as a Sar-El volunteer, serving with the Israel Defense Forces during the Gulf War. On that trip to Israel I had a chance to get to Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. This was a truly moving experience, but it still didn't come close to what I had seen 22 years earlier outside the little village of Dachau.

When I returned home from Israel that spring, I decided that it was time to return to Europe for a visit after so long. So it was in June that I flew into Brussels, this time with a different wife, but with just as much anticipation as I had on that first trip so long ago. We picked up a car at the airport and, after a short stay with a Dutch friend whom I had met in Israel, we set out on what was to be a month-long driving tour of Europe. We drove down the beautiful Rhine valley and found ourselves in southern Germany. I realized that we would be passing by Munich and I thought it would be a good opportunity to give my wife a chance to see and experience what I had years before. I started to look for some signs that might point us in the right direction to the village of Dachau.

We were on the outskirts of Munich when I noticed a sign pointing "KZ-CONCENTRATION CAMP." What was this? There hadn't been a bus stop at the camp when I had last been there. We followed the direction of the sign and soon found more signs. Suddenly we made a right turn and found ourselves pulling into a modern car park, complete with parking attendant. It seemed a bit strange to find such modernization, but I guess after so many years a little change was to be expected.

We parked the car and found our way to the main entrance. What was this? It looked like a modern park entrance. Gone was the lonely front gate that I had waited in front of, so long ago. Then in one great rush it hit me. This was not the same place. I couldn't believe my eyes. The guard towers, which stood watch over the cold compound with their broken windows, had been torn down and replaced by freshly painted, new, clean facsimiles. The old barbed wire was replaced with new, clean wire. As we walked on, I immediately became aware of the crowds of tourists all around me. It was a tourist attraction. The air was actually a bit festive. What was going on here? I hurried across the main compound toward the crematorium building. It, too, had changed. It now sat in a beautifully landscaped garden. A friggin' garden! It all started to become clear. I could see what had happened here. I understood what they were doing. At that moment a group of German schoolchildren on a field trip came out of the building that held the cleaned-up ovens. They were laughing and joking, as kids will, while on an outing to the zoo. This place had been sanitized. Yes, I'm sure that the authorities had argued, for safety's sake alone, much rebuilding had to be done, if the place were to be open to the public. But how convenient -- in the process they also could do a bit of rebuilding on the soul of the place. I had seen it for the first time 24 years after liberation, so how close to the original had it been at that time. Now 22 years later I return to find a much different place, a place positively pleasant. What did these school kids think? Might they think, "It couldn't have been that bad?" What will their children see when they come here in 22 years? After all, in another 22 years there virtually will be no survivors left to tell the truth of what this place was in its original state. What the German authorities had done to this place was nothing short of sacrilegious. They might as well have turned into into a theme park, perhaps SS World or Dachau-land. Could it be that this was the only camp on German soil where they had the control to do such a thing?

We left the camp much sadder than the rest of the tourists. None of them seemed to have a clue as to what was going on here. I could have understood if they had pulled the camp down in 1945. But to try to tell a different story, a cleaner, softer story -- that is truly evil. In the end, I'm so glad to have come here back in '69. At least I will be one person who retains a bit of the truth as the years pass. I feel a great honor to be a small part of the collective memory that will always tell the truth and never, ever forget.

There are only a few days of 1996 left and I find myself in a leadership position in the Jewish Defense League. The story seems to have made a full turn. A restaurant has opened adjacent to the Dachau concentration camp. And as that were not enough desecration to G-d's name, it is not just any restaurant, but a McDonalds!

The thought of sitting in a window with your Happy Meal in hand as you gaze out at the newest German theme park across the street truly boggles the mind. What kind of little action figures will be given out with your child's Happy Meal? A little SS man or a walking skeleton in a striped camp uniform?

Almost as sad as the story itself is the fact that, back in '91 when I wrote this short article, I submitted it to every mainline Jewish publication in America. To sum up the replies I received: "We don't do anything on the Shoah anymore; it just depresses everyone and no one wants to hear about it anymore." I repeat, this was from the Jewish mainstream in this country. But we have enough interest in the same community to squander Jewish money on awards and grants to the likes of Thomas Friedman, a writer whose track record on anti-Jewish, anti-Israeli, leftist propaganda is almost unequaled. But there you have the main example of what is wrong with such organizations like the ADL, who are guilty of the above mentioned insanity.

If this latest outrage at Dachau is allowed to stand, I predict that the first rides will shortly follow. If this sounds cynical and bitter, it is. As the Germans, along with stupid Jews in this country, sit back and allow this to continue, I can only assume that they are biding their time as they sit their death watch for the last witness to fade into the death that comes to all of us. And when that day comes, will it be only we JDLers who will still know the meaning of "Never Again"? Time will tell.

Elie ben Cramer is the director of the Northern California Chapter of the Jewish Defense League.

Color Photographs of Dachau by Jim Lanaghan, Jr.

Visit the Virtual Tour of Dachau for more information.