An insignificant man

In the opening quote of his memoir, The Last Witness, former Adolf Hitler bodyguard Rochus Misch wrote: "My name is Rochus Misch. I am an insignificant man, but I have experienced significant things." Misch, who died at age 96 today, was the last survivor from Hitler's bunker in Berlin. He thought the Furher was a swell quy. Prior to his death, Misch told the AP that Hitler was "a very normal man... he was no brute, he was no monster." Right. The moral blindness in some men beggars belief. Given the horrific consequences of WWII (which Hitler started and resulted in 60 million dead worldwide) and the "Final Solution" (which Hitler ordered and resulted in the murder of six million Jews), Misch's daughter, Brigitta Jacob-Engelken, told the BBC that "she could not understand why her father, who remained loyal to Hitler to the end, was not more critical in his reflections of Nazi history." The answer is simple. Misch was an insignificant man without a discernable conscience or a soul -- and incapable of developing either. Let that be his true epitaph.