The Atlantic Wall

In the 1940s, the German Nazi regime began the construction of many fortification systems along the coastline of the occupied territory from Norway to France over a length of more than 2,500 km. The idea behind these enormous concrete buildings was to protect the territory from an invasion of the Allies. In the process, German authorities imposed a regime of forced labor on the local population to build thousands of those massive bunkers. In the end, the “Atlantic Wall” was useless. It was never fully finished and overrun in less than 24 hours, but its ruins still exist to this day. Friedjof Feye and I visited them in the dunes of the Danish coast, where we saw the traces of the fortunately long-gone World War II and turned them into skateable spots.