Berlin wants to get rid of the villa of Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s propaganda minister: “Take it, it’s a gift!”

The Berlin government wants to sell a villa that once belonged to Adolf Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels. It hopes to end a decades-long debate over the transformation or demolition of a vast disused site in the countryside north of the German capital, writes The Guardian.

“I offer to anyone who would like to take over the site, to take it as a gift from the state of Berlin,” said Berlin’s finance minister, Stefan Evers, in front of the state’s parliament, the German news agency reported.

Berlin has repeatedly tried to cede the site to the federal authorities or the state of Brandenburg, where the villa is located, rather than continue to pay for the maintenance and security of the complex, which has grown too large and fallen into disrepair.

Evers renewed that offer Thursday, asking for proposals that reflect the site’s history. He did not specify whether proposals from private individuals will also be taken into account.

“If we fail again, as we have in recent decades, then Berlin has no other option but to carry out the demolition we have already prepared for,” Evers said.

Goebbels, one of Hitler’s closest allies, built the luxury villa in 1939 on a wooded plot overlooking Lake Bogensee, near the town of Wandlitz, about 40 km north of Berlin.

Goebbels, who was retiring from Berlin, where he lived with his wife and six children, used the villa and an older house on the site to host Nazi leaders, artists and actors and, it is said, as a nest of love for secret adventures.

After the war, the 17-hectare site was briefly used as a hospital, then taken over by the youth wing of the East German Communist Party, who built a training centre, including several large accommodation blocks.

After the reunification of Germany, in 1990, ownership of the site returned to the Land of Berlin. However, the city found no use for it. Since then, the site has become an attraction for day-trippers, who can make their way through the overgrown grounds and gaze through the villa’s floor-to-ceiling windows.

Goebbels moved back to Berlin in the final phase of World War II. He and his wife committed suicide with their children with cyanide capsules in Hitler’s bunker as Soviet troops approached.

The opulent family home, located on an island in Berlin, was sold at auction in 2011.

Publisher: GM

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