Debunking the myth of the saubere Wehrmacht

This paper will draw on key notions from several of Roland Barthes's texts to examine how the Hamburger Institut f�r Sozialforschung (HIS) used word and photographic image to contest a widely held belief in post-Second World War Germany that Wehrmacht soldiers were not directly involved in committing Nazi war crimes. The first exhibition, ?Vernichtungskrieg: Verbrechen der Wehrmacht 1941 bis 1944?, ran from 1995 through to 1999 and was seen by roughly 860 000 visitors in 33 cities in Germany and Austria.The second show, ?Verbrechen der Wehrmacht: Dimensionen des Vernichtungskrieges?, was seen by approximately 420000 visitors in 13 cities in Germany, Austria and Luxemburg.