I have always felt grateful for having the opportunity of making those documentaries. It was one of the most interesting and uplifting projects I have ever been involved in, mainly due to the calibre of the people I interviewed.

I have a clear recollection of a meeting in the early hours of December 16 in 1994, 50 years to the day after the start of the Battle of Bulge (forgive me if the date is wrong, I couldn't be bothered checking). It was around 3 am in the morning in a hotel lobby in the Ardennes. It was dark outside, bitingly cold and snow was swirling around. It was frigid outside, paralysingly cold, just like it was back in '44.

I was going to spend the day with a group of US vets.
I noticed this one old guy sitting in the lobby on a low couch, slumped, looking uneasy, his headed buried in his upturned collar.
I turned out he was a German vet.
The organisers of the commemoration had also invited some German vets to attend as a form of reconciling the old enemies.
Only one of them had dared to turn up.

When the ex GIs heard who he was, they approached him cautiously, surrounding him, engulfing him, shaking his hand and exhanging courtesies.
The man was visibly upset by the attention and gestures of friendship.
I tried to interview him afterwards but he was so emotional, he was virtually incoherent and he refrained from attending the ceremony a bit later.

The commemoration took place at around 5am at the spot where the Germans came pouring over the border into the Ardennes.
A few speeches were given, flags were hoisted and  raised, a flame was lit. It was very low key but dignified. The vets looked grim and lost in thought.

Later I asked them about the German vet. They said they were glad he had turned up and it was high time to put old emnities behind.
They did add, however, that the presence of an ex SSer would've been unacceptable to them.
They had a lot of respect for regular Wehrmacht soldiers, like the guy who had turned up, but they loathed SSers with a passion because of the low-down tricks Skorzeny and his men had gotten up to and because of the massacre of unarmed GIs at Malmedy.
Some things could not be forgiven.

Here's another reminiscence from that period, which I've shared here once before but it seem apropos here.. It was a very minor thing and yet it moved me greatly.

In 1994, I was a reporter for the English language service of Radio Netherlands and I was working on a series of documentaries to mark the 50th anniversary of the end of WW2. One of the documentaries was about the Battle of the Bulge. I spent several days in the beautiful lush forest of the Ardennes in November '94. It was already bitterly cold, bringing home to me how harsh the conditions must've been back in '44. More GIs actually succumbed to frostbite than to enemy fire. I spent a whole day with a group of US vets, which was a deeply moving experience and I attended a commemorative ceremony early in the morning of December 16 at 5.00 am at the very spot where the Germans launched their last-ditch, desperate attempt to change the course of the war. That, however, is a story for another time.

During my research, I interviewed an elderly Belgian lady, who had lived through the Battle. She was very old and frail, with silvery hair drawn tightly around her face in a bun. Wrinkles streaked her ancient but kind face. As she talked about those long ago days, her features were tinged with a hint of sadness and melancholy. At one stage she moved to the piano and started play gently and humming, while relating a story in her gently, lilting voice. She spoke in the distinctive, local French dialogue. She told me about an American GI who was quartered at their house. Her affection for him was evident even after half a century. She told me how he would go on patrol at night and how she would lay awake in fear and anticipation, longing for his safe return. As he approached their house, he always gently whistled a tune, the tune she was playing softly on the piano. Whenever she heard his whistling approaching from the distance through the dark and mist, she felt a surge of relief and safety. Then one night, no whistling was heard…

The way she told the story, her thin frame sitting at the piano, her thin but elegant fingers caressing the keys, talking and humming, as if she was in a trance, was deeply moving.