The 1972 Olympics: Massacre at Munich… 40 years later
Sanders said the Munich Olympics grew in part out of an effort to have an Olympic Games in East and West Berlin at the same time. “The Olympics had this vision of themselves as being a bridge and something that superseded politics.”
Though he did not attend the Olympics, Large was in Munich in 1972 while researching his previous book, “Nazi Games: The Olympics of 1936.”
Security plays a major role in Large’s book. Large says that security has improved significantly at the Olympics since 1972. “Huge efforts go in to try to protect the games. For the most part those efforts have been successful. There was the bombing in Atlanta in 1996 that resulted in some fatalities, but nothing on the scale of Munich since 1972. We know that for London, they are spending a billion dollars on security alone.”
The conventional wisdom surrounding the Munich tragedy is that the Germans were woefully unprepared. This is only partially true, according to Sanders.
“Germany did change and they wanted to project this demilitarized image of themselves,” Sanders says. “They didn’t want to have armed guards. At the same time, they were prepared. It was a tumultuous moment in world history. The Vietnam War was raging and politics had intruded on the 1968 Olympics with the famous black power salute. What the West Germans seemed more worried about was black militants and not Middle Eastern ones. They were prepared, but for the wrong kind of threat.”
Shortly after the crisis began, the Palestinians demanded the release of 234 prisoners held in Israeli jails. By the end of the ordeals, the kidnappers had killed 11 Israeli athletes and coaches and a West German police officer. Five of the eight members of Black September were killed by police officers during a failed rescue attempt. In “Operation Wrath of God,” Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir ordered the Mossad to assassinate the three surviving members — who were captured but later released by West Germany after Black September hijacked a Lufthansa plane — and others involved in the Munich massacre. The Mossad assassinated leading Black September figure Ali Hassan Salameh in 1979.
Due to lack of preparation, Large said, the Bavarian police botched the rescue attempt in 1972. “They had no training or counterterrorism force, and they didn’t work well together or share information properly,” he said. “We have those things now, and London has them.”
One of the issues still debated is whether Israel offered to help the Bavarian police.
“The Israelis say they offered to send their [counter-terrorism] force right away and the Bavarians said ‘No we can’t have that,’” Large said. “I think the Israeli claim is true and the Bavarians declined it because it would have been embarrassing for them to have to turn matters over to the Israelis. The Bavarians didn’t have a counter-terrorism force at that time and the Israelis had the best force in the
world.”
Billed as a way to bring countries together to compete in a peaceful way, Large said the Olympics remain what they have always been — political.
“Events like the Munich tragedy call into question the advisability of enterprises like the Olympics at times of international tension,” Large said. “I’m not sure it makes much sense given what’s going on to put on these big shows. I’m not saying they should be discontinued, but it’s worth having the conversation.”
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