They have to weigh the undoubted benefits of ... (Iraqi President Saddam) Hussein's overthrow against the risk of turning the Middle East into an inexhaustible recruiting ground for anti-Western terrorism.

But Germany will always suffer, I fear, from the intensely dramatic character of the crimes of the Third Reich.

There are thus great swathes of the past where understanding is more important and reputable than judgement, because the principal actors performed in line with the ideas and values of that time, not of ours.

Prison is an expensive way of making bad people worse.

History provides no precise guidelines.

It is not helpful to help a friend by putting coins in his pockets when he has got holes in his pockets.