the visit caused some controversy, both in the united states and around the world, when it became known that members of the waffen-ss, the military arm of nazi germany's ss ("schutzstaffel"), were also buried there. the entire ss was judged to be a criminal organisation at the nuremberg trials. the fact that reagan had not been scheduled to visit former nazi concentration-camp sites compounded the controversy, and a trip to bergen-belsen concentration camp was later added to his itinerary.