A series of blunders culminated in a bloody debacle at Fuerstenfeldbruck, an airbase where the Germans had provided the Palestinians with a getaway plane but planned to overpower them and free their Israeli hostages.

"We had never seen a terrorist, it was like something out of a bad TV cop film...We hadn't trained for that," recalls Heinz Hohensinn, 63, a Munich policeman who was part of the assault team but whose previous experience was limited to tackling robbers and drug dealers.

"The fully fuelled plane was standing there ready to take off, as the terrorists demanded," he told Reuters.

"We were supposed to overwhelm the terrorists in the aircraft before it took off, but that was a short-term emergency plan and it was abandoned as too risky because the leader had a hand grenade and we would all have been blown up with the plane. Then the shooting started..."

All the hostages were killed in the carnage, along with a German policeman and five of the kidnappers.

Security analyst Rolf Tophoven said Germany's desire to present a friendly face to the world at Munich -- in contrast to the Nazi-hosted Olympics in Berlin 36 years earlier -- was partly to blame for the lack of preparedness.

"The trauma of the Hitler Olympiad was in the minds of the German organisers...Security was low-profile in Munich because no one wanted to stir memories of German police and armed troops in 1936," he said.

Another generation on, and with the U.S.-led war on terrorism nearly five years old, German security is forewarned, better equipped and confident it can throw a great sporting party for the world.

"The training, weapons and technical equipment are all very different today...There's a lot more understanding of security and controls. The hospitality won't be dampened if the security is cranked up," Hohensinn said.

Officials believe they can show off their country as a fun-loving, welcoming host and keep the tournament safe without smothering it with security.

"We have our tournament motto -- "A Time to Make Friends" -- and that means above all that sportsmen and fans from all over the world will feel safe," Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said this week. "We need security for a joyful and happy World Cup."