‘What happened?’ Stanford asked.
‘It crashed years ago,’ the German said. ‘The natives thought it was a gift from the gods, so they dragged it in here.’
‘Was there anyone in it?’
‘I think so. I assume so. But there’s no way to open it up – and now the snakes keep us out of there.’
Stanford’s heart was pounding. The sublime machine mesmerized him. He saw the intertwined, sleeping snakes on the dusty dome, still and silent, together forming a protective, deadly tapestry. Stanford felt himself shaking. He couldn’t bear it any longer. He stepped forward, intending to walk to the saucer, determined to touch it.
A single shot rang. The bullet ricocheted off the saucer. Stanford gasped and stepped back and turned around and saw the men looking at him. Frozen in crimson light, they looked hazy and unreal. The tall German had a pistol in his hand and was waving it gently.
‘Don’t do that,’ he said. ‘Don’t try to touch it. If you do, you’ll soon be a dead man.’
Stanford looked at the saucer. His flesh crawled at what he saw. The snakes were all awake, slithering through one another, wrapped themselves around the dome, dangling over the edges, hissing and spitting and sliding along the smooth, seamless surface. Stanford shook even more, exhaustion finally claiming him. He stood there in the clearing, the dust billowing about him, staring through the swimming crimson haze at the snakes on the saucer.
‘Your proof,’ the German said. ‘Now I talk.’
Chapter Thirty-One
‘Let me begin at the beginning. In 1933, when Hitler took power, the greater part of German science was totally subordinated to the creation of new military weapons. Thus, by 1935, research on rockets and other forms of aerial warfare had advanced by spectacular leaps. Now, the common assumption is that most of that work was being done by Walter Dornberger, Karl Becker, Klaus Reidel, Helmut Grottrup and Wernher von Braun, but such was not in fact the case. Most of the fame attached to those gentlemen resides in the fact that they all worked on the V-1 and V-2 rockets,, that the majority of them went to America after the war, and that once in America they became even more well known for their NASA work on space exploration. Sehr gut. However, the real pioneer of Germany’s World War Two achievements was the American, Wilson.
‘In 1935 most of the German rocket research was being undertaken at the experimental stations in Reinickendorf and Kummersdorft West, not far from Berlin. It was to Kummersdorft West, where I was then scientific administrator, that Himmler personally came to introduce Wilson. And what really astonished me, apart from the fact that Wilson was an American, was the extent of the powers that Himmler intended giving him.
‘By the middle of 1935 it had been decided that the Reinickendorf and Kummersdorft research centers were no longer big enough to house the rocket projects. That same year, Wernher von Braun had suggested using an island in the Baltic, named Usedom; this island was situated close to Szczecin at the mouth of the Oder River, and it was densely wooded, sparsely inhabited and relatively isolated. It was therefore decided to move the two research centers to the northern promontory of Usedom, near to the small village of Peenemüde… And this mysterious man, Wilson, this stranger from America, was to take over Kummersdorft West when the rocket teams left.
‘It was an unusual situation, but not as impossible as it might at first seem. While Germany was now a nation under constant surveillance, that surveillance was carried out by the Gestapo and the SS, and those organizations were strictly controlled by Himmler. Himmler’s SS were unique, a law unto themselves; they answered neither to Hitler nor to the German High Command, but only to their beloved Reichsführer, their demigod, Heinrich Himmler. In fact, Himmler controlled Germany. He did it quietly and surreptitiously. He quietly took over schools, universities and factories, and soon he had his own research centers scattered all over Germany. Thus Himmler controlled Germany – he controlled the flow of information – and his projects were shrouded in a secrecy that would never be broken.
‘Wilson’s project was such a secret. It was known only to a few. His research centers were filled with meticulously chosen technicians and constantly patrolled by the SS. He was a genius, almost certainly. I don’t doubt it at all. He was cold and brilliant and relentless – and nearly inhuman. His sole passion was science, his knowledge beyond belief, and he rarely discussed anything but his work and the need to complete it. That’s why he was in Germany. Only Germany could meet his needs. He had limitless facilities and slave labor and Himmler’s personal support. That’s what he wanted. He didn’t care about anything else. He needed money and muscle, and he didn’t give a damn where they came from.
‘So! Given carte blanche by Himmler, Wilson quickly strengthened his project: pulling in other departments, utilizing other research centers, and stealing more technicians wherever he found them, working through the SS. Now while this had many advantages, unfortunately it also meant that Wilson was forced to take on some engineers whom he didn’t really care for all that much. Included in these were the German scientists, Habermohl and Miethe, the aging Italian, Dr Belluzzo, and the ambitious Luftwaffe engineer, Rudolph Schriever. Most of those men were actually there to watch Wilson, and their presence around his project really annoyed him. He therefore kept them busy by letting them work on various designs, which they could then forward at regular intervals to Himmler. Few of the designs were worth the papers they were drawn on, but they kept Himmler happy, soothed the vanity of his four supposed innovators, and enabled Wilson to get on with the real work without too much interference.
‘Determined that his project should be the most advanced then in existence, Wilson traveled all over Germany, visiting the other research centers, and utilizing any innovation that could enhance the possibilities of his own project.
‘At this point you must understand that while it is true that the German scientists as a whole were then working on some remarkable innovations, it is equally true that their separate projects were rarely coordinated. So great were the rewards in Nazi Germany, and so terrible the penalties, that even formerly cooperative scientists were reduced to seeking favor by competing ferociously with one another. In this sense, the Peenemünde situation was typical: while we had the cream of our rocket engineers working on the V-1 and V-2 rockets at Peenemünde, the V-1 wasa Luftwaffe project, the V-2 was an Army project, and both sides competed with one another instead of putting their heads together. Similarly, while various establishments scattered all over Germany and Austria were working separately on gas turbines and jet propulsion, heat resistant and porous metals, and gyroscopic mechanisms and boundary layer-defeating airfoils, it was not until the arrival of the relentless Wilson that someone had the sense to link these innovations together in one astonishing, revolutionary aircraft. Wilson did that – he combined the cream of German innovations – and in five years he had completed the prototype of his first flying saucer.
‘Now, Himmler was excited by the possibilities of the flying saucer, but he never mentioned the saucer to Adolf Hitler. Indeed, the only thing der Führer knew about Kummersdorft West was that it was only one of many aeronautical research centers and that it was probably engaged in producing conventional aircraft. Regarding technological matters, Hitler knew very little, since he expected Himmler to keep him informed. That was a mistake. Himmler kept a lot to himself. So Hitler knew about Peenemünde, about the V-1 and V-2 rockets, but otherwise he only heard about “secret” weapons that were still being processed.
‘Himmler had good reason for his secrecy. Back in 1938, Hitler, anxious for a foothold in the Antarctic, had sent an expedition commanded by Captain Alfred Richter to the coast due south of South Africa. Daily for three weeks two seaplanes were catapulted from the deck of the German aircraft carrier, Schwabenland, with orders to fly back and forth across the territory that Norwegian explorers had named Queen Maud Land. The Germans made a far more thorough study of the area than the Norwegians had don
e – believed to be the most extensive aerial study undertaken up to that time – finding vast regions that were surprisingly free of ice. Their airplanes covered two hundred and thirty thousand square miles in all, photographing almost half of the area. They also dropped several thousand metal poles, each marked with the swastika and pointed at the tip so that the poles would dig into the ice and remain upright. This job done, they renamed the whole area Neuschwabenland and then claimed it as part of the Third Reich.
‘From that moment on, men and equipment were shipped regularly to Neuschwabenland for the purpose of building a secret underground military base. Most of the men were either specially trained SS troopers or slave workers from the concentration camps. Now, while Hitler was aware of the fact that Himmler was shipping his men to the Antarctic, he thought of it as a purely military endeavour. As far as der Führer was concerned, the secret base in Antarctica, being constructed underground, was merely an SS training base designed to acclimatize scientists and soldiers to those rigorous conditions in preparation for explorations after the war. However, the truth is that Himmler was pursuing a dream that did not include Hitler, would supersede the Third Reich, and would place Himmler up there with the immortals as the Lord of Atlantis.
‘Let me clarify this. Himmler’s obsessions were numerous, bizarre and totally mad: sorcery, mesmerizm, clairvoyance, reincarnation, faith healing, Lemuria, Atlantis, the mystic strength of the Volk. Himmler also believed absolutely in Horbiger’s fanciful doctrine of Eternal Ice – that a world of ice was the natural habitat of Nordic men – and he therefore also believed that a return to such a world would lead to men who were like gods. It was because of this dream that Himmler, when he was given the task of organizing the SS, did not envisage it as a normal police force but as a real religious order devoted to the creation of the perfect man. Indeed, right from the start it was his intention to eventually isolate the “élite” of the SS from the world of ordinary men for the rest of their lives. It was also his intention to create special colonies of the “élite” all over the world, answerable only to the administration and authority of Himmler’s New Order.
‘For this, the first step was the creation of special schools in the mountains of Bavaria where the SS élite were indoctrinated in Himmler’s ideals and firmly convinced that they were the unique new men “far finer and more valuable than the world has yet seen.” The second step was the creation of the Ahnenerbe – the Institute for Research into Heredity – whose function was to finance and publish Germanic researches and to supervise the so-called “anthropological” medical experiments in hellholes like Auschwitz and Dachau. The third step was to eliminate the Jews from the face of the Earth, and to transport all subhumans – the Poles, Czechs and Slavs – to the numerous concentration camps and keep them there, generation after generation, as slaves to the Reich. And the fourth and most important step was the Lebensborn – Spring of Life – which would, through the controlled mating of élite SS men and pure Aryan women, breed out the “imperfect” German types within one hundred years.
‘A world of ice and fire: the Antarctic and the SS. This dream obsessed Himmler night and day and then became a reality. He had his colony: the Antarctic. He had his masters: the SS. He would send his slaves to the Antarctic, use them for labor and as medical or surgical guinea pigs, and in time, with scientific application, the Superman would be born.
‘You do not believe, Herr Stanford? You do not think it possible? Then think of the Ahnenerbe and the Lebensborn, of the medical experiments and controlled breeding, of Belsen and Buchenwald and the SS torture chambers, of the millions who were processed like battery hens and emerged as warm ash. The concentration camps were no accidents. They indulged in imitative rites. They were the prototypes for the social order of the future: that world of masters and slaves… And think again, Herr Stanford, of the Lebensborn. Apart from arranging matings between the SS élite and fine blonde ladies and adopting “racially suitable” children for childless parents, the Lebensborn also abducted thousands of “suitable” children from the occupied territories and had them raised in special SS institutions… And a lot of those children – indeed, thousands of those children – simply disappeared from the face of the Earth.
‘So, it was Himmler. Hitler never knew about it. Himmler wanted his secret colony, he wanted his world of ice and fire, and he wanted the extraordinary flying saucer for his future protection. Thus it was that by 1943 more concentration camp prisoners and children abducted by the Lebensborn were being shipped to the Antarctic, and that a lot of valuable equipment, including components for the flying saucer, were disappearing via the South Atlantic route in SS controlled submarines.
‘Alas, Himmler’s dream then collapsed. By that time it was clear to most of us that the war would eventually be lost. This awareness put Hitler in a panic, made him yearn more desperately for some extraordinary new weapons, and finally encouraged him to look fondly at the V-1 and V-2 rocket projects. Then, after the August 17 bombing of the Peenemünde research centers, Hammler persuaded Hitler to hand the whole project over to the safekeeping of the SS. A month later, on September 3, 1943, SS General Hans Kammler was put in charge of the transfer of most of the Peenemünde development works – not including Wernher von Braun – to caves in the mountains near the Traunsee in Austria, and mass production of the rockets to the underground factory in Nordhausen in the Harz Mountains. This effectively gave Himmler a new pet project and distracted him from Wilson.
‘By early 1944, Wilson, now working at the BMW Platz near Prague, had replaced his original flying saucer’s turboprop propulsion system with a new, highly advanced jet propulsion system, thus completing the first truly operative machine. It was Wilson’s intention to test-fly the machine as soon as possible, but increasingly darker thoughts about Himmler put him off this idea.
‘Bear this in mind about Wilson: As a child in America he had, like our own Wernher von Braun, been obsessed with the potential of space flight. A genius himself, he had secretly worked with the genius Goddard, and had observed how that gentleman was mistreated by his own country. Because of this – and because of his bad experience in Iowa – Wilson was obsessed with the need to avoid a similar fate and find absolute freedom regarding his work. That freedom was to be found in the Antarctic. It was to be found in a master and slave society. And Wilson wanted that society to succeed more than anything else.
‘By 1943, however, it was Wilson’s belief that Himmler was basically insane, that he would eventually fall apart, and that he would then represent a threat to Wilson’s plans for escaping. Knowing that this view was shared by a few other high-ranking officers, Wilson waited until the time was ripe – when the forthcoming defeat was evident – and then approached them with a separate escape plan. One of those officers was myself, another was SS General Hans Kammler, and a third was SS General Artur Nebe, a very secretive man. It being that both Kammler and I had been directly responsible for the utilization of slave labor, and that Nebe had been in the Gestapo and had also headed an extermination squad in Russia, we were all well aware of what our fate would be should the Allies get hold of us. Needless to say, we fell in with Wilson’s plan.
‘The crux of the plan was to make Himmler forget our project and turn his attention elsewhere. Consequently, Wilson started to lie about his project and submit incomplete drawings to Himmler and one of his favored engineers, namely Flugkapitän Schriever. While never going far enough to make Himmler suspicious, Wilson nevertheless understated the actual progress being made and told Himmler of bad setbacks, involving labor and equipment, that never for one minute existed. This worried Himmler – like Hitler, he desperately wanted an extraordinary new weapon – and as anticipated, he turned away from Wilson and looked elsewhere.
‘This brings me back to Wilson’s unwanted associates, particularly Flugkapitän Rudolph Schriever. Now remember that it was mostly the unworkable drawings of Schriever that had been passed on to Himmler
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� not the more advanced Wilson drawings. Therefore, in accordance with Wilson’s plan, Hans Kammler, shortly after the Allied invasion of Europe, intimated to Himmler that the Schriever drawings were more advanced, that Wilson was maliciously holding Schriever back, and that Schriever should be given his own research facility and allowed to continue with his work without further interference. Kammler also suggested that because of the terrible bombing raids over Berlin and its surrounding areas – and because of the successful Allied invasion – the research center at Kummersdorft West should be evacuated to a more inaccessible, secret area. He suggested that Wilson’s project be moved to Kahla in the mountains of Thuringia, and that Schriever’s new project be located in a desolate area of Mahren. Himmler agreed to this.
‘On June 22, 1944, shortly after having fitted his saucer with jet propulsion, Wilson moved from Kummersdorft West to Thuringia. A week later, with Schriever in charge, the remaining staff of Kummersdorft West were moved to a secret location in Mahren. Thus, while Schriever’s progress could be watched closely by Himmler, Wilson could complete the genuine flying saucer under the protection of Hans Kammler and myself.
‘What we now needed was a tightly controlled escape route that would take us from Kahla to Kiel in the Baltic. The best man for such a task was clearly Artur Nebe, an SS general with a keen sense of survival and sound training in all kinds of intrigue. Unfortunately, while Nebe had once been one of the most favored of the SS, he was now under suspicion from those closest to Hitler and knew that he was being watched all the time. Nebe had to disappear – he would have to work in anonymity – and his chance came on July 20, 1944, after the attempted assassination of Hitler.
‘That assassination attempt led to the most terrible reprisals, and many of our officers, in fear for their lives, fled and then disappeared for good. One such officer was General Nebe. He had a lot of fanatical followers. Nebe fled straight to Kahla, took a lot of his men with him, and those men organized the escape route from Kahla to Kiel. Thus it was that by early 1945 important men and materials were being quietly moved from the research complex in Thuringia to sympathetic submarines and ships in Kiel harbor on the Baltic Sea – the moves officially authorized by favored SS General Hans Kammler and tightly controlled by the anonymous General Nebe and his other “missing” SS men.
GENESIS (Projekt Saucer) Page 54
