Wonder weapons in World War II

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The term miracle weapon was used by Nazi propaganda during the Second World War . Generally speaking, it describes a weapon that is intended to give a party an unexpected, surprising advantage in a weapon-based conflict. The propaganda effect is just as important as the progress in weapons technology. In a narrower sense, the inventions of researchers of the German Reich during the Second World War are meant, which were supposed to prevent the looming defeat of Germany. During the Second World War the term secret weapon or weapon of retaliation was also often usedused. The exaggerated propaganda associated with the wonder weapons continues to have an impact today (see also Reichsflugscheibe ). These views belong in the realm of modern sagas and conspiracy theories ; they are used as an interpretation of (actually and supposedly) inexplicable phenomena and in right-wing extremist discourses of superiority.

As early as the First World War , the German media dubbed the Dicke Bertha (M device) as a miracle weapon. The Paris gun was comparable .

Technical, propaganda and ideological aspects

The origins of the conception of the technical superiority of National Socialist Germany go back to the war period (WW I) and even further back. The German level of technology and research was recognized to be high in the second half of the 19th century; Germany quickly narrowed its gap to Great Britain (see Made in Germany ). The artillery guns, which were superior at the time, made a significant contribution to the rapid German victory in the war of 1870/71 : Alfred Krupp's steel breech- loading guns ( artillery ) had a range of over four kilometers, more than twice the range of the French guns of the time. The newest of these guns at the time was called the C / 64/67 ; it had numerous advantages. The Battle of Sedan in particular showed that a high rate of fire (up to ten rounds per minute) combined with a long range and good hit performance produced a devastating effect. The caliber 8 cm could shoot a maximum of 3450 m.

From 1933 the effects of the National Socialist armaments policy and war propaganda played an essential role. The provisions of the Versailles Treaty had the effect that the German arsenal largely dissolved after 1918 and until 1933 was rebuilt ; as a result, it was overall more modern compared to the stocks of the Allied war opponents - at least at the beginning of the military conflict. The German warfare also relied more on broad armament instead of deep armor, with the effect that weapons research was given high priority and new developments were used at an increased rate instead of standardized weapons production. The technical leaps that were actually achieved were propagandized in rocket technology and aviation ( jet engines , flying wings ), as well as in the areas of armored and submarine construction (snorkeling technology, screw noise insulation), especially towards the end of the war, under the impression of impending defeat by means of perseverance slogans inflated in the sense that so-called miracle weapons were promised. The combination of the words “miracle” and “weapon” refers to the remarkable contrast between the “high tech” on the application side and the conspicuous rejection of established science ( German physics , world ice theory ) and the tendency towards a mystical worldview ( ariosophy , ancestral heritage ) in the National Socialist Elite.

On the Allied side there were some reports of inexplicable phenomena ( Foo-Fighters ) during the war , which gave the appearance of a secret and advanced German weapon technology. After 1945, on the one hand, documents and various well-developed weapons systems or weapons systems that were just being tested fell into Allied hands. These sometimes surprising finds came to the public and, enriched with speculations about their readiness for use and possibilities, conveyed the image of a far-reaching technical superiority of Germany due to the concealment of own allied developments and projects. The intensive search for German scientists and their internment (USA: Operation Overcast ; similar action by the USSR / Red Army) as well as the self-styling of German nuclear scientists as secret saboteurs on their own “ uranium project ” helped to underpin the impression that had already arisen that it had in Germany has given immense and untapped potential for weapons development. The actually great and omnipresent influence of German scientists, engineers and technicians and their preliminary work on military technology in the first post-war decade was particularly evident in the American and Soviet aircraft and missile construction, which resulted in similar products.

Reception and media differentiation

The knowledge about the further use of German armaments technology in secret military projects and about the partly forced, partly tendered transfer of German scientists to post-war research by the two later superpowers (the best-known example of this is the American space program and Wernher von Braun ) gained momentum by making various assumptions effective in the media were employed by the weapons technology of National Socialist Germany. The most recent example is the controversy over an atomic bomb allegedly tested in Thuringia shortly before the end of the war . Especially in the case of UFO phenomena, however, there is constant speculation about whether this is a further development of an anti - gravity technique that has already been used in the so-called Reichsflugscheibe, which has been kept secret from the public . Assertions of this kind can be found among conspiracy theorists, but also right-wing extremists (there often still in connection with the "Sanctuary of Neuschwabenland " and ariosophical theories), for which the pseudoscientific proximity of technology and mysticism , which was already established under National Socialism, has proven to be particularly fertile ground. In this context, the Vril Society should be mentioned in particular , a secret society that has not been historically documented but was postulated in the circles of right-wing esotericism . This is said to have been involved in the rise of National Socialism and by researching supernatural forces or so-called "free energy" helped to develop the "Reich flying disks".

The concept of miracle weapons or a highly advanced technology in National Socialist Germany has also found a permanent place in the entertainment industry as a modern legend : As early as 1947, the science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein wrote the short story Rocket Ship Galileo about a Nazi moon base (a Idea that was combined with a superhero story in the 1990 Cinemaware computer game Rocket Ranger ); the flying disk of the popular Hollywood UFO (e.g. in Mars Attacks ) rotating around its center is said to be based on German war designs; Dr. Strange , the chief scientist of the US President in the film of the same name by Stanley Kubrick , speaks in the original with a German accent and turns out to be a Nazi. In the film / comic Hellboy (in connection with occult acts, compare also parts 1 and 3 of the Indiana Jones trilogy) or in the film Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow as well as in computer games such as Return to Castle Wolfenstein the “Nazi Technology ”with its counterpart“ Nazi mysticism ”as a derivative of an already pop-cultural phenomenon.

With the 2012 film Iron Sky , pop culture received another media product related to Nazi technology. While Nazi mysticism is not part of the film world, both Reichsflugplatten and a Nazi moon base appear in it .

overview

Missiles
V2 replica in Peenemünde
Air defense

In the hunter emergency program , various unconventional concepts were devised using the most primitive means. Various types of anti-aircraft missiles were under development.

Guns
  • Cannon V3 , a high pressure cannon. The cannon was built underground in occupied France and was intended to fire projectiles into England (destroyed by British bombing shortly before completion).

See also

literature

  • Rudolf Lusar: The German weapons and secret weapons of the 2nd World War and their further development. JF Lehmanns, Munich 1956.
  • Fritz Hahn: Weapons and Secret Weapons of the German Army 1933–1945. Bernard & Graefe, Koblenz 1986. ISBN 3-89555-128-7 .
  • Ralf Schabel: The illusion of miracle weapons. The role of jet planes and anti-aircraft missiles in the armaments policy of the Third Reich. Oldenbourg, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-486-55965-6 , ISBN, ( contributions to military history 35), (at the same time: Augsburg, University, dissertation 1989), (short discussion) .
  • Justo Miranda, Paula Mercado: The secret miracle weapons of the III. Rich. The German rocket and rocket aircraft projects 1934–1945. Airplane publications, Illertissen 1995, ISBN 3-927132-25-X , ( airplane documentation 5).
  • Uli Jungbluth : Hitler's secret weapons in the Westerwald. For the use of V-weapons towards the end of the Second World War. V 1, 2, 3. Westerwald history and culture workshop , Montabaur 1996, ( workshop contributions to Westerwald 2, ZDB -ID 2288365-4 )
  • Jürgen Michels: Peenemünde and its heirs in East and West. Development and way of German secret weapons. Bernard & Graefe, Bonn 1997. ISBN 3-7637-5960-3 .
  • Heinz Dieter Hölsken: The V weapons. Emergence propaganda war effort. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart 1984, ISBN 3-421-06197-1 .

Filmography

  • Hitler's secret weapons: attack on America. Documentation, 45 min., Script and direction: Christoph Weber, production: SWR , first broadcast: June 13, 2005, summary of the SWR
  • Hitler's secret weapons: missiles for the victors. Documentation, 45 min., Script and direction: Christine Greiner, production: SWR, first broadcast: June 20, 2005, summary of the SWR
  • The myth of “miracle weapons”. Technology in the service of dictatorship. Documentation, Germany, 45 min., 2007, production: ZDF , series: History, first broadcast: December 30, 2007, table of contents by ZDF

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ulli Kulke : "Big Bertha", Germany's first miracle weapon. March 17, 2014, archived from the original on May 2, 2014 ; accessed on May 2, 2014 .
  2. ↑ - ( Memento from May 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Giant guns as wonder weapons.
  3. ↑ Ralf Schabel : The illusion of miracle weapons: the role of jet planes and anti-aircraft missiles in the armaments industry of the Third Reich. Oldenbourg, Munich 1993, ISBN 3-486-55965-6 .
  4. ^ Brigitte Hamann : Hitler's Vienna: Apprenticeship years of a dictator. Piper, Munich / Zurich 1996, ISBN 3-492-03598-1 , chap. Racial theorist and explainer of the world.
  5. ↑ As an example: Gary Hyland , Anthony Gill : Last talons of the eagle: secret Nazi technology which could have changed the course of World War II. Headline, London 1998, ISBN 0-7472-2156-1 .
  6. ^ Rainer Karlsch : Hitler's bomb: the secret history of the German nuclear weapons tests. Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-421-05809-1 .
  7. ↑ As an example: Karl-Heinz Zunneck : secret technologies, miracle weapons and the earthly facets of the UFO phenomenon: 50 years of disinformation and the consequences. Kopp Verlag , Rottenburg 2004. ISBN 3-930219-86-7 .
  8. ↑ In German translation: Robert A. Heinlein: Destination: Moon. Bastei Lübbe, Bergisch Gladbach 2001, ISBN 3-404-24293-9 .
  9. ↑ Burkhard Schröder : Nazis are pop. Espresso Verlag, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-88520-779-6 .