(27).
What happened to Kammler? This was the most knowledgeable of all
the German technical people. Even Albert Speer, German Minister
of Munitions, admitted under Allied interrogation, that Kammler
was the expert in the area of V-weapons development. This was no
small admission for Speer. With the cessation of hostilities in
Europe, Kammler simply waltzed off the pages of history, never to
be seen or heard from again. Why, then, was there no post-war
manhunt for Kammler? What are we missing here?
Tom Agoston recounts the stories of Kammler's death (28). There
are five in all. They all read like pulp fiction. None are even
remotely believable. As proof of this, no serious investigation
was ever done into any of these stories by any of the Allied
Powers. But equally shocking is the fact that Kammler was
ignored by the "Nazi Hunter" aficionados. A quick call to the
Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles revealed that they were
not looking for Kammler and have never looked for Kammler even
though they fully agreed that the stories of his death stretched
credulity. This, in spite of the fact that it was Kammler who
was responsible for the many slave-labor camps, including Dora
and S-3, where many inmates died working for the SS.
There is a sixth possible story for Kammler's demise.
Could not the answer to this enigma be found in a practice
commonly given to criminals in the USA, that of the "witness
protection program"? Was Kammler given a new identity in
exchange for his knowledge and knowledge of where the treasuretrove of SS technical information was stored? Actually, any
country in the world at the time would have made Kammler this
deal in a second. He was simply too technologically valuable to
loose or to involve in a showcase criminal trial. A new identity
was the best way out of his problems.
One thing is striking concerning the technological history of the
Twentieth Century. The preponderance of that century's
technology has its roots in the 1940s. The technology we use and
take for granted today was invented or developed to the
utilitarian degree during this time frame. These technological
roots sink most deeply into Nazi Germany. In support of this
argument, there is a laundry list too long to fully recount. It
ranges from synthetic materials such as plastics and artificial
rubber to metallurgy. It included the host of technologies which
gave us the jet engine, rockets and so access to space travel.
It includes atomic power. It also includes early semi-conductor
research upon which our modern computer-based research, economy
and communications are built. Technically speaking, we are still
living off the Caracas of the Third Reich. Yet, still, to this
day, much of that German technology remains veiled. Counted
among this still-veiled technology are the German flying discs.
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