When most people think about racial persecution and genocide during the Nazi regime, the Holocaust is usually the first thing on everyone’s mind. Although it’s true that the Jews endured horrible atrocities, they were not the only ones to suffer under Adolf Hitler’s twisted ideas of racial superiority.

The population of African people living in Germany was relatively small compared to the Jews, but the Africans weren’t spared when the Nazis decided to rid the world of anyone who did not fit their Aryan ideal. The stories of the Africans who lost their lives before, during, and after the war—as well as those who survived—are often forgotten. We believe those stories need to be told.

10 The Death Camps

Years before the Nazis came to power, the German army was methodically killing off Africans in a racially motivated genocide. When Germany colonized South West Africa, they created a death camp in what is now known as modern-day Namibia.

In 1904, General Lothar von Trotha gave the order that all native Herero people needed to be exterminated to make space for German colonists. He specifically ordered that the soldiers show no mercy to women and children. In just three years, the Germans killed thousands of people, wiping out approximately 80 percent of the Herero tribe and 50 percent of the Nama tribe.

A total of five different concentration camps were located in Namibia on Shark Island. It earned the nickname “Skeleton Coast” because of the mass graves that are still there. One missionary described a scene of an African woman lying on the ground and wasting away. When she asked for water from fellow prisoners, a German soldier shot her five times, outraged that she would have the audacity to ask for anything.^[1]

The soldiers were so proud of their “conquest” that they would have friends document the experience by taking photos of the soldiers surrounded by starving African prisoners. Then the pictures were turned into postcards to send back home. Some postcards even had pornographic images of German soldiers raping African women.

A man named Dr. Bofinger living in Namibia conducted experiments on the cadavers of these prisoners. He was known for decapitating the victims, preserving the heads, and sending them back to scientists living in Germany. At the time, Adolf Hitler was a young child, and none of these horrific crimes were actually associated with the Nazis.

9 Propaganda

Propaganda played a huge role in influencing the German people’s perspectives of Africans. The vast majority of Germans had no idea what went on in the African colonies. Propaganda was spreading about the friendship between Africa and Germany.

One propaganda poster shows a German woman with her arm around an African woman, claiming that there was no longer any “racial pride” in Germany. The government wanted to encourage citizens to move to all-German colonies in Africa, but the authorities couldn’t convince people to move unless it seemed like an appealing prospect.

After World War I, Germany lost their African colonies to the Allies. Before and after World War I, Germany was losing thousands of people who immigrated to the United States due to rampant unemployment and poverty.^[2]

After the rise of the Third Reich in the 1930s, German filmmakers created movies to glorify the history of German colonization in South West Africa. One of the Nazi’s long-term goals was to regain their African colonies and spread the Aryan race all over the world. They wanted people to get excited by the idea through these films.

8 The Rhineland Bastards

After World War I, the Treaty of Versailles was signed in 1919. Allied troops were stationed in the area of western Germany known as the Rhineland. Many of these troops were black men from the French colonies in Africa.

Hundreds of German women ended up becoming pregnant with the babies of these African soldiers, giving birth to the first significant population of multiracial children Germany had ever seen. These children were nicknamed the “Rhineland bastards.”^[3]

The public was outraged. Propaganda began spreading about women falling victim to black men. One illustration titled “Jumbo” showed a Godzilla-sized naked black soldier holding nearly a dozen German damsels in distress. A metal coin was even minted with the image of a white woman being shackled to a gigantic penis on one side and the image of a black soldier on the other side.

The German public was taught to believe that these women had been raped by the African soldiers, although only one woman out of hundreds of mothers ever made that claim. Those who knew that the sex was consensual tried to paint the black men as oversexed predators and the women as demented.

Therefore, their offspring were not worthy. In Hitler’s Mein Kampf, he blamed the Jews for bringing black men into Germany, saying that it was all part of their plan to soil the pure blood of the Aryan race.

7 Rassenschande

Nazi Germany strongly pushed the idea of Rassenschande, which translates roughly to “racial pollution.” The Nuremberg Laws of 1935 prevented Aryans from having sexual relations with or marrying non-Aryan people.

Most people remember this rule as it applied to the Jews, but of course, it also extended to Afro-German people. German citizens had to undergo medical examinations to get an Aryan certificate to prove that they were “pure-blooded.”

Publications around that time claimed that the Allies introducing African soldiers into Germany was itself an attack on the German population. The Nazis claimed that they were victims of the outside world trying to force racial integration. If they allowed Africans to defile their bloodline, it would mean the end of the German race as they knew it.

Though Germany once had diplomatic ties within Africa and wanted to eventually colonize it again someday, they strongly believed that black people belonged in Africa and nowhere else.^[4]

6 Murder And Sterilization

An anthropologist named Dr. Wolfgang Abel ran tests on Afro-Germans and Asian Germans and claimed that many of the children were aggressive, psychotic, and “genetically inferior” to Aryan children. He also claimed that the German mothers who gave birth to them were corrupted after being a sort of alien vessel.

In 1937, the Gestapo was ordered to round up any black people they could find. Many of these blacks were killed, sent off to be sterilized, or used in scientific experiments. Non-German black people who happened to be in Germany at the time were also killed or imprisoned rather than being allowed to return to their home countries.

During Nazi Germany, any person who was considered to carry undesirable DNA was sterilized, which prevented them from having children of their own. There was an order that every single one of the Rhineland bastards must be sterilized. Over 400 sterilization procedures were recorded.^[5]

5 The Extraordinary Life Of Hans Massaquoi

Hans Massaquoi was one of the few black children who survived growing up in Nazi Germany. Hans wasn’t just any boy. He was a prince. Momolu Massaquoi, the king of the Vai tribe in Liberia, was working as a consul general in Germany. His son, Prince Al-Haj, fell in love with a German nurse named Bertha Baetz. She became pregnant with their son, Hans.

However, Al-Haj was a university student in Dublin and never returned to Germany. King Momolu helped to raise Hans at the consulate’s mansion for the first few years of his life. Then the king returned to Liberia. Bertha did not want to leave Germany, so she chose to raise Hans as a single mother in Hamburg and returned to working as a nurse.

When Hans was a child, he was bullied and harassed over the color of his skin. But he was intelligent and friendly, so he was able to make friends with people in his neighborhood. He desperately wanted to become part of the Hitler Youth because they got to wear “cool uniforms” and all his friends were doing it.

Hans was the only child who was left out, and he desperately wanted to fit in. He even got his babysitter to sew a swastika patch on his sweater to wear to school. His mother tried to stop it, but Hans continued to support the Nazis along with the other brainwashed children, not fully grasping what the Nazis were really like.

As he grew up, the war caused starvation and unemployment. As a black man, he was not allowed to work a job. Though he hated what the Nazis stood for, Hans tried to enlist in the German army. He was denied.

In 1948, his father finally stepped up and brought Hans to live in Liberia where he was treated like the prince he actually was. When he grew up, Hans became a journalist for magazines like Jet and Ebony.

Thankfully, Hans was spared the sterilization imposed on others like the Rhineland bastards, most likely because German officials shared with him that he could be useful if the Nazis ever regained control of their African colonies. Hans grew up, moved to the United States, got married, and had children.

Later, he wrote his autobiography, Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black In Nazi Germany, which was made into a movie in Germany.^[6] The entire film is available on YouTube.

4 Human Zoos

Theodor Wonja Michael’s parents were from a German colony in Cameroon. They were taught to believe that the “motherland” was a wonderful place, so they moved to Germany, believing that they could find a better life.

Once they arrived, they were horrified to learn that Africans were not allowed to be hired for normal jobs. Unfortunately, they didn’t have enough money to go back home to Cameroon. They all had to work as actors in a human zoo. They were called “People’s Shows,” where black actors dressed in grass skirts and sat in front of mud huts picking at a fire and pretending to act like savages.

These human zoos typically traveled with a circus. Many of them were set up inside actual German zoos, right next to the monkeys. The showrunners claimed that these were Africans who were recently captured from their homes and given a habitat just like where they came from, exactly like animals.

German people would watch, laugh, and mock these Africans, not knowing that many of them actually spoke German, too. Around 400 human zoos existed in Germany until the 1930s.^[7]

After the end of the Nazi regime, human zoos became a thing of the past—until 2005. The Augsburg Zoo in Germany set up a display of native African life, including mud huts, grass skirts, and tribal dance. They placed it with the baboon exhibit, which is exactly what happened during the Nazi era.

Considering that black people had been compared to wild beasts and baboons in Germany for years, it was a clearly racist exhibit. People were so outraged that the zoo began receiving threatening letters.

Protesters picketed the zoo until the display was removed. The Augsburg Zoo maintains that they were not trying to bring back “human zoos,” and they deny seeing any racist correlation.

3 The African Campaigns

History remembers the lives lost during the bombings of the Blitz in London and so many other attacks on civilians throughout Europe. Yet few memorials bring attention to the lives that were lost in Africa. Much of the fighting during World War II happened in the countries of North Africa between the European colonies, which kept the war far away from European civilians.^[8]

Similar to today’s wars, the battle was also waged over controlling oil supplies in the Middle East. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, roughly one million European soldiers died or were injured during the campaign in North Africa. Germany had control over Tunisia for a short time in 1942 and immediately set out to “neutralize civilians.”

The National WWII Museum has a chart of all the civilian casualties across the globe during World War II. Yet the countries of North Africa are suspiciously excluded.

Some may argue that the desert terrain where the battles took place was not highly populated, but civilian deaths in these countries were recorded elsewhere in biographies and personal accounts. Yet it seems as though no one stopped to recognize these people and keep track of the numbers.

2 Prisoners Of War

There is a code of honor that prisoners of war (POWs) should be left alive, even if only to be traded for the capturing country’s own soldiers. These prisoners are usually used for manual labor, extracting secrets, and as pawns against the enemy. As The Journal of American History points out, both the Axis and Allied powers were guilty of war crimes against POWs during World War II.

The Nazis had no qualms about killing the African soldiers who were fighting from the French colonies. In fact, the Germans probably saw this as revenge for the enemies’ “crimes” against the German women in Rhineland.

African prisoners of war were not allowed to set foot on German soil for fear that they would defile the purity of the German race. They were housed at prison camps called the Frontstalags in France. These prisoners came from Algeria, Tunisia, Southeast Asia, West India, Madagascar, and Morocco, just to name a few places.

Nonwhite prisoners were sent to the Frontstalags. Vintage photographs show that the prisoners were forced to live in flimsy handmade tents with virtually no protection from the cold.

In 1941, there were over 100,000 prisoners at the Frontstalags. By 1942, there were only 44,000 left. The prisoners were forced into hard labor, and tuberculosis spread rampantly among all the men, who were constantly in close proximity to one another. In 1943, Germany commanded the French government to take over guard duty for the prisoners at the Frontstalags.

Once the French were in charge of the people from their own colonies, they began to provide a “godmother” service where female volunteers would cook, read, educate, knit, and give religious sermons. Some of them fell in love with these prisoners of war, giving birth to mixed-race babies.

Unfortunately, even after the war was over, these men were not allowed to return home or marry the women with whom they had children. The men were still considered to be members of the French military and were regrouped to live in barracks.^[9]

1 After The War

When the war was over, soldiers from the United States occupied Germany, which resulted in the births of what Germans called Mischlingskinder (“brown babies”). The German media used these kids as an example of how much Germany had changed by accepting mixed-race children into their society. The media also said that within just 10–20 years, everyone had come to embrace all races.

Despite their portrayal, racist views were still very much alive and well after the war. The vast majority of mixed-race babies were abandoned in orphanages. One cover of Ebony magazine showed a picture of a black child with blue eyes. Under the picture was the caption: “Homes Needed For 10,000 Brown Orphans.”

In the 1950s, thousands of African-American families stepped up to adopt these kids. Still, many children were left unwanted and abused in German orphanages.^[10] A documentary filmmaker named Regina Griffin interviewed dozens of the now-adult Afro-Germans in a movie called Brown Babies: The Mischlingskinder Story. The documentary shares incredibly tragic stories of these children, including one boy whose caregiver at the orphanage tried to drown him.

Today, there are few black people living in Germany. The United Nations released an official warning in 2017 to black tourists that they should never go into certain areas of Germany if they don’t want to get killed. The UN is also investigating reports that teachers grade Afro-German children poorly in schools on purpose and that there is rampant job discrimination.

Shannon Quinn is a writer and entrepreneur. You can find her on Twitter.

When we think of the East side of the Cold War, many of us likely imagine KGB officers and discreet agents working out of Moscow. However, while often overlooked by comparison, the Stasi of East Germany (officially the State Security Service of the German Democratic Republic) was without a doubt one of the most brutal secret police agencies in recent history.

From imprisoning political opponents and closely watching every citizen of East Germany to sending “sleeper” agents to live secret lives in various places in the West, the Stasi remains an organization of deep interest to those who study such repressive groups.

Here are 10 things we learned about the Stasi’s activities after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War. These revelations show just how brutal and harsh an organization it really was. The Stasi was certainly on a par with equivalent agencies working out of Moscow.

10 Unconventional Methods For Successfully Fighting Crime

10 They Were Part Of One Of The Most Repressive Regimes In History

Without a doubt, the Stasi was a repressive secret police agency. They monitored each of their nation’s citizens closely and constantly. They also took decisive action against anyone who went against the accepted ideology. This even necessitated men keeping their hair a certain length. In some cases, people had to wear government-approved clothing.^[1]

What’s more, the Stasi was far from discreet about its actions. They often made it crystal clear that they were watching every citizen, especially the ones who had proven themselves to be “enemies” of the communist state.

The Stasi often used wiretaps and steamed open personal mail. In some cases, they drilled holes into the rooms of their citizens to spy directly on them.

Even more chilling for those living under the East German regime, it is thought that the Stasi had around 200,000 informants on their books. Each was willing—or forced—to keep close tabs on his neighbors and even his family.

9 The Stasi Files Conspiracy

At this point, it is probably worth examining how we gained knowledge about the Stasi. This is largely due to their secret files.

Following the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, high-ranking Stasi agents issued orders to destroy the mountain of paperwork at their headquarters. These files contained multiple things previously withheld from the public arena—including the names of informants, details of secret trials, and the Stasi’s dealings with the West.^[2]

The paper shredding occurred almost immediately. Although around 45 million pages were shredded, activists managed to storm the headquarters before all the files were destroyed. They discovered 600 million pieces of paper in over 15,000 bags. Many of the documents had been torn by hand to destroy as much as possible.

Initially, there was discussion of what to do with the files. However, two years after Germany reunified, it was decided that a special task force would be set up. Their job was to piece together the files, page by page, in order to make the revelations public. For as much as we now know of the Stasi’s activities, it is likely that a considerable amount was lost and will likely remain secret.

8 The Arrests Of Political Opponents

The Stasi especially kept close tabs on political opponents of the East German government. Although many people were arrested and imprisoned, most were interrogated and confined at Hohenschonhausen prison. As we might imagine, conditions were far from luxurious.

Decades later, one former political prisoner recounted how he had been locked in a “small cell” with small windows. These windows “only told you whether it was light or dark outside.” He regularly underwent brutal interrogations designed to mentally weaken him. Like all such prisoners, he was also forced to wear an “ill-fitting blue tracksuit” to further demoralize him.^[3]

All this was designed to mentally exhaust the political prisoners so that they would sign confessions. Most often, they were unaware of the charges of which they were accused and only found out on the day of their sentencing.

7 The Plan To ‘Rebrand’ The Stasi

As the 1980s wore on, it became clearer that the communist experiment was failing. In response, the East German authorities began to look at ways to “rebrand” the Ministry for State Security. They opted to become the Office for National Security.

In reality, this was a last attempt to hand the power of a unified Germany to the Stasi under another name. Legislation was even passed to allow this at roughly the same time that Stasi agents were destroying the files of their activities.^[4]

However, there was a huge public outcry at the potential move. Combined with the discovery of the destroyed files, this led to the move being blocked. Soon after, the Stasi was broken up.

It is an intriguing thought as to what might have happened if the attempted rebranding had succeeded. Perhaps we only need to look at the decades that have followed the breakup of the Soviet Union. To some, Russia is still a nation being led by the same dictatorship that ruled during the Cold War.

6 They Helped To Train Castro’s Cuban Communists

Although we might expect a kinship between two communist nations such as East Germany and Cuba, it still came as a shock when records revealed a much deeper relationship. It came to light that there was a more intricate connection between the Stasi and its Cuban equivalent, the Ministry of the Interior (MININT).

The discovery was made by a Cuban exile and one-time prisoner of the Stasi. He found that the Stasi had trained Cuban security officers to act with their population in the same way that the East German authorities did. This Cuban exile stated that MININT’s activities were “almost a copy” of the Stasi’s own brutal methods.^[5]

Much of this export of ideas took place during the 1970s and ’80s. It involved activities such as using LSD with interrogations, bugging the hotel rooms of tourists, and other security and spying methods. The Stasi also exported hardware and computers to make keeping tabs on Cuban citizens easier.

10 Real Honeypot Operations That Played Out Like Spy Thrillers

5 They Had ‘Sleeper’ Agents In The West For Years

We now know of Cold War activities on both sides of the divide. Perhaps it won’t come as a surprise to discover that the Stasi had “sleeper” agents planted in various places in the West. For all intents and purposes, these agents led normal Western lives and shared in the respective ideology.^[6]

They reported all the activities occurring in the West. In some cases, they even influenced these events. Many worked their way up to important positions in government or industry.

Perhaps the best example is the case of Gunter Guillaume. He managed to become the secretary of Willy Brandt, the West German chancellor.

Guillaume regularly reported to Stasi headquarters about Brandt’s activities. Guillaume also told of other goings-on inside the West German government. When he was discovered to be a Stasi agent, it led to Brandt’s public downfall.

4 The Disinformation About HIV/AIDS

Today, it is well established that disinformation is purposely released to the general public. This is often done by certain governments to influence public thinking.

Much the same was true with the Stasi when they had power. Perhaps one of the most outrageous claims came during the initial outbreak of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the early 1980s.^[7]

The mission—known as Operation INFEKTION—even involved the KGB. Aided by the Stasi, the KGB was the chief driver behind the propaganda. According to the main notion of this fake news, HIV/AIDS was created by the United States government as a biological weapon to target certain parts of the population. The creation supposedly took place at Fort Detrick in Maryland.

Although the claims were completely untrue, many millions of people—both in the East and the West—took them as fact. What’s more, these conspiracies persist in some circles today.

3 They Planned To Assist The Communists In North Vietnam

In 1972, when direct US involvement was nearing its end in the Vietnam War, it was revealed that the Stasi had been looking at ways to actively assist the North Vietnamese communists against the United States. Most of this support was to be intelligence training for the North Vietnamese troops. In reality, contact had been taking place between North Vietnam and East Germany since the late 1950s.^[8]

The plans were never fully realized. However, the Stasi managed to import intelligence procedures similar to the North Vietnamese mindset. In reality, the Vietnam War was a wider conflict of ideologies. Other communist nations also offered discreet support to the North Vietnamese communist regime.

2 The Sandoz Chemical Spill Conspiracy

Without a doubt, one of the most intriguing revelations about the Stasi’s activities are the claims of their involvement in the Sandoz chemical spill of 1986. Supposedly, this was an attempt to take the world’s attention away from the recent Chernobyl disaster. The claims surfaced shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall during a German television documentary.^[9]

It was stated that the Stasi was behind several “chemical accidents” along the River Rhine. A fire at the Sandoz factory got the most attention. The cause of the fire has still not been established.

The warehouse contained over 1,300 tons of agrochemical products when it ignited. The fire was the cause of huge environmental damage in the months that followed.

There is still debate as to whether the claims are accurate. The television program makers stated that their source was a former CIA agent.

1 They Made Active Attempts To Turn Western Nations Against Each Other

We have already mentioned how the Stasi was involved in disinformation missions regarding the HIV/AIDS outbreak. However, the organization was also active in attempts to turn Western nations against one another.

This was particularly true with the United States. Among Stasi agents, the relevant unit was known as Division X. Its only purpose was to provide information for smear campaigns. This could be photographs, state secrets, and even recordings of conversations.

Perhaps the best example occurred in 1975. Stasi agents secretly recorded talks between Helmut Kohl and Kurt Biedenkopf, two high-ranking West German politicians. The Stasi “leaked” the recording to the media while claiming that it had been made by US agents. It looked like the United States was secretly spying on allied nations.

Remarkably, West German citizens believed that the recording had been made by US intelligence. In part, this was due to increasing distrust of the United States throughout Europe at the time. It is arguably one of the most successful Stasi propaganda missions.^[10]

10 US Government Employees Who Defected To The Eastern Bloc

About The Author: Marcus Lowth—writer at Me Time For The Mind—https://www.metimeforthemind.com/
Me Time For The Mind on Facebook—https://www.facebook.com/MeTimeForTheMind/

There are very few areas of research and scientific discoveries that have not at some point interacted with immoral behaviour or politics. Indeed, more often than not in the 20th Century, discoveries were made in circumstances which would be classed as illegal or at the very least unethical today.

The question remains therefore, that if doctors, scientists, researchers or the everyday consumer utilise inventions that have been discovered unethically, are we not simply complicit in the past? Can the discoveries and research of certain people be completely separated from their actions?

10 Nazis Who Killed Themselves With Cyanide Suicide Capsules

10 Fanta

How did this zesty refreshing drink originate in the Third Reich?
With the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the United States formally entered WW2, and declared Nazi Germany an enemy. The Trading With the Enemy Act of 1917 was reinstated and the flow of Coca Cola syrup to German factories was halted.

Nonetheless, Max Keith, the German Coca Cola subsidiary manager at the time, was determined to continue trading. He decided to oversee the creation of an exclusively German soft drink; ridding it of its typically ‘American Dream’, patriotic branding.

Chemists concocted a new drink which was made from the leftovers of other food industries, such as fruit pulp and the by-product of cheese curdling. The flavour was similar to the Ginger Beer of today, and as one of the only soft drinks now available in Germany, Fanta soon became a household staple. As the Germans conquered more European territories, Max Keith continued to spread Fanta across the continent and saved other Coca Cola subsidiaries from collapse.

Once the Allies finally defeated Nazi Germany, the production of Fanta ceased and Keith handed over Fanta’s profits to the Coca Cola headquarters in Atlanta.^[1]

9 The Hunger Disease Study of the Warsaw Ghetto

There is evidence and testimony of senior Gestapo personnel deciding that those residing in the Warsaw Ghetto would be murdered via starvation. According to their calculations, low-calorie food rationing would take nine months for everyone in the ghetto to die.

The hunger gave rise to cannibalism, violence and a lethal black market. A combination of starvation and disease led to thousands of deaths. In 1942 Dr Israel Milezkowski, decided to conduct a study of the physiology and pathology of the starving ghetto prisoners.

Dr Israel wanted to understand how hunger disease could be cured, whilst Dr Julian Fliederbaum aimed to conduct a study on hunger that would have scientific validity and consequently set up a research platform.

The study was divided into several sections with topics including blood circulation, aspects of starvation in children and more. The research project had over 100 participants and was conducted on an enormous scale. Women were used to smuggle medical equipment into the ghetto, and some of the finest medical minds of Europe worked collectively to study what happens to the energy usage of a person who loses weight- something which is still studied today.

The Jewish physicians themselves were hungry and endangering their lives, as it was prohibited for Jews to carry out research. These physicians did the research not in the knowledge that they could save themselves, but instead in the hopes of advancing medical research.

The physicians’ most important conclusion was that the rehabilitation process from starvation must be gradual, and if this knowledge had been made public at the time, thousands of liberated lives could’ve been saved at the end of the war.

The only way to arrive to these findings was sadly through an atrocity, and it is a study that can never be replicated ethically again.^[2]

8 Nerve Agents Tabun and Sarin

German chemists had invented and readied thousands of tons of lethal nerve agents, including sarin, in the build up to WW2. The deadly agents were not known to the Allies, and if used could potentially have altered the outcome of the conflict.

Nerve agents directly disrupt vital organs of the body, and as a result, the smallest amount of exposure can be fatal.

German scientists invented the two most dangerous nerve agents, Tabun and Sarin, in 1936 and 38 respectively. Even to this day the substances still rank among the most toxic chemical warfare agents. It is believed that the Nazis had over 30,000 tons of Tabun and smaller amounts of Sarin in storage by the end of the war- and yet, it was never used in combat.

Several theories exist as to why this was the case, with some historians even suggesting that due to Hitler’s own personal experience of chemical warfare in WW1, he chose not to engage in such acts. However, this becomes hard to believe when one considers what he was willing to do in death camps. Ultimately, we just don’t know why.^[3]

7 Audio Tape/Cassette

Whilst Gen Z may not even know what I’m referring to, this revolutionary invention actually has Nazi Germany to thank for its existence.

A German scientist, Fritz Pfleumer, created a way to coat paper with metal strips in 1928, and by 1935 the first magnetic tape recorder was created. This technology allowed for both improved audio material and also longer recordings.

When Allied forces intercepted radio transmission from Europe in WW2 they were often fooled into thinking that different people in different places were providing re-readings of messages simultaneously across multiple time-zones. This assumption was based on the Allied Forces’ knowledge of their contemporary recording equipment which did not allow for the audio quality and length of recordings that they were picking up.

It was only once an audio tape recorder was liberated from Radio Luxembourg, that they realised they had been mistaken. The technology was sent back to the US, and the release of the cassette two decades later was no doubt founded on this captured technology.^[4]

6 Jagermeister

The recipe for this herby liquor has not changed since 1934, and much to the company’s dismay, neither has the drink’s rumoured association with the Nazi party.

Curt Mast, one of the founding brothers of this herb liquor, is rumoured to have named Jagermeister as a nod to the Nazi Party’s second in command; Hermann Goring. In 1934 Goring gave himself the title of Imperial Huntsmaster, or in German; Jagermeister.

Rumours even exist that Goring came to personally visit Curt Mast for a hunting celebration at his property where the drink was first invented.

In 1933 Curt Mast joined the National Socialist German Workers Party and even bought his house in Wolfenbuttel on land that the state had seized from a Jewish family. Whilst the company and family members have tried to deny the company’s past-ties to the Nazis; no affirmative conclusion exists.^[5]

10 Nazi Scientists Who Survived The War

5 JerryCan

Without fuel, a military becomes immobile and consequently pointless.

With this in mind, the German army invented the “Armed Forces Unit Cannister”, intended to keep the tanks fuelled and ready for battle at any moment in turbulent pre-war Europe.

The Jerrycan didn’t get its nickname however until an American engineer, Paul Pleiss, picked up a few of these German inventions at the Berlin Tempelhof Airport. At first the Allied Forces were not interested in this invention, as they had their own poorly designed canisters, which were easily punctured and required a wrench to open.

Nonetheless it could not be denied that the Germans had designed a masterpiece, with very little changes made to this original design to date. The German canister could hold up to 5.3 gallons of fuel, and featured handles. Ultimately, their effectiveness was undeniable and the US made a swift decision to manufacture their own version – naming it the ‘Jerrycan’ after the Allied nickname for the German forces.

Over 19 million jerrycans were required to support the US forces in WW2, and President Roosevelt is noted as saying that “without these cans, it would have been impossible for our armies to cut across France.”^[6]

4 Pervitin- Amphetamine

When Germany was still known as the Weimar Republic its pharmaceutical industry was thriving, and the country was a leading exporter of opiates and cocaine.

At a pharmaceutical company in Berlin, Dr Fritz Hauschild became inspired by the American’s successful use of amphetamines at the 1936 Olympic Games.

Hauschild consequently developed his own wonder drug, and patented the first German methyl-amphetamine; Pervitin. The drug quickly became a sensation and was available in many formats, including chocolate bars. Women were recommended to eat 2 or 3 a day, in order to help them get through housework faster and to curb their appetite.

In 1940 when Germany was planning to invade France through the Ardennes Mountains, a ‘stimulant decree’ was sent out to army doctors. The decree recommended that German soldiers take up to 5 tablets a day in order to decrease inhibitions when fighting and to make sleep unnecessary. The Wehrmacht ordered 35 million tablets for the army and Luftwaffe.

The tablet allowed whole divisions to remain awake for three days and three nights, and remain one of the key reasons Blitzkrieg was not only successful, but physically possible.^[7]

3 Night Vision

Okay fine, this one needs a caveat. Germany was not the first nation to invent night vision, however it was the first to deploy a portable version of night vision that could be carried by a single soldier.

Its codename, rather fittingly, was “Vampir” (vampire). Its real name doesn’t quite roll of the tongue; Zielgerat 1229.

The device was essentially an enormous backpack battery which powered an infra-red searchlight and an infra-red scope mounted on the gun of choice.

Whilst the search light emitted high infra-red, the scope then amplified this light. This device does not pick up body heat, and is essentially an ‘invisible light’, and can be spotted up by another Vampir user.

Deployed in 1945 these devices were rare and reserved for the unit known as the Night Hunter. Although too late to make a difference in the war, for a while there was paranoia around the German’s ability to spot people at night.^[8]

2 The Term ‘Privatization’

The coining of the term privatization has been falsely credited to Peter Drucker, when in reality it was the Nazis who coined the term.

Peter Drucker referred to ‘reprivatization’ in 1969, as he suggested handing executive responsibilities of the public sector back over to what was previously controlled by the private.

However, after researching the structure of the Nazi Economy, major work by Maxine Yaple Sweezy actually found that industrialists supported Hitler because of his economic policies. These policies consisted of what Drucker later termed ‘reprivatization’, in which the Nazi German government restored state controlled monopolies to the private sector.

Sweezy first published the term in 1941, where she describes how “The United Steel Trust is an outstanding example of the ‘reprivatization’.” And this may be the first use of the term ‘reprivatization’ in social science literature in English.^[9]

1 Counterfeit Money

One of Nazi Germany’s more elaborate plans to destroy not only the Allies but also their economies was titled; “Operation Bernhard”.

The operation involved creating huge sums of counterfeit British and American money, to be secretly introduced into England’s economy. The idea not only hoped to destroy the British economy, but also to ruin the trust of the people in their own government.

In 1942, SS Major Bernhard Kruger was ordered to carry out this plan, and he recruited 142 counterfeiters and artisans from the concentration camps. Together, they created some of the most impressive counterfeit currencies ever seen, and by 1945 they had created 182 million British Pounds, and had just finished the plates ready to counterfeit US American Dollars.

In May 1945 the operation was ordered to retreat to an Austrian village, and it was here that the equipment was dumped into a lake, the prisoners revolted and their guards fled as US army unit neared their base.^[10]

10 Famous People Who Were Nazi Sympathizers

Whenever a politician says or does something the other side doesn’t like, they are often compared to Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist party. Many online discussions will eventually result in people who lack the cognitive facilities to rationally form an argument calling their debating opponent a Nazi and some countries are even passing laws (or pushing for the same) to remove free speech from those whose views they don’t like by using linguistic sleight of hand and calling it “anti hate speech” legislation.

Calling someone a Nazi or comparing the modern world to the socio-political conditions that precipitated the rise of the Nazi party has somewhat desensitized the world to the horrors of what that word represents.

Still, there are several aspects of modern society that, when examined objectively, show similarities to the Weimar Republic’s collapse and the rise of the socialist Nazi party. This list takes a look at those similarities and examines how history may end up repeating itself if we are not careful.

Top 10 Myths Involving the Nazis

10 A Worldwide Pandemic

When the Great War concluded on November 11th, 1918, the world saw an end to a conflict that resulted in the deaths of 20 million people.^[1] That massive number of casualties escalated warfare to new levels, but they paled in comparison to the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

That pandemic resulted in the deaths of 20 to 50 million people around the world, though some estimates put the number closer to 100 million. The pandemic is often recalled these days as a comparison to the COVID-19 pandemic that originated in China in early 2020.

There are many similarities between the H1N1 Influenza A viral outbreak of 1918 and the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic that began in 2020. Both pandemics gripped the world, causing millions of infections and millions of deaths. They were both linked to a foreign origin and resulted in targeted xenophobia by various populations.^[2]

While the “Chinese virus” is far less deadly than the “Spanish flu” that preceded it by a century, it has severely impacted the way we live and work.^[3]

9 Scapegoating Is Alive And Well

The core of Hitler’s ideology was racially built around his belief that the German race, which he called Aryan, was superior to all others. Most conservatives in pre-Nazi Germany didn’t follow his views. Still, they went along with Hitler’s socialist party for all the economic good being promised. As the Nazis rose to power, they did so upon the backs of everyone Hitler believed to be inferior.

This included the Jews, Romani, the disabled, homosexuals, and other communities who weren’t considered pure Germans. The Nazis placed the blame for most of society’s problems on the Jews and enacted policies to strip them of their rights, property, and eventually, their humanness.^[4] Scapegoating worked well for the Nazis, and it’s alive and well today.

Fortunately, people aren’t being rounded up in concentration camps like they were in the 1930s, but scapegoating has become a powerful party platform for many worldwide on both sides of the political spectrum in equal measure. Conservatives blame illegal immigration and floods of refugees for the problems of their particular nations while liberals blame conservatives (mostly in the form of white males) for all of their problems.

While many point to the States’ vilification of South American illegal immigrants (deceptively conflated by the media as enmity with all immigrants including legal ones) and foreign refugees, it’s hardly the only country that does this. Scapegoating migrants and immigrants (legal or otherwise) has occurred in various countries during epidemics going back to the Black Death, and it’s been widely used to blame an economic downturn on outsiders in nations across the planet.^[5]

8 A Hyperpolarization Of Politics

For most of its history, the United States has featured a somewhat cooperative government. While the bi-party system has resulted in many disagreements, work was still completed, and the nation grew as a result. Unfortunately, the days of compromise are behind us, and the United States has devolved into a hyperpolarization of political ideologies.

This isn’t unique to the United States, and other countries around the world are seeing their political ideologies stand in opposition to one another. This limits government processes, and even more dangerously, it pits two ideological sides against one another, which can become dangerous.

The same happened in pre-Nazi Germany, thanks, in part, to a man named Paul von Hindenburg, the President of Germany. He took a burgeoning democracy and turned it into a dictatorship by ceding control to the chancellor, who built up his side to suit his purposes, and then blew past them when he rose to power. In like manner, the communists were a growing threat and fears were growing that they would perform a socialist revolt similar to the one seen in Russia in which the Tsar and his family were butchered along with all opponents of globalist socialism.^[6]

This was made possible by several issues, including the Great Depression. Still, it likely wouldn’t have happened had the German people not been so ideologically divided as they were. The hyperpolarization of politics in 1920s Germany resulted in the degradation of democratic norms, making it possible for the Nazis to take over.^[7]

7 A Rise In Sexual Liberty & Gay Rights In The 1920s And 2020s

In 1929, Germany had a serious movement to repeal anti-gay legislation known as “Paragraph 175,” which criminalized homosexuality. It was repealed in 1994, but it nearly happened 65 years earlier, before the Nazis rose to power.

Germany (and much of Europe) was on the cusp of liberating its gay (and transsexual and transvestite) citizens. As a result, the country was filled with gay bars and cafes. Gay people were more open and out at the time, and the movement had a strong chance of doing away with anti-gay legislation.^[8]

The Nazis’ rise to power and put a stop to all of that. They didn’t just keep the law in place — they rounded up and imprisoned anyone they believed to be members of the gay community. Those days are behind us in most parts of the world, but there is a correlation between the rise of gay openness in 1920s Germany and today.

Modern society has seen a great many changes made in the gay rights movement. Gay marriage is now legal in many nations, and previous prohibitions placed on homosexuals have been lifted.

6 Ruined Economies Foster Resentment

When WWI came to an end, Germany was left in ruins. The country was not only in need of rebuilding, but its economy was in shambles. Additionally, it was forced to pay hefty reparations to France and other countries on the winning side of the conflict and had large swathes of productive land confiscated.^[9]

The Nazis used the economic disaster and the Great Depression to their benefit. They developed a protectionist economic policy that promised to boost the German people from the ruinous post-war economy.

It worked by amassing a large population of people to their side with the promise of jobs, money which wasn’t hyper-inflated by the central bank, and a better tomorrow. Global economies are different today than in the early 20th century, but there are still many parallels.

The world saw a bank-caused Great Recession from 2007 until 2009, which saw many Americans lose their homes.^[10] The Great Recession did a number on the economy in the States, but it didn’t just impact the U.S., as nations worldwide suffered severe economic disasters. Greece underwent a government-debt crisis from 2009 until 2018, nearly destroying the country’s economy.

5 Widespread Distrust In The Media

When Donald Trump began his campaign for President of the United States, he wasn’t shy about calling out various news and media organizations as fake news. Trust in the media plummeted during his presidency. Even after leaving office, his claims of fake news persist primarily regarding the majority left-wing news outfits like CNN, the New York Times, and most others.

Hitler never used the phrase “fake news”, but he certainly adopted one that was similar. Lügenpresse is German for “lying press,” and it’s perfectly analogous to “fake news.” The term goes back centuries and the Marxists used it to refer to the media when they wrote damning articles about communism and socialism. Hitler often called the media out for lying and manipulating the truth by using the same term.

Widespread distrust in the media was prevalent in pre-Nazi Germany, and it’s prevalent now. When people lose faith in the integrity of the news media, they become susceptible to manipulation and influence from other spheres. That worked well in the 1920s and ‘30s for Hitler and his national socialist party and it works well now for those controlling the new means of news dissemination: social media and tech giants.^[11][12]

4 Socialist Globalism Is Back and So Is Socialist Nationalism

The Nazi Party was one thing above all else — it was a nationalist movement (extreme patriotism). It arose in Munich after WWI when people upset over the Treaty of Versailles met to discuss their political views. A trend toward socialist nationalism developed to combat the globalist principles of the burgeoning German Communist movement (as seen in the attempted coup of the 1919 Spartacist uprising), and the National Socialist German Worker’s Party (NSDAP) was established in 1920.

National Socialism helped bring the Nazis to power, as it focused the people’s attention on their own national needs. It placed German workers above other communities and found scapegoats for the nation’s problems in the Jews, immigrants, and other “undesirable” members of society.^[13]

In the United States, the Republican party ran in the 2016 election with the phrase, “Make America Great Again,” which was further developed into an ideology that put “America First.” American neo-nationalism similarly prioritizes the country above others (much to the chagrin of the globalist movement again rising under the new brand of “Democratic” socialism). As has happened previously in the States, illegal-immigrants were blamed for the country’s problems.

America was hardly alone in moving back towards nationalism in the 21st century. It’s also making a comeback in Europe, with Hungary, Austria, Switzerland, Denmark, Belgium, Estonia, Germany, Italy, and others seeing a rise in Nationalist movements in their recent parliamentary elections.^[14]

3 Propaganda Has Taken Over Social Media For Millions Of People

The Nazi use of propaganda is one of the most successful tools employed by Hitler and Goebbels. Leading up to the party’s rise and well through its established dominance in Germany, propaganda stood as the most important weapon available to the Nazis.

Propaganda helped convince the German people that their political opponents and the Jews were responsible for all their troubles. It helped convince the people that their only salvation was the election of Adolf Hitler, and it kept the people in check when the government turned on those same people who put them into power.

Propaganda was a psychological operation of masterful deceit, and it has a modern comparison in social media. Social media platforms have given a voice to every person on the planet, and while some choose to speak out (at the risk of being “cancelled” or silenced), many more listen closely to what they’re told.

Propaganda spread through social media has impacted and influenced millions of people into believing all manner of bizarre things. Through sites like Facebook, Twitter, instagram, and others, people have been roped into believing all kinds of novel or crazy ideas, including many promoted at the time of the Nazis in the 1920s and early ’30s.^[15][16]

2 An American “Insurrection”

As the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election got closer and closer, the country appeared to be on a tipping point. The people were voting in what was often cited as “the most important election in history” by folks on both sides. More people voted in the election than at any other point in American history.^[17]

The result saw Joe Biden defeat the incumbent, Donald Trump, but it didn’t end there. Court challenges and claims of a stolen election ultimately reached a boiling point that saw thousands of people amass on the U.S. Capitol Building in protest.^[18]

The January 6th event was one of the most shocking developments in recent U.S. history, and it has a historical comparison to pre-Nazi Germany. In 1923, Adolf Hitler and other leaders in the Nazi party attempted a coup d’état in Munich. The “Beer Hall Putsch” resulted in 20 deaths and landed Hitler in prison for treason.^[19]

The U.S. protest wasn’t an attempted coup. Still, it does share similarities with the overall sentiment expressed by the Nazis of the 1920s. Specifically, a belief that dark forces betrayed the people, and the only recourse was a confrontation. The Nazis weren’t successful in ’23, but a decade later, they rose to power.

1 Growing Worldwide Instability

Before the Nazis rose to power, the Weimar Republic was in disarray. This was primarily due to the end of the Great War, but the Great Depression that followed didn’t help. In fact, the majority of the countries in the world were subjected to instability. New borders were drawn throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia, which caused many problems.

While Germany was only one nation among many dealing with these problems, it was right at the center of them, thanks to its participation in the war. Over time, resentment and further global instability helped the Nazis rise to power, resulting in even more instability with the global outcry from the peaceful annexation of Austria (known as the Anschluss or War Of Flowers due to the German military being greeted by cheering Austrians who showered them with flowers, a scene repeated during World War II during which Ukrainian peasants saw the Germans as their liberators from the horrors of socialism under the Soviet government), which was followed by German demands for the return of territorial losses resulting from the Versailles Treaty and, later, territory over which Germany had no legitimate claim.^[20]

The world is a complicated place filled with numerous governments, economies, and ideologies, so it’s always in a state of relative instability. Still, it’s been a lot more unstable since the 21st century began with the 9/11 attacks. The global fight against Islamic terrorism has destabilized the Middle East and caused problems around the world.

Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the ongoing war in Ukraine are further indications of international instability comparable to pre-Nazi Germany in the 1920s and early ’30s.^[21] If these situations continue to devolve, the world may find itself in similar circumstances that precipitated the Nazi’s rise to power.

One thing is for sure, digital book burnings, cancel culture, and the abolition of free speech are not the answer to the problems of today.

Top 10 Plans Hitler Would Have Put In Motion If The Nazis Had Won