The Manhattan Project, the top-secret research and development project that eventually produced the first nuclear weapon, has long been known as one of the best and worst achievements in human history. Though the nuclear weapons it produced eventually stopped World War II, the development of it also is responsible for years of radiation damage, disease, fear and threats of its continued use.
Many people have hypothesized about the terror that would have occurred if Hitler had nuclear weapons. New findings prove that this horrific scenario almost became a reality. Filmmaker Andreas Sulzer recently discovered what is believed to be the largest Nazi nuclear weapons facility found to date.
Years ago, Sulzer began his search for the facility in Sankt Georgen an der Gusen in Austria, after reading a comment in a letter written by Viktor Schauberger. Schauberger was a German scientist who worked for the Third Reich during World War II. He comments in his letter that he is working under strict security at a research facility and is involved in “smashing atoms.” Experts believe this comment is evidence that Hitler was trying to develop nuclear weapons.
The secret project is thought to have first began in the late 1930s, after German scientists Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman wrote about their findings in nuclear fission and splitting the Uranium 235 atom. This split occurs via a neutron that ignites a nuclear reaction.
High levels of radiation have been found at the facility, which was also used as a Nazi Mauthausen-Gusen Concentration Camp. The Jewish men and women in the camp were responsible for digging the tunnels that connect to the facility. After the tunnels were complete, thousands of Jewish prisoners were systematically killed in the camp.
The B8 Bergkristall weapons facility consists of several catacombs that each contain parts of the past. Sulzer is carefully excavating each one, looking for clues and further details of what happened there many years ago. Over the past three years, Sulzer and his team have uncovered several artifacts from the era, including an authentic SS Nazi helmet and evidence of Hitler’s missile program. Researchers believe that the facility was also responsible for the development of the first engine-powered jet plane, Messerschmitt ME 262. The plane was the fastest until the Allies developed their own engine-powered jet planes.
Though historians are still trying to prove whether or not Hitler actually used the facility as for the research, development and experimentation of nuclear weapons, they are hopeful that further studies will reveal what the building was used for and what horrors it almost gave to one of the most terrible world leaders.
