As a boy, I was fascinated with Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich's rise to power. After reading William L. Shirer's The Rise and Fall of Adolf Hitler
and subsequent accounts, I wondered if Hitler had faked his death and escaped to parts unknown. Nazi hunters had found other members of the SS and party elite...was it much of a stretch to believe that Adolf Hitler and his Nazi handlers had created an elaborate ruse and that he continued to live out the rest of his days in secret?Recent information may be shedding light on the mystery:
In 2009, the MysteryQuest TV series took the challenge of finding clues of Adolf Hitler’s death. There has been speculation that he escaped to South America, notably Argentina. Witnesses have said they had seen him around other parts of Germany. Regardless of the stories, there is no tangible evidence of a corpse belonging to Adolph Hitler.
In the Russian archive, there is a divan with blood stains and a piece of human skull with a bullet hole in it. MysteryQuest sent an American archaeologist to Russia to obtain evidence from these items and bring it back to the United States for DNA testing.
Back in Germany, a team of experts was reconstructing the bunker using computer technology, attempting to figure out if eyewitness accounts were plausible. The underground bunkers had large generators that might have been loud enough to drown out a gun shot. What they discovered was an original working generator, allowing them to hear the noise intensity during the time Hitler apparently committed suicide.
Around the same time, three US professors were given access to the alleged remains. Their announcement was there was scientific DNA proof that the skull and bones that Russia had claimed since the end of World War II were Hitler’s actually belonged to a woman between the age of 20-40. Her identity remains unknown.
This announcement rekindled interest in the claim made by Joseph Stalin, maintained to the end of his life, that Hitler got away. The truth is that no one saw Hitler and Eva Braun die in the bunker in Berlin on April 30, 1945. No photographs were taken to document claims Hitler and Evan Braun committed suicide. Hitler’s body was never recovered. No definitive physical evidence exists proving Hitler died in the bunker in Berlin.
The questions left are: Is it possible that Hitler escaped Nazi Germany at the end of World War II to plot revenge and to plan the rise of the Fourth Reich? If he did survive, how did he escape and where did he go?
Since that time, several investigators have raised the historical possibility that Hitler escaped Nazi Germany at the end of World War II. FBI and CIA records maintained at the National Archives indicate that the US government took seriously reports at the end of World War II that Hitler had escaped to Argentina.
For the past month, the History Channel has presented a series titled 'Hunting Hitler' which was derived from 700 pages of FBI material that were declassified in 2014. The information in these documents indicates that the bureau continued to probe the question of whether Adolf Hitler might have actually survived World War II, fleeing to Argentina.
The series is described as:
An FBI cold case that has lain dormant for 70 years leads a group of world-renowned investigators on the ultimate manhunt to finally answer the question: Did Adolf Hitler survive World War II? In early 2014, the FBI declassified hundreds of confidential documents showing that Hitler may have not committed suicide, but rather escaped to South America after the fall of Germany. A memo from J. Edgar Hoover himself states: "American Army officials in Germany have not located Hitler's body nor is there any reliable source that will say definitely that Hitler is dead." Armed with the most cutting edge technology and these newly released FBI files, the team will approach this case like a modern death claims investigation. Whether they are investigating a mysterious Nazi lair deep in the Argentinian jungle or diving for evidence of a missing U-Boat that could have shuttled Hitler to South America, our team will focus on the tried and tested tenants for solving a fraudulent death case.
Could Adolf Hilter have fled the ruins of Berlin to live out his days in South America? The theory is being taken seriously for the first time after the 'Hunting Hitler' team's discovery of a secret tunnel beneath the German capital. Tim Kennedy, a top US special forces operative who was part of the unit tracking Osama Bin Laden after 9/11, and Sascha Keil, a German historian from the Berlin Underworlds Association made the discovery.
The producers and researchers for the series learned that there was a mass Nazi exodus from Tempelhof Airport on April 21, 1945, the day after the last recorded public sighting of Hitler. On that date, eight planes were apparently loaded with the Führer’s personal effects.
The team worked out that the Nazi leader could have made it from his bunker to the airport almost entirely underground (using the existing subway which was built during the period), except for the final 200 yards.
Rumors have long circulated of an unknown tunnel connecting this final 200 yards from a nearby subway station (once known as U6 and now called Luftbrücke) to the airport. Using a state-of-the-art sonar device, the team located that tunnel. Once inside the now-abandoned but well-kept airport, a false wall covering the tunnel entrance was found.
This provides the “missing link” from what was the U6 subway station to Tempelhof and could have allowed the Führer to escape without being captured above ground by the invading Soviet Army.
The team has also collected tantalizing information in Argentina. The evidence include a sprawling sophisticated jungle compound, underground Nazi hideouts, monetary and support connections with Nazi sympathizers and a location where U-boats were observed delivering Third Reich escapees.
It will be interesting to see what further evidence is disclosed in the remaining weeks of the series.
 |
| Is this grainy photo that of Adolf Hitler many years after he escaped Germany? |
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany
The Rise and Fall of Adolf Hitler
Mein Kampf: Vol. I and Vol. II
Grey Wolf: The Escape of Adolf Hitler
