7 ms·

The origins of the Nazis’ secret horse breeding project

47 points by Hooke 10y ago

cloudjacker 10y ago
Secret Nazi attempt lol You guys act like you wouldn't jump at the chance to have your pet project subsidized by ANYBODY, literally any government or organization with any ideology if it meant the chance for you to pursue your dream Aren't most of you guys here interested in VCs, for example. Interesting story though, any more details about the guys that successfully scammed Nazi taxpayers?
- coderdude 10y ago
  Investment money and government subsidization aren't the same thing but I get the gist. Money for doing what you'd rather be doing instead of what you're currently doing. Sounds lame though. Too many strings attached. Most people here aren't chasing that. They just want a better adblock.
  - cloudjacker 10y ago
    better adblock lol! I mentioned government or organization to specifically counter the rebuttal you went straight for! Oh well, moth to a flame. A lot of VCs have very polarizing political views, or have their funds in things you or historians may not agree with, which is the same as with governments.
  - bitwize 10y ago
    Literally all of Silicon Valley and most of the computing research of the 20th century was built on funds the US government plowed into industry, in the hopes of developing tech that would help us nuke the Russkies while preventing them from doing the same to us.
    - coderdude 10y ago
      Sounds even more lame when you frame it like that. Are you supporting my point of view?
    - hueving 10y ago
      I think you mean 'figuratively'. If it was literal there would have been no private industry at all, which is complete nonsense.
      - delazeur 10y ago
        I believe the above commenter was being hyperbolic, but plenty of government money has supported private industry. That's not just defense contractors, either. Where would Silicon Valley be without ARPANET?
        hueving 10y ago
        That's why I said figuratively. Some support doesn't mean the whole valley is running on government money. Where would ARPANET be without the discovery of electricity or the massive railroad expansion throughout the US that resulted in a large telegraph network? It's pretty stupid to tie the valley to one particular invention supported by the government when it depends on essentially all of history until this point.
        bitwize 10y ago
        The Silicon Valley economy were established to develop radar and comms equipment for the military -- before digital computers even became the boom industry they are today. So when I say "literally all", I'm exaggerating -- but only slightly. Not every dollar in the fucktons of VC money sloshing around out there can be traced back to defense funding, but an awful lot of them can.
totocino 10y ago
Did they come up with Shadowmere?
smnscu 10y ago
Slightly off topic, my wife just sent me this link after a friend mentioned today how Bayer had links to the Nazis. The last paragraph about IBM is particularly funny. http://www.11points.com/News-Politics/11_Companies_That_Surprisingly_Collaborated_With_the_Nazis http://www.11points.com/News-Politics/11_Companies_That_Surp...
- gnarbarian 10y ago
  In September of 1939, when Germany invaded Poland, the "New York Times" reported that three million Jews were going to be "immediately removed" from Poland and were likely going to be "exterminat[ed]." IBM's reaction? An internal memo saying that, due to that "situation", they really needed to step up production on high-speed alphabetizing equipment. (Source: CNet)
  - delazeur 10y ago
    When I click on the source link I get redirected to http://www.cnet.com/topics/tech-industry/ http://www.cnet.com/topics/tech-industry/, which tells me nothing. It doesn't strike me as very plausible that NYT would be reporting on the extermination of Jews in 1939. If they were, I am eager to learn about it. If anyone knows more about this, please link me to it. To my knowledge, mass exterminations didn't begin until 1941, carried out by gas trucks and firing squads. The Final Solution was formulated in 1942, with the first death camps going into operation that year. In 1939 the Nazis had already started exterminating some "undesirables" (including at least the disabled and mentally ill) and they were already operating concentration camps, but the nominal goal of these camps was the eventual deportation of Jews rather than extermination. I would be surprised to learn that any Allied governments (or those who would become Allies) knew about the extermination of Jews in 1939, let alone the press.
    - Chinjut 10y ago
      The link should've been to http://www.cnet.com/news/probing-ibms-nazi-connection/ http://www.cnet.com/news/probing-ibms-nazi-connection/. The claim about the IBM memo comes from Edwin Black, author of the book "IBM and the Holocaust". The reference to a New York Times article is specifically to one from its front page on September 13, 1939, titled "Nazis Hint 'Purge' of Jews in Poland". The article can be purchased from the New York Times at http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B06EED81330E53ABC4B52DFBF668382629EDE http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B06EED81330E.... You can also see bits of the article at http://www.rarenewspapers.com/view/590025 http://www.rarenewspapers.com/view/590025, and it is also referenced at the New York Times itself more contemporarily in the article http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/14/news/150th-anniversary-1851-2001-turning-away-from-the-holocaust.html http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/14/news/150th-anniversary-185.... (I haven't actually been able to read the referenced article in full, mind you, because I am cheap; thus, I am not personally vouching for the article saying what it is claimed to. I'm just providing to others the ability to do so if any of you have interest and/or disposability of income greater than mine at the moment.)
sandworm101 10y ago
>> Gustav Rau pulled a pistol from his hip and pointed it directly at the SS officer.“You have no authority here,” he said. “This horse farm is under the jurisdiction of the German Army. [...] Neither man moved until, with a curt nod, the officer stepped back. He agreed to remove his men." I like this story. It emphasizes the error in the title. These seem to have been German horses, not Nazi horses. I see so many articles and books reference everyone and everything in the German armed forces of the time as "Nazi". The reality was complicated. There was much conflict as many in the armed forces felt they should remain politically neutral. This idea is not uncommon today. Many members of various armies go so far as to not vote while in active service. Others, notably in the US forces, see political detachment unpatriotic. This boils down to an officer within an older, politically detached force pulling a gun on an officer of a new and fanatically active force. There must have been many such stand-offs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazism_and_the_Wehrmacht https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazism_and_the_Wehrmacht
- pvg 10y ago
  The reality was complicated. There was much conflict as many in the armed forces felt they should remain politically neutral. This idea is not uncommon today. Most armies today are not involved in genocide so the parallel is not a very good one. The reality was complicated but the Wehrmacht was very much an essential and willing instrument of Nazism. A precedent in Nazi horse-detection - in the mid 80s, it was reported that former UN Secretary General and then- Austrian presidential candidate Kurt Waldheim had been a member of an SA mounted unit. In response to Waldheim's denials, Chancellor Fred Sinowatz quipped that Waldheim 'hadn't been in the SA, only his horse had'.
- Animats 10y ago
  It's more like some guy managed to get the German army to fund his pet project. A huge herd of white Lipizzaners would have been militarily Cool, but Ineffective. That's a parade unit, not a fighting force. After the war, the Lipizzaners, both this group and the ones at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna, were rescued by US forces under Patton, who was a cavalryman before his tanker days. A good horse is never the wrong color.
aab0 10y ago
Cuts out at the most interesting point.
- zdw 10y ago
  Did you expect something else from a book excerpt? It's intended to draw you in so you buy a copy.
  - aab0 10y ago
    I actually do expect more from a longreads post. They're usually a top-notch site and above dark patterns like that.
gravypod 10y ago
I wish there was a place I could go to read translated versions of notes kept by German scientists. They did horrible things but some of the other research was really cool like what I've learned about their attempts in creating nuclear power.
- pjc50 10y ago
  "German scientists" is rather a broad category, covering people from Joseph Mengele to Werhner von Braun. The latter has a large number of works in English.
- kaybe 10y ago
  The Nazis had a very strange relationship with science; ideas were rejected because the person to propose them was Jewish. Since many of the top scientists at that time were, in fact, Jewish, they rejected the new development with regards to quantum mechanics and basically most now established new theory in favor of going after 'German physics'.
- bbctol 10y ago
  Not quite the same, but immediately after the war a number of prominent German scientists were interned at Farm Hall, in England, and secretly recorded for months. The full transcripts are available (https://books.google.com/books?id=pzNjntMMq-oC https://books.google.com/books?id=pzNjntMMq-oC) and it's interesting to hear what Heisenberg and Otto Hahn thought of the Nazis and the successful American nuclear bomb. The transcripts were also adapted into a pretty good stage play a few years back.
  - gravypod 10y ago
    Very interesting! I'll definitely be buying a copy of that with one of my next pay checks.
  - scottdw 10y ago
    Would that play be Copenhagen (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_(play) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_(play))? If so, I highly recommend the BBC adaptation with Daniel Craig as Heisenberg, Stephen Rea as Niels Bohr, and Francesca Annis as Margrethe Bohr.
pingec 10y ago
Since Lipizzans are mentioned. If you ever get the chance, go visit Lipica, Slovenia [1] it's the place the horses take the name after with a very old stud farm. The place is well underfunded and nothing special from a commercial tourism perspective imho (well, except if you like golf). But the nature and the horses are amazing. I can walk for hours there and get a huge energy boost and mood improvement. [1] http://www.lipica.org/en/ http://www.lipica.org/en/

47 points by Hooke 10y ago

Secret Nazi attempt lol You guys act like you wouldn't jump at the chance to have your pet project subsidized by ANYBODY, literally any government or organization with any ideology if it meant the chance for you to pursue your dream Aren't most of you guys here interested in VCs, for example. Interesting story though, any more details about the guys that successfully scammed Nazi taxpayers?

coderdude 10y ago
Investment money and government subsidization aren't the same thing but I get the gist. Money for doing what you'd rather be doing instead of what you're currently doing. Sounds lame though. Too many strings attached. Most people here aren't chasing that. They just want a better adblock.
- cloudjacker 10y ago
  better adblock lol! I mentioned government or organization to specifically counter the rebuttal you went straight for! Oh well, moth to a flame. A lot of VCs have very polarizing political views, or have their funds in things you or historians may not agree with, which is the same as with governments.
- bitwize 10y ago
  Literally all of Silicon Valley and most of the computing research of the 20th century was built on funds the US government plowed into industry, in the hopes of developing tech that would help us nuke the Russkies while preventing them from doing the same to us.
  - coderdude 10y ago
    Sounds even more lame when you frame it like that. Are you supporting my point of view?
  - hueving 10y ago
    I think you mean 'figuratively'. If it was literal there would have been no private industry at all, which is complete nonsense.
    - delazeur 10y ago
      I believe the above commenter was being hyperbolic, but plenty of government money has supported private industry. That's not just defense contractors, either. Where would Silicon Valley be without ARPANET?
      - hueving 10y ago
        That's why I said figuratively. Some support doesn't mean the whole valley is running on government money. Where would ARPANET be without the discovery of electricity or the massive railroad expansion throughout the US that resulted in a large telegraph network? It's pretty stupid to tie the valley to one particular invention supported by the government when it depends on essentially all of history until this point.
      - bitwize 10y ago
        The Silicon Valley economy were established to develop radar and comms equipment for the military -- before digital computers even became the boom industry they are today. So when I say "literally all", I'm exaggerating -- but only slightly. Not every dollar in the fucktons of VC money sloshing around out there can be traced back to defense funding, but an awful lot of them can.

totocino 10y ago

Did they come up with Shadowmere?

smnscu 10y ago

Slightly off topic, my wife just sent me this link after a friend mentioned today how Bayer had links to the Nazis. The last paragraph about IBM is particularly funny. http://www.11points.com/News-Politics/11_Companies_That_Surprisingly_Collaborated_With_the_Nazis http://www.11points.com/News-Politics/11_Companies_That_Surp...

gnarbarian 10y ago
In September of 1939, when Germany invaded Poland, the "New York Times" reported that three million Jews were going to be "immediately removed" from Poland and were likely going to be "exterminat[ed]." IBM's reaction? An internal memo saying that, due to that "situation", they really needed to step up production on high-speed alphabetizing equipment. (Source: CNet)
- delazeur 10y ago
  When I click on the source link I get redirected to http://www.cnet.com/topics/tech-industry/ http://www.cnet.com/topics/tech-industry/, which tells me nothing. It doesn't strike me as very plausible that NYT would be reporting on the extermination of Jews in 1939. If they were, I am eager to learn about it. If anyone knows more about this, please link me to it. To my knowledge, mass exterminations didn't begin until 1941, carried out by gas trucks and firing squads. The Final Solution was formulated in 1942, with the first death camps going into operation that year. In 1939 the Nazis had already started exterminating some "undesirables" (including at least the disabled and mentally ill) and they were already operating concentration camps, but the nominal goal of these camps was the eventual deportation of Jews rather than extermination. I would be surprised to learn that any Allied governments (or those who would become Allies) knew about the extermination of Jews in 1939, let alone the press.
  - Chinjut 10y ago
    The link should've been to http://www.cnet.com/news/probing-ibms-nazi-connection/ http://www.cnet.com/news/probing-ibms-nazi-connection/. The claim about the IBM memo comes from Edwin Black, author of the book "IBM and the Holocaust". The reference to a New York Times article is specifically to one from its front page on September 13, 1939, titled "Nazis Hint 'Purge' of Jews in Poland". The article can be purchased from the New York Times at http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B06EED81330E53ABC4B52DFBF668382629EDE http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B06EED81330E.... You can also see bits of the article at http://www.rarenewspapers.com/view/590025 http://www.rarenewspapers.com/view/590025, and it is also referenced at the New York Times itself more contemporarily in the article http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/14/news/150th-anniversary-1851-2001-turning-away-from-the-holocaust.html http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/14/news/150th-anniversary-185.... (I haven't actually been able to read the referenced article in full, mind you, because I am cheap; thus, I am not personally vouching for the article saying what it is claimed to. I'm just providing to others the ability to do so if any of you have interest and/or disposability of income greater than mine at the moment.)

sandworm101 10y ago

>> Gustav Rau pulled a pistol from his hip and pointed it directly at the SS officer.“You have no authority here,” he said. “This horse farm is under the jurisdiction of the German Army. [...] Neither man moved until, with a curt nod, the officer stepped back. He agreed to remove his men." I like this story. It emphasizes the error in the title. These seem to have been German horses, not Nazi horses. I see so many articles and books reference everyone and everything in the German armed forces of the time as "Nazi". The reality was complicated. There was much conflict as many in the armed forces felt they should remain politically neutral. This idea is not uncommon today. Many members of various armies go so far as to not vote while in active service. Others, notably in the US forces, see political detachment unpatriotic. This boils down to an officer within an older, politically detached force pulling a gun on an officer of a new and fanatically active force. There must have been many such stand-offs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazism_and_the_Wehrmacht https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazism_and_the_Wehrmacht

pvg 10y ago
The reality was complicated. There was much conflict as many in the armed forces felt they should remain politically neutral. This idea is not uncommon today. Most armies today are not involved in genocide so the parallel is not a very good one. The reality was complicated but the Wehrmacht was very much an essential and willing instrument of Nazism. A precedent in Nazi horse-detection - in the mid 80s, it was reported that former UN Secretary General and then- Austrian presidential candidate Kurt Waldheim had been a member of an SA mounted unit. In response to Waldheim's denials, Chancellor Fred Sinowatz quipped that Waldheim 'hadn't been in the SA, only his horse had'.
Animats 10y ago
It's more like some guy managed to get the German army to fund his pet project. A huge herd of white Lipizzaners would have been militarily Cool, but Ineffective. That's a parade unit, not a fighting force. After the war, the Lipizzaners, both this group and the ones at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna, were rescued by US forces under Patton, who was a cavalryman before his tanker days. A good horse is never the wrong color.

aab0 10y ago

Cuts out at the most interesting point.

zdw 10y ago
Did you expect something else from a book excerpt? It's intended to draw you in so you buy a copy.
- aab0 10y ago
  I actually do expect more from a longreads post. They're usually a top-notch site and above dark patterns like that.

gravypod 10y ago

I wish there was a place I could go to read translated versions of notes kept by German scientists. They did horrible things but some of the other research was really cool like what I've learned about their attempts in creating nuclear power.

pjc50 10y ago
"German scientists" is rather a broad category, covering people from Joseph Mengele to Werhner von Braun. The latter has a large number of works in English.
kaybe 10y ago
The Nazis had a very strange relationship with science; ideas were rejected because the person to propose them was Jewish. Since many of the top scientists at that time were, in fact, Jewish, they rejected the new development with regards to quantum mechanics and basically most now established new theory in favor of going after 'German physics'.
bbctol 10y ago
Not quite the same, but immediately after the war a number of prominent German scientists were interned at Farm Hall, in England, and secretly recorded for months. The full transcripts are available (https://books.google.com/books?id=pzNjntMMq-oC https://books.google.com/books?id=pzNjntMMq-oC) and it's interesting to hear what Heisenberg and Otto Hahn thought of the Nazis and the successful American nuclear bomb. The transcripts were also adapted into a pretty good stage play a few years back.
- gravypod 10y ago
  Very interesting! I'll definitely be buying a copy of that with one of my next pay checks.
- scottdw 10y ago
  Would that play be Copenhagen (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_(play) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_(play))? If so, I highly recommend the BBC adaptation with Daniel Craig as Heisenberg, Stephen Rea as Niels Bohr, and Francesca Annis as Margrethe Bohr.

pingec 10y ago

Since Lipizzans are mentioned. If you ever get the chance, go visit Lipica, Slovenia [1] it's the place the horses take the name after with a very old stud farm. The place is well underfunded and nothing special from a commercial tourism perspective imho (well, except if you like golf). But the nature and the horses are amazing. I can walk for hours there and get a huge energy boost and mood improvement. [1] http://www.lipica.org/en/ http://www.lipica.org/en/