Die Glocke (conspiracy theory)

Die Glocke (German: [diː ˈɡlɔkə], 'The Bell') was a purported top-secret scientific technological device, wonder weapon, or Wunderwaffe developed in the 1940s in Nazi Germany. Rumors of this device have persisted for decades after WW2 and were used as a plot trope in the fiction novel Lightning by Dean Koontz (1988) and in the fiction television series 12 Monkeys (Season 4). First fully described by Polish journalist and author Igor Witkowski in Prawda o Wunderwaffe (2000), it was later popularized by military journalist and author Nick Cook, who associated it with Nazi occultism, anti-gravity, and free energy research. Mainstream reviewers have criticized claims about Die Glocke as being pseudoscientific, recycled rumors, and a hoax. Die Glocke, and other alleged Nazi "miracle weapons", have been dramatised in films, TV shows, video games, and novels.

History

In his 2001 book The Hunt for Zero Point, author Nick Cook identified claims about Die Glocke as having originated in the 2000 Polish book Prawda o Wunderwaffe ("The Truth About the Wonder Weapon") by Igor Witkowski. Cook described Witkowski's claims of a device called "The Bell" engineered by Nazi scientists that was "a glowing, rotating contraption" rumored to have "some kind of antigravitational effect", be a "time machine", or part of an "SS antigravity programme" for a flying saucer.

According to Cook, Die Glocke was bell-shaped, about 4 metres (12 ft) high and 3 metres (9 ft) in diameter, and incorporated "two high-speed, counter-rotating cylinders filled with a purplish, liquid metallic-looking substance that was supposed to be highly radioactive, code-named 'Xerum 525.'" Cook recounts claims that "scientists and technicians who worked on the bell and who did not die of its effects were wiped out by the SS at the close of the war, and the device was moved to an unknown location". Cook proposed that SS official Hans Kammler later secretly traded this technology to the U.S. military in exchange for his freedom. Witkowski suggested that a concrete ring called "The Henge" near the Wenceslaus mine built in 1943 or 1944 and vaguely resembling Stonehenge was used to tether the Bell during tests.