Nazi Germany

Thirty Nazi bunkers stand intact in a Masurian forest because nobody bothered to blow them up. Treasure hunters still drill into the walls.

Portrait of a male author with glasses standing against a concrete wall, wearing a green shirt and jacket.

Edward C.

Tragedies & Disasters

Mittelbau-Dora: Inside the Nazi Tunnel Factory That Built the V-2 Rocket

The V-2 rocket killed more people building it than it ever killed in flight. Its engineers went on to build the rocket that reached the Moon.

Portrait of a female author standing against a brick wall, wearing a green jacket and grey shirt.

Wünsdorf: The Forbidden City Where the Soviet Army Ruled East Germany

Soviet troops sealed off a Brandenburg forest for forty years and forbade Germans to enter. They watched the Berlin Wall fall from behind their own.

Berghof: Hitler's Mountain Home That the RAF Bombed and Bavaria Dynamited

Hitler broke Austria and bluffed Britain from a chalet with a view. Bavaria dynamited what was left on the anniversary of his suicide.

The Battle of Grunwald: The Day the Teutonic Order Broke

In 1410 a Polish-Lithuanian army destroyed the Teutonic Order in one afternoon. The Order had run out of a reason to fight twenty-four years earlier.

The Eagle's Nest: Hitler's Mountaintop Fortress — the Gift He Barely Used

Martin Bormann blasted a road and a brass elevator through a mountain to build Hitler the ultimate gift. The Führer barely wanted to set foot in it.

Externsteine: The Sacred German Rocks the Nazis Invented an Ancient Religion For

Five sandstone pillars in a German forest, declared an ancient pagan shrine by Himmler's SS — for a religion that the evidence says never existed.

Portrait of a female author smiling in warm evening light on a city street.

Wolf's Lair: The Forest Headquarters Where Hitler Ran the War and Nearly Died

Hitler spent 800 days in a mosquito swamp behind seven-meter walls. The bomb that nearly killed him walked in through the front gate.

Sophia R.

Mamerki: The Nazi Army Headquarters Nobody Blew Up and the Hidden Ring Around the Wolf's Lair

Mittelbau-Dora: Inside the Nazi Tunnel Factory That Built the V-2 Rocket

Wünsdorf: The Forbidden City Where the Soviet Army Ruled East Germany

Berghof: Hitler's Mountain Home That the RAF Bombed and Bavaria Dynamited

The Battle of Grunwald: The Day the Teutonic Order Broke

The Eagle's Nest: Hitler's Mountaintop Fortress — the Gift He Barely Used

Externsteine: The Sacred German Rocks the Nazis Invented an Ancient Religion For

Wolf's Lair: The Forest Headquarters Where Hitler Ran the War and Nearly Died