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Hello, friends. Our story today begins in the resort town of Bad Aussee. It's a small town in the center of Austria. Cozy, mountains, a clear lake, neat little houses, respected people live there. In general, this town was not for nothing the favorite resort of Ernst Kaltenbrunner. He was the head of the security department of the Third Reich. And there is a legend that it was here that the Germans hid huge reserves of gold during their retreat. And supposedly, even after the war, entire houses were found here on foundations of gold bars. Well, this is, of course, a delusional legend, but it is based on real events. Indeed, after the war, dozens of boxes with gold bars were found in the basement of Kaltenbrunner's villa. And after the Nazi was arrested, his neighbor found boxes of gold coins, literally in a dung heap in his garden. And there were very many such stories in the fifties. The gold of Bad Aussee is only part of a larger story about Hitler's mysterious gold, about golden trains, about giant caches, about submarines filled with gold that had to be sunk somewhere. Some of these stories are real, some are myths. Let's try to figure out today what is true and what is not.
Let's start with a simple question. Is it true that at the end of the war the Nazis had untold treasures? You can often hear the objection, like, what gold are you talking about? By the spring of '45, the entire economy of the Reich had collapsed. Everything, down to the last penny, was spent on the war. Well, that's partly true. The economy and state budget of Nazi Germany were indeed in ruins. By the end of the war, the country was spending 75% of its GDP on military needs. What does this mean? It means that the Reichsmark was worth almost nothing. On the domestic market, the main currency was cigarettes, alcohol, and food. But this is state money. And the Nazis also had a parallel economy. These were reserves of gold and jewelry taken from occupied territories. This is gold that was taken from prisoners in the camps. This is the gold of allied regimes, for example, like Yugoslavia. Because the rulers of these regimes fled to Germany and brought their capital with them. This money is incredible. Well, here's a simple example. The Anschluss of Austria, 1938. At that moment, the gold reserves of the Third Reich amounted to 15 tons of gold. And by July '45, 920 tons of gold had passed through the bank. That is, Germany's gold reserves increased 61 times. And there are also banknotes, works of art, and everything that was not documented in the Reich. By the most conservative estimates, by the spring of '45, Hitler's Germany owned gold, jewelry, and works of art worth a total of 30 billion dollars. This is three to four times more than the annual GDP of any European country in 1945, including Britain, or, for example, including the Soviet Union. One could say that the Reich at that moment was the richest country. Yes, there was no economy, but the country was rich, because a large part of this wealth was, of course, stolen.
Here we need to make a small digression. So, the state budget, everything is clear with it. Germany's economy is in ruins. What the German state stole and put into the Reichsbank and storage is also clear. Well, there was also a third component. We imagine that the Reich worked like a single machine. So, here are the concentration camps, here is the economy, here they built weapons, and everything was subordinated to only one goal: world domination. But this is, of course, not the case, because different parts of the German economy were supervised by different people. These people had entire clans under them. For example, Himmler sits there, with the SS and the concentration camp structure under him. What does this mean in reality? Some head of I.G. Farbenindustrie comes to him and says: "Heinrich, listen, I need to add 10,000 working hands. We are building production here, and there's nowhere to get people from, you understand, the war." Maybe you could send us 10,000 from Sachsenhausen? He says: "Well, of course, we'll send them. Why not send them?" It's clear that the management of the concern thanked Himmler for this. Perhaps not only Himmler himself, but also the officials who were under him and who were in contact with the concern's officials. Goebbels. Well, we have propaganda, we say, Goebbels' propaganda. We had a great program, watch it. But Goebbels supervised all media. What is this? This is theater, this is radio, most importantly, and this is cinema. Besides the fact that he put his mistresses in roles, which is already a common saying, that's all clear, right? Huge sums of money were allocated from the state budget for cinema, which dissolved in controlled companies. In addition, when we talk about museums, everything that was called degenerate art, which did not fit into the concept of Aryan culture, was removed from museums, but some items, naturally, ended up in the homes of officials. Well, and perhaps the most important, the most telling thing is Hermann Göring, who was the head of the Luftwaffe. He was not only the head of the Luftwaffe, he built a huge concern that produced weapons, which included steel foundries and production. It was a huge state corporation. And according to eyewitnesses, the villas and private homes of the head of the Luftwaffe were simply, as they say, bursting with luxury items, with incredible works of art, with paintings, with sculptures, and so on and so forth. No one knows how much there was, because it was all gifted, it was all re-gifted, it was all kept in different houses. Then someone stole it, and someone managed to hide it. We don't understand. But this is monstrous, astronomical money.
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To understand where all this wealth disappeared, let's talk about how this wealth, how this gold, ended up in Berlin. The Germans began to accumulate gold even before the war. So, it came to the Reich through four channels. Well, first, nationalization, or rather, Aryanization. 1933. What happens? The Reich begins to take away businesses from Jews. First of all, they looked for jewelers and those who traded in precious metals. This sector is traditionally Jewish and traditionally very profitable. In April 1938, all Jews were obliged to register their property. And if it exceeded 5,000 Reichsmarks, it had to be declared. This amount included personal jewelry, gold, stones. And a year later, based on this inventory, Jews were obliged to hand over all items: gold, platinum, silver, and precious stones to state pawnshops. And to the state, a pawnshop implies that you brought something, you were paid money for it, but the state paid a pittance for it. And not only that, the money was transferred to special, so-called, Jewish state accounts. So, the Jews gave us their stones, we paid you for them, but the money was transferred to your special accounts. And the accounts were immediately blocked. Thus, the Nazis appropriated both the gold and the money. And it's clear, right, that according to their German laws, everything was within the legal procedure. Here's another small digression. Ordinary Germans also participated in this. There were auctions where items confiscated from Jews were sold to normal, German citizens, Aryans. And all this money also went into the state budget.
The second part of the Nazis' gold reserves is everything taken from the banks of occupied countries. In 1938, the Anschluss of Austria. Immediately after the German troops entered Vienna, the SS occupied the building of the National Bank of Austria. The Austrian Schilling was pegged to the German Reichsmark at the most unfavorable rate. The Austrian National Bank was liquidated, and its assets were transferred to the Reichsbank's balance sheet. The Nazis received 91 tons of pure gold. And this gold actually saved Germany from default. At that time, the official reserves of the Reich had already been depleted. The Germans bought materials for weapons production abroad, and a huge part of the budget went to this. There was almost no gold left in Germany. Then Hitler occupied Czechoslovakia. The Czechs did not surrender their loot. They saw what happened in Austria. Even before the occupation, they transferred 80 tons of gold to British banks. The Germans occupied Prague in March 1939, put the management of the Czechoslovak National Bank under machine guns and forced them to send an official order to London. The order stated that the gold from the Czech bank's accounts should be transferred to the Reichsbank's account. The Bank of England was supposed to refuse, but the papers were official. And the British said that we have a banking protocol, we cannot violate it. And tons of Czech gold were handed over directly into Hitler's hands. When the British press found out about this, a colossal scandal erupted. But the gold had already left. And in fact, the Germans partially used it to prepare for the attack on Poland and France. The Poles were third on this list. They already understood what the scenario would be. When Hitler's army approached Warsaw, 70 tons of gold were loaded onto buses and trucks and taken along country roads to neutral Romania. The Germans began to pressure Bucharest. Stop the cars with Polish gold. The Romanian authorities resorted to a trick. In words, they said: "Yes, yes, yes, listen, we will ban all this now. We don't want any Polish gold on our territory." They issued an official order and drowned it in bureaucracy. While all the papers were being coordinated, the caravan with Polish gold left for the port of Constanta. There it was quickly loaded onto a British tanker. The ship left, and then Romania finally issued an official ban on transit. By this time, the Polish gold had already moved to Turkey, and from there to France.
Yes, yes, yes. >> Friends, a new issue of "Chitay-ka" is about to hit the stands. And this time we decided to talk about money. In my entire life, I have never met people who do not count money. Everyone does it: millionaires, students, even crooks. This is a topic that can be discussed with literally anyone. What's in this issue? For example, the answer to the question: "Why do we love money at all," based, as they say, on historical lessons. We recalled how the Russian ruble was formed, how the main stronghold of capitalism was built. The legendary Wall Street. We found out how people end up on banknotes, compiled a rating of the richest people of the past. And, of course, when there is money, there are always those who want to steal it. On these pages, the story of the most amazing robberies of the 20th century. The cover of the issue features actor Alexei Guskov. He played one of the main roles in the series "Golden Bottom." And in general, he is a person with an amazing professional destiny. Today, he has hundreds of roles in films and series behind him. We discussed the role of money in a man's life and how successful producers find funding for their projects. Pre-orders for the issue are already open on Ozon. In early June, the magazine will be on sale. The link to pre-order the issue is in the description. Yes, yes, yes. >> When France capitulated in 1940, the Vichy government sent the Polish gold all the way to the Sahara. Officially, so that it would not fall into the hands of the British. In reality, to have a trump card in negotiations with the Germans, for better terms for France. And this gold lay there until 1942, when the Allies landed in Africa and captured it. As a result, the Poles, the only ones in Central Europe, managed to save almost their entire gold reserves.
And the most terrible part of the gold, the third part, is the gold of the victims, that is, those who ended up in concentration camps. When a person arrived at the camp, they were thoroughly searched, their wedding rings, and crosses were taken away. If someone resisted, their finger along with the ring could be cut off. Then gas chambers. After that, special Sonderkommandos extracted gold crowns, gold bridges. In Auschwitz alone, 9 tons of such gold were extracted per year. All confiscated gold was sent to the Reichsbank in the name of a certain Max Heiger. As it turned out later, such a person never existed. It was a pseudonym invented to hide the origin of the gold. The Nazis also had the gold of their allies at their disposal. Officially, it did not belong to the Reich, of course, but in fact, they managed it. And this is also a huge sum. First, the gold reserves of Italy. In 1943, the Germans took control of the headquarters of the Bank of Italy in Rome. At that time, there were, no more, no less, excuse me, 119 tons of gold. These were ingots, these were coins. Part of the money was taken to Berlin. Second, the gold of the Croatian dictator Pavelić. When his regime fell, the leader and his accomplices fled, taking with them valuables worth 80 million dollars. The Nazis helped transport this gold to Latin America. Well, we'll talk about that later. What else? The valuables of the Cossack SS Corps. These are Russian White émigrés who fought on the side of Hitler's Germany. At the end of the war, the corps retreated from Yugoslavia to Austria and Poland and took with them valuables from Tsarist times. Ingots, gold, platinum, gold coins, church utensils, jewelry. What else? Soviet gold. The Nazis collected gold from the population in the occupied territories. And, of course, they took gold from churches and museums. They also managed to export valuable industrial materials, for example, industrial diamonds and platinum, which was valued higher than gold. But it was the banking gold that the Soviet Union managed to evacuate. In the very first days of the war, most of the Soviet Union's gold reserves were moved from the western regions and from Moscow to the rear, to the Urals and the Volga region. And there it was stored until the end of the war.
By the summer of 1944, it became clear to everyone that Hitler's song was, in general, sung. In early June, the Allies landed in Normandy, taking France back from the Germans. At the end of June, the Red Army almost completely destroyed Army Group Center. The Germans lost Belarus, part of Poland. The front rolled back hundreds of kilometers to the borders of Germany. And then the leadership of the Reich asked themselves the question: "What will happen when we lose?" To be able to continue the fight after the fall of Germany, Hitler's secretary Martin Bormann proposed to declare the gold an inviolable reserve of the Reich. All valuables were completely removed from state circulation. Then they had to be hidden somewhere, so that the gold would be both reliably hidden and accessible. There were two main ways. Part of the gold certainly had to be hidden in Germany. The Nazis did not lose hope of establishing relations with the Americans, and cash gold could be useful here. The second part had to be taken out. No one understood what would happen tomorrow. If it was possible to smuggle out part of the gold, then there would be an opportunity to use it in a new life after the war. But after six months, it became clear that all fears were justified. On February 3, 1945, the Americans bombed Berlin. 1,000 planes dropped high-explosive bombs on the city center. The main targets were the ministry and the Reichsbank. The bank building was severely damaged. Of course, the safes with gold and valuables were not damaged. They were located deep in the basements. But it became clear that Berlin was not a safe place. The gold had to be urgently evacuated and hidden.
And so began Operation Merkers. On February 12, 1945, an unusual train arrived at the station in Thuringia from Berlin. At least two hundred SS men guarded two passenger and 13 freight cars. Doors, windows, all tightly boarded up. In the vestibule of each car, there was a post of armed guards. All cars were packed to capacity with boxes, gold, stones, currency, jewelry. A platinum necklace, bracelets, gold watches. Even before dawn, the gold was taken to the town of Merkers, to the area of the Kaiseroda mine. This is one of the largest potash mines in the world. So, what is it essentially? It's a real underground city. So, why did the Germans decide to hide the treasure here? Well, first, the mine is truly colossal, over 400 km of tunnels. It is very deep. Some shafts were located at depths of up to 800 meters. So, no aerial bomb of that time could penetrate it. The mines were operational. There were powerful electric hoists, and it was possible to quickly lower a whole truck literally to a depth and, if necessary, quickly raise it. The third reason is also important. Not only gold and money were taken out of the Reichsbank, but also hundreds of priceless works of art that the Germans stole from museums in Europe. And in the Kaiseroda mine, the air was cool and dry, i.e., ideal conditions for storing works of art. The Nazis spent several days loading valuables into the mine and installing massive doors there. And just two months later, Merkers was captured by American troops. And the locals quickly told them what was hidden in the mines. The commander of Merkers sent a special group of secret intelligence and a group of financial experts to assess the value of the cache. On April 6, several experts, accompanied by officers of an infantry division, descended into the mine. So, the elevator reached a depth of 640 meters. Below were two mine administrators and representatives of the Reichsbank. He immediately said: "Dear friends, here is the gold reserve of Germany." First, the officers saw thousands of boxes with paintings. Well, for example, there were masterpieces by Rembrandt, Titian, Rubens, Dürer, Raphael. 12,000 boxes with works of art. In huge underground halls, imagine, there were statues, because they could not be packed into boxes, and the size of the statues did not allow it. The most interesting was yet to come. In one of the side tunnels, a steel safe door was found. This was the so-called room number eight.
Friends, very short and very important information. I invite you all on June 7 to MTS Lifehall. I will be in Nizhny Novgorod. Tickets are available via the link in the description. Please come. I am waiting for all of you. Yes, yes, yes. >> The Germans said: "We cannot open it, we don't have the keys." Then the Americans placed dynamite under the door. When the dust settled after the explosion, an incredible sight opened before them. A vast hall was filled with a pile of sacks. Then they counted them. There were at least 7,000 sacks. In each sack, there were two gold bars, each weighing 12.5 kg. The sacks were arranged in rows, and between them stood suitcases. In the suitcases were currency, and there were also boxes. In the boxes were jewelry taken from concentration camp victims. The scale of the find was so great that the commanders-in-chief had to be summoned. And when General Patton saw the mountains of gold, he joked that now he would have enough money for new tanks for the entire army. But otherwise, of course, there was no room for jokes. According to the Yalta agreements, Thuringia was to be part of the Soviet occupation zone. The Americans immediately began to evacuate the gold so that it would not fall into the hands of the Soviet Union. For three whole days, huge ten-ton trucks continuously transported gold and money from Merkers to Frankfurt am Main. They operated under heavy guard. 10 assault air regiments and several hundred armored vehicles. All the treasures were placed in an underground storage facility of a branch of the Reichsbank, which was already in the American occupation zone. All the gold was carefully counted by experts. The gold of the victims, i.e., rings, crosses, gold teeth, was handed over to the International Committee for Refugee Affairs. This gold went to help Holocaust survivors. The ingots were combined into a common fund. This was the fund of the Gold Restitution Commission. We will also talk about it. To finish with the gold of Merkers, a brief remark. Well, it's obvious that among the truck drivers and experts there were different people. And we can imagine that someone, here and there, took a 12.5 kg ingot, and someone might have taken a picture. No one knew what was actually there. Therefore, of course, at the end of the episode, I will tell you an interesting story. We cannot imagine how much of what the Germans stole is still circulating in the world.
Well, okay. The storage in Merkers is, of course, not all of the Nazis' gold. This is only part of what was stored in the Reichsbank. There was also Himmler's gold, there was the gold of the RSHA, an organization that dealt with the enemies of the Reich. In addition, there were personal valuables of officials. Their fate is connected with a man named Otto Skorzeny. Well, he is a completely ideal Nazi. In 1942, within the SS, he created a special sabotage group for special assignments. In 1943, Hitler entrusted him with the liberation of Mussolini. In 1944, his sabotage group thwarted the assassination attempt on Hitler. After that, the Führer simply trusted him completely. And Skorzeny began to be entrusted with the most difficult and secret operations. We will definitely make an episode about this man. So, at the end of the war, Skorzeny worked with the head of intelligence, Ernst Kaltenbrunner. On his orders, Skorzeny and his group hid the personal reserves of jewelry and personal reserves of gold of the SS leadership. Göring, whom I have already told you about, ordered a cache to be set up at his residence in a castle near Nuremberg. When this cache was found, dozens of kilograms of jewelry were recovered from the underground. For example, 36 gold candlesticks, a huge bathtub made of pure silver, paintings by famous artists, several boxes of aged cognac. So, he didn't shy away from anything. Kaltenbrunner himself rented that very villa in Bad Aussee almost a year before the collapse of the Third Reich. Well, he rented it, of course, through a straw man. And in the basement of this villa, Skorzeny equipped him with a secret underground storage, from which we started this episode. So, in the last days before the capitulation, small batches of gold were distributed among the local residents, and they buried them, literally in their own gardens. The Nazis believed that they would return and reclaim the valuables. Well, or perhaps they were simply afraid of being held responsible. After all, the gold is bloody. In May 1945, Skorzeny led another secret operation at Lake Toplitz. A secret research base had existed here since the beginning of the war. German scientists and engineers conducted experiments with samples of the latest technology. For example, depth charges, torpedoes, rockets. This lake literally had a double bottom. At a depth of about 20 meters, there is a layer of submerged trees and branches in the lake. And under it is a grate. If something falls under this grate, it is almost impossible to find it. Researchers still argue about how much the Nazis sent to this lake. They say that there were about two dozen boxes with gold bars alone, weighing about a ton in total. They talk about a large steel case filled with diamonds, but no one knows for sure. On May 16, an American patrol arrested Otto Skorzeny on the shore of this very lake. It was absolutely obvious that Skorzeny was trying to hide something. Well, the Americans immediately called divers. The operation was technically very difficult, great depth, dark water, the forest submerged at the bottom. But they still managed to raise containers with stacks of money from the bottom. These were British pounds sterling. The amount was huge, several million. But all the banknotes turned out to be counterfeit. These very pounds were specially printed by the Germans during the war to collapse the British economy. But the gold at the bottom of Lake Toplitz was not found by the divers. Perhaps Skorzeny really sank it well, but most likely, the operation at Lake Toplitz was just a diversionary maneuver, while the Germans were catching Skorzeny, while they were raising these fake pounds, the real gold was being transported to the Austrian city of Graz. From there, it could be sent through the mountains, towards Italy, or, for example, south to the sea.
In the 2000s, historians managed to find a participant in that operation named Adam Janušinović. During the war, he served in the Croatian SS division, near Graz. Janušinović told the following. Their detachment was brought to the train station at night. There were wagons, sealed boxes in the wagons. They were unloaded until morning. The work was managed by priests, assistants of the local bishop, whose name is Alois Hudal. The cargo was transferred to trucks. Then the trucks went south. The gold was transported in different directions, mainly towards the Mediterranean Sea. The question arises: "What do priests and a bishop have to do with this?" In fact, the sixty-year-old bishop of Austria was an assistant to the Nazis. After Germany's surrender, he helped SS officers transfer to South America. And some researchers believe that he also supervised the transfer of Nazi gold. Well, it's completely logical, if he was taking people away, of course, he was also taking gold away. He had informal ties with the Neapolitan mafia. The mafia had its own small fleet, so part of Hitler's gold reserves could have crossed the Adriatic Sea on boats of Italian organized crime. Opinions on the further fate of the treasures differ. Some researchers believe that the gold arrived in Venice. Yes, what a spiral history makes. Again, gold was brought to Venice, as it once was from Byzantium. Other historians believe that the valuables from Graz were taken to the coast of Slovenia, because two Nazi Navy submarines were on duty there until the end of May. And these submarines could have delivered the gold to Naples. And after May 24, these submarines suddenly disappeared. According to a third version, the gold could have reached the city of Piron in Yugoslavia by trucks, and then, with the help of those very submarines, sailed to Italy. Allegedly, the boxes with gold were sent to the basements of the Vatican, and from there to South America. It is clear that in this case, at least part of the gold could have ended up in the safes of the papal capital. The Vatican, we know, we had an episode about how the Germans escaped to Latin America through rat paths. And we know that the Vatican served as the main point on the route of this escape of Germans and, consequently, the escape of gold to South America. Former Nazis fled to Latin America. And according to the calculations of a special commission, about 9,000 people, and of them, about 5,000 settled in Argentina. The then President of Argentina, Juan Perón, openly sympathized with the Reich and gladly accepted all these Nazis. Branches of German banks operated in Buenos Aires. Historians claim that the Argentine government received huge bribes for issuing clean passports and entry permits. Well, it's obvious that this was the case. In Argentina, former SS men made a pretty good life for themselves with the Reich's gold. They stuck together and built closed German communities for themselves. There they only communicated with their own kind. Spanish and Italian, no one.
He didn't learn because in Argentina they still speak Italian. In entire suburbs. You know, in some of the most beautiful places, whole villages or entire neighborhoods emerged where former SS officers lived. Some opened businesses with forged documents, and others were hired by President Perón. Well, that's, as they say, a completely different story. So far, we've talked about the gold that the Nazis tried to hide or smuggle out. But there's another interesting topic. It's the so-called Hitler's gold train. More precisely, the legend of the gold train. They've been trying to find it for decades, but so far, no one has found it. The story begins in Lower Silesia. It's a region. Look at the map. It's located in southwestern Poland. Before '45, these lands were part of Nazi Germany. This territory was bombed very little. The place was quite safe. Therefore, after the Reichsbank was bombed in Berlin, part of the gold reserve was sent here. In the spring of '45, Soviet troops began an offensive operation in Lower Silesia. And the Germans started thinking about how to evacuate all of this. According to legend, the treasures were loaded into 12 wagons. In early April, the gold train departed from Wrocław towards the city of Wałbrzych. Further, the train entered a tunnel on the outskirts of the city and disappeared without a trace. As if it dissolved into thin air. Well, of course, it couldn't dissolve. Some believe that the gold train entered a secret tunnel. The fact is that on the territory of Wałbrzych, the fascist project "Giant" was located. What is it? It's a gigantic system of secret tunnels and secret mines. It's impossible to say now why the Germans built it. According to one version, they were preparing a new headquarters for Hitler; according to another, they planned to relocate the production of the secret new V-2 weapon there, to hide all these missiles from air raids. No documents remain, but the tunnels themselves do. They even give tours through them. For example, in the Osówka mountains, a real underground city has been preserved. There are huge halls, ceiling heights of 12 meters, tunnels 2 kilometers long. And this is only what has been preserved and only what has been found. In general, of course, the tunnels were much longer. There is a version that the gold train is in one of these tunnels. However, no traces or even hints of this train have ever been found. And this story was told by a Polish miner named Tadeusz Sławiakowski. So, he was friends with a German. One old woman was friends with another old woman, who was friends with a third old woman. So, he was friends with a German who worked in these parts on the railway in '45. And supposedly, he saw with his own eyes how the train entered the tunnel, right around the 65th kilometer. And then workers appeared. The tunnel was blown up and disguised as if no tunnel had ever existed. In the 1970s, Sławiakowski retired and began searching for this gold train. He received permission for excavations in the area of the 65th kilometer, but he dug up nothing there. At the same time, the Polish security service became interested in the mythical train, but also found nothing. In 2015, the European press literally went wild. Researchers Piotr Koper and Andreas Richter announced that they had found the gold train using a ground-penetrating radar. But it soon turned out that they had only found artificial embankments that did not correspond to official maps of the area, and they also found mysterious voids in the ground at a depth of 8-9 meters. Nevertheless, the Deputy Minister of Culture of Poland promised to begin official excavations, that is, he actually confirmed that something was there. But the Poles were in no hurry to undertake the research. Even if the gold train is found, a problem arises. Who will it belong to? What's the situation here? First of all, the treasures are found on the territory of Poland. This means the country can claim at least part of the gold and part of the looted art, if any, what was taken from Polish museums and castles. But this is only part of it. Russia will also be able to claim part of the valuables. Firstly, the gold of the Cossack corps, and also compensation for what was taken from the Soviet Union. If there was also Italian or, for example, Croatian gold on the gold train, then these countries would also, as they say, get a share. In general, in the end, nothing is clear. There is the famous story with the Galleon, right, which was found somewhere in the waters of Colombia. Spain claims it immediately because it was their galleon. Colombia claims it because it was found in their waters, and Mexico and Peru claim it because it is gold and silver that was plundered from the Indians. In general, the lawsuits have been going on, I think, for 15 years. As of today, the commandant of Wrocław has issued the following order. If citizens find gold, they are obliged to report it to the police. It is forbidden to appropriate the treasure for oneself. By law, attempting to smuggle or sell the find is considered theft of state property, and one will be given 8 years in prison for it. In general, the Nazi gold train in Poland remained a legend, but there was another, Hungarian one, and it really existed. At the end of '44, the Red Army approached Budapest. The Hungarian government decided to evacuate state valuables. And in December, a train of six wagons departed from Budapest. Gold bars, jewelry, yellow diamonds, works of art, carpets, silverware, everything as it should be. The echelon was heading towards Germany. For some time, it was hidden in Austria. On May 11, near Salzburg, the gold train fell into the hands of the Americans. And they said: "We will not return anything to Hungary." Because it is not known at all what this property actually is: Hungarian or looted. It is clear that the Americans simply did not want to help Hungary, which by that time was already in the Soviet Union's sphere of influence. American officers took antique furniture, porcelain, and silver for themselves. Part of the gold and jewelry was sold through military stores or auctions. The money went to help refugees. Refugees who came to the United States. The Hungarians got nothing. The next topic is cultural treasures. The Nazis systematically plundered art galleries and museums of all occupied countries. All of this was exported to Germany. This was part of the Third Reich's cultural program. As we remember, Hitler was an artist by education, and he actually understood art history. And he planned to assemble the Führer Museum in his hometown of Linz, Austria. After Germany's victory over the whole world, this museum was to become the greatest art museum in the world. Paintings and valuables for this museum were collected, that is, plundered from all over Europe. Some items the Führer bought quite legally, but it is obvious that 99.9% of the collection was stolen and taken from occupied territories. Hitler himself preferred, as they say, the old school, especially German and Dutch. Classical 17th-century painting from Belgium, Vermeer, was taken for his collection. For example, the famous Ghent Altarpiece, for example, the famous Madonna of Bruges by Michelangelo. From Poland, they took Leonardo da Vinci's Lady with an Ermine. They took paintings by Raphael. And there was also the Ahnenerbe society, which hunted for historical and various sacred artifacts. In Vienna, they took the notorious Spear of Destiny. A very rare item. According to legend, a soldier pierced Christ himself on the cross with this spear. They took the crown of the Holy Roman Emperors. Hitler wanted to return them to Germany to symbolically confirm his power, because at one time this was the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. It turned out that Hitler was also a bit of an emperor. When the Germans approached Leningrad, the Amber Room from the time of Peter I was stolen from the Catherine Palace. The Germans dismantled it in 36 hours, packed it into boxes, and took it to Königsberg. And there its traces are lost. It has not been found to this day. From the museums of Krasnodar, from the museums of Rostov-on-Don, a huge number of ancient gold jewelry was taken. There are coins, ceramics. In total, more than a million items were lost from Soviet museums. At the same time, the Germans, of course, considered the art of Eastern Europe and Russia to be second-rate. It could not get into the Führer Museum, so the items were not particularly cared for. They were used for what? Well, they decorated the offices of Nazi officials, sold them cheaply, or destroyed them altogether during the retreat. In '44, Hitler ordered the best part of his collection to be hidden in a salt mine in the Alps, near Lake Altaussee. Göring rested here, Keitel rested here, Brunner. Perhaps one of them advised Hitler to hide the canvas in a salt mine. And so, by order of the Führer, 137 museum rooms were equipped in the mines. The walls of the salt mine were lined with wood, shelves were installed, lighting was provided, even a telephone was installed. All items, and Germans, we know, are meticulous people, were sorted by category. So, in some halls, paintings, in others, porcelain, in third, sculpture, and even a laboratory for restorers was equipped right underground. Here, experts checked the condition of the masterpieces, and if something was wrong, if they were damaged on the way, they were restored. That is, a real underground museum. At the end of the war, Hitler gave the order to destroy all the contents of the mine, because he understood that the Allies would take everything. Eight boxes with the inscription "Caution, Marble" were brought into the mine. In reality, of course, there was no marble. Each box contained five 500-kilogram aerial bombs. And soon these bombs were to be detonated. Then the mine would blow up, taking the entire underground museum with it. The miners who worked in this mine were supposed to blow up the mine, but they sabotaged this order. Of course, they were not so much concerned about art, they didn't understand it, they were concerned about much more practical things, but, firstly, they would have destroyed the mine with their own hands, in which generations of their families had worked. Secondly, as a result of the explosion, the villages that stood above would, of course, have suffered from the blast wave. And one way or another, on May 4, '45, they carried out most of the bombs on trolleys and hid them in closed adits. But the Nazis were not fools either. They realized that there were no explosions. Therefore, on May 5, the miners did what they were supposed to do, they detonated small charges at the entrance to the mine. The entrance was blocked. Now they could not fear looters, and then, after 3 days, the Americans came again. Well, it's clear that this whole collection went to them. After the war, most of the Nazi gold was never found. Well, most likely, it ended up in the banks of third countries. For example, such an inconspicuous country as Portugal. Lisbon had agreements with Hitler on tungsten supplies. This is one of the main metals for Germany's defense industry. Armor-piercing shells were made from it, it was added to steel for aircraft engines, and it was used in many other places. The Germans paid for tungsten with gold bars. And according to American intelligence, Germany transferred gold worth $150 million to Portugal. This is in '45 prices. Another 120 tons of gold arrived in Portugal through Switzerland. The Swiss National Bank acted as an intermediary to hide the German origin of the bars. After the war, Portugal refused to admit for a long time: "We have no gold at all. Are you crazy? We only have this wine, port wine. We have no gold for anyone." And only when the Allies put strong pressure on the country did it say: "Well, okay, yes, we found gold and returned a few kopecks, about 4 tons. The rest remained in the country's gold reserves." Lisbon did not allow any commissions to inspect its vaults. Another part of the gold most likely ended up in the banks of Turkey. Turkey supplied Germany with chromium, which was necessary for steel production. Hitler personally controlled diplomatic relations with Ankara so that supplies would not stop. According to American intelligence estimates, Germany transferred 15 tons of gold to Turkey. Compared to Portugal, it's a little, but for the Turkish economy at that time, it's a rather significant figure, I must say. Turkey officially did not accept gold with the stamps of banks of occupied countries. So what did the Germans do? Well, you don't need such stamps, and that's fine. The bars were re-melted and a new stamp was applied. A pre-war stamp from '38, or maybe even earlier. And so they looked as if it was gold from old state reserves in Germany. In '46, the tripartite gold commission demanded the return of the looted gold. Turkey returned bars worth only $800,000. No inspection of Turkish vaults followed, because the Cold War began, Turkey became a counterweight to the Soviet Union. And generally, the conflict was unnecessary. It was decided to avoid it. Now let's talk about Latin America. Well, we've already discussed that thousands of former Nazis moved here and brought some of their capital. But tracking them is not easy. The Nazis didn't bring bars with swastikas to Argentina, literally. Instead, they used Swiss banks. Money was transferred to Argentina through German corporations, through German non-profit organizations. The emigrants even had their own banks. The German Transatlantic Bank and the German Bank of South America. In 2022, well, literally yesterday, an internal investigation discovered at least 70 accounts belonging to immigrant Nazis. The most surprising thing is that one of them was still open at the time. And what fate awaited the valuables that were eventually found? In August '45, the Potsdam Conference decreed: "The gold reserve of the Third Reich must be divided equally among the victorious countries, i.e., among Britain, the United States, France, and the Soviet Union." But in reality, as often happens, everything turned out differently. The gold found in the Merkers mine had to be divided. There were two types: monetary gold, i.e., bars with bank stamps. This was to be divided among the countries whose banks were robbed by the Nazis. The second was the gold of the victims, i.e., personal items, jewelry, valuables, and so on. These were to be sent to a fund for the assistance of Holocaust victims. A special commission was assembled to count the monetary gold. It counted 337 tons. Belgium received the largest share, almost half, 142 tons. Italy was in second place, another 100 tons. This is in addition to the gold that was likely smuggled into Italy. The Netherlands received approximately 70 tons. Austria received about 25 tons as compensation. This is quite amusing, considering how many valuables the Nazis hid in the Austrian mountains. The Soviet Union did not participate in this process. At Potsdam, Stalin renounced claims to the gold seized by the Allies. In return, the Soviet Union gained full control over German assets in its occupation zone. Why was this done? Stalin hoped to find the Third Reich's gold in Berlin. But when the Red Army captured the Reichsbank building, there were only a paltry 90 bars lying around. This is a little over a ton, but there was also some amount of currency. With the finds in Merkers, of course, it was incomparable, but the Soviet leadership did not lose hope, as they say. After the war, in the territories of Thuringia, Lower Silesia, East Prussia, which today is Poland and, accordingly, the Kaliningrad region, an operation codenamed "Cross" began. Special groups of the Ministry of Internal Affairs searched for German caches: not only gold, but also works of art, industrial facilities, and archives. The special groups used captured maps and testimonies of prisoners of war. Some of the searches were successful. For example, large German archives were found in the Polish castle of Wolfhain. In the Osówka mountains, machines for producing rockets were found, tungsten reserves were found, and also some gold. In the mines in the area of Göttingen, boxes with gold coins and platinum bars were found. Half a century passed, and scandals surrounding Nazi gold flared up with renewed vigor. In 1995, the World Jewish Congress accused the Swiss National Bank of holding Nazi gold. We must talk about Switzerland in this episode. According to the version, during the war, the bank accepted looted gold, knowing that it was looted. Accusations were made that the Swiss deliberately kept the gold of deceased Jews and did not give it to their heirs. So, they make up absurd rules. The Swiss, it seems. Well, bring a certificate that your ancestor died in a concentration camp. At first, Switzerland remained silent in response to these accusations. But the pressure from the public and Jewish organizations is great. An internal investigation began. And, you know, the results were simply shocking. Firstly, it turned out that throughout the war, Switzerland actually bought gold from the Reichsbank for approximately $440 million at that exchange rate. Well, it's clear, of course, that this was gold that the Germans stole from other countries, but the Swiss didn't ask questions. Gold is gold. Secondly, a special commission found 54,000 dormant accounts. What is this? These are accounts for which there have been no transactions for decades. Most likely, the owners died. At the same time, the bank continued to charge commissions from these accounts and made no attempt whatsoever to find the heirs. The total amount of accounts was $2 billion. Swiss bankers diligently pretended not to know what these accounts were. But it's clear that this wasn't just money lying in accounts. This money was used in the bank's operations, in investment operations, in real estate purchases, in anything. The scandal was simply colossal. The fact that during the investigation, bank employees tried to destroy wartime documents only added fuel to the fire. And all this, in general, destroyed the myth of impeccable Swiss neutrality. As a result, Swiss banks paid 270 million francs to the Holocaust fund. Well, I must say, that's also pennies. The legends of Nazi gold do not give people around the world peace. From time to time, in newspapers, on the internet, there are stories about adventurers who try to find treasures, mostly without success. In the summer of '17, British submariners explored the sunken German cargo ship Minen. In September '39, this ship sailed from Brazil. It was heading to Germany. On board were 4 tons of gold. Apparently, the gold was requisitioned from South American banks. Off the coast of Iceland, the ship was spotted by the British fleet. And so that the ship would not fall into the hands of the British fleet, it was sunk approximately 190 km from the coast. And 78 years later, British treasure hunters announced that they had found a chest in the ship's postal compartment. Theoretically, there could have been gold bars in the chest. The find itself immediately caused a diplomatic scandal, because the ship's wreckage was in Iceland's economic zone. It had not given any official permission for diving and research. After several attempts, the British received permission to open the ship's hull, but found no valuable items inside the chest. At least, that's what was reported to the Icelandic authorities. According to the documents, the ship was carrying industrial resin, and the 4 tons of gold that were allegedly there had disappeared somewhere. Well, perhaps they dissolved in the sea. Or here's a story from Holland. This story began in August '44. During the bombing of the Dutch city of Arnhem, a branch of a bank was damaged, and the explosion blew open the vault. Four German soldiers collected scattered diamonds, gold, and silver, sealed them in four cartridge cases. And when the German units retreated, they buried these boxes under a poplar tree in Omeeren, hoping to return and dig up the treasures someday. Two soldiers died, the third disappeared. The fourth survived and blabbed about the stash in Berlin. After the war, employees of the Dutch Institute for War Documentation took an interest in the chatterbox. They were engaged in the search for property stolen by the Nazis. And the veteran told in detail. There was such a stash. He drew a map and marked the coveted treasure with a cross. For many years, this map lay in the Dutch archives. Why they didn't go digging right away is unclear. In early 2023, the National Archives of the Netherlands declassified and published a number of documents from the World War II period, including that very map. After that, chaos began in the village of Omeeren. Hundreds of people with metal detectors flocked there. They dug up fields, forests. They even climbed into the gardens of local residents with shovels. The authorities fought the invasion as best they could. First, they declared the excavations illegal and banned metal detectors. Then they said that excavations were generally dangerous to life. After all, the front line was here, and there were still many unexploded bombs and mines. Then the authorities posted a notice that any finds must be handed over to local authorities, otherwise a fine, prison, or deportation. Well, of course, neither fines nor the danger of hitting a mine stopped anyone. Adventurers still flock to the village of Omeeren. But the chances of luck, it must be said, are minimal, because the Dutch authorities, of course, tried to find the buried boxes of valuables in the village immediately after World War II, but found nothing. There are several versions of where the treasure went. For example, that it was dug up by a German looter, the very one who disappeared. Or the treasure could have been dug up by an employee of the Dutch Institute for War Documentation who received that very map. Could some local resident have stolen it? Well, he could have accidentally seen the Germans burying zinc boxes. In general, if someone goes to look for gold, I'll tell you straight, it's unlikely to still be waiting for you under the poplar tree. Sometimes hidden Nazi treasures appear out of nowhere and in the most surprising ways. Here's a story from 2010. On the Zurich-Munich train, an inconspicuous elderly man, let's call him Grandpa in a gray coat, is traveling near the Bavarian city of Lindau. Customs officers board the train. It's a routine, boring random check. They take the old man, and the old man has 9,000 euros in cash. And in general, that's not a problem. You can carry 10, and he has nine. And they say: "Grandpa, where did the money come from?" He says: "You know, I went to an auction, sold a painting," and the old man was very nervous. All of this seemed suspicious to the customs officers. They decided to check who this old man was. The man's name was Cornelius Gurlitt, and they found nothing about him. The old man had never worked a day in his life. There was no information about him in the German tax office. Social services knew nothing about him. He didn't even have medical insurance, meaning he didn't exist according to the documents. All of this is extremely strange for an eighty-year-old man. The police requested a search warrant for Gurlitt's apartment in Munich. During the search, they found 100 priceless paintings. Picasso, Matisse, Chagall. The entire elite of the 20th century. The total value of the collection is approximately one billion euros. Once again, 1 billion euros. An investigation began. Grandpa, where did you get Chagall from? Cornelius's father was a renowned German art historian, a specialist in modern art. During the war, he helped sell paintings confiscated from museums or private individuals. The so-called degenerate art. Works by modernists like Picasso were despised by the Nazis, and all this degenerate art was supposed to be destroyed. Americans, on the other hand, highly valued modernists and readily bought them. And Gurlitt's father acted as a consultant and intermediary in such deals. Thousands of canvases passed through his hands. He hid some of them. And after the war, of course, he had no intention of returning them to anyone. In '56, he died, and the entire collection logically passed to his son, who lived a modest life, secretly selling one painting every few years. A truly colossal scandal erupted. The entire collection was confiscated. Old Gurlitt claimed that the works were legally purchased by his father. Researchers found accounting books with purchase records. It turned out that his father had indeed bought some of the paintings before the Nazis came to power. For example, 14 paintings were unequivocally stolen or seized from Jewish collectors. Almost a thousand more works came to the father through unknown means without any records. In general, owning paintings that were once stolen by the Nazis is no longer a crime today. From a purely legal point of view, the statute of limitations for such cases expired in 1975. Cornelius Gurlitt could have acted as was customary for Germans, repented of his father's mistakes, and sent part of the works to charitable foundations, and kept part for himself, and everyone would have forgotten about him. But instead, Gurlitt began to argue that 1,000 stolen canvases were simply family heritage, that his father had collected what they wanted to destroy. He demanded the return of the canvases and declared that he would not give anything to anyone. After 3 years of scandals and investigations, Gurlitt finally agreed to return half of the canvases to the owners. He said the following: "Let them return my collection, and we will discuss the terms." But they didn't have time to discuss anything. A month later, on May 6, 2014, Cornelius Gurlitt died, and his collection, according to his will, went to the Bern Museum. What do I want to say at the end of the episode? Today, experts believe that in the context of international relations, it is no longer meaningful for individual states to officially demand the return of Hitler's gold. This will only spoil relations with other countries. But in private, the heirs of fascism victims have the right to sue, for example, banks in neutral countries, those where it might have ended up. And most likely, the number of such lawsuits will not decrease in the coming years. Because, as we understand, all these accounts in various banks still exist. What else do I want to say? In this episode, I made references to our earlier episodes. These are the Ratlines, how the Germans fled to Latin America after the war. This is the Vatican Bank, also watch it. It was an interesting episode. Well, in general, in the episode about the last year of World War II. If you haven't seen them yet, be sure to watch them. And subscribe to the channel if you haven't already. Until next time.