The Master Plan
SUMMARY
What happens when science falls prey to a deadly political agenda?
Prehistory, according to Heinrich Himmler, had to be rewritten. The chief of the SS and the architect of the Nazi death camps was convinced that archeologists had long ignored the accomplishments of a primeval race of blond-haired, blue-eyed conquerors -- the Aryans. Himmler believed that Germany's ancestors had evolved in the icy barrens of the Arctic where they had ruled as an invincible master race. Now, he theorized, only in select parts of the world did some true Aryan blood remain.
Himmler's history was pure fiction, but his conviction was unshakeable. In 1935 he founded the Ahnenerbe -- a research institute to manufacture archaeological evidence for political purposes -- and set about recruiting a bizarre mix of adventurers, mystics, and reputable scholars to help rewrite all of human history. Researchers were sent on public expeditions and secretive missions to Iraq, Finland, Tibet, and beyond, backed by the power of the Third Reich.
Drawing on extensive original research, Heather Pringle paints a compelling and sinister portrait of the Ahnenerbe and its role in the Holocaust, and reveals the German scientists and scholars who allowed their research to be used to justify extermination. Combining the energy and storytelling skill of the best fiction with the chilling detail of history, The Master Plan is a groundbreaking story of delusion and excess, of scientific and political abuse on a global scale.
Published by Hyperion, Fourth Estate and Penguin Canada
