a small town in the east German state of Thuringia As children slurp ice cream and Thuringian Bratwürste warm on the grill a practised provocateur who leads the state branch of the hard-right Alternative for Germany (afd) journalists and the politicians who exploited the covid “plandemic” to test the limits of Germans’ support for freedom He urges his audience to give the “cartel parties” the boot on September 1st when Germany’s most fraught state elections in years will take place in Thuringia and neighbouring Saxony This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “Rising in the east” Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents George Simion will face Nicusor Dan, a mainstream candidate, in a run-off There are five luxuries it can no longer feasibly afford Friedrich Merz’s career is one of unforced errors and puzzling missteps. But he is serious about Europe Both Donald Trump and Ukraine’s diplomats will consider it a success EDITOR’S NOTE: This “Historically Speaking” column contains the opinions of Dr. Todd H. Rider based upon the research and information contained in his book, “Forgotten Creators: How German-Speaking Scientists and Engineers Invented the Modern World, And What We Can Learn from Them.” [https://riderinstitute.org/revolutionary-innovation/] I now bring to you "Historically Speaking" readers an interesting insight into Germany during the Manhattan Project and World War II era This one is based on extensive research and is published online for your review Rider has also been featured on the YouTube series "Hidden History: Stories from the Secret City View this story online for the direct links or search on YouTube to watch the five episodes Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0j4vsrz5XE Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1pPh048r0o Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQ8AQm6kboY Part 4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHss4fDGCAY Part 5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfYvRarCrg8 Get ready to have your mind filled with new information regarding the history of German atomic weapons Spring 2025 is the 80th anniversary of the end of the World War II German nuclear weapons program Although the standard historical view since the war has been that the German nuclear program was small and primitive compared to the U.S recently declassified and rediscovered archival documents reveal a different story Germany acquired thousands of tons of uranium and thorium ores from German territory One route to producing fission fuel for nuclear weapons is enriching uranium - separating the highly fissionable uranium-235 isotope that constitutes approximately 0.72% of natural uranium from the rest that is relatively inert the United States enriched uranium primarily using a combination of “calutrons” or electromagnetic separators (the Oak Ridge Y-12 facility) and gaseous thermal diffusion (the Oak Ridge K-25 facility) Documents now available show that the Nobel-Prize-winning German physicist Dr Gustav Hertz invented gaseous thermal diffusion enrichment in 1923 and the German government considered his research so important that he was able to work throughout the war despite his Jewish ancestry invented an improved method of diffusion enrichment When Soviet forces entered Germany in 1945 they discovered that factories in the town of Neustadt an der Orla were uniquely skilled at producing nickel membrane filters for diffusion enrichment What exactly had those factories been doing during the war Leslie Groves of the Manhattan Project sent Percival C chief designer of the Oak Ridge K-25 plant What mission would have required Keith’s unique knowledge and would have justified the risk if he were captured by Czech or Soviet forces or sabotage a former German enrichment plant in Czechoslovakia What we do know from the available documents is that Gustav Hertz and resources from Czechoslovakia all played vital roles in the postwar Soviet nuclear weapons program rediscovered archival documents reveal the German scientist Manfred von Ardenne one of the inventors of television and the electron microscope built a prototype calutron electromagnetic isotope separator in 1941 After successfully demonstrating his calutron he called upon the German government and German industry to mass-produce his calutrons for large-scale uranium enrichment Army Air Forces and Office of Special Services (OSS) reveal at least three large facilities were built for von Ardenne’s machines and at least one of those facilities was destroyed by Allied bombing Further information about this wartime work remains classified although von Ardenne is known to have played a leading role in the postwar Soviet nuclear program which are more efficient than calutrons and gaseous diffusion for uranium enrichment and which therefore have now become the preferred method of enrichment worldwide Georg Bredig invented gas centrifuges sometime before 1895 uranium gas centrifuges were being produced in Kiel (by two different groups) and even factories in nominally neutral Switzerland for export back to Germany How many uranium gas centrifuges did Germany produce and use during the war the details remain unavailable even 80 years later If Germany had built one large Oak-Ridge-like facility for all its uranium enrichment machines it would have been straightforward for Allied bombers to destroy that facility Germany would have been strongly motivated to divide up its uranium enrichment machines among many smaller sites far apart especially in the eastern regions of German-controlled territory (further from United States/United Kingdom bombing) and in the numerous large underground facilities that were highly resistant to aerial bombing That is what Germany did with most of its other major industries as the war progressed a declassified October 1944 report from a highly placed Office of Strategic Services (OSS) spy cites several leading German industrialists as privately admitting that is exactly how Germany distributed its nuclear production facilities Other declassified wartime and early postwar documents name many of the German nuclear sites: twin I.G said to have 30,000 workers each and to be producing an important new type of explosive material for nuclear weapons; a similar 30,000-person facility underground in Thuringia; underground factories with huge numbers of workers making explosive nuclear material south of Hamburg; one or more uranium enrichment facilities on the outskirts of Berlin; an underground facility at Redl-Zipf From the official Manhattan District history all of Oak Ridge (both the facilities and the town itself) consumed an average of 0.189 gigawatts of electrical power Strategic Bombing Survey and the British Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee at the end of 1944 the Greater German Reich was producing over 22 gigawatts of power despite all the Allied bombing Including all other countries aiding Germany during the war the total was probably around twice that amount operating enrichment facilities fully comparable to Oak Ridge would have required less than 0.86% of the power of the Greater German Reich or probably less than 0.5% of the total power aiding Germany Other documents indicate that German enrichment (especially centrifuges) was more efficient than Oak Ridge and that German bomb designs used methods more efficient than the U.S so Germany would have needed much less power than Oak Ridge Another route to producing fission fuel for nuclear weapons is to use a fission reactor to convert natural uranium-238 into highly fissionable plutonium-239 to convert natural thorium-232 into highly fissionable uranium-233 the United States built several large graphite-moderated fission reactors at Hanford plus several large heavy-water-moderated fission reactors at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina after the war The most famous wartime fission reactor in Germany was a small experimental reactor that was supervised by Dr Werner Heisenberg and his associates and that never managed to achieve criticality (self-sustaining fission reactions) by the end of the war recently rediscovered archival documents mention several other wartime reactors that may have achieved criticality and may have also been much larger shows what appears to be largely underground octagonal pool-type fission reactors under construction or operational An aerial surveillance photo of this same site on April 16 shows that German forces filled the site with earth and concrete and sealed it before U.S Surviving Austrian construction plans for this site list “two atomic piles.” 1944 Austrian train logbooks show that several other suspected nuclear sites sent regular shipments of codenamed products to this Gusen site Army Air Forces report on this site is prominently hand-labelled “Underground Pile” with three underlines - and the actual report is still classified the son of the SS commandant of Gusen stated the purpose of the facility was to produce atomic bombs Of the reported 30-40 kilometers of tunnels at this underground facility only one small portion is now opened to the public twice per year - and it contains such a high concentration of radioactive gases that it must be thoroughly ventilated before each public opening visitors cannot remain in the tunnel longer than one hour and a plastic barrier had to be installed to block even higher levels of radioactive gases coming from the off-limits tunnels beyond Requests to conduct industrial archaeological excavations at the site have been rejected by the Austrian government Other archival documents mention known or suspected wartime fission reactors at Leverkusen detailed reports on those sites remain unavailable to this day Most reactors include a moderator material that increases the probability that neutrons released by one fission reaction will cause more fission reactions nuclear program used a graphite moderator in its Hanford reactors and heavy water (oxygen with deuterium instead of regular light hydrogen) moderator in its Savannah River reactors It is well known that Germany was receiving shipments of heavy water from the Vemork plant in German-occupied Norway and that Allied forces and the Norwegian resistance launched several attacks against that plant Recently rediscovered documents indicate Germany was also receiving heavy water from at least 24 other plants all over German-controlled Europe Detailed reports on those heavy water plants remain classified The fact that Germany was producing heavy water at approximately 25 or more plants despite other urgent wartime needs strongly suggests that the heavy water was required for operational fission reactors or other aspects of a nuclear weapons program currently available documents show wartime Germany was also producing enormous quantities of other materials that a serious nuclear weapons program would require: tens of thousands of tons of graphite Farben’s Bitterfeld facility were producing multiple nuclear-related materials all at the same location These activities began as early as 1938 and continued as a high priority to the very end of the war in Europe we will discuss what recently rediscovered archival documents tell us about the design and successful testing of German atomic bombs as well as the transfer of German nuclear technologies and personnel to the United States and other countries after the war All of the archival evidence mentioned in these two articles and much more is available for free at: https://riderinstitute.org/revolutionary-innovation/ .Everything discussed there and in these articles is based entirely on unclassified and declassified sources please use it as a starting point and see how much more evidence you can find in public archives and private collections around the world and procedures!) at some of the suspected wartime sites in Europe What a great start to the insights he has discovered Look forward to the next part of the story Ray Smith is the city of Oak Ridge historian His "Historically Speaking" columns are published weekly in The Oak Ridger The Volkswagen Group has lined up its launch crew for the mission to quickly and comprehensively industrialize new battery technologies A highly talented team led by Frank Blome will work from their base in Salzgitter to expand the rapidly growing battery business and turn Volkswagen into a global cell manufacturer a six-member Executive Board has been appointed to manage the new independent European company (Société Européenne) an operation that will employ top international experts from the fields of technology The board will begin work on July 1 and oversee all activities along the battery value chain – from the procurement and processing of raw materials to the development of the Volkswagen unit cell and the management of the company's initial six gigafactories This work will also include new business models involving second-life uses for vehicle batteries and closed-loop recycling of valuable raw materials The company will be headquartered at the Salzgitter site which serves as the Group's battery hub in Europe CEO Volkswagen AG: "We have set up one of the most competent battery teams in the world and are therefore at the forefront of the competition Volkswagen has the size and clout to secure the ramp-up of its e-mobility strategy with its own battery roadmap." the Group Board Member for Technology and the Chairman of the Board of Management of Volkswagen Group Components added: "A successful mission needs a clear goal a clear strategy for getting there and a team with a strong team spirit we will be a driving force behind the transformation of the automotive industry and the future of Volkswagen." An overview of the management team at the new battery company: Chief Executive OfficerFrank Blome will oversee the entire operation as Chief Executive Officer After completing vocational training as an electrician Blome majored in electrical engineering at the Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences After holding various positions at Continental AG he headed two joint ventures that eventually became subsidiaries of Daimler AG: Deutsche ACCUmotive GmbH and Li-Tec Battery GmbH he joined Volkswagen AG and has been Head of the Battery division in the Group's Technology division since 2020 Chief Operations OfficerAs Chief Operations Officer Sebastian Wolf will be responsible for the planning construction and operation of the planned cell factories in Europe Wolf was born in 1990 in Oelsnitz in the Vogtland region of eastern Germany After earning his diploma from a college-preparatory high school in Istanbul The production engineer later held management positions at Bosch and Boston Consulting before becoming European CEO of the Chinese battery manufacturer Farasis Energy Wolf has been Head of Operations Battery Cell in the Battery division since 2021 Chief Financial OfficerAs Chief Financial Officer Kai Alexander Müller will be responsible for Controlling & Accounting Müller was born in Frankfurt am Main in 1990 graduating with a master of engineering degree in materials He held various positions at Berenberg and the Bank of America before becoming the Head of Automotive Equity at Barclays in London Müller joined the Volkswagen Group as CFO of the Battery division Chief Technology OfficerAs Chief Technology Officer Soonho Ahn will be responsible for technology and product development as well as testing and analytics The chemical engineer first studied in Korea and earned his doctorate in 1992 on the subject of electrochemistry for battery applications at Auburn University in the United States he held various management positions at the battery manufacturers LG Chem and Samsung SDI in Korea where he was most recently head of development he became Global Head of Battery Development at Apple Ahn became the CTO of the Battery division at the beginning of 2022 Chief Purchasing OfficerAs Chief Purchasing Officer Jörg Teichmann will be responsible for raw material purchasing Teichmann was born in 1971 in Neustadt an der Orla in the eastern German state of Thuringia After earning a degree in business administration he first worked for the automotive supplier Butz leper He then held various management positions in procurement and supplier management at ZF Friedrichshafen AG he joined the BMW Group as Head of Cost Engineering Teichmann joined Volkswagen AG as Head of Value Engineering and has been the Chief Procurement Officer for Group Components since 2021 Chief Human Resources OfficerAs Chief Human Resources Officer Sebastian Krapoth will be responsible for human resources culture & change management and organizational issues Krapoth was born in the northern German city of Göttingen in 1970 He earned a degree in psychology and began his professional career in 1999 at Volkswagen Coaching GmbH He later held a range of management positions in the human resources department of Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles Krapoth joined the company that is now known as Volkswagen Group Services GmbH as Head of Human Resources and authorized signatory He became chairman of the Management Board in 2016 he was appointed Chief Human Resources Officer of Volkswagen Slovakia in Bratislava The campaign will be aimed at international battery experts individuals who are highly sought after not just by the automotive industry and energy companies The company is focusing not just on chemists with relevant experience in the field of Li-Ion batteries who can immediately enter the field of cell and cell component development It is also looking for electrical engineers process planners for battery cell production quality employees with experience in the chemical industry or production process-related companies as well as experts working in the field of international partnerships and investments More information about the battery company:https://www.volkswagenag.com/de/brands-and-models/group-components/mission-has-started.html This is Radio Schuman, your new go-to podcast to spice up your weekday mornings with relevant news, insights, and behind-the-scenes from Brussels and beyond. From the economy to the climate and the EU's role in world affairs, this talk show sheds light on European affairs and the issues that impact on our daily lives as Europeans. Tune in to understand the ins and outs of European politics. No agenda, no argument, no bias, No Comment. Get the story without commentary. Dare to imagine the future with business and tech visionaries Deep dive conversations with business leaders Euronews Tech Talks goes beyond discussions to explore the impact of new technologies on our lives. With explanations, engaging Q&As, and lively conversations, the podcast provides valuable insights into the intersection of technology and society. Europe's water is under increasing pressure. Pollution, droughts, floods are taking their toll on our drinking water, lakes, rivers and coastlines. Join us on a journey around Europe to see why protecting ecosystems matters, how our wastewater can be better managed, and to discover some of the best water solutions. Video reports, an animated explainer series and live debate - find out why Water Matters, from Euronews. We give you the latest climate facts from the world’s leading source, analyse the trends and explain how our planet is changing. We meet the experts on the front line of climate change who explore new strategies to mitigate and adapt. Three eastern German states of Thuringia, Saxony, and Brandenburg are set to elect new parliaments next month, and in all three states the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD, is ahead in the polls. In Thuringia, which has a population of 2.1 million and where the famous Buchenwald memorial is located, the fiercely anti-immigration AfD is leading with 30% in the polls, ahead of the 1 September elections. That figure is way ahead of the centre-right Christian Democrats (CDU), who were in power for 16 years under former Chancellor Angela Merkel. The CDU is currently polling at 21% in the state. Faced with the far-right's potential win in the regional elections, experts say there are reasons for Germany's federal government to be afraid for the future, especially the parties that make up Chancellor Olaf Scholz's centre-left bloc. Germany's security service has labelled the Thuringian AfD as a right-wing extremist party. The AfD leader in the state, Björn Höcke, was convicted twice for using the banned Nazi slogan 'Alles für Deutschland' ('Everything for Germany'). The party's current election manifesto carries the slogan 'Alles für Thüringen' ('Everything for Thüringen') which has sparked a wave of concern among many, including Jens-Christian Wagner, the director of the Buchenwald Memorial which commemorates the victims of the Nazi concentration camp of the same name. Wagner is even more worried about the success of the radical and extreme right in Germany following its strong record in the recent European election. He believes that relativising Nazism is part of AfD's "ideological core", and that the Buchenwald Memorial may not survive if the party wins the vote, because it could then intervene in the memorial's management. "The AfD claims that the work we do here, the culture of remembrance, is a so-called 'culture of guilt'," Wagner said. "And according to that idea, I am the preacher of this culture of guilt. And of course, I therefore have to go." During World War II, the Nazis held some 277,000 people at Buchenwald, around 56,000 of whom died. After US troops liberated the camp, the inhabitants of the nearby city of Weimar were forced to visit. The expression "Wir haben es nicht gewußt" is attributed to their reaction: they claimed they had not noticed. This time many are trying to sound the alarm so that people do notice. Wagner sees it as his duty to warn against the radical right and the trivialisation of the Holocaust, making him one of the most important voices against the AfD. "[It is frustrating] that despite our work, teaching history and politics, at the moment about 30% of the people in Thuringia are prepared to vote for the AfD," he said. "But of course that cannot make us give up." At an AfD rally in Neustadt an der Orla, attendees were not impressed by Wagner's warnings. "What has always bothered me is that they always say: 'Germany started the two world wars'. That is not true," a woman attending the rally said. “Yes, that was indeed part of our history. But not only Germany committed crimes, did it?" she added. Thuringian AfD leader Björn Höcke, 52, was one of the speakers. He told the crowd, "Germans need normal patriotism again. A lively patriotism," he said. "We have been portrayed as a kind of pariah in history for 80 years now," he said. "This cannot continue. The Germans must learn to become friends with themselves again. And that too is the mission of the AfD." At the campaign rally, the belief was that the AfD would change this, albeit led by the man who was recently convicted for repeating Nazi slogans in his speeches. However noble the plan, the records tell a different tale, and analysts say that specifically in Thuringia, radical far-right forces have created an environment that's hostile toward minorities, including black people. In 2023, the NGO Ezra, which helps victims of far-right, racist, and antisemitic violence, documented 85 racist attacks in Thuringia, down only slightly from 88 attacks in 2022. Ezra described this as "an all-time high of right-wing and racist violence" in the state. "In recent years, an extreme right-wing movement has formed in Thuringia, which has contributed to a noticeable ideological radicalisation of its followers. Politically, the Alternative for Germany party is the main beneficiary," Ezra and a consortium of organisations tracking racism wrote in their annual report. Some companies in eastern Germany have also said they are finding it increasingly hard to attract the skilled foreign workers they desperately need as the far-right AfD gains more power. A recent poll of more than 900 German companies by the Institute for the German Economy also showed that a majority sees the AfD as a risk, both for securing skilled workers and for investment in the region. Last year, businesses and individuals set up Cosmopolitan Thuringia, a grassroots network to promote tolerance, diversity, and "indivisible human rights," which now has more than 7,940 members. In particular, the AfD's Thuringia branch was put under official surveillance by the domestic intelligence service four years ago as a "proven right-wing extremist" group. All three German eastern states — Thüringia, Saxony, and Brandenburg — account for 10% of Germany's population, and their election results are expected to have a major influence on national politics and foreign policy. One of the topics on foreign policy is the war in Ukraine, and alongside that, the issue of migration. Both far-left and far-right parties are demanding negotiations with Russia and the halting of weapons deliveries to Ukraine. A new far-left party, the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), splintered from left-wing party Die Linke last year, wants negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the end of weapons deliveries to Ukraine, and the watering down of climate policies. Poling at 20% in Thuringia and over 10% in Saxony, the new populist leftwing upstart led by Sahra Wagenknecht, an almost most cult-like figure in eastern Germany, is highly critical of the current government but hasn't offered many feasible solutions. There is also the issue of migration, on which Olaf Scholz's SPD coalition government has been put under pressure, more so since Friday's attack in Solingen, involving a suspected extremist from Syria. The stabbing spree left three people dead and eight others injured, four of them critically, in the western city. Days later, the leader of the centre-right opposition CDU, Friedrich Merz, said he anticipates working with Chancellor Olaf Scholz to tighten immigration policies. Merz called for concrete measures to curb irregular migration and urged Scholz's centre-left Social Democrats to cooperate with the CDU on the subject. The suspect in the Solligen attack, a 26-year-old Syrian male who has been placed under arrest, was meant to be sent to Bulgaria last year after his asylum application was turned down in Germany. To keep the AfD out of power, a potential alliance between parties will have to happen, potentially between the BSW and CDU, something that is almost inconceivable with divergent standpoints on several issues. With elections scheduled for 1 September and 22 September, respectively, the AfD is also quite powerful in the states of Saxony and Brandenburg. However, in Saxony, the CDU is fighting back. They are currently tied with the AfD at about 30%, while Scholz's SPD coalition is hovering around 5% in opinion polls in both Saxony and Thuringia, the required threshold to have any representation in government. Eastern Germany is widely perceived to be a homogenous region, but there are significant political disparities among the states. In the past ten years, the socialist Left Party led by State Premier Bodo Ramelow has governed Thuringia, while since 2017, Michael Kretschmer of the centre-right CDU has been in charge of Saxony. Dr. Carsten Koschmieder, political analyst at the Free University in Berlin, expects the AfD to be the strongest party, at least in Saxony. But it is unlikely that it will win over the 50% needed for a majority to join the government. Since the end of World War II, an outright majority has been exceedingly rare in Germany, a system designed to curb the rise of an extremist to power. As such, leading parties must usually form coalitions to govern, and appointing judges requires a two-thirds majority. However, even if the AfD doesn't enter government, it can still exert great influence, according to Koschmieder. Whilst the CDU has ruled out forming a coalition with AfD on both local and federal levels, they could potentially backtrack on this promise. Analysts have said both parties have more in common than what sets them apart. If there is any party to lose, that will be the Social Democrats of Chancellor Scholz and its fractious coalition with the Green Party and the neoliberal Free Democrats (FDP). Scholz has set the next national election for 28 September 2025, but first, he'd have to see the outcome of the eastern elections this September to know where Germany's political dimension is headed. 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