As you know, the secret organizations of the Third Reich tried to put occult practices at their service. Of course, they were also interested in Tibet - the Germans tried to join the secret knowledge of another "people of the swastika".
The results of German research in Tibet are still classified, but some information still leaked to the press. The Tibetan project of German mystics began in 1922 at the initiative of Karl Haushofer.
Taking advantage of the visit of several Tibetan lamas to Germany, he tried to learn from them. Haushofer considered it an honor to bear the title of "disciple of the Eastern Mysteries" and argued that only Tibet could bestow mystical power on the new German Reich.
Haushofer soon established the Tibetan Society in Berlin. Around 1926, Adolf Schicklgruber, better known as Hitler, became acquainted with Tibetan culture and mythology. Hitler was captured by the history of this country, but the mysterious Shambhala, about which the French mystic Rene Guyon wrote, especially struck the imagination of the founder of Nazism:
“After the fall of Atlantis, the Great Teachers (Mahatmas) of the previous civilization, the masters of Knowledge, the children of the Cosmic Mind, moved to a huge system of caves.
There they split into two "branches": right and left faith. The first "branch" is "Agarthi" ("The Hidden Center of Good"); it is engaged in contemplation, without interfering in human affairs. The second "branch" is Shambhala ("The Hidden Center of Power"), it controls the elements and crowds of people. Magicians and warriors, the heads of the peoples of the Earth can make sacrifices and conclude an agreement with Shambhala."
Of course, entering into an alliance with cosmic forces is the ultimate dream of any ruler.
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So, first Haushofer tried to establish contact with the mysterious Shambhala, and later Ernst Schaeffer took over. A hereditary fan of Oriental studies, Ernst Schaeffer was born in 1910 into the family of a collector, collector of Japanese weapons and Chinese porcelain.
The heart of the younger Schaeffer, who grew up surrounded by samurai swords and cups painted with dragons, forever belonged to the East. After finishing high school, Ernst went to university to study a seemingly completely different subject - zoology, but in 1931 he was already in Tibet. Formally, Schaeffer - a member of Dolan's expedition - went to Tibet as a zoologist.
The young man did not betray his interests in any way. Nobody in the collective knew that he was an orientalist, a member of the NSDP and personally acquainted with Heinrich Himmler. Schaeffer's secret patron, the Reichsfuehrer SS, is rumored to have given the zoologist an order to find the mysterious Shambhala.
The hike began in Myanmar and nearly ended in China, which is in the midst of civil war. Many members of the expedition, including Dolan himself, were killed. Schaeffer took the lead in the rest and stubbornly pushed forward. The expedition visited areas that Europeans had never visited before. And soon after returning to Germany, Schaeffer published the book "Mountains, Buddhas and Bears", where he talked about the unthinkable exploits of the expedition, which overcame mountain ranges, made its way through narrow gorges, and crossed rough rivers.
The travelers visited the sources of the Yellow River and Yangtze, simultaneously eliminating the "blank spots" on the map of Tibet. The highlanders from the transcendental villages periodically attacked the white newcomers, but they did not leave salty. On the whole, the expedition was successful: we managed to collect rare herbariums from plants that were not left anywhere else in wildlife, and to catch a panda bear, little known to European zoologists.
The results of the secret mission of the young scientist remain a mystery to this day. It is only known that Himmler was pleased with him. When the Ahnenerbe Institute was founded in 1933, Schaeffer was invited there as a leading researcher.
Schaeffer organized a new expedition to Tibet in 1935. Since the research was funded by the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, half of the expedition members were Americans. However, shortly after crossing the Tibetan border, Schaeffer provoked a conflict between the American and German groups in order to get rid of prying eyes. The frustrated Americans turned back, and the Germans, guided by Schaeffer's instructions, reached the sources of the Yangtze and Mekong. It is quite possible that the expedition also visited Lhasa.
The results of the second trip to the mountains of Tibet were no less impressive. Researchers have discovered many new, previously unknown species of animals and plants. Among them are the pygmy pigeon, the orango antelope, and many rare birds. In 1937, based on the materials of the expeditions, Schaeffer published a monograph and defended his dissertation.
After gaining fame in the academic circles of the Reich, he was assigned to head the Tibetan department of the Ahnenerbe Institute. The department had something to do, because as a result of the expeditions, thousands of ancient Tibetan manuscripts came to the disposal of the SS - a significant part of the vast occult heritage of the East …
On September 10, 1938, SS Reichsfuehrer Heinrich Himmler met with the leadership of the Tibetan Department of the Ahnenerbe Institute. At this meeting, held in the office of the head of the SS, the dates, goals and objectives of the new expedition were approved. Officially, this was another naturalist expedition to study the flora and fauna of Tibet. But the expedition included employees of the special services of the Reich, radio communication specialists and, of course, oriental scholars associated with the SS and Ahnenerbe.
The unofficial task was not advertised this time, but it was not hidden either. The Germans wanted to establish closer contact between the "two cultures of the swastika" - the Nazi and the Tibetan.
For this, it was planned to place a permanently functioning radio station in the residence of the Dalai Lama in Lhasa. This installation was supposed to be ciphers, engineers and highly qualified radio operators.
Perhaps their activities were only supposed to serve as a cover: in fact, Germany needed to improve the quality of radio communications with its Far Eastern ally Japan. To do this, on one of the mountain peaks of Tibet, in a zone of strong winds, it was necessary to install an automatic repeater and a wind generator with a vertical turbine specially developed in secret SS laboratories.
The installation site and the repeater itself were to be mined, technicians should be eliminated, and the approaches to the repeater should be destroyed. There is still no direct evidence of the existence of this device, but there are allegedly some British intelligence documents for 1942, where it is mentioned that a special group was sent to Tibet to destroy a German long-distance communication transmitter operating there.
The documents contain the testimony of a surviving participant in this raid, according to which, upon arrival in the area of Mount Kanchenjunga, the British stumbled upon the remains of temporary buildings of some German expedition. Some of the buildings contained personal belongings, and in one there were the remains of breakfast. It looked as if the camp had been abandoned in a hurry just recently. To the northeast, to the steep slope of the mountain, there was a well-equipped path, abutting against a steep cliff, with a possible secret entrance to an underground cavity.
The British group failed to neutralize the German mines, which, having exploded, caused a collapse of rocks into the valley and covered this mysterious place with millions of tons of soil. Almost all members of the group died, why the narrator himself survived remains a mystery …
After installing the repeater (if it really existed), Schaeffer's expedition visited the capital of Tibet, Lhasa. The Regent of Tibet Kvotukhtu through Schaeffer conveyed a personal message to Hitler, in which he wrote:
“Dear Mr. (King) Hitler, ruler of Germany, dominating vast countries! May health, joy of peace and virtue be with you! Now you are working to create a vast state on a racial basis.
Therefore, the now arrived leader of the German Tibetan expedition, Sahib Schaeffer, did not have the slightest difficulty either on the journey through Tibet, or in the implementation of his goal of establishing personal friendly relations, moreover, we hope for a further expansion of friendly relations between our governments.
Please accept, Your Grace, Mr. (King) Hitler, our assurances of further friendship in accordance with the words spoken by your side. I confirm this to you! Written on the 18th of the first Tibetan month of the Earth Hare year (1939)."
Soon after the regent's letter to Hitler, radio communication was established between Lhasa and Berlin. The Regent of Tibet, Kvotukhtu, presented to Schaeffer gifts that he was supposed to give to the Fuhrer of the German nation: a silver cup with a lid, inlaid with precious stones; a silk scarf and a special Tibetan dog.
Schaeffer enjoyed the regent's hospitality. Schaeffer's report betrays the depth of his admiration for what he saw in the capital of Tibet:
“Monks in scarlet festive garments in unison recited festive texts. Deliberately low, rumbling voices merged into an inexpressible murmur that seemed to emanate from the naked womb of Maitreya - the coming Buddha. It was the most grandiose statue on a high altar painted with red lacquer …
Symphonies of colors and smells were echoed by a splendidly oiled orchestra. A drum thumped dully, flutes carved from human bones whistled, the sound of cymbals and golden bells scattered like a March drop. Maitreya, who is called Champa here, was depicted as a good-natured, shaved-headed fat man.
The time had not yet come for him to descend from heaven to a sinful earth with a new incarnation of Buddha, and with a sad smile he looked at what was happening through the fragrant smoke, clutching a travel bundle in his hand. The time will come, and with a triumphant thunder the mountain that hides him will split, and he will walk the Tibetan paths in the guise of a prince, heralding the coming of an era of happiness and justice."
Having studied the rituals of Buddhist monks, Schaeffer found in them much in common with the rituals of the Aryans, which was quite in the spirit of Nazi "science". And, of course, there was a search for Shambhala. Using medieval maps and based on the writings of Blavatsky, the Roerichs and other travelers who were interested in the occult secrets of the East, the German orientalist, Professor Albert Grunwedel, concluded that there was a passage accessible to people to Shambhala near Mount Kanchenjungi.
According to rumors, Schaeffer's expedition visited there as well. And supposedly it was not entirely unsuccessful: the Germans did not find the entrance to Shambhala, but they recorded several mysterious radio broadcasts in an incomprehensible language, which were conducted in the ultra-shortwave range that was practically unused at that time. However, since the tapes containing these recordings have either disappeared or are classified, it is impossible to draw any conclusions.
Most of the members of the Tibetan expedition of Germany returned to the Reich in the summer of 1939. In Munich, Schaeffer was honored as a hero; the Reichsfuehrer SS Heinrich Himmler himself took part in the solemn meeting. Literally on the second day upon arrival at home, the German leadership raised the issue of sending a whole detachment of soldiers and scientists in uniform with a load of military equipment and scientific instruments to Tibet. Only the outbreak of war thwarted these plans to establish control over the heart of Asia.
In 1941, Schaeffer had the opportunity to participate in another mysterious project called Laplandia.
This time the action took place not in Tibet, but in Finland. According to rumors, the Germans became interested in the search for Arctida-Hyperborea, the mythological ancestral home of the Europeans.
The details of the Laplandia project are unknown even today, since no documents have survived that testify to the true goals of the Germans.
And in 1943, Schaeffer began working again on Tibetan topics. Goebbels, who launched the "Mysterious and Friendly Tibet" propaganda campaign, needed his knowledge. Schaeffer disappeared shortly after the end of the campaign. Sent back to Tibet to reestablish contact with the mysterious forces dormant beneath the Himalayas?
Or was it something else? It was impossible for Schaeffer to return to Germany after May 1945, all the more so as the secret services of the winning countries were interested in him. The same special services were also interested in the Tibetans, a considerable number of whom were in the service of the Reich.
Even before Hitler came to power, many Tibetan religious and secular leaders lived in Germany. In some large cities, they formed entire communities, especially many of them lived in Munich and Berlin. The mysterious Tibetan Green Monks Society maintained contact with the Thule Society.
There was a Tibetan lama in Berlin who was famous for wearing green gloves as a sign of belonging to the "green monks." This man allegedly several times gave an accurate forecast of the results of elections to the German parliament, foreseeing the role of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDPA).
Hitler, who was interested in the occult, favored the Tibetans, and many of them moved "at the court" of the Fuhrer. However, during the assault on the capital of the Reich by Soviet troops, Tibetans from Hitler's entourage died. They did not surrender in captivity, preferring to fall in battle or commit suicide. Hitler's eastern adherents took all their secrets with them.