# Nazi Werewolves: fact or fiction? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 28, 2004, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461 "2004-05-28T02:55:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/21 "2004-05-29T13:29:33Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > $75, that’s huge! [Accounting for inflation](http://www.westegg.com/inflation/infl.cgi), that works out to about $740 current dollars. It was 1-1/5 months gross base pay for a private. On the other hand, who needed money? You could get everything you needed at the PX for $5 a month or so. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/22 "2004-05-29T13:30:42Z")
Sheeeesh! Make that 1-1/2 months. ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/23 "2004-05-29T17:35:46Z")
IIRC, Ian Fleming wrote some James Bond short stories before(?) the novels really hit. At least one of them had to do with Bond taking out a Nazi Werewolf after the end of WWII. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/24 "2004-05-30T03:01:21Z")
> [@LouisB](#): > > IIRC, Ian Fleming wrote some James Bond short stories before(?) the novels really hit. At least one of them had to do with Bond taking out a Nazi Werewolf after the end of WWII. You’re likely referring to _From a View to a Kill_, in which Bond investigates who’s been killing NATO motorcycle messengers on the back roads in France. It was published in 1960 (along with four other shorts under the title _For Your Eyes Only_), about halfway into Fleming’s Bond career. The first novel, _Casino Royale_, was published in 1954. The last Fleming Bond work, a collection of short stories titled _Octopussy and the Living Daylights_, came out in 1966, two years after Fleming’s death. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/25 "2004-05-30T17:57:19Z")
Of course, this could provide an interesting scenario for an “alternate universe” SF author like Harry Turtledove, where Germany decides to create _real_ werewolves… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/26 "2004-05-30T18:49:16Z")
FWIW what I learned in 1970s _Gymnasium_ history class was - Werewolf project widely touted by Nazi radio propaganda towards the end of the war - Werewolves failed to materialize (instead everyone preferred to save their own hide) - Allies when entering Germany convinced of existence of Werewolves (or had to assume they existed, to be on the safe side), which led to a few instances of civilans being killed, and to the very few instances of hostages being executed. To sum op: Werewolves failed as a guerilla project, were successful for a short time as a propaganda project poisoning Allied/civilan relations. ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2004, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/27 "2004-05-31T00:37:00Z")
**Bryan Ekers,** that is exactly right. I had forgotten the sequence of publication, though. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2004, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461/28 "2004-05-31T02:49:27Z")
> [@LouisB](#): > > **Bryan Ekers,** that is exactly right. I had forgotten the sequence of publication, though. Actually it was probably wrong, now that I’ve had a chance to think about it. The novel _Moonraker_ features a villian who I believe _was_ a NAZI Werewolf. He and his unit had stayed in France when the allies rolled in, in order to perform acts of sabotage and whatnot. Their last big operation was parking a truck filled with explosives next to a allied mess hall, timed to go off during the lunch hour. The leader, whose real name was van der Drache, or something, was conducting a individual mission at the time, killing an allied messenger and taking his uniform. He ended up getting ironically strafed by a German plane and regained consciousness on the same allied base, just in time to get blown up. Drache survived, though with his face significantly scarred. Feigning memory loss, he manages to convince allied investigators that he is Hugo Drax, one of the missing casualties (Drache had been educated in England, conveniently enough). Anyhoo, ten years after the war Drax/Drache has struck it rich by investing in the nascent jet engine industry (he got his seed money by killing and robbing a Jewish gemstone merchant). He spearheads the development of a British proto-ICBM (the eponymous Moonraker), with help from a number of German V2 rocket scientists. It turns out they’re all in a big conspiracy to bring the test rocket down on London (instead of as planned - into the North Sea) armed with a Soviet-supplied nuclear warhead. It’s dizzyingly improbable, of course. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nazi-werewolves-fact-or-fiction/247461.md?page=1)