Continental drift under the Third ReichEric Buffetaut

CNRS, 16 cour du Liegat, 75013 Paris, France

Contrary to what happened in many other countries in

the 1930s and 1940s, Alfred Wegener’s theory of conti-

nental drift was not generally rejected in Nazi Germany,

although several leading German geologists of the time

did not accept it. It was actually presented as the

modern view of Earth history in books and magazine

articles aimed at the general public. Although outland-

ish geological theories such as Horbiger’s Welteislehre

were favoured by some Nazi dignitaries, they were not

widely accepted in scientific circles. On the other hand,

continental drift received official support under the

Third Reich, at a time when it was ignored or ridiculed

by most earth scientists outside Germany.

When Alfred Wegener died, aged 50, on the Greenland icecap in November 1930, continental drift lost its mostinfluential proponent. The idea that continents movedon the surface of the Earth had been hotly debated inthe 1920s, after Wegener’s original publications in 1912and 1915. Despite the support of a few eminent scientists,such as Emile Argand in Switzerland, Arthur Holmes inBritain, Alex Du Toit in South Africa and Ma Ting Ying inChina, the hypothesis of continental drift was met withwidespread scepticism in the 1930s and 1940s, to berevived on the basis of new evidence in the late 1950s and1960s, under the guise of plate tectonics. The story of therejection of continental drift by most geologists andgeophysicists in western Europe and North America hasbeen told repeatedly and analysed in great detail [1].However, relatively little is known about what happenedin Wegener’s own country, Germany, in the years immedi-ately following his death.

In the standard German biography of Alfred Wegener,Schwarzbach [2] did mention that a few German scientistssupported continental drift, but that most opposed it,and summed up the German response to Wegener’s ideaswith the old saying, ‘No man is a prophet in his owncountry’. Among the few supporters of Wegener’s ideas,Schwarzbach listed Solomon-Calvi, who had to emigrateto Turkey in 1934, after Hitler’s accession to power. Hemainly stressed that two of the leading German structuralgeologists of the time, Hans Cloos and Hans Stille, fordifferent reasons rejected continental drift. This gives theimpression that continental drift was generally ignoredor rejected in Germany in the decades that followedWegener’s death. However, a closer look at the reception ofcontinental drift in Germany in the 1930s and early 1940sreveals a different picture.

Less than three years after Wegener’s death, AdolfHitler became chancellor of the Reich, and within a fewmonths, all aspects of German society and culture cameunder the influence of national-socialist ideology. A studyof various documents published under the Third Reich(1933–1945) shows that the response to Wegener’ ideaswas more complex than simple ignorance or rejection onthe part of eminent geologists, and that the Nazis were notunsympathetic to continental drift, at a time when it wasalmost universally rejected.

Welteislehre – a theory of ‘universal ice’

Descriptions of Nazi ‘science’ sometimes stress the import-ance of the Welteislehre, the theory of ‘universal ice’, whichwas put forward in the first decades of the 20th century bythe Austrian engineer Hanns Horbiger (1860–1931). TheWelteislehre involved repeated catastrophic collisions oficy moons with the Earth, and, at least in its later versions,had strong mystical and racist overtones, involving theNordic race, whose superior physical and mental featureshad been tried during those cataclysms. There is nodoubt that some members of the Nazi hierarchy, especiallyamong the Schutzstaffel (SS), were supporters of theWelteislehre. Novels inspired by Horbiger’s ideas – includ-ing a bizarre biography of a trilobite – were distributedunder the auspices of Reichsfuhrer SS Heinrich Himmler(Fig. 1). The Welteislehre was one of the pseudo-sciencesthat flourished in Germany in the aftermath of the defeatof 1918, as noted by Muir Wood [3], who goes so far asto suggest a link between Horbiger’s icy cosmology and

Fig. 1. Stielauge der Urkrebs (‘Stem-eye the primeval crab’), by Batti Dohm, the

biography of a trilobite inspired by the Welteislehre, and distributed under the

auspices of Reichsfuhrer SS Heinrich Himmler (1942).Corresponding author: Eric Buffetaut (eric.buffetaut@wanadoo.fr).

Review Endeavour Vol.27 No.4 December 2003 171

http://ende.trends.com 0160-9327/$ - see front matter q 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.endeavour.2003.08.005

Wegener’s attempts to explain ice ages through continen-tal drift. However, there is no mention of Horbiger’stheories in Wegener’s writings, and nothing to suggestthat he ever was influenced by the Welteislehre. It shouldnot be supposed that the outlandish speculations ofHorbiger and his followers ever became the officialgeological credo of the national-socialists – who after allneeded serious geology for economic purposes, especiallyin wartime. Books and papers published by academicgeologists under the Third Reich show no influence fromthe Welteislehre, which was never accepted as a bona fidescientific theory, although it did have vocal and sometimesinfluential followers outside scientific circles under theWeimar Republic and the Third Reich.

Alfred Wegener was neither ignored nor forgotten inNazi Germany. The account of his last and fatal expeditionto Greenland in 1930, edited by his widow Else, originallypublished in 1932, was reprinted in 1940 [4] (which, in atotalitarian state, reveals implicit support, or at leastacceptance). Else Wegener repeatedly mentioned that herhusband was ‘a good German but not a nationalist’, andhad been hurt by the brutality and bloodshed of WorldWar I [5,6], during which he was sent to the western frontas a reserve officer and was wounded twice, after which heserved in the meteorological service of the German army.However, Wegener’s image as a brave German explorerand scientist, who had lost his life in the pursuit ofscientific knowledge, was likely to appeal to the national-socialists (all the more so because he was no longer aroundto criticize the regime). Continental drift, as a theory putforward by a German scientist, but widely rejected in theoutside world, could also be represented as an instance ofthe superiority and inventiveness of German science,compared with foreign science which, in the case of geo-logy, was sometimes denounced as the ‘slave of economicinterests’ [7].

Although Wegener’s ideas were not adopted by allGerman geologists in the 1930s and 1940s [2,6], some wererather outspoken in their acceptance of continental drift.In a book aimed at the general public published in 1941 [7],for instance, Kurd von Bulow (1899–1971), who was thenprofessor of geology at the University of Rostock, pre-sented Wegener’s ideas as the ‘most modern views’, andcontrasted his paleogeographical reconstructions withthe older, outdated ones. Others, who were clearly Nazisympathisers at that time, do not seem to have sharedvon Bulow’s views. Karl Beurlen, in a 1939 book on Earthhistory [8] in which he railed against the ‘Jewish-Orientalworld view’, did not even mention Wegener, and onlybriefly suggested that the southern continents mighthave been closer to each other at the time of thePermian glaciation.

A supportive Signal

All this certainly suggests that there was no consensusabout continental drift among German geologists underthe Third Reich, and no strong pressure from the govern-ment to either accept or reject it. Evidence for officialsupport for Wegener’s ideas comes from a different source– an article published in 1941 in Signal (Fig. 2). Signalwas a bimonthly propaganda magazine, published by

Deutscher Verlag in Berlin for distribution in the countriesoccupied by Germany (including the Channel Islands,hence an English edition), and among its allies, such asItaly, Spain, Hungary, Finland and Croatia, as well as inneutral countries such as Switzerland. It had editionsin more than 20 languages, including French, Russian,Spanish, Italian, Czech, English, and even Arabic andIranian. In a format reminiscent of the American Lifemagazine, Signal was lavishly illustrated with photo-graphs (some of them in colour) and drawings, and wasmainly designed to praise the successes of the Germanarmy and its allies, and to foster the idea of a united,German-led Europe fighting for its freedom against theSoviets and their Anglo-American allies. Besides warreports and papers praising collaboration with Germany,Signal also included articles on cultural and scientific topics.

Its first issue for August 1941 was largely devoted to theGerman invasion of the Soviet Union, which had beenlaunched on 22 June, and featured photographs of theearly successes of the Wehrmacht. However, Germanvictories in the East left enough space for a two-pagearticle on continental drift by K. von Philippoff, under atitle with Galilean overtones, ‘And yet they do move’(Fig. 3) [9]. Like, to some extent, Wegener himself, vonPhilippoff ’s article in defence of continental drift was rightfor the wrong reasons, in that it was based mainlyon geodetic measurements, which purportedly revealedthat the distance between North America and Europeincreased by 32 cm per year.

Fig. 2. The cover of Signal from August 1941, showing German soldiers passing

through a burning Russian town.

Review Endeavour Vol.27 No.4 December 2003172

http://ende.trends.com

The article described in some detail how astronomicaldata obtained at different places on Earth could be coupledwith extremely accurate time measurements (provided bya high-precision chronometer kept in a sealed room atPotsdam) to produce precise longitude determinations.These, in turn, supposedly revealed an increasing distancebetween the American and European continents. Wegenerconsidered geodetic data as being of prime importance fordemonstrating continental drift, and discussed them atlength in the last edition of Die Entstehung der Kontinenteund Ozeane [10], but, as remarked by Schwarzbach [2], hewas overoptimistic in this regard, for at this time longitudemeasurements were not accurate enough to really demon-strate continental movements. As a result, both Wegenerand von Philippoff overestimated the rate of displacementof the continents – according to von Philippoff, whenColumbus reached the shores of America, the AtlanticOcean was 140 m narrower than in 1941.

Although he devoted a large part of his paper to thosemisleading geodetic results, which he considered the ulti-mate and indisputable proof of Wegener’s hypothesis, vonPhilippoff also reminded his readers of other evidence(such as the fit of coastlines on both sides of the Atlantic) infavour of continental drift, a theory which provided a likelyand satisfactory solution to many geological and biologicalproblems that could not be explained otherwise. Accordingto von Philippoff, ‘no mistake was possible’, and ‘ProfessorWegener’s bold hypothesis’ was now fully demonstrated.

Nazi approval

The importance of this paper lies in the fact that it waspublished in a propaganda magazine, which reflected theviews of the German government. Obviously, contrary toother scientific theories, continental drift was politicallyrather innocuous, and the scientific and personal record ofAlfred Wegener was acceptable to the Nazis. Beyond that,some geodetic measurements appeared to prove him right,and the ‘demonstration’ of continental drift could be con-sidered as one more triumph of German science (althoughvon Philippoff ’s paper was rather subdued in this regard).That continental drift was chosen to appear in Signalcertainly denotes approval and support by at least a part ofthe Nazi administration (which is notorious for havingbeen divided on many issues, because of parallel hier-archies, some of which may have supported continentaldrift while others were in favour of the Welteislehre).

Understandably, studies of German science duringthe Nazi period have often concentrated on its criminalaspects (in the medical and biological sciences), or on itsmore outlandish developments, the Welteislehre being agood example. More ‘progressive’ aspects have often beenoverlooked, or considered simply as part of mainstreamscience in the mid-20th century (which certainly largelyapplies to German earth sciences at that time). However,recent research has shown that the Third Reich was aheadof most other countries in some unexpected fields, such ascancer prevention and attempts to limit smoking [11].

Fig. 3. The French version of K. von Philippoff’s article on continental drift, published in Signal.

Review Endeavour Vol.27 No.4 December 2003 173

http://ende.trends.com

Support of continental drift never amounted to a full-scalecampaign, for the simple reason that it was a mainlyacademic issue without any real political or social signi-ficance, and German geologists were left free to decidewhether to accept it or not on the basis of their ownconceptions of Earth dynamics – and they were obviouslydivided on this issue. Moreover, it is now known that thepurported geodetic evidence in favour of continental driftwhich was made so much of in von Philippoff ’s paper wasflawed. Nevertheless, at a time when in other countriesthey were generally dismissed as ‘the dream of a greatpoet’ (to quote the French geologist Pierre Termier), orsimply a ‘fairy tale’ (to quote the American geologist BaileyWillis), in the early 1940s it was far-sighted to promoteWegener’s ideas and to consider them as the solution tomany of the major problems of Earth history.

Conclusion

Historians who have studied the reception of continentaldrift in the geological community have often emphasizedits widespread rejection, notably by American scientists,but little attention has been paid to those who accepted it,especially in Wegener’s own country in the very peculiarintellectual atmosphere of the Third Reich. Books and

articles in defence of Wegener’s hypothesis published atthat time suggest that continental drift enjoyed someofficial support. More research is obviously needed toestablish to what extent continental drift was actuallypromoted by the Nazi authorities, and what influence thisofficial support may have had on the opinion of Germangeologists during that period.

References

1 Oreskes, N. (1999) The Rejection of Continental Drift, OxfordUniversity Press

2 Schwarzbach, M. (1980) Alfred Wegener und die Drift der Kontinente,Wissenschaftliche Verlagsgesellschaft

3 Muir Wood, R. (1985) The Dark Side of the Earth, George Allen andUnwin

4 Wegener, E. ed. (1940) Alfred Wegeners letzte Gronlandfahrt, Brockhaus5 Korber, H.G. (1982) Alfred Wegener, B.G. Teubner Verlagsgesellschaft6 Wutzke, U. (1988) Der Forscher aus der Friedrichsgracht. Leben und

Leistung Alfred Wegeners, Brockhaus7 Bulow, K. von (1941) Geologie fur Jedermann, Kosmos8 Beurlen, K. (1939) Erd- und Lebensgeschichte. Eine Einfuhrung in die

historische Geologie, Quelle und Meyer9 Wegener, A. (1929) Die Entstehung der Kontinente und Ozeane (Vierte

umgearbeitete Auflage), Fried. Vieweg und Sohn10 Philippoff, K. von (1941) Et pourtant ils se meuvent! Signal 15, 44–4511 Proctor, R.N. (1999) Why did the Nazis have the world’s most

aggressive anti-cancer campaign? Endeavour 23, 76–79

News & Features on BioMedNet

Start your day with BioMedNet’s own daily science news, features, research update articles and special reports. Every two weeks,

enjoy BioMedNet Magazine, which contains free articles from Trends, Current Opinion, Cell and Current Biology. Plus, subscribe to

Conference Reporter to get daily reports direct from major life science meetings.

http://news.bmn.com

Here is what you will find in News & Features:

Today’s News

Daily news and features for life scientists.

Sign up to receive weekly email alerts at http://news.bmn.com/alerts

Special Report

Special in-depth report on events of current importance in the world of the life sciences.

Research Update

Brief commentary on the latest hot papers from across the Life Sciences, written by laboratory researchers chosen by the editors of

the Trends and Current Opinions journals, and a panel of key experts in their fields.

Sign up to receive Research Update email alerts on your chosen subject at http://update.bmn.com/alerts

BioMedNet Magazine

BioMedNet Magazine offers free articles from Trends, Current Opinion, Cell and BioMedNet News, with a focus on issues of general

scientific interest. From the latest book reviews to the most current Special Report, BioMedNet Magazine features Opinions, Forum

pieces, Conference Reporter, Historical Perspectives, Science and Society pieces and much more in an easily accessible format. It

also provides exciting reviews, news and features, and primary research. BioMedNet Magazine is published every 2 weeks.

Sign up to receive weekly email alerts at http://news.bmn.com/alerts

Conference Reporter

BioMedNet’s expert science journalists cover dozens of sessions at major conferences, providing a quick but comprehensive report

of what you might have missed. Far more informative than an ordinary conference overview, Conference Reporter’s easy-to-read

summaries are updated daily throughout the meeting.

Sign up to receive email alerts at http://news.bmn.com/alerts

Review Endeavour Vol.27 No.4 December 2003174

http://ende.trends.com