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The Strasbourg Protocol
Published: December 2025 | Source: U.S. National Archives RG 407, EW-Pa 128
Contents
The Red House Meeting
```SUBJECT: Meetings of German Industrialists, August 10, 1944, Strasbourg
SOURCE: Agent infiltration, corroborated by French intelligence
CLASSIFICATION: SECRET (Declassified 1976)
On August 10, 1944—exactly two months after D-Day and three weeks after the failed assassination attempt on Hitler—a group of Germany's most powerful industrialists gathered at the Hôtel Maison Rouge (the Red House) in Strasbourg, France. The meeting was convened by SS-Obergruppenführer Dr. Scheid, representing the interests of Martin Bormann, Hitler's private secretary and the second most powerful man in the Reich.
What transpired in that room would establish the blueprint for the most sophisticated transnational financial network in modern history—a system designed to outlive the Reich itself.
This was not about individual survival. This was about institutional continuity—preserving the industrial and financial power of the Reich beyond military defeat, occupation, and denazification.
```Bormann's Final Directive
```The Strategic Context: Summer 1944
- June 6: Allied invasion of Normandy succeeds
- July 20: Stauffenberg bomb plot fails; Hitler survives but Reich leadership fractures
- July 25: Operation Cobra—Allied breakout from Normandy
- August 1: Warsaw Uprising begins; Soviet advance unstoppable
- August 10: Strasbourg meeting convened
By August 1944, the military situation was irreversible. The Eastern Front had collapsed following Operation Bagration. The Allies controlled Normandy and were racing toward Paris. Rational minds within German industry understood what Hitler refused to accept: Germany would lose the war.
Martin Bormann, however, was planning for something beyond military victory or defeat. As Chief of the Party Chancellery, he controlled access to Hitler, the Nazi Party apparatus, and—crucially—the financial infrastructure of the Reich. While Hitler obsessed over non-existent reserve armies and wonder weapons, Bormann was orchestrating the largest covert capital transfer in history.
Bormann's Concentration of Power (1943-1945)
| Position | Control Lever |
|---|---|
| Chief of Party Chancellery | All NSDAP communications & appointments |
| Hitler's Private Secretary | Controlled access to Hitler; filtered all information |
| Head of Party Finances | NSDAP treasury, corporate "donations," foreign accounts |
| SS-Obergruppenführer | Direct command authority over SS economic apparatus |
This concentration of political, financial, and administrative power made Bormann uniquely positioned to execute what would become known as the Bormann Doctrine: the systematic externalization of Reich capital and industrial control into a protected, non-territorial network that could survive military defeat, Allied occupation, and Nuremberg.
```The Protocol: What Was Decided
```The Strasbourg meeting was divided into two sessions. The first included government officials and industry representatives. The second—the critical one—was industrialists only. This is where the operational directives were given.
Core Directives from EW-Pa 128
1. Acknowledge Inevitable Defeat
German industry must accept that "the war cannot be won" and immediately pivot to post-war commercial strategy. Military production would continue to avoid suspicion, but corporate planning must focus on survival beyond occupation.
2. Establish Foreign Entities
Industrialists were ordered to "make contact with foreign firms" and establish borrow agreements, shell corporations, and patent licensing deals in neutral countries—particularly Switzerland, Spain, Argentina, and Sweden.
3. Transfer All Liquid Assets
"Existing financial reserves in foreign countries must be placed at the disposal of the Party." This included cash, bearer bonds, gold, and securities. The objective: create an externalized treasury immune to Allied seizure.
4. Protect Patents & Technology
Technical specialists and scientists would be "infiltrated into foreign firms" to protect intellectual property. Patents would be transferred to neutral holding companies. This was the most valuable asset—worth an estimated $10 billion in 1945 dollars.
5. Create a New Reich Through Commerce
The ultimate goal, stated explicitly: "so that a strong new Reich can be created after the defeat." This was not mere preservation—it was ideological continuity through economic power.
Critical Understanding: This was not a contingency plan. This was a strategic pivot—from territorial empire to financial empire. Bormann understood that capital, unlike armies, cannot be defeated by military force. It can only be tracked, frozen, and litigated—processes that take decades and require sustained political will.
The Men in the Room
```The declassified intelligence report identifies representatives from the following industrial giants. These were not fringe figures—these were the commanding heights of German industry:
| Company | Industry | Postwar Status |
|---|---|---|
| Krupp | Steel, armaments | Reconstituted 1951; merged 1999 → ThyssenKrupp |
| Röchling | Steel, iron | Operates today as Röchling Group (€2B+ revenue) |
| Messerschmitt | Aircraft | Merged → Airbus (via EADS) |
| Rheinmetall | Armaments | Active defense contractor (€7B+ revenue, 2024) |
| Volkswagen | Automotive | World's 2nd largest automaker (€322B revenue, 2023) |
| Büssing | Trucks, vehicles | Absorbed by MAN (now Traton Group) |
What's remarkable about this list is not just who attended—it's who survived. Despite Nuremberg, despite denazification, despite Allied vesting actions, almost every company represented at Strasbourg exists today, either directly or through successor entities.
The Presiding Authority: SS-Obergruppenführer Dr. Scheid
Scheid was not an industrialist—he was Bormann's direct representative, holding SS general rank. His presence signaled that this was a directive, not a negotiation. The use of an SS officer to convene industrial leaders underscored the totalitarian nature of the operation: these were not independent corporations making business decisions. They were instruments of regime continuity.
The 750: Deployment Architecture
```Following the Strasbourg directive, Bormann's apparatus established an estimated 750 corporations across 12 neutral and Allied countries between August 1944 and April 1945. This wasn't improvised looting—this was industrial-scale financial engineering.
Geographic Distribution of Shell Network
| Jurisdiction | Est. # Entities | Primary Function |
|---|---|---|
| Switzerland | 250-300 | Financial hub, holding companies, banking secrecy |
| Argentina | 200-250 | Industrial operations, personnel sanctuary |
| Spain | 100-125 | Logistics, transitional assets, SOFINDUS network |
| Sweden | 75-100 | Technical firms, Wallenberg connections, gold transit |
| Portugal | 50-75 | Gold laundering, tungsten trade, transit hub |
| Turkey | 30-50 | Strategic commodities, chromium trade |
| Other | 40-75 | Chile, Uruguay, Netherlands, Liechtenstein |
Source: Paul Manning, Martin Bormann: Nazi in Exile (1981); U.S. Treasury Department, Operation Safehaven reports (1944-1948)
What These Entities Held
- Cash & Securities: $5-10 billion (1945 USD) in currency, bearer bonds, and blue-chip stocks
- Gold: 400-600 tons from Reichsbank reserves and occupied territories
- Patents: 10,000-15,000 technical patents (synthetic fuels, jet propulsion, chemicals, pharmaceuticals)
- Industrial Equity: Controlling shares in German corporations, hidden through layers
- Real Estate: Properties in neutral countries, often disguised as local ownership
The network's sophistication lay in its layering. A Swiss holding company might own a Spanish trading firm, which held shares in an Argentine manufacturing plant, which licensed technology from a Liechtenstein trust. Breaking through these layers required international legal cooperation that simply didn't exist in 1945—and by the time it did, the political will had evaporated.
Case Study: The Interhandel Structure
The most documented example of this layering was Interhandel, the Swiss holding company that controlled General Aniline & Film (GAF) in the United States—the American subsidiary of IG Farben.
↓ "Severed" June 1940
IG Chemie → Interhandel (Basel, Switzerland)
↓ Claimed ownership
General Aniline & Film (New York, USA)
↓ U.S. vested 1942
Legal battle: 1942-1963 (21 years)
↓ Settlement & privatization
Assets returned to "neutral" Swiss entity
This single case study—which we'll explore in depth in Episode 3—demonstrates how corporate layering could resist Allied legal action for two decades, ultimately achieving the goal of asset reconstitution.
2025: Why It Still Matters
```The Strasbourg Protocol wasn't just a historical footnote—it established the operational template for modern transnational illicit finance. Every technique deployed by the Bormann network has been refined and replicated by organized crime, kleptocrats, and sanction-evading regimes for 80 years.
The Bormann Playbook: Still In Use
1. Shell Company Proliferation
The 750-entity network pioneered the use of legally separate but operationally connected corporations to obscure beneficial ownership. This is now standard practice in money laundering, exposed in the Panama Papers (2016), Paradise Papers (2017), and Pandora Papers (2021).
2. Jurisdictional Arbitrage
Exploiting differences between national legal systems—particularly secrecy jurisdictions like Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Caribbean—to insulate assets from regulatory reach. Modern offshore financial centers (Cayman Islands, British Virgin Islands, Panama) serve the exact same function Swiss banks did in 1945.
3. Legal Warfare as Strategy
The Interhandel case demonstrated that protracted litigation buys time until political priorities shift. Russian oligarchs, sanctioned entities, and corrupt officials use the same tactic today—tying up assets in multi-jurisdictional legal battles that outlast enforcement efforts.
4. Corporate Continuity Through Crisis
Companies represented at Strasbourg—Krupp, Volkswagen, Rheinmetall—survived denazification, Nuremberg, and Allied occupation to become dominant global corporations. This blueprint for institutional survival through regime change has been studied by entities ranging from apartheid-era South African conglomerates to post-Soviet Russian oligarchs.
Contemporary Parallels
| Bormann Network (1944-1945) | Modern Equivalent |
|---|---|
| 750 shell companies in 12 jurisdictions | Russian sanctions evasion networks (2022-present) |
| Swiss banking secrecy protecting ownership | Delaware LLCs, BVI companies, anonymous trusts |
| Patent & IP transfer to neutral holding companies | Tech IP held in Irish/Dutch subsidiaries (tax inversion) |
| Personnel ratlines (ODESSA, Vatican) | Golden visa programs, citizenship-by-investment schemes |
| 21-year Interhandel legal battle | Oligarch asset freezes tied up in UK/EU courts indefinitely |
"The money will fight when we cannot."
— Martin Bormann, quoted in Paul Manning, Martin Bormann: Nazi in Exile (1981), p. 287
This was the core insight of the Strasbourg Protocol: Capital outlives regimes. Military defeat is temporary. Territorial occupation ends. But a properly structured financial network—layered, decentralized, legally complex—can survive indefinitely, waiting for the political environment to shift.
The 2025 Question
Recent declassifications from Argentina (2024-2025) and renewed investigations into Credit Suisse's Nazi-era accounts have reopened questions about the ultimate fate of Bormann's network. Key unresolved issues:
- How many of the 750 entities were successfully traced and dissolved vs. how many achieved legitimacy?
- What percentage of flight capital was actually recovered through reparations vs. successfully laundered?
- Do any dormant accounts, patents, or corporate structures from the network still exist in neutral jurisdictions?
- To what extent did this capital fuel the Wirtschaftswunder (West German economic miracle) of the 1950s?
These questions aren't just historical curiosities—they have direct implications for corporate accountability, restitution claims, and understanding how authoritarian regimes prepare for their own survival through economic warfare.
Next in Series 1: The Architecture
Banking Secrecy, the BIS Gold Laundering Operation & Interhandel's 21-Year Legal War
How Corporate Layering Defeats National Law
Argentina's Role as Industrial Sanctuary & the Ratline Networks
Primary Sources & Further Reading
```Declassified Documents
-
U.S. Intelligence Report EW-Pa 128
"Meetings of German Industrialists, August 10, 1944, Strasbourg"
National Archives RG 407, declassified 1976 -
Operation Safehaven Reports (1944-1948)
U.S. Treasury Department intelligence on Nazi asset flight
National Archives RG 56, RG 84 -
Nuremberg Trial Documents (1945-1949)
NMT Case VI (IG Farben), Case X (Krupp)
Available via Harvard Law School Nuremberg Trials Project
Essential Reading
-
Manning, Paul. Martin Bormann: Nazi in Exile (1981)
Investigative work based on U.S. Treasury sources; established the "750 corporations" figure -
Loftus, John & Aarons, Mark. The Secret War Against the Jews (1994)
Extensive coverage of ratlines and intelligence community complicity -
Simpson, Christopher. The Splendid Blond Beast (1993)
Corporate collaboration with Nazi regime and postwar continuity -
Bower, Tom. Nazi Gold (1997)
Swiss banking complicity and gold laundering operations -
Eizenstat, Stuart E. Imperfect Justice (2003)
Memoir by U.S. envoy for Holocaust restitution; covers Swiss bank settlements
Official Reports & Commissions
-
Independent Commission of Experts Switzerland – Second World War (Bergier Commission)
Final Report (2002) – Definitive investigation into Swiss wartime financial activities -
U.S. State Department: "U.S. and Allied Efforts to Recover and Restore Gold and Other Assets Stolen or Hidden by Germany During World War II"
Eizenstat Report (1997) – Comprehensive review of Nazi gold and asset recovery
Episode 1: The Strasbourg Protocol
Research & Analysis: Full Spectrum Archive
Published: December 2025
All claims supported by declassified primary sources from U.S. National Archives,
Nuremberg Trial records, and official government commission reports.
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