SS Brotherhood of the Bell: The Nazis’ Incredible Secret Technology (44 page)

Included in the vortex theory are some criticisms of relativity theory, as one might expect of a theory under development prior to and during the Nazi period. Like others, Krafft criticizes the dogmatic mathematical formalism of relativity by pointing out its tautological nature:

Regardless of whether the velocity of light is actually constant, it is rendered constant in the Einsteinian equations by the use of variable units of measurement. It is therefore not surprising that the equations of special relativity have met all the so-called “experimental tests”, because they are in substance nothing more than mathematical trueisms, and any violation of a mathematical trueism is unthinkable.
³²

German physicist Hermann Fricke was even more unsparing of relativity’s mathematical formalism and the new dogmas it imposed on physics:

Instead of the ether we now have formulas and equations according to which some stars are millions of times more dense and others millions of times less dense than the sun, although composed of the same chemical elements. We are now supposed to be able to ascertain (via mathematics) the diameter of the entire world, and also the number of protons and electrons in it. And finally we are supposed to be able to calculate the exact time when the world (including space and time themselves) began with the explosion of a
point.
As to all this, the 20th century physicist may harangue as much as he pleases. All of this is accepted as well-nigh certain. It is only the mechanics of the ether and the vortex atom theory which he may not write about or take up for serious study –
that
is anathema.
³³

But perhaps the dogmatism came from the fact that, “as O.C. Hilgenberg explained in detail in his recently published booklets,” the oft-touted “proofs of relativity” – Doppler Red Shift, the progression of Mercury’s perihelion, and, of course, the failure of the Michelson-Morley experiment to detect the aether wind – “can be accounted for under the hydro-mechanical ether theory as well as, and even better than under Einsteinian relativity.”
³⁴

Pause and consider what this means. At least one scientist in Germany, Hilgenberg – and there were in fact many others – evolved a theory, based on a vortex model of the aether, that was not only a comprehensive explanation of gravity, that not only gave satisfactory explanations of “relativistic phenomena,” but, as we shall see, gave satisfactory accounts of atomic structure as well, and in some cases did so more satisfactorily than the “nuclear” theory. This, basically, was the theoretical milieu in which physicists in Nazi Germany worked, a peculiar blend of the avante garde notions of quantum mechanics and vortices, with the older idea of an underlying substrate common to mind, energy, and matter: the aether.
³⁵

As Krafft points out, one of Hilgenberg’s trenchant criticisms was of relativistic interpretations of the Red Shift effect. Positing an aether, Hilgenberg stated a law, in 1931, in opposition to Einstein’s emerging “expanding universe” theories that were beginning to emerge,
³⁶which Krafft summarizes as follows:

The following is therefore universally true for all media: Whenever a train of waves traverses a medium that has currents flowing across it, an observer who is at rest relative to the source of radiation will observe a diminution of frequency, and a simultaneous refraction of the ray in a direction opposite to the direction of the current it traverses.
³⁷

The assumption of a vorticular structure in the aether as constituting the basis of observable particles and energy also bridges conveniently to the idea of a flux in the vacuum, or zero point energy, for “if the elementary or subatomic particles are vortices in the ether, then it would be reasonable to assume that such vortices keep the ether in a turbulent and streaming condition.”
³⁸

As Krafft points out, the vortex model also has another powerful explanatory function in accounting for the persistence of the individuality of any given particle.

The most outstanding characteristic of all elementary particles of matter is their
localized persistence of individuality,
and it is inconceivable how this can be explained on any other basis than vortex motion, wave motion, or motion into or out of a center functioning as a sink or source.

If the ether is incompressible, then it can have only two forms of motion which are dynamically self-sustaining, namely vortex motion and wave motion. The stability of these two forms of motion is not due to any unique property of the medium, but is inherent in the form of motion itself.
³⁹

Moreover, the model assumes another important feature, one pregnant with implications not only for “scalar physics” and the Bell, but also for any true appreciation of the work of Nikola Tesla:

A vortex atom for example may be assumed to carry an array of standing waves along with it in the form of nodes and loops in the streamlines of the circulating ether
, as is evidenced by electron diffraction patterns, but this is something very different from the usual concept of “wave atom.”
⁴⁰

Again, consider what this means: a basic theory had been worked out connecting vorticular structures in the aether, not only with elementary particles and vacuum flux, but that flux is now connected to structures of standing waves in the medium itself, structures which give rise to “nodes and loops” in the medium, making it resemble a crystal lattice.

Krafft uses the following diagrams to illustrate the basic vorticular structure of electrons and protons.

Krafft’s Vortex Model of a Neutron(Left) and Hydrogen Atom
(Right)

A further consequence results from this conception, one with obvious implications for the Bell:

The mass of a proton must have its origin in the gyrostatic effect of the circulating or rotating ether, either inside or outside the vortex rings.
The greater mass of the proton as compared with the electron may then be attributed either to a greater speed of circulatory movement of the ether, or to a greater volume of circulating ether, or to the difference in geometric structures.
⁴¹

Altering, or cohering the rotation of a particle or aggregate of particles will thus in turn affect the circulation of the ether and consequently affect the mass of that aggregate.

Krafft then makes a stunning series of statements whose similarities to the Bell and the type of physics it implies are obvious:

If one proton and one electron produces the system of ether current shown in the diagram of the hydrogen atom (above), then many protons and many electrons should produce a similar system of ether currents, but on a larger scale. In order to test for the presence of such ether currents, the arrangement of apparatus shown (below) may be used. An interferometer of approximately square form has hollow metal spheres or cylinders placed over two of the corners. These spheres or cylinders are then charged electrostatically as shown so that there will be an electrostatic potential gradient along one of the bifurcated beams. If there is a flow of ether along electrostatic lines of force as indicated by the short straight arrows, then there should be a shift of the interference fringes when the electrostatic field then is applied, provided the ether flows with sufficient velocity to produce an observable effect.
⁴²

From there it is a short step to the idea that the two cylinders could be counterrotated both mechanically and electrically, producing vector cancellation and a “rotational bubble” of localized space around the Bell, to study any mass anomalies.

Krafft’s Interferometer

In any case, Hilgenberg, by the time of his “Quantenzahlen” paper, was able to re-model almost the entire periodic table, including the properties of the super-heavy elements not even discovered.