While it was never successful in real life, can you imagine an armed version of this American "snow cruiser" (from Admiral Byrd's 1940 Antarctic expedition) in a fight with the Nazis from the Lufthansa aircraft-catapult ship 'Schwabenland'? A cool (pun intended!) basis for an unusual "what-if" war game, maybe?
And here's the German "Schwabenland", a Lufthansa catapult ship that was really used by the Germans in the Antarctic. In 1939 she proceeded to aerial map and photograph a large portion of Antarctic territory, which was later demarcated as "Neu-Schwabenland".
"According to some websites, this exploration led to the creation of a number of myths and conspiracy stories which have grown over the years. They include the creation of massive Nazi bases in Antarctica and connections with extraterrestrial spacecraft. According to many of the conspiracy theories, the substantial U.S. Navy involvement in Antarctic exploration in 1946-47, was part of a massive military exercise required to root out the remnants of a vast underground Nazi base established there."
link
Apologies for starting two discussions threads on this topic – the first one went a bit haywire, not showing up on the main page, so I deleted it. Nazi/alien interference, perhaps?
