A newly released trove of declassified government documents has reignited one of the most enduring mysteries of the Second World War: did the Nazis secretly develop a functional flying saucer? The files, released by the Pentagon as part of a transparency initiative under President Donald Trump, include a jaw-dropping FBI report detailing a tip about a disc-shaped aircraft supposedly built in the Black Forest of Austria in 1944.
The initial tranche of 162 declassified files spans from 1948 to 2026, comprising PDFs, videos, and images from agencies including the Department of Defense, the FBI, NASA, and the State Department. While many of the documents detail unexplained aerial phenomena (UAP) observed by military personnel and astronauts, the inclusion of the Nazi flying saucer claim has captured the public’s imagination.
The Black Forest Sighting
According to the declassified FBI documents, a man named Paul Peyerl provided information suggesting that the Nazis had constructed a remarkable aircraft. In 1944, Peyerl claimed to have observed a disc-shaped craft approximately 6.5 meters (21 feet) in diameter in the Black Forest region of Austria. The alleged UFO was described as remotely controlled and equipped with several jet engines mounted on its outer structure.
Peyerl further detailed that the outer section of the craft rotated around a central dome, which remained stationary during flight. His task was reportedly to photograph the object in action. He claimed to have retained a photographic negative taken at an altitude of 7,000 meters (nearly 23,000 feet), a copy of which was provided to the FBI. He also stated that he had taken a photograph of the object resting in a hangar, taken “at the risk of his own life.”
The Mysterious Engineer Kuehr
The FBI file notes that Peyerl attributed the design and construction of the aircraft to a German engineer named Kuehr, whose first name remains unknown. Peyerl suspected that Kuehr was arrested by the Allies at the end of the war. He also noted that Kuehr had previously tried to avoid conscription into the German Wehrmacht, only to be arrested by the Gestapo.
The FBI explicitly states that these documents contain “neither recommendations nor conclusions” from the agency, making it virtually impossible to confirm or deny the existence of the alleged Nazi UFO based on this tip alone. The identity of Kuehr, like so many figures from the shadowy world of Nazi secret weapons programs, has never been independently verified.
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Wonder Weapons and Operation Paperclip
During World War II, the Nazi regime invested heavily in advanced technologies, collectively known as Wunderwaffen or wonder weapons. These included the V-1 flying bomb, the V-2 rocket, and the Messerschmitt Me 262, the world’s first operational jet-powered fighter aircraft. While these innovations arrived too late to decisively alter the course of the war, they demonstrated a level of aeronautical engineering that was genuinely ahead of its time.
Following the war, the United States launched Operation Paperclip, a secret program that brought over 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians to America. Many of these individuals were instrumental in advancing the U.S. space program and military technology during the Cold War. The presence of these minds in the U.S. has long fueled theories suggesting that advanced Nazi designs (perhaps even flying discs) were quietly developed further by the American military.
The legend of Nazi flying saucers, often associated with craft names such as the Haunebu or the mysterious Die Glocke (The Bell), has persisted in ufology and popular culture for decades. While concrete evidence remains elusive, the release of these FBI files is a striking reminder of the Third Reich’s extraordinary technological ambitions, and of how many questions from that era remain unanswered.
Top image: Artistic impression of a Nazi flying saucer. Source: Nesnad/CC0
By Gary Manners
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