Industrial intelligence, reparations, and German expertise: the Australian Scientific and Technical Mission to Germany, 1945-1950

Abstract

ABSTRACTAmong the multiplicity of missions that the Allied governments and armed forces sent to Europe towards the end and after World War II to document and exploit Nazi Germany’s wartime scientific and industrial progress was the Australian Scientific and Technical Mission to Germany. Composed of less than a dozen personnel, the Mission was a modest but important component in the Australian Commonwealth Government’s post-war foreign policy towards Germany and expansion of scientific and industrial development. Based at Australia House in London, the Mission worked in close cooperation with British Government departments, and was instrumental in the transnational transfer of German science and technology to Australia between 1946 and 1950 – initially under the auspices of the British Intelligence Objectives Sub-committee, and later through the Inter-Allied Reparation Agency and the Employment of Scientific and Technical Enemy Aliens scheme.