Dispatch Ultra: A Man of Appetites

Bzzzztttzzz. Dispatch Ultra back online. Have relocated to new temporal and physical quadrant. Am now prepared to resume transmissions.

Our move was precipitated by security concerns. We have recently uncovered new information about the rise of Nazi power during the Second World War and the rationale for much of the Nazi actions in Europe. This will be the focus of many of our future transmissions. We begin with Herman Goering.

Goering was the second most powerful man in Nazi Germany behind Adolph Hitler for the early phases of WW 2. A fighter ace in the Great War, he was an early convert to the Nazi cause. Goering founded the Gestapo, ran the Luftwaffe, and was senior military commander in the German armed forces until 1942. He was Hitler’s designated successor. After the Luftwaffe’s defeat in the Battle of Britain, Going found his influence significantly reduced. While still head of the German Air Force and a senior economic leader, he was the scapegoat as Allied bombs began to rain down on Germany on a daily basis. Goering survived the war. He fled the advancing Russian army, surrendering to the Americans in May of 1945. While he was sentenced to be hung at Nuremberg, he was able to swallow a cyanide capsule and commit suicide before his execution. The details of how he obtained the cyanide are still unknown.

Within this broad scope of Goering’s history, several interesting details emerge. He was a morphine addict, becoming hooked after wounds suffered in the Beer Hall Putsch. He briefly tried barnstorming after WW I. Goering met Mussolini before Hitler; later, at Hitler’s behest, he met with Pope Pius XII in the Vatican. In the 1930’s, he spent time in an asylum for his violent tendencies due to the morphine addiction. It’s a distinct possibility that he set the Reichstag fire. The Four Year Plan, leading to Germany’s rearmament, was steered by Goering. It was Goering’s huge ego that led to his belief that he could destroy the RAF in just a few weeks and resupply the surrounded German amy in Stalingrad. Both proved to be costly German mistakes. His ego was matched by his extravagant tastes and eccentricities.

Goering lined his pockets as Germany rearmed, building an enormous hunting lodge called Carinall. Carinhall housed both the body of Goering’s first wife and much of the Nazi plunder from Europe. Goering was instrumental in setting up the Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce — the organization that led the confiscation of much of the Jewish wealth France and other countries. A significant amount of that wealth ended up in Goering’s pudgy hands at Carinhall, where it nicely accompanied his costumes. Goering was a notoriously extravagant dresser, changing from costume to costume (including a toga, a floor length fur coat, and hunting outfit) while hosting parties at his lodge.

Goering was a weird fellow — congenial, extravagant, and evil. He makes an interesting game antagonist, one not as easy to immediately hate as Hitler, but perhaps more dangerous as a result. He has control of much of the Nazi apparatus, able to bring economic and military resourced to bear against any opponents. Couple this power with his general weirdness and you have a great foil for a Weird War 2 game. In order to bring Goering in, you just need to pick your point of departure into alternate history.

Why was Goering really institutionalized? He was a violent morphine addict. But maybe there was more. Maybe he saw things. Strange, terrible things, calling him to service. He answered. Sure, Hitler was an evil megalomanic. But it wasn’t Hitler that had the ear of the supernatural forces seeking entry into this world through the chaos and evil of war. It was Goering, who regularly injected himself with a serum to heighten his supernatural senses. His job wasn’t to ensure the establishment of the Third Reich, but rather to carry out the whims of his supernatural sponsors.

Goering was a man of appetites — for power, for food, for wealth, for acclaim. He could be a servant of Mammon, god of greed, carrying out Mammon’s orders and lining his pockets in the process. His acquisition of the looted wealth of Europe takes a supernatural bent. It’s not just greed, but greed in service of a deeper, darker evil. Maybe this evil makes Carinhall into a frightening, dark circus of excess — an ideal dungeon for characters to explore, infiltrate, or destroy. Goering’s wife may be entombed there, but who is to say she’s really dead?

Now you just need to decide the topic of Goering’s meeting with the Pope. . .