Talk:Project Riese

"Complex" names

This project was developed, if that's the proper word, by the Germans at a time when this place was part of Nazi Germany. It's puzzling that in this interesting article, the names of the "complexes" all are Polish. It's doubtful that the German builders would have employed Polish names for them. The German Wiki entry doesn't shed any light on this question, though. Sca (talk) 13:41, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

All complexes have German code names but we just don't know them. Documents connected to individual structures of the project are lost or destroyed. Because Riese is now in Poland, Polish names were created to help identify and find them. Les7007 (talk) 14:25, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

There was no "project". "Project Riese" represents a postwar effort to tie several different construction projects for different purposes in Silesia together as if they were one large effort. Riese itself was a code-name for a headquarters to be built in the area. The Polish names mostly come from conspiracy theory. Those who care about Riese are mostly UFO conspiracy people. Wartime construction projects often don't have specific names. Sometimes a factory is just a factory. Outside of a sensitive project like a headquarters for Hilter, industrial sites would typically have just been named for the town they were the most near to. 99.197.237.45 (talk) 17:29, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

The code name "Riese" for the whole project is well documented as part of the Organisation Todt (Oberbauleitung Riese) and as a network of labour camps (Arbeitslager Riese), well known Holocaust location. Only an idiot could call it "UFO conspiracy".188.29.238.16 (talk) 13:31, 7 February 2019 (UTC)

"Oberbauleitung Riese" is not the same thing as "Project Riese". Oberbauleitung Riese and Arbeitslager Riese are real things. "Project Riese" is something from the world of UFO conspiracy people. 12.12.144.130 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:00, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

So we can't use the word "project" because some UFO conspiracy people used it first? Are you serious? 94.196.246.13 (talk) 10:40, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Complaint

The single purpose account Les7007 (talk · contribs) who translated this article from the Polish Wikipedia in July 2009 won’t let me touch it (if any indication is a blanket revert with a cryptic edit summary which was false anyway) mere two hours after my first attempted improvements to the layout. I have left a message on the article owner’s talk page but no word yet. Therefore I’m listing here the most glaring problems, so as not to be talking to the hand like some human cog in a Terminator movie.

1. Please be aware that the Wikipedia license (CC-by-sa) requires source attribution which looks like this when properly formatted: {{Translated page|pl| Riese}}.
2. There’s nothing in this article about the known fact that the Nazi German government confiscated the Schloß Fürstenstein castle in 1941 from the aristocratic family of Hochbergs who owned it for over four hundred years. Please explain in the history section of this article why the castle was confiscated in 1941 thus shedding light on the Riese origins.
3. Please do not mislead the reader (as well as other concerned Wikipedians before me) that the German names of the "complexes" are not known. This is a lie.
   1. Complex Rzeczka is known as Complex Dorfberg
   2. Complex Osówka is known as Complex Säuferhöhen
   3. Complex Książ should read Fürstenstein (or similar)
   4. Complex Włodarz is known as Complex Wolfsberg etcetera.
      Just because you don’t know these names, it doesn’t mean that they don’t exist.
4. Arbeitslager Riese was a subcamp of Gross-Rosen concentration camp and it did not have subcamps of its own. Please, don't make up things. The so-called subcamps of Arbeitslager Riese were in fact German companies who used forced labour from Gross-Rosen administration including Organisation Todt (Dörnhau), Stollen Wolfsberg und Hausdorf (Erlenbusch) and Stollen Falkenberg (Falkenberg) among others.
5. This article has multiple issues (obviously), but I don’t need the grief so I'm just going to leave it here. Poeticbent talk 20:03, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

1. ...not much left from the original translation anyway...
2. It's useful to read article before editing or criticizing it. From Project Riese: "In 1941 the Nazis confiscated the castle." ...and it had nothing to do with the Riese origins.
3. It's unknown if German names of nearby villages or mountains were used as codenames for the individual structures of the project and highly unlikely if we compare codenames of other underground factories: Malachit (Malachite), Makrele I (Mackerel I), Dachs IV (Badger IV), Weingut I (Vineyard I), Maifish (Allis Shad). Complex Rzeczka isn't known as Complex Dorfberg etc. Web search of the name "Complex Dorfberg" provides one result, "Complex Rzeczka" hundreds.
4. Scholars from Gross-Rosen Museum disagree: "In this way arose Arbeitslager Riese that consisted of thirteen subcamps and a camp hospital." Les7007 (talk) 14:52, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

Note, to the owner of this article! Please stop lying. The webpage you quote provides "not a single source" in support of what you claim. The full sentence you cannibalized reads: "They [the first concentration camps] were subordinated to the headquarter [should be headquarters], which, to some extend, possessed autonomy. [what kind?] In this way arose Arbeitslager Riese that consisted of thirteen subcamps [sic, see below] and a camp hospital." -- What was the extent of their autonomy, I ask? Where are the sources? Whose subcamps were they? Does the info originate from the out of print Alfred Konieczny listed somewhere else on that page? Again, I don't like to repeat myself while talking to a blank wall, but stop making up things OK?

Other websites, like www.riese.krzyzowa.org.pl at least provide a page of literature. Quote: "A majority of the prisoners who had to do forced labour during the construction of “Riese” were housed in 4 large subcamps: Wüstegiersdorf, Dörnau, Oberwüstegiersdorf and Wüstewaltersdorf." Again, subcamps of what? Gross-Rosen? Four only? Not thirteen? -- The Riese-Krzyzowa website is more extensive than the other. It is supported by Deschichtswerkstatt Europa and Robert Bosch Stiftung Foundation. On the page about the Tunnels it reads, quote: "As of today, seven systems of shelters and tunnels belonging to the “Komplex Riese” are known to exist in the Owl Mountains. They are found at Dorfbach/Rzeczka, Oberdorf/Jugowice, Wolfsberg/Wlodarz, Ramenberg/Soboul, Falkenberg/Sokolec, on the slopes of the Säuferhöhen/Osowka and near Castle Fürstensein/Zamek Książ." – Quite a departure from your lies about the lack of German designations online. Arbeitslager Riese was a subcamp of Gross-Rosen on its own, and so were the others. Quote from PDF: "The construction work was done by forced labourers from concentration camps. In this case, they came from the KZ Groß-Rosen. They were housed in a number of Außenlagern (sub-camps or satellite camps) called “AL Riese” in the immediate vicinity to the tunnels and other construction sites related to the “Complex Riese." – I repeat, Complex Riese consisted of a number of camps, all subordinated to Gross-Rosen. – It's like calling a factory making wheels a subfactory of factory making the car engines. Gross-Rosen was the assembly line. BTW, I'm taking this page off my watchlist. Enough is enough. Poeticbent talk 03:25, 20 October 2014 (UTC)

Gross-Rosen Museum is a source of all documents and ultimate authority on the subject of Gross-Rosen concentration camp and just dismissing it is pathetic and childish.

I don't think it's a good idea to use quotation: "They were housed in a number of Außenlagen (subcamps or satellite camps) called "AL Riese"..." for a person claiming: "Arbeitslager Riese (…) did not have subcamps of its own."

Another quote from the same website: "The "AL Riese" of the KZ Groß-Rosen consisted of 4 major and 12 minor camps." ...and there is a chapter called: "Individual Camps of "AL Riese". Les7007 (talk) 19:01, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

Just saying things doesn't make them true. Even if the source is a Museum. The camps in the area are the fact. Calling them "Riese" or associating them with "Riese" is speculation based on nothing. Even the association of the multiple sites into one "project" is nothing more than speculation. Its as likely that they were simply a number of independent construction projects in a region of Silesia. By the actual sources, Riese was not a "project". It was simply a code-name for a FHQ to be constructed in lower silesia. 99.197.237.45 (talk) 17:20, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not truth, Wikipedia is WP:VERIFY 81.132.173.220 (talk) 13:50, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia is also supposed to avoid original research which most of the contents of this article source to. 12.12.144.130 (talk) 21:07, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

This article doesn't contain translation any-more. Template "Translated page" was removed.188.30.54.168 (talk) 10:01, 20 March 2019 (UTC)

Nazi UFO conspiracy

This article is of terrible quality. Its full of speculation, distortions and depends on very questionable sources associated with Nazi UFO conspiracy theory. It has a great number of citations but if one follows back the citations, they inevitably lead back to sources which simply present the speculation of the authors. Even the idea of tying these seven structures together into a single project is not supported by documentation or sources. That they are given made-up Polish names simply creates further misunderstanding. There is no factual basis to even link these sites together. The only valid sources on this topic are speer's comments before and after the war plus those of Nicolaus von Below. Riese was a code-name for a Furher Headquarters to be built. Even calling it "project Riese" is a distortion.

The Speer material often sources to the book of James O'Donnell (The Bunker). That book is rather problematical in that it contains stories supposed from Speer that appear nowhere else. An example being a claim attributed to Speer of polar route flight from Germany to Japan in 1945. From the trustworthy sources, it seems certain that Riese was nothing more than the a headquarters to be built out of Fürstenstein Castle and the estate of the von Pless family. 99.197.237.45 (talk) 17:10, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Shut up Meg. 81.132.173.220 (talk) 13:50, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

Not much can be done about it. There is a whole conspiracy industrial complex today that runs from television to book publishing to tourism in Poland. There is alot of money being made in Poland off Nazi UFO tourism and many jobs depending on interest in it. Wikipedia by design just repeats what people have said or written. Just because people are saying things that are not popular doesn't man that Wikipedia should exclude what they have said or written. People believe in Nazi UFOs. Its not the role of Wikipedia to convince them otherwise. 184.20.115.141 (talk) 18:00, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

There’s nothing in this article about Nazi UFO conspiracy theory. 92.40.15.149 (talk) 18:22, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

Nearly the entire article presents the point of view of Nazi UFO conspiracy theory. The actual valid historical sources are clear as to what Riese was. What the article does is amalgamate a set of unrelated construction projects together into one "project", present "code-names" as if they were historical terms when in fact they are inventions of the postwar era and to confuse a great deal of conspiracy speculation with the known facts. Riese was the intended Fuhrer Headquarters in the area. The authentic source documents make that clear. The other sites said to be part of "Riese" are simply a random collection of industrial projects in the region associated by conspiracy theorists with the headquarters project.

The inclusion of these "industrial" sites within Riese is important to the UFO community because it enables the false connection of the industrial sites to the headquarters. Thus used to push the idea that the "project" was connected to the highest levels of the nazi government & involved in weapons research. The expanded size of Riese is used to promote theories that far overstate its actual importance. If "Riese" were presented accurately and according to actual historical evidence, all of the nonsense promoted by the conspiracy crowd would fall away.

The article uses terms like "Complex Rzeczka" or "Complex Włodarz" as if they are actual historical terms for portions of a greater project. But these terms were simply made up after the war and retroactively applied. The same thing is done in terms of creating a false association between the large network of camps in the region with a "Project Riese". The truth is far more simple than what is presented in the article. The article should be based on the known historical materials. It should not be promoting false invented names and the idea of the Riese "super-project" which have their origins in the Nazi UFO community. This is all about pushing the theories to be found in the article Die_Glocke which links back to this article.75.17.126.209 (talk) 02:40, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

I changed the section heading because it was against talk page guidelines: "Keep headings neutral: A heading should indicate what the topic is, but not communicate a specific view about it. " WP:TALKNEW 92.40.102.51 (talk) 16:05, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

The Henge

@Les7007: The Henge is not made up. It is a wartime structure that really exists. SpinningSpark 14:35, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

This base of cooling tower was built next to coal power station, coal mine and munition factory but these structures were not part of Project Riese. Les7007 (talk) 14:45, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Featured picture scheduled for POTD

Hello! This is to let editors know that File:Ksiaz - zamek 01.jpg, a featured picture used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for December 13, 2022. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2022-12-13. For the greater benefit of readers, any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be done before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you! --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 19:12, 14 June 2022 (UTC)

Project Riese was the code name for an unfinished construction project undertaken by Nazi Germany between 1943 and 1945. It consisted of seven underground structures in the Owl Mountains and Książ Castle – pictured here – in Lower Silesia (now part of Poland). The purpose of the project remains uncertain because of a lack of documentation. Some sources suggest that all the structures were part of the Führer Headquarters; according to others, it was a combination of headquarters and arms industry, but comparison to similar facilities can indicate that only the castle was adapted as a headquarters or official residence, and the tunnels in the Owl Mountains were planned as a network of underground factories.

Photograph credit: Jarosław Ciuruś

Recently featured:

• Elizabeth Glendower Evans
• Crypsis
• Lilac-breasted roller