In 1938, on the eve of war, a Nazi expedition set out through British India on a mission sponsored by Himmler himself. Its aim was to trace the origins of the Aryan race, high in the sacred mountains of Tibet. The expedition was led by two complex individuals - Ernst Schafer, a swashbuckling, gun-toting naturalist for whom Nazism promised a short-cut to personal glory, and Bruno Beger, an anthropologist whose racial theories were taken to their logical conclusion in Auschwitz.
Schafer and Beger soon found themselves battling hostility from the British, being manipulated by the Tibetans and struggling with the primitive conditions in the holy city of Lhasa. Every detail of the expedition was recorded in diaries, letters and secret reports. It was also documented in thousands of extraordinary photographs (some of which are reproduced here for the first time in decades) and on film.
Despite this abundant documentation, the full story of Schafer's ill-fated expedition has never been told. This encounter between the British and the Nazis so close to the Second World War forms a 'picture in little' of the conflict to come. HIMMLER'S CRUSADE explores the ideological roots of the Nazis' obsession with racial theory and the occult. Using the wealth of primary material as well as his own interviews with Bruno Beger, Christopher Hale has written a fascinating and thought-provoking book that brilliantly evokes this little-known prelude to the unimaginable horror of war.

About the Author
Christopher Hale is an award-winning writer and producer who was educated at Sussex University and the Slade School of Fine Art. He has made numerous films about the sciences and arts for all the major broadcasters, including the BBC. He has filmed and travelled in unmapped regions of Mozambique and the Yemen in search of a 'lost tribe of Israel' - as well as in previously unexplored parts of Borneo and on one of the remotest islands in the Pacific. He lives in London and Berlin.

Reviews
'An extraordinary and well-told tale of mountains, myths and mass-murder'
'His research is prodigious and chilling... a wide-ranging book which offers a warning about the dangers of alternative history' * Sunday Telegraph *
'A stunning digest of the expedition to uncover the beginnings of the Aryan people' * Good Book Guide *
'Hale's fascinating and thoughtful book grips from the start...a thought-provoking and important addition to the history of the twentieth century' * Yorkshire Post *
'Gripping and well-researched...Hale is to be commended' * The Sunday Times *



Book Information
ISBN 9780553824278
Author Christopher Hale
Format Paperback
Page Count 592
Imprint Bantam Books (Transworld Publishers a division of the Random House Group)
Publisher Transworld Publishers Ltd
Weight(grams) 436g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 32mm