Patton launches an investigation that initially leads to OSS major Joe De Luca, from whom the thieves took a plan from his wartime operations to steal the gold.

The film is based on the 1974 historical novel The Algonquin Project by British writer Frederick W. Nolan in which a fictional protagonist tries to stop the assassination of Patton in a staged car accident.

[6] Numerous books have since been published on the subject culminating in the "sensationalist" but "widely read" 2008 best-seller Target: Patton, The Plot to Assassinate General George S.

[7][8] Although approximately $2.5 billion in German gold, most of which is still missing, was determined to have been pilfered in several separate thefts, no train robbery occurred as depicted in the film.

[11] Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote in his review: "It is the dubious premise of The Brass Target, a film full of dubiety, that Gen. George S. Patton was assassinated in Germany in 1945 by a motley crew of United States Army officers in an attempt to hide their theft of $250 million in Nazi gold.

History says that General Patton died in Germany in 1945 following an automobile accident, but Frederick Nolan, who wrote The Algonquin Project, this film's source material, has connected various unsolved mysteries to make a wobbly case for his conspiracy theory.

As historical speculation goes, it's less interesting than wondering where we might be today if Ford's Theater had been playing Uncle Tom's Cabin that fateful night in 1865, instead of Our American Cousin.