Die Glocke (conspiracy theory)

Cook described Witkowski's claims of a device called "The Bell" engineered by Nazi scientists that was "a glowing, rotating contraption" rumored to have "some kind of antigravitational effect", be a "time machine", or part of an "SS antigravity program" for a flying saucer.

The first document, allegedly supplied to Witkowski by an unnamed Polish government official, was an affidavit from the war crimes trial for General Jakob Sporrenberg, who supposedly confessed to ordering the murder of about 60 persons who had knowledge of the secretive project.

[2] Jason Colavito wrote that Witkowski's claims were "recycled reflection" of 1960s rumors of Nazi occult science, like those published in Morning of the Magicians, and describes Die Glocke as "a device few outside of fringe culture think actually existed.

[3] Author Brian Dunning states that Morning of the Magicians helped promote belief in Die Glocke and Nazi occultism, and its absence in the historical record make it "increasingly unlikely that anything like it actually existed".

[7] Author and historian Robert F. Dorr characterizes Die Glocke as among "the most imaginative of the conspiracy theories" that arose in post-World War II years, and typical of the fantasies of magical German weapons often popularized in pulp magazines such as the National Police Gazette.

[8] Some theories circulating on Internet conspiracy sites claim that Die Glocke is located in a Nazi gold train that is buried in a tunnel beneath a mountain in Poland.

[10] Journalist Patrick J. Kiger wrote that German propaganda of fictional Wunderwaffen combined with the secrecy surrounding actual advanced technology such as the V-2 rocket captured at war's end by the U.S. military helped spawn "sensational book-length exposes, web sites, and legions of enthusiasts who revel in rumors of science fiction-like weapons supposedly invented by Hitler’s scientists".

According to Kiger, Die Glocke is a popular example of such legends and speculation, citing former aerospace scientist David Myhra's contention that if antigravity devices actually existed, the Germans, desperate to stop the Allies' advance, would have used them.