The Counterfeiters

During WW2 the Nazi’s created an “Operation Burghard” with the goal of counterfeiting the British pound sterling and US Dollar and then flooding the market with same to collapse those two economies. This secret operation used Jewish masters of counterfeit in Nazi concentration camps. Ultimately 136 million pounds sterling were counterfeited and passed the test thru the actual Bank of England as being authentic.  This amounted to four times Britain’s financial reserves. Fortunately the majority of the forgeries were boxed up and ended up in an Austrian lake just before the camp was liberated.

Adolf Burger was one of the master counterfeiters who later wrote his memoirs into the book The Devil’s Workshop that was made into the movie. Burger toured Europe telling his story of counterfeiting and of the concentration camps of which he had spent time in three. He lived to be 90 years old.