Unimog - The Swabian Swiss army knife

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‘War is the father of all things’, wrote Greek philosopher Heraclitus about 500 BC The Unimog is also (indirectly) a product of the Second World War, but perhaps differently than Heraclitus had imagined…

At the beginning of 1945 it did not really look good for Germany. Everyone, except for a few completely blinded, knew that the war was over and that the Germans would not end up being victorious. Even graduate engineer Albert Friedrich, development engineer in the Daimler-Benz flight engine department in Faurndau near Göppingen, realized that the construction of aircraft engines would soon come to an end. And then there was one mister Morgenthau, a good six hundred miles further to the west. Henry Morgenthau was the USA’s Minister of finance in the government of Franklin D. Roosevelt. In the summer of 1944, Morgenthau wrote a memorandum, in which he proposed that after the foreseeable victory Germany would be divided and converted into an agricultural state - no industry, no arms, no war of aggression-that was the line of argument. To this day it is controversial, who basically agreed with the Allied politicians as after publication Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945 and the Morgenthau plan was politically dead, too. Albert Friedrich, of course, had also taken note of this, and saw the aerospace and automotive industry disappear. But perhaps, according to his considerations, the Allies would at least allow the construction of agricultural tractors.

Not a conventional tractor, but a versatile device not just for the field but also for use in the forest and for transports. 4-wheel drive with four equal-sized wheels, a small loading area and a protected workplace for the driver and passenger - these were the most important basic data of the project, which is still unnamed. On November 21, 1945, Friedrich received a "Production Order" for ten prototypes…

This is a distract from Austro Classic magazine, in which Wolfgang Buchta describes the remarkable history of the Unimog over 20 pages and with a multitude of historic photographs.

(Words Wolfgang M. Buchta, pictures Ulli Buchta/Daimler AG)

  

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