By TOM FOWLER
Royal Dutch Shell RDSB.LN +0.28% had high hopes for its plans this summer to start drilling the first oil wells in U.S. Arctic waters in 20 years, backed by an Obama administration eager to show it wasn’t opposed to offshore exploration.
But the closely watched, multibillion-dollar project isn’t going the way the company or the government hoped—illustrating the continuing challenge of plumbing for natural riches in one of the world’s most unforgiving locations.
Sea ice in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas off the northern Alaska coast was slow to break up this year, leaving the drilling areas inaccessible much later than anticipated. Meanwhile, one of Shell’s two drilling rigs slipped its anchor while waiting in Dutch Harbor, Alaska, and almost ran aground. Shell also still isn’t finished working on a spill-response vessel that under new federal regulations must be in operation before drilling can begin.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
