Spokane inventor and entrepreneur John Adrain, who has collector-car auction experience and what he describes as a long history of "horse trading," is helping to market three resurrected World War II-era Mercedes-Benz cars designed and built for Adolf Hitler.

The ruggedly designed, six-wheel 1939 model vehicles, appraised three years ago at $9 million to $11 million as a set, should be able to fetch at least as much as $5 million for all three in today's depressed market, Adrain says. He says he's put out feelers to contacts in markets as far-flung as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia in search of a well-heeled buyer for the rare mini-fleet, which includes a seven-passenger convertible parade car, a radio communications car, and a luggage car. He also has created an Internet Web site, at worldwarcars.com, to help generate some buzz about their availability.

Adrain speculates that there probably are fewer than 100 people in the world who have both the discretionary cash and the inclination to want to buy the cars, rolling symbols of one of the darkest periods in recent global history. He adds, though, that certain types of collector vehicles, because of their uniqueness, always will have strong inherent value.

"These cars are a part of history," Adrain says, "and when they were built they were ahead of their time. Hitler committed a lot of atrocities; the cars didn't."

He adds that the period when Hitler reigned as leader of Germany's Third Reich was "an incredible, pivotal time in the world," and the cars are fascinating for the sheer fact that they were owned by someone singularly responsible for so much of that international upheaval.

The cars now are owned by Dean V. Kruse, of Indiana-based Kruse International, which claimed at one time to be the world's largest collector-car auction company. Adrain worked for Kruse International, in vehicle setup, appraisals, and as a bid-spotting "ringman" at auctions, beginning when he was in his early teens and continuing through college, and knew Kruse personally.

He says Kruse "took out a huge loan, put up these cars as collateral, and there is a bank in Kansas City that's going to end up with them (if a buyer can't be found beforehand), so both parties have asked me to help sell the cars. If I succeed, they're going to pay me a commission, and that's in writing." He estimates there's a window of about 60 days in which to find a buyer, and says his commission would amount to "a few hundred thousand dollars."

The cars were resurrected by the late Ralph Engelstadt, owner of the Imperial Palace hotel and casino in Las Vegas, who reportedly drew the ire of the Nevada gaming commission by throwing parties to show off his Nazi memorabilia.

Engelstadt searched all over Europe to find the Grosser G4-W131 Mercedes Offener Tourenwagen six-wheelers, according to background information on the Web site. When he located them, they were so totally decayed that he rebuilt them from the ground up in precise detail, using factory blueprints and the actual skeletons when possible, at a cost of about $10 million, the Web site says.

It's believed that just eight G4-W131s were built—six of the parade cars and the one radio car and one luggage car—and that all were used by the German military high command, except for one that was given as a gift to Spain's General Francisco Franco.

The cars were kept at Hitler's various castles, and he used the three different models together only a few times during his travels. He used the parade car, the most valuable of the three, for special events and also to cross rough terrain to visit troops and to maneuver through bombed streets, the Web site says. Mercedes-Benz had photos taken of mountain-climbing and rough-terrain test-drives of the massive cars, each of which weighed about four tons.

"To say that these three Mercedes-Benz special-purpose vehicles are so unique that they fall into a class and category unlike any other motorcar in the arena of car collection is an understatement," one appraiser wrote.

The Imperial Palace in Las Vegas, now owned by Harrah's Entertainment Inc., is home to what's touted to be the world's largest collector-car showroom, featuring collector vehicles of all types that are available for purchase.

Adrain, the Spokane man who is helping to market the resurrected Hitler fleet, is an avid inventor who holds a number of automotive patents and who before moving here founded a company in California that sold alternative-fuel and aftermarket automotive components. One of his latest ventures, which he is pursuing through a company he owns called Heracles Research Corp., involves the manufacture and marketing of an under-the-bed gun safe called the BedBunker.