Wernher von Braun (1912 - 1977) was one of the most important rocket developers and champions of space exploration during the period between the 1930s and the 1970s. As a youth he became enamored with the possibilities of space exploration by reading the science fiction of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, and from the science fact writings of Hermann Oberth, whose 1923 classic study, Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen (By Rocket to Space), prompted young von Braun to master calculus and trigonometry so he could understand the physics of rocketry.

From his teenage years, von Braun had held a keen interest in space flight, becoming involved in the German rocket society, Verein fur Raumschiffarht (VfR), as early as 1929. As a means of furthering his desire to build large and capable rockets, in 1932 he went to work for the German army to develop ballistic missiles. While engaged in this work, von Braun received a Ph.D. in physics on July 27, 1934.

Von Braun is well known as the leader of what has been called the “rocket team” which developed the V–2 ballistic missile during World War II. The V–2s were manufactured at a forced labor factory called Mittelwerk. Scholars are still reassessing his role in these controversial activities.

The brainchild of von Braun’s rocket team operating at a secret laboratory at Peenemünde on the Baltic coast, the V–2 rocket was the immediate antecedent of those used in space exploration programs in the United States and the Soviet Union.

A liquid propellant missile extending some 46 feet in length and weighing 27,000 pounds, the V-2 flew at speeds in excess of 3,500 miles per hour and delivered a 2,200-pound warhead to a target 500 miles away. First flown in October 1942, it was employed against targets in Europe beginning in September 1944. By the beginning of 1945, it was obvious to von Braun that Germany would not achieve victory against the Allies, and he began planning for the postwar era.

Before the Allied capture of the V–2 rocket complex, von Braun engineered the surrender of 500 of his top rocket scientists, along with plans and test vehicles, to the Americans.

For fifteen years after World War II, von Braun worked with the U.S. Army in the development of ballistic missiles. As part of a military operation called Project Paperclip, he and his rocket team were scooped up from defeated Germany and sent to America where they were installed at Fort Bliss, Texas. There they worked on rockets for the U.S. Army, launching them at White Sands Proving Ground, New Mexico. In 1950 von Braun’s team moved to the Redstone Arsenal near Huntsville, Ala., where they built the Army’s Jupiter ballistic missile.

In 1960, his rocket development center transferred from the Army to the newly established NASA and received a mandate to build the giant Saturn rockets. Accordingly, von Braun became director of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that would propel Americans to the Moon.

Von Braun also became one of the most prominent spokesmen of space exploration in the United States during the 1950s. In 1970, NASA leadership asked von Braun to move to Washington, D.C., to head up the strategic planning effort for the agency. He left his home in Huntsville, Ala., but in 1972 he decided to retire from NASA and work for Fairchild Industries of Germantown, Md. He died in Alexandria, Va., on June 16, 1977.

MARSHALL SPACE FLIGHT CENTER - HUNTSVILLE, ALABAMA

Von Braun ruled with an extremely iron hand, causing some observers and workers to call the Alabama city "Hunsville."

The following excerpts are from "Power to Explore," a history of the Marshall Space Flight Center published in 1999 and prepared for NASA by Dr. Andrew Dunar and Dr. Stephen Waring, historians at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

(Excerpt from "Power to Explore," Page 7)

Labor for V-2 production became a pressing problem in 1943. In April Arthur Rudolph, chief engineer of the Peenemunde factory, learned of the availability of concentration camp prisoners, enthusiastically endorsed their use, and helped win approval for their transfer. The first prisoners began working in June.

The concern for V-2 development after July 1943 peaked the interest of the German military, who conspired to take control of the rocket program and research activities at Peenemunde as a means to expand their power base.

When Dornberger and von Braun resisted these advances, they arrested von Braun, charging that he had tried to sabotage the V-2 program. Himmler cited as evidence remarks that von Braun had made at a party suggesting developing the V-2 for space travel after the war. Dornberger's intercession won von Braun's release, but Himmler had made his point. Von Braun's defenders cite his arrest as proof of his differences with the military and his distance from the use of slave labor.

Von Braun's relationship to the German military is complex; although he was not an ardent Party member, he did hold rank as an Sx2 officer. His relationship to slave labor is likewise complicated, for his distance from direct responsibility for the use of slave labor must be balanced by the fact that he was aware of its use and the conditions under which prisoners labored.

Atrocities perpetrated at V-2 production facilities at Nordhausen and the nearby concentration camp at Dora - where some 20,000 died as a result of execution, starvation, and disease - stimulated controversy that plagued the rocket pioneers who left Germany after the war.

The most important V-2 production sites were the central plants, called Mittelwerk, in the southern Harz Mountains near Nordhausen, where an abandoned gypsum mine provided an underground cavern large enough to house extensive facilities in secrecy. Slave labor from Dora carved out an underground factory in the abandoned mine, which extended a mile into the hillside. Foreign workers under the supervision of skilled German technicians assumed an increasing burden; at Mittelwerk, ninety percent of the 10,000 laborers were non-Germans.

(Excerpts from "Power to Explore," Page 9-10)

The question of what to do with German technicians in American custody was laden with political, military, and moral overtones. Some feared that allowing them to continue their research might allow for a rebirth of German militarism. Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau sought a punitive policy toward Germany, with no room for coddling weapons developers.

The most compelling moral argument hinged on the involvement of the Germans with either the N--- Party or slave labor at Mittelwerk.

Many German academics, scientists, and technicians had been members of the Party, often because party membership brought benefits such as research grants and promotions. The Party often bestowed honorary rank as a reward. Himmler personally awarded an honorary Sx2 rank to von Braun in May 1940, which von Braun accepted only after he and his colleagues agreed that to turn it down might risk Himmler's wrath. Party membership alone seemed an inadequate criteria, and advocates of using German scientists suggested distinguishing "ardent" members from those who joined the Party out of expediency.

Similar ambiguities clouded the issue of responsibility for the slave labor at Nordhausen. Manufacture facilities were far from Peenemunde, under the supervision of Himmler's Sx2. Himmler and Sx2-General Kammler dictated production schedules and allocated V-2s for deployment and for testing.

Neither Dornberger nor von Braun had direct authority over Mittelwerk, but both men visited the plant several times and observed conditions. Dornberger and von Braun could influence V-2 production only indirectly, by lobbying for greater resources.

In the years after the war, when von Braun and other Peenemunde veterans had risen to responsible positions in the American space program, accusations regarding their role in the Mittelwerk slave labor production rose occasionally.

Responding to charges leveled by former inmates of the Dora-Ellrich concentration camps in the mid-1960s, von Braun gave his most detailed response. He admitted that he had indeed visited Mittelwerk on several occasions, summoned there in response to attempts by Mittelwerk management to hasten the V-2 into production. He insisted that his visits lasted only hours, or at most one or two days, and that he never saw a prisoner beaten, hanged, or otherwise killed. He conceded that in 1944 he learned that many prisoners had been killed, and that others had died from mistreatment, malnutrition, and other causes, that the environment at the production facility was "repulsive."

This guide was assembled by booksuncommon.  Any errors are mine. For those I apologize.

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