The Nazi Rocketeers: Dreams of Space and Crimes of War

by Dennis Piszkiewicz

Wernher von Braun is known to many as a brilliant pioneer of rocketry who left Germany in 1945 to become a key advisor in America's space program. Until now, few realize the bloody legacy he left behind. The Nazi Rocketeers tells the story of how von Braun and his fellow scientists abandoned their initial dreams of space exploration in favor of creating the devastating V-2 ballistic missile. This weapon enabled the Nazis to precipitate mass destruction and loss of life. Contrary to previous accounts, this history proves that von Braun and his colleagues were not forced under duress to turn their rockets into weapons of war. They were, in fact, highly ambitious members of the Nazi movement who willingly put their creation to lethal use. In return, honors were bestowed on them from the Third Reich and Hitler himself. Perhaps the most shocking revelation is the collaboration between the scientists and the SS in the exploitation of concentration camp slave labor for the building of the V-2 missiles. In addition to addressing an overlooked portion of World War II study, this book is a sobering testament to the consequences of corrupted genius. In the late 1920s, Herman Oberth, an early theoretician of space travel, told the world of his plan for using liquid-fueled rockets as vehicles for space travel. To his surprise and delight, he found himself with a group of young German disciples, prominent among them Wernher von Braun, who wanted to turn this dream into reality. During the years of the Third Reich, with von Braun as their technical leader, these men developed the first modern rockets and attended at the birth of the Space Age. Although von Braun and his fellow rocket scientists dreamed of exploring space, they readily embraced the goal of creating weapons of terror and mass destruction. The myth they encouraged after the war described them as brilliant visionaries whose genius was exploited by the Nazi regime. Now, 50 years later, The Nazi Rocketeers tells the true story of how these men enthusiastically participated in the Nazi cause and crimes. The Nazi Rocketeers describes how Hermann Oberth, Wernher von Braun, and their colleagues progressed, from the innocent dream of space travel, through the development of the V-2 ballistic missile, to the transfer of their technological legacy to the Americans. Other notable Nazi Rocketeers are Army General Walter Dornberger, career soldier and von Braun's mentor; Albert Speer, technocrat and advocate of the rocket as a weapon; and SS General Hans Kammler, architect of Auschwitz and director of the V-2 rocket war. The book tells how Wernher von Braun and many of his fellow rocket scientists were early and active members of the Nazi movement; von Braun was both a member of the Nazi party and a major in the SS. For their service to the Nazi cause, they were honored by the Third Reich and by Hitler himself. Most damning is the revelation that they actively collaborated with the SS in the exploitation of concentration camp slave labor to build the V-2 missile. This rocket, when used as a weapon, killed thousands; yet tens of thousands of prisoners died at the Dora concentration camp, where the rockets were built under the direction of the SS and the rocket scientists. The Nazi Rocketeers tells the story of the technical genius and moral corruption of the creators of the first modern rockets.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, History Of Science

288 pages, Hardcover

First published September 30, 1995

Reviews

[Teemu Öhman · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Nazi Rocketeers: Dreams of Space and Crimes of War by Dennis Piszkiewicz is a book that every fan of the early American space programme – like me – should read. The basic story is a familiar one and has been told countless times. Wernher von Braun and other young men dreamt of flying to space and started to build small rockets. Then the Nazis took over and von Braun and his colleagues decided to work for them. Von Braun joined the SS and they started to build and test their rockets at Peenemünde by the Baltic Sea. When the A4 (renamed V2) became sort of operational, they began using slave labour from the Dora concentration camp to build the V2s in the tunnels of the Mittelwerk factory. Thousands of people died while building the V2s (the total casualties of the Dora camp has been estimated to be about 20 000), much more than was the death toll of V2s in England and Belgium where the V2s where used as weapons. Von Braun and the others were of course fully aware of the atrocities at Dora and Mittelwerk, but it never bothered them too much.

Near the end of the war, von Braun and his colleagues surrendered to the Americans, who also managed to grab the parts to build about a hundred V2s just before the Russians arrived, plus tons of documents that had been hidden in an abandoned mine. In USA von Braun & co. built the rockets that, for example, launched the first American satellite Explorer I and of course took the Apollo astronauts to the Moon. Nobody seemed to mind that more than half of the group that came along with von Braun to Huntsville were Nazis and were, in essence, war criminals. Von Braun became a national hero.

So that is what everybody knows. However, The Nazi Rocketeers offers much more details and layers to the story. The crucial role played by Walter Dornberger, who was von Braun’s boss, has not been made so clear in the other books that I’ve read. He was a prisoner of war in England for two years and then went to the States, where he worked for the Air Force and Bell Aerospace. He made significant contributions for example to the development of the legendary rocket plane X-15, the fastest airplane ever built.

Another significant and interesting figure was Albert Speer who in essence was Dornberger’s boss. He wasn’t actually interested in rockets or space travel, but because of the Nazi politics he ended up overseeing the V2 project anyway.

One thing that I had somehow not fully realized before was that Hermann Oberth – one of three rocket pioneers along with Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and Robert Goddard – was a Nazi too. He really wanted to be involved with the V2 project and even worked at Peenemünde for a while. However, Oberth was constantly sidelined because although he was of German descent, he was born in Transylvania in the Austro-Hungarian empire.

The Nazi Rocketeers is an extremely important and interesting book. It’s not flawless, though. The story progresses chronologically, and sometimes a sub-chapter that covers only a day or two (often the dates are just estimates, which Piszkiewicz admits in the references and notes) may be just one or two paragraphs long. As a result, the text doesn’t always flow as well as it could.

Piszkiewicz also has continuous problems with German names and letters. Peenemünde is always spelled correctly, but that’s the only name with an umlaut that Piszkiewicz gets right. For example, Hermann Göring is always Goering. Curiously, even Hitler’s first name is sometimes Adolf, sometimes Adolph. That’s odd, because otherwise the book has clearly been proofread as there aren’t typos or other obvious mistakes. Units of measure are of course the silly imperial ones, so miles, yards, feet, inches, gallons and pounds abound. Temperatures are sometimes in Fahrenheit degrees, sometimes in Celsius.

Those, however, are very minor problems. Overall, I really enjoyed reading The Nazi Rocketeers (if that word can be used with a book like this). At least everyone with an interest in the American space programme, rockets and World War II should read it.

4.25/5

[Jennie Floyd · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is helpful in that it documents the key events in the development of rockets, through the middle of WWII up to the end when the Germans were brought to the US under "Operation Paperclip." It is well-researched, and the biographical information about all the key players is enlightening. But the writer shows his bias throughout the book, presenting all the engineers as evil and corrupt. It would have been a much better book if a more balanced view had been presented. However, it certainly contains some damning evidence about Wernher Von Braun, and made me regard him as less of a hero than I have in the past (I grew up in Huntsville, Alabama, and my father worked with Von Braun on the Apollo moon team).

[Brian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Poorly written, references not well organized, but some useful information.