Operation Overcast

[Karl Heidenreich]

In order to address the myths that ONLY the US was technological proficient enough to achieve some sort of superiority I found this, as a reminder, that arrogance is a very bad ingredient for objective discusssion:

(From wikipedia)

Operation Paperclip was the code name for the 1945 Office of Strategic Services, Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency[1] recruitment of German scientists from Nazi Germany to the U.S. after VE Day.

President Truman authorized Operation Paperclip in August 1945; however he expressly ordered that anyone found "to have been a member of the Nazi party and more than a nominal participant in its activities, or an active supporter of Nazi militarism" would be excluded.

Under this criterion many of the scientists recruited would have been ineligible. These included Wernher von Braun, Arthur Rudolph and Hubertus Strughold, who were all officially on record as Nazis and listed as a "menace to the security of the Allied Forces." All were cleared to work in the U.S. after having their backgrounds "bleached" by the military; false employment histories were provided, and their previous Nazi affiliations were expunged from the record. The paperclips that secured newly-minted background details to their personnel files gave the operation its name.

Osenberg List

Following the failure of the German invasion of the Soviet Union, Germany was at a disadvantage since its military industries were unprepared for a long war. As a result, Germany began efforts in Spring 1943 to recall scientists and technical personnel from combat units for use in research and development,[3] including 4000 to rocket work:[4]

“ Overnight, Ph.D.s were liberated from KP duty, masters of science were recalled from orderly service, mathematicians were hauled out of bakeries, and precision mechanics ceased to be truck drivers. „
—Dieter K. Huzel

The recall first required identifying the men, then finding them and ascertaining their political correctness and reliability, before their names were recorded on the Osenberg List, kept by Werner Osenberg, a University of Hannover engineer–scientist, head of the Wehrforschungsgemeinschaft (English: Military Research Association).[5] In March 1945, a Polish laboratory technician found the pieces of the Osenberg List in an improperly flushed toilet.[6] Major Robert B. Staver, Chief of the Jet Propulsion Section of the Research and Intelligence Branch of the U.S. Army Ordnance, London, used the Osenberg List to compile his blacklist of scientists to be interrogated, headed by rocket scientist Wernher von Braun.[7]

Operation Overcast
The original, unnamed plan to only interview the rocket scientists changed after Major Staver sent Col. Joel Holmes's cable to the Pentagon, on 22 May 1945, about the urgency of evacuating the German technicians and their families as "important for [the] Pacific war." [6] Most of the scientists were at Army Research Center Peenemünde which developed the V-2 rocket and were initially housed with their families in Landshut, Bavaria.

On 19 July 1945, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff designated the handling of the Nazi scientists and their families as Operation Overcast,[7] but when their housing's nickname, "Camp Overcast," became common usage, Operation Overcast was renamed Operation Paperclip[6][7] in March 1946.[8]

An equally strong reason for these scientific rescues was to deny German expertise to the Soviets. For example, in Operation Alsos, nuclear physicist Werner Heisenberg—principal scientist in the German nuclear energy project—was said by Allied intelligence to be "...worth more to us than ten divisions of Germans." [9] Besides rocketeers and nuclear physicists, Allied teams also searched for chemists, medical doctors, and naval weaponeers.


Evacuation and Detention

Early on the U.S. created the Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee (CIOS). This provided the information on targets for the T-Forces that went in and targeted scientific, military and industrial installations (and their employees) for their know-how. Initial priorities were advanced technology such as infra-red that could be used in the war against Japan, finding out what technology had been passed on to Japan, and finally to halt the research. The latter was codenamed "Project Safehaven", and was initially not targeted against the Soviet Union, instead it was feared that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries such as Spain, Argentina or Egypt.

Much U.S. effort was focused in Saxony and Thuringia, in what per agreement on July 1 1945 would be part of the Soviet Occupation zone. To these areas much of German research and facilities had been evacuated during the war, particularly from the Berlin area.

Fearing that the Soviet takeover would limit the ability to exploit scientific and technical know-how the U.S. instigated an evacuation, issuing orders such as:

"On orders of Military Government you are to report with your family and baggage as much as you can carry tomorrow noon at 1300 hours (Friday, 22 June 1945) at the town square in Bitterfeld. There is no need to bring winter clothing. Easily carried possessions, such as family documents, jewelry, and the like should be taken along. You will be transported by motor vehicle to the nearest railway station. From there you will travel on to the West. Please tell the bearer of this letter how large your family is."
By 1947 it was estimated that this "evacuation" operation had netted 1,800 technicians and scientists, and 3,700 family-members. Those with special skills or knowledge were taken to detention and interrogation centers such as the one code-named DUSTBIN[10], to be held and interrogated in some cases for months.

A few were taken up in Operation Overcast, but most were left in villages in the countryside where there were no facilities nor work for them, and were forced to report two times a week to police in order to stop them from leaving. The JCS directive on research and teaching stated that technicians and scientist such as them should be released "only after all interested agencies were satisfied that all desired intelligence information had been obtained from them".

On 5 November 1947 OMGUS held a conference regarding the monetary claims that the evacuees had filed against the U.S., their status, and the "possible violation by the U.S. of laws of war or Rules of Land Warfare". The OMGUS director of Intelligence R. L. Walsh initiated a program to resettle the evacuees into the Third world, which apparently came to nothing. It was by the Germans referred to as "General Walsh's Urwald-Programm" (Jungle program). In mid 1948 the evacuees received settlements of 69.5 million Reich Marks from the U.S., a settlement which immediately thereafter became severely devalued in the currency reform that introduced the Deutsche Mark.

John Gimbel concludes that some of Germany's best minds were simply put on ice for three years by the U.S. and therefore could not contribute to the German recovery.[11]

Groups of scientists

In May 1945, the U.S. Navy acquired Dr. Herbert A. Wagner, a highly regarded expert in aerodynamics, controls and guidance. The inventor of the Hs 293 missile, Wagner worked for the first two years at the Special Devices Center located at the Castle Gould and Hempstead House in Long Island. In 1947, Wagner moved his operation to the Naval Air Station Point Mugu.[12]

In early August 1945, Colonel Holger Toftoy, chief of the Rocket Branch in the Research and Development Division of Army Ordnance, offered initial one-year contracts to the rocket scientists. After Toftoy agreed to take care of their families, 127 scientists accepted the offer. In September 1945, the first group of seven rocket scientists arrived from Germany at Fort Strong in the US: Wernher von Braun, Erich W. Neubert, Theodor A. Poppel, August Schulze, Eberhard Rees, Wilhelm Jungert and Walter Schwidetzky.[6] In November, December, and February, three subsequent groups of rocket scientists arrived in the US for duty at Fort Bliss and White Sands Proving Grounds as "War Department Special Employees."[3]:27

In early 1950, U.S. legal residence for some "Paperclip Specialists" was effected [7] through the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, from which the scientists legally entered the U.S.[3]:226 In later decades, the World War II activities of some scientists were investigated—Arthur Rudolph was exiled in 1984[13] and then exonerated by Germany, Georg Rickhey was acquitted of war crimes, and Hubertus Strughold was implicated[14] in Nazi human experimentation.

Eighty-six aeronautical engineers were transferred to Wright Field, which had acquired Luftwaffe aircraft and equipment under Operation Lusty (Luftwaffe Secret Technology).[15]

The 'United States Army Signal Corps' employed 24 specialists—including physicists Drs. Georg Goubau, Gunter Guttwein, Georg Hass, Horst Kedesdy, and Kurt Levovec; physical chemists Professor Rudolf Brill and Drs. Ernst Baars and Eberhard Both; geophysicist Dr. Helmut Weickmann; technical optician Dr. Gerhard Schwesinger; and electronics engineers Drs. Eduard Gerber, Richard Guenther and Hans Ziegler[16]

The 'United States Bureau of Mines' employed seven German synthetic fuel scientists in a Fischer-Tropsch chemical plant in Louisiana, Missouri in 1946.[17]

In 1959, ninety-four Operation Paperclip men went to the U.S., including Friedwardt Winterberg, Hans Dolezalek, and Friedrich Wigand.[12] Through 1990, the operation immigrated 1,600 personnel,[12] with the "intellectual reparations" taken by the U.S. and the U.K. (patents and industrial processes) valued at some $10 billion.[18]

Related operations

APPLEPIE: Project to locate and interrogate key German personnel of RSHA AMT VI and members of the German Army Staff who were knowledgeable about Soviet industrial and economic matters.[19]
DUSTBIN (counterpart of ASHCAN): British-American operation[20] established first in Paris and later in Kransberg Castle outside Frankfurt.[21]:314
ECLIPSE: unimplemented 1944 plan for post-war operations in Europe[21] that would destroy V-1 and V-2 missiles found by the Air Disarmament Wing.[22]:44
Safehaven: US project under ECLIPSE to prevent German researchers from escaping to other countries (e.g., Latin America).[7]
Field Information Agency; Technical (FIAT): US Army agency for securing the "major, and perhaps only, material reward of victory, namely, the advancement of science and the improvement of production and standards of living in the United Nations by proper exploitation of German methods in these fields."[21]:316 FIAT was dissolved in 1947 when operation PAPERCLIP began large scale operations.
JCS Directive 1067/14: On April 26, 1946, Joint Chiefs of Staff Order 1067 had been issued to General Eisenhower to "preserve from destruction and take under your control records, plans, books, documents, papers, files and scientific, industrial and other information and data belonging to … German organizations engaged in military research."[6]:185 The U.S. occupation directive stated that German scientists should be detained as needed for intelligence purposes, except for war-criminals.[23]
National Interest/Project 63: "Project to help former Nazis obtain jobs with Lockheed, Martin Marietta, North American Aviation or other defense contractors during a time when many American engineers in the aircraft industry were being laid off."[12]
Operation Alsos, Operation Big, Russian Alsos: US and USSR efforts to capture German nuclear secrets, equipment and personnel
Operation Backfire (WWII): Rocket experiments in the area of Cuxhaven
Operation Lusty: US efforts to capture German aeronautical secrets, equipment and personnel
Operation Surgeon: British operation to deny German aeronautical expertise to the USSR and instead exploit the scientists in order to further British research.[24]
Special Mission V-2: US operation commanded by Major William Bromley to recover V-2 rocket parts and equipment. Major James P. Hamill, with the aid of the 144th Motor Vehicle Assembly Company, coordinated the shipment of the first trainload of V-2 equipment from Nordhausen to Erfurt.[7][1] (see also Operation Blossom, Broomstick Scientists, Hermes project, Operations Sandy and Pushover)
Target Intelligence Committee: US project to gather German experts in cryptography.

Key figures

Rocketry: (see also List of German rocket scientists in the US): Rudi Beichel, Magnus von Braun, Wernher von Braun, Walter Dornberger, Werner Dahm, Konrad Dannenberg, Kurt H. Debus, Ernst R. G. Eckert, Krafft Arnold Ehricke, Otto Hirschler, Hermann H. Kurzweg, Fritz Mueller, Gerhard Reisig, Georg Rickhey, Arthur Rudolph, Ernst Stuhlinger, Werner Rosinski, Eberhard Rees, Ludwig Roth, Bernhard Tessmann
Aeronautics: Alexander Martin Lippisch, Hans von Ohain, Hans Multhopp, Kurt Tank
Medicine: Walter Schreiber, Kurt Blome, Hubertus Strughold, Hans Antmann (Human factors)[15]
Electronics: Hans Ziegler, Kurt Lehovec, Hans Hollmann, Johannes Plendl, Heinz Schlicke
Intelligence: Reinhard Gehlen

[Karl Heidenreich]

Operation Surgeon

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Operation Surgeon was a British post-World War II programme to exploit German aeronautics and deny German technical skills to the Soviet Union.

A list of 1500 German scientists and technicians was drawn up. Policy was to forcibly remove ”whether they liked it or not” the scientists from Germany to lessen the risk of them falling into enemy hands.[1]

It was feared that if they were allowed to remain in Germany they might enable the Soviet Union to ”achieve a long range bomber force superior to any other in the world".[2]

Of the removed scientists in the years 1946-1947, 100 chose to work for the UK.

Many of the listed scientists had already at the inception of the operation offered their services to British Commonwealth countries, Sweden, Switzerland, Brazil and South America, and regarded working for the Soviet Union as a last resort if stopped from working in Germany and unable to find employment elsewhere in the west.

Operation Lusty

Overview
During World War II, the U.S. Army Air Forces Intelligence Service sent teams to Europe to gain access to enemy aircraft, technical and scientific reports, research facilities, and weapons for study in the United States. The Air Technical Intelligence (ATI) teams, trained at the Technical Intelligence School at Wright Field, Ohio, collected enemy equipment to learn about Germany's technical developments. The ATI teams competed with 32 allied technical intelligence groups to gain information and equipment recovered from crash sites.

As the war concluded, the various intelligence teams, including the ATI, shifted from tactical intelligence to post hostilities investigations. Exploitation intelligence increased dramatically.

On April 22, 1945, the USAAF combined technical and post-hostilities intelligence objectives under the Exploitation Division with the code name Lusty. Operation Lusty began with the aim of exploiting captured German scientific documents, research facilities, and aircraft. The Operation had two teams.

Team One, under the leadership of Col. Harold E. Watson, a former Wright Field test pilot, collected enemy aircraft and weapons for further examination in the United States.

Team Two recruited scientists, collected documents and investigated facilities. Having been part of ATI in 1944, Col. Watson eagerly accepted the Operation Lusty assignment.

[edit] Watson's "Whizzers"
In 1944 intelligence experts at Wright Field had developed lists of advanced aviation equipment they wanted to examine. Col. Watson and his crew, nicknamed "Watson's Whizzers," composed of pilots, engineers and maintenance men, used these "Black Lists" to collect aircraft. Col. Watson organized his Whizzers into two sections. One collected jet aircraft and the other procured piston engine aircraft and nonflyable jet and rocket equipment.

After the war, the Whizzers added Luftwaffe test pilots to their team. One was Hauptman Heinz Braur. On May 8, 1945, Braur flew 70 women, children and wounded troops to Munich-Riem airport. After he landed, Braur was approached by one of Watson's men who gave him the choice of either going to a prison camp or flying with the Whizzers. Braur thought flying more preferable. Three Messerschmitt employees also joined the Whizzers: Karl Baur, the Chief Test Pilot of Experimental Aircraft, test pilot Ludwig "Willie" Huffman, and engineering superintendent Gerhard Coulis. Test pilot Herman Kersting joined later. When the Whizzers located nine Messerschmitt Me 262 jet aircraft at Lechfeld airfield, these German test pilots had the expertise to fly them.

Watson's men traveled far and wide across Europe by jeep and occasionally by air to find the aircraft on the "Black Lists." Once found, they had to be shipped to the United States. Fortunately, the British were willing to loan them the originally American-built escort carrier HMS Reaper. The most viable harbor for docking the carrier and loading the various aircraft was at Cherbourg, France. The Whizzers flew the Me 262s and other aircraft from Lechfeld to St. Dizier to Melun and then to Cherbourg. All the aircraft were cocooned against the salt air and weather, loaded onto the carrier and brought to the United States where they were studied by the Air Intelligence groups of both the USAAF and Navy.

[edit] Disposition of Foreign Equipment
In 1945 the enemy aircraft shipped to the United States were divided between the Navy and the Army Air Forces. General Hap Arnold ordered the preservation of one of every type of aircraft used by the enemy forces. The Air Force brought their aircraft to Wright Field, and when the field could no longer handle additional aircraft, many were sent to Freeman Field, Seymour, Ind. In the end, Operation Lusty collectors had acquired 16,280 items (6,200 tons) to be examined by intelligence personnel who selected 2,398 separate items for technical analysis. Forty-seven personnel were engaged in the identification, inspection and warehousing of captured foreign equipment.

In 1946 when Freeman Field was scheduled to close, Air Technical Service Command had to move the aircraft. The larger aircraft were sent to Davis-Monthan Field, Arizona, and the fighter aircraft sent to the Special Depot, Park Ridge, Ill. (now O'Hare Airport), which was under the control of ATSC's Office of Intelligence. The Special Depot occupied buildings that Douglas Airplane Co. had used to build C-54 aircraft. The aircraft were stored in these two locations until they could be disposed of in accordance with General Arnold's order.

With the start of the Korean War in 1950, the Air Force needed the Special Depot, so the aircraft had to be moved outside. In 1953 some of the aircraft were moved to the National Air and Space Museum in Silver Hill, Md., and the remaining aircraft were scrapped. It is possible that, as part of Lusty, that an American-captured example of the Heinkel He 177A-7, a late war development of the Luftwaffe's only operational heavy bomber, had been ferried from Europe to the Park Ridge depot, only to be similarly crushed flat and buried under the modern O'Hare airport runways.

Operation Lusty was responsible, wholly or partly, for the existence of the sole surviving examples of the German Heinkel He 219 night fighter, and the Arado Ar 234 jet reconnaissance/bomber, that are in the collection of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum.

This one is SO GOOD:

Operation Backfire (WWII)


Operation Backfire was a military scientific operation during and after World War II, which was performed mainly by British staff. It was part of the Allies' scramble to acquire as much German technology as they could.

For this operation, four V-2 rockets were launched during October 1945 from a launch pad at 53°50′50″N 8°35′32″E / 53.84722°N 8.59222°E / 53.84722; 8.59222 north-east of Arensch near Cuxhaven in Germany, in order to demonstrate the weapon to Allied personnel.

The Americans had already removed most of the V2 rocket technology from the German underground Mittelwerk facility at the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp near Nordhausen. Before the Soviets took occupation of that area, the British were given the opportunity to gather material themselves. They were able to assemble parts sufficient to build eight V2 rockets. Some parts were, however, still missing and there was a large-scale search throughout Germany. Some 400 railway cars and 70 Lancaster flights were used to bring the quarter-of-a-million parts and 60 specialized vehicles to Cuxhaven, the most elusive part being batteries to operate the guidance gyros. The US supplied some tail assemblies from those that they had taken. Many of the rockets and the hydrogen peroxide fuel used in the operation was provided by T-Force, a secretive British Army unit that had, in spring and summer 1945, searched for German military technology and scientists.[1]

The handling and launch procedures were unknown, so German personnel were ordered to perform these, which, for the most part, they did willingly[citation needed]. The launches were filmed and, because the personnel wore their original uniforms and the rockets were painted in near to their original livery, this footage, often used for documentaries, has been mistaken for actual footage of wartime German launches.

At the site of the former launchpad there is a trough and some remnants of shelters.

During and after the launches, the British attempted to recruit German personnel, even those transferred from US custody and due to be returned, to assist with their own missile programme

[Karl Heidenreich]

And this despicts so good the American moral standing. From wikipedia:

Arthur Louis Hugo Rudolph
(November 9, 1906 – January 1, 1996) was a German rocket engineer who helped develop and produce the V-2 rocket. After World War II he was brought to the United States and worked for the U.S. Army and NASA where he managed the development of several important systems including the Pershing missile and the Saturn V Moon rocket. In 1984 he was investigated for possible war crimes and renounced his United States citizenship.

Early life

Rudolph was born in Stepfershausen, Meiningen, Germany in 1906. His family were farmers, with a long tradition in the area. His father Gustav died in 1915 while serving during World War I and Arthur and his younger brother Walter were raised by their mother, Ida. When Ida noted that young Arthur had a mechanical gift, she decided that he should attend technical training, while Walter inherited the family farm.

From 1921 on, Rudolph attended the technical school[Note 1] in Schmalkalden for three years. In 1924 he found employment at a factory for silver goods in Bremen. In August 1927 he accepted a job at Stock & Co. in Berlin. After a few months, he became a toolmaker at Fritz Werner in Berlin. In 1928 he attended the Technical College of Berlin (now the Technical University of Berlin), graduating in 1930 with the equivalent of a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering.

Berlin
On May 1, 1930, Rudolph began working for the Heylandt Works[Note 2] in Berlin where he met rocketry pioneer Max Valier. Valier had use of the factory grounds for his experiments in rocketry and Rudolph became interested, working with Valier in his spare time along with Walter Riedel. Rudolph already had some interest in rocketry, having read Wege zur Raumschiffahrt (Ways to Spaceflight) by Hermann Oberth and having seen the film Woman in the Moon.

On May 27, an experimental engine exploded and killed Valier. Dr. Paulus Heylandt forbade further rocket research, but Rudolph continued secretly with Riedel and Alfons Pietsch. Rudolph then developed an improved and safer version of Valier's engine while Pietsch designed a rocket car. Dr. Heylandt conceded to back the project, and the "Heylandt Rocket Car" was born and was exhibited at Tempelhof Aerodrome. While it was a technical success, the fuel costs were greater than the admissions received and performances were discontinued. Rudolph joined the Nazi Party in 1931, then later the SA Reserve for a short period.

Rudolph first met Wernher von Braun when he visited a meeting of the Verein für Raumschiffahrt (VfR, the "Spaceflight Society"). In May 1932 Rudolph was laid off and looking for work when he encountered Pietsch. After forming a partnership Rudolph began design on a new engine, while Pietsch looked for a backer. Pietsch met with Walter Dornberger, who had been tasked by the German Ordnance Department to develop a rocket weapons system and had become interested in the VfR.

After demonstrating the new engine to Dornberger, Rudolph moved to the proving grounds at Kummersdorf along with Riedel, and began working under von Braun. Rudolph's engine was used in the Aggregate series of rockets. In December 1934, the von Braun team successfully launched two A-2 rockets from the island of Borkum. Arthur Rudolph married Martha Therese Kohls (b. July 5, 1905) on October 3, 1935 in Berlin. Static testing on the A-3 engines began in Kummersdorf in late 1936 and were observed by General Werner von Fritsch, the commander-in chief of the German Army High Command.

V-2
The Kummersdorf facilities were inadequate for continued operations, so the von Braun team was moved to Peenemünde in May 1937 where Rudolph was tasked with the building of the A-3 test stand. The Rudolphs lived in nearby Zinnowitz, where their daughter, Marianne Erika, was born on November 26, 1937. The A-3 series was plagued with guidance problems and never proved successful. In early 1938, Dornberger put Rudolph in charge of the design for the new production plant to be built at Peenemünde for the A-4 series, which was later named the V-2 (Vergeltungswaffe 2 or Reprisal Weapon 2). In August 1943— as Rudolph was ready to begin production of the V-2— the British bombed Peenemünde. Martha and Marianne Rudolph were evacuated and went to live with Ida Rudolph in Stepfershausen.

The V-2 production facility was moved to the Mittelwerk facility near Nordhausen. Mittelwerk was originally a gypsum mine that was being used as a storage facility and was being excavated for production facilities. The labor force consisted of prisoners who were eventually housed at the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp. Rudolph was in charge of moving the equipment from Peenemünde to Mittelwerk, working under Albin Sawatzki. After the plant was in place, Rudolph was placed in charge of the V-2 production. Sawatzki decreed that fifty V-2 rockets were to be produced in December. Given the labor and parts issues, Rudolph was barely able to produce four rockets that were later returned from Peenemünde as defective. In 1944, Himmler convinced Hitler to put the V-2 project directly under SS control, and in August replaced Dornberger with SS General Hans Kammler as its director. In January 1945 the SS ordered all of the civilians and prisoners, including Rudolph and his team, to attend a public hanging of several prisoners accused of sabotage. By March 1945, production had stopped due to a lack of parts and Rudolph and his staff were moved to Oberammergau where they met von Braun and others from Peenemünde. They finally surrendered to the U.S. Army and were transported to Garmisch.

U.S. Army
From July to October 1945, Rudolph was transferred to the British to participate in Operation Backfire. He was then transferred back to the Americans. The U.S. Army picked up Martha and Marianne Rudolph from Stepfershausen before it was occupied by the Red Army and the Rudolphs were reunited at Camp Overcast near Landshut. In November 1945, Operation Overcast brought Rudolph, von Braun and the rest of the V-2 team temporarily to the US for six months. After President Truman approved Operation Paperclip in August 1946 most of the group stayed permanently.

After a brief interrogation at Fort Strong, the team was sent to White Sands Proving Grounds to work on further V-2 engineering in January 1946. In January 1947 Rudolph was moved to the Ordnance Research and Development Division at Fort Bliss, El Paso, Texas, where his family finally joined him in April. Since he had been brought into the US without a visa, he and others were sent to Juárez, Mexico where he obtained a visa and officially immigrated to the U.S. on April 14, 1949. During his time at Fort Bliss, he acted as a liaison to the Solar Aircraft Company,[Note 3] and spent much of 1947 and 1949 in San Diego, California.

During a 1949 inquiry by the FBI, Rudolph made the following statement on his participation in the Nazi party:

Until 1930 I sympathized with the social democratic party, voted for it and was a member of a socialdemocratic union (Bund Techn. Agst. u. Beamt.) After 1930 the economical situation became so serious that it appeared to me to be headed for catastrophe. (I really became unemployed in 1932.) The great amount of unemployment caused expansion of nationalsoc. and communistic parties. Frightened that the latter one would become the government I Joined the NSDAP (a legally reg. entity) to help, I believed in the preservation of the western culture.[1]

On June 25, 1950 Rudolph was transferred to Redstone Arsenal, Huntsville, Alabama, and his group was re-designated as the Ordnance Guided Missile Center. He was naturalized as an American citizen on November 11, 1954 in Birmingham, Alabama. In 1950 Rudolph was appointed as the technical director for the Redstone missile project. Rudolph was assigned as the project manager for the Pershing missile project in 1956. He specifically selected The Martin Company as the prime contractor for the program. He also chose the Eclipse-Pioneer division of Bendix to develop the guidance system after he personally inspected the plant in Teterboro, New Jersey.

Rudolph received an honorary doctorate of science degree from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida on February 23, 1959. He received the Exceptional Civilian Service Award,[2] the highest Army award for civilians, for his work on Pershing.


NASA

Although von Braun and his team had been transferred to NASA in 1960, Rudolph stayed with ABMA to continue critical work on Pershing. In 1961 he finally moved to NASA, once again working for von Braun. He became the assistant director of systems engineering, serving as liaison between vehicle development at Marshall Space Flight Center and the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston. He later became the project director of the Saturn V rocket program from in August 1963. He developed the requirements for the rocket system and the mission plan for the Apollo program. The first Saturn V launch lifted off from Kennedy Space Center and performed flawlessly on November 9, 1967, Rudolph's birthday.[3] He was then assigned as the special assistant to the director of MSFC in May 1968 and then retired from NASA on January 1, 1969.[4] During his tenure he was awarded the NASA Exceptional Service Medal and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal. On July 16, 1969, the Saturn V launched Apollo 11, putting man on the Moon.

OSI investigation and controversy
The Rudolphs retired to San Jose, California to be near their daughter. Soon after moving, he had a heart attack and a triple bypass. In September 1982, he received a letter requesting an interview by the Office of Special Investigations (OSI).[5] Rudolph believed this was one of the series of interrogations he had gone through since his arrival in the U.S. The first of three interviews, it centered on his attitudes on racial superiority, his early participation in the Nazi Party and a possible role in the treatment of prisoners at Mittelwerk. On November 28, 1983, Rudolph, purportedly under duress and fearful for the welfare of his wife and daughter, signed an agreement with the OSI stating that he would leave the United States and renounce his United States citizenship. Under the agreement, Rudolph would not be prosecuted, the citizenship of his wife and daughter was not in danger of revocation and Rudolph's retirement and Social Security benefits were left intact. In March 1984 Arthur and Martha Rudolph departed for Germany where Rudolph renounced his citizenship as agreed. Germany protested to the United States Department of State, as Rudolph now had no citizenship in any country. In July, Germany requested documentation from the OSI to determine if Rudolph should be prosecuted or granted citizenship. The World Jewish Congress placed articles in newspapers in January 1985 on behalf of the Department of Justice, searching for survivors of the Mittelwerk.[6]

After receiving documentation in April 1985, the case was investigated by Harald Duhn, the Attorney General of Hamburg. In March 1987, the investigation concluded after questioning a number of witnesses and determining no basis for prosecution. Rudolph was then granted German citizenship.[7]

Meanwhile, a great deal of controversy occurred back in the U.S. Rudolph had not told his friends of the investigation, but the OSI made a news release after his departure. Several groups and individuals were calling for an investigation into the OSI's activities regarding Rudolph. These included retired Major General John Medaris (former commander of ABMA), officials of the city of Huntsville, the American Legion and former associates at NASA. Thomas Franklin interviewed Rudolph and wrote a series of articles in the Huntsville News that questioned the OSI investigation– these were later used as the basis for An American in Exile: The Story of Arthur Rudolph.[8][Note 4]

In 1985, Representative Bill Green of New York introduced a bill to strip Rudolph of the NASA Distinguished Service Medal (DSM) and re-introduced it in 1987.[9][10] Rudolph applied for a visa in 1989 to attend a 20th anniversary celebration of the first Moon landing, but was denied by the State Department. In May 1990, the United States House of Representatives ordered hearings to determine whether the OSI was negligent in not pursuing the prosecution, or if it had violated the rights of Arthur Rudolph.[11][12][13] In July the Rudolphs entered Canada for a reunion with their daughter. Since the OSI had placed Rudolph on a watch list, he was detained and left Canada of his own accord.[14] Neo-Nazi Ernst Zündel and Paul Fromm attempted to support Rudolph with demonstrations. After Rudolph left, an immigration hearing was held in his absence; he was represented by Barbara Kulaszka, but Canadian authorities ruled that he could not return to Canada.[15] Rudolph sued to regain his U.S. citizenship, but the case was dismissed in 1993.[16]

Arthur Rudolph died in Hamburg on January 1, 1996 from heart failure. In November, Martha Rudolph wrote to Henry Hyde, then chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. She stated that her husband had signed the agreement after coercion and duress by the OSI and that she was dismayed by the House resolutions to strip her husband of the DSM. Rudolph continued to be defended by Pat Buchanan, Lyndon LaRouche and Friedwardt Winterberg.[17][18]

[lwd]

In order to address the myths that ONLY the US was technological proficient enough to achieve some sort of superiority I found this, as a reminder, that arrogance is a very bad ingredient for objective discusssion:

Since you are the only one promulgating that myth I'm not sure what you point is. Indeed this is a rather classic strawman. One of the big reasons for the technical superiority that the allies enjoyed in many fields by the end of the war was the synergy between the US, British, and other allied researchers. Look at the number of British citizens involved in the Manhattan project for instance or the development of radar where the British and US developments fed on each other. Other reasons were that the western allies also had the resources to fully devote to this, as well as OR establishments to direct research, extensive exploitation efforts as you note.

[Karl Heidenreich]

Since you are the only one promulgating that myth I'm not sure what you point is. Indeed this is a rather classic strawman. One of the big reasons for the technical superiority that the allies enjoyed in many fields by the end of the war was the synergy between the US, British, and other allied researchers. Look at the number of British citizens involved in the Manhattan project for instance or the development of radar where the British and US developments fed on each other. Other reasons were that the western allies also had the resources to fully devote to this, as well as OR establishments to direct research, extensive exploitation efforts as you note.

I like the strawman part, always did. Please enjoy the posted articles.

[yellowtail3]

In order to address the myths that ONLY the US was technological proficient enough to achieve some sort of superiority I found this, as a reminder, that arrogance is a very bad ingredient for objective discusssion:

Karl - is this myth found in the same volume as the 'Iowa Class Gospel' you were writing about the other day? I'd like to see both of them!

[Karl Heidenreich]

Werner von Braun:


March 23, 1912(1912-03-23) – June 16, 1977 (aged 65)

Place of birth:
Wirsitz, German Empire

Place of death:
Alexandria, Virginia, USA

Place of burial:
Alexandria, Virginia, USA

Allegiance:
Nazi Germany

Service/branch:
Schutzstaffel (SS)

Years of service:
1937 (or 1933) to 1945

Rank Sturmbannführer, SS

Battles/wars World War II:

Awards War Merit Cross, Knight's Cross First Class with Swords

Other work Rocket engineer, NASA, Built the Saturn V rocket of the Apollo manned moon missions

[Karl Heidenreich]

yellowtail3:

Karl - is this myth found in the same volume as the 'Iowa Class Gospel' you were writing about the other day? I'd like to see both of them!

Yellowtail: I apologysed already for the Iowa Class Gospel remark and it was honest. Many guys here commit more serious offenses or mistakes and just for not losing face persist in unbereable postions. So... don´t bring that.

About the myth of US superiority there are plenty of threads and posts demostrating it so there is no need for me to show them to you... being you one of those that had made some of those posts.

I invite you to give a good reading to the previous posts and think about them. OK?

Best regards,

[Byron Angel]

Karl,

The Allies indeed benefited greatly from German technical progress in a number of areas including rocketry during the post-war years. All this is fairly common knowledge to anyone who has bothered to study his modern technological history lessons. I'm just at a loss to understand exactly what your point is in raising the subject in such an ostentatious manner. If it is simply to raise controversy, then permit me to refer you to the high German interest in the experimental liquid fuel rocketry experiments of one Professor Robert Goddard of Worcester Polytechnic Institute during the 1920's.


Byron

[lwd]

Indeed Von Braun was instrumental in helping Goddard's wife win what I believe was the largest settlement at that time in a patent infringement case vs the US government. He freely admitted making use of Goddard's work. There was also a Russian whose name I don't remember that was one of the readers in modern rocketry and who corresponded with Goddard and Von Braun to a considerable extent in the pre-war years.

[RF]

Werner von Braun:

Allegiance:
Nazi Germany

Service/branch:
Schutzstaffel (SS)

Years of service:
1937 (or 1933) to 1945

Rank Sturmbannführer, SS

Battles/wars World War II:

Awards War Merit Cross, Knight's Cross First Class with Swords

Other work Rocket engineer, NASA, Built the Saturn V rocket of the Apollo manned moon missions

And not actually involved in the implementation of Nazi policy on race, genocide or expoloitation of slave labour and deportations, nor an advocate of such policy. His posts in the SS were a stepping stone to doing his job as a weapons developer and did not involve him in the commission of war crimes. As far as I can see this conforms to the criteria specified by Trueman as to the selection of German technical personnel in the US postwar.

[Karl Heidenreich]

Byron:

Karl,

The Allies indeed benefited greatly from German technical progress in a number of areas including rocketry during the post-war years. All this is fairly common knowledge to anyone who has bothered to study his modern technological history lessons. I'm just at a loss to understand exactly what your point is in raising the subject in such an ostentatious manner. If it is simply to raise controversy, then permit me to refer you to the high German interest in the experimental liquid fuel rocketry experiments of one Professor Robert Goddard of Worcester Polytechnic Institute during the 1920's.
Byron

The purpose, as stated at the first post, is to serve as a reminder because, some times, perspective of several historical FACTS are lost by some biased and pre conceived arguments. Some posters here have the precise purpose of trying to convince the rest that it was the US, alone, the only belligerent country that had in it´s posesion an incredible technological superiority in WWII, which is by all means incorrect. Basically the US benefited, technologically, from it´s geographic position, industrial might and the migration of hundreds, if not thousands, of european scientists as von Braun, Albert Einstein or Leo Szilard.


lwd:

Indeed Von Braun was instrumental in helping Goddard's wife win what I believe was the largest settlement at that time in a patent infringement case vs the US government. He freely admitted making use of Goddard's work. There was also a Russian whose name I don't remember that was one of the readers in modern rocketry and who corresponded with Goddard and Von Braun to a considerable extent in the pre-war years.

Your capacity of trying, when absolutely defeated, to divert the issue is incredible: it was VON BRAUN and the German scientists working for NASA that developed the Mercury Program, the Gemini Program and the Apolo Program. If not for the German scientists the US would have been experimenting with firecrackers by the end of 1960 when the russians were already orbiting the Earth... Remember the russians? Russians, who by the way also developed their space program making use of Penemunde´s scientists and engineers.

No one, at least not me, is saying that Gooddard´s or Konstantin Tsiolkovsky contribution as small or, as you do, try to diminish it on just nationalistis grounds (as a matter of fact the rocket propulsion equation is named after Tsiolkovsky and not after von Braun or Goddard, for your info).

For your info, now, it seems that it´s going to be a Costa Rica´s scientist, not a WASP guy from MIT the one that finnaly developed a plasma engine (VASIMIR) for space flight and the Mars exploration program. His name is Frankling Chang Diaz and he had to quit NASA and start his own research company, AD ASTRA, in order to be able to develop this incredible technological advance for mankind. And, man, that´s a fact:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VASIMR

Best regards,

[yellowtail3]

The purpose, as stated at the first post, is to serve as a reminder because, some times, perspective of several historical FACTS are lost by some biased and pre conceived arguments.

what arguments are these, in what threads? Not this one, I suppose, since it's your thread meant to debunk something someone wrote in (some other?) thread.

Some posters here have the precise purpose of trying to convince the rest that it was the US, alone, the only belligerent country that had in it´s posesion an incredible technological superiority in WWII

Who said that?!? Which thread? I want to read it!!

If not for the German scientists the US would have been experimenting with firecrackers by the end of 1960 when the russians were already orbiting the Earth... Remember the russians? Russians, who by the way also developed their space program making use of Penemunde´s scientists and engineers.

Firecrackers? Well... thank goodness for Germans to help us, if firecrackers are all the US engineers would have been able to come up with by 1960! Where would the world be without Germans (there's a thread). We couldn't have gotten into orbit with firecrackers, now, could we?

For your info, now, it seems that it´s going to be a Costa Rica´s scientist, not a WASP guy from MIT the one that finnaly developed a plasma engine (VASIMIR) for space flight and the Mars exploration program. His name is Frankling Chang Diaz and he had to quit NASA and start his own research company, AD ASTRA, in order to be able to develop this incredible technological advance for mankind. And, man, that´s a fact: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VASIMR

alright... I'm not sure what this has to do with anything on this board, but I'm willing to learn: what does it mean?

[lwd]

Your capacity of trying, when absolutely defeated,

Where was I "absolutely defeated"?

to divert the issue is incredible: it was VON BRAUN and the German scientists working for NASA that developed the Mercury Program, the Gemini Program and the Apolo Program.

No diversion. Von Braun made extensive use of Goddards work and defintily contributed to the US space program as did other Germans.

If not for the German scientists the US would have been experimenting with firecrackers by the end of 1960 when the russians were already orbiting the Earth... Remember the russians? Russians, who by the way also developed their space program making use of Penemunde´s scientists and engineers.

Here you are wrong. The US had an extensive rocket/missile research program going at the end of WWII. Indeed it actually had a couple of them and while Von Braun made his contributions to the army program he had little or nothing to do with the navy program and if you look at the developments there you'll get an idea what the US program would have looked like without him. Certainly he and the Germans helped but claiming all the credit for them as you seem to want to do is simply wrong.

, try to diminish it on just nationalistis grounds

This sort of comment I happen to view as not only incorrect but an insult.

For your info, now, it seems that it´s going to be a Costa Rica´s scientist, not a WASP guy from MIT the one that finnaly developed a plasma engine (VASIMIR) for space flight and the Mars exploration program. His name is Frankling Chang Diaz and he had to quit NASA and start his own research company, AD ASTRA, in order to be able to develop this incredible technological advance for mankind. And, man, that´s a fact:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VASIMR
...s,

Interesting but if my mentioning Goddard was a diversion isn't this an even greater one?

[Karl Heidenreich]

lwd:

No diversion. Von Braun made extensive use of Goddards work and defintily contributed to the US space program as did other Germans.

Wrong again: the Germans were the US rocket program. No Germans, no man on the Moon in 1969.... and for what it seems no man on the Moon by December 12th, 2009.

lwd:

The US had an extensive rocket/missile research program going at the end of WWII. Indeed it actually had a couple of them and while Von Braun made his contributions to the army program he had little or nothing to do with the navy program and if you look at the developments there you'll get an idea what the US program would have looked like without him.

Not entirely accurate. According to von Braun the years between he was sent to the US and the Space Race were the most frustrating in his life because the US didn´t show any interest in having a rocket program.

The navy rocket program had his "own" Germans, by the way. It seems that you didn´t even bothered to read your own US History:

In May 1945, the U.S. Navy acquired Dr. Herbert A. Wagner, a highly regarded expert in aerodynamics, controls and guidance. The inventor of the Hs 293 missile, Wagner worked for the first two years at the Special Devices Center located at the Castle Gould and Hempstead House in Long Island. In 1947, Wagner moved his operation to the Naval Air Station Point Mugu.[12]

lwd:

Certainly he and the Germans helped but claiming all the credit for them as you seem to want to do is simply wrong.

It´s the other way around: the US put the money and resources and helped von Braun to put together a rocket program.


lwd:

This sort of comment I happen to view as not only incorrect but an insult.

It was not intended to be. If I offended you, as I have been so many times without the satisfaction of an apology, then you have my apology for it. But the way you have refered to the Tiger tank, the Bismarck, the Me 262 or whatever is NOT US made leads to a very nationalistic way of figure things: only the USS Iowa is worth a good design, only the Sherman is a good tank and the Me 262 was a defective plane.... Good God! You are trying to write your own History.

lwd:

Interesting but if my mentioning Goddard was a diversion isn't this an even greater one?

Could be. The intention is to sum up that, still, the "stucked" space program depends in a great measure on foreign scientists.