Posted on 01/05/2015 7:18:57 AM PST by fishtank
Wernher von Braun: The Father of Space Flight
by Jerry Bergman, Ph.D. *
Wernher von Braun—more than any other scientist—brought us into the space age.1 Von Braun laid the foundation for cell phones, satellite radio, the Internet, GPS, and Doppler radar. His later career reads like a history of the American space program,2 and it was undergirded by a firm belief in the Creator God of the Bible.
I remember his monthly articles on space flight in Popular Science in the early and mid 60s. I was amazed by the man even in my teens. Those articles helped reinforce my interest in science and technology.
He also help build the V-2 rocket for Adolf Hitler.
Can you the liberals today with Von Braun?
He was a nazi so who cares about developing cell phones, satellite radio, the Internet, GPS, and Doppler radar???
#whiteprivileged
Come to Huntsville Alabama, his name is all over the place.
He was like a lot of the nazi scientists in the sense that he was milking Hitler for funding money for his own research.
There was a lot of foot dragging among the nazi scientists which meant a lot of the nazi “superweapons” came just a little too late.
Yeah, was thinking that. Saw a V-2 shell at a museum in OK City last year.
Tom Lehrer, a different kind of genius, wrote a short song about von Braun in the 1960s: Tom Lehrer - Wernher von Braun
He was also an unapologetic Nazi.
Very true, the Nazi “super weapons” proved to be too little too late to have had a chance to change the outcome of the war. But when you consider all of the areas they pioneered in, it is truly amazing. Including missiles and rockets, jet fighters, synthetic fuel, atomic weapons, super tanks, submarine warfare, massive rail guns, precision guided munitions...it is no wonder there was fierce competition for their scientists among the West and the Soviets as the war drew to a close.
“He also help build the V-2 rocket for Adolf Hitler.”
No, he was the principal creator and designer of the V-2 rocket and its engines with a view towards using it for space exploration. It was made very clear to Von Braun and his team that saying no to the use of the technology for war was not an available choice.
He aimed for the stars. But he sometimes hit London.
Our Nazis beat Russia’s Nazis.
We knew that we had created a new means of warfare, and the question as to what nation, to what victorious nation we were willing to entrust this brainchild of ours was a moral decision more than anything else. We wanted to see the world spared another conflict such as Germany had just been through, and we felt that only by surrendering such a weapon to people who are guided by the Bible could such an assurance to the world be best secured.
This is why he and several others from his team sought out and surrendered to the US. This doesn't sound like an unapologetic Nazi to me.
While it is hard for someone my age, who grew up watching every launch during the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs to not be hugely grateful to von Braun and his team (”our” Germans), it is also impossible to dispel that sickening taste at the back of one’s throat over the thousands in England and Holland who were blasted without the slightest warning by his V2’s, or the grotesque sufferings and death of the thousands of slave laborers who toiled underground building his machines. Brilliant scientist, and maybe an even more brilliant self promoter, but he seems to have had the conscience of a pit viper.
Von Braun joined the NSDAP (Nazi party)in 1937. He joined the Allgemeine SS in 1940. By 1945 he held the rank of Sturmbannfuhrer (major).
/mark
“Can you the liberals today with Von Braun?”
“He was a Nazi[....]”
No, the oft repeated claim that Wehrner von Braun chose to join the NAZI Party has always been a lie. Himmler wanted to take control of the rocket programme from the German Army, so he arrested and jailed Von Braun. Himmler intimidated Von Braun by threatening to have him shot or executed by other means, but promised Von Braun he would be forgiven if he agreed to join the NAZIs. What finally persuaded Von Braun to cooperate was Himmler’s threat to arrest, imprison in the concentration camps, and/or execute members of Von Braun’s team of rocket scientists and their families. Von Braun risked his life on many occasions to save lives threatened by Himmler and his NAZI Gestapo, SD, and SS troops.
In the last days of the war, Von Braun risked his life to evacuate the members of his team and their technical documentation to the U.S. Army.
Please stop posting real history it unsettles some...
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