1. Von Braun was arrested and jailed by the Gestapo.
2. He was charged with resisting the military use of his rockets, and trying to escape.
3. Himmler’s awarding von Braun an honorary rank in the SS no more made him a Nazi than awarding Martin Luther King an honorary membership in the KKK would make him a white supremacist.
4. The evil uses of his rockets occupied only a few months at the end of the war.
5. During his release from jail, when the military used von Braun for his advice, he was escorted under military guard at all times and under strict orders what he could say or do.
6. He used his influence to argue for more time (delaying tactics) and better conditions for the prisoners.
7. When he tried to argue for better treatment of the prisoners, he was threatened that it was none of his business, and that he had better shut up or he would be wearing the same prison stripes.
8. His lifelong dream was the peaceful exploration of space. He was devastated when he heard the news that his rockets had been used against Allied cities.
9. After the war, he sought out the Americans, and willingly surrendered not only himself but his whole team. He knew this meant abandoning his fatherland (and who, in spite of evil leaders, does not have some heart for his own country?). He became a patriotic, energetic American citizen.
10. As soon as he reached America, he was eager to help the American space program.
11. He repeatedly gave a full accounting of all his activities during the war, when interrogated by the government and by suspicious critics.
12. His record since the war speaks for itself. A leopard does not change its spots. If von Braun were anything less than a man of integrity, bad signs would have surfaced in the subsequent 32 years in America.
13. The British Interplanetary Society awarded him an honorary membership right after the war. Surely if anyone had doubts about his motives and allegiances, it would be those who were victimized by V-2 rockets raining down on their city.
He was worried the Russians would get him. He knew they were snapping up engineers and researchers left and right to fuel their industrial machine. He figured ending up in America was a whole lot better than being forced to work for the Russians.
They can throw out all of the crappy cliches they want, those "liberal elites", but Dr. Von Braun's memory will continue to rise above their petty carping.