Dear americans, without quoting Tom Lehrer, what’s your opinion on Wernher von Braun?

34 comments

1. Brilliant engineer and space pioneer, but his Nazidom really shouldn’t be brushed under the rug. He was an SS major and Nazi party member, not just some random German who had the misfortune of getting lumped in with the regime.

2. He’s kind of a big deal in Huntsville because he helped start the U.S. Space and Rocket Center and was a proponent of Space Camp. The local arena is even named after him.

   I recently read up on him and his ties to the Nazis are kind of murky. He claimed he was only ever a member because it was the only way to advance in one’s career at the time, but there are some conflicting stories about how “involved” he was.

3. He was a Nazi.. and he brought us NASA

   So I just let that conflict sit as is without trying to resolve it

   Still, an American hero in my eyes

4. Doesn’t really answer the question, but I was just talking with a neighbor who grew up in this area. And he was just going on and on about different things. But there are some condos on the actual beach across from our neighborhood. He mentioned that he used to deliver newspapers to the condo. But that’s where the Germans were housed while they were working. He said they all requested multiple newspapers from all over. I just thought that was pretty interesting.

5. An American hero, despite his past which he redeemed himself in my eyes and many others. He also brought us NASA and helped get us to space

6. Evil man, but I’d rather have had him working for us than for the Soviets.

   While it’s understandable that people want their “pound of flesh”, using evil men for the advancement of science and technology is kind of what governments do.

7. Complex and conflicted.

   ETA: I’ve read two (fiction) books recently that dealt with the space race / early NASA and featured Von Braun as a side character. I can appreciate his contributions to the space programs. I remain deeply conflicted about his actions during WWII and I am not altogether comfortable with having benefitted from his and other scientists contributions post-WWII

8. What possible answer is there other than “Nazis = bad”? Our forgiveness of their braintrust for our own war machine? Also bad. Whether or not von Braun joined the party because he had to, that should serve as a cautionary tale of how people end up supporting fascism to help themselves.

9. Were his crimes such that if he had been tried at Nuremberg he would have gotten the death penalty? If not, how would justice be served by letting him live on in obscurity in Germany contributing nothing to the field of space exploration?

10. “call him a nazi, he won’t even frown.”

    -Tom Lehrer

    Don’t tell me what to do!

11. He was less of a Nazi than Robert Byrd was a Klansman and far more important to the advancement of the human race.

12. I think that he was a bad person (obviously, cause he was a nazi) and that it was extremely wrong of the American government to find him and not immediately arrest him and allow him to be tried with all the other nazis.

13. He’s a complex issue. On the one hand, he did very evil things. On the other hand, he was instrumental in getting American’s to the moon, and establishing our best-in-the-world space program.

    Although it’s tempting to call him evil, I think that he was somehow worse than that, rather than having evil morals, I suspect that he had *no morals at all.* He had no allegiance and no principles other than building rockets, and couldn’t have cared less what the rockets were for.

    In that sense, I’m glad that we were able to capture the sociopath and use him for something good.

14. This reminds me that I still need to watch season 2 of the Amazon Prime show Hunters.

15. When I tell you I only recently googled him and was shocked that a high ranking nazi rocket scientist was a decent looking dude, that’s an understatement. Also, makes sense why he was banging his way thru every chick he saw.

    Then, I realized there were videos, and I was shocked at how normal he sounded and acted. I guess I just had a stereotype of Nazi rocket scientist in my head and was very wrong lol.

16. I didn’t hear of him. I looked him up and it says something about being “father of rocket science” but I always knew that as Goddard.

17. SS member who, according to multiple witnesses under oath, participated in or ordered the torture of prisoners who were forced to help him. Wasn’t some no-body in the party, was awarded the Iron Cross by Adolf Hitler. Only when the Soviets were in his backyard did he flee behind American lines out of self-preservation. Due to changing allegiance, his persona has been whitewashed quite a bit. But i honestly don’t think much about it. I have no doubt he genuinely wanted to help the US defeat the Soviet Union.

18. Kinda laughing at the people who think “he brought us NASA”… No, not really. He was the head of a Center,several layers down in the hierarchy. (ABMA didn’t even shift over and become the Marshall Space Flight Center until some months after NASA was created.) Though, TBF/TBH a NASA Center enjoys a great deal more independence than you might think. (In some ways NASA is less of a unified agency and more a collection of fiefdoms begrudgingly cooperating. Sometimes. If they have to.)

    He was a brilliant engineer, but he was also an absolutely tireless self promoter. And that’s lead to a skewed view of his role among the general public. In reality, he was just one of a fairly large cast of brilliant individuals who contributed to the space program in general and the Apollo program in particular. But unless you’re deeply into space history, you’ve never heard of people like Brainerd Holmes, Charles Stark Draper, or George Mueller.

    von Braun also played a large role in promoting the Shuttle – which arises from the Shuttle -> Station -> Mars mission architecture he created and promoted as far back as the mid 1950’s. (Among space wonks, that sequence is known as the von Braun Vision. And it was deeply influential at NASA in the 1960’s.) You’ll note the complete absence of the Moon… von Braun supported it publically because it was popular and politically important. Privately, he regarded it as something of a sideshow.

19. I always thought he was the kind of guy who didn’t let morals get in the way of his passion. Like he was willing to break 6 million eggs to make an omelet.

20. He’s a beautiful introduction to the vagaries of history. So many people revered historically did things or held beliefs that would be monstrous by todays standards. People who did wonderful things for humanity also were awful people in their personal lives or politics.

    Von Braun is no exception. He was forced into the Nazi Party to continue his research. Yet without him we wouldn’t have NASA. Like all historical characters he is more complex than a simple historiography.

21. A Nazi who sent us to the moon.

22. von Braun is a complex figure. I think at best you can refer to him as a chameleon. He was a Nazi when he needed to be a Nazi, and he was an American when he needed to be. I don’t believe he held deep feelings about politics in all cases.

    Potentially my most controversial take is that large scale forgiveness of all but the highest level Germans and Japanese was necessary in order to have a (mostly) peaceful post-war world and he certainly wasn’t a high level Nazi

23. Rockets go up, doesn’t matter where they come down

    It’s not my department! Says Wernher von Braun

24. He was going to work for either the Soviets or us. So I’m glad he worked for us.

25. I like Werner Herzog better

26. He was an opportunist.

27. I’m not sure I have one. We certainly celebrate worse men for less.

28. One of the greatest engineers of the 20th Century, if not of all time.

    How much of a Nazi was he? At this point we’ll never really know. He was a Nazi, took the oath, and was a commissioned officer in the SS. But he was likely “volunteered” for the SS due to the strategic and highly visible nature of his work. When he had a chance, he became a naturalized US citizen, and we assume he meant it.

    But we can celebrate his mind. Brilliant.

29. Who and who now?

30. I only know about him through Mr Lehrer, so i would say because I like the sign, my opinion of von Braun is positive.

31. I’m glad his grossmutter made him stay in school.

32. I have no problem with him.

    If you’re going to start killing, condemning, and imprisoning everyone involved with your enemy, you’re going to find yourself having very few friends and short on potential resources while also disrupting the social fabric.

    It’s the difference between the Revolutionary War and the French Revolution. The former may have seen some vengeance and anger directed at loyalists but eventually welcomed and allowed them to stay after the war. The latter….well, when was France’s last great victory and great political achievement?

    It’s no surprise those who are most snooty and snobbish about Werhner von Braun tend to be people who idolize and romanticize the French Revolution over the American one.

33. who

34. I would listen to Wagner’s music, too.

    It’s a complicated world. Condemn that which needs condemning, but also appreciate the benefits.