NASA's Nazi Memorials - Honouring War Criminals 2024
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- čas přidán 19. 04. 2024
- In 2024, several Nazi war criminals that were brought to America under Operation Paperclip in 1945 to work on the US ballistic missile and space programmes, are widely honoured. These men were responsible for tens of thousands of deaths, mostly of slave labourers forced to build Nazi rockets, and were also active Nazi Party members and SS officers. It is an interesting moral problem for NASA, other space organisations and the American public to wrestle with - should such men, that got America to the Moon in 1969 still be accorded such honours?
Dr. Mark Felton FRHistS, FRSA is a well-known British historian, the author of 22 non-fiction books, including bestsellers 'Zero Night' and 'Castle of the Eagles', both currently being developed into movies in Hollywood. In addition to writing, Mark also appears regularly in television documentaries around the world, including on The History Channel, Netflix, National Geographic, Quest, American Heroes Channel and RMC Decouverte. His books have formed the background to several TV and radio documentaries. More information about Mark can be found at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Fe...
Visit my audio book channel 'War Stories with Mark Felton': • One Thousand Miles to ...
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Disclaimer: All opinions and comments expressed in the 'Comments' section do not reflect the opinions of Mark Felton Productions. All opinions and comments should contribute to the dialogue. Mark Felton Productions does not condone written attacks, insults, racism, sexism, extremism, violence or otherwise questionable comments or material in the 'Comments' section, and reserves the right to delete any comment violating this rule or to block any poster from the channel.
Credits: US National Archives; Library of Congress; NASA; Alabama University; Anivron
Source: 'Nazi Collaborator Monuments in the United States', Lev Golinkin, Forward, 27 Jan. 2021
I remember hearing in the 60's concerning the space program that our Nazis were better than the USSR;s Nazis.
In the 1980's Film "The Right Stuff" there was a scene where Von Braun's character said pretty much the same thing
Operation Osoaviakhim. At least, that's what's being claimed on various internet websites about this.
USA's attitude to various evil people they've used has always been "Yes, he's a bastard, but he's our bastard".
Was a running theme in the X-files too. 😢
Absolutely true. The Von Braun house was nice and he was free to vacation and come and go as he liked. America and not Germany became his true home.
Rule no.1 of the Geneva convention: Its only a war crime if you lose
True
"War has its own laws." -Ex-Wehrmacht soldier in the 1970s.
Japan begs to differ.
True
That's first rule of war.
Twenty years ago I had a German girlfriend who came from Nordhausen, the town directly next to Mittelbau Dora. I visited her parents for Christmas with her that year and her father, a lovely man, knowing I was interested in the history of WWII, took me to the Mittelbau Dora site.
He told me that at the war’s end, the Russians took the lower ranking technician staff while the Americans took the top engineers, men like Von Braun.
He quoted Von Braun as saying ‘At the war’s end, we knew we’d have to work for someone. We didn’t want to work for the Russians and the British couldn’t afford us, so we went to work for the Americans!’
Similarly, I read that von Braun, et al, wanted to emigrate to the US because it offered them the best opportunity to make their dream of spaceflight a reality. Period.
The British saw them for what they were: war criminals.
A V2 rocket launching facility was built underground at La Coupole in Northern France, an hour's drive from Calais. The idea was rockets would be launched through an exit connecting to the surface. It was destroyed by precision heavy bomb drops by 617 Squadron of the RAF, the Dambusters unit. It later provided inspiration for Ian Fleming when he wrote "You Only Live Twice," with the rocket launched from inside a hollow volcano. Fleming worked for the Special Operations Executive during the war, with the rank of Commander in Naval Intelligence. James Bond was modelled on Fleming himself.
Frankly, it makes me sick. I do not think the US should honor them. Fine with me if we change the names.
USSR we're better than the USA until they faked the moon landings.
“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.” ~ Orwell
Every new generation arrogantly thinks they're superior to the previous one.
@@michaelbruns449
Turn out they get much less smart than their forebears
bekoz, disdaining what the latter wrote, they prefer the brainwashing by revisionist newcomers.
honestly i think it would be better to just add plaques mentioning his verified involvement, but still recognize he did a lot to advance things in the US and changed as a person. Either way, anyone who looks him up or knows who he is knows he was a Nazi and will come up as one of the first google results so its not a secret
@@michaelbruns449but for some weird reason old generation not only arrogantly thinks but acts if they are so
It’s been the business model for our future, held captive in -5 minute cities, and showing that as von Braun is quoted here saying, only the Nutsies will rocket toward heaven. The masses? Held in their hives, earthbound and dominated by the same ideology that has wrought so much carnage. Two classes exist now. Autonomy is being reduced, and flight is being presented as sketchy via Boeing’s latest news. Stay where you are. “World Travel” is cited as bringing illnesses in record numbers. Stay home. It’s the background landscaping performed to get the populaces ready for what’s coming.
The blatant, overt celebrations prove their nature. Trusting these people is an outlandish proposal. Imagine the world without Nutsies.
“Von Braun aimed for the stars…and hit London.”
And he went to Disney and wore the Mouse Ears in Florida.
And got to the moon.😂
"'Vonce ze rockets go up, who cares where zhey come down? Zhat's not my department' says Werner von Braun."
- Tom Lehrer
..... AND Helped keep Communism out of the West.
@centozo Ja! Just like ze Balloon bombs, Der Japanese let Ze Jet Stream take dem ANYVARE DE VANT TO GO. ☝️
I grew up in Huntsville from the beginning of the space program. My father was in charge of the gyroscope program for Mercury, Gemini,and Apollo. He worked on The Arsenal. One day in fifth grade our teacher Mrs. Jackson led a discussion on great Americans and included Von Braun. I raised my hand and said he was German, not an American, and questioned whether he was a war criminal. All shiz hit the fan at that moment, and a very stern letter was sent home to my parents. To his credit, and despite the fact that the space program put a roof over our heads and food on our table, my father wrote a longer letter back defending my opinion.
That, my friend , is a most valid point and I thank you for raising it as such.
But the USA has always used/abused the norms of humanity...in order to progress.
But would also take issue with the term "Americans".... The USA is but a part of "the Americas"" Not its entirety.
But then....that would need to have all geography books in schools recalled and made accurate.
@@patagualianmostly7437 well not much has changed, but it got worse. Back then at least using Nazis served a project serving the Nation. Today your country sends Billions to the Ukrainian Nazi State and only a few from the liberal Establishment (especially the Biden Family) got some monetary Benefits out of shady natural Ressources-Deals... Meanwhile the CIA was Arming and Using Azov and other open Nazis to do all they can that this conflict escalated. M-I-Complex must run after all
@@patagualianmostly7437 The U.S. used German Nazis to build their space program and used Zionist Jews to build the Atomic Bomb and their International Banking System !!!
Every country has people that behaved badly help it.
I think it is easy to blame someone if one was fortunate enough to have never been in their position. The US city bombing in WW2 has cost above a million lives, most of them women and children. It has deliberately targeted residential areas. But fortunately for all of us the war is over and we forgave & forgot our ancestors past, instead we worked together to advance.
My Grandpa was a German who worked in Huntsville, fortunately he was born after the war.
What is really sad is the way that the " other " father of American rocketry, Robert Goddard, has been my marginalized and ignored by mainstream history. Then there is Willi Ley , the great forgotten rocket scientist and engineer who fled Germany in 1933. He too has been airbrushed aside by the mainstream media, and is almost unknown today
the fact that I didn't hear of them speaks for itself
...and because of Goddard, USA's WW2 secret weapons. Some of which are still classified. USA's 1942 jet fighter was made before Nazis made theirs and supposedly, USA rockets were better than the Nazi's. I don't think we needed Werner gang but I'm glad USSR didn't get them.
@@lalubkoGoddard Space Center is named after Goddard and has been for many years
Good points! Not handsome enough. Not “upper class”. Exactly what I was saying. Renown in the US has much less to do with talent or expertise and more to do with appearances!
Watch the 1955 "Man in Space" special from Disney; Willie Ley is a narrator.
My grandfather was the Chief Propulsion Engine Inspector of the V-2 rocket programme, and the senior Luftwaffe officer involved in its operation. He was the man that personally fired the first man-made rocket into outer space. He was recruited to North America following the war. This video is correct that the programme was under overall command by the SS, and they were responsible for the slave labour camps and production; but the technical design, engineering and operational use were conducted by the Luftwaffe. My grandfather hated Hans Kammler and the SS, yet ironically Kammler saved his life when their bunker at La Coupole was bombed by RAF Tallboys in 1944.
I have attempted to access historical records held by the USA, the UK and DE of my grandfather's interrogation and cooperation with the Allies, as well as his service records -- but they are still classified under 100 year protective seal until 2045.
it would be cool to hear about when its declassified
@@Stefon02554 It's crazy how much we still don't know because governments still have information classified. All I was able to learn was that the files were sealed for 100 years "to protect living people and their descendants."
@@woollygoat8921 Try looking him up in the Bundesarchiv in Germany.. His military service records should still be under file there..
@@woollygoat8921what if the descendants don't want protection?? What if the descendant wants to know the truth before they die.
Britain had a 75 year seal that was extended to cover up what happened with King Edward's abdication. Those who fought and those who supported them deserve the truth before they die.
I would be satisfied if the memorials were given contextual plaques. We don't need to cover up our history, we need to deepen our understanding of it.
well said
No. That does not need be a thing. What needs to be a thing is for people to be smart enough to know that just because they're told a person did one good thing doesn't mean everything that person did is good. Simple as that. We don't need context plaques. Its useless on CZcams and it would be useless in real life.
@@alexandercarney1286but this is real life, many people don't work like that
What would the context be? Some Nazis were useful and some were not? Some war criminals were useful to USA and some were not? Anyway I dont think taking down a memorial is a cover up. Putting them in a museum like Air and Space makes more sense as an exhibit. An exhibit is not a memoiral.
@@virgilstarkwell8383 what do you think about the naming of streets and buildings? Also just a memorial? I'd say it's more of an honor thing
A friend,former TV News presenter and reporter told me of his meeting with Werner at a NASA party in the late 1960s. Werner was telling him about working on satellite communications, primarily for spacecraft relay transceivers. He said that within a decade or so the public would have transceivers the size of a pack of cigarettes. Two men in shiny shoes hustled him away while another told my friend to take no notice,Werner was lost in science fiction fantasies. My friend lived long enough to see the cell phone and have an FB page.
15 years ago when I said “One day we gonna be able to see the caller on our cell phone “my coworkers laughed at me.
@@jollcheist1443 It was already a reality in 2009, at least with iphone.
I'm fairly sure that Nicola Tesla mentioned the likelihood of that future technology many decades before he did.
@@jollcheist1443 I said that this morning.
Sounds like the makings of a typical B.S. unattributed, unsubstantiated urban legend, A guy told a guy who knew a guy. Whatever. The program von Braun was associated with was for the Applications Technology Satellites. Rather than being watched over by guys in shiny shoes he was writing articles about the direct broadcast satellite ATS-F in the May 1970 Popular Science and both ATS-1 and -3 in the November 1970 Popular Science magazine. And his job was launching them, not building them. But in any case you're referring to the United States Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System which I have to tell you didn't begin launching until 1983. von Braun had retired from NASA in 1972 and had died in 1977 so he didn't work on anything for "for spacecraft relay transceivers" beyond launching the ATS technology testbeds. And BTW, you do realize that your friend's cell phone and satellite phones are two different things, right? Asking for a friend.
What about doctor Shiro Ishii. He was basically the Japanese Mengele and retired in Maryland on a US government pension.
In fact, he died of laryngeal cancer in Tokyo in 1959. He was a long-time smoker. But yes, he was the worst of the worst, guilty of all kinds of terrible atrocities performed on prisoners who almost never survived. The U.S. government did hold its nose and hire him to lecture on his 'work' for a few years. It it true that he escaped punishment for war crimes.
excellent point.
Or How about Nobusuke Kishi- architect of the puppet state of Manchuria. And grandfather in law of Shinzo Abe
He got pardoned by the US and went on to found the conservative LDP party (with the support of the US government), which dominates japanese politics even today.
@@ciello___8307 leave me alone, how many ex nsdap members were later in the cdu here in germany is absolutely ridiculous.
History is always rewritten by the winners. Some things are best forgotten while others should remain in our memory forever. I do agree that a notation should be put after his accomplishments that he was also tied in with the Nazis during World War II. I have been aware of project paperclip for a while and put two and two together rather quickly that these brilliant scientists were coerced / convinced ( call it what you will ) to come to America to work for the Americans after being coerced to work for the Germans during the war. I appreciate your view on how this issue was handled and understand how you being a British citizen could make you a little angry how these people managed to escape Prosecution after the war. As usual, your videos are educational in the history of the second world war. Keep up the good work, Mike from Montreal.
I meet Von Braun as a child and had lunch with him and my uncle at Huntsville.
Von Braun ate two large cheese burgers that day and loved American fast food.
Von Braun was a cheerful smiling man and often had a quirk of in the middle of a conversation
sort of to look off to the side and kind of talk to himself to resolve a question.
My uncle told me after lunch that despite being a likeable guy never forget that
he was a dangerous man as was not completely reformed.
As an adult looking back what troubles me most is how a smart likeable guy like
Von Braun could live in his own world and not really care who he worked for as long as
he got "to play" doing what he loved.
Kimi Räikkönen is the same way
@@pretzelhuntHow so?
True morality is difficult to achieve. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Read that somewhere once.
@@tooterooterville but maybe there's a difference between scratching your neighbour's car without leaving a note and working 20,000 people to death
And your point? Dear god most ppl are like that. And honestly I see a lot of whats happening now in this country to be akin to Germany 193~s. The nation is being torn apart racism is on the rise, our agencies being used for policing purposes, speech being curtailed, rights being taken, and this re education campaign going on. Its spooky as hell and its because most ppl want to be left alone. Sadly if you do this you let evil rise up around you making YOU an accomplish of evil. The same thing that happened then is happening right now.
Such are the politics of reality. History and geopolitics are never clean.
Exactly the Jewish physicists working on the Atomic bomb never imagined it would be dropped on Japanese civilians, having nothing to do with European antisemitism.
I've done some morally ambiguous things in my life but I gotta say I never shot for the stars venerating the people who brought us the industrialized art of gassing babies.
@@DCresident123
It isn't an excuse, it's absolutely reality.
Life isn't a 90's Saturday morning cartoon with good guys and bad guys, where the good guys always do the right thing.
@@grandmufftwerkin9037Then why have we been told the axis were the bad guys and the allies the good guys? All lies and propaganda
@@grandmufftwerkin9037 stop being an apologist for the shit our government does...
My father-in-law, PFC John H. Atsatt of River Edge, NJ. was a soldier in the U.S. 104th Infantry Division, the Timberwolves. They were among the liberators of Dora-Mittelbau, where they found 3,000 corpses and 750 barely alive survivors.
John was no stranger to the horrors of war; he was one of a group of 350 men from the 81st Engineer Combat Battalion, of the U.S. 106th Infantry Division, and the 168th Engineer Combat Battalion, who served under the command of Lt. Col. Thomas Riggs, who guarded the roads leading into the city of St. Vith, Belgium, which was the central point of the surprise German attack that began on Saturday, December 16, 1944, and is known as the Battle of the Bulge. This December will mark the 80th anniversary of the beginning of the Bulge. The young men serving under Lt. Col. Riggs -- John had turned 20 on December 2 -- held off the Fifth Panzer Army for a crucial five days, helping to doom Hitler's timetable for penetrating American lines quickly and reaching Antwerp. They were later recognized with a Distinguished Unit Citation.
The 106th, the Golden Lions, distinguished themselves during their first combat experience. But the division was badly damaged, losing two regiments on December 19, when they were forced to surrender after fighting fiercely for three days until they were out of ammunition, medical supplies, food, and water. The division was so decimated that in 1946 The Saturday Evening Post would respectfully call their fate a "glorious collapse." So John found himself becoming a replacement in the 104th Division, which fought through the maelstrom of fire that was the Battle of Cologne, for example.
They had seen lots of death and destruction, but the gruesome sights at Dora-Mittelbau tore them apart. John recalled to his wife that there was one large-framed GI he knew who was the very picture of a warrior. (He even carved notches in the butt of his rifle to count the Germans he killed.) But after about a half-hour's tour of the human carnage at the slave-labor camp, the tough guy just dropped down in a dead faint. Their command ordered the GIs to enter the nearby city of Nordhausen and bring the able-bodied citizens to the camp, by bayonet point if necessary, to dig trenches to bury the hundreds of dead. I don't know if John was one of the soldiers ordered into Nordhausen, but if he was, he would have carried out the duty in a black fury.
John never forgot the atrocities he witnessed at Dora-Mittelbau. Knowing that the country he and others served so nobly felt it had to recruit the Nazi slavemasters responsible for tens of thousands of murders to build its space program, which Dr. Felton's documentary fills with one of his most compelling narratives, must have made them bitter. Or maybe it didn't; the Cold War was a desperate struggle for technological dominance, and whoever used the former Nazi scientists the most successfully would win. What a choice.
John didn't live to see men land on the Moon. He died at age 41 in 1966 of lung cancer from a four-pack-daily smoking habit he acquired during the war. If he had survived, he would have turned 100 this December.
In 1962, when my wife, Janet, was 5, she was riding with her father as they drove home one of her relatives, who, unfortunately, was an antisemite. During a conversation about the war, this man ventured the disgusting opinion that Hitler hadn't killed enough Jews. John wasn't going to have that kind of talk around his daughter. He immediately pulled off the road and ordered the old man, a Great War veteran, out of the car to make his own way home (30 miles!).
God bless forever the incredible men and women who won the Second World War.
Thank you for illustrating just how bad it was. The USA's employment of these perpetrators always struck me as shameful and whoreish.
You know when you're a history buff , when your stoner friends ask you on 4-20 " guess what day it is" and you reply "Hitler's birthday"
My sister´s birthday. Mine is on d-day. We are not close. ;)
I said "Columbine Day"😅
In 1966 Von Braun visited the Antarctic. I was serving a year at New Zealand's Scott Base. We had a visit from him and 3 other NASA engineers. Although I was in the lab, I also was back up dog man (we had a number of husky teams in those days pre greenies) I took him for a run on a dog sledge. I have a letter from him thanking me.
“HOW DARE YOU. Tear that letter up right now and throw it in the fire. WHAAAAAA” ~ M Felton
Oh interestning Episode, witness of time. I guess persons like you who can compare antartica over a few decades, are very aware about climate change. Thanks for sharing.
Happen remindful of 'The Thing' filum, just saying... 💦
@@johndough1703 Mark is a true priest of the ww2 religion
Just to put a bit of perspective on the labour supplied for the V1 and V2 projects. Slave labour was decided upon by Heinrich Himmler of the SS. You will find a reference to this in Speer's book. Von Braun and his team would have had no influence there.
The appallingly gentle treatment of Japanese war criminals was much worse.
...I'D ATTRIBUTE THAT TO THE ONSET OF THE COLD WAR- IF THE RUSSIANS HADN'T TURNED AGAINST THE ALLIES, THE ALLIES COULD HAVE REALLY CLEANED HOUSE IN GERMANY AND JAPAN- AFTER WW2!!!
AS IT HAPPENED- THE ALLIES WERE FORCED TO BE PRAGMATIC: IT STINKS- BUT THAT'S THE REAL WORLD!!!
Have you seen Princes of the Yen? A lot of them ended up back in power in Japan in like the 70s-80s
First they put tens of thousands of ordinary people of Japanese origin to concentration camps during the war, then treated the worst Japanese war criminals and mass murderers with silk gloves after the war... So much freedumb.
I mean war criminals just get away with it now so...
Well they treated our soldiers a minor few to labor camps that were disease infested or executed them instead of taking them prisoners of war they did not abide by the rules of war either
Hipocrisy is a human trait
,,The good man say‘s ,Sorry‘ for the mistakes, that he made in the past. The better man corrects them!!‘‘
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Bob Hope related a joke he told when he was visiting Moscow. The joke told to them was how he wanted to talk with Russia's top rocket scientists - but he couldn't speak German. He said the audience response was a cold quiet silence.
The audience was ignorant.
@trime1851 or maybe they didn't want to end up dead. Russia wasn't exactly a friendly place that encouraged people to speak out about the regime.
@@taoofjester4113 Laughing along with an American comedian poking fun at the USSR in a hand picked crowd of connected communist party types would be risky.
haha got a posthumous giggle from me
I grew up believing that there were little fish as far as the Party was concerned. I loved Rommel and the Afrika Corps because I believed that they were the only ones that had clean hands. Nope. They all were dirty
The only lesson here is be invaluable and irreplaceable and you can pretty much get away with anything.
as is right and proper
"too big to fail"
That’s the only lesson you took away?
@@AC-wz9txit is the truth. Is it not?
@@lcmiracle no, it's not right and proper for any criminal to escape justice
I've said before and it's worth repeating, one of the most shameful actions that the U.S. engaged in, concerning WWII, was Operation Paperclip! They could have gathered the research materials, used them as they wished, mostly free of complicity, but in excusing these criminals, the American political machine became complicit in the crimes of the NAZI, but they are certainly not alone. One other thing that bears mentioning is that von Braun was also motivated by a "science at all cost" attitude, which, I'm sure, helped him sooth his conscience, if he had one, over the horrid treatment of his slave labor force. Thanks again, Dr. Felton, I appreciate your frank and honest report here!
Agreed.
Are you surprised? The second most fascist nation after Germany at the time. Why do you think they were so reluctant to jump off the fence to help the allies up until 1944. Why was Henry Ford supplying the German War machine with steel? Why was JFK assassinated?
It doesn't work that way and never has.
Annie Jacobsen wrote a brilliant book about Operation Paperclip. I first saw her on one of Joe Rogan's Podcast. Kurt Debus and a lot of the Operation Paperclip scientists had academic duelling scars. They would pack them with horse hairs to make them scar more. Dueling scars were popular amongst upper class Germans and Austrians involved in academic fencing at the start of the 20th century and seen as a badge of honour. Annie interviewed the son of a top medical doctor who had 6000 Jews with tuberculosis gassed, and purposely infected many with the plague to test vaccines, and gave the sickest in the camp Malaria by bringing mosquitos to see if they could outcompete typhus lice. He was saved by the Americans in the Doctor trial from the gallows in 1947 to give information about chemical and biological weapons to the US, he them went on to work for MK-Ultra- his name was Kurt Blome.
yeah its an amazing book
Dr Strangeloves arm approves
Love that movie. Peter Sellers was outstanding!
Mein Fuhrer, I can walk!
@@Chris-ut6eq Sellers was truly a rare comedic genius.
@@tooterooterville "Being There" is my favorite of his movies, very still, subtle kind of humor.
@@focusedfilmw2168if you ordered to commit a crime and commit it, you are still a criminal. The nazi criminal regime couldn’t have existed without mass compliance, and therefore compliance = culpability.
I was a sometimes NASA contractor for nearly 40 years. I met Von Braun several years before his death. It was early in my career, and speaking with him was very interesting and intimidating. I was aware of his NAZI background, but the intimidation factor kept me from asking about it. I also knew and occasionally worked with one of his rocket-propulsion proteges. (No names here) This person fled to Argentina after WW2 because of his propulsion involvement in the development of V1s and V2s (so he inferred). He was keenly aware of the slave labor that was used in NAZI rocket assembly facilities. He stayed in Argentina until 1952 when he was recruited by Huntsville to come and work in the US. In his later years, I asked him about his WW2 work several times, but never ever got an answer. He would always remain silent. He never appeared to resent my questions.
Liar
@@Markos581973how do you know ?
He did not resent yet did not answer either…
At the end of the war, men with knowledge of the rocket program had little choice, either join the American space program or the Russians..it's a choice these wanted war criminals made easily..anyone of value was swept up..I'm sure the top scientists, once the realities of the wars outcome was apparent, made their way towards the American lines..unfortunate their value gave them the ticket to freedom..a ticket none of them deserved.
He was dealing probably personally with his demons from the war, creating the future at the cost of the pre WWII Europe and millions was too heavy a price.
As a historian, you should know very well that history, like the humans who make it, is messy. Musical satirist, Tom Lehrer sang a birthday song for Werner von Braun saying, "Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down - That's not my department" says Werner von Braun.
Yes the US got to the moon with the work of murderous war criminals. However, the US also used their work to counter the Soviets and their nuclear missile program. That is pretty important to your home in Great Britain as without US nuclear protection and missile technology from us to develop your own nuclear deterrent, you would have been blown just as high and glowed just as much as us Yanks, at the hands of the Soviets - who would have happily taken the US Nazis scientists and used them to gain overwhelming superiority over both of us.
I don't think that these awards need to be maintained without an enormous asterisk and an equal explanation for their reprehensible war crimes, but then, History is Messy!
Dr von Braun's last job was vice-president of Fairchild Industries, an aerospace company in Maryland, whose offices were only 1-mile from where I am now sitting. He died in Alexandria, Virginia and is buried in a prestigious cemetery in that city.
Funny that you uploaded this on Hitler's birthday.
YES! 😂😂😂
🤣
I just farted...juicy stinky moist fart. Fuuuck you and the swamp you came from
Also my Mother in Laws birthday ! Regarding V1's, they were also fired towards Antwerp in 1944 as well as the UK.
@@ElToro2000UK Bro 😂
'Countries don't have friends. They have interests'. Kissenger
* Kissinger
A cynical perspective from a thankfully dead war criminal.
@@patrickfitzgerald2861agreed.
@@patrickfitzgerald2861Its a fact since countries are not people but built up of powerfull people with their own interests
or more accurately, countries don't have friends, the elites that run the countries have interests. And it is never the interests of their people.
A very well done and informative documentary. As a boy of 10 and upwards in the 1950's, I was hooked on aviation and space flight. Von Braun, of course, was always in the spotlight and it appeared that he could do (and could never do by extension) anything criminal. He was my hero at the time. Later, more of truth became available and I was able to see his questionable past. Thank you for putting the rest of the pieces of the puzzle together and for publishing the truth.
Mark, I will always remember that during a news conference just before Apollo 11 launched, a reporter asked Von Braun if we could be sure that the Saturn V wouldn't land on London.
I wonder if the Reporter still asked that sarcastic question after Saturn V brought the Astronauts to the moon.
@@aka99file under "everyone's gotta be a comedian" ...in other countries you'd be fired for that type of non-professional conduct
I think the sad fact is that great monuments and achievements have always been achieved on the broken backs of labour. The Pantheon and Roman aqueducts weren't built by volunteer boy scouts. Behind all those stately British manors, lies the "Conditions of the Working Class in England" a true horror story by Richard Engels. The life expectancy of a "free labourer" on Guano Island was about three weeks after which they died of horrible lung disease. Whether a plantation owner surveilling his field of slaves or a general who brushes past a soldier who has been standing at attention for six hours, callous indifference is the principle characteristic of the human species. We ought not kid ourselves.
BINGO we have a winner. England doesn't have the greatest record when it comes to the moral high ground.
Anything to achieve a goal no matter the human cost. You are correct!
Ah, the reality of our "noble" species.
@@muskokamike127Other than when you compare them with just about anyone else.
Agreed. However, Mark’s main point in this video seems to be asking if the U.S. should continue to honor these men with memorials and such.
Many years ago I was serving civil process after retiring from the San Antonio Police Dept. In one of my stops,
I chanced onto a neighbor of the people I was looking for. He informed me the person did not live at the location
any longer.
I noticed a German accent, and that was the beginning of a lengthy visit. Being of Irish decent I have no trouble
carrying on a conversation.
It seemed he worked at Brooks AFB in the space program. He went on to tell me of his wartime experiences. He had
been set to leave with his crew on the rocket program there in Germany to another location by air.
He had turned up sick that morning and was unable to make the flight. He watched as the Tri Motor plane started
to take off.
The plane didn't even clear the runway when it crashed killing everyone aboard.
I've always found it interesting speaking with men that was on the other side of the Allies.
I have always regretted not remember this man's name.
Were his initials AH?
@@DisobedientSpaceWhale Literally Lol. Seriously, Adolph was an Austrian immigrant, who honed his own accent, that was neither Austrian nor German.
After that first generation of Germans left NASA, the agency lost a lot of its talent.
I always thought Stanley Kubrick was exaggerating in Dr. Strangelove.
There's a few things, where I might give them a pass:
-You had to be in the nazi party for anything from having any serious job to even attending a higher school.
-Bombing cities was widely accepted by all countries in the war.
-However, no pass on slave labor. Especially in leading positions, they could have had influence on their treatement.
But my point is, history is not just black & white. Those guys were war criminals and helped progress a lot.
It is not a contradiction, but a reality.
We should not let our brains be too lazy to work on that.
But we need to be honest, and if we honor them for the good stuff, we should not ignore their crimes.
So thanks Mr Felton, for keeping things present in our minds.
If you try to look at the past with today's eyes, you're never going to see it clearly
You started this comment listing things you might give nazis "a pass"?
One of them is "having to be a nazi to access higher education
...and that textbook example of the oppressing boot of a totalitarian dictator gets a pass from you, right?
in that case get some education on democratic values, bruv!
🙄
Many a lauded wealthy English Gentleman honoured for their philanthropy was a slave owner, many slave owners were black former slaves themselves. All were equally compensated per slaves owned by HMG when slavery was abolished. That money would equate to a few million pounds today for some.
@@danrayha3756such utter nonsense and juvenile 😂
@@tonys1636 Actually the British government just finished paying reparations for those slavery days. It was paid to the former owners of slaves as compensation for the losses they incurred when slavery was abolished in the British Empire. The last payment was made in 2015. The slaves were not owned by HMG. They were owned by private individuals and businesses. The epitomony of the Capitalist system. Complete ownership of the means of production including the labor.
“If We Had Lost The War, We All Would Have Been Prosecuted As War Criminals” - General Curtis LeMay
All the more reason not to believe in war crimes as a concept and simply make sure you're always the one who wins.
@@onalert413 Or better yet, don't get into one. Nobody walks away with clean hands.
so very true
@@1960HikerDude The difference being that Le May was aware of this, whereas Nazis were adamant they were doing the right thing and would have committed their crimes even without war.
Golden rule of thumb if you are wh1 t3 or from g4 z4 you are a war criminal ! or so the "TV people" told me.
So should any one driving a Porsche take it back for a refund then ?
It's one of those" The enemy of my enemy is my friend" situations but it came with a cost.
There is ALWAYS a cost.
@@trustmemysonisadoctor8479 Yep. And sometimes people have to choose between the lesser of two evils or turn a blind eye. But there will be price to pay.
Dr. Felton, I grew up in Huntsville beginning in 1963 at six years old. You have to remember the absolute shock that the Russians had delivered with Sputnik, which not only beat the U.S. into orbit, but insinuated that the Russians had the capability to create an ICBM. The German scientists’ original mission was to scale up the V2 for the U.S. Army. Adding to the impetus was the call President Kennedy gave to get to the moon “. . .by the end of the decade.” Kennedy’s assassination sealed NASA’s determination to succeed in landing on the moon.
A man who was like a father to me was a NASA engineer there “on the Arsenal.” He respected the Germans as engineers but didn’t care for them personally because as expatriates they always spoke of everything being better in Germany. My recollection was that von Braun was respected at the time as the head administrator who was “standing up” a major scientific and engineering organization with the stated mission of accomplishing what had never been done and carried the nation’s honor with it. Huntsville named its civic center after von Braun for his NASA accomplishments and to avoid naming it after some politician.
I understand your moral outrage at the honors given to von Braun in today’s political milieu which still correctly detects Nazism but forgets the terror of the Cold War with its real threat of nuclear war. As a teenager I heard that every American city over 100,000 people was targeted by Soviet ICBMs, information which was confirmed when I became an airborne infantry officer with the 101st Airborne in 1979.
Finally, my Japanese father was converted to Christianity by my missionary mother in 1947. My father became a Presbyterian minister serving churches around Huntsville. One of the original German scientists who worked with von Braun at Peenemunde, White Sands, and Huntsville played organ in my father’s church. As a young man I used to marvel that a small Presbyterian church in Gurley, Alabama had two men, my father who as a 14 year old survived the night General LeMay’s B-29s started a firestorm in Tokyo and killed more people than at Hiroshima, and another playing organ, who had survived twice being a radioman with German infantry divisions on the Russian front, conducting services as accepted American citizens. They both died and were buried in Huntsville. You have to admit the winds of wars sometimes blow very strange indeed.
Don't forget. German National Socialists helped Sputnik into space too, just different ones. It's also why a SCUD looks so much like a copy of a mobile V-2 rocket. Likewise the Bolsheviks were slaughtering innocent people as their National Socialist comrades and allies would later, indeed learning NKV techniques for doing so during a series of conferences during their collaboration in Poland. The Bolsheviks would continue to murder people in death cams long after the Second World War was over, and would even used captured concentration camps like Buchenwald to that end. Some of those they disposed of were the survivors of Polish resistance groups who fought the Nazis.
With all due respect. Soviets were only responding to the west aggression. There was never any intention to destroy or attack the west and there were no real threat outside of a retaliatory strike.
@@korana6308 That's why the Bolsheviks needed all the German rocket scientists they could get, and why then needed to start a communist insurgency in Greece and support an invasion of South Korea. "To respond to Western aggression."
Uncle Joe Stalin was just a peacenik at heart. Ask the victims of his show trials.. Ask his Nazi allies. Ask a Pole.
@@korana6308 The Soviets were an expansionist power and with verbiage like "we will bury you," coming from the likes of Kruschev you can't blame the U.S. for taking them seriously. Communism ideologically demands global expansion. The notion that the Soviets only ever responded to western aggression is incorrect revisionism.
@@korana6308 about that western aggression thing... have you run that by the people of the Soviet Block nations? like Hungary, Poland & Ukraine?
You should consider doing a video about Kurt Waldheim, another former Nazi officer who had a very successful career after the war. An Austrian diplomat and politician, he was secretary-general of the UN from 1972 to 1981. Later, despite his Nazi past being well known at that point, he still became president of Austria in 1986.
Am I right in recalling that that one of the Voyager spacecraft which have now left our Solar System has plaque on it with a quote from Waldheim (presumably from his UN days)?
Oh yes,had forgotten about him. Didn't exactly paint a glowing picture of Austria's progression did it.
There is a "funny" detail, IIRC: it could not be exactly proven what his relations with the SS were like, but it COULD be proven that he had had an SS horse. So that gave rise to the joke, "Waldheim was not in the SS, only his horse".
I visited Austria in the summer. There was a plaque on one of the impressive music halls (I think) to those in the resistance movement. I subsequently read that the Anschluss had been approved by some 97% of those voting.
Depending on the winners, people’s tendency is to downplay, or play-up, their part in an event. What I think Mark Felton is doing here is providing an extremely timely reminder of the role some people had in the atrocities of World War Two.
Perhaps there will be someone similar in 80 years time who looks critically at the role played by politicians in the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.
Very interesting story. I hope that Mark will make a video about him.
I'd like to know who wouldn't choose life over death in that situation? You're a brilliant scientist that doesn't want anything to do with the war or genocide, just want to continue your research in your field of study and see an avenue of not only survival but reverence. If the choice is take the job or die, not much of a choice is it? I'm sure if you study your own English history you could find dozens of attrocities to cry about as well. Stop trying to erase history, stop taking down monuments, they are not there to celebrate a particularly dark time in history, but to remind us not to repeat it. It should be remembered that those men brought the impossible into reality, just as it should be remembered the cost of their actions.
Trying to mask his German accent, he ended up sounding suspiciously Jamaican.
I love how CZcams feels the need to do a disclaimer under the video of an award winning Historian. Give it up Google, Mark is the real deal not like your bots
Appeal to authority.
CZcams shows its idiocy over and over again.
@@jasonthewatchmansson8873 That's literally what you're doing though.
Well, Dr. Felton may have secretly turned to the dark side and is now editing small but crucial historical lies into his videos. We don't know. CZcams doesn't need to know. Only the man, the myth and great narrator, the Dr. himself, knows. 🤔
😁
@@Ukie88not the first time, unfortunately won’t be the last too
Great show Mark. I’ve been a space nut since I was a little man. Built and flew Estes model rockets and designed and flew a couple of my own before I turned 12. Loved Werner. Was shocked to find out his background later in life. My dad and I were contractors. We were working in a beautiful mansion home on Youngstowns north side for a very old Jewish couple. Wonderful folks. Every day we would sit down to lunch and eat with them in their kitchen with them. Then they blew my head up and showed me their concentration camp tattoos, and told me and my dad of the horrors of concentration camp life. I’ll never forget them.
lmao classic. Guy sends humanity to the moon, but oh some old people said something! As if Von Braun had anything to do with anything other than his scientific work, come on man.
@@AthelstanKing He never discredited Wernhers work.
We must never forget the crimes committed by the Nazis and ignored by many Germans during WW11...lest we ever forget.
Over the years, while usually informed and entertained by Mark's videos, I'm sometimes disappointed by claims, especially those touching on religion, politics and society, that are over the top. Speaking as a fellow student of history, I strongly suggest he more carefully vet his sources and watch his biases.
@@AthelstanKing They knew, most of the V2 production facilities were on hidden factories being ran-out by PEOPLE from concentration camps. One thick example is in Gusen I concentration camp where the SS could detonate 2 of the 5 exits and killed many on the explosion. This facility was a Messerschmitt Me 262 factory. Most of the high ranking officers knew and just decided to turn back to their jobs. Most of them did not care, or they just thought to themselfs. Operation Paperclip was never forgotten, as the inmunity given by war criminals of Unit 731. If you know a little of the horrors of ww2, you might know about Josef Mengele, these dudes killed over 200-400k by human experimentation.While the soviets (not defending their action) killed them.
Dr. Felton, what would you suggest for the best source on Operation Paperclip? I think my father may have been involved but don't know where to begin looking. Thank you for all you do.
In the 1960s Disney had Von Braun some episodes of the "Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color" to talk about space flight. He was considered part of the team and one of the "good guys".
“Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down! That’s not my department! Says Wernher Von Braun.”- Tom Lehrer
Nazi schmatzi, says Wernher Von Braun.
The widows and cripples of old London Town...
looks like the chinese have adopted this policy too.
I doubt Von Braun ever said that. This is quoted from a satirical song. Just wanted to make sure people didn't start attributing the quote to WVB. People on social media will believe and interpret things too easily.
While stationed at Patrick Air Force Base in the mid-sixties, we lived in “North Wherry housing” on base. Dr. Debus had a large-ish house (larger than the tiny 3 bedroom, one bath, or duplexes for officers) located on the extreme north section on what was known as Riverside Drive. In high school at the time, I knew, we all knew, that he and von Braun were among the German scientists that had come into the country so the US could gain the advantage in the space race. We were really never told of the full extent of the use of slave labor involved, nor of the brutality of that system. But we were young and well, pretty much ignorant of the dreadful system that existed. As an aside, one evening forty plus years ago, at a neighborly get-together, a couple of us thirty something’s were chatting in the presence of an older Polish gentleman (a NASA employee), about the marvels of our space program (early Space Shuttle days then) and the German engineers for who gave us the foundation on which the program was built. We ran our mouths talking about the great planes they made, their great cars, and blah, blah, blah. He sat there in silence listening to our praise of German engineering. Then, without a word, he unbuttoned the left cuff of his shirt, rolled up his sleeve, and there, as clear as the day it was forever tattooed, was THAT number midway up on his inner arm. No explanation was given, nor was it necessary. That was his response to our misdirected praise. I’m old now, but I will never forget that.
The Germans tattooed everything even SS men as a form of identification, I've even seen pictures of Americans tattooing their New Social Security numbers on their bodies in the 1930's.
Thank you so much for this poignant testimony. I once also met a person who had a number tattooed on her arm. She seemed to be a happy person who had worked hard to move on with her life. I can't imagine what it was like for that Polish man to work in the vicinity of those criminals.
You were correct in your praises though. David Lee Roth lead singer of Van Halen, had a music teacher growing up. The man taught him to put his absolute all into performing. One day he showed Roth a similar tattoo. And told him make every performance as if your life depends on it, because had he not done the same, he would have went up the chimneys with his peers.
In a world of opportunists, you dare to point out just these two? As for evil men who are now honored, make a list, baby - there are hundreds of them.
Mr. Felton, can you study the genocide of the German folk who were murdered in Galacia after WW2. My great grandfather was murdered along with uncles and aunts. Some of my Aunts who survived being raped immigrated to Canada but were unable to have children.
LOL this isn't that kind of channel. this is a regime propaganda mouthpiece.
Growing up in Toronto, my neighbours were German from Kiel and never had kids…turns out the wife had been sterilized. Not sure if she was Jewish or her parents were some sort of political opponents. She smoked like a chimney, told us that cigarettes were a way to stave off hunger and were cheaper than food and easier to get for years.
Felton is a propaganda spouter. Hes not gonna mention allied war crimes. Hes very good at lambasting the germans for doing something all the allies were also doing though.
Nemesis at Potsdam is a great book on the mass murder of Germans by the Red Army post-WWII.
Never thought I'd see the day Mark Felton uses Wolfenstein Imagery as a Thumbnail.
He must be playing iron sky
I think it’s originally from Star Trek: Enterprise’s mirror universe episode. 🤔
@@CAP198462 Popped a copy of the episode into my DVD player and its not from there
Ikr lol, hoping we get Wolf 3 one day 🤞
@@hugostiglitz491 I'm still counting the days.
Breaker Morant’s defence attorney summed it up like this:
“The fact of the matter is that war changes men's natures. The barbarities of war are seldom committed by abnormal men. The tragedy of war is that these horrors are committed by normal men in abnormal situations. Situations in which the ebb and flow of everyday life have departed and have been replaced by a constant round of fear and anger, blood and death.”
The difference is that not only was Breaker Morant tried, convicted and shot, but that his own army did this to him.
Rule 303.
@@DrXarulYou got it. Great film, eh?
@@Salam_Damai431 It was indeed. I still quote "Rule 303" but not too many understand the reference.
@@DrXarul Edward Woodward was very convincing in that role.
@@ZilogBob He was indeed.
Mark you wouldnt believe some of the symbolism on the mission patchs. You have to know what to look for but the Latin phrases always gives it away. Its amazing the stuff put on mission patches. Most of it is from Top Secret stuff but the patches are all online. Its fun to speculate. The easiest way to spot them is there will be 6 stars or 6 birds and 1 of them will be separate from the others. This always means Area51. Its symbology, it takes a while to learn how to read all of it but you csn easily translate the Latin.
Might be a good video, definitely a fun rabbit hole.
Thanks for all the great content Dr.Mark!!!
Dear Dr. Felton... As an English historian, I hardly have to explain to you that the only way to achieve or advance something in Nazi Germany was to cry with wolves. And how little a personal position could be worth, even at the end of the war, shows how brutally Hitler had his highly decorated brother-in-law Fegelein killed. I certainly don't want to engage in Nazi moor laundering here. Nevertheless, we should imagine ourselves in the reality of the Third Reich. It sometimes helps to pick up books like those by Sebastian Haffner and read them. So from British citizen to British citizen... Von Braun and his boys wanted to reach the moon from the beginning of their careers. And to get closer to this goal, they would have made a pact with the devil, which is where they almost ended up. This should not be ignored when considering. They were obsessed with science...
The Germans credited a yank, Robert Goddard (1882-1945) for his basic rocketry 🚀 research, even securing patents, but the shortsighted u.s. had no interest in Goddard, while the Nazis used and developed their rockets on Goddard’s initial work.
Initial inspirations are important but those advancing tech. to the ultimate levels for the times get all the attention !
Yes, the USA is usually only interetsted in killing inventors if the bankers and oil guys etc are losing money.
Goddard was the first to patent the multistage rocket and its liquid-fueling ... back in 1914....
@@simonhandy962 As I said initial innovators are important but it's those who contribute to the current most advanced tech. , like the Nazi's back then, who get all the
attention period !
There is a little known fact about Von Braun that I'd like to share. In the late 1920s, before Hitler came to power, Von Braun, Willy Ley and Hermann Oberth consulted in the making of a Fritz Lang film called Frau im Mond (Woman in the Moon). They had a great deal to do with a sequence of the film showing a great rocket being prepared for a trip to the moon. The footage of this scene, which uses models, looks remarkably like what Von Braun did in real life for NASA, including the Vertical Assembly Building and the flatbed tractor that moved the rocket to the gantry.
I had no idea - thank you so much!
99% of people seem to think von Braun did nothing worth mentioning until the Nazis came to power.
To be honest, this video - though generally ver ygood - hasn't helped correct that.
@@tulliusexmisc2191 Von Braun was only 21 when the Nazis came to power and was only 33 at the end of WWII. He was a child prodigy totally dedicated to engineering. I think that Felton (and many others) are being way to hard on Von Braun. He was a very young man at the time the Nazis came to power and was utterly apolitical.
Can a guy in his 20's who is an engineering prodigy really be expected to confront the Nazi government? He would have been shot immediately and there would have been nothing gained.
I think that genius types who remains apolitical should be celebrated not castigated. My eyes tell me that we have way to many politicians and pundits and far to few practical people.
Von Braun was similar to Oppenheimer really. Both were pretty torn up by what their technology did. Oppenheimer had the benefit of being born in the right place at the right time and in the country that won the war.
Neither man has anything to apologize for in my opinion. They created new technologies (tools) and the politicians need to be held accountable for what they did with those tools.
You can present irrefutable documentary evidence to support your argument?
@@nhermanc well said
The Soviets were led by a bigger criminal than Hitler and had amongst them some of the worst criminals ever, yet very very rarely this thing got mentioned, since they were "the good ones".
They were our allies, and they beat the filthy Germans. He wasn't bigger, just better. Thanks to that alliance many of our young men were saved a horrible death in combat. You could say the western allies used the Soviets, like they were Stallin' for time.
Everybody decries the deceitful unfairness of the "Soviet show trials" but conveniently forget the fact that the main soviet judge at Nuremberg was General Ion Nikitchenko, who oversaw the worst of the soviet show trials. Really makes me think... 🤔
Considering how everything turned out for the West since the Germans lost so long ago, i would rather be speaking German now and so would many veterans if they knew how things would go for their grand and great gand children.
It was your West who built the gas chambers (give yourself a pat on the head for scientific endeavour) but it was the East that liberated them.
idk but were is the systematic and industrial killing that stalin did
That's cool. When is your video on the USS Liberty set for release?
Mark woke up angry today
Gotta take that pill EVERY day or this slop is what happens
@@carlsystem8519 Slop? This is a very informative video. Real historians shine light on topics like this where others try to cover them up.
@@grapesurgeon Only a political dilettante believes that their side was the "good guys" in WWII -- despite very public records to the contrary. Firebombing of exclusively civilian targets and many others. No historian worth the title would believe that all sides were committing crimes worthy of hanging at every level of government and civilian leadership.
These crimes are a matter of record and it was only because one side won that they absolved themselves in their own courts.
I find it sophomoric for any historian to portray the Nazis as any worse than the allies. The record of civilian deaths at the hands of the allies is an atrocity. The record of depredations and exploitation of the British Empire against the rest of the world are manifestly known. I sh*t myself laughing when a Brit points fingers at any political group for war crimes.
If WW1 would not have been as what it was than being friends would not have been so hard thought of.
I do not believe of what had rages over Germany that there were still hard feelings about.
Very wise and constructive things came out of this all.
Angry? No, he just walks about completely awake. Never forgive, never forget.
I worked for several years of active involvement in the US human space exploration program, having direct participation in the last sixteen STS missions. It was some of the most fulfilling work I've ever done, and this report, some of which I already knew, is indicative of how good can come in the aftermath of evil deeds. Dr. von Braun was always something of an enigma to me. If I had to characterize him, I would say von Braun was a man driven by one thing: his absolute passion for the rocket. Such a passion can be a dangerous thing, and, that passion also led him into the NSDAP and the SS to help advance his own aims, while his masters put his work to dark purposes, to say the least. That was a Devil's Bargain of monstrous proportions.
I wonder if he would have achieved such progress in rocketry had there not been a war such as the world had never seen to spur its development. That war still leaves its mark on humanity to this day.
My brother in law Don Gray worked on the Shuttle Program from the early landings in Edwards until his last job with the hubble telescope. Maybe you two ran across each other there.
Thank you for your nuanced and thoughtful comment!
We may have WWII to thank for the Civil Rights movement as well: Fighting fascism, then seeing the south half of the US being run in a similar fashion led to lot of cognitive dissonance among many Americans from many backgrounds.
You are spot on with your thoughtful comment. As Dr. Felton makes clear, WVB wasn't the only one in the German weapons program to do this. But Nazi Germany was full of these amoral opportunists who sold their souls so they could pursue their own interests. Hannah Reitsch, a remarkable aviator; Albert Speer, the architect and Leni Reifenstahl, in film, are only a few of these people. This is a deep lesson in human nature to all of us.
The answer to your last question is sadly NO. Man's greatest achievements in science and technology have always been on the back of human tragedy and death.
Interesting research, even though I don't see it quite the way you see it. Being an SS officer didn't necessarily mean a war criminal, at least not for everybody. It depended on where they worked, and what orders they had been given. I believe that in general the Operation Paperclip was a great succes for the United States, and for the free world as a whole, for our democracies. Many of these German scientists hadn't been given much of a choice to begin with. In the United States already millions of Germans were living in communities from a time long before the war.
The hostilities with the Soviet Union, the new enemy had begun, and Washington just couldn't afford to let these men with their valuable knowledge, slip away. There was an arms race going on, and the U.S. had to be in space before the Russians did. German scientists and engineers were known for their top quality contributions, it was a matter of honour and prestige. And let's be honest, not only the U.S. had this kind of policy.
After all, isn't Lord Roberts and many more like him, honoured in the UK and by the Royal Family, although he played a leading role in the Boer War, and it's concentration camps, where the Boer women and children were being held hostage and were starved to death? I don't mean to justify all this, but that is the way how it works in the world. Priorities, that's human nature.
I think you are missing the point. Von Braun was not just an SS officer, he was deeply involved in running the slave labor factories, and could have intervened to make them more human. We know this because Oskar Schindler did exactly that. Von Braun could have been brought to the US to work but without all the hero-worship. I believe what Felton makes clear is that the honors were heaped upon him by his American overseers are shameful. He could have been given a comfortable life in exchange for his work, but passed over for any special honors, facilities named after him, pictures with presidents, etc. Beyond the film, is there any other American memorial to Oskar Schindler that compares to what was given von Braun? As far as true bravery and human decency go, I know who deserves it more, and who I would want as a neighbor or friend.
@mikesloothaak679 No, he's not missing the point at all. He's making a very good one.
Roberts was not just a minion of the Evil Empire, he was commanding officer of all british forces in South Africa at the time. Directly reponsible for the deaths in the concentration camps. He knew exactly what he was doing when he took our women and children hostage and starved them to death. When he realized the lumbering steamroller of the army was not going to win the war against better men.
His henchman Kitchener continuing the slaughter after his departure, likewise showered with honours and accolades after the war, even becoming the WW1 poster boy.
I know your british obsession with the nazis is a means of distraction from your own war crimes.
The world must be reminded of this.
@@mikesloothaak679 Yes, the hero worship is connected to von Braun having contributed to America's prestige, and her military and moral position in the world. That was an opportunity for these men to clear their name. At one point they were stuck under a regime, that is waging a senseless war for survival, they are involved in destruction, and the next moment, they're given an opportunity to do something positive with that same knowledge, in a sense, uniting humanity instead of dividing it. They must have been very happy with it themselves. They lived good lives, they became wealthy. They helped the United States to gain a position in the world of respect, and an example of how other nations should organise their democracy.
My point is, I don't see it as criminals who were being rewarded for their crime. Since when do we expect moral heroïsm of scientists. Scientists are not saints.
I see it as they were given the chance to re-direct their purpose in life.
They were like little kids, playing with Lego, as that was their obsession, making these rockets and drones, and at some point the father came in, and they were being put in a completely other environment, where they suddenly did some magnificent things with that same gift.
I feel like we are culpable to our conscience for our actions. I worked for a National Lab for a year on "confidencial engineering designs" when my Q-clearance came through I found out my project was working on trigger devices of atomic weapns, I quit the next day. (I could have saved the government a lot of money and me a lot of time if they would have been up front at the interview about the purpose of my job.) Of course that was a different time and place, not Nazi Germany.
von Braun surrendered to my grandfather’s 114th infantry regiment
In college I had a nuclear science professor who was clearly german and told everyone he was from Argentina. We all thought he was a former nazi.
Probably one of the many descendants from the german colonies there, imagine being him though having everyone instantly assume you’re a nazi lol.
@@EvilSmonker yep and there were a couple russian jews in the class. Imagine your professor is someone your grandfather fought against or may jave killed your family members, or to have students whos grandparents you may have killed.
I bet he was a very good professor intelligent and knew his stuff inside out right !
@@gregorygant4242he was good and funny. There were a few russian jews in the class, made me wonder if it made things akward between them but if it was they never showed it.
I also had an Argentinian German professor.
When Felton drops, I’m here for it!
The fact that Mark Felton does so much reading and research and still believes these guys are the bad ones is beyond shocking I hope these great men will always be honored as them and there forefathers and comrades who died fighting for a great cause will always be
Wernher von Braun was arrested by Nazi regime for expressing his thoughts about the war and his regret working on missiles rather than space program. Himmler brand him having "defeatist" attitude and Gestapo detained him for 2 weeks. Armament minister Albert Speer persuade Hitler to reinstate him to the V2 program and protected from all prosecution as long as he is indispensable according to Speer's memoirs. Also there was an account von Braun was approaching a concentration prisoner about his treatment by SS Guard.. he was asked to move away and SS guard threaten to shoot him.. on hindsight everyone is bad including Winston Churchill.. he was very opposing giving freedom to all British colonies.. we should take down his statues then..!!!
What about Porsche, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and all of the engineers, draftsman, factory workers (not the slave laborers)?
So what?? Ever see that picture of Von Braun sitting next to President Kennedy and Gen. Curtis "Bomb them back to the stone age!" LeMay?? Why were not US personnel charged for war crimes for the bombing of Dresden??
What about Volkswagen? That company was literally founded by the Nazis.
not to mention those great uniforms by Hugo Boss😂
Add Ford and Chevrolet to your list.
All German companies in Germany. Unlike NASA who is a US company hero worshiping nazis
This is why History needs to remain both the good and the bad so people can make their own decisions about what happened.
Yes,but, they should be clearly labeled.
We haven't gone to the moon since those men passed on.
I grew up with many of the children of these Germans .I still live next door to great- grandchildren of these Germans .They do not speak German. I live in the Cape Canaveral area of Florida since early1960's .So many people retire to Florida and Germans who worked in aerospace just stayed here when they retired .My father used to go to estate sales all the time around here .At some of these garage sales he would find old German items with NAZI markings .I still have these items. I went to school with children of these Germans here and in Huntsville,Alabama .I borrowed lederhosen from German neighbors for a school play in Huntsville . Von Braun's house had a paved yard painted green in Huntsville .He didn't have to mow that yard.
My Nephew, who did his degree in astrophysics, applied for a job with NASA. He currently lives in South America, but is a UK citizen. His rejection letter said NASA only employs Americans.
"If you are not a U.S. citizen, you may wish to consider opportunities with one of our International Space Partners: Agencia Espacial Brasileira (AEB) Italian Space Agency."
Maybe NASA was tired of getting sabotaged
Bruan was a US citizens, he obtained his citizenship during operation paperclip
All the aerospatial investiment is to being used at MIC.
You have to be a U.S. Citizen. It is not easy to get jobs with companies like that as you are a risk to national security if you happened to leave to another country and leak technology
Glorious irony. Did you reply and say, "Correction: Americans and Nazis" ?
When Space Camp was around, we had frequent seminars about the early US space program and the people who manned the helm. It was the first time I heard the name Werner von Braun, and they didn't hesitate to mention that his first major place of employment was Nazi Germany. All things considered a ballsy move to be factually frank, if only briefly and to a crowd of impressionable children whose primary interest was learning about space ice cream and the Shuttle.
Back when facts used to matter. My wife went to space camp back in the 90s.
Space camp is closed?
@@leftseat30still open, my wife worked there as recently as last year
But one doesn't get CZcams clicks by admitting that something isn't actually a secret conspiracy that they're WAKING ALL YOU DURNED SHEEPLE UP to.
If there's one thing you can find more than anything else on CZcams, its a video telling you about a thing you and EVERYONE always knew any damned way.
@@WindFireAllThatKindOfThingThat's my constant complaint about modern documentaries. Anything made recently will talk about the Nazis, then remind us they were bad, and Hitler, WHO WAS TERRIBLE! and then talk about what they were doing, which was a sin against humanity! And also good science AT THE COST OF INNOCENT LIVES. It's all sensationalizing and talking down to us as if we aren't aware that mustache man bad.
"Once the Rockets are up, who cares where they come down...That´s not my department, says Wehner von Braun"...
Dr. Felton, I won’t defend the abhorrent actions of those men before being captured and given the opportunity to turn their skills into something beneficial to all mankind. Should they continue to be honored for their contributions? Those accomplishments achieved in peacetime ARE laudable, but as men? Hard to reconcile the crimes committed if not impossible….
That flag is actually less offensive than the MTV version.
I just read a book about Werner Von Braun. You are correct in everything you stated. I don’t think he was political; rather, he was the supreme opportunist. He was patriotic to his country. He was singularly focused on space travel. Using rockets for military purposes was a means to an end.
He understood that slave labour was used to build bunkers underground..at a point where defeat was inevitable and a war crime.
Using slaves was a 'means to an end' also.
In reality, what exactly could he have done in regards to the labour being used to build his rockets?? He was overall a designer and scientist...I doubt very much that he was involved in the running of the factories or the production of the finished product?
well he was certainly opportunistic in his choice of country
@@noeldonovan3363 he could have done what so many other brave souls did who paid with their lives for it: refused to do the Nazi's bidding.
It's either willing complicity or cowardess. Either one is equally disgusting. If he was instrumental enough to warrant the Americans' attention then he was important enough to be able to demand that the workers be fed more and shot less.
Oscar Schindler also exploited slave labor but he was still *somewhat* stubborn with the Nazis about ill treatment of *his* workers. von Braun did no such thing.
It is well known that acquiring skilled and trained labor is not an easy task. It is also known that in a time when CNC machines, robots, etc., did not exist, a rocket production line relied on highly skilled workers to perform tasks such as quality welding, precision machining, and mastering complex casting techniques, among other complex techniques. It is therefore difficult to understand how the Nazis managed to provide technical training to slaves, making them technically capable of producing rockets. Apparently, this was done so easily that they could afford to starve or kill thousands of these slave technicians as punishment, and still manage to produce thousands of rockets. Even more intriguing is the fact that nowadays the German industry faces a very high deficit of skilled technicians!
The work of these men is still benefitting the mightiest nations today. 😮
Sadly,in this day&age, one man’s criminal is another man’s hero.
Perhaps these people are both?
Perhaps these people are neither?
But it’s sad truth in these time🙁
That's ALWAYS been the case... the old saying used to be "one mans freedom fighter is another mans terrorist"... There's NOTHING new under the sun.
@@walterkronkitesleftshoe6684 thank you for proving my point. And look at what happened with Unit 731 IJA , which backs up the point.
So the Nazi scientists helped the US and Russia bring the world closer to apocalypse...think about that
you either are a criminal or not, everything else is an excuse
So NAZI scientists helped the US and Russia to bring the world onto the doorstep of the Apocalypse
As an American I appreciate your honest interpretation of history. We often gloss over the true cost of “progress”.
Good, bad, and somewhere in between, I want my kids to know and be humbled by the truth and cost of our current state.
I like your open enquiring approach to the raising of your family and educating them to the reality of human nature. Unfortunately in the US at the moment it looks to me that the dumbing down of people is having a very negative effect on your lives and I feel.l for your country at this moment. I'm sure that sentiment is echoed far and wide around the world. As humans we really haven't learnt very much from history. Another great ep from Felton...🤙🦘🇦🇺
Anyone vaguely familiar with the US and Russian early space programs already knew both countries used Nazi scientists in their programs. This isn’t new info.
...it was well know in Huntsville that von Braun was a nazi, but not a war criminal. And just like you said Mark, we here had an understanding that he was a genius that was drug into the dark service he performed, and was glad to be out and free in America. Certainly a shroud or at least a veil over the knowledge....
The UK would, in the 1950's, accept the rocket technology given to it by the US. The UK is not clean either as Dr. Felton would like everyone to believe. The fact that he doesn't cover the various UK governments benefitting from US rocket technology, no doubt shared with these Germans, is sad.
Thank you Mark Felton for exposing these people for who they actually were.
I shared my first office with one of the German scientists, Dr. Walter Hauserman. Nice to me, and a handy office mate when I had engineering questions during my master’s degree. I never told him I was the son of a Holocaust survivor. My father, the survivor and ever pragmatic and forgiving, admired von Braun.
Pragmatism reigns Supreme! All hail, Mein Pragmatist!
Jk
@@roberthevern6169 Don't be an jerk. If his father, a survivor, could forgive von Braun, who was he to say otherwise?
And All Soviet war criminals got off Scott free!
In this lifetime, yes.
Come judgment day, we all will bow at the throne of God.
Beria ended up getting executed. Stalin ended up getting exposed by Nikkita Kruschev.
@@scottmccloud9029amen
🎉
@@scottmccloud9029lol
Nations don't have permanent enemies, only permanent self-interests.
„German scientists got America to the moon in 1969“ - otherwise all the places they‘d gotten to would have been Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan… ☺️
I'm from Huntsville Alabama and many of the Germans who worked for NASA lived there. In fact the city civic center is called the Werner von Braun civic center built in the mid 70s.
Living in Huntsville, Alabama was enough punishment 😂😂😂 j/k but I 've heard summer can be brutal... where did the Soviets drag all their Teutonic rocket geniuses? And was there a "von Braun" type character among them?
@@ernst624it was a nice place to grow up. Summers are hot but that's true for the entire south. It's far worse in South Alabama. Huntsville is now the largest city in alabama having overtaken Birmingham a few years ago. Spring and fall are very nice and I have warm memories of playing in my large back yard with a huge field and cows right behind our property separated only by a barbed wire fence. Sadly my childhood home was destroyed in 1989 by a tornado. Had a few teachers in my high school that were sons of German rocket scientists...nice guys.
This is what we need, education, not eradication of history. Thanks Mark!
fears of the 'eradication' of history is an illusory cry for attention from the insecure. It is misrepresented and is used to misinform.
This sounds a little disturbing but it goes to show you that rehabilitation programs have alot of merit. These were some of the most vile humans on earth and they went on to advance our sciences for space travel.
They will be subject of cancel culture
You’re right about this….forgiveness is unmoral…after tens of thousands were murdered by those Nazi scientists 😞
what about the tens of thousands in Iroshima anda Nagasaki, were naz scientists that killed them?
@@jross9919 Einstein and Oppenheimer were not a Nazi scientists.
We'd pass the Huntsville rocket on trips as kids...any time I pass it now it won't be the same. Thanks for covering this! 💜
Let us also recall that the Germans were admirers of American rocket pioneer: Robert Goddard. I recall reading that in initial debriefings the Germans asked why are you asking us these questions? Your Dr Goddard taught us.
@jameseldridge im glad somebody brought up Goddard. In the 1930’s a few years before hitler, WVB corresponded with Goddard quite often. Goddard had sent most of his findings to WVB. If you had asked WVB where he got some of his ideas about rocketry, he probably would have said Goddard. WVB also corresponded with a Russian scientist at the same time he was corresponding with Goddard although his name escapes me.
I don’t think you understand the video, it’s about NASA hero worshiping nazi war criminals
Yep, von Braun said that Goddard was "ahead of us all."
I graduated from Worcester MA South High. 1972. As a student I met Dr Goddard’s widow. She was an active and very informative senior citizen.
In Canada the government invited a Waffen SS soldiers into the House of Commons
And also the US has and had several army bases NAMED after confederate commanders, literally enemies of the US.
And then gave him a standing ovation, then call the opposite party nazis! Liberals....
Ukrainian Nahtzis Rock. They are Trudeau's mates and are most welcome in the Canadian parliament.
Do get your facts straight. The man was a Ukrainian who fought with the Nazis against the even-more-hated Russians, at a time and place when choosing sides was a terrible moral dilemma. I don't know much more than that about this person. I do know he was invited by a junior staffer who neglected to do his job by vetting him first. Obviously it was a tremendous international embarrassment to the government, something that could easily have been avoided.
@@paulmaxwell8851 Russian bots aren't interested in the facts.
My Grandfather was an ARP Warden in London and saw the product of Mr Brauns studies first hand. One of the people to pick up the pieces.
did he check out the complete annihilation of the cities firebombed by the allies?
😀
a decent documentary as usual.... but how's that U.K space program working out?
Don't recall seeing any criticism of Oppenheimer or other German scientists in that bit of WW2 that the UK/EU largely forget about (allies v. Japan)
It was Norman Mailer who wrote how "NASA" and "NAZI" so aptly went together. Even as a high schooler in 1961 I knew about this, but our main focus was "beating the Russians" to get into space and on to the moon. Well, is this a story of redemption or of evil? How long does a former enemy have to be shunned? Tough moral questions.
Perhaps a bit longer than 2 months!
@@timdinch5598 1 day is too long
😂 *I love that photo description "You know who"*
Given the fact that this Von Braun was able to speak fluent English with hardly any accent. Makes me believe he was a genius indeed.
I think Mark's analysis is excellent as usual. I agree that Von Braun and his ex-Nazi comrades should receive no new honors and current use of their names in place of honor should be considered for replacement. I have a small bone to pick with Mark's own use of honorifics on his channel. I have commented on this several times in the past but this video gives me new grounds to bring pick the bone again.
In his videos, Mark consistently refers to the chief propagandist of the Nazi party as "Dr. Goebbels" rather than as "Joseph Goebbels". Goebbels received a doctorate in German philology, a field that is the study of "structure, historical development, and relationships of a language or languages". Not exactly a PhD in propaganda, but it was probably useful. Von Braun received a doctorate in physics which certainly was applicable to rocket development.
Yet Mark does not refer to the rocket scientist one time in this video as "Dr. Von Braun". Why not? More to the point, why use the honorific of "Doctor" for a Nazi war criminal at all? I have objected in the comments section to this regarding the despicable Goebbels many times. I can almost see using it when referring to a practicing member of a profession, e.g., Hitler's physician. I think it shows undue respect to someone like Goebbels and it should stop. Thankfully it was not used for Von Braun in this video.