Wernher von Braun
3rd Reich WW2 VIPs- Rocket Technology of 3rd Reich

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HISTORY DATA
Pearl Harbor Overview
Pearl Harbor Japs forces
Pearl Harbor Japs Aircraft
Coral Sea
Doolitle Attack
Midway
Guadalcanal
Japan Capitulates
Battleship Bismarck
Normandy Invasion
USN Admirals
Japan Admirals
Torpedo Bombers
USN WW2 Fighters
USN WW2 Battleships
SLS NAVY DATA
Aircraft Carriers
Cruisers
Destroyers
Frigates
Patrol Ships
Attack Sumbarines
Missile Sumbarines
Assault Ships
F-14 Tomcat
F-18 Hornet
P-3C Orion
S-3B Viking
CH-46 Sea Knight
CH-53 Sea Stallion
H-3 Sea King
MH-53 Sea Dragon
SH-60 Seahawk
HH/UH-1N Iroquois
Wernher von Braun

Wernher von Braun (March 23, 1912 - June 16, 1977) was one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Germany and the United States. His work on the Nazi rocket programme made him a controversial figure. The controversy was captured in a song by satirist Tom Lehrer, who described him as "A man whose allegiance is ruled by expedience".
He was born on in Wirsitz, Posen, Germany and his mother gave him a telescope upon his Lutheran confirmation. His interest in astronomy and the realm of space motivated him all his life. When Wirsitz was given to Poland in 1920, due to the Treaty of Versailles, his family, like many other German families, moved. The von Brauns found a new life in Berlin, Brandenburg. He did not do well in physics and mathematics until he acquired a copy of the book Die Rakete zu den Planetenr?umen (The Rocket into Interplanetary Space) by rocket pioneer Hermann Oberth. From then on he applied himself at school in order to understand mathematics, until he excelled. At the age of 13, he caused a major disruption when he fired off a toy wagon to which he had attached a number of firecrackers. The wagon travelled several blocks into the centre of town and caught fire. The young von Braun was taken into custody by the local police until his father came to collect him.

In 1930 he attended the Berlin Institute of Technology. He also joined the Verein f?r Raumschiffahrt (VfR - "Spaceflight Society") and assisted Hermann Oberth in liquid-fueled rocket motor tests. He received a B.S. degree and entered Berlin University.

Under Captain Walter Dornberger a research grant from the Ordnance Department was arranged for von Braun, who then researched adjacent to Dornberger's existing solid-fuel rocket test site at Kummersdorf. Von Braun received a doctorate in physics two years later. By the end of 1934, Braun's group had successfully launched two rockets that rose to more than 2.4 kilometres or 1.5 miles. At that time, however, there was no German rocket society, as the VfR had collapsed and rocket tests had been forbidden by the new regime. Only military development was possible and a larger facility was erected at the village of Peenem?nde in northeastern Germany on the Baltic Sea. Dornberger became military commander and von Braun was technical director. They undertook successful liquid-fueled aircraft and jet-assisted takeoffs. They developed the long-range ballistic missile A-4 and supersonic anti-aircraft missile named Wasserfall.

In 1943 Hitler decided to use the A-4 as a "vengeance weapon," and the group found themselves developing the A-4 to rain explosives on London. Fourteen months after Hitler ordered it into production, the first combat A-4, now called the V-2 (a name invented by Heinrich Himmler), was launched toward western Europe on September 7, 1944. When the first V-2 hit London von Braun remarked to his colleagues, "The rocket worked perfectly except for landing on the wrong planet."

The SS and the Gestapo arrested von Braun for crimes against the state because he persisted in talking about building rockets which would go into orbit around the Earth and perhaps go to the Moon. His crime was indulging in frivolous dreams when he should have been concentrating on building bigger rocket bombs for the Nazi war machine. Dornberger convinced the SS and the Gestapo to release von Braun because without him there would be no V-2 and Hitler would have them all shot.

On arriving back at Peenem?nde, von Braun immediately assembled his planning staff and asked them to decide how and to whom they should surrender. Most of the scientists were frightened of the Russians, they felt the French would treat them like slaves, and the British did not have enough money to afford a rocket program. That left the Americans. After stealing a train with forged papers, von Braun led 500 people through war-torn Germany to surrender to the Americans. The SS were issued orders to kill the German engineers, who hid their notes in a mine shaft and evaded their own army while searching for the Americans. Finally, the team found an American private and surrendered to him. Realizing the importance of these engineers, the Americans immediately went to Peenem?nde and Nordhausen and captured all of the remaining V-2's and V-2 parts, then destroyed both places with explosives. The Americans brought over 300 train car loads of spare V-2 parts to the United States. Much of von Braun's production team was captured by the Russians.

On June 20, 1945, U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull approved the transfer of von Braun's German rocket specialists. This transfer was known as Operation Paperclip because of the large number of Germans stationed at Army Ordnance, the paperwork of those selected to come to the United States were indicated by paperclips.

They arrived in the United States at New Castle Army Air Base, just south of Wilmington, Delaware. Afterwards, they were flown to Boston, and then taken by boat to an Army Intelligence Service post at Fort Strong in Boston Harbor. Later, with the exception of von Braun, the men were transferred to Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland to sort out the Peenem?nde documents. Those documents would enable the scientists to continue their rocketry experiments where they had left off.

Finally, von Braun and the 126 Peenem?nders were transferred to their new home at Fort Bliss, Texas, a large Army installation just north of El Paso, under the command of Major James P. Hamill. They found themselves in a strange situation as they began their new lives in America. Because they could not leave Fort Bliss without a military escort, they sometimes referred to themselves as "PoPs", Prisoners of Peace.

While at Fort Bliss, they trained military, industrial, and university personnel in the intricacies of rockets and guided missiles and to help refurbish, assemble, and launch a number of V-2s that had been shipped from Germany to the White Sands Proving Grounds in New Mexico. Further, they were to study the future potential of rockets for military and research applications.

During this time, von Braun mailed a marriage proposal to his first cousin, 18-year-old Maria von Quirstorp. On March 1, 1947, he married her in a local Lutheran church. In December 1948, his first daughter, Iris was born at Fort Bliss Army Hospital.

In 1950, von Braun and his team were transferred to Huntsville, Alabama, his home for the next twenty years. Between 1950 and 1956, von Braun led the Army's development team at Redstone Arsenal, resulting in the Arsenal's namesake: the Redstone rocket.

Still dreaming of a world in which rockets would be used for peaceful exploration, in 1952 von Braun published his concept of a space station in Collier's magazine. This station would have a diameter of 250 feet, orbit in a 1075 mile-high orbit, and spin to provide artificial gravity. In his vision, it would be the perfect jumping-off point for lunar expeditions. Von Braun also worked with Disney studios as a technical director for three television films about Space Exploration. Over the years von Braun continued his work with Disney, hoping that Disney's involvement would bring about greater public interest in the future of the space program.

As Director of the Development Operations Division of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA), von Braun's team then developed the Jupiter-C, a modified Redstone rocket. The Jupiter-C successfully launched the West's first satellite, Explorer 1, on January 31, 1958. This event signaled the birth of America's space program.

NASA was established by law on July 29, 1958. One day later, the 50th Redstone rocket was successfully fired off Johnston Island in the South Pacific as part of Project Hardtack. Two years later NASA opened the new Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama and transferred von Braun and his development team from the ABMA at Redstone Arsenal to NASA. Von Braun was the center's first Director, from July 1960 to February 1970.

The Marshall Center's first major program was development of the Saturn rockets, capable of carrying astronauts to the moon. Von Braun's childhood commitment to "turn the wheel of time," and his later dream to help mankind set foot on the moon became a reality on July 16, 1969 when a Marshall-developed Saturn V rocket launched the crew of Apollo 11. Over the course of the Apollo program, six teams of astronauts explored the surface of our moon.

In 1970, Dr. von Braun and his family relocated from Huntsville to Washington, DC. when he was assigned duties as NASA's Deputy Associate Administrator for Planning at NASA Headquarters. After the Apollo space program, von Braun felt that his vision for future spaceflight was different than NASA's, and he retired in June 1972. He became the vice-present of Fairchild Industries in Germantown, Maryland, where he was active in establishing and promoting the National Space Institute (merged into the National Space Society).

At the peak of his activities, von Braun learned he had cancer. Despite surgery, the cancer progressed, forcing him to retire from Fairchild on December 31, 1976. On June 16, 1977, Wernher von Braun died in Alexandria, Virginia and is interred there in the Ivy Hillside Cemetery.
WW2 HISTORY DATA
Pearl Harbor Overview
Pearl Harbor Japanese Forces
Pearl Harbor Japanese Aircraft
Battle of the Coral Sea, 7-8 May 1942
Doolitle Raid on Japan, 18 April 1942
Battle of Midway, 4-7 June 1942
Guadalcanal Campaign, August 1942 - February 1943
Guadalcanal-Tulagi Invasion, 7-9 August 1942
Battle of the Philippine Sea
Battle of Iwo Jima Battle of Okinawa
Japan Capitulates WW2 Japan Planes - List of Aircraft
Battleship Bismarck, Graf Zeppelin
Battleships Tirpitz, Scharnhorst , Admiral Graf Spee
WW2 Luftwaffe Planes - List of Aircraft
U-Boats Types 1, 2A, 2B, 2C, 2D
Kriegsmarine Submarines Types U-Flak, 7A, 7B, 7C, 7C/41, 7C/42, 7D, 7F
Kriegsmarine Submarines: U-Boats
Type 9A, 9B, 9C, 9C/40, 9D, 14
Kriegsmarine Submarines: Type XXI , Type XXIII
Grand Admiral Karl Donitz, Erich Raeder
HMS Prince of Wales Battleship, HMS Repulse,
HMS Ark Royal, HMS Hood Battlecruisers
Battle of the River Plate, Battle of Dunkirk, Battle of the Atlantic
Normandy Invasion, June 1944
Normandy Invasion ,Crossing the English Channel on D-Day, 6 June 1944
Normandy Invasion- The D-Day Landings, 6 June 1944
USN WW2 Admirals, USN WW2 Cruisers List
Imperial Japan Navy Admirals
Japan WW2 Fighters- Mitsubishi Zero
USN Battleships - Indiana Class, Kearsarge Class, Illinois Class, Maine Class, Virginia Class, Connecticut Class, Mississippi Class, South Carolina Class, Delaware Class, Florida Class, Pennsylvania Class, New Mexico Class, Wyoming Class, New York Class, Nevada Class, Tennessee Class, Colorado Class, South Dakota Class, Lexington Class, North Carolina Class, South Dakota Class, Iowa Class, Montana Class
USN WW2 CRUISERS
USN WW2 Torpedo Bomber - Douglas TBD-1 Devastator
USN WW2 Fighters: Brewster F2A Buffalo, Curtiss F9C Sparrowhawk
Grumman F3F, Grumman F4F Wildcat, General Motors FM-2 Wildcat
LOCKHEED P-38 LIGHTNING F-82 TWIN MUSTANG
REPUBLIC P-47 THUNDERBOLT
NORTH AMERICAN P-51 MUSTANG
Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, Boeing B-29 Superfortress
Consolidated B-24 D Liberator
North American B-25 Mitchell, Martin B-26 Marauder
Junkers Ju 87 Stuka Dornier Do 215 Ju-188
Dornier Do 17, Dornier Do 335 Pfeil Junkers Ju 88
Messerschmitt Bf 109, Messerschmitt Me 262
RAF List of aircraft, Avro Lancaster
Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Condor, Heinkel He 111
Focke-Wulf Fw 190, Junkers Ju 52
De Havilland Mosquito, Vickers Wellington
Fairey Swordfish Hawker Tempest Hawker Hurricane Supermarine Spitfire Gloster Meteor
Operation Stalingrad , Operation Barbarossa
Third Reich Organization and people
German Africa Corps
Field Marshal Erwin Rommel - Desert Fox
Maus (Tank) - Panzer VIII WW2 world largest tank
Panzer 3 III, Panzer 4 IV, Tiger 1, King Tiger 2
T-34 Soviet medium tank
List of tanks WW1, WW2, Modern
MODERN USN / WORLD AF/NAVY DATA
USN Aircraft Carriers USS Kitty Hawk, Enterprise, John F. Kennedy, Nimitz, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Carl Vinson, Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, John C. Stennis, Harry S. Truman, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush
USS Abraham Lincoln CVN72 USS Enterprise CVN65
USN Cruisers 1 - USS Ticonderoga, Vincennes, Valley Forge, Thomas S. Gates, Bunker Hill, Mobile Bay, Antietam, Leyte Gulf, San Jacinto, Lake Champlain, Philippine Sea, Princeton, Normandy, Monterey
USN Cruisers 2 - USS Chancellorsville, Cowpens, Gettysburg, Chosin, Hue City, Shiloh, Anzio, Vicksburg, Lake Erie, Cape St. George, Vella Gulf, Port Royal
USN Destroyers United States Navy
Amphibious Assault Ships - LHA/LHD/LHA(R) USS Wasp, USS Essex, USS Kearsarge, USS Boxer, USS Bataan, USS Bonhomme Richard, USS Iwo Jima, USS Makin Island, USS Tarawa, USS Saipan, USS Belleau Wood, USS Nassau, USS Peleliu
SSN Attack Sumbarines 1 USS Seawolf, Connecticut, Jimmy Carter, Virginia, Texax, Hawaii, North Carolina, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Memphis, Bremerton, Jacksonville, Dallas, La Jolla, City of Corpus Christi, Albuquerque, Portsmouth, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Hyman G. Rickover, Augusta, San Francisco, Houston, Norfolk, Buffalo, Salt Lake City, Olympia, Honolulu, Providence
SSN Attack Sumbarines 2 USS Pittsburgh, Chicago, Key West, Oklahoma City, Louisville, Helena, Newport News, San Juan, Pasadena, Albany, Topeka, Miami, Scranton, Alexandria, Asheville, Jefferson City, Annapolis, Springfield, Columbus, Santa Fe, Boise, Montpelier, Charlotte, Hampton, Hartford, Toledo, Tucson, Columbia, Greeneville, Cheyenne
SSBN Fleet Balistic Missile Sumbarines USS Georgia, USS Henry M. Jackson, USS Alabama, USS Alaska,USS Nevada, USS Pennsylvania, USS Kentucky, USS Tennessee, USS West Virginia, USS Maryland, USS Nebraska, USS Rhode Island, USS Maine, USS Wyoming, USS Louisiana, USS Ohio
USN Frigates, USN Patrol Ships, USAF Plane List
Anti-submarine aircraft - P-3C Orion S-3B Viking
USN FIGHTERS
A-10 / A10 Thunderbolt II
F-5 Freedom Fighter, F-20 Tigershark
F-4 Phantom II F-86 Sabre, A-4 Skyhawk, A-6 Grumann Intruder
F-14 Tomcat F-15 Eagle F15, F-16 Fighting Falcon,
F-18 Hornet F-22 Raptor F-35 Joint Strike Fighter
CH-46 Sea Knight, CH-53 Sea Stallion
H-3 Sea King MH-53 Sea Dragon
SH-60 Seahawk HH/UH-1N Iroquois
AH-1 Cobra, UH-60 Black Hawk, HH-60 Pave Hawk Helicopter
AH-64 Apache
B-52 Stratofortress F-111, AC130 Gunship
B-1 Lancer
B-2 Spirit
F-117 Nighthawk
U-2 Dragon Lady , SR-71 Blackbird
RQ-1 Predator
Panavia Tornado
Tornado F3 AV-8 Harrier
Pre/Post WW2 USSR Russia Planes - List of Aircraft
Pre/Post WW2 RAAF Australia Planes - List of Aircraft
Pre/Post WW2 SWEDEN Planes - List of Aircraft
F-22 Raptor, F-35 Joint Strike Fighter JSF

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