Wernher von Braun – Part 2

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February 17, 2016

V2 Rocket Development • Peenemünde • Fort Bliss

GERMANY’S V2 ROCKET

Part 1 > Wernher von Braun – Part 2 > Wernher von Braun – Part 3

Peenemünde and the V2

From 1937 to 1945, Dr. Wernher von Braun was the technical director for the German
army’s new rocket test facility (Heeresversuchsanstalt) at Peenemünde on the Baltic
island of Usedom. It was here on the isolated north German coast that von Braun and his
team would develop the world’s first ballistic missile, the A4, later known as the V2. The
Nazi German military poured money and people into the rocket effort, and soon the new
testing facility would swallow up and spread beyond what was once a small fishing village
known as Peenemünde (“mouth of the Peene river”) on the northwestern tip of Usedom.

Part of the Peenemünde complex as it looks today. In his first two

years here, Wernher von Braun often traveled by train between his
home in Zinnowitz and his offices in Peenemünde. PHOTO: Hyde Flippo

Although it was not public knowledge during most of von Braun’s heyday in the US, we
now know that he joined the NSDAP (Nazi party) on 1 December 1938. In May 1940 he
joined the SS, eventually achieving the rank of Sturmbannführer (equal to the army rank
of major). Despite that, in March 1944 Himmler’s Gestapo accused von Braun of treason
(and the intention of escaping to England). He was arrested and spent time in jail, only
being released because of his special status and the intervention of his boss Walter
Dornberger and armaments minister Albert Speer.

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At the ever-expanding Peenemünde facility, and later at the notorious underground Dora
(Mittelwerk) complex near Nordhausen in the Harz mountains, von Braun and his team
developed the V2 (Vergeltungswaffe 2), the world’s first liquid-fueled ballistic rocket
weapon. The first successful test firing of the V2 took place on 3 October 1942 at the
Peenemünde site. The V2 carried a 2,000-pound (980 kg) warhead and had an
operational range of 320 km (about 200 mi). (There were plans for longer range rockets
that could cross the Atlantic and strike the USA, but they were never developed.) The first
V2 to be used against the Allies took off for London on 7 September 1944 (flight time: 320
seconds, about 5 minutes). Eventually over 3,000 V2s were launched against targets in
England, Belgium, France, and the Netherlands. (More V2s struck Antwerp [1610] than
London [1358].) An estimated 8,000 people, most of them in Antwerp and London, died in
the V2 attacks. Another 12,000 people or more, mostly slave-labor prisoners, died as a
result of the horrible working and living conditions at the Mittelwerk V2 plant. Although
von Braun had no direct control over Mittelwerk, he was well aware of the deplorable
situation there and at the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp. He later admitted shame
that such things could happen in Germany, even in war.

Wernher von Braun (in business suit) at the Peenemünde V2 test

complex in spring 1941. PHOTO: Bundesarchiv

As a rocket, the V2 (A4) was a major success. As a destructive weapon, the V2 was less
successful. For its massive development costs, each V2 yielded only modest destruction
and – looking at it coldly and from a military perspective – an average of two deaths per
V2 rocket fired. This was in part due to many V2s missing their targets. Despite a few rare
“successes,” including a V2 strike on a Woolworth’s store in New Cross, England (160
deaths) and another that hit a packed cinema in Antwerp (567 deaths), in the end the V2
was not really the “miracle weapon” (Wunderwaffe) that Hitler had promised the
Germans. Its military value was modest. A V2’s explosive power was only half of a single
B-17’s 4,000 lb (1814 kg) bomb load dropped during a typical Allied raid. More people
died making the V2 than in actual V2 attacks. The terror effect of the V2 only made the
Allies more determined to defeat the Germans.

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Going over to the Americans: Operation Paperclip
When the war ended in 1945, von Braun and most members of his team decided they
wanted to work for the Americans rather than the Soviets, who were also actively trying to
get former German rocket engineers. To avoid the Russians, von Braun and about 500
team members traveled south to Bavaria, which was an American occupation zone.
Wernher’s brother Magnus was chosen to contact the Americans because he spoke the
best English. On 3 May 1945, in Reutte, Austria, just across the border from Bavaria, von
Braun and his team surrendered to US Army officers. (Photo in Part 1.)

As part of what was dubbed “Operation Paperclip,” von Braun and over 100 of his
contingent were sent to the United States in late 1945 and early 1946. The German
rocket team was first assigned to Fort Bliss in Texas and the nearby White Sands Proving
Grounds in New Mexico, where they helped test several captured V2 rockets.

Most of the “Operation Paperclip” team of German scientists under

Wernher von Braun were sent to Fort Bliss, Texas. This photo was
taken in 1946. Wernher von Braun is standing in the front row, seventh
from the right. PHOTO: NASA

Dr. von Braun began his work in Texas with a supersonic ramjet project (first named
“Comet” and later “Hermes”) while assigning some of his team to work on getting rusty
recovered V2 rockets ready for testing at White Sands. At first, the Fort Bliss scientists
were alone, with their wives and families still in occupied Germany. This, combined with a
lack of financial and technical support from the army, soon led to a crisis in the group’s
morale. Conditions later improved and von Braun began to feel more at home in his new
country. It was during this time that von Braun, raised as a Lutheran in Germany,
converted to evangelical Protestantism as a member of a small Texas church.

In December 1946, von Braun and his team gained some fame when the War
Department finally announced their presence in the United States. The El Paso Times
headline read: “118 Top German V-2 Experts Stationed in E.P.” Von Braun was in New
York on business when the story broke. Pictures of the young German scientist appeared
in major American newspapers and Life magazine. But the Germans would become
frustrated by a lack of funding and support for advanced guided missile development
during the Fort Bliss years. It would take the Korean War to finally get the US truly
interested in turning the V2 into an advanced weapon.

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Next | Wernher von Braun – Part 3
Back | Wernher von Braun – Part 1

Related Pages
AT THE GERMAN
WAY

Wernher von Braun – Part 1 – von Braun’s early years in Germany

Wernher von Braun – Part 3 – von Braun’s marriage + NASA
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speaking world
Mini Bios A-Z – More brief biographies of people from the German-speaking world
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Also see Germans in Hollywood – German, Austrian and Swiss people in Hollywood

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