Wernher von Braun: From Nazis to NASA
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- Опубліковано 7 лют 2025
- The American space program wouldn’t be what it is today if it weren’t for the contributions of a scientist who was also a former Nazi. Learn about the life and work of rocket scientist Wernher von Braun.
Hosted by: Hank Green
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"The Rocket worked perfectly, except for landing on the wrong planet."
~Von Braun after the first successful V-2 bombing of London.
Let that say what you will about Von Brauns character.
have you seen BBC's documentary on the space race?
Wernher von Braun says to American officials when they wouldn't let him launch a satellite:
"My men are beginning to think whether the future would've been better for us working for Stalin"
Then he says in a TV broadcast talking about the Saturn V:
"The rocket can produce 7,600,000 pounds of thrust, enough to launch 15 hundred sputniks into orbit"
That is a man who cares little for the petty squabbles of governments. He wishes only to further the pursuit of science. Why?
For Science!!!
Don't say that he's hypocritical, say rather that he's apolitical. "Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down. That's not my department.", says Wernher von Braun
yes, it was said after the first successful V-2 bombing of london - 12 years after it to be precise
Wrong planet? What was he talking about?
"Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
That's not my department." says Wernher Von Braun
Von Braun's answer was correct, he just created a vehicle that could go into space, just like the plane was created by the Wright brothers who did not know that later in the future it would be used to kill millions of people or even as a missile on 11 September in the twin towers, they are vehicles, of how usalos is another department
@@carloskarbat Sure, but in contrast to the Wright brothers he did well know where his rockets were going down and what the very first use case of his rockets will be in the 3rd Reich. Your comparison is weak at best. He also know about the working conditions in Penemünde where thousands of people were worked to death. He was part of the SS to. You don't casually stumble into that without any guilt.
"Once the rockets are up
Who cares vhere zhey come down?
Zhat's not my department."
Says Wernher von Braun.
Beautiful
Tom Lehrer
He had no problem designing weapons, to target innocent British civilians. His designs of rockets were used against innocent British subjects. For example the V1 and V2 rockets. And somehow he is considered to be the Father of the US Space programme.
Try that at a trial of the DEA Court Hall I just made the heroine it wasn't me who distribute it oh well that's okay then
Here, here. Werner Von Braun SHOULD have been given a rope necklace when he was captured, but thanks to the yanks, he was not. My other half is Jewish, and has stories sent down through the past, of how forced Jewish labor was used to build these filthy rockets. V2 Rocket Manufacture was under the rule of the SS, of which Von Braun was a member.
If you did not work fast enough, you had your brains shot out. Then your body was suspended via a rope and hooks over the workshop, just to remind others what would happen if you worked too slow.
And yes, forget how many people he murdered in London.
Von Braun, the great space genius.........with many peoples blood on his, and NASAs hands.
America: Hey von Braun, wanna build rockets for the United States?
Von Braun: Nien
America: We won’t send you to be executed at the Nuremberg trials.
Von Braun: Ok
Nein
Lmao you copy-pasted this on another video, even with the same spelling mistake
that's true America is build by German engineer that's true 😆😆😆😆😎😎😎
Actually when they asked him he said “yes” on the spot.
He never said nein, he surrendered himself to us forces and told them immediately about the v2 projects.
Does anyone else realise that within a span of 66 years we jumped from inventing the airplane to landing people on the moon? O.O
Manibe who says we landed on the moon? Wvb has staged 6 space missions. Look it up.
@Mr. Davario P. Precisely..you've save me a monologue....
Manibe - and in 100 year span from 1869-1969 Americans went from traveling westward using rawhide covered wagons, to sending men to walk on the moon.
I get your point in your comment. This comment opens the window a little. It’s hard to believe how far and how fast we have came. Yet 100 years isn’t really that long.
Unbelievable.
The ammount of times 666 shows up in “space math” for lack of a better term is crazy
@Mr Davario Then how did we came from large chunky phones to phones with screens everyone uses in a span of a decade?
Wernher Von Braun is the founder of NASA . Wernher Von Braun assisted with his knowledge of detecting radiation trails (all life leaves radiation trails, past , present and future, they all occur at the same time ) he used his knowledge of radiation trails in assisting to make the chrono visor ,after operation paperclip the knowledge he had about that time viewer evolved into operation Pegasus . Wernher was a genius but humble, if called a genius he would respond "I just had good teachers"
the future doesn't exist yet in the physical world so it cannot leave any physical trails such as 'radiation'
Not only the Americans recruited thousands of German scientists and engineers after WW2 - Russia did as well. Germany had by far the most advanced military- and scientific-research technology and the USA and Russia both used that knowledge to boost their own rdevelopment. Even scientists who were proud supporters of Hitlers ideologies were not convicted but highly paid and hired in high positions.
So now the USA built their advanced weapons from the advices of the german scientist in world war 2?
This is truly magnificence. From the first rocket ever to reach the space border to the most powerful thing humankind had built in under 20 years is.... no words can describe how brilliant he is.
I was privileged personally to see and hear Dr. Wernher Von Braun speak at the University of Hawaii in the early ‘60s. It was a thrill to sit at the feet of such a great rocket scientist. This great man was one of my professional heroes because I was vitally interested in rockets, missiles, and space travel and went to work in the U.S. defense and space programs. My great interest was in rocketry, so I majored in aerospace engineering and focused my college studies on propulsion, aerodynamics, and orbital mechanics.
After graduating from the University of Oklahoma, I entered active duty in the USAF and served for over eight years as an astronautical development engineer. I served as a launch operations manager handling Titan IIIC launches out of Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Furthermore, I also worked in the Aerospace Industry for Planning Research Corporation at Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and personally witnessed the spectacular Apollo-Soyuz launch. At KSC, I worked on the design, development, and test of the Space Shuttle tail service masts (TSMs) on the mobile launcher platform (MLP). The TSMs retracted the T-minus-zero umbilicals (the last interface with the Orbiter vehicle upon liftoff) from the aft-end of the Space Shuttle Orbiter during liftoff.
He knowingly contributed to the attempted extinction of an entire race. That doesn't sound like a hero to humanity. That sounds like the worst scum possible.
let me guess you vote democrat ?
@@falloutfan1013
when you try to make everything political because someone said something you didn’t like:
Jeśli to Pana interesuje. To mieszkam 100 km od miejsca gdzie urodził się von Braun. Mogę wysłać za darmo worek z piaskiem jako ciekawostka. Pozdrawiam
Excuse me
Von Braun was said to have not wanted to join the Nazis, but only did so to further his research into rockets. In the end, he did good for humanity, and I applaud him for getting us to the Moon.
There's a great docu-drama series with his story (and Korolev's) called "Space Race" from the BBC. Definitely worth checking out.
I suppose he did do a deal with the devil, but it wasn't really held against him after the war.
+Mr motivator is that a bad thing?
He did good for humanity, and you applaud him for getting us to the moon? OK, let's set aside all of the various photographic and video proofs that they weren't actually on the moon.
.
.
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NASA claims that they "accidentally" destroyed the technology to go to the moon (the greatest achievement in human history). I call it the "My Dog, ate my homework" excuse:
ua-cam.com/video/MpZyHvr6Y2M/v-deo.html
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They can't get through the Van Allen Radiation belts today that they supposedly got through in the 1960's:
ua-cam.com/video/IDBBUwdyz4I/v-deo.html
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If they couldn't make it to the moon, they'd fake it to the moon.
ua-cam.com/video/Vb-IShOYM6A/v-deo.html
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.
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The pictures we have of Earth are composites. They are assembled from data and using "trusted" old images. This is quote is from their own website:
www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/about/people/RSimmon.html
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[QUOTE] "What is the coolest thing you’ve ever done as part of your job at Goddard?
The last time anyone took a photograph from above low Earth orbit that showed an entire hemisphere (one side of a globe) was in *1972* during Apollo 17. NASA’s Earth Observing System (EOS) satellites were designed to give a check-up of Earth’s health. By *2002* , we finally had enough data to make a snap shot of the entire Earth. So we did. The hard part was creating a flat map of the Earth’s surface with four months’ of satellite data. Reto Stockli, now at the Swiss Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology, did much of this work. Then we wrapped the flat map around a ball. My part was integrating the surface, clouds, and oceans to match people’s expectations of how Earth looks from space. That ball became the famous Blue Marble."
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.
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Lastly, exactly how did they beam a full color video 239,000 miles to earth, using only the energy in their batteries and collected by their solar panels? Answer: they didn't.
.
He did good for humanity but causally caused the death of 10 000 civilians or so. Sure.
i'm glad hank is using the metric system, but he should express force in newtons and not in kilograms...
It's still way better than using the Imperial system.
Kg is the standard used around the world for measuring rocket thrust
I've heard somewhere that von Braun never wanted his rockets to be used as weapons, rather as space launch vehicles.
yes and that almost got him shot.
and to this day people still call him a villain
@@Sednas he use to have the 5 slowest employees executed every day of work btw
@@toxicwifi65 source please
@@toxicwifi65 nonsense - he was not in operational charge of the rocket factories
I remember hearing a supposed quote of Werner von Braun as a kid and it always seemed inspirational. The quote was said supposedly after the first V2 landed in london
"The rocket performed admirably, however it landed on the wrong planet"
Its uncertain whether he was forced to work under the nazis or whether he took the opportunity as Hank said however i believe that he was a scientist of mankind no matter how you look at him, a man who dreamed of a world with no borders and a world where we would one day explore others as a common goal. As a scientist, as an engineer, and as a pioneer, i can at least show my admiration in thanking him for his contributions.
Could be admired for his contributions to rocketry but at the end of the day he willingly became part of a murderous idealogy whether because he also believed in it or to selfishly save himself shows a true lack of moral integrity and being a member of the SS knowingly witnessed and was a party to the atrocities commited makes him someone of weak character at best and a premeditated murderer at worst....either way idolizing the morally corrupt makes you a lowlife as well
I like that. Wrong planet! I’m sure that if he didn’t say that, it was on his mind. His thoughts were always beyond making weapons. Of course he was forced. If nothing else, he was a German and a ride thru any German city in 1945 would make any child of the fatherland want to hit back . Yes the wrong planet. After the war and Von Brauns rise to prominence. Where did he choose to live and where did he put his talents.? Here in America. He is one of us. He didn’t go back to Germany. He was an American.
Thank you! Native of Huntsville. I was a preteen and teen during the time. I live 10 miles from the big test sites. We use to have our cousins visit not warning them of the sound of a Saturn test. They would run wild eyed when it started as we sat causally in the yard. It was funny and mean. I met Von Braun when I was 17 at an event at NASA/ Redstone. He was a very pleasant man with a good reputation. I heard he became a Christian. He has a scripture on his grave stone. I don’t know for sure but his rocket scientist were for the most part Christians. It was an amazing time to live here and still is.
"If you want something done right, learning from the Nazis isn't enough. You have to put them in charge too" -XKCD
Love your video, but as a propulsion engineer I just have one slight correction, kilograms are not a measure of thrust, they are a measure of mass. Thrust is a force, and therefore the metric measure of force is Newtons. While its true that imperial units for thrust are lbs, they're actually pound-force (or lbf), as opposed to pound-mass (lbm) which is a measure of mass. 1 lbf = 1 lbm at 1g acceleration.
Hail Hydra?
More like Hail Science.
Real life. Yea he’s a part of some made up group that made some writers a bunch of money in 2011. Yea.
@@Shadowkey392 so basically Hail Hydra ?
@@percival8193 Hydra’s based?
if youre a Biden supporter I suppose so but you should look up operation paperclip
Could future episodes have rockets doing at least somewhat sane gravity turns?
Reminds me of the good 'ol days of KSP, with the 10km sudden 'gravity turn' xD
Jordan O'C I love how 99% of people who notice these things have played ksp. That game is truly amazing
impwarhamer Damn right! KSP is literally my most favourite game of all time. Period.
+HALL9000ish And accurate staging of the Saturn V....
The SS give him a honory rank .But he was never realy a SS member.
Idk if any of you have heard what he apparently confessed to his assistant near his death but it was incredibly accurate. (in the 70’s, they met in 73’ and he died in 77)
It’s mentioned briefly on an incredible piece of Netflix called “Unacknowledged”
Drinking game:
You have to drink for every comment that mentions "the Nazi's" instead of "the Nazis".
I've just realized... I've become a Grammar Nazi :(
Nilguiri i'll drink to that dood
Nilguiri
that is the only nazi i will ever be ^^
That would be enough booze to fuel a V-2 flight.
Sergei Korolev what about Sergei Korolev? He did it all, was responsable for all the first achivments in space exploration: First satelite, first man in space, first living being in space, first woman in space, first a shit load of stuff in space, and he wasnt responsable for the killing of anyone, apart from those poor animals in the first space try outs!
Fr
americans will never admit the "dirty commie" achivements
Metric units only! woohoo!
Yeah, it sucks. A good amount of his audience is in the U.S. and they just can't relate.
Matt Hoffman 'Murika, fuck youuuuuu! That's what you get for not adopting the most widely used measurement system in the world! Metres, AWAYYYYYY!!!!
Matt Hoffman I know. It's a ballsy move. I'm surprised they didn't put metric and imperial tbh.
Matt Hoffman It can't be that hard to use metric...
~2.5cm = 1 inch
~3.3ft = 1 meter
2.2 lbs = 1 kg
Matt Hoffman well Scishow is about science, and science uses the metric system, so maybe you could get over the obsolete imperial system and learn how all the scientific world measures things
The V-2 had a pretty respectable success rate. Of the 1600 or so launched almost 1400 found their targets. The numbers you refer to are for the V-1 or “Doodlebug”.
Von Braun never aspired to create weapons, his passion was for rocketry and exploration. He happened to be born in a country which became dominated by the Nazi party. His choice: work for them or die.
Had he been born in USA, Russia, England, etc. (on the "good side") and conscripted to aid the war effort, his background would not be in question, he would be be a war hero.
Fortunately he was able to achieve hero status as the driving force behind NASA :)
+BggProductions You can'Ät really concider russia th good side xD he would had a similar carrier there xD. maybe the exact same witha red star instead of an swastika xD
+BggProductions
How naive are you? Einstein (and several other notable German scientists) also happened to be born in a country which became dominated by the Nazi party. Did they work for the Nazis to produce, for instance, the first atomic bomb? No, mate, as soon as they saw what the Nazis were all about, they left Germany.
Just pay attention to the historical context, and you'll see what kind of person Von Braun was.
-The Nazis attempted a coup d'état after which Hitler was imprisoned. By the time Hitler got out of prison, the Nazis were in the process of eliminating political opposition in Germany using violence, propaganda and fear-mongering.
-The Nazis started portraying Jews as the enemy, initiating a campaign of discrimination and hate against them... Von Braun was still studying by then.
-By 1933, Hitler had managed to become chancellor, through violence, murder, propaganda, repeated elections and political pacts with the conservatives. He convinced parliament to grant him emergency plenary power, in exchange for his promise not to take action against them.
Obviously, he broke that promise. He banned all parties except his own, he abolished the governments of the German states, he suspended civil liberties, he banned trade unions, he started a witch hunt against Communists and all the rest of political opposition, etc.
In the streets, Nazis had been attacking Jews and political rivals for several years already, bullying people into joining them, organizing the famous book burning events all over Germany, etc.
By that time, Von Braun was finishing his post-graduate studies and building non-military prototype rockets with some of his colleagues.... But make no mistake, Von Braun (like most people in Germany) already knew what the Nazis were all about by that time. And yet he made the choice to remain in Germany after he finished his studies.
Years later, in the US, Von braun would declare that he lived relatively well during the first years of Hitler's totalitarian regime. Although, apparently, he considered Hitler to be "just a buffoon"...
I love how he preferred to join that "buffoon" rather than act like a decent human being would.
In 1937, Von Braun became a member of the Nazi Party...
In 1938 Hitler started invading and annexing territories around Germany (including Austria).
The future allies made a pact with him, by which he was not to claim any more territory...
As you probably know, he broke that pact too, eventually invading Poland and forcing the allies to declare war.
In the face of all this stuff, what did Von Braun do? He did not only remain in Germany, he joined the Nazis, produced weapons for them, he selected Jewish slave labor for the rocket factories, he met with Hitler and other high ranking Nazis in several occasions. He even joined the SS and rose up to the rank of major...
Sure, sure, he HAD to do those things, otherwise how was he supposed to keep building mass-murdering rockets?
Are we supposed to feel sorry for this disgusting character? I mean, are you kidding me? He consented to fanatical discrimination, persecution, censure, human slavery and murder. He sided with people who pissed on human rights and values, who liked to burn books (and piles of corpses), invade countries, and mass-murder people just because... He even helped those people kill innocent civilian population with his rockets.
And we are supposed to feel sorry for him... Being naive is sometimes worse than being a Nazi, if you ask me.
Von Braun didn't really give a shit, and he even agreed with the Nazis in some respects. But, of course, he wasn't going to declare that during interrogation.
As I said at the beginning, Von Braun had the choice to act like a human being, like other Germans did, but he refused. When it was clear that Nazi Germany would fall, he decided to bet on another horse.
He defected to the Americans, offering his rocket expertise in exchange for asylum and immunity.
What kind of person asks for immunity? Yes, you guessed it, a guilty one.
+Goreuncle You ask how naive I am, I ask how gullible you are to believe the shite you just spouted.
+BggProductions He's the very person Tony Stark's character is based off of.
Umm no that would be Howard Hughes.
Don't say that he's hypocritical.
Rather say that he's apolitical.
"Once the rockets go up who cares where they come down.
that's not my department" Says Wernher von Braun.
~ Tom Leherer
Not really apolitical when those rockets are used to massacre millions. He can claim to feign knowledge but he knows damn well who he's siding with.
@@Petey0707 not millions lmao
"I aim for the star but kept hitting London" - Von Braun
Something for him to joke about. Shows you what a disgusting man he was
"Some have harsh words for this man of renown, but others say our attitude should be one of gratitude. Like the cripples and widows in old London town, whose pensions they owe to Wernher von braun..."
-Tom Lehrer, 1965
Did nobody think to mention his hair before he started recording?
What's wrong with his hair?
Bed head! 😂😂
WHAT ARE THOSE! Pretty sure he was going for a ‘planned messy’ look lol
A shave and an iron before rolling camera would not have hurt either.
You know, I have similar crazy hair and I'm into science and tech (worked on broadcast TV and radio tech crews). I think maybe there's just "engineer hair" and we have to accept it. You can flatten it with grease...but then it just looks flattened with grease.
Von Braun's comment on the V2 was "The rocket worked perfectly, it just landed on the wrong planet."
Landed in England and killed many people 😢
5,000 missiles fired with 1,100 actually hitting their target (22% accuracy) which then killed only 3,000. they killed 0.60 people per rocket fired or 2.72 people for each rocket on target. Rockets are not cheap.
To compare, the US dropped 2 bombs with 100% accuracy that killed 129,000 . That is 64,500 people for each bomb.
The sheer inefficiency of the rockets; especially their poor accuracy, leads me to believe their creator may have tried to minimize the death toll.
Thats what I was thinking. I mean that is some terrible aim.
I bet those two cost more than all the V2s
I'll bet they did. The focus is the cost efficiency of the weapon, though. What will give you the most *bang* for your buck.
You're forgetting the fact that Nazis primarily aimed to knowck down military, economic, and production portions of their opponents. The fact that these were often away from populous cities explains why there were less deaths. Agreed, many of them failed, but the creator didn't mean to minimize death toll.
Prad Bis I most certainly did forget that, thanks for the correction.
Ooh ooh, I get to share! My family is close with the von Brauns. My grandfather worked on the Saturn V program with him in Huntsville, AL.
Your proud of that ? I met the man as a child and got the feeling his was Evel then
@@ytgre7767 Evil.
Imagine if he had been in on the Valkyrie plot. One V-2 to the Wolf's Lair, and no more Hitler.
It didn't have that kind of precision.
I think Wernher von Braun was a cunning opportunistic
Of the first V-2 to hit London, Wernher von Braun said:
The rocket worked perfectly, except for landing on the wrong planet.
said in 1956, just for the record
tim hem - why did he say wrong planet?
@@wethepeople9161 he was implying the Moon or Mars would have been his preferred target
E Montibeller Yeah. And this dude was a genius!! One of a kind!
E Montibeller - well, there are books about him and his life (in USA) was well known. His home town here loved him. He was a big smoker. And that’s what killed him. But,... Von Braun was 50 years or so ahead of his time. What he had planned on (as far as a space station on moon and colonizing Mars) AND his ‘wheel shaped’ (I don’t know what you call it. - it rotates to create gravity. And they are planning on building it. IT WAS WERNHER VON BRAUN’S IDEA!!!
Von Braun got us to the moon! I wonder what Von Braun’s children think about their dad. He was a Legend! I highly recommend reading his biography to anyone interested in space/space travel. I’m sure Elon Musk knows everything about this man. RIP - Mr. Von Braun.
About his work at NASA he had the following to say, "The final card they play will be the alien card, and it's all a lie."
Werner von Braun was the perfect example of just wanting to do one thing and thats make rockets. and whoever was paying him to do so he would make rockets. Tom Lehrer said it best. "once the rockets go up who cares were they come down, thats not my department says Werner von Braun."
Hibbeler productions channel may help
Tom Lehrer anyone? "Once the rockets go up, I don't care where they lands, that's not my department says Werner von Braun"
Once they go up, who cares where they come down? "That's not my department" says Werner von Braun!
My two best rocket pioneers...
Professor Werhner Von Braun
Professor Sergei Korolev
Good job guys. Love having rocket stuff explained to me.
Just a 4 min video for the man who took us to the moon , really not enough
Now you must do an episode on Korolyov too.
I just took a history test on WWII today and he was an answer.
Gather round while I sing you of Wernher von Braun, A man whose allegiance is ruled by expedience. Call him a Nazi, he won't even frown, "Ha, Nazi schmazi," says Wernher von Braun
Don't say that he's hypocritical, Say rather that he's apolitical "Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down That's not my department," says Wernher von Braun
Some have harsh words for this man of renown But some think our attitude should be one of gratitude, Like the widows and cripples in old London town who owe their large pensions to Wernher von Braun
You too may be a big hero, once you've learned to count backwards to zero "In German or English I know how to count down and I'm learning Chinese," says Wernher von Braun
(A Tom Lehrer song)
Well made video, keep it up! :)
So a Visionary was born in Germany in the wrong era. That doesn't make him a villain.
Most of the Nazis were just normal people trying to feed their families in a dark time of history.
most did not set up a rocket factory using slave about with such poor conditions that it killed the workforce.
given that more than one eye witness said that they saw him beating slave labourers i'd say he's a villain. Did he end up doing good? yes, but tell that to 'the widows and cripples in old London town' or those who died in his missile factory.
@@elizabethveldonstuff Not denying even though those accounts aren't exactly the most credible but it seems odd that you would beat and abuse people working on sensitive rocket systems and a first of its kind guidance using Gyroscopes and PIGA accelerometers. Those in forced labor conditions during the war on any side were notorious for sabotaging comparatively simple firearms during production and it seems unlikely that so many V2s did operate as intended despite their complexity and the supposed conditions of their manufacture.
@@volka2199 i find it odd that anyone would seek to deny recorded historical fact but then, judging from the content of your own youtube that's hardly a shock.
the v2 rockets where assembled by slave labour in conditions that killed many. beatings where commonplace and there are even stories that von braun himself engaged in beatings.
i live in huntsville and work at the von braun center lol
Is anyone gonna mention that in the tutorial of Kerbal space program there is a Kerbal named
"wernher Von kerman" how did no one get that reference when playing the tutorial of KSP
+kelly wilson whitehead I got the reference!
I think a lot of people got the reference...
got the reference
Oh so I guess people did get the reference
I noticed
I goto work in the building in Huntsville that carries his namesake every day.
Gather round while I sing you of Wernher von Braun,
A man whose allegiance
Is ruled by expedience.
Call him a Nazi, he won't even frown.
"ha, Nazi Schmazi," says Wernher von Braun.
Don't say that he's hypocritical,
Say rather that he's apolitical.
"once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
That's not my department," says Wernher von Braun.
Some have harsh words for this man of renown,
But some think our attitude
Should be one of gratitude,
Like the widows and cripples in old London town
Who owe their large pensions to Wernher von Braun.
You too may be a big hero,
Once you've learned to count backwards to zero.
"in German oder English I know how to count down,
Und I'm learning Chinese," says Wernher von Braun.
-Tom Lehrer
RIP
Now do an episode on Korolev. :P
He never followed the nazi ideology..... plus, it's not like he could've said, "Nahh, I don't want to develop rockets for you". "Oh, ok."
Gather round while I sing you of Wernher Von Braun,
A man whose allegiance is ruled by expedience,
Call him a Nazi, he won't even frown,
Blah, Nazi-smatzi, says Wernher Von Braun....
Don't say that he's hypocritical,
Say rather that he's apolitical.
"Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?"
"That's not my department," says Wernher von Braun.
Some have harsh words for this man of renown
But some think our attitude
Should be one of gratitude
Like the widows and cripples in old London Town
Who owe their large pensions to Wernher von Braun
0. A You too can be a big hero;
Once you learn to count backwards to zero.
In German and English, I know how to count down;
Undt I'm learning Chinese, says Werner Von Brown....
0. A "That's not my department", says Wernher von Braun!
bless you
12000 people died because of forced labour , due to the v2 rocket project ! Now tell me he wasn't a war criminal !!!!!!
During the WWII hundreds of thousands of people died in Europe because of starvation..
During a war cruel facts happen, slave labor, bad condition POW camps, no food, diseases , etc.
Von Braun had no choice, he was forced to built the V2's. He didn't want to be used for bombing cities. He also never ever gave any orders to kill, imprison, or use someone for slave labor. He was imprisoned because he didn't want to work for Himler.. and his last hours in Germany SS was ordered to shout and kill VIP scientists, and he was running for his life. He was ordered to burn any files and papers regarding the rocket program development and he refused to do so, because all that he wanted is going to space and to the planets!
I would like for all of you that you pass judgement, to be in his shoes when he was asked to work for the government and develop a future weapon...let's see then if you had balls and say "No"..... yeah , that's what I thought so! 😠
My favorite nazzy.
von Braun was the most interesting man in the world!
A war criminal getting away with it, and lots of people finding excuses for him… pathetic… never mind all those dead civilians and POWs, all the blood on his hands…. 🤮
But it is for science. They say, trust the experts they say.
america has a long history of sanitising its worst acts , even the foundation of america was partially based on not wanting to recoginise british-native territorial treaties
an interesting factoid (in the true sense of the owrd, as in I don't know whether it's true) I heard about the V2 was that the british counterintelligence fed false information to the germans, stating that the rockets were undershooting london, which led to adjustments to the flightpaths. from then on the V2 was overshooting london
Almost right- British intelligence fed them information that the V2 was overshooting London, which caused them to undershoot. A lot of this misinformation was done by a double-agent named Eddie Chapman. Chapman has a fascinating story- there's a wonderful biography about him called Agent Zigzag. I highly recommend reading it.
I find it somewhat odd that we still find the Saturn V to be an engineering marvel. It's first launch was in 1967. I'll happily admit that, for its day, it was breathtaking in its then-advanced capabilities. But why do we still think it's an amazing rocket today? Look at any other technology that debuted in 1967. We don't venerate them as pinnacles of achievement. A phone from 1967 is just old. A car from 1967 might be appreciated as a classic, but not as a top-of-its-class modern marvel. Yet the Saturn V is still treated not just as impressive for its time, but impressive NOW.
I've got some ideas on why. But they all come down to the same thing: we stopped caring about advancing the goals that it was working towards. So far, none of the successors have been built, so it's a technology that basically just stopped advancing. Hopefully, the SLS will change that, and we'll be soaring through interplanetary space again soon.
Ask musicians when the best guitars and amplifiers were made. I'd wager they'd all say the ones from that era.
We have, however, been steadily advancing our music-making technology. Any electronic musician will tell you that today's synths are far superior.
to be fair, the Saturn V is still the biggest rocket to date, that might have something to do with it.
Matthew Prorok We've advanced our RECORDING technology. For the best LIVE sound you have to look 50-60 years in the past.
have you LOOKED at the Saturn V rocket? because it looks so beautiful and amazing and goddamn awesome.
You forgot to mention that Walt Disney worked for NASA too. Pretty sure he was executive producer on the moon landing footage.
I would have appreciated more about the man and less about the Saturn 5. His work in print and TV media inspired a whole generation to reach for the stars.
I agree
Max Schirmer made it to Australia, you never heard of him, he came here and lived a quit retired life, we think.
Given how many of his peers left Germany rather than see their work used by the Nazis, I have a hard time accepting he was anything other than an amoral opportunist, and if he had not found a winning nation that wanted his skills he probably would have been hung.
Moral of the story, ethics are irrelevant when you are valuable, don't be evil unless you have a way to get away with it.
Could you possibly name some names? I know of few Germans who left Nazi Germany based on "their work used by the Nazis". Plenty who left for racial reasons, sure. Ah, one possibility does come to mind: Klaus Fuchs.
puncheex2 Not off the top of my head, but I do recall reading about how Germany was having issues because quite a few people from von Braun's peer group left the country due to discomfort with where things were going, so there was a bit of a brain drain that bumped him up even higher.
If he was amoral, what kind of people are the Americans who gave him shelter and used him for reaching their goals? In the war there is no morality you know.. the winners in the war write the historical books. If Nazis won they would say all the Americans, Russians, Britons and so on, were the bad and stuff like this, their scientists would be taken to do the German researches, they would be the amoral opportunists(I am not saying Nazis were good, this is not my point, I am just saying that history books would be different if they won). You can't say for example, that all the German soldiers were bad, because they fought for Germany and did not left.
Science will be done no matter what, and it will be used for good and bad things no matter what, if it is used for bad things it does not make the scientists bad people, they just do their job.
Yeah because most people who see their government doing something amoral just up and leave their homes and family to go somewhere else in the world. I don't understand how the U.S. has any scientists considering their record of amoral activities e.g. torture, extermination of native americans, dropping nuclear bombs, invading the privacy of their own citizens, drone strikes on civilians etc. Or let's look at the Imperialism of Britain and the cruel treatment of the people living in the colonies, again why didn't scientists just abandon Britain and ran off to some magical place filled with weapons that shoot flowers and bombs that create peace?
Maybe stop to think that before, during and since world war II the U.S., Britain and Russia have not been saints. =)
Is it a coincidence that I'm doing a National History Day project on Von Braun?
von Braun wasn't a nazi. He was a scientist first and foremost! He dedicated basically all his life to science, if you go and read about him. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time so to speak. Under the circumstances (with which I mean the time when he was in Germany during Hitlers reign), since he was a scientist, he had to work for Hitler.. Many of the german scientists had to. And many of them did, but some of them got out! And the US was smart enough to recruit many of the german/austrian scientists.. This for many other reasons too, but I won't get into that now.
Okay.. thanks.
A guy named Tom Lehrer wrote a humorous song in the 60s about von braun and how scientists in general become attached to their work instead of who they work for.
yes he wasn't a Nazi, he was a German man who loved science...
It's tempting to demonize him for inventing the V2, and I'm not entirely sure we shouldn't. But it's worth considering that Oppenheimer's legacy is nearly as troubling despite having been on our side.
I'm reminded of the poem made up when he came to work for the US:
(Spoken in a cheezy German accent:)
"The rockets go up, who cares where they come down,
"That's not my department, says Wernher von Braun."
I'll never know if he did care or if he really just did it all "for Science." But there's no denying he changed the world.
Thank you one maybe leaving out skylab and his drawings these all came from wernher. Lock scientists into to the center over weekend, he was a hard task master. He was very exact, made it so it would work. These craft looked very well preformed perfectly. After wernher one had the voyager probe. The moon landings still recognise one of the worlds greatest achievement.
German proved to be excellent space research and development. They all have great scientists that change the world. Amazing!
And first prototype used potato alcohol,but improved version V2 used liquid oxigen and etanol.
How did they get through the van allen asteroid belt, multiple times?
The big question!!!?
I think the Mars and Moon thing is a lie.Yes a big fat Lie.
Interesting side note is that of all the times I have been to the Kennedy Space Center, one of which was this past weekend, with the exception of a few photographs and mainly in candid shots in videos von Braun is not mentioned, He is the Father of the U.S. space program after all and you would think they would give more acknowledgment to that historic fact. Villain or not that debate will go on forever. I have my opinion and will not express it here. I live in Florida and KSC is one of mt favorite places to go, I am fortunate enough too, as a 9yr old boy, watch the events of the Moon landings on TV and still remember it well. Anyway, it is not hard to be in awe at all the history that has taken place there and is still being made. To view up close pads 39a and b, to see the Saturn V in person and to be just out of arms reach of the Orbiter Atlantis. Also on display is the hatch, all three panels, from Apollo 1 capsule with the scorch marks still on it. Such history that should be viewed by all at least once.
Your Messy Hair is really distracting Hank :P
CAN'T... STOP... LOOKING... AT THE... TUFF
I recently discovered that the first image made of the Earth from space was with a V-2:
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5b/First_photo_from_space.jpg
Nice that you made a video about von Braun, I hoped you would, after the Goddard one. Next up: Korolev or Tsiolkovsky?
I LOVE YOUR HAIR
500 German engineers were transferred to America with their equipments to build NASA's space project..what clever germans I rise my hat to you.
That shit's still cool no matter how you slice it.
Kilograms are not a unit of thrust.... Newtons are.... I know you can use kg in a fiddly way, but Newtons are normally use for metric
Shhh, let the Americans adapt to the metric system. They're making progress...
Very nice. maybe you guys wll some day say somethig abut romanian flight pioneer Traian Vuia and how does he compare to the Wright Brothers.
Now please do a video about the other father of spaceflight, Sergey Korolyov.
A great scientist caught in the intricate world of politics
how many metric using countries have landed men on the moon?.... 0.
Russia beat you to everything else, get over it.
*****
someones got moon envy!
SawyerKnight SPUTNIK.
I did not know Von Braun was a prodigy. Gerard Bull (Babylon Gun /HARP) was also like that.
I seem to remember that von Braun had a paper design for something like a 12 stage A-series based rocket to put a man into LEO or something like that, but the nazis being evil warmongers and all, refused to fund it.
Also, the A-4 wasn't renamed to the V2, that's just what the Allies called it.
There is an interesting portrayal of Von Braun in episode 4 of History Channel's Project Bluebook. He acts all charming, but then forced a serviceman in an alien craft to see what would happen.
Where do the detachable parts of the rocket end up? Do they fall back down? And is there a designated and calculated space in which it will fall?
"Once the rockets go up,
Who cares where they come down?
That's not my department"
Says Wernher von Braun!
We moved them... gave them new identities... gave them good jobs... and plenty of FREEDOM to do what they want. It is now 2019 and I have been told this country has new owners.
thanks for telling us everything we already knew... just goes to show if you copy enuff...you learn nuthing
Let's just give the man his props,are we putting the great grand children of american slave owners in jail? Von braun was the man actually the best in that field, because of him we have satellite communication which is everything and i mean everything,if all the satellites stop working at once the world would stop within 24 hours and humans would start dying within a week,so let's not down play the importance of the space program..
Great job hank
I find it fascinating!! How some American citizens frowned upon a true naturalized American Patriot!! Mr Wernher Von Braun. What more can you ask of a man.. he made it a point to turn himself into the Americans after the war,,
He gave us a lot
What's interesting to know is that the previous height record was held by german Paris canons.
I forgot where on the map but somewhere in Europe I found a town called Von Braun
i think Von Braun's charcater can be summed up in his most famous qoute, apoun seeing the launch of the V-2 rockect he reportatly said “The rocket worked perfectly except for landing on the wrong planet.”
Could be admired for his contributions to rocketry but at the end of the day he willingly became part of a murderous idealogy whether because he also believed in it or to selfishly save himself shows a true lack of moral integrity and being a member of the SS knowingly witnessed and was a party to the atrocities commited makes him someone of weak character at best and a premeditated murderer at worst....either way idolizing the morally corrupt makes you a lowlife as well
SciShow, I love your videos, and I especially love that fact that you use the metric system regularly, however I was disappointed that this video gave thrust in Kilograms and not Newtons. Whilst I assume you did this to make it a bit easier for people who aren't as familiar with metric, substituting pounds for kilograms isn't scientifically valid in this instance and I could see it causing confusion. What viewers (and the general public for that matter) may not realise is that pounds are either pounds-mass or pounds-force (usually pounds-force) whilst kilograms is only ever a unit of mass. Perhaps measuring in newtons and providing an explanation of "enough to lift x kilograms) either verbally or on-screen text would work. That said, still a great video.
I was kinda scared of what the comments would be like after this video.
(Please ignore this and continue the amazingly constructive comments. I just wanted to point out how incredible these comments are.)