Customer Reviews

Wernher von Braun: The Man Who Sold the Moon

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BIASED - That is, unbalanced research by a man who could easily have gone to some firsthand sources but who evidently reached his conclusions before he even bagan his study, then stuck to those conclusions, with all the skill of a lawyer deciding which evidence to select and exclude, in order to show us only one half of a man's face. We are then left to judge, from that half-portrait, the full measure of the man. Granted: von Braun aimed for the stars and sometimes hit London, but he was by every account I know a timid and at times frightened man who was far, far from being a devoted believer in nazism. The historian Walter Lord (who worked for the OSS during World War II) found no similarities between the captured von Braun and Hitler's architect Speers, (the latter spoke loudly and with great charisma about being "the repentant nazi" but the remorse was, according to Lord, all pretense). Sir Arthur C. Clarke had known von Braun before the war and they remained very close friends after the war, right up to the time of the rocket pioneer's death. George Zebrowski and I asked Arthur, some two years ago, about von Braun's knowledge of slave labor at the rocket factory. Arthur said von Braun had told him: "I knew there were bad things happening... prison laborers... slave labor... hangings. I knew some things, and I knew that I could have made an effort to learn more. But I was not brave enough to learn more. If I would have learned more, I would then have felt morally obligated to speak out, again, and try to do something about it. And then I would have very quickly become just another corpse. So I looked away... I looked away." These words echo the lament of Charles Victor Groves in his letters to Walter Lord, describing another cold night in another time and place - but the questions remain the same: What would we have done, in their place? How much does darkness weigh?

Don't be fooled by the title and outline. While being sold as a biography, this book's place is in "tabloid investigative report"/"war crimes" category.

It is not a biography of Wernher von Braun "per se", neither is it the history of rocket development under his supervision. Rather it is a highly emotional attempt to prove that:

1) Wernher von Braun was a war criminal

2) he should have been put under trial, sentenced and serve the sentence

3) United States did wrong by bringing him in and using his skills and genius for US rocket program Period

The book presumably covers 30 years span from 1945 (von Braun arrival to US) to 1975 (his death). The developments of rocketry in this era are only a background for the author and never paid any serious attention. Mr. Pinzkiewicz 's real interest and effort are invested into collecting and presenting accusations against von Braun Nazi past in chronological order. The technical details of particular important developments of principal space programs are scarce, while "dirty clothes" and cover-up theories are inspected at length and with great interest.

The whole story of Moonship project from 1960 President Eisenhower directive to Apollo 11 landing in 1969 is covered in 9 pages(!). Wernher von Braun's one-time interchange with a French newspaper concerning his Nazi past takes 3 pages. Compare - 9 years of hard and complex work in 9 pages. Several days and several letters - 3 pages.

Even so - Mr. Pinzkiewicz seems never be able to get to any kind of consistent statement- either PRO or CONS. He never has the bravery to say "Wernher von Braun IS beyond reasonable doubt a war criminal based on this, this and that". Instead we have tabloid quality book - gossips, partial quotes, twisted interpretations - enough to plant a seed of doubt, but not substantial enough to be accused of a lie.

It is truly remarkable that in the whole book not a SINGLE document is ever quoted in full - a must for an investigative report, even trashy one.

Wernher von Braun was not an angel. His most productive years were during a cruel and controversial period of our history. If Mr. Pinzkiewicz tried to show this person as a ruthless, blood-thirsty, dishonest and manipulative individual with selfish agenda, then he fails miserably to convince me.

As I stated in the very beginning, perhaps not so bad in the category of "tabloid investigative report", but has little merit for anything else.

The book is an extremely biased account of Wernher Von Braun's life. It makes a strong effort to find "skeletons" in Von Braun's closet, but finally fails miserably in its intent. The fact that the German scientist was, during WW2, a member of the Nazi party and was commissioned by the SS shouldn't surprise anyone who knows how, in order to succeed in the military-industrial complex of Nazi Germany, these were absolutely unavoidable prerequisites. The book is a witch-hunt against the man who, more than anyone else, created modern rocketry and opened the way to space exploration. His record as an American citizen is exemplary and he was a pillar of the community where he lived. The world of science owes Wernher Von Braun a debt of gratitude. Mr Piskiewicz's bitter biography is best avoided. There are other, better biographies of Von Braun available, namely the one by Ernst Stuhlinger and Frederick Ordway, who knew and worked with the German rocketry pioneer.

Wernher von Braun (March 23 1912 - June 16 1977) is a two-sided problem for any writer. First, we know, he developed as a NASA-genius the Redstone rocket that placed Alan Shepard in suborbital flight in May 1961. Then he produced the great Saturn rockets that so successfully launched the U.S. manned flights to the Moon. But on the other hand over 5,000 of his V-2s were fired on Britain (V-2 for "Vergeltungswaffe 2", meaning "retaliation weapon 2"; a name invented by Josef Goebbels). These Nazi-rockets killed 2,724 people and badly injured 6,000. Moreover he was a major in the Nazi SS and one of Hitler's elite. Von Braun supervised the rocket's construction at the Nazis' Mittelwerk factory, which used slave labor from the nearby Dora concentration camp. In a letter to Mittelwerk's production manager, von Braun tells how he himself went to the notorious Buchenwald camp to arrange for the transport of more prisoners to Mittelwerk. At least 700 of them later died there. Survivors of the "hell of DORA" reported of burning corpse mountains, torture and for deterrence hanged prisoners at cranes. Dutch Sources report of 20.000 dead ones. Many slaves were murdered to eliminate any oral historical record of this new strange technology and the Nazi cruelties. Therefore von Braun also was a war criminal, and there must be a discussion of his culpability. The book of Dennis Piskiewicz tries to satisfy both sides of view. Not as satirical as the songwriter and verse-maker Tom Lehrer rhymed 1965 for a BBC television show: "'Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down? / That's not my department', says Wernher von Braun". Maybe there are character-similarities (and friendly helping connections) between von Braun and Hitler's architect and Minister of Armaments Albert Speer. Fragment of those ingenious conqueror characters (compare with the Howard Hughes Story THE AVIATOR) often are human abysses like success greed, triumphing and all controlling volitions (Von Braun adored Nietzsche), a drive to achieve goals at almost any price, pathological jealous (remember Eisenhower's personal dislike of the German rocket team). On the other hand: 118 German rocket scientists were brought from Hitler's Third Reich together with von Braun to the USA as part of a military operation called Project Paperclip (helping sift through the Pennemuende documents). Later on von Braun became the director of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, in Huntsville. He developed the Redstone (used for the Persian Gulf War), Jupiter-C (first satellite, Explorer), Juno and Pershing missiles; he received a mandate to build the giant Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that would propel Americans 1969 to the Moon: Armstrong, Aldrin, Collins. The above mentioned Tom Lehrer criticized: "What is it that will make it possible to spend twenty billion dollars of your money to put some clown on the moon?" Von Braun diabolically used his rhetorical abilities to set the US senate in fear of the Soviet Union; that blowed up the financing of his rocket-budgets and the Cold War hysteria as well. Once von Braun answered (with regard to the Nazi-system): it has been important, how the golden cow would be milked most successfully. Now, he didn't change his behaviour-patterns in the USA. Very ironically WvB commented: "There is just one thing I can promise you about the outer-space program - your tax-dollar will go further." Therefore it is not astonishing, that the last line of Piskiewicz's book is: "Sadly, because of his complicity with the Nazi cause, he also sold his soul to reach that goal." The rocket programs (in Germany and the United States as well) ate up scare resources that could have been better invested in other types of social responsibility and political care.

The book is not a good biography of Wernher von Braun. The autor made a highly emotional attempt to prove that von Braun was a war criminal. Don't waste your precious money!

I really liked this book. It was well read, well researched. I don't see it as having a bias, but a point, and a point well taken. Taken in context, Werner von Braun was no more and no less than a German, and a product of his times. He was a leader in his field in Germany, and in America. What stands out for me is what this book says about America and, in particular, the United States Army.

This book has the most thorough documentation of Project Paperclip that I have seen yet. While presenting as balanced a perception as possible about why certain things played out the way they did, it is indeed troublesome that the high-tech space industry was balanced on the backs of slave labor from its inception, and definitely seems to be moving even further in that direction today throughout corporate America and the New World Order. This is no accident.

Nor is Werner von Braun the ultimate Evil. He was a human being who was exploited as so many are and wanted only to do his best work. Germans were raised, through their educational system, to respect and obey authority without question. This, too, is where our public education system is trying to go.

I bought the book in particular for its chapter on his work with Disney. I was not disappointed. You won't be either.

the author had a hidden agenda when he wrote this book of linking Von Braun to Nazi atrocities. That agenda clouded his ability to write a clear perspective of Von Braun's career. He brings in other historians with a similar bent and refers to their opinions when making his points. Combine with the author's poor writing style and you find a throughly unreadable biography. The only saving grace is a few bits of information that if surfaced on the US space program not found in other books.

Wernher von Braun (March 23 1912 - June 16 1977) is a two-sided problem for any writer. First, we know, he developed as a NASA-genius the Redstone rocket that placed Alan Shepard in suborbital flight in May 1961. Then he produced the great Saturn rockets that so successfully launched the U.S. manned flights to the Moon. But on the other hand over 5,000 of his V-2s were fired on Britain (V-2 for "Vergeltungswaffe 2", meaning "retaliation weapon 2"; a name invented by Josef Goebbels). These Nazi-rockets killed 2,724 people and badly injured 6,000. Moreover he was a major in the Nazi SS and one of Hitler's elite. Von Braun supervised the rocket's construction at the Nazis' Mittelwerk factory, which used slave labor from the nearby Dora concentration camp. In a letter to Mittelwerk's production manager, von Braun tells how he himself went to the notorious Buchenwald camp to arrange for the transport of more prisoners to Mittelwerk. At least 700 of them later died there. Survivors of the "hell of DORA" reported of burning corpse mountains, torture and for deterrence hanged prisoners at cranes. Dutch Sources report of 20.000 dead ones. Many slaves were murdered to eliminate any oral historical record of this new strange technology and the Nazi cruelties. Therefore von Braun also was a war criminal, and there must be a discussion of his culpability. The book of Dennis Piskiewicz tries to satisfy both sides of view. Not as satirical as the songwriter and verse-maker Tom Lehrer rhymed 1965 for a BBC television show: "'Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down? / That's not my department', says Wernher von Braun". Maybe there are character-similarities (and friendly helping connections) between von Braun and Hitler's architect and Minister of Armaments Albert Speer. Fragment of those ingenious conqueror characters (compare with the Howard Hughes Story THE AVIATOR) often are human abysses like success greed, triumphing and all controlling volitions (Von Braun adored Nietzsche), a drive to achieve goals at almost any price, pathological jealous (remember Eisenhower's personal dislike of the German rocket team). On the other hand: 118 German rocket scientists were brought from Hitler's Third Reich together with von Braun to the USA as part of a military operation called Project Paperclip (helping sift through the Pennemuende documents). Later on von Braun became the director of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, in Huntsville. He developed the Redstone (used for the Persian Gulf War), Jupiter-C (first satellite, Explorer), Juno and Pershing missiles; he received a mandate to build the giant Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that would propel Americans 1969 to the Moon: Armstrong, Aldrin, Collins. The above mentioned Tom Lehrer criticized: "What is it that will make it possible to spend twenty billion dollars of your money to put some clown on the moon?" Von Braun diabolically used his rhetorical abilities to set the US senate in fear of the Soviet Union; that blowed up the financing of his rocket-budgets and the Cold War hysteria as well. Once von Braun answered (with regard to the Nazi-system): it has been important, how the golden cow would be milked most successfully. Now, he didn't change his behaviour-patterns in the USA. Very ironically WvB commented: "There is just one thing I can promise you about the outer-space program - your tax-dollar will go further." Therefore it is not astonishing, that the last line of Piskiewicz's book is: "Sadly, because of his complicity with the Nazi cause, he also sold his soul to reach that goal." The rocket programs (in Germany and the United States as well) ate up scare resources that could have been better invested in other types of social responsibility and political care.

Sadly, books like this one by Piszkiewicz are considered by many to be historically accurate. Piszkiewicz is not a historian and his attempt to hide behind psuedo-historical wording still cannot hide his obvious bias against von Braun. I wrote my MA thesis on von Braun and his Team and these men were not Nazis. Von Braun gets labeled (Neufeld for one) as an opportunist, like that is a bad thing. If I had to choose between the USSR and the USA, darn right I would go with the Americans. Thankfully, von Braun and his team did come to America and were the foundation of our booster program that led to the incredible Saturn V which landed Americans on the moon. Von Braun is a great American Hero, warts and all. There are numerous books out there much better than this shallow attempt at character assassination.

A brilliant and perfect analysis of the American period in the life of this very clever, organized,tough and "protected" man. The title suits perfectly the contents.
It is a pity the author does not cover in some detail the first six months of 1.945 in the life of this person, this would have provided a more complete analysis of the biography of this German manager (more than engineer)and a better understanding of those aspects of his American biography not yet clearly explained.
In any case it is a perfect analysis of the character.
If this analysis be extrapolated to the German period of his life it would be easy to anticipate his authentic biography. A pragmatic and egocentric character. A potentially dangerous man.
A very good book