Thread by @shawnchauhan1

The man who put Americans on the Moon was a Nazi SS officer.

He killed 20,000 slave labor to build the infamous V-2 rockets that later terrorized London.

Meet Wernher von Braun: Nazi mass murderer turned American hero and the dark secret NASA doesn't want you to know 🧵

In 1945, as Germany fell, the US launched Operation Paperclip - a covert program to recruit Nazi scientists before the Soviets could get them.

Over 1,600 German experts were brought to America.

Many were war criminals. All had their records "sanitized."

Von Braun wasn't just any Nazi scientist. He was SS-Sturmbannführer von Braun.

He developed the V-2 rocket that terrorized London, killing 9,000 civilians.

The rockets were built at Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp using slave labor from Buchenwald.

At least 20,000 prisoners died building von Braun's rockets, more than were killed by the rockets themselves.

Survivors reported that von Braun personally visited the underground factories and handpicked skilled prisoners from the concentration camps.

When Germany surrendered, von Braun didn't flee or hide.

He calculated his next move.

He surrendered to Americans with 118 of his team and a train full of rocket blueprints, knowing the US needed his expertise more than justice for his crimes.

The US government knew exactly who they were hiring.

Internal memos called von Braun "a security threat" and noted his "Nazi beliefs."

But Cold War priorities trumped moral concerns.

The Soviets were recruiting German scientists too.

By 1950, von Braun was in Huntsville, Alabama, developing missiles for the US Army.

His Nazi past? Buried in classified files. His war crimes? Never prosecuted.

His new image? All-American rocket pioneer and Disney consultant.

In 1960, von Braun became NASA's first Marshall Space Flight Center director.

The same hands that built weapons of terror now designed the Saturn V rocket.

The same mind that engineered mass death now planned humanity's greatest journey.

July 20, 1969: Neil Armstrong steps onto the Moon.

The world celebrates. Von Braun becomes a hero. TIME magazine features him on covers. Disney makes him a household name.

Nobody mentions the bodies buried beneath the launchpad.

Von Braun wasn't alone. His Paperclip colleagues built NASA's foundation:

Kurt Debus (Kennedy Space Center director) Arthur Rudolph (Saturn V chief engineer) Hubertus Strughold (space medicine pioneer)

All former Nazis. All essential to Apollo's success.

The moral cost was staggering, but so were the results.

Operation Paperclip gave America decisive advantages in the Space Race.

The Apollo program succeeded largely due to Nazi expertise.

$10 billion in patents and processes transferred to US control.

Some Paperclip scientists eventually faced consequences, decades later.

Arthur Rudolph was stripped of US citizenship in 1984 for war crimes.

He fled to Germany rather than face trial.

But most, like von Braun, lived as respected Americans until death.

The ultimate question haunts NASA's legacy: Was it worth it?

Did landing on the Moon justify employing mass murderers? Did beating the Soviets excuse betraying Holocaust victims?

There's no clean answer. Only the cold calculus of power.

Today, NASA celebrates Apollo as humanity's finest achievement.

The sanitized story omits the concentration camps, the slave labor, the 20,000 dead.

It's easier to worship heroes than confront the darkness that launched us to the stars.

I’m Shawn, a Generative AI Consultant passionate about building AI-driven solutions.

I write about AI, startups, and the future of work.

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