Von Braun: Dreamer of Space, Engineer of War (review)

In Von Braun: Dreamer of Space, Engineer of War, Michael Neufeld undertook the self-imposed yet daunting task of coming to terms with the personal history of one of space history’s most complex characters. As one of the leading engineers responsible for the design and production of Germany’s V-2 rocket during World War II and then the lead rocket engineer of NASA’s space program and the Apollo program, Wernher von Braun is recognized by historians and the general American public alike as the face of NASA—aside from the astronauts—during the space race. In this biography, Neufeld portrays von Braun not just as an “‘indisputable genius’ for his management of huge military-industrial projects,” but also as “a twentieth-century Faust” (pp. 476–77).

There are plenty of books about von Braun himself or about him and his team of rocket engineers in the decades following World War II: see Erik Bergaust’s Wernher von Braun (1976); Frederick I. Ordway and Mitchell R. Sharpe’s The Rocket Team (1979); Dennis Piszkiewicz’s Wernher von Braun: The Man Who Sold the Moon (1998); and Bob Ward’s The Life of Wernher von Braun (2005) as a beginning. What Neufeld brings to the historiography is a deeply researched story of von Braun’s early life. Neufeld explores the man’s family background, particularly the influences of his mother on his scientific aspirations—she insisted that he be given a telescope when he was thirteen—and of his father on his political perspectives. Von Braun’s parents both came from the aristocratic Junker elite. His father, Magnus Freiherr (Baron) von Braun was a civil servant under Kaiser Wilhelm II. In terms of political leanings, Neufeld argues that “von Braun’s essential nature [was one] obsessed with space and indifferent to party politics but comfortable with his father’s values” (p. 55).

Unsurprisingly, the bulk of Von Braun (chapters 3–17) deals with the early rocket years in Germany through to the success of the Apollo 11 moon mission. Neufeld points out that serendipity was partly responsible for the rise of von Braun as one of the most recognizable rocket engineers in history. When the amateur rocket club that had been the home of von Braun’s early work faced financial collapse, Col. Karl Becker from the Army Ordnance’s ballistics division threw his support behind rocket development that led ultimately to von Braun’s team building its R&D laboratory at Peenemünde in northern Germany and creating the V-2. Guiding that team, then heading the development of the Saturn V rocket in Huntsville, Alabama, was, argues Neufeld, von Braun’s true calling: “the efforts of the growing corps of scientists, engineers, and technicians . . . would have been wasted but for von Braun’s superb technical leadership” (p. 89). Opportunity combined with great know-how made history’s image of von Braun possible.

While this book will not always appeal to von Braun’s champions and admirers because of its honesty, it does largely demystify the man behind the rocket. Throughout, Neufeld brings the discussion back to questions about von Braun’s commitment to the Nazi Party in Germany and his knowledge and complicity in the use of slave labor to build V-2 rockets for the war effort. As for von Braun’s politics, Neufeld asks, “Could Wernher von Braun really have been as apolitical and naive as he presents himself?” To his own question, he writes, “The answer is a qualified yes,” pointing to such evidence as von Braun’s close friendships with Klaus Riedel (“a true liberal”) and Arthur Rudolph, a dedicated Nazi, to argue that von Braun seemed ignorant of the perceived political meaning of either relationship (pp. 55, 76). It is clear that von Braun’s push to advance rocket technology in 1930s Germany and in cold-war America came from passion for space travel irrespective of the political or military gains. Throughout the book Neufeld...