Comments by "MRA" (@yassassin6425) on "Who Was Behind The Apollo Space Program? (Feature Documentary)" video.
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Massively inaccurate statement there.
von Braun was indeed a member of the Nazi party, but he joined simply though expedience to get support and funding for his work. He despised Hitler and all that he ideologically stood for.
He did not directly murder anyone. He had sleep-walked into a Faustian bargain—that he had worked with this regime without considering the darker implications of the Third Reich and the Nazi regime. As Technical Director at the Army Rocket Center at Peenemünde his work attracted more and more attention in higher levels. His refusal to join the party would have meant that he would have had to abandon his life's work. Of course he bears some responsibility for his own actions but in the case of concentration camp labor, there wasn’t much he could do to help. Yes, he still bears some moral responsibility for being in the middle of that situation, seeing the concentration camp labor personally, face to face but powerless to effect change. Von Braun admitted visiting the plant at Mittelwerk on many occasions, and later referred to conditions at the plant as "repulsive", but he maintained throughout his life that he never personally witnessed any deaths or beatings. By 1944 he was certainly privy to the atrocities but he denied ever having visited the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp itself - and there is no evidence that he did, where 20,000 died from illness, beatings, hangings, and appalling working conditions. Yes the slave labour was being used - more people died though this that the actual V2 itself, but contrary to your claim, he never murdered anyone. The slave labour you refer to was not at his behest or choosing and he certainly didn't preside over it as you imply.
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