People seem to make such a fuss over the *secret* operation Paper Clip when it was no secret at the time. Not really. Back in the early '60s my father, who worked on the Apollo project, would joke about it, calling it "Share an office with a Nazi." For some reason my dad, a Jew, found that notion hilarious. But he did end up sharing an office with a German engineer who came over to the States on Paper Clip, and the two got on famously. And his officemate was no Nazi.
@@murdog62 could you or I just walk into the Apollo areas?? Countries knew we wanted to get to the moon, but it's not like the engineers and works were saying "Did you know I work with Nazis" and "we didn't worry about pure oxygen fires so we never thought of it happening" they couldn't because they'd lose their clearance to top level secrets.
@@ruthlessntoothless7552 Yeah, you have a point there. And while I discussed the program with my airplane mechanic, whose father came over on Paper Clip, that was in the 2000s, not the mid 20th century.
@@BlueBaron3339 my stepdad was in the gulf and apparently "a high ranking so N so" (he never said rank or who) had a bit too much to drink and let out that he had worked in and around Argentina "getting" elderly/dying Nazis debriefed so they wouldn't take information to their graves. I cannot verify this story, but my stepdad didn't play around when it came to his military career so I have no reason not to believe him.
I remember watching a movie one time, it was about the space race. A man was reacting to the news that the Soviet Union had beaten the US to space. His reaction was, "They couldn't beat us to space, our Germans are better than their Germans!!!!"
Ice Station Zebra: "The Russians put our camera made by our German scientists and your film made by your German scientists into their satellite made by their German scientists."
@@markrhodes1717 Scott Beach. San Francisco based actor, comedian and DJ. Mr Beach had a late night (12 mid - 6am) classical radio program which he recorded on cassette earlier for playback at the appointed time by the station. He would record sometimes days before the program was due to be aired. It all depended on the station's engineer playing the cassettes on time and not mixing up the order. Great show.
The two "Hungarian-born scientists" were Eugene Wigner and Leo Szilard, both Jewish refugees. For a study of not only the technical development of the bomb, but a deep dive into the people who made it happen, and an excellent overview of the development of quantum mechanics and nuclear physics from about 1900 through the war years, I highly recommend Richard Rhodes' classic "The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 25th Anniversary Edition."
Yes ...they and Einstein wrote letter to Roosevelt warning about German nukes. But Dr Leonard a Nazi banned all nuclear physics as "non Aryan Jewish nonsense".... 😂
Yes, the list of key people who made or advanced the development of the bomb is filled with folks who had to flee for their lives from Europe. Even Fermi whose wife was Jewish. An object lesson in bigotry as not just a bad idea, but perhaps the worst. On so many levels.
@@BlueBaron3339 Not only a bad idea, but one that can kill you. I've always thought that evil is self-limiting; the mechanisms may vary, but evil always carries the seeds of its own destruction. It's just a question of how much damage it does before it's stopped.
@@rabbi120348 That last sentence ruined a noble and acutely truthful statement. But I do take your intent very positively. Of all things I think one most needs to beware Hubris. Reconsider, for yourself, the idea such mechanisms have ever been, even today, "stopped", whether they in fact really can be entirely, and whether changes in forms and fashion are actually effective changes in the basic nature of a thing. I applaud the force of your first sentence wholeheartedly. Societies often seem to live or die by more kinds of selection than 'natural'.
We lived near Huntsville, AL for many years. A story was told that Von Braun, not wanting to waste time mowing his lawn, had it paved in concrete and painted green. Don’t know if that is a true story or not, but it was local legend. My son’s high school german language teacher’s father worked with Von Braun during the war. She recalled as a child meeting Hitler.
I could not find reference to that. This current picture shows grass at that house. www.theredstonerocket.com/news/article_e83fb8f4-1bb2-11ec-aa2c-978461564317.html
Thanks. That was enjoyable. It not only showed the mirror image of Operation Paperclip but demonstrated why the USSR didn't make it to the moon. Science thrives when there's free flowing idea exchange. The Germans that the USSR took were isolated and, as you point out in the video, by 1951 were no longer useful. Their primary purpose was to bring Soviet science up to the German standards of 1944. Once that had been achieved, the USSR kept up its policy of isolating scientists -- especially from other disciplines. That crippled the stunted Soviet computer industry. Tantalum capacitors were an important nuclear weapon component for implosion-type fission bombs because tantalum capacitors possessed rapid discharge characteristics--now modern microchips and integrated circuit boards (obsolete terms, I know) mimic tantalum capacitor speeds with greater precision. Electronics in rocketry, atomic weapons, and aviation were developed in isolation from the rest of the electronics world and resources (time, especially) were expended in reinventing the wheel. Suggestion for a new video--Czechoslovakia was the source of much Soviet uranium from the time of Czech annexation by the USSR. The role of Czechoslovakia in the Soviet atomic bomb program would make for an interesting story.
@@churblefurbles Which came first? The rich chicken or the poor egg? Everything was invented in Russia and don't you forget that! "I did it first!" "Yes, and I did it right!"
I knew the Russians had gathered up a large crew of German Scientists and Engineers, but never knew any real details. Thanks for your information packed video.
I heard a story after WW2 people in Germany complain, "the US took our first class scientists and engineers, the Soviets took our second class scientists and engineers, and we are now stuck with our third class scientists and engineers!"
A similar thing happened with the Japanese chemical and biological research establishment in Manchuria Unit 731. Japanese personnel weren't prosecuted in exchange for research information even though their tests involve live allied prisoners.
Not all Germans were returned. At least one I know lived in Russia with his family until his death in the 70s. He never applied for Russian citizenship. His son served in the red army and attended university in Moscow. Eventually the KGB grabbed the son because he was not a russian citizen but was working in the defence industry. Eventually the son with the help of Austria he was able to leave. Eventually he came to America which is where I meet him. There were many things that happened through all this but without asking him for permission to tell his story this is all I will say.
@@samsignorelli An Englishman, a Frenchman and a Russian are looking at a painting of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The Englishman says, "They're having a proper garden party -- they must be English!" The Frenchman says, "Two people in nature, naked and in love -- they must be French!" The Russian says, "No clothes, no shoes, one apple to eat between them, and they think it is Paradise -- Russian!"
My father was a US solder in Berlin in 1946. The West Germans that worked in East Germany were grabbed when they went to work in the morning. No phone calls you just disappeared.
I watch every day. I learn so much that I've either forgotten or never learned while in school. thank you for this. Oh and today I saw you pretty cat .. How old is she? My Woody is 16 years old. hoping to get a year or two more if his youthful actions and looks are an indentation...
This reminds me of one of my favorite lines from the movie, Ice Station Zebra: "The Russians put our camera made by our German scientists and your film made by your German scientists into their satellite made by their German scientists and thus up it went..."
There was nothing German left in Russia after what Germany did to its people (beside Russian Germans who had nothing to do with the 3rd Reich and its atrocities). All German things won by Russia became Russian - scientists, technologies, cities - as deserved.
I've been interested in world war II since I was a kid and I remember when I was in church one day I approached a well-known member of the congregation hearing that he fought in the war and I asked him what he did. His response was underseboat. I wish I had a chance to respond now that I'm older but as a kid you're in a church facing eye to eye with a Nazi it was very intimidating I think he was a good guy just got caught up in the war and he liked submarines I guess. It really tears me apart the volume of information I could have learned if I had talked to him more.
I also knew a U boat sailor back in the 80.s. He was a huge fan of Hogan’s Hero’s, but he said that his father was appalled and totally insulted by the program.
@@BlueBaron3339 IIRC, you had to be a person of some importance/influence before being "invited" to join the Nazi Party. It was an exclusive club and not open to the average German, whether they were civilian or military.
Plenty of Germans were not Nazis, and plenty of Germans openly opposed, and worked against the Nazi party, and you know what, rarely did those people wind up in the NAZI military, fighting under direct Nazi subordination, and killing people in cold blood.
I remember reading about the Soviet's building exact copies of aircraft factories, research and even house's and then transferring the Germans to the "New" location to work and live.
My cousin is still outside Murmansk on the Lapwing..convoy escort that nearly got there..don't let any Russian say they won their "Great Patriotic War" without help.......As a commercial Diver.. years ago..full of it..bragging...in local club with beers on board,an old neibour commented "I've pi55ed more salt water than you've been in"...(Royal navy..Russian convoys)..certainly slapped me down..RIP. These Hero's..Navy and especially Merchant Seamen.
We used some help but it's our Great Patriotic War and don't you dare belittle the tragedy you and your pampered ancestors know nothing about. The USA profitted enormously from this war watching its "enemies" destroying each other.
A lot of the German scientists we got turned out to be ditherers in gadgets or fields that weren't of much interest. The bigger get was this: We had them and the Soviets didn't.
To be fair, native Russian engineers were not treated much better by the Bolsheviks. One of their best aircraft designers, Andrei Tupolev, did some of his most important work while imprisoned in a gulag.
These are Soviets... they are the same people who need an OGPU, a Cheka, an NKVD, a KGB, a Yezhov, a Beria, Commissars, Gulags, and a Lyublanka Prison basement execution chamber... just to keep their own people from having an original thought. So no, they had good relations with no one. Except the Stasi.
One of my favorite bits of dialog from The Right Stuff is when they’re reacting to Sputnik and see film of the Soviet German Scientists: LBJ: Was it them? Was it their Germans who got them there ahead of us? Von Braun: No, no it was not Senator. Our Germans are better than their Germans.
My grandparents knew Von Braun and they said he was very happy living in the United States. He was treated well and in a friendly non condisending way. According to my grandparents he happily worked with his fellow American scientists because they both had the same hated enemies. Communism and the Soviet Union.
But more importantly, Von Braun was finally able to pursue his real dream: spaceflight. That's why he was critical for the development of the Saturn 1, 1B and V rockets.
Communism Won Socialism always leads to communism. The Nazis were commies too just not in name yet just like the Russians were socialist until they weren't Start learning, stop worshipping
I really enjoy your posts. An Austrian scientist Paul Rosbaud was in East Berlin at the end of the War. The Russians wanted to snatch him. His girlfriend Ruth Lange, however, was the sister of the Justice Minister Hilde Lange. Rote Hilde intervened to allow Rosbaud to escape to the West. If you have any insight about this, I would appreciate your take. Rosbaud published Otto Hahn's report about the splitting of the atom and helped Lise Meitner escape to Sweden.
Yeah we didn't really care about their past as long as they can help us with that rocket technology. Also we wanted to learn tactics from the Gestapo. But we also gave a pass to the Japanese Commander if Unit 731. All about getting that biological warfare information.
I mean yeah, the US did the same thing lol. Pretty sure they charged Unit 731 with war crimes and such, but also let some of the go in exchange for their research information. German scientists helped with the Manhattan project too.
We did not use any captured German scientists or former Nazis on the Manhattan project. Paperclip came too late for that, and the US was far ahead of the German effort anyway. There were several German scientists, including Albert Einstein, who participated on the project who were refugees who had fled the Nazis prior to the war. Interesting among those was Klaus Fuchs, who spied on the project for the Soviets.
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel Ohhh my bad for the misinformation, and thanks for correcting me. I don’t have a source I just always heard we did use them. Wasn’t Einstein completely against the atom bomb though? I thought he had helped in some minor part and then left. I’ve been told he believed detonating the bomb would destroy the earth
I often wondered whatever happened to those poor guys that were whisked off to the Soviet Union. 🤷🤔 They certainly had their share of disappointment for where their careers took them.
Churchill said, " We slaughtered the wrong pig". Tell me you geniuses, how could such a small country almost win a three-front war? At some point, truths will have to be spoken.
The letter you mention in your opening to the episode "The Soviet's Germain Scientists: Osoaviakhim" was not from two Hungarian scientists but rather from Albert Einstein. Three Hungarian-born physicists, Leo Szilard, Edward Teller, and Eugene Wigner, drafted the letter. Szilard and Teller (I believe) hand delivered the draft to Einstein, who, although a pacifist, recognized the danger of a Nazi bomb. He signed it and the rest is history.
The letter was written by Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner, who enlisted Einstein to sign the letter as it would be more likely to get the appropriate attention. The explanation from all parties was that Szilard dictated the letter in German, Wigner wrote it down and Einstein signed it.
A guy in my synagogue heard me discussing Wigner and told me that his great-aunt was Wigner's first wife, whom he always called the love of his life. They were only married a short time, less than 2 years, before she died of breast cancer. This fellow's family was from Madison (I live in Milwaukee, 90 mi away) and I believe they met when Wigner was at UW. Had she lived and they stayed in Madison, who knows how that might have affected history.
Nicely done video on a little-known subject, sir. :) I do have a question, though: if the Nazis had suddenly grown so inept at research and development of atomic research after 1938...then why the "gold rush" by both the Americans and the Soviets to scoop up all of those 'inept' scientists in the closing days of the war? If they'd gotten their bomb research so wrong, why expend so many resources ("thousands of troops" , 97 railcars, etc.) to scoop them all up in 24 hours? The simple answer: the Nazis weren't that inept...at all. And that's the "History that Everyone Wants to be Forgotten", to make a play on the title of this channel.
If you're getting any Cameo appearances I would definitely like to know where so that I can see them. Anyone that the history guy deems worthy of working with I want to watch.
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel Dennis Pragers dog has become so famous he had his own book published! I think you will get many e mails asking about cats from now on.
You neglected to say that the August 2 1939 letter, though written by Hungarians Szilard, Teller, and Wigner, was signed by yet another Jewish scientist - and he was famous the world over. Albert Einstein was the signatory.
He also wanted to go after the Soviet’s as soon as he realized what they wanted to do , that’s why they killed him because they knew his protests and attitude towards the Soviet would affect the us /ussr relationship and especially since the ussr owed a lot to the us from the lend lease act .
I know the French and the British benefited from the small arms programs of the post war reparations, but does anyone know if they welcomed/used German scientists in other fields after the war?
Great video on an interesting subject. Choice of the used stock footage felt off in places trough not matching the narrative (pre-war Berlin street scenes when talking about post-war Berlin and such).
I've always wondered why you have a picture of the Flatiron Building in your backdrop wall. Why is it there? There's no link to Flatiron in a search. WTF? By the way, I love your videos. And your cat.
Another great German engineer who was kidnapped and forced to work in Russia was Hugo Schmeisser the great firearms designer.. He was given an assistant named Mikhail Kalashnikov who had been a Soviet tank driver. HS designed the German MP44 the first fully automatic rifle that shot a shortened mid length rifle cartridge called 8mm Kurtz, which was shortened German 8mm rifle round for less recoil. Just so happened after the two of them "worked" together for a few years the AK47 was invented by this poor Soviet tank driver, hero of the Soviet union. Most honest historians know that it was Schmeisser who invented the AK47. But as mentioned in this video the Soviets wanted everyone to think it was Russians who were the great inventors thus Schmeisser was given no credit for a gun that looked almost identical to the MP44 and used a shortened Russian caliber called 7.62x39 which of course was the shortened .30 version of the German 8mm Kurtz round.. Thus the AK47 should actually be called the HS47. Note too that after Schmeisser died in the 1950's that Kalashnikov invented no new operating systems for firearms,after Hugo left him just firearms all based on the AK47 operating system which says it all right there. Also bare in mind that the Soviet jet and rocket edge they had in the 50's died too as the old German scientists died which also is worth noting.
Know what other "Soviet" technology stagnated in the 50's? Cameras. The Carl Zeiss factory in Jena ended up in East Germany, & the Soviets packed up everything & everyone in it & took the whole shebang to Kiev, Ukraine. There, they made their version of the Contax IIa & IIIa. The Ernst Leitz plant was in West Germany, so the Russians couldn't sieze that, but they did get their mitts on the patents for the Leica & all the lenses made for it up to 1939. (These were siezed by the US military, along w/Ziess patents, & given away for free as war reparations = see Canon, Minolta, Nikon, etc.) The FED, a near-clone of the Leica IIIa, appeared, along w/Industar screw-mount lenses containing Leitz & Zeiss formulas. But whereas Leitz introduced the revolutionary bayonet-mount M3 in 1954, & Zeiss stopped making the IIa & IIIa in 1962 to concentrate on SLR's, Kiev & FED still made Contax IIa & IIIa copies & screw-mounts into the 1980's. Since the M3 & Contarex patents were filed after WW2, it was too late to plunder them. The Kievs have a much better reputation as shooters today cos they were made using the actual Zeiss dies & tools. But also, cos the workers were treated better than those at FED, cos they had the right... Contax.
Hey Lance you should do the story about the Sullivan Brothers. They were all killed on the same ship in WW2. There were 4 or 5 of them. There's a ship in Buffalo named for them.
Why would an Austrian paper issue such a Soviet-favoring news report? ( 9:50 - 10:05). Can we get a citation of which newspapers said this?...maybe a Socialist/Communist leaning publication?
Huh. Did the Brits have a similar program as well? What about Japanese scientists? I know of the American interest in Unit 731 (and how they waived that program's scientist's responsibility for crimes I personally consider worse than what Mengele did, in return for their knowledge), but did the Soviets put similar demands on Japan? Did the Kuomintang demand such reparations, too? China was by far the most affected by Japan. Actually, on the topic of Mengele, do you think he actually would have gone to trial, had he been captured? Seeing as the Americans did give amnesty to personnel of what was Japan's equivalent program in return for their medical information, could something similar have happened with Josef? Or was he too high-profile to be left alone? Actually, what WAS his profile at the end of the war? Was he known as the butcher he was, or just another member of a camp's staff?
Both the British and French grabbed German scientists and according to the book I read on the subject as the usefulness to the big players diminished they were recruited by Egypt, Brazil and Argentina amongst others.
People seem to make such a fuss over the *secret* operation Paper Clip when it was no secret at the time. Not really. Back in the early '60s my father, who worked on the Apollo project, would joke about it, calling it "Share an office with a Nazi." For some reason my dad, a Jew, found that notion hilarious. But he did end up sharing an office with a German engineer who came over to the States on Paper Clip, and the two got on famously. And his officemate was no Nazi.
It wasn't a big secret, but your dad only knew because he worked on the Apollo... The irony 🤦🏾♂️
@@ruthlessntoothless7552 Apollo wasn't exactly secret either.
@@murdog62 could you or I just walk into the Apollo areas??
Countries knew we wanted to get to the moon, but it's not like the engineers and works were saying "Did you know I work with Nazis" and "we didn't worry about pure oxygen fires so we never thought of it happening" they couldn't because they'd lose their clearance to top level secrets.
@@ruthlessntoothless7552 Yeah, you have a point there. And while I discussed the program with my airplane mechanic, whose father came over on Paper Clip, that was in the 2000s, not the mid 20th century.
@@BlueBaron3339 my stepdad was in the gulf and apparently "a high ranking so N so" (he never said rank or who) had a bit too much to drink and let out that he had worked in and around Argentina "getting" elderly/dying Nazis debriefed so they wouldn't take information to their graves. I cannot verify this story, but my stepdad didn't play around when it came to his military career so I have no reason not to believe him.
I remember watching a movie one time, it was about the space race. A man was reacting to the news that the Soviet Union had beaten the US to space. His reaction was, "They couldn't beat us to space, our Germans are better than their Germans!!!!"
The Right Stuff (1983) - I was thinking about the same line.
@@cygnet4949
I didn't think I had ever seen that movie. I guess I have seen at least part of it....
I will confirm 'The Right Stuff' the man who says the line is the actor playing Werner Von Braun.
Ice Station Zebra: "The Russians put our camera made by our German scientists and your film made by your German scientists into their satellite made by their German scientists."
@@markrhodes1717 Scott Beach. San Francisco based actor, comedian and DJ. Mr Beach had a late night (12 mid - 6am) classical radio program which he recorded on cassette earlier for playback at the appointed time by the station. He would record sometimes days before the program was due to be aired. It all depended on the station's engineer playing the cassettes on time and not mixing up the order. Great show.
The two "Hungarian-born scientists" were Eugene Wigner and Leo Szilard, both Jewish refugees. For a study of not only the technical development of the bomb, but a deep dive into the people who made it happen, and an excellent overview of the development of quantum mechanics and nuclear physics from about 1900 through the war years, I highly recommend Richard Rhodes' classic "The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 25th Anniversary Edition."
Yes ...they and Einstein wrote letter to Roosevelt warning about German nukes.
But Dr Leonard a Nazi banned all nuclear physics as "non Aryan Jewish nonsense".... 😂
Yes, the list of key people who made or advanced the development of the bomb is filled with folks who had to flee for their lives from Europe. Even Fermi whose wife was Jewish. An object lesson in bigotry as not just a bad idea, but perhaps the worst. On so many levels.
@@BlueBaron3339 I am half German a Wagner... Ashamed of what Nazi Germany did..
@@BlueBaron3339 Not only a bad idea, but one that can kill you. I've always thought that evil is self-limiting; the mechanisms may vary, but evil always carries the seeds of its own destruction. It's just a question of how much damage it does before it's stopped.
@@rabbi120348 That last sentence ruined a noble and acutely truthful statement. But I do take your intent very positively. Of all things I think one most needs to beware Hubris. Reconsider, for yourself, the idea such mechanisms have ever been, even today, "stopped", whether they in fact really can be entirely, and whether changes in forms and fashion are actually effective changes in the basic nature of a thing. I applaud the force of your first sentence wholeheartedly. Societies often seem to live or die by more kinds of selection than 'natural'.
We lived near Huntsville, AL for many years. A story was told that Von Braun, not wanting to waste time mowing his lawn, had it paved in concrete and painted green. Don’t know if that is a true story or not, but it was local legend. My son’s high school german language teacher’s father worked with Von Braun during the war. She recalled as a child meeting Hitler.
I could not find reference to that. This current picture shows grass at that house. www.theredstonerocket.com/news/article_e83fb8f4-1bb2-11ec-aa2c-978461564317.html
My great-uncle was a colleague of Von Braun at NASA. I sat in a chair he once slept in.
"Once I shoot rocket up who cares where it comes down. / That's not mein department says Werner von Braun." Tom Lehrer
@@O-sa-car sickening... that was a leading murderer you shared a chair with.
you can say the same about many leaders who wage war - look what Churchill did to Hamburg and Dresden
My mom and dad both worked on the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos .
Mom is now 98 and still does not speak of her job there.🇺🇸
We always hear so much about Operation Paperclip and Von Braun. I always wondered what happened to the scientists that the Soviets took. Thanks!
Thanks. That was enjoyable. It not only showed the mirror image of Operation Paperclip but demonstrated why the USSR didn't make it to the moon. Science thrives when there's free flowing idea exchange. The Germans that the USSR took were isolated and, as you point out in the video, by 1951 were no longer useful. Their primary purpose was to bring Soviet science up to the German standards of 1944. Once that had been achieved, the USSR kept up its policy of isolating scientists -- especially from other disciplines. That crippled the stunted Soviet computer industry. Tantalum capacitors were an important nuclear weapon component for implosion-type fission bombs because tantalum capacitors possessed rapid discharge characteristics--now modern microchips and integrated circuit boards (obsolete terms, I know) mimic tantalum capacitor speeds with greater precision. Electronics in rocketry, atomic weapons, and aviation were developed in isolation from the rest of the electronics world and resources (time, especially) were expended in reinventing the wheel.
Suggestion for a new video--Czechoslovakia was the source of much Soviet uranium from the time of Czech annexation by the USSR. The role of Czechoslovakia in the Soviet atomic bomb program would make for an interesting story.
No, this is the same mistake as the star trek futurists, its just a matter of one society being far richer to begin with that mattered.
@@churblefurbles Which came first? The rich chicken or the poor egg? Everything was invented in Russia and don't you forget that! "I did it first!" "Yes, and I did it right!"
I knew the Russians had gathered up a large crew of German Scientists and Engineers, but never knew any real details. Thanks for your information packed video.
That's beacuse communists in Western universities and media pushed propaganda that America was evil for opperation paperclip.
How old are you and where the hell did you got school ??
I heard a story after WW2 people in Germany complain, "the US took our first class scientists and engineers, the Soviets took our second class scientists and engineers, and we are now stuck with our third class scientists and engineers!"
A similar thing happened with the Japanese chemical and biological research establishment in Manchuria Unit 731. Japanese personnel weren't prosecuted in exchange for research information even though their tests involve live allied prisoners.
Not all Germans were returned. At least one I know lived in Russia with his family until his death in the 70s. He never applied for Russian citizenship. His son served in the red army and attended university in Moscow. Eventually the KGB grabbed the son because he was not a russian citizen but was working in the defence industry. Eventually the son with the help of Austria he was able to leave. Eventually he came to America which is where I meet him.
There were many things that happened through all this but without asking him for permission to tell his story this is all I will say.
Loved seeing The History Cat again!
Good to see HC make an appearance! 😻
Thank you for this (and all your sharing of History). Definitely little that has been put out there on Osoaviakhim.
very interesting..this is exactly what I was looking for😊
12:05 That explains why Chekov was always claiming something was "inwented" in Russia.
And the Garden of Eden was just outside of Moscow.
@@samsignorelli An Englishman, a Frenchman and a Russian are looking at a painting of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
The Englishman says, "They're having a proper garden party -- they must be English!"
The Frenchman says, "Two people in nature, naked and in love -- they must be French!"
The Russian says, "No clothes, no shoes, one apple to eat between them, and they think it is Paradise -- Russian!"
My father was a US solder in Berlin in 1946. The West Germans that worked in East Germany were grabbed when they went to work in the morning. No phone calls you just disappeared.
I watch every day. I learn so much that I've either forgotten or never learned while in school.
thank you for this.
Oh and today I saw you pretty cat .. How old is she? My Woody is 16 years old. hoping to get a year or two more if his youthful actions and looks are an indentation...
Strudel is 16 months.
This reminds me of one of my favorite lines from the movie, Ice Station Zebra:
"The Russians put our camera made by our German scientists and your film made by your German scientists into their satellite made by their German scientists and thus up it went..."
"Ice Station Zebra" Just what I thought! Was gonna post it but you beat me to it.
There was nothing German left in Russia after what Germany did to its people (beside Russian Germans who had nothing to do with the 3rd Reich and its atrocities). All German things won by Russia became Russian - scientists, technologies, cities - as deserved.
Thanks for posting this little-discussed topic.
The history guy is our cat man. I always enjoy seeing the kitty in video assisting with research and discussion. This is a good thing
"Intellectual Reparations" is actually a pretty good label for it.
I've been interested in world war II since I was a kid and I remember when I was in church one day I approached a well-known member of the congregation hearing that he fought in the war and I asked him what he did. His response was underseboat. I wish I had a chance to respond now that I'm older but as a kid you're in a church facing eye to eye with a Nazi it was very intimidating I think he was a good guy just got caught up in the war and he liked submarines I guess. It really tears me apart the volume of information I could have learned if I had talked to him more.
If he served aboard a U-boot, he was one of the lucky survivors. About 75% of their crews were killed in action during the war.
I also knew a U boat sailor back in the 80.s. He was a huge fan of Hogan’s Hero’s, but he said that his father was appalled and totally insulted by the program.
You didn't have to be a Nazi to serve in the Kriegsmarine. Few were. Same for the Luftwaffe.
@@BlueBaron3339 IIRC, you had to be a person of some importance/influence before being "invited" to join the Nazi Party. It was an exclusive club and not open to the average German, whether they were civilian or military.
Plenty of Germans were not Nazis, and plenty of Germans openly opposed, and worked against the Nazi party, and you know what, rarely did those people wind up in the NAZI military, fighting under direct Nazi subordination, and killing people in cold blood.
OMG HISTORY CAT!!!
Fantastic research
That is a
Cat
That deserves to be
Remembered.
Ah, so that’s why Mr. Chekov keeps insisting Scotch was inwented by a little old lady in Leningrad…
I remember reading about the Soviet's building exact copies of aircraft factories, research and even house's and then transferring the Germans to the "New" location to work and live.
Thank you for the lesson.
My cousin is still outside Murmansk on the Lapwing..convoy escort that nearly got there..don't let any Russian say they won their "Great Patriotic War" without help.......As a commercial Diver.. years ago..full of it..bragging...in local club with beers on board,an old neibour commented "I've pi55ed more salt water than you've been in"...(Royal navy..Russian convoys)..certainly slapped me down..RIP. These Hero's..Navy and especially Merchant Seamen.
We used some help but it's our Great Patriotic War and don't you dare belittle the tragedy you and your pampered ancestors know nothing about. The USA profitted enormously from this war watching its "enemies" destroying each other.
Great video! The more you learn about the Soviets, the more you scratch your head in confused amazement.
Another great episode.
A lot of the German scientists we got turned out to be ditherers in gadgets or fields that weren't of much interest. The bigger get was this: We had them and the Soviets didn't.
Always interesting!
I would guess that the relationship between the Soviets and their scientists was not the same as with the US.
To be fair, native Russian engineers were not treated much better by the Bolsheviks. One of their best aircraft designers, Andrei Tupolev, did some of his most important work while imprisoned in a gulag.
These are Soviets... they are the same people who need an OGPU, a Cheka, an NKVD, a KGB, a Yezhov, a Beria, Commissars, Gulags, and a Lyublanka Prison basement execution chamber...
just to keep their own people from having an original thought. So no, they had good relations with no one.
Except the Stasi.
thanks for the apperance of History Cat
One of my favorite bits of dialog from The Right Stuff is when they’re reacting to Sputnik and see film of the Soviet German Scientists:
LBJ: Was it them? Was it their Germans who got them there ahead of us?
Von Braun: No, no it was not Senator. Our Germans are better than their Germans.
my grandfather said the Cold War was largely "our Germans are better than your Germans"
My grandparents knew Von Braun and they said he was very happy living in the United States. He was treated well and in a friendly non condisending way. According to my grandparents he happily worked with his fellow American scientists because they both had the same hated enemies. Communism and the Soviet Union.
But more importantly, Von Braun was finally able to pursue his real dream: spaceflight. That's why he was critical for the development of the Saturn 1, 1B and V rockets.
Communism Won
Socialism always leads to communism.
The Nazis were commies too just not in name yet just like the Russians were socialist until they weren't
Start learning, stop worshipping
Truth of the matter is, postwar USA and prewar Germany were fighting the same enemy.
I really enjoy your posts. An Austrian scientist Paul Rosbaud was in East Berlin at the end of the War. The Russians wanted to snatch him. His girlfriend Ruth Lange, however, was the sister of the Justice Minister Hilde Lange. Rote Hilde intervened to allow Rosbaud to escape to the West. If you have any insight about this, I would appreciate your take. Rosbaud published Otto Hahn's report about the splitting of the atom and helped Lise Meitner escape to Sweden.
Yeah we didn't really care about their past as long as they can help us with that rocket technology. Also we wanted to learn tactics from the Gestapo. But we also gave a pass to the Japanese Commander if Unit 731. All about getting that biological warfare information.
I mean yeah, the US did the same thing lol. Pretty sure they charged Unit 731 with war crimes and such, but also let some of the go in exchange for their research information.
German scientists helped with the Manhattan project too.
We did not use any captured German scientists or former Nazis on the Manhattan project. Paperclip came too late for that, and the US was far ahead of the German effort anyway. There were several German scientists, including Albert Einstein, who participated on the project who were refugees who had fled the Nazis prior to the war. Interesting among those was Klaus Fuchs, who spied on the project for the Soviets.
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel I'm talking about the scientists that worked on the V1 and V2 Rockets.
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel Ohhh my bad for the misinformation, and thanks for correcting me. I don’t have a source I just always heard we did use them.
Wasn’t Einstein completely against the atom bomb though? I thought he had helped in some minor part and then left.
I’ve been told he believed detonating the bomb would destroy the earth
The Japanese in general got a pass very few trials considering the amount of atrocities committed across the Pacific China Philippines etc
I often wondered whatever happened to those poor guys that were whisked off to the Soviet Union. 🤷🤔 They certainly had their share of disappointment for where their careers took them.
Excellent video. RS
Like Dr. Von Braun in the movie The Right Stuff said: our Germans are better than their Germans. I love that line! It's so nonchalant yet true. 👍
Dr. Von Braun didn't say that, the movie script writer did...
In times of war, ethics fall silent...
"recruitment" nice wordplay
Yes when we crashed a Horton fighter in Roswell NM , were the Horton’s worked aeria 51
Love the History Guy kitty visits
Intellectual reparations 🤔
Fascinating concept
💜🙏⚡️
THANKS Mr.THG🎀Ans nice hair cut....Shoe🇺🇸
Churchill said, " We slaughtered the wrong pig". Tell me you geniuses, how could such a small country almost win a three-front war? At some point, truths will have to be spoken.
five fronts
Germans had a lot of allies
I'd like to see the First Wagon Train to California. The Bartleson-Bidwell party and the life of John Bidwell and Capitain John Bartleson.
Cool History Cat!
I want to see a film made about the Osoaviakhim.
You might want to have a read of Sudoplatov's book "Special Tasks."
PAPER CLIP: People against people ever re-enlisting, civilian life incentive program.
That really got the khaki klad klowns wound up on my boat.
The letter you mention in your opening to the episode "The Soviet's Germain Scientists: Osoaviakhim" was not from two Hungarian scientists but rather from Albert Einstein. Three Hungarian-born physicists, Leo Szilard, Edward Teller, and Eugene Wigner, drafted the letter. Szilard and Teller (I believe) hand delivered the draft to Einstein, who, although a pacifist, recognized the danger of a Nazi bomb. He signed it and the rest is history.
The letter was written by Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner, who enlisted Einstein to sign the letter as it would be more likely to get the appropriate attention. The explanation from all parties was that Szilard dictated the letter in German, Wigner wrote it down and Einstein signed it.
A guy in my synagogue heard me discussing Wigner and told me that his great-aunt was Wigner's first wife, whom he always called the love of his life. They were only married a short time, less than 2 years, before she died of breast cancer. This fellow's family was from Madison (I live in Milwaukee, 90 mi away) and I believe they met when Wigner was at UW. Had she lived and they stayed in Madison, who knows how that might have affected history.
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel Thank you. I almost tried to answer that myself, but you've done a better job than I could have. :)
Great video.
Hello History Cat! ❤️
Let's hear it.
thanks
Nicely done video on a little-known subject, sir. :)
I do have a question, though: if the Nazis had suddenly grown so inept at research and development of atomic research after 1938...then why the "gold rush" by both the Americans and the Soviets to scoop up all of those 'inept' scientists in the closing days of the war? If they'd gotten their bomb research so wrong, why expend so many resources ("thousands of troops" , 97 railcars, etc.) to scoop them all up in 24 hours?
The simple answer: the Nazis weren't that inept...at all.
And that's the "History that Everyone Wants to be Forgotten", to make a play on the title of this channel.
If you're getting any Cameo appearances I would definitely like to know where so that I can see them. Anyone that the history guy deems worthy of working with I want to watch.
Very informative ..... hope he does one on Operation Paperclip . .... and hope more cats paw views.....
Man. Never heard of this. V interesting
Bill Nye only plays like he's the Guy.
Youda Guy!
Nice cat 😸🐾 History is cool 🕶️
What's with holding the cat?
I have cats, they decide when they want to be held.
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel Dennis Pragers dog has become so famous he had his own book published!
I think you will get many e mails asking about cats from now on.
He is secretly SPECTRE.
@@shawnr771 Good one!
You neglected to say that the August 2 1939 letter, though written by Hungarians Szilard, Teller, and Wigner, was signed by yet another Jewish scientist - and he was famous the world over. Albert Einstein was the signatory.
“I believe we have defeated the wrong enemy.” General George Patton in ref to USSR
He was talking about nazi Germany
He also wanted to go after the Soviet’s as soon as he realized what they wanted to do , that’s why they killed him because they knew his protests and attitude towards the Soviet would affect the us /ussr relationship and especially since the ussr owed a lot to the us from the lend lease act .
Patton was a peice of shit. I don't think he's someone to hold on a pedestal.
I know the French and the British benefited from the small arms programs of the post war reparations, but does anyone know if they welcomed/used German scientists in other fields after the war?
Your lovely cat is very patient 🐈
As my Dad use to say during the space race, "Our German scientists are better than your German scientists."
Great video on an interesting subject. Choice of the used stock footage felt off in places trough not matching the narrative (pre-war Berlin street scenes when talking about post-war Berlin and such).
I always wanted to know about the German scientists that Russia got you always hear about paperclip and their scientists ...so thanks for this video
You volunteer to work in Soviet union.
(Nudges with the barrel of a ppsh41)
..well since you put it that way.
Back in the Saddle Again Naturally
@John Chorny Form of a 3 toed Sloth 🦥 Shape of an ICE 🧊BERG!
@John Chorny Form of..a puddle of water 💦
@John Chorny Reading 📚 Rainbow 🌈!
Strudel is pAwesome, @The History Guy!
What's up with the cars at 4.43.
I've always wondered why you have a picture of the Flatiron Building in your backdrop wall. Why is it there? There's no link to Flatiron in a search. WTF? By the way, I love your videos. And your cat.
Another great German engineer who was kidnapped and forced to work in Russia was Hugo Schmeisser the great firearms designer.. He was given an assistant named Mikhail Kalashnikov who had been a Soviet tank driver. HS designed the German MP44 the first fully automatic rifle that shot a shortened mid length rifle cartridge called 8mm Kurtz, which was shortened German 8mm rifle round for less recoil. Just so happened after the two of them "worked" together for a few years the AK47 was invented by this poor Soviet tank driver, hero of the Soviet union. Most honest historians know that it was Schmeisser who invented the AK47. But as mentioned in this video the Soviets wanted everyone to think it was Russians who were the great inventors thus Schmeisser was given no credit for a gun that looked almost identical to the MP44 and used a shortened Russian caliber called 7.62x39 which of course was the shortened .30 version of the German 8mm Kurtz round.. Thus the AK47 should actually be called the HS47. Note too that after Schmeisser died in the 1950's that Kalashnikov invented no new operating systems for firearms,after Hugo left him just firearms all based on the AK47 operating system which says it all right there. Also bare in mind that the Soviet jet and rocket edge they had in the 50's died too as the old German scientists died which also is worth noting.
Know what other "Soviet" technology stagnated in the 50's?
Cameras.
The Carl Zeiss factory in Jena ended up in East Germany, & the Soviets packed up everything & everyone in it & took the whole shebang to Kiev, Ukraine. There, they made their version of the Contax IIa & IIIa. The Ernst Leitz plant was in West Germany, so the Russians couldn't sieze that, but they did get their mitts on the patents for the Leica & all the lenses made for it up to 1939. (These were siezed by the US military, along w/Ziess patents, & given away for free as war reparations = see Canon, Minolta, Nikon, etc.) The FED, a near-clone of the Leica IIIa, appeared, along w/Industar screw-mount lenses containing Leitz & Zeiss formulas.
But whereas Leitz introduced the revolutionary bayonet-mount M3 in 1954, & Zeiss stopped making the IIa & IIIa in 1962 to concentrate on SLR's, Kiev & FED still made Contax IIa & IIIa copies & screw-mounts into the 1980's. Since the M3 & Contarex patents were filed after WW2, it was too late to plunder them.
The Kievs have a much better reputation as shooters today cos they were made using the actual Zeiss dies & tools. But also, cos the workers were treated better than those at FED, cos they had the right...
Contax.
your cat has the same face shape as mine... sadly mine passed in 2019
what...is that kitties name?
Hey Lance you should do the story about the Sullivan Brothers. They were all killed on the same ship in WW2. There were 4 or 5 of them. There's a ship in Buffalo named for them.
Camera tilted too high again, when your head is below the centre line it feels uncomfortable to watch.
As opposed to the Americans German scientists, like Werhner Von Braun.
you misplaced the apostrophe.
Fair point- thanks! We'll fix that
Why would an Austrian paper issue such a Soviet-favoring news report? ( 9:50 - 10:05). Can we get a citation of which newspapers said this?...maybe a Socialist/Communist leaning publication?
Mmmm… instead of wearing a butterfly tie… butterfly cat!👍🤣
The soviets also deported small arms designers and technicians to Russia.
According to the Wernher Von Braun inspired character in the film the Right Stuff, our Germans are better than their Germans.
She was demanding to be held. LOL I was being patient...
Love the cat...
If not for German scientists, the US and Soviet Russia would not have advanced as well as they did.
Actually we would, since there's nothing special about germans, also, it's more accurate to say that von braun was property of the US.
My favorite party was the wife was saying "Oh my god, these communists lied to us that they wouldn't take us to Russia!"
And we Gave any Intellectual Advantage away for Cheap Wal-Mart plastic Products, Wow Corruption and Rust is Extremely Costly to All
Dr. Strange love, "Our German Scientist are much more crazy, and evil than yours!" Wanna bet! We had Von Braun and went to the moon! That's crazy!
I'm allergic to cats . . . a-CHOO!!
Thanks for the video, as always.
Huh. Did the Brits have a similar program as well? What about Japanese scientists? I know of the American interest in Unit 731 (and how they waived that program's scientist's responsibility for crimes I personally consider worse than what Mengele did, in return for their knowledge), but did the Soviets put similar demands on Japan? Did the Kuomintang demand such reparations, too? China was by far the most affected by Japan.
Actually, on the topic of Mengele, do you think he actually would have gone to trial, had he been captured? Seeing as the Americans did give amnesty to personnel of what was Japan's equivalent program in return for their medical information, could something similar have happened with Josef? Or was he too high-profile to be left alone? Actually, what WAS his profile at the end of the war? Was he known as the butcher he was, or just another member of a camp's staff?
Both the British and French grabbed German scientists and according to the book I read on the subject as the usefulness to the big players diminished they were recruited by Egypt, Brazil and Argentina amongst others.
The Brits did indeed have a poor gram but once Churchill knew that the Manhattan District ( NOT Project) existed it was rolled into the US research...
Always happy to see your cat!!
Niceeee H.G. 👍👍💛💛👍👍