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The Operation Paperclip was a secret United States intelligence program in which more than 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians were taken from former
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...
to the US for government employment after the
end of World War II in Europe The end of World War II in Europe occurred in May 1945. Following the Death of Adolf Hitler, suicide of Adolf Hitler on 30 April, leadership of Nazi Germany passed to Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz and the Flensburg Government. Soviet Union, Soviet t ...
, between 1945 and 1959; several were confirmed to be former members of the
Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...
, including the SS or the SA. The effort began in earnest in 1945, as the Allies advanced into Germany and discovered a wealth of scientific talent and advanced research that had contributed to Germany's wartime technological advancements. The US Joint Chiefs of Staff officially established Operation Overcast (operations "Overcast" and "Paperclip" were related, and the terms are often used interchangeably) on July 20, 1945, with the dual aims of leveraging German expertise for the ongoing war effort against Japan and to bolster US postwar military research. The operation, conducted by the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA), was largely actioned by special agents of the US Army's
Counterintelligence Corps The Counter Intelligence Corps (Army CIC) was a World War II and early Cold War intelligence agency within the United States Army consisting of highly trained special agents. Its role was taken over by the U.S. Army Intelligence Corps in 1961 and ...
(CIC). Many selected scientists were involved in the Nazi rocket program, aviation, or chemical/biological warfare. The
Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
in the following year conducted a similar program, called Operation Osoaviakhim, that emphasized many of the same fields of research. The operation, characterized by the recruitment of German specialists and their families, relocated more than 1600 experts to the US. It has been valued at US$10 billion in patents and industrial processes. Recruits included such notable figures as
Wernher von Braun Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun ( ; ; 23 March 191216 June 1977) was a German–American aerospace engineer and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and '' Allgemeine SS'', the leading figure in the development of ...
, a leading rocket-technology scientist. Those recruited were instrumental in the development of the US space program and military technology during the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
. Despite its contributions to American scientific advances, Operation Paperclip has been controversial because of the Nazi affiliations of many recruits, and the ethics of assimilating individuals associated with
war crime A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostage ...
s into American society. The operation was not solely focused on rocketry; efforts were directed toward synthetic fuels, medicine, and other fields of research. Notable advances in
aeronautics Aeronautics is the science or art involved with the study, design process, design, and manufacturing of air flight-capable machines, and the techniques of operating aircraft and rockets within the atmosphere. While the term originally referred ...
fostered rocket and space-flight technologies pivotal in the
Space Race The Space Race (, ) was a 20th-century competition between the Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile-based nuclear arms race between t ...
. The operation played a crucial role in the establishment of
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...
and the success of the Apollo missions to the Moon. Operation Paperclip was part of a broader strategy by the US to harness German scientific talent in the face of emerging Cold War tensions, and ensuring this expertise did not fall into the hands of the Soviet Union or other nations. The operation's legacy has remained controversial in subsequent decades.


Background and Operation Overcast

In February 1945,
Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF; ) was the headquarters of the Commander of Allies of World War II, Allied forces in northwest Europe, from late 1943 until the end of World War II. US General Dwight D. Eisenhower was the ...
(SHAEF) set up
T-Force T-Force was the operational arm of a joint US Army–British Army mission to secure German scientific and industrial technology before it could be destroyed by retreating German forces or looters during the final stages of the Second World War a ...
, or Special Sections Subdivision, which grew to over 2,000 personnel by June. T-Force examined 5,000 German targets, seeking expertise in synthetic rubber and oil catalysts, new designs in armored equipment, V-2 (rocket) weapons, jet and rocket propelled aircraft, naval equipment, field radios, secret writing chemicals, aero medicine research, gliders, and "scientific and industrial personalities". When large numbers of German scientists began to be discovered by the advancing Allied forces in late April 1945, the Special Sections Subdivision set up the Enemy Personnel Exploitation Section to manage and interrogate them. The Enemy Personnel Exploitation Section established a detention center, Camp Dustbin, first near Paris and later in Kransberg Castle outside Frankfurt. The US
Joint Chiefs of Staff The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) is the body of the most senior uniformed leaders within the United States Department of Defense, which advises the president of the United States, the secretary of defense, the Homeland Security Council and ...
(JCS) established the first secret recruitment program, called Operation Overcast, on July 20, 1945, initially "to assist in shortening the Japanese war and to aid our postwar military research". The term "Overcast" was the name first given by the German scientists' family members for the housing camp where they were held in
Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...
. In late summer 1945, the JCS established the JIOA, a subcommittee of the Joint Intelligence Community, to directly oversee Operation Overcast and later Operation Paperclip. The JIOA representatives included the army's director of intelligence, the chief of naval intelligence, the assistant chief of Air Staff-2 (air force intelligence), and a representative from the
State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs o ...
. In November 1945, Operation Overcast was renamed Operation Paperclip by Ordnance Corps officers, who would attach a
paperclip A paper clip (or paperclip) is a tool used to hold sheets of paper together, usually made of steel wire bent to a looped shape (though some are covered in plastic). Most paper clips are variations of the ''Gem'' type introduced in the 1890s or ...
to the folders of those rocket experts whom they wished to employ in the United States. The project was not initially targeted against the Soviet Union; rather the concern was that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries that remained neutral during the war. Much US effort was focused on
Saxony Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...
and
Thuringia Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area. Er ...
, which on July 1, 1945, became part of the
Soviet occupation zone The Soviet occupation zone in Germany ( or , ; ) was an area of Germany that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a communist area, established as a result of the Potsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945. On 7 October 1949 the German Democratic Republ ...
. Many German research facilities and personnel had been evacuated to these states before the end of the war, particularly from the Berlin area. The USSR then relocated more than 2,200 Nazi specialists and their families—more than 6,000 people—with Operation Osoaviakhim during one night on October 22, 1946. In a secret directive circulated on September 3, 1946, President Truman officially approved Operation Paperclip and expanded it to include 1,000 German scientists under "temporary, limited military custody".
News media The news media or news industry are forms of mass media that focus on delivering news to the general public. These include News agency, news agencies, newspapers, news magazines, News broadcasting, news channels etc. History Some of the fir ...
revealed the program as early as December 1946. On April 26, 1946, the Joint Chiefs of Staff issued directive JCS 1067/14 to General Eisenhower instructing that he "preserve from destruction and take under your control records, plans, books, documents, papers, files and scientific, industrial and other information and data belonging to ... German organizations engaged in military research"; and that, excepting war-criminals, German scientists be detained for intelligence purposes as required. Much of the FIAT information was adapted commercially, to the degree that the office of the Assistant Secretary of State for Occupied Areas requested that the peace treaty with Germany be redacted to protect US industry from lawsuits.


Osenberg List

In the later part of World War II,
Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
was at a logistical disadvantage, having failed to conquer the
USSR The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
with
Operation Barbarossa Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and several of its European Axis allies starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during World War II. More than 3.8 million Axis troops invaded the western Soviet Union along ...
(June–December 1941), and its drive for the Caucasus (June 1942 – February 1943). The failed conquest had depleted German resources, and its
military–industrial complex The expression military–industrial complex (MIC) describes the relationship between a country's military and the Arms industry, defense industry that supplies it, seen together as a vested interest which influences public policy. A driving fac ...
was unprepared to defend the
Greater Germanic Reich The Greater Germanic Reich (), fully styled the Greater Germanic Reich of the German Nation (), was the official state name of the political entity that Nazi Germany tried to establish in Europe during World War II.Elvert 1999, p. 325. The terr ...
against the Red Army's westward counterattack. By early 1943, the German government began recalling from combat a number of scientists, engineers, and technicians to work in research and development to bolster German defense for a protracted war with the USSR. The recall from frontline combat included 4,000 rocketeers returned to
Peenemünde Peenemünde (, ) is a municipality on the Baltic Sea island of Usedom in the Vorpommern-Greifswald district in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in north-eastern Germany. It is part of the ''Amt (country subdivision), Amt'' (collective municipality) of Used ...
, in northeast coastal Germany. The
Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...
government's recall of their now-useful intellectuals for scientific work first required identifying and locating the scientists, engineers, and technicians, then ascertaining their political and ideological reliability. Werner Osenberg, the engineer-scientist heading the ''Wehrforschungsgemeinschaft'' (Defense Research Association), recorded the names of the politically cleared men to the Osenberg List, thus reinstating them to scientific work. In March 1945, at
Bonn University The University of Bonn, officially the Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (), is a public research university in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the () on 18 October 1818 by Frederick Will ...
, a Polish laboratory technician found pieces of the Osenberg List stuffed in a toilet; the list subsequently reached
MI6 The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 ( Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of human intelligenc ...
, who transmitted it to US intelligence. Then US Army Major Robert B. Staver, Chief of the Jet Propulsion Section of the Research and Intelligence Branch of the
United States Army Ordnance Corps The United States Army Ordnance Corps, formerly the United States Army Ordnance Department, is a Combat service support (United States), sustainment branch of the United States Army, headquartered at Fort Gregg-Adams, Fort Gregg-Adams, Virginia ...
, used the Osenberg List to compile his list of German scientists to be captured and interrogated;
Wernher von Braun Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun ( ; ; 23 March 191216 June 1977) was a German–American aerospace engineer and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and '' Allgemeine SS'', the leading figure in the development of ...
, Germany's best rocket scientist, headed Major Staver's list.


Identification

In Operation Overcast, Major Staver's original intent was only to interview the scientists, but what he learned changed the operation's purpose. On May 22, 1945, he transmitted to the US Department of War Colonel Joel Holmes' telegram urging the evacuation to America of 100 of the 400 German scientists in his custody, as most "important for he
Pacific war The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War or the Pacific Theatre, was the Theater (warfare), theatre of World War II fought between the Empire of Japan and the Allies of World War II, Allies in East Asia, East and Southeast As ...
" effort. Most of the Osenberg List engineers worked at the Baltic coast German Army Research Center Peenemünde, developing the V-2 rocket. After capturing them, the Allies initially housed them and their families in
Landshut Landshut (; ) is a town in Bavaria, Germany, on the banks of the Isar, River Isar. Landshut is the capital of Lower Bavaria, one of the seven administrative regions of the Free state (government), Free State of Bavaria, and the seat of the surrou ...
, Bavaria, in southern Germany. Beginning on July 19, 1945, the US Joint Chiefs managed the captured ARC rocketeers under Operation Overcast. However, when the "Camp Overcast" name of the scientists' quarters became locally known, the program was renamed Operation Paperclip in November 1945. Despite these attempts at secrecy, the press interviewed several of the scientists later that year.


Capture and detention

Early on, the United States created the Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee (CIOS). This provided the information on targets for the
T-Force T-Force was the operational arm of a joint US Army–British Army mission to secure German scientific and industrial technology before it could be destroyed by retreating German forces or looters during the final stages of the Second World War a ...
s that went in and targeted scientific, military, and industrial installations (and their employees) for their know-how. Initial priorities were advanced technology, such as
infrared Infrared (IR; sometimes called infrared light) is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than that of visible light but shorter than microwaves. The infrared spectral band begins with the waves that are just longer than those ...
, that could be used in the war against Japan; finding out what technology had been passed on to Japan; and finally to halt research elsewhere. Von Braun and more than a thousand of his colleagues decided to surrender to Americans in 1945. One of the engineers later recalled their options: "We despise the French, we are mortally afraid of the Soviets, we do not believe the British can afford us. So that leaves the Americans." On June 20, 1945, they moved from the east closer to the American forces, to avoid the advancing Soviet army. A project to halt the research was codenamed "Project Safehaven"; it was not initially targeted against the Soviet Union but addressed the concern that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries that had remained neutral during the war. To avoid the complications involved with the emigration of German scientists, the CIOS was responsible for scouting and kidnapping high-profile individuals to block technological advancements in nations hostile to the US. Much US effort was focused on
Saxony Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...
and
Thuringia Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area. Er ...
, which on July 1, 1945, would become part of the
Soviet Occupation zone The Soviet occupation zone in Germany ( or , ; ) was an area of Germany that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a communist area, established as a result of the Potsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945. On 7 October 1949 the German Democratic Republ ...
. Many German research facilities and personnel had been evacuated to these states, particularly from the Berlin area. Fearing that the Soviet takeover would limit US ability to exploit German scientific and technical expertise, and not wanting the Soviet Union to benefit from it, the United States instigated an "evacuation operation" of scientific personnel from Saxony and Thuringia, issuing orders such as: By 1947, this evacuation operation had netted an estimated 1,800 technicians and scientists and 3,700 family members. Those with special skills or knowledge were taken to detention and interrogation centers, such as one code-named "
Dustbin A waste container, also known as a dustbin, rubbish bin, trash can, garbage can, wastepaper basket, and wastebasket, among other names, is a type of container intended to store waste that is usually made out of metal or plastic. The words "r ...
" (located first at Chesnay, near
Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( ; ) is a former royal residence commissioned by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, Yvelines, Versailles, about west of Paris, in the Yvelines, Yvelines Department of Île-de-France, Île-de-France region in Franc ...
and then moved to Kransberg Castle outside
Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
) to be held and interrogated, in some cases for months. A few of the scientists were gathered as a part of Operation Overcast, but most were transported to villages in the countryside where there were neither research facilities nor work; they were provided with stipends, and required to report twice weekly to police headquarters to prevent them from leaving. The Joint Chiefs of Staff directive on research and teaching stated that technicians and scientists should be released "only after all interested agencies were satisfied that all desired intelligence information had been obtained from them". On November 5, 1947, the
Office of Military Government, United States The Office of Military Government, United States (OMGUS; ) was the United States military-established government created shortly after the end of hostilities in Allied-occupied Germany, occupied Germany in World War II. Under General Lucius D. Cla ...
(OMGUS), which had jurisdiction over the western part of occupied Germany, held a conference to consider the status of the evacuees, the monetary claims that the evacuees had filed against the United States, and the "possible violation by the US of laws of war or Rules of Land Warfare". The OMGUS director of Intelligence Robert L. Walsh initiated a program to resettle the evacuees in the
Third World The term Third World arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO or the Warsaw Pact. The United States, Canada, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, the Southern Cone, NATO, Western European countries and oth ...
, which the Germans referred to as General Walsh's ("jungle program"); but the program was not carried out. In 1948, the evacuees received settlements of 69.5 million
Reichsmarks The (; Currency sign, sign: ℛ︁ℳ︁; abbreviation: RM) was the currency of German Reich, Germany from 1924 until the fall of Nazi Germany in 1945, and in the Bizone, American, British and French occupied zones of Germany, until 20 June 19 ...
from the US, a settlement that soon became severely devalued during the currency reform that introduced the
Deutsche Mark The Deutsche Mark (; "German mark (currency), mark"), abbreviated "DM" or "D-Mark" (), was the official currency of West Germany from 1948 until 1990 and later of unified Germany from 1990 until the adoption of the euro in 2002. In English, it ...
as the official currency of western Germany. John Gimbel concludes that the United States held some of Germany's best minds for three years, therefore depriving the German recovery of their expertise.


Arrivals

In May 1945, the US Navy "received in custody" Herbert A. Wagner, the inventor of the Hs 293 missile; for two years, he first worked at the Special Devices Center, at Castle Gould and at Hempstead House, Long Island, New York; in 1947, he moved to the Naval Air Station Point Mugu. In August 1945, Colonel Holger Toftoy, head of the Rocket Branch of the Research and Development Division of the US Army's Ordnance Corps, offered initial one-year contracts to the rocket scientists; 127 of them accepted. In September 1945, the first group of seven rocket scientists (aerospace engineers) arrived at
Fort Strong Fort Strong is a former U.S. Army Coast Artillery fort that occupied the northern third of Long Island (Massachusetts), Long Island in Boston Harbor. The island had a training camp during the American Civil War, and a gun battery was built there ...
on
Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land are ...
in
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
harbor:
Wernher von Braun Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun ( ; ; 23 March 191216 June 1977) was a German–American aerospace engineer and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and '' Allgemeine SS'', the leading figure in the development of ...
, Erich W. Neubert, Theodor A. Poppel, William August Schulze, Eberhard Rees, Wilhelm Jungert, and Walter Schwidetzky. Beginning in late 1945, three rocket-scientist groups arrived in the United States for duty at
Fort Bliss Fort Bliss is a United States Army post in New Mexico and Texas, with its headquarters in El Paso, Texas. Established in 1848, the fort was renamed in 1854 to honor William Wallace Smith Bliss, Bvt.Lieut.Colonel William W.S. Bliss (1815–1853 ...
, Texas, and at White Sands Proving Grounds,
New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...
, as "War Department Special Employees". In 1946, the
United States Bureau of Mines The United States Bureau of Mines (USBM) was the primary Federal government of the United States, United States government agency in the 20th century that conducted scientific research and disseminated information on the extraction, processing ...
employed seven German
synthetic fuel Synthetic fuel or synfuel is a liquid fuel, or sometimes Fuel gas, gaseous fuel, obtained from syngas, a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen, in which the syngas was derived from gasification of solid feedstocks such as coal or biomass or by ...
scientists at a Fischer–Tropsch chemical plant in
Louisiana Louisiana ( ; ; ) is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It borders Texas to the west, Arkansas to the north, and Mississippi to the east. Of the 50 U.S. states, it ranks 31st in area and 25 ...
,
Missouri Missouri (''see #Etymology and pronunciation, pronunciation'') is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it border ...
. On June 1, 1949, the Chief of Ordnance of the United States Army designated
Redstone Arsenal Redstone Arsenal is a United States Army base adjacent to Huntsville, Alabama in the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge. A census-designated place in Madison County, Alabama, United States, it is part of the Huntsville-Decatur Combined Statistica ...
in
Huntsville, Alabama Huntsville is the List of municipalities in Alabama, most populous city in the U.S. state of Alabama. The population of the city is estimated to be 241,114 in 2024, making it the List of United States cities by population, 100th-most populous ...
, as the Ordnance Rocket Center, its facility for rocket research and development. On April 1, 1950, the Fort Bliss missile development operation, including von Braun and his team of over 130 Paperclip members, was transferred to Redstone Arsenal. In early 1950, legal US residency for some of the Project Paperclip specialists was effected through the US consulate in
Ciudad Juárez Ciudad Juárez ( , ; "Juárez City"), commonly referred to as just Juárez (Lipan language, Lipan: ''Tsé Táhú'ayá''), is the most populous city in the Administrative divisions of Mexico, Mexican state of Chihuahua (state), Chihuahua. It was k ...
, Chihuahua, Mexico; thus, German scientists legally entered the United States from Latin America. Between 1945 and 1952, the
United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...
sponsored the largest number of Paperclip scientists, importing 260 men, of whom 36 returned to Germany, and one, Walter Schreiber, emigrated to Argentina. The
United States Army Signal Corps The United States Army Signal Corps (USASC) is a branch of the United States Army responsible for creating and managing Military communications, communications and information systems for the command and control of combined arms forces. It was ...
employed 24 specialists—including the physicists Georg Goubau, Gunter Guttwein, Georg Hass, Horst Kedesdy, and
Kurt Lehovec Kurt Lehovec (12 June 1918 – 17 February 2012) was a Czech-American physicist. He one of the pioneers of the integrated circuit. While also pioneering the Solar cell, photo-voltaic effect, light-emitting diodes and History of the battery#Invent ...
; the physical chemists Rudolf Brill, , and Eberhard Both; the geophysicist Helmut Weickmann; the optician Gerhard Schwesinger; and the engineers Eduard Gerber, Richard Guenther, and Hans Ziegler. In 1959, 94 Operation Paperclip men went to the United States, including Friedwardt Winterberg and Friedrich Wigand. Overall, through its operations to 1990, Operation Paperclip imported 1,600 men as part of the ''intellectual reparations'' owed to the US and the UK, valued at
US$ The United States dollar (Currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and International use of the U.S. dollar, several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introdu ...
10 billion in patents and industrial processes.


Major awards (in the United States)

The NASA Distinguished Service Medal is the highest award which may be bestowed by the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the United States's civil space program, aeronautics research and space research. Established in 1958, it su ...
(NASA). After more than two decades of service and leadership in NASA, four Nazi members from Operation Paperclip were awarded the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1969:
Kurt Debus Kurt Heinrich Debus (November 29, 1908 – October 10, 1983) was a German-American rocket engineer and NASA director. Born in Germany, he was a member of the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) during World War II, where he served as a V-weapons flight test d ...
, Eberhard Rees,
Arthur Rudolph Arthur Louis Hugo Rudolph (November 9, 1906 – January 1, 1996) was a German rocket engineer who was a leader of the effort to develop the V-2 rocket for Nazi Germany. After World War II, the United States government's Office of Strategic Servic ...
, and Wernher von Braun. Ernst Geissler was awarded the medal in 1973. The Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award is the highest civilian award given by the
United States Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD, or DOD) is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government charged with coordinating and superv ...
. After two decades of service, Nazi member from Operation Paperclip Siegfried Knemeyer was awarded the Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award in 1966. The Goddard Astronautics Award is the highest honor bestowed for notable achievements in the field of astronautics by the
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) is a professional society for the field of aerospace engineering Aerospace engineering is the primary field of engineering concerned with the development of aircraft and spacecra ...
(AIAA). For their service, three Operation Paperclip members were awarded the Goddard Astronautics Award: Wernher von Braun (1961),
Hans von Ohain Hans Joachim Pabst von Ohain (14 December 191113 March 1998) was a German physicist, engineer, and the designer of the first aircraft to use a turbojet engine. Together with Frank Whittle and Anselm Franz, he has been described as the co-invent ...
(1966), and Krafft Arnold Ehricke (1984). The US Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, owns and operates the US Space Camp. Several Operation Paperclip members are members of the Space Camp Hall of Fame (which began in 2007): Wernher von Braun (2007), Georg von Tiesenhausen (2007), and Oscar Holderer (2008). The New Mexico Museum of Space History includes the International Space Hall of Fame. Two Operation Paperclip members are members of the International Space Hall of Fame: Wernher von Braun (1976) and Ernst Steinhoff (1979). Hubertus Strughold was inducted in 1978 but removed as a member in 2006. Other closely related members include Willy Ley (1976), a German-American science writer, and Hermann Oberth (1976), a German scientist who advised von Braun's rocket team in the US from 1955 to 1958; neither Ley, nor Oberth moved to the US via the Operation Paperclip. Two lunar craters are named after Paperclip scientists: Debus after
Kurt Debus Kurt Heinrich Debus (November 29, 1908 – October 10, 1983) was a German-American rocket engineer and NASA director. Born in Germany, he was a member of the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) during World War II, where he served as a V-weapons flight test d ...
, the first director of NASA's
Kennedy Space Center The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the NASA, National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten NASA facilities#List of field c ...
, and von Braun.


Advancements in aeronautics


Significant migrants


Adolf Busemann

Dr.
Adolf Busemann Adolf Busemann (20 April 1901 – 3 November 1986) was a German aerospace engineer and influential Nazi-era pioneer in aerodynamics, specialising in supersonic airflows. He introduced the concept of swept wings and, after emigrating in 1947 to th ...
was born in Lübeck, Germany, in 1902. He graduated from the Carolo Wilhelmina Technical University in Braunschweig and received a Ph.D. in engineering in 1924. In 1925, the Max-Planck Institute invited him to become an official aeronautical research scientist, and in 1930, he became a professor at Georgia Augusta University in Göttingen. Busemann spent many years working for the German government, most notably directing research at the Braunschweig Laboratory. He gave a speech in 1935 at the Volta Congress, an international meeting on the problems of high-speed aeronautics. At this conference, he presented his first theory of how the angle of sweep of a plane wing reduces drag at supersonic speed. After the war, he traveled to the United States to assist them with the war tensions with Russia, where he continued his work on his theory of wing sweep.


Wernher von Braun

Wernher von Braun Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun ( ; ; 23 March 191216 June 1977) was a German–American aerospace engineer and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and '' Allgemeine SS'', the leading figure in the development of ...
is known for developing rocket and space-flight technology, including the V-2 missile. In late 1932, he worked for the German army to develop new liquid propulsion-based missiles. He received a doctorate in physics in 1934 from the Friedrich-Wilhelms University of Berlin. He and his team then surrendered to the Allies at the end of World War II, shortly after Hitler's suicide in 1945. They were brought to America through Operation Paperclip and assimilated into
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...
's space program, where they worked on missile technology at Fort Bliss before transferring to
Huntsville, Alabama Huntsville is the List of municipalities in Alabama, most populous city in the U.S. state of Alabama. The population of the city is estimated to be 241,114 in 2024, making it the List of United States cities by population, 100th-most populous ...
. He became the director of the
Marshall Space Flight Center Marshall Space Flight Center (officially the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center; MSFC), located in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama (Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville postal address), is the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government's ...
in 1960. Von Braun is also a controversial figure for his involvement with the Nazi party and the slave labor involved in developing the V-2 rocket in Germany before it began to be developed in the United States. He became a member of the Nazi party in 1937 and was made a junior SS officer in 1940.


Marshall Space Flight Center

In July 1960, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) established the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) in Huntsville, Alabama after taking control of the Development Operations Division from the Army's
Redstone Arsenal Redstone Arsenal is a United States Army base adjacent to Huntsville, Alabama in the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge. A census-designated place in Madison County, Alabama, United States, it is part of the Huntsville-Decatur Combined Statistica ...
. The Redstone Arsenal was led by the Army Ballistic Missile Agency. Wernher von Braun became the first director of the MSFC. The MSFC's development team was formed by American engineers from the Redstone Arsenal and 118 German migrants who came from Peenemünde through Operation Paperclip. Von Braun worked with Operation Paperclip to get scientists from his team to the United States. They began work at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas in September 1945, and most of the team had arrived by 1946. Von Braun and his team worked as consultants for the military until 1950 when they began transferring to Huntsville. Originally, the center focused on weaponry and further development of the V-2 rocket line but later became one of NASA's main development centers for space flight project. The team also worked on missions that related to Moon landing missions, such as the
Lunar Roving Vehicle The Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV) is a Battery electric vehicle, battery-powered four-wheeled Rover (space exploration), rover used on the Moon in the last three missions of the American Apollo program (Apollo 15, 15, Apollo 16, 16, and Apollo 17 ...
. However, the main projects from the Marshall Space Flight Center were the V-2 rocket and the Apollo missions.


V-2 rocket

The
V-2 rocket The V2 (), with the technical name ''Aggregat (rocket family), Aggregat-4'' (A4), was the world's first long-range missile guidance, guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was developed during the S ...
was developed in Germany at the
Peenemünde Peenemünde (, ) is a municipality on the Baltic Sea island of Usedom in the Vorpommern-Greifswald district in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in north-eastern Germany. It is part of the ''Amt (country subdivision), Amt'' (collective municipality) of Used ...
military research center. Wernher von Braun was the director of Peenemünde and worked with a team of engineers, physicists, and chemists. The Nazis used the V-2 missile during World War II to attack Paris, the port of Antwerp, and Great Britain, among many other targets. An estimated 9,000 civilians and military personnel died in these attacks. The location of V-2 production moved to
Mittelwerk Mittelwerk (; German for "Central Works") was a German World War II factory built underground in the Kohnstein to avoid Allied bombing. It used slave labor from the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp to produce V-2 ballistic missiles, V-1 flyin ...
in Nordhausen after a British raid on Peenemünde on August 17, 1943. Mittelwerk was supplemented with slave labor from Dora, a nearby concentration camp. Production of the V-2 missile moved to the United States after Wernher von Braun surrendered to the Allies (Hall 2022). In March 1946, a V-2 was test-fired in New Mexico, followed by the first launch of a captured V-2 in April of the same year. After months of adaptation, a V-2 missile was fired in White Sands Proving Ground, New Mexico that broke a record with an altitude of . Known as V-2 sounding rockets, they were used to test the effects of cosmic rays on fruit flies and seeds. They also took the first pictures of Earth from in the air (high enough to show the curvature of the planet), and tested g-force on various monkeys.


Apollo missions

The Marshall Space Flight Center was one of three institutions at NASA involved in the
Apollo Apollo is one of the Twelve Olympians, Olympian deities in Ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek and Ancient Roman religion, Roman religion and Greek mythology, Greek and Roman mythology. Apollo has been recognized as a god of archery, mu ...
program. The center was equipped to become a part of Apollo because it had the facilities to study rocketry: Aero-Astrodynamics, Astrionics, Space Sciences, Propulsion and Vehicle Engineering, Computation, Manufacturing, Test, and Quality. Each of these laboratories handled a different aspect of creating and testing rockets that suited the shift from military weapons to space travel. The weaponry from WWII, including rocket and missile in the United States, set the precedent for the kinds of technology used to create the Saturn rocket line. The Marshall engineers' experience in rocket development led to what Dieter Grau, head of the Quality lab, described as a "rigid inspection program" focused on craftsmanship. This meant to create prototypes that had a higher success rate instead of lesser prototypes that required more tests. The American and German Marshall engineers created the launch vehicles and designed some launching facilities at
Cape Canaveral, Florida Cape Canaveral is a city in Brevard County, Florida. It is part of the Palm Bay–Melbourne– Titusville Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 9,912 at the 2020 US census. History After the establishment of a lighthouse in 184 ...
during the Apollo program. They also created the Saturn rocket line, which was the kind of rocket that sent American astronauts to the Moon. The Saturn rocket line drew on previous military engineering, such as the liquid propulsion system developed from von Braun's V-2 rocket and navigation systems derived from the US army's Redstone and Jupiter rockets.


Controversy and investigations

Before his official approval of the program, President Truman was indecisive about it for sixteen months. Years later in 1963, Truman recalled that he was not in the least reluctant to approve Paperclip; that because of relations with the Soviet Union "this had to be done and was done". Several of the Paperclip scientists were later investigated because of their links with the
Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...
during the war. Only one Paperclip scientist, Georg Rickhey, was formally tried for any crime, and no Paperclip scientist was found guilty of any crime, in the United States or Germany. Rickhey was returned to Germany in 1947 to stand at the Dora Trial, where he was acquitted. In 1951, weeks after his US arrival, ''
The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...
'' accused Walter Schreiber of being a party to human experiments conducted by Kurt Blome at Ravensbrück; he emigrated to Argentina with the aid of the US military. In 1984,
Arthur Rudolph Arthur Louis Hugo Rudolph (November 9, 1906 – January 1, 1996) was a German rocket engineer who was a leader of the effort to develop the V-2 rocket for Nazi Germany. After World War II, the United States government's Office of Strategic Servic ...
, under perceived threat of prosecution relating to his connection – as operations director for V-2 missile production – to the use of
forced labor Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, or violence, including death or other forms of ...
from
Mittelbau-Dora Mittelbau-Dora (also Dora-Mittelbau and Nordhausen-Dora) was a Nazi concentration camp located near Nordhausen in Thuringia, Germany. It was established in late summer 1943 as a subcamp of Buchenwald concentration camp, supplying slave labour f ...
at the
Mittelwerk Mittelwerk (; German for "Central Works") was a German World War II factory built underground in the Kohnstein to avoid Allied bombing. It used slave labor from the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp to produce V-2 ballistic missiles, V-1 flyin ...
, renounced his US citizenship and moved to West Germany, which granted him citizenship. Von Braun was investigated in 1961 for his involvement in the Nazi party as an SS member. The FBI concluded that he had joined the Nazi Party solely to advance his academic career and to avoid imprisonment. For 50 years, from 1963 to 2013, the Strughold Award – named after Hubertus Strughold, "the father of space medicine", for his central role in developing innovations like the
space suit A space suit (or spacesuit) is an environmental suit used for protection from the harsh environment of outer space, mainly from its vacuum as a highly specialized pressure suit, but also its temperature extremes, as well as radiation and ...
and space life support systems – was the most prestigious award from the Space Medicine Association, a member organization of the
Aerospace Medical Association The Aerospace Medical Association (AsMA) is the largest professional organization in the fields of aviation, space, and environmental medicine. The AsMA membership includes aerospace and hyperbaric medical specialists, scientists, flight nurses ...
. On October 1, 2013, in the aftermath of a ''
Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'' article published on December 1, 2012, which highlighted his connection to human experiments during WWII, the Space Medicine Association's executive committee announced that the Space Medicine Association Strughold Award had been retired. In a 2014 book, Annie Jacobsen investigated 21 prominent scientists and technicians recruited by Paperclip, and found that 15 were active Nazi party members. 10 served in paramilitary groups like the SS or the SA, 8 worked directly with major Nazi leaders, and 6 were tried at Nuremberg.


Similar operations

*Operation APPLEPIE: Project to capture and interrogate key Wehrmacht,
RSHA The Reich Security Main Office ( , RSHA) was an organization under Heinrich Himmler in his dual capacity as ''Chef der Deutschen Polizei'' (Chief of German Police) and , the head of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS). The organization's stat ...
AMT VI, and General Staff officers knowledgeable of the industry and economy of the USSR. * Operation Bloodstone: Project to recruit and utilize personnel in Eastern Europe to foster anti-Communism. * Camp Dustbin (counterpart of
Camp Ashcan Central Continental Prisoner of War Enclosure No. 32, code-named ''Ashcan'', was an Allied prisoner-of-war camp in the ''Palace Hotel'' of Mondorf-les-Bains, Luxembourg during World War II. Operating from May to August 1945, it served as a proce ...
): An Anglo-American military interrogation camp for German scientists and industry specialists. *ECLIPSE (1944): An unimplemented Air Disarmament Wing plan for post-war operations in Europe for destroying V-1 and V-2 missiles. **Safehaven: US project within ECLIPSE meant to prevent the escape of Nazi scientists from Allied-occupied Germany. * Field Information Agency, Technical (FIAT): US Army agency for securing the "major, and perhaps only, material reward of victory, namely, the advancement of science and the improvement of production and standards of living in the United Nations, by proper exploitation of German methods in these fields"; FIAT ended in 1947, when ''Operation Paperclip'' began functioning. *National Interest/Project 63: Job placement assistance for Nazi engineers at Lockheed, Martin Marietta, North American Aviation, and other aeroplane companies, whilst American aerospace engineers were being laid off work. * Alsos Mission, Operation Big,
Operation Epsilon Operation Epsilon was the codename of a program in which Allies of World War II, Allied forces near the end of World War II detained ten Germany, German scientists who were thought to have worked on German nuclear energy project, Nazi Germany's n ...
, Russian Alsos: American, British and Soviet efforts to capture German
nuclear Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the nucleus of the atom: *Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics * Nuclear space *Nuclear ...
secrets, equipment, and personnel. * Operation Backfire: A British effort at recovering rocket and aerospace technology, followed by assembling and testing rockets at
Cuxhaven Cuxhaven (; ) is a town and seat of the Cuxhaven district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. The town includes the northernmost point of Lower Saxony. It is situated on the shore of the North Sea at the mouth of the Elbe River. Cuxhaven has a footprint o ...
. * Fedden Mission: British mission to gain technical intelligence concerning advanced German aircraft and their propulsion systems. * Operation LUSTY (Luftwaffe Secret Technology): US efforts to capture
Luftwaffe The Luftwaffe () was the aerial warfare, aerial-warfare branch of the before and during World War II. German Empire, Germany's military air arms during World War I, the of the Imperial German Army, Imperial Army and the of the Imperial Ge ...
equipment, technology, and personnel. * Technical Air Intelligence Unit: joint Allied military intelligence units formed to recover Japanese aircraft * Operation Osoaviakhim (sometimes transliterated as "Operation Ossavakim"), a Soviet counterpart of Operation Paperclip, involving German technicians, managers, skilled workers and their respective families who were transferred to the USSR in October 1946. * Operation Surgeon: British operation for denying German aeronautical expertise to the USSR, and for exploiting German scientists in furthering British research. *Special Mission V-2: April–May 1945 US operation, by Maj. William Bromley, that recovered parts and equipment for 100 V-2 missiles from a Mittelwerk underground factory in Kohnstein within the Soviet zone. Major James P. Hamill co-ordinated the transport of the equipment on 341 railroad cars with the 144th Motor Vehicle Assembly Company, from Nordhausen to Erfurt, just before the Soviets arrived. (See also Operation Blossom, Project Hermes, and Operation Sandy) *
TICOM TICOM (Target Intelligence Committee) was a secret Allied project formed in World War II to find and seize German intelligence assets, particularly in the field of cryptology and signals intelligence. It operated alongside other Western Allied ...
: Anglo/US project to exploit German cryptographers.


See also

* American cover-up of Japanese war crimes * Carmel Offie *
List of Axis personnel indicted for war crimes The following is a list of people who were formally indicted for committing war crimes or crimes against humanity on behalf of the Axis powers during World War II, including those who were acquitted or never received judgement. It does not includ ...
* Project MKNAOMI *
Ratlines (World War II) The ratlines () were systems of escape routes used by German Nazi Party, Nazis and other fascists to flee Europe from 1945 onwards in the aftermath of World War II. These escape routes mainly led toward havens in South America, particularly ...
*
Unit 731 , short for Manchu Detachment 731 and also known as the Kamo Detachment and the Ishii Unit, was a covert biological and chemical warfare research and development unit of the Imperial Japanese Army that engaged in lethal human experimentat ...
– Japanese human experimenters who were recruited for their biological weapons technology * Upper Atmosphere Research Panel *
Yozma Program Yozma, Yozma Program, or Yozma Fund was a Venture capital in Israel, venture capital organization in Israel that initially started out as a government funded program in 1993 to help kick start venture capital, angel investing, and private equity in ...
-
post-Soviet states The post-Soviet states, also referred to as the former Soviet Union or the former Soviet republics, are the independent sovereign states that emerged/re-emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Prior to their independence, they ...
had mass migration of skilled people to Israel and Israel kick-started venture capital *
Operation Gladio Operation Gladio was the codename for clandestine " stay-behind" operations of armed resistance that were organized by the Western Union (WU; founded in 1948), and subsequently by NATO (formed in 1949) and by the CIA (established in 1947), in ...
In fiction: *'' Dr. Strangelove'' – a 1964 film where the title character was said to have been brought to the USA via Operation Paperclip. *'' Captain America: The Winter Soldier'' – a 2014 film in which
Arnim Zola Arnim Zola is a supervillain appearing in American comic books by Marvel Comics. He is a master of biochemistry and a recurring enemy of Captain America and the Avengers. The character first appeared in ''Captain America and the Falcon'' #208 (A ...
was said to have been brought to the USA via Operation Paperclip, where he secretly reformed Hydra within S.H.I.E.L.D. *'' Moonglow'' – a 2016 novel which features a subplot which is based on Operation Paperclip. *'' A History of What Comes Next'' – a 2021 alternate history novel that features Operation Paperclip and its Soviet counterpart, Operation Osoaviakhim *''
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny ''Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny'' is a 2023 American action-adventure film directed by James Mangold and written by Mangold, David Koepp, Jez Butterworth, Jez and John-Henry Butterworth. It is the fifth and final installment in Indiana_ ...
'' – a 2023 film in which the main antagonist is a Nazi scientist working for the
Apollo program The Apollo program, also known as Project Apollo, was the United States human spaceflight program led by NASA, which Moon landing, landed the first humans on the Moon in 1969. Apollo followed Project Mercury that put the first Americans in sp ...
in 1969. The title character is uneasy about Operation Paperclip thanks to his past clashes with the Nazis. *'' Hunters'' – a 2020 Amazon Prime TV show depicting a fictionalized version of Operation Paperclip and after in the late 1970s, driving the plot of the show. *" Paper Clip" – an episode of ''
The X-Files ''The X-Files'' is an American science fiction on television, science fiction drama (film and television), drama television series created by Chris Carter (screenwriter), Chris Carter. The original series aired from September 10, 1993, to Ma ...
'' featuring a Nazi scientist from the Operation. *'' Sniper Elite V2'' - a 2012 video game set between Operation Overcast and Operation Paperclip, where the protagonist is an OSS
commando A commando is a combatant, or operative of an elite light infantry or special operations force, specially trained for carrying out raids and operating in small teams behind enemy lines. Originally, "a commando" was a type of combat unit, as oppo ...
sent to retrieve or eliminate Nazi scientists ahead of the Soviets.


References


Further reading

*Yves Beon, ''Planet Dora''. Westview Press, 1997. . *Giuseppe Ciampaglia: "Come ebbe effettivo inizio a Roma l'Operazione Paperclip". Roma 2005. In: Strenna dei Romanisti 2005. Edit. Roma Amor *Henry Stevens, ''Hitler's Suppressed and Still-Secret Weapons, Science and Technology.'' Adventures Unlimited Press, 2007. *John Gimbel, "''Science Technology and Reparations: Exploitation and Plunder in Postwar Germany''"
Stanford University Press Stanford University Press (SUP) is the publishing house of Stanford University. It is one of the oldest academic presses in the United States and the first university press to be established on the West Coast. It is currently a member of the Ass ...
, 1990 *
Linda Hunt Linda Hunt (born Lydia Susanna Hunt; April 2, 1945) is an American actress. She made her film debut playing Mrs. Oxheart in Popeye (film), ''Popeye'' (1980). Her portrayal of the male character Billy Kwan in ''The Year of Living Dangerously (fil ...
,
Arthur Rudolph of Dora and NASA
', Moment 4, 1987 (Yorkshire Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) * *Linda Hunt
U.S. Coverup of Nazi ScientistsThe Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
April 1985. *Matthias Judt; Burghard Ciesla, ''Technology Transfer Out of Germany After 1945'' Harwood Academic Publishers, 1996. *Michael C. Carroll, ''Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government's Secret Germ Laboratory.''
Harper Paperbacks Harper is an American publishing house, the flagship imprint of global publisher HarperCollins, based in New York City. Founded in New York in 1817 by James Harper and his brother John, the company operated as J. & J. Harper until 1833, when ...
, 2005. *John Gimbel
U.S. Policy and German Scientists: The Early Cold War"
Political Science Quarterly ''Political Science Quarterly'' is an American double blind peer-reviewed academic journal covering government, politics, and policy, published since 1886 by the Academy of Political Science. Its editor-in-chief is Robert Y. Shapiro (Columbia ...
, Volume 101, Number 3 (1986), pp. 433–451 * *Wolfgang W. E. Samuel ''American Raiders: The Race to Capture the Luftwaffe's Secrets'' (
University Press of Mississippi The University Press of Mississippi (UPM), founded in 1970, is a university press that is sponsored by the eight state universities in Mississippi (i.e., Alcorn State University, Delta State University, Jackson State University, Mississippi Sta ...
, 2004) *Koerner, Steven T
"Technology Transfer from Germany to Canada after 1945: A Study in Failure?"
''Comparative Technology Transfer and Society'', Volume 2, Number 1, April 2004, pp. 99–124 *John Farquharso
"Governed or Exploited? The British Acquisition of German Technology, 1945–48"
''Journal of Contemporary History'', Volume 32, Number 1 (January 1997), pp. 23–42
1995 Human Radiation Experiments Memorandum: Post-World War II Reccruitment of German Scientists – Project ''Paperclip''
UK
National archives National archives are the archives of a country. The concept evolved in various nations at the dawn of modernity based on the impact of nationalism upon bureaucratic processes of paperwork retention. Conceptual development From the Middle Ages i ...
releases March 2006. * * * * * * *


External links


In Cold War, U.S. Spy Agencies Used 1,000 Nazis
Eric Lichtblau for ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
.'' October 26, 2014.
The Nazis Next Door: Eric Lichtblau on how the CIA & FBI Secretly Sheltered Nazi War Criminals
– video report by ''
Democracy Now! ''Democracy Now!'' is an hour-long TV, radio, and Internet news program based in Manhattan and hosted by journalists Amy Goodman (who also acts as the show's executive producer), Juan González, and Nermeen Shaikh. The show, which airs live ...
'', October 31, 2014
Operation Paperclip at Fort Bliss: 1945-1950

UC San Diego, Holocaust Living History Collection: The Nazis Next Door with Eric Lichtblau
{{DEFAULTSORT:Paperclip, Operation Operation Paperclip Aftermath of World War II in the United States Allied occupation of Germany American secret government programs Brain drain Cold War history of the United States German-American history Office of Strategic Services operations Science and technology during World War II Science in Nazi Germany United States intelligence operations World War II operations and battles of Europe Wernher von Braun