Konrad Dannenberg one of the last of the German rocket men who put Americans on the moon RIP

Konrad Dannenberg who died this week aged 95 was one of last of the 118 German rocket scientists, many ideological Nazis, who arrived on "Operation Paperclip" in Huntsville Alabama (visit the Von Braun Astronomy Facility, The Von Braun Civic Center) in a case of post war "special rendition" of prisoners.... and rocket parts , equipment etc.,

Trained at Hanover and fascinated by rocketry he ended up helping on the German WW II V-2 missile – built using slave labour – which the Germans used (with devastating success) to indiscriminately kill several thousand people in Europe.

About 1000 of these missiles were fired at the cities of London (see map of sites hit) and Norwich, while about 2000 more were fired at targets on the European continent.

Given top-secret clearance by the US Government , he worked with Wernher von Braun on US military weapons systems. When NASA was established in 1958, Dannenberg became a key agency leader: the deputy manager of the program that produced the Saturn V, the first rocket to send humans to the moon. The engine he helped design in the 1960s Marshall Space Flight Centerat remains the foundation for NASA's rockets. "His fingerprints are all over it," NASA exploration official Steve Cook told Forbes in 2007.

Dannenberg never publicly expressed remorse for the people killed by the V-2 he helped create, assigning sole moral responsibility to the Nazi officials who ordered its use.

The Huntsville Times report,family, friends and admirers filled the theater of the Davidson Center for Space Exploration Friday afternoon for a memorial to Dannenberg which, in the words of Ralph Petroff, was definitely not a funeral service - "This is a celebration of the life of this extraordinary man,".... "If there ever was a rocket scientist, he was a rocket scientist," Klaus Dannenberg said of his father.

Previous posts on Operation Paperclip - Reidel , Steinhoff , Braun etc.,

See FROM PEENEMÜNDE TO THE MOON By Konrad K. Dannenberg ... afascinating read . "This presentation will briefly describe the activities in the German Rocket Development Center in Peenemünde, and summarize the key factors that made the V-2 rocket an effective weapon. The Allied Forces showed, after the war, great interest in learning more about this new weapon and its military applications."

Aerial bombing continues relentlessly in Afghanistan

In total, 52 close-air-support missions were flown in support of the ISAF and Afghan security forces, reconstruction activities and route patrols reports the US November 14th Airpower summary .

On November 16th an Air Force MQ-9A Reaper and an Air Force MQ-1B Predator used Hellfire missiles against anti-Afghan forces who were placing IEDs along a route in the vicinity of Bolocan. The missions were confirmed a success by on-scene joint terminal attack controllers.

Always remembering that On November 6th , an Air Force MQ-9 Reaper dropped guided bomb unit-12s and used Hellfire missiles against anti-Afghan forces who were firing rocket-propelled grenades at coalition forces in the vicinity of Bolocan. The mission was confirmed a success by an on-scene joint terminal attack controller.

In the vicinity of Bari Kowt, an Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle dropped a guided bomb unit-31 and GBU-38s on enemy fighters who were attacking coalition forces from behind a tree line. A JTAC declared the mission successful.

In total, 51 close-air-support missions were flown on November 16th in support of the ISAF and Afghan security forces, reconstruction activities and route patrols.

28 year old Cuban model Mayra Veronica is said to be the modern equivalent of Betty Grable

Unlikely Birthday Party - Philatelic aside

If Adolf Hitler is alive and well and living in South America somewhere, he would be 118 today.

The site philatelist points out that a set of a block of four dark green 6-pfennig stamps was issued -"Who Would Save His People Must Think Heroically". Wer ein Volk retten will kann nur heroisch denken (Which is Ko želi spasiti jedan narod, može samo herojski razmišljati in Hungarian)

334 stamps were issued during the period of the Third Reich often bearing Hitler's head, his head never appeared on any coinage of the Third Reich. There are two versions of the block set, with and without the perforations Both blocks were issued 4/5/1937 for Hitler's 48th birthday on 4/20/1937.... 70 years to the day.

Ref :

Propaganda Art in the Postage Stamps of the Third Reich
Frederick Lauritzen
The Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts, Vol. 10, Autumn, 1988 (Autumn, 1988), pp. 62-79 doi:10.2307/1504019

An interesting footnote is that in 1944 the American propaganda sections of U. S. Office of Strategic Services re-issued a mocking set showing a deaths skull instead of Hilters head with the date by the Reichsmark of 1944 - they are supposed to be blood red the head stands in a field of cemetery crosses. They also issued millions of not dissimiliar stamps, sometimes using them to post to the addresses of dead soldiers.

Curiously there has been a small and modestly profitable post war industry in forging these proaganda stamps.(A set is for sale at US$25 here)