Building Hitler’s Missiles
Traces of History in Peenemünde
Volkhard Bode, Katy Derbyshire, Gerhard Kaiser
Many people regard Peenemünde on the Baltic island of Usedom as the birthplace of space travel. In 1942, the first liquid-fuelled rocket took off from here into space, yet it was undoubtedly designed as a long-range weapon. Volker Bode and Gerhard Kaiser document the development of the „retaliation weapons“ V1 and V2 in the Nazis military research centres, the Soviet occupation in the early post-war period, Peenemündes history as an East German arm base and the current use of the site.
