Did Nazi Germany’s Technology Turn America Into a Military Superpower?

A new book gives us some answers.

byRobert Farley

Before the guns fell silent in 1945, the Allies had already drawn up plans for gathering as much German technology as they could take. The German war machine had caused untold destruction across the continent, and German technology was reputed to be cutting age. Weapons like the V-2 missile, the Me 262 jet fighter, and the Type XXI submarine seemed like wonder-weapons, enabling Germany to punch well above its weight during the war.

Taking Nazi Technology, a new book from Douglas O’Reagan details what the Americans found when they began looting Nazi Germany, and why they were disappointed in their haul. At a time when the United States has become deeply insecure about its technological leadership, the story has important lessons for policymakers.

The Heist

The idea of German military and technological supremacy was widely held in the United States before and during the war. German industry had an almost mythic quality, even as objective indicators of technological prowess increasingly began to favor the United States in the early twentieth century. The evident sophistication of the V-2 and the Me 262, along with rhetoric about the effectiveness of other “super-weapons,” also led Americans to believe that the Germans had harnessed technological innovation on a large scale.

But the United States had no standing intelligence infrastructure to capture and exploit German technology. Much was developed on the fly, often with inexperienced and inappropriately trained intelligence “professionals.” When the United States finally attacked the problem of appropriating German technology, it did so in a haphazard fashion, with a bewildering array of different agencies and acronyms. Operation Paperclip, focusing on what would eventually be termed aerospace technology, is relatively well-known. The Field Information Agency, Technical (FIAT) became a major bureaucratic driver, tasked with facilitating the investigation and acquisition of German technology.

The Gang