There are probably a lot of Russians who fled to Germany after WWII only to end up in Huntsville, Al with a 9 year gap in their resume starting in 1941..., right?
Not sure why most commenters are shitting on you. It is an interesting possibility. The apple not falling far from the tree is an expression for a reason.
Yeah it's almost kinda weird how defensive people are getting with this.
It's really hard to find somewhat accurate information on this guy. He seems to have been part of the White Army fighting the bolsheviks until the left for Yugoslavia. He taught there until 1941, when Germany invaded Yugoslavia. He stayed in the country until 1942 or 1945 (unclear), when he left for Bavaria. If the latter, it's possible he tried to avoid Operation Keelhaul which would have seen him forcibly repatriated to the Soviet Union.
After the war he was in an American-run camp for displaced German peoples, where he met Hans mother. They left for the US in 1950/1951 and settled in Huntsville. Since he was connected to the University of Alabama (and was a professor in sociology before the war), it seems likely that he was somewhat connected to Von Braun, who was also important in elevating the UoA.
Interestingly, it's said that Von Braun and his fellow German scientists were more progressive than the Americans there. Von Braun was threatened by the KKK for a while because he hired black people.
But the timeline is shaky. Hans claims that his dad fought communists in Russia and Yugoslavia (specifically Tito's), but it's unclear when he did so. If he left for Germany in 1942 he couldn't have fought Tito's communists because he wasn't around.
Presumably if he was around in this period, he likely due to his nobleman origin would have been part of the Chetniks, who had a complicated relationship with the Axis. Not quite Nazis, but plenty of war crimes to go around still.
But the most credible source I could find claims he left for Germany in 1942, seemingly making it impossible for him to have been part of the Chetniks. Which raises the question: who did he even fight, if anyone at all? He seems to have consistently moved towards areas where there was less or no fighting at the time (and that he could actually move to). It's not impossible that he tried to avoid the wars once they reached his doorstep. He was also an anti-communist, which at least could explain the move to Yugoslavia and to Germany if it happened in 1945.
I'm not sure if based on these fragile timelines we can conclusively say or suggest he was part of the Nazis, Chetniks or any other group. The gap in his resume could well be explained by the fact that it's an academic resume, likely leaving things off if they weren't relevant to his academic career. Had he worked in a factory in that time for example, it probably wouldn't have been listed either.
We do know that his son's a fascist shitstain though. Whether he himself was a Nazi is highly unclear given the contradicting timelines and statements.
Von Braun and his fellow German scientists were more progressive than the Americans there.
Most of the Americans there would have been fascist shit stains. But let's be very clear, there is no way in hell Von Braun deserves the title of more progressive than any other racist shit stain while hiding from justice after performing horrific Nazi experiments on human beings. A Nazi shit stain is a Nazi shit stain. It might not have been your intention, but it just really rubs me the wrong way to hear anybody try and paint this monster in any kind of positive light.
The reason he was hidden in Huntsville vs somewhere more progressive, is bc it was the middle of nowhere and the U.S. government wanted to keep him and the atomic technology he was helping to create, a secret. This is also why it would be a very strange coincidence for Von Spakovsky to end up in Huntsville of all places.
I don't believe a word his son says about him, but I'd love to read any info you may have found in addition to his son's rose colored memories.
I'm particularly interested in reading this report that is mentioned in a citation footnote from an article titled ‘What Did You Do during the War?’
Berezino district party committee report on the case of Ia. A. Shpakovskii, 24 May 1946
It might not have been your intention, but it just really rubs me the wrong way to hear anybody try and paint this monster in any kind of positive light.
Von Braun was a Nazi and likely committed war crimes, most likely the usage of forced labour. But ultimately he himself did not seem to hold the Nazi ideology that close to heart. He was especially alienated after his arrest by the Gestapo.
The man lacked principles, and seemed fine with using slave labour as long as he could play rocketman. A shitstain, sure. Nonetheless, he doesn't appear to have held any (strong) racial prejudices, afaik not even antisemitism or something.
What I was pointing out is that the shitstains in Alabama were even more racist than the former Nazi immigrants were. So even if Hans turned out to be a racist shitstain, that might not necessarily be because his dad was; it might also be caused by the racists that were around during his upbringing.
I'm not sure what that citation you mentioned contains, but the context it's used in makes it a little ambiguous:
Appealing to the authorities to reclaim property that people believed was unlawfully taken by local officials in the weeks right after the war was also dangerous. After all, investigations would ensue, which could backfire on those who had sought justice from the state. When F. Borisevich from Slutsk (eastern Belorussia) wrote a letter to Ponomarenko, complaining that NKVD officers had taken several of her possessions, among them money and clothes, the Slutsk authorities began to look into the issue. They found out that Borisevich’s husband had been arrested in 1937 and sentenced to forced labor. During the war, Borisevich had shared a house with two local policemen—one of them her grandson, who stole from “partisan and Jewish families.” Slutsk authorities concluded that she had acquired most of her possessions unlawfully during the war, and they decided to pass the case on to a higher court
So either dad did steal from partisans or Jews, or he was merely tried for doing so after seeking justice from authorities. The timeline is weird though, when would this case have taken place? In 1945 he had already left for Germany, so how was he tried by the Soviets? Or was he tried in his absence? Or is that citation referring to a different person?
Spakovsky ended up in Huntsville, likely to join the rest of the Germans who went there. He was a sociologist, not a rocket scientist, so maybe not a priority for operation Paperclip or something.
At first I thought you were implying the dad was a part of Operation Paperclip. But that would require Nazis to have recruited an ethnic Slav for missile work.
Then I wonder if you're implying dad might have been a Soviet spy targeting the stuff in Huntsville. And that seems more plausible. Under that scenario it is likely that significant parts or all of the refugee story are real, and that can be fashioned into decent cover.
And then it's also plausible that there is no meaning, and a refugee settling in Huntsville is mere coincidence.
By the looks of the dates he left Yugoslavia when the Axis attacked, which seems a perfectly reasonable thing to do
"Settled in Yugoslavia after WWI" means White Russian, so not really Soviet agent material.
There were plenty of reasons to flee Russia after WWI other than being a member of the White Movement. I mean you had civil war, famine, terror, more terror, etc. Plenty of reasons to fuck off and never look back.
Operation Paperclip
So the idea of apolitical nazi scientists just working on rockets is kinda not true when you look closer, but the real meat is Operation Bloodstone, where nazi officers were brought over snd given immunity to help run anticommunist programs.
An ethnic slav? He was born in Saint Petersburg...
And sure, it could just be a coincidental 9 year gap in his resume starting in 1941 and have nothing to do with him being a Nazi
Why would it be weird for an ethnic Slav to be born in the capital of the Russian empire? And are you suggesting he was a member of the Nazi party while he was teaching in Yugoslavia?
Well if you're saying he was in paperclip, paperclip has been mostly declassified. You can look him up in the rolls here. Not a lot of Russian names on that list, but there might be a few.
He was born in Saint Petersburg...
Uh, yes, the capital of Russia? Your point?
So Hans Anatol von Spakovsky was an immigrant anchor baby?
More of a paperclip baby
I don't know if you can really call Huntsville a small town? It's a city of almost a million people, including the suburbs around it.
In 1941?
Technically I don't think he got to Huntsville until 1951, but yeah when he got there it was a town of less than 17k people and only 4 square miles.
In 1941 he was somewhere else... Doing something. Who knows what. We can't say for sure what he was doing before he suddenly reappears in Germany in 1950 and then off to the city that never sleeps, Huntsville, Alabama, in 1951.
Huh, if only there was some way to know how big Huntsville was in 1951
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Huntsville,_Alabama
It's hilarious how many random points you have to swat down, like people are playing gotcha with every aspect of the post.
What's funny about this is you're going a long way to imply the father was a fascist/Nazi, when growing up in Alabama in the 50's is all that's needed to turn a child into a racist, fascist piece of shit.
Heritage foundation isn't a Nazi respawn. It's the American born and bred fascists who have been in America all along. Either way it doesn't matter. They're fascists through and through, no different to the nazi's.
Alabama was the birthplace of the modern Civil Rights Movement, from Montgomery to Birmingham to Selma. A little unfair to assert it was a state that just makes people racist. The neo-confederates of the post-Depression Era had to work pretty hard to keep cramming Jim Crow down people's throats decade after decade.
That said, Huntsville Alabama circa 1950 was most notable for Redstone Arsenal, home to the Marshall Space Flight Center. The center was founded through Operation Paperclip, a project to export German rocket scientists to the United States and pump them for their expertise in the field.
A guy with a Nazi mother and White-Russian father who emigrated to a city built around the famous rocketry lab was almost certainly influenced by the German brand of fascist ideology.
That said, the Germans got their strain of fascism from Fordist antisemitism pumped into the country after WW1. So if you're going to pick a state to blame for The Heritage Foundation's brand of white nationalist hate, you'd be better off pointing the finger at Michigan.
I mean, isn't that because the core of the movement was persecuted black Southerners? Alabama having enough of thise guys to kickstart the movement feels like more of an indictment than praise.
You linked a source saying his mother was German, not that she was a Nazi. His father also did not move straight to Huntsville in 1951 according to this post, he retired there over a decade later after having worked in
FloridaJacksonville (thanks to derfunkatron for the correction).Man, they still racist as fuck there.
Or the zionists
Ok.. not sure why you're trying to defend a neo Nazi or his old school Nazi dad, but sure.
I don't think they were defending him; I think they were saying you don't need German credentials to be a proper, full-blooded Nazi. Just being American is enough.