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Chapter 15
Moscow—Poznan—Berlin
In early April 1945, military actions raged across a significant portion of Germany.
Soviet troops were on a forced march from the east and the allied troops were
advancing from the west.
In the central sector of the Soviet-German front, the troops of the First
Byelorussian Army Group under the command of Marshal G. K. Zhukov were
conducting combat operations on the left bank of the Oder. The primary concentration
of this army group was already located 60–70 kilometers from Berlin. The
troops of the Second Byelorussian Army Group under the command of Marshal
K. K. Rokossovskiy were delivering the main thrust from the area of Stettin
(Szczecin) with a subsequent breakout to the shores of Pomeranian Bay on the
Baltic Sea. 1
The atmosphere at NII-1 of the People’s Commissariat of the Aircraft Industry
in Likhobory where I worked was extremely exciting. It was not just the euphoria
of imminent victory that had seized the entire population and the sensation of
stepping out into the bright light after four agonizing years of war. We now had
our own special interests in Germany.
By studying materials that had been recovered from the German rocket firing
range in Poland near Debica, as well as intelligence data, the scant reports from our
British allies, and testimonies and accounts provided by a few prisoners of war who
had information, we had been able in general terms to get an idea of the scope of
the work that the Germans had conducted on a new type of weapon—the longrange
guided missile.
Subsequent events showed that we had been very close to putting together a
fundamentally correct description of the V-1 and V-2 “vengeance weapons.” It
was evident that neither we nor our allies had developed similar weapons, either
in terms of the parameters achieved or the production scale.We were extremely
interested in the problems of guidance technology, the instrument design, the
actual parameters and control systems for powerful rocket engines, and the role of
radio-control. All of our specialists—the rocket specialists, engine specialists, and
1. Szczecin is located in northwest Poland where the Oder river meets the Baltic Sea.
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