Willy Messerschmitt & Kurt Tank

I did not list the UK because I was not aware that they also “collected” Germans after the war.

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Dietrich Kuchemann, Riemer Horton, Johanna Weber among others would disagree with you as they worked in the U.K. aero industry after WW2.

I agree that in the west the scientists were more prized than the designer. But not so in the East but that situation was not voluntary, an enforced “milking” whereby they mentored and taught the next generation of Soviet designers, no long term career prospects, but no long holiday in deepest Siberia either.

I understand quite a few German industrialists struggled to bring themselves to voluntarily work in the West even for a fat salary and a new start, probably as a result of patriotic pride.

I know that German aerodynamic engineers/scientists were valued, the actual aircraft designers, not so much.

Thanks for your replies. I tend to believe that the very prominent names were not looked after because -as rightly said above- there were teams developping the aircraft and because them getting “new jobs offered” would probably not have met what people in the “Allied Countries” wpuld have expected…

…but I do not really think that it was the first question, if somebody made moeny, used slave labour or was a member of the Nazi-party. And whilst I do not really believe in German “Wonder-weapons” I would still dare to say that a lot of the German aerodynamical research was more than valuable for all those Nations and manufacturers who could obtain it 😉

Certain production techniques like the use of slave labour to the point of death certainly weighed against them – also Nazi Party membership and affiliations at the highest level probably didn’t help. Von Braun and his team were grabbed by the Yanks for their rocket skills but for several years after the war were kept in isolation such was the rightful repugnance felt by many towards von Braun and his use of slave labour. Besides there really wasn’t much room in the west given our existing design and manufacturing teams had leaped ahead of the Germans. Tank and Messerschmitt’s post war designs were pretty pedestrian, even given the reduced circumstances in which they worked while on the run. Don’t forget that these people made a lot of money out of furthering the Nazi cause and actively sought influence at the highest levels.

They didn’t design the aircraft purely themselves but headed the design team.

I did not list the UK because I was not aware that they also “collected” Germans after the war.

Anyhow . both Tank and Messerschmitt continued to desing aircraft in Argentine, Spain, India and Egypt (although with a fairly limited success).

Good question.

I’d guess they weren’t needed. And the ability to design an aircraft in the late 30s or early 40s didn’t necessarily translate into jets. Or perhaps they thought the days of the “one man” primary design talent was over. Certainly, the “name” designers became more of team leaders than our images of a solitary man hunched a drafting table (and I’m not sure that was ever completely accurate).

You didn’t list the UK in your list of potential employers…any reason why?