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The conventional narrative of the Space Race presents a tale of two systems: the liberal, capitalist democracy of the United States pitted against the centralized, communist party-state of the Soviet Union. This framework, while capturing the superstructural conflict of the Cold War, obscures a more complex and unsettling substratum. The technological foundations upon which both superpowers launched their celestial ambitions were not solely products of indigenous innovation but were deeply embedded in the moral and geopolitical aftermath of the Second World War. The systematic recruitment of scientific and engineering personnel from the defeated Third Reich—most notably through the United States’…