V2: The Nazi rocket that launched the space age

[Gerald]

This week marks the 70th anniversary of the first V2 rocket attack on London. As our space correspondent Richard Hollingham discovers, the legacy of the missile lives on in today’s spacecraft.

The beginnings of an arms race in outer space and the regular military forces.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/2014...ace-age-rocket

Note: 8 September 2014

[Bilge_Rat]

interesting, currently reading "Wages of Destruction" on the WW2 Nazi economy (fascinating book btw).

Turns out the entire V2 program was aggressivily pushed by Speer as a political ploy to increase his control over the economy/arms production/Luftwaffe since the V2 was an "Army" program and therefore under his initial jurisdiction.

While technically interesting, the V2 Rocket program was prohibitively expensive and tied up valuable raw materials while contributing very little to the German war effort. Classic Boondoggle.

[Wolferz]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

interesting, currently reading "Wages of Destruction" on the WW2 Nazi economy (fascinating book btw).

Turns out the entire V2 program was aggressivily pushed by Speer as a political ploy to increase his control over the economy/arms production/Luftwaffe since the V2 was an "Army" program and therefore under his initial jurisdiction.

While technically interesting, the V2 Rocket program was prohibitively expensive and tied up valuable raw materials while contributing very little to the German war effort. Classic Boondoggle.

Not to mention, it was an indiscriminant weapon of terror like the buzz bomb. With no guidance system it was a fire and forget weapon of mediocre destruction. Hardly worth the expense.

[vanjast]

Originally Posted by Wolferz

Not to mention, it was an indiscriminant weapon of terror like the buzz bomb. With no guidance system it was a fire and forget weapon of mediocre destruction. Hardly worth the expense.

You are both wrong to the extreme, and are forgetting a more recent example in the Iraq Ver1 war... Scud missiles.

These, as the V1's and V2's, became priority targets that superseded everything else, and the expenses and manpower employed to counteract this threat ??

Ultimately against vastly superior forces the threat looks down scaled, but it you look at the production/effect costs.... it looks very good.

[Stealhead]

Originally Posted by Wolferz

Not to mention, it was an indiscriminant weapon of terror like the buzz bomb. With no guidance system it was a fire and forget weapon of mediocre destruction. Hardly worth the expense.

It did have a gyroscopic guidance system and the accuracy improved as it was used. I would not consider the deaths of 2,754 UK civilians and the injuring or 6,523 to be mediocre that is not even counting the deaths to military personal nor deaths at other target locations. If you compare a V2 to what a single bomber can do the V2 is about equal in accuracy and effect with the advantage of being much harder to defend against of course it cost more than a bomber. The only way it could truly have been a game changer during the war is if the Germans had developed an atomic bomb(not likely as a bomb that size was not developed until the mid 50's) or perhaps more likely a form of dirty bomb to arm it either of those would have caused serious losses. Or just popping into my head a chemical or biological weapon. Even then the war was lost for Germany.

I agree that it was expensive and the money and man power could have been used to better effect elsewhere. Of course in wars nations takes risks the US spent a huge sum on the Manhattan Project without even knowing if an atomic bomb was 100% achievable until July 1945 and the Trinity test it could have been all bust even the head folks took bets as to weather it would explode or be a fizzle or set the atmosphere on fire.

The V2 is more important as a stepping stone towards more advanced rockets and missiles had it not been developed the process would have easily been delayed 10 or 15 years perhaps more.

[Aktungbby]

WOLFERTZ: it was a fire and forget weapon of mediocre destruction. Hardly worth the expense

Beginning in September 1944, over 3,000 V-2s were launched by the German Wehrmacht against Allied targets during the war, mostly London and later Antwerp and Liège. According to a BBC documentary in 2011, the attacks resulted in the deaths of an estimated 9,000 civilians and military personnel, while 12,000 forced laborers and concentration camp prisoners were killed producing the weapons.
For the war the 8th AF lost about 2000 heavy bombers - each with a ten man crew. Not all were killed of course - some bailed out. For the entire war the 8th AF, out of two million men, had 27,000 killed.
RAF Bombing Sorties & Losses 1939–45 Sorties Losses Night: 7,449; Day: 876. After the war, the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey reviewed the available records in Germany, and concluded that official German statistics of casualties from air attack had been too low. The survey estimated that at a minimum 305,000 were killed in German cities due to bombing and estimated a minimum of 780,000 wounded. Roughly 7,500,000 German civilians were also rendered homeless. In addition to the minimum figure given in the Strategic bombing survey, the number of people killed by Allied bombing in Germany has been estimated at between 400,000 and 600,000 In the UK, 60,595 British were killed by German bombing and in France, 67,078 French were killed by US-UK bombing Belgrade was heavily bombed by the Luftwaffe on 6 April 1941, when more than 17,000 people were killed. According to The Oxford companion to World War II, "After Italy's surrender the Allies kept up the bombing of the northern part occupied by the Germans and more than 50,000 Italians were killed in these raids." Thankyou Wikipedia:
Ballpark math: British and American bombers lost: 10,325! vs estimated civilian bombing raid fatalities of Germans, French, and Italians -not counting 'dehoused persons- 422,070+-; comes to 41 people killed per bomber lost. 9,000 casualties, not including 'dehoused people (and the 12,000 slave laborers killed making the weapon) from 3000 V-2's comes to 3 people killed per V-2, all of which were lost. Each V-2 cost 20 times more money to manufacture than a V-1, and yet their warheads were almost the same size.(1900 vs 2000 lbs.) The final V-2 attacks of the war occurred on March 27, 1945 -- one on Antwerp, which killed 27 people, and one on England, which seriously injured 23 and killed Ivy Mildred Millichamp, the last person to be killed in Britain by enemy action during World War II. If rule 1 of war is true: 'war must pay for itself', V-2's were mediocre at best and a total failure at worst-little return for investment IMHO...round one to Wolfertz.

[eddie]

Its war record aside, the V2 was the stepping stone to further rocket development by both sides. With von Braun in the States after the war, what was learned from the technology of the V2 would lead in the end, to rockets like the Atlas, Titan and finally the Saturn V.