V-1, V-2, and Me 163 B Rocket Propelled Craft at the Deutsches Museum - World War II Sites on Waymarking.com

You'll find these displayed on the first floor towards the back of the museum complex.

The Vergeltungswaffe-1, V-1, also designated Fieseler Fi 103/FZG-76, known colloquially in English as the Flying bomb, Buzz bomb or Doodlebug, was the first guided missile used in war and the forerunner of today's cruise missile.

The V-1 was developed by the German Luftwaffe during the Second World War and was used between June 1944 and March 1945. It was fired at targets in southeastern England and Belgium, chiefly London and Antwerp. V-1s were launched from "ski-jump" launch sites along the French (Pas-de-Calais) and Dutch coasts until the sites were overrun by Allied forces. A small number were air-launched from German aircraft over the North Sea. The V-1 was later complemented by the more sophisticated V-2 rocket. The last V-1 struck British soil on March 29, 1945, two days after the last V-2 struck.

First operational use was on June 12 and 13, 1944, after a series of heavy Allied air attacks (Operation Crossbow) on the launch sites beginning in December 1943. The launch sites could theoretically launch about 15 bombs per day, although this was never consistently achieved; the record was 18 in one day. Only a quarter hit their targets due to a combination of defensive measures (see Countermeasures below), mechanical unreliability and guidance errors.

The Vergeltungswaffe 2 (V-2) ("Reprisal weapon 2" Propaganda name given by Joseph Goebbels) , also known, in the Development Process as the A4 (Aggregat 1-4), was the first ballistic missile.[1][2] It was used by the German Army primarily against Belgian and British targets during the later stages of World War II. The V-2 was the first man-made object launched into space, during test flights that reached an altitude of 189 km (117 miles) in 1944.

Dornberger had always wanted a mobile launch platform for the missiles, but Hitler pressed for the construction of massive underground blockhouses from which to launch them. According to his plans, V-2s should have arrived from a number of factories in a continuous stream on several redundant rail lines, and launching should have been almost continual.

Construction of the first such site started at Éperlecques, near St Omer in the Pas-de-Calais area of France, in 1943. The British spotted it almost immediately and started a massive bombing campaign that eventually forced the Germans to abandon it, although the large 5000 kg "Tallboy" bombs had little impact.

Another site was then started nearby in a huge quarry and called La Coupole, but it was not long before that too was destroyed by bombing. Eventually they gave up on the area and moved to the south near Cherbourg, but once again the site was discovered and bombed, while the concrete was still wet.


A V-2 rocket on its Meillerwagen transporterThe plan was changed to build large truck-towed trailers for the missiles. An entire convoy for the missile, men, equipment and fuel required about 30 trucks. The missile was delivered to a staging area on a Vidalwagen (made by Vidal) and the local crews installed the warhead. Launch teams then transferred the missile to a Meillerwagen (made by Meiller) and towed it to the launch site. There it was erected onto the launch table, fuelled, armed, gyros were set and the rocket was fired. From arrival at a site to firing took about 90 minutes. The crew could leave the firing site within 30 minutes.

This was very successful, and an average of ten V-2s were launched per day, by far the most large rockets of a single type. After the war, estimates showed that up to 100 V-2s could be launched per day with these trailers, given sufficient supply of the rockets.[1]

The missile could be launched practically anywhere, roads running through forests being a particular favorite. The system was so mobile and small that not one Meillerwagen was caught in action by Allied aircraft.

The first unit to reach operational status was Batterie 444. On September 2, 1944 they formed up to launch attacks on Paris, recently liberated, and eventually set up near Houffalize in Belgium. The next day the 485th moved to The Hague for operations against London. Several launch attempts over the next few days failed, but on 8 September both groups fired successfully.

Over the next few months the number of V-2s fired was at least 3,172, distributed over various targets in Belgium (especially Antwerp), France, England (especially London), and the Netherlands.

Ultimately the most successful countermeasure was the Allied advance that forced the launchers back beyond range. The underground assembly plant in the Harz mountains near Nordhausen was never bombed.

At the end of the war, a race between the United States and the USSR to retrieve as many V-2 rockets and staff as possible began.[4] Three hundred trainloads of V-2s and parts were captured and shipped to the United States, and 126 of the principal designers, including both Wernher von Braun and Walter Dornberger were in American hands. In fact, Von Braun and his team made the conscious decision to surrender to the United States military to ensure they were not captured by the advancing Russians.

Under Operation Paperclip the German engineers' stay in the U.S. was legitimised. For several years afterward, the U.S. rocketry program made use of the supply of unused V-2 rockets left from the war, launching over 60 of them. A U.S. V-2 flight in 1946 saw the first animals in space, when fruit flies were launched to study radiation effects. Some V-2s were equipped with a WAC-rocket as a second stage. These rockets were called Bumper. On 24 February 1949 such a rocket reached a then-record altitude of 400 km (250 miles) and a velocity of 8290 km/h (5150 mph) at its launch from White Sands Proving Grounds. The Bumper was also the first rocket launched from Cape Canaveral. Many of these rockets were used for peaceful purposes, including upper-atmosphere research.

The Me 163 Komet was the only operational rocket-powered fighter aircraft during the Second World War. Although revolutionary and capable of performance unrivalled at the time, it proved dangerous to operate and resulted in the destruction of very few Allied aircraft.

Operations began in 1944. As expected, the plane was extremely fast, and for a time the Allied fighters were at a complete loss as what to do about it. The plane often climbed to the bombers faster than the opposing fighters could dive in an attempt to intercept it. A typical Me 163 tactic was to zoom through the bomber formations at 30,000 ft (9,000 m), up to an altitude of 35,000–40,000 ft (10,700–12,000 m), then dive down through the formation again. With luck, this would afford the pilot two brief chances to fire off a few rounds from his cannons before he had to glide back to his airfield.

As the cockpit was unpressurized, the operational ceiling was limited by what the pilot could endure for several minutes while breathing oxygen from a mask, without losing consciousness. Pilots underwent altitude chamber training to harden them against the rigors of operating in the thin air of the stratosphere without a pressure suit.

Related Website: [Web Link] Supplementary Related Website: [Web Link] Admission Fee: € 8.50 Opening Days/Times: The Deutsches Museum is open daily from 09:00 to 17:00. It is closed only on January 1, Shrove Tuesday, Good Friday, May 1, November 1, and December 24, 25, and 31. On December 13 the museum is closed at 13:30.

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