Question inspired by this thread on the Allied bombing of Germany.
The American approach to war being maximum application of firepower for minimal friendly casualties, it seems like rockets would be right up their alley. When they started to overrun the launch sites, was it ever seriously suggested that the Allies should use them against targets in Germany? Or develop their own version of what the Germans were using?
Both V1 or V2 were purely terror weapons. They never developed guidance systems accurate enough to achieve anything tactical other than reduce civilian morale.
Even if it was technically feasible to launch them there is nothing they could do for allies war goals.
I hear you, though much as I hate to say it it doesn’t sound all that different to the strategic bombing campaign in general, although the USAAF talked big about precision bombing earlier on experience disabused them. I guess they could still pay lip-service to the idea, though.
Actually one of the ironies of WW2 is while bomber command actually believed this throughout the war, by the end of the war their technology and training had progressed enough that they could. Prior to D-Day bomber command were force (against their leaders wishes) to abandon wide area bombing of cities to attack more precise targets needed to prepare for the D-Day landings. They were very successful but still pulled back into wide area bombing of cities after D-Day.
The V-1’s and V-2’s were actually poor weapons. A V-2 rocket could deliver a 2000 pound payload - once. And a V-1 had a smaller payload.
A B-29 bomber could deliver a 9000 pound payload. And do it again the next day.
Hitler also misused the V-1. It would have made more sense to use them against the Allied beaches and mulberry harbours in Normandy. But he was fixated with revenge
Apparently the United States reverse-engineered it and was going to use the JB-2 Loon in the planned amphibious landings of Japan.
The Germans, i.e. Army Ordnance, started looking into rockets around 1932. By 1934 they made rocketry a military field and every person who wanted to work on rockets had to do so for the Army. All of them did, with a couple exceptions who fled the country. They supported rocket experimentation with small but regular budgets until the war and then started increasing the flow of money until it reached possibly a billion marks.
The Americans didn’t care about rockets. They didn’t support rocket scientists. The military gave no money to rockets. All the equivalent money and brainpower went into the atomic bomb.
Just because the Americans captured some launch sites doesn’t mean they could simply turn around and use them. Peenemunde was way to the northeast of Germany, far closer to the Soviet armies. Von Braun wasn’t captured until May 3, 1945. V-E Day was May 8.
It took the Americans years to figure out that rockets could be useful weapons. They certainly weren’t in 1945. Their enormous fuel use alone was a guarantee that no one other than a desperate losing dictator would have allowed a single one to be flown in a time of scarce resources. Rockets were looney toons. The Americans were more likely to drop empty Bugs Bunny film canisters than fire rockets.
Bolding added.
That is Looney TUNES, not TOONS.
Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter
Ballistic missiles generally are poor weapons. They are best used for carrying nuclear payloads at anything resembling targets greater than 300 km.
Cruise missile really did not get going until the microchip revolution improved guidance in the 1970’s.
There was a U.S. Cruise missile which in one test landed on the wrong continent.
The V-weapons were terror weapons, and by that point in the war, our bombers were terrifying enough.
The V-1 wasn’t used until after D-Day, and the V-2 was first used three months later. There was little reason for the Allies to change tactics to something mostly untried when Fortress Europe had already been breached and we were making major gains on multiple fronts.
What Exapno said about the mix of desperation and politics driving the rocketry program goes for jet aircraft as well: The Me-262 wasn’t actually used in combat until July 1944, at which point, again, the Allies’ well-tested and well-proven aircraft were making large advances and Germany was on the ropes. We could have made jets, and we eventually did, but there was no huge reason to do it right then, and big pushes like that rarely happen without huge reason.
While agreeing with the general point it is worth noting that the first Allied jet fighter (the Meteor) went into service with the RAF in July 1944 - somewhat rushed under pressure to find a response to the first V1s hitting London.
There wasn’t even much support for the jet engine. Frank Whittle sent his detailed proposal to the Air Ministry in 1929 and they turned him down.
Y’know, as a matter of fact, I do recall reading about a proposal to use captured V-2s as part of the invasion of Japan, and not long ago…but it got quickly shot down (unsurprisingly) due to the V-2s 1) Not being particularly accurate, effective, or reliable, 2) The limited number of the things, and 3) a lack of any real pressing need, as the Allies were pretty well armed at that point, anyway. Studying and testing the rockets would be a better use of them.
However, aside from a single mention on a NASA board of a slide in some Hap Arnold briefing notes (“USE OF CAPTURED GERMAN V-2 ROCKETS AGAINST JAPAN AS OPPOSED TO STUDY AND TESTING OF ROCKETS IN UNITED STATES.”), I can’t find mention of this anywhere online, my notes, or even obviously in my browser history. Huh. Well, if anyone else has better luck, I’d love to hear it.
“mulberry harbor”?
Here is a good overview of the JB-2 project. It shows that although they reverse engineered the devices easily the problems they encountered with the launch system took months to fix.
USAAF Gen. Hap Arnold ordered 75,000 of the JB-2 in January, 1945, but the order was reduced to 10,000 because of cost, and only a little less than 1,400 were produced. They were not ready for use before the end of the war. Later work added to the accuracy (although not enough to make it a great weapon), and there was even a submarine version planned.
The Soviets manufactured several hundred of their copied version, and their experience with it helped future weapons.
As others have mentioned, the greatest problem was the accuracy, or rather the lack there of. The early versions of the flying bomb had an eight mile radius of landing, which made it useless except for use against large cities.
I don’t believe there was a serious proposal. The Allies didn’t capture V-2s until May, '45 and weren’t able to fly them until Sept., '45 with the help of captured German technicians and scientists. The surrender of Japan occurred before that.
Capturing V-2 rockets and their scientists was a high priority for the Allies, obviously the Soviets and US and Britain were on opposite sides, but there was even competition between the US the UK.
Could you be misremembering the US version of the V-1 which was called the JB-2?
[quote]
“mulberry harbor”?
[quote]
Mulberries were barges that were designed to be towed to a beach and then sunk to become a pier or artifical breakwater for a temporary harbor. Ships could tie up and unload without running aground on the beach.
Some are still there.
Where’d you get that idea? When the original daylight bombing raids started, the casualty rate was horrendous (IIRC sometimes one quarter of aircraft did not come back). I think that’s why they switched to nighttime raids, where they reduced casualties a bit but reduced (already sad) accuracy of bombs, this creating more German casualties.
The main point is that with air superiority, the allies could drop anything, anywhere, with far more accuracy and larger volume. The benefit of the V1 an V2 were that even without any air support, they could easily reach their target and deliver payload, however ineffective.
When invading Japan, the USAF could easily fly fairly unmolested over any battlefield already and drop what they would need to. The Japanese were running out of aircraft an trained pilots. Fancy weapons were not necessary.
We were going to use the V-1 copies ourselves if the atom bomb had not worked:
Didn’t the RAF do more nighttime bombing? And the USAAF went in the daytime; their plan was “precision” strategic bombing, although the precision wasn’t all that exact. (And, yes–the casualty rates for fliers were pretty bad, especially at first.)
Of course we captured V-2’s–& the scientists who made them. But that was for the next war…
From Wikipedia:
Back atcha.