How effectively and progressively were the German rockets at the end of WW2, for example compared with the allied state of knowledge ? Wasserfall Rheintochter Schmetterling Enzian Regards, Che.
The Germans were probably a decade ahead of the Allies in rocket design, which was why the Western Allies and the Russians were so eager to get their hands on the facilities, equipment and men who produced them. The West got most of the scientist and much of the equipment and the Russians got most of the technicians who actually built the rockets.
Here we are: The Americans had the 'Bat', a long-range radar-guided anti-shipping missile. It was 12 feet long, and could fly at up to 3,000mph for 20 miles. One of them did in fact sink a Japanese destroyer 20 miles from its launch point. (see here for more detail. The British had the 'Stooge', a winged anti-Kamikazi rocket with an 8-mile range. I think that they were not used operationally - or even entered service. (see here and here for more detail There were a whole host of other ingenious rocket/missile designs (the last German submarine sunk during the war was sunk by an American rocket-retarded munition that fell vertically downwards from the launch aircraft) that were not guided, and a fair few guided weapons that never saw operational service. Incidentally, the German radio-controlled bombs were apparently fairly easy to disrupt by simply jamming their radio frequency.
Ricky the Bat didn't have any propulsion (it was a radar guided glide bomb)...so how does it get to go 3000 mph?? Think it was 300mph....probable a typo! When used during World War II, the Bat proved somewhat disappointing. A total of 3,000 Bats were manufactured, but most were never used. It was taken out of deployment following the war after tests revealed the radar could be relatively easily foiled by simple countermeasures. It seems that all early guidance systems were easily jammed....hmmm rasberry Some more info (and pics! Corsair for instance)! http://biomicro.sdstate.edu/pederses/asmbat.html Nice article about this topic http://www.spaceline.org/history/5.html
