V2 Development Problems - Postwar Article

[harry palmer]

"PROBLEMS OF V-2 DEVELOPMENT 1944-1945"

Colonel X, German Guided Missile Regiment

Originally published in "An Cosantoir" 1949

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[A.C.E. van T.]

I haven't got my records with me so I give you what I can remember.

About 8000 V1's and 1300 V2 were fired towards Antwerp.
Just over 1200 reached Antwerp,Port of Antwerp(then about 40km's) or Antwerp county.
For instance in Ossendrecht(NL) north of Antwerp about 800 went down.
I resurched some impactsites and discovered that a V1 "crashsite" in the woods or farmland has a diameter between 6 to 9 meters.
A V2 has about 9 to 12 meter diameter.
All are in Putte (NL) or Kalmthoutse Heide(BE)
Via Google-Earth you look up Kalmthoutse Heide and you can see some V2 impactsites near path made by 500pounders.
Strargely enough the ones we visited were near eachother.
Which maybe indicate that the germans used the so called Leitstrahl or guidancebeam(radiofreq. to cut the fuel)
Son of Blacksmit in Waarde(NL) made an photo of mobileV2 when it was in teir village.
I'm not sure if there is still an exposition in Antwerp City hall.

[Simon Gunson]

In 1941 before Pearl Harbour, GEC was indicted for price fixing on Tungsten Carbide according to a secret deal it had with Krupp industries. The price of Tungsten Carbide was inflated to 12 times the cost which Nazi Germany paid for the same product. The case was abandoned as America entered the war.

The most interesting aspect of V-2 development for me was that the Nazi Government regarded Peenemunde as a drain on resources and funding which could not be tolerated. Herr Denkolb had tried to shut Penemunde down and then in 1943 hit upon the idea of amortising the cost of Penemunde research, by privatising Penemunde into a Limited Liability company.

Then Degenkolb theorised the cost could be written off as a production cost with the rights to build V-2 rockets sold off to private industry. Eventually Himmler had Von Braun arrested on trumped up charges to coerce agreement with this privatisation plan.

Several private bidders including Krupp, Seimens and AEG tendered for production rights. Eventually AEG with funds raised from it's significant shareholder General Electric Corporation were used to fund production of the V-2 in return for license rights to the V-2. In USA the project to acquire V-2 rights was known as the ORDCIT project, funded by US Army ordnance.

During late 1944 Dornberger and Von Braun met in secret with two GEC officials in Lisbon to discuss transfer of technical know how of the V-2 rocket to GEC. GEC provided it's V-2 know how to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory under contract in 1944-45. In return for this, when the trial for price fixing of Tungsten Carbide resumed after the war, GEC officials escaped prison terms and recieved very modest fines.

The irony is that without massive financing from USA the Nazis could not afford to put the V-2 into production. Had it not been financed, London and Antwerp would never have been bombarded by V-2 rockets.

Who was the major shareholder of GEC during WW2 ?
Franklin D. Roosevelt ...

Who became the major beneficiary of license fees to Krupp ?
Adolf Hitler.