V-2 Rocket Program

When one refers to the V-2 Rocket one must differentiate between the German missile program and what America accomplished with the several V-2 Rockets and components that were captured at the end of WW-2. The original V-2 weapon system was developed by Germany as an Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM) and used with limited success as a terror weapon against the British.  The V-2 was developed by a German rocket team headed by the then 32 year old Werner von Braun, who admitted that the V-2 "borrowed heavily" from the published work of Dr. Robert Goddard.  After a development program it was deployed against the British, but fortunately, introduced too late in the war effort to influence the outcome of the war.  Werner von Braun and a large portion of his team of scientists, engineers and technicians surrendered to the US military, and after the tragedy of the war had subsided, went to work for the US Army.  At one point in the war Werner von Braun was arrested by the Gestapo and charged with sabotage of the V-2 Project.  Drawings had been discovered of a V-2 like rocket outfitted with a small cabin for a man. It was stated that his real objective was space travel, not the defense of the Fatherland.  It was only through the efforts of General Dornberger that he was freed and allowed to continue his work, which Dornberger said could not be accomplished without the direction of von Braun. 

When fired vertically the V-2 achieved altitudes of over 100 miles and when launched at approximately 45 degrees it traveled along a parabolic arc with a maximum altitude of roughly 60 miles and a ground range of 190 miles.  Then after, the US took over further testing of the V-2, this work culminated in the Bumper Project which mated the American WAC-Corporal to the V-2 rocket, forming a two stage rocket, validating staging theory, and reached an altitude of approximately 250 miles and a speed of 5,100 mile per hour.  After the war Dr. Werner von Braun went on to develop numerous successful missile systems for the US Army including the Redstone Rocket, which placed the first American satellite in orbit and the first Americans into suborbital flights.  He then was transferred to NASA where he continued the development of the Saturn-1B and designed the Saturn V mega-rocket, which was essential for the success of the Apollo Moon Program.

The V-2 demonstrated the use of guidance systems, vectored thrust control though the use of steerable exit guide vanes in the rockets exhaust, turbopump delivery of fuel and oxidizer to the combustion chamber, and many of the concepts used in modern launch vehicles.  It was the first rocket to demonstrate this technology on a large scale.