An uncommon sight in Europe's skies

[sjk.fly4ever]

I share with you an interesting collection of pictures showing one of the projects launched at the end of World War II by Germany as part of its war effort to try to avoid the increasingly Allied bombing. The big question remains whether this rocket plane had been built in greater quantities and earlier would have changed the final outcome? What do you think? Visit the link below, see photos and give your opinion about it.


http://aviacaoemfloripa.blogspot.com.br/2011/01/uma-visao-incomum-nos-ceus-da-europa.html



Best Regards.

[Mike M]

No, it would not have changed the outcome. Many Allied weapons were inferior to Axis weapons. Allied manufacturing capacity and manpower were not, and the gap continued to widen. Simplifying. "You can't beat cubic inches" and "there's no replacement for displacement." Don't start fights if you aren't the biggest and the baddest, and when you gotta run what you brung, bring the best you got and share with your buddies.

Short answer. No.

[cub builder]

I see you keep posting various axis Aircraft prototypes asking if they could have changed the outcome. Not any of the planes or super-planes would have made a significant difference in the outcome, only in how it ended. Remember, the atomic bombs were being developed and built to drop on Germany first. The Allies won the war in Europe before the bombs were ready. But Japan fought on. And a 3 months later, Hiroshima, then Nagasaki were bombed, then Japan surrendered saving hundreds of thousands of lives on both sides. Had the Germans held on a few months longer, it could have just as well been Nuremburg and Hamburg to be the first cities to be nuked. The war was lost to Germany regardless, it was just a matter of how it would end. However, the various aircraft and weapon prototypes Germany had on the drawing board are quite fascinating.

-Cub builder

[lnuss]

Cubby has it right, as does Mike -- better technology, in and of itself, could not have helped the Germans win. A lack of resources, poor leadership in many areas, and a number of other factors meant that at most they could have delayed the end for a short time. And that rocket plane wasn't really worth messing with, except for the novelty value and, perhaps, for the research knowledge it would gain.

[cluttonfred]

"Wonder weapons" in the hands of the Allies or the Axis did not and would not have changed the outcome of the war significantly. Even the use of nuclear weapons by the USA did not have any impact on the outcome, just on timing. German, Japan and Italy were all relatively small, resource-poor countries that needed to hold vast territories and control their people and industry in order to feed their war machines, while the USA, Soviet Union and UK (with its colonies) already controlled vast territories, manpower, natural resources and industrial capacity. On the offensive, the Axis seemed unstoppable, but once they started to lose territory, it was a vicious cycle.

On the other hand, the Bachem Natter is a very interesting design in terms of extreme performance on wood and plywood. How about a miniature version launched from a small gantry on a trailer, maybe with an oversized air-water rocket like a Coke bottle fed from an air compressor on the trailer, with a small electric or gasoline sustainer motor, landing on a skid, and then winched back on the trailer? THAT would get some attention at the local fly-in, though of course with the obvious disadvantage that you always have to land where you took off. ;-)

[Frank Giger]

The Natter, like the Komet, were pretty stupid weapons, when one gets right down to it.

Yes, they were crazy fast in the climb, but then they turned into gliders. They both had one shot at their targets, and then they were meat for the regular ol' prop fighter escorts.

The Natter was particularly nasty in that it was designed to be cheap to build and piloted by men with very little training. If they had produced the Natter in abundance the expectation for the man to have a second or third mission was pretty low...they were trading the savings of materiel for the spending of human capital. And at the later stages of the war, the Germans were dipping into their kids, putting thirteen year olds into the Army and Air Corps.

[Mike M]

The Natter? So we got a small, cheap, non-magnetic, non-radar-reflecting device that can be launched from a small mobile platform, guided by a motivated individual (or, in the modern world, cheap autopilot with GPS guidance) that will fly a few miles really fast and carry a couple hundred pound load of high explosive? What's not to like?