V-3

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/v3.htm

A 20mm prototype was built at a test site at Misdroy (Miedzyzdroje), Poland and successfully demonstrated in April-May 1943. Hitler was persuaded that this could be a third terror weapon to supplement the V-1 and V-2. Overruling the German military, he ordered fifty of the guns to be built in concrete bunkers in France in order to bombard London. The first installation of five guns was to be built 165 km from London at Mimoyecques, near Calais, under Operation Wiese. The superguns were built at a fixed angle into a 30 m chalk hill, covered by a 5.2 m thick protective concrete dome. Each 140 m long cannon was capable of delivering a 150 mm / 140 kg shell on London.

Hundreds of slave workers began construction in September 1943 by sinking an initial tunnel 30 m below the hill's surface into the chalk. French Resistance informed the Allies of the new effort almost immediately. Bombing raids to destroy the site began two months later. However the bunker proved impervious to Allied bombs, even 5400 kg Tallboy penetrator weapons. The weapons were nearing completion when, on 6 July 1944, three Tallboys happened to make it through the gun shaft openings. They penetrated 30 m to the first level of the complex and exploded, killing dozens of workers. Work on the complex stopped at this point.

The Allies were unaware of this success and searched for new methods to destroy Mimoyecques and other German bunker sites. Under Project Aphrodite (USAAF) and Operation Anvil (USN) radio-controlled, television-guided B-17 or PB4Y (B-24) bombers crammed with ten tonnes of explosives were to be flown by a crew near to the target. The pilot and co-pilot would then bail out while an accompanying aircraft guided the missile to a precision strike. This approach was abandoned in August 1944 after a total lack of success and several crew fatalities (including Joseph P Kennedy, Jr, elder brother of the future president).

By the end of August the Germans completely abandoned the complex in the face of the advancing British forces. Two short-length (45 m long) V-3's were built at Antwerp and Luxembourg in support of the Ardennes offensive in December 1944. These were found to be unreliable and only a few shots were fired without known effect. The British dynamited the Mimoyecques complex on 9 May 1945




A V-3 projectile



A V-3 installation



A V-3 prototype

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