In September 1944, Germany launched its brandnew wonder weapon for the first time – the V2. Designed to destroy Allied morale the socalled vengeance weapon was an awesome technological achievement. Hitler genuinely believed it could turn the war back in his favour. Instead, the first V2 crashed soon after liftoff a preview of things to come.

The V2 was expensive, resource intensive and had little strategic value. Few weapons better exemplify Germanys fixation with the wonder weapon, a fictional magic bullet for a war they had already lost. In this video, IWM's Ian Kikuchi takes a closer look at the V2, how it worked, why it was built and what impact it had on the Second World War.

With grateful thanks to Eric Horne, for his kind donation, and to Colin Welch of Research Resource Archaeology, for his expertise and assistance.

Find out more about Hitler's vengeance weapons: https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/thete...

Find out more about the V1 Flying Bomb: https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/thev1...

View and licence the archive films used in this video here: https://film.iwmcollections.org.uk/my...

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Attributions:
Wernher von Braun at Peenemünde. Bundesarchiv, Bild 1461978Anh.02302. CCBYSA 3.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...
Wernher von Braun at Peenemünde. Bundesarchiv, Bild 1461978Anh.02403. CCBYSA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...