All language subtitles for Nazi War Machines Secrets Uncovered S01x4

I'm James Holland, and one of the things
that's always really fascinated me

about the Second World War is the
interplay between man and machine.

In this series, I'm going to go inside
the Nazi war machine.

Travelling across Europe, I'll explore
the extraordinary machines they produced

and uncover rare archives to understand
who built them, how they evolved, and

why they're technically brilliant
designs.

were militarily flawed.

The magnificent fighter planes no rookie
could fly.

You know, the first time you fly a
Messerschmitt 109, you just have to take

leap of faith.

The power of the Pandas. If I had come
up against this, I would have been

terrified. But I'm about to learn one of
the biggest cons of them all.

The weapon that couldn't cope with mud
or sand.

Wow. It's got so little kick on it. And
you hit the target, I'm proud about you.

The U -boats that were floating bombs.

That was a suicide command.

Absolute horror.

A journey through the heart of the Nazi
war machine.

By the outbreak of the Second World War,
the Luftwaffe was without doubt the

finest air force in the entire world.

Just five years later, it was no longer
an effective fighting force.

I'm going to uncover the secrets of the
Luftwaffe machine.

The devastating jet fighter that Hitler
insisted be turned into a bomber.

This was the most insane decision ever.

The infighting between the top Nazi
design teams.

The aircraft designers had just been
running amok and they were doing

they liked.

The wonder weapon that cost more than
the creation of the atomic bomb.

The cost of it is just absolutely
staggering.

How the Nazis turned exquisite
engineering into combat disaster.

And hubris led them to downfall and
defeat.

In early 1935, Adolf Hitler announced
the birth of the Luftwaffe in defiance

the Treaty of Versailles. It was a
symbol of its technological advancement

modernity.

Meanwhile, with the advent of Hitler,
the German Air Force came back to life.

Glider clubs for Hitler youth were
fostered throughout the Parthaland.

For the bigger boys, flying sports clubs
were the attraction.

Then Hitler gave Air Minister Goering
the green light to go into mass

of fighters and bombers.

And airfields like this at Oldenburg
were springing up, bristling with

control towers, hangars, and shiny new
accommodation blocks, a symbol of their

growing military might.

And so although by 1939 Britain and
Germany were virtually neck and neck in

terms of aircraft production at around 8
,000 per year, the Luftwaffe had been

producing those kind of figures for way
longer.

And so by the eve of war, the number of
Luftwaffe airplanes was roughly double

that of the RAF.

Their principal fighter was the
Messerschmitt 109.

It made its first flight in 1935.

With its innovative low -wing monoplane
design and heavy armament, It was the

ultimate in modern fighter technology,
created by one of Germany's most

designers, Willy Messerschmitt.

Better known today as the ME 109, it was
powered by a V12 Daimler -Benz piston

engine. This was inverted to give the
pilot better visibility.

It was armed with two machine guns and
two cannon with an optimum rate of fire

of 1200 rounds a minute.

Between 1935 and 1945,

34 ,000 variants of the aircraft were
produced, making it one of the most

numerous designs in aviation history.

By the start of the war, the
Messerschmitt 109 had developed into the

the Emil, and it was the finest fighter
aircraft in the world at the time. It

could climb faster than any other
fighter.

When it got to the combat zone, it could
pack a bigger punch. It had 55 seconds'

worth of ammunition with its machine
guns.

and it could dive faster than anything
else.

And those were the three things you
really needed for air -to -air combat by

start of the Second World War.

It's just a beautiful machine to watch
in the air.

This one is a post -war Bouchon, built
in Spain with a British Rolls -Royce

Merlin engine, but absolutely born of
the original ME109.

It's being flown by an old friend of
mine, Richard Grape.

He restores these magnificent machines
based at Cywell Aerodrome in

Northamptonshire.

I'm just still so struck that, you know,
in the mid -1930s, most of the world

was still making biplane fighters, which
just look at two generations earlier,

don't they? And then this, I mean, what
must the German people and what must the

world have thought when suddenly the
Luftwaffe is announced in 1935?

And they've got these personally, of
course. I mean, it's just amazing. It

just be unbelievable. But, I mean,
Germany was ahead the whole time, wasn't

with the design school. I mean, they
obviously just, the people driving the

slide walls over there were very clever.
I think that's the crux of it.

But I think to come up with the
production techniques so early on.

is the cleverest bit from where I'm sat.

I mean, I think they were building 109s
in about 4 ,500 man -hours, whereas

Spitfires, you know, 13 ,500 man -hours
was as short as we got it, I think.

In that size? Yeah. So it's just a
tremendous difference in production

and techniques.

The Germans are often accused of over
-engineering everything, wasting

time and money on unnecessary detail.

But that's not Richard's experience with
the 109.

Obviously, someone very clever somewhere
developed a school of thought that if

you build things in two halves and then
join those two halves together, it's

going to take half the time. And they're
quite right, because you've got the

fuselage, as I said, which is simply
riveted together top and bottom once

built. The tailplane's the same. The
tailplane has got a piece of piano hinge

down the leading edge.

You make it in two halves, you put the
two halves together, and then you just

slot a pin down the middle of it. Ta
-da! One tailplane.

Wow. Same with the fin. It's exactly the
same. It's just got a piece of hinge

down the leading edge. It's genius.

The 109 is certainly an impressive
aircraft, but it's not something a

pilot can just climb into and pull back
the control column.

Getting it into the air takes a fair bit
of skill, as Richard can attest.

As far as flying it goes, I mean, the
take -off and landing is definitely the

hairy bit.

The take -off can be just as bad as the
landing. It can be just as exciting.

And you've got to treat it with kid
gloves.

Fundamentally, there's a very small
envelope from being stationary to being

airborne that you need to keep the
aeroplane within.

And if you drift outside of said
envelope, the effects can be exciting.

And many have discovered it. I mean,
I've had a couple of exciting take -offs

it. myself. So, yes, it's got some
charm, shall we say. So what are the

fundamental issues? The fundamental
issue is too much torque for not enough

control. That's the basic. Right.

So in layman's speak, that is just too
much power, the props going round.

Too much. It's wanting to go that way.

It's trying to roll the aeroplane the
other way. Yeah.

Very narrow track undercarriage.

So that just means it's not very stable
on the ground. That's it, and it wants

to literally roll.

It's not trying... Most aeroplanes will
try and be divergent laterally. This is

literally trying to roll itself. To turn
itself over.

Yeah. OK, so you're in the cockpit, the
brake's released,

throttle open, hurtle down the runway.

How are you stopping it from rolling?
What you need to do is get the tail up

reduce the angle of attack on the wing,
which will therefore reduce the lift, so

the aeroplane will take off at a higher
speed.

Right. Then once it takes off at higher
speed, of course, you've got more

aileron control because the ailerons are
reliant on aerodynamics.

So just say I'm a young recruit, I'm on
a grass airfield, there's a bit of a

ridge or a bump, you know, it's not
beautifully rolled or anything.

That's your worst nightmare then.

So you're coming along, boom.

That's the worst, that's the most
dangerous thing that could ever possibly

happen, would be getting bumped off the
ground at low speed.

Because then you've got all of the
torque, you've got no...

reference point what you really need to
do is is is keep the wheels on the

ground the wheels are really helping you
not roll and certainly if it starts

going wrong you actually put it back on
the ground to level it out again so that

it will speed up some more so yeah
certainly getting bounced off the ground

then attempting to fly off that bound is
about the most dangerous thing you

could do in the airplane the allies shot
down many 109 But astonishingly, across

the course of the war, the Luftwaffe
lost nearly 60 % of its fleet to

rather than combat, many in take -offs
and landings.

So what would a new recruit feel like in
the cockpit of one of these machines?

The agility of a man who's done this
many times.

It's really shocking, isn't it? It's
such a small cockpit that they've just

to put everything everywhere, you know,
just to try and fit it all in.

I just keep thinking about that young
recruit, mid -war, 90 hours in his

logbook, getting into one of these for
the first time. It would just be

frightening. I mean, as I say, if
nothing else, just sitting in it like

shutting the canopy.

would just be frightening.

And then, of course, you've got people
shooting at you. You know, as if flying

isn't bad enough, all of a sudden the
bullets start flying. And you can't see

much. Yeah, knowing you're sitting on a
fuel tank. I mean, the fuel tank is

under me and behind me.

So is that why so many of these things
just blow up? Yeah.

Absolutely. And it would just, all of
the fuel you have, which is about 390

litres, is directly behind you and
underneath you. And there is a way for

bit of aluminium between you and it.

The first time you fly a Messerschmitt
109, you just have to take that leap of

faith. You can do all your notes, you
can be told what to do, but ultimately

you've got to get in that cockpit and
you've just got to fly it.

At the start of the war, a new pilot
would be reaching his staffel, his

squadron, with about 150 to 170 hours in
his logbook.

By the beginning of 1944, that's
probably only about 90 to 100 hours in

logbook. And that is not enough to fly a
beast like this first up.

At the same time, Allied fighter pilots
in the RAF and in the US Army Air Force,

they're coming to their squadrons with
around 350 hours in their logbook. So

disparity is just getting wider and
wider and wider.

This is not the plane to reduce the
hours.

of a new pilot. It really isn't.

During the Blitzkrieg years, the Me 109E
was undoubtedly the world's best

fighter. But as the war progressed, its
mid -30s airframe and Daimler -Benz

engine lacked the power of the RAF
-upgraded Spitfires.

Phase 1 of the Nazi plan called for the
RAF to be knocked out of the air.

But the men of the RAF hadn't read the
Nazi plan.

A new fighter, faster, more manoeuvrable
and more stable was vital if the

Luftwaffe was to dominate the skies.

Designing aircraft for the Nazi war
machines was a highly competitive

Heinkel, Dornier, Focke -Wulf and
Junkers were all vying with

lucrative contracts from Reichsmarschall
Goering.

Professor Willie Messerschmitt, here on
Goering's left, was a loyal Nazi and

Hitler favorite, so few other companies
bothered to take him on.

The exception was the design team at
Focke -Wulf.

They challenged Messerschmitt's monopoly
with what is undoubtedly one of the

best fighter planes of the war, the
Focke -Wulf 190.

German fighters take off to attack the
enemy's supply lines, announces the

commentator.

This is a rare story of tactical
Luftwaffe action on the Western Front.

When the Spitfires of the RAF first came
up against this, the Fokker Wolf 190,

in August 1941, they were in for a
shock. Suddenly, they were up against a

machine that was more maneuverable and
faster.

And unlike the Messerschmitt 109, this
was a firmer gun platform and much more

stable on the ground.

Powered by a potent BMW radial engine,
its superior handling gave it an edge in

the hands of even less experienced
pilots.

The A model also carried considerably
more armament than the Me 109. Four 8mm

machine guns and two 20mm cannons.

On their first combat appearance, they
shot down three of the latest variant

Spitfires, besting anything the 109s
have managed and transforming the

of the air war.

But even the production of this aircraft
was dogged by the kind of Machiavellian

infighting that Goering encouraged.

While Field Marshal Erhard Milk was in
day -to -day charge of the Luftwaffe,

Goering handed the crucial role of
procurement to his old friend Ernst

former fighter pilot woefully unfooted
to the job.

Field Marshal Erhard Milk was finally
given control of procurement in

1941.

He was in for an absolute shock because
he realized that the aircraft designers,

and Professor Willie Messerschmitt
particularly, had just been running

There was no control over them
whatsoever, and they were doing whatever

liked. And it wasn't what Milk wanted or
what the Luftwaffe needed.

Based on the performance figures for the
FW -190 that UDET had been claiming,

Milk decided to prioritize its
production over that of the ME -109.

Only afterwards did he realise that
Udet's office had actually falsified the

performance figures for the Focke -Wulf
190 and that actually, despite its

dramatic entry into the war, the BMW
engine had all sorts of overheating

problems and it simply wasn't ready for
the kind of production figures that Milt

wanted.

The flaws in the BMW engine were to
prove critical.

delaying production and forcing the
engineers to cut costs as materials

impossible to obtain.

Towards the end of the war, the plane
was being just too hastily assembled.

I think what's amazing about this
particular model is that this came out

and you can see how the quality
standards have really dropped.

I mean, look at that there. That is just
not a straight line.

This is still being handmade.

but not with the same attention of
detail and quality. Look at that. It

doesn't fit.

And look at this up here.

This is, you know, for the extra
quantity that milk wants by the

1944, some 2 ,000 single -engine
fighters every single month, you're

massive qualitative drop, and that's the
price you're paying.

As it is, this isn't up to speed
compared to the latest marks of

This is below that in terms of
performance, and they're just churning

as quickly as they can. But in doing so,
they're cutting all sorts of corners,

and you can see that on this. You really
can. This is not the high spec you

would expect from Wolfram Dirk's
technique of German engineering.

Fighters above at high altitude.

Fighters on both sides.

Fighters in the front and in the rear.

Fighters weaving in and out of the
bomber for me.

The Luftwaffe was, of course, made up of
much more than its fighters.

Its bombers, Heinkel 111s and Dornier
17s, delivered the blitz bombing

to Britain's cities and ports.

German long -range bombers lay in wait
to spot the convoy and keep them under

surveillance until short -range dive
bombers could strike.

The most iconic of these was the Junkers
87, the Stuka dive bomber.

With its gull wings and infamous Jericho
trumpet, it screamed out of the skies,

traumatizing all in its path and
becoming a mainstay of Nazi propaganda.

Carrying both a pilot and navigator air
gunner, more than 6 ,000 Stukas were

built between 1936 and 1944.

The anti -tank variant carried two 37mm
cannons in underwing gun pods, with two

six -round magazines of armour -piercing
ammunition.

It could carry up to five bombs, tank
more Allied ships than any other

and destroyed a record number of enemy
tanks.

I've come to the Technic Museum at
Sinsheim, south of Frankfurt, where it's

still possible to see the remains of one
of the very few surviving Stukas.

Well, this Stuka was pulled up out of
the Mediterranean.

It's in a bit of a sorry state, but look
at this here. You can still see the

Junkers signs on the exhaust subs.

And the iconic gull wing that was such a
feature of the Stuka dive bomber.

You know, this really was the spearhead
of Blitzkrieg. You know, the screaming

banshee wail as it was diving down,
terrorizing the people below. And that

wailing sound that it made was 100 %
deliberate. It was there as a

weapon to terrify people.

It's absolutely fine in the early stages
of the war, you know, in Poland, in

Scandinavia, in France, in the low
countries, because the Luftwaffe is

dominating the skies.

The moment you lose that air
superiority, however, this becomes a big

Because as it comes out of its dive,
it's almost at a standstill. And anyone

waiting above, a Spitfire or a Hurricane
of the RAF, for example, can pounce on

it like a hawk and it's goodbye to the
Stuka. And that's exactly what happened.

The problem for the Luftwaffe is, by
that stage, it was too late to do

about this, because they've already gone
down this route of trying to focus on

dive bombing with their new generation
of aircraft.

The Nazi love affair with dive bombing
seriously affected the long -term

development of the Luftwaffe.

Despite the sustained attacks on Britain
during the Blitz, they completely

failed to develop a coherent strategy
for their bomber fleet.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than
in the decisions they made over the

Junkers JU -88.

It was originally conceived as a fast,
long -range medium bomber, potentially

the most versatile aircraft of its day.

I'm returning to the RAF Museum at
Cosford near Wolverhampton, where

of them on display.

Well, I've got to say, the thing that
really strikes me about this, being so

close to a Junkers 88, is just how big
it is. It's a real beast.

And then you remember, of course, that
this was originally designed as a long

-range Schnell bomber, fast bomber.

You know, it was designed to go kind of
350 miles an hour, have incredible

range, and have a payload roughly
equivalent to that of the Heinkel 111

Dornier 17, which were the kind of
standard bombers just at the beginning

Second World War.

The Ju -88 had two 1 ,200 -horsepower
Jumo engines.

It could carry two 500 -kilogram bombs
under each wing and 28 50 -kilogram

stored inside.

Its four -man crew had an extensive
array of machine guns for defensive

purposes.

Its original design promised a great
deal.

But the early success of the Stuka meant
the Luftwaffe High Command insisted

that their exciting new bomber should
also have dive -bombing capabilities.

The problem is that they suddenly go,
hang on a minute, we've got this amazing

new... bomber, the Junkers 88 that's
been developed, why don't we give that

bombing capabilities as well? And the
good folk at Junkers sort of do lots of

teeth -sucking and say, well, okay, we
can, but that's not the original spec.

The original spec is to have a Schnell
bomber, a fast bomber that can fly at

over 350 miles an hour and have a range
of 1 ,000 miles.

And they go, no, no, we don't care. We
want to have dive bombing capabilities.

And so they go, okay, but it's going to
cost you. It's going to cost you in

terms of time.

It's going to cost you in terms of
money. And it's going to cost you in

performance. And by the time the Junkers
88 finally starts reaching frontline

squadron, it's just half the plane it
used to be.

So what starts off being something
really special and really rather

ends up being... Incredibly average.

Attempts to silence British artillery by
Ju -88s ended in disaster for the

enemy. Watch one of the Junkers crash
near the battery which shot it down.

As the war progressed and the Luftwaffe
lost its dominance of the skies...

So a new strategy was developed, that of
the vengeance weapon, the Wunderwaffen

as it was known, a wonder weapon that
would strike such fear into the enemy

all resistance would collapse.

The first of these was the V1, the
doodlebug.

It was the sudden silence as it dropped
from the skies that was especially

unnerving.

London is doomed, said Dr Goebbels.

The first attack on Britain came at dawn
on the 13th of June, 1944.

Adolf Hitler's intuitive propaganda
experts claimed that in its first few

of attack, V1, the buzz bomb, had almost
entirely removed the city of London

from the war -scarred face of the earth.

The Allies quickly learned ways of
combating this pilotless plane.

Anti -aircraft fire was knocking the
terror weapons down in hundreds, often

before they reached the coastline.

But something more devastating was to
come. The world's first ballistic

ever to be used in combat.

The V -2 unmanned rocket.

The V2 offensive against England was
launched on the 8th of September 1944,

killing three civilians that first day.

More than 2 ,500 Londoners were killed
in the following six months.

Well, I'm on Kynaston Road in Orpington
in Kent, in the southeast of London.

And just along here was the site of the
last ever V2 to land on England, the

27th of March, 1945, so just before the
end of the war.

I've got this photograph here, and I'm
trying to sort of marry it up. It's one

of these ones. Yeah, this is it.

88.

So here we are. This is the spot. So
this building here is this one, and

there's that gaping hole, look.

And this was also, tragically, where the
last... civilian to be killed in

England, lost their life.

Ivy Millerchamp, 34, newly married, was
in number 88 in the

kitchen when the V2 landed.

I've met up with Barry Newman, who was a
13 -year -old schoolboy living nearby

at the time.

It was at about 5 o 'clock in the
evening and... So you were back from

Oh, yes.

And having tea with mother and sister.
Yep.

When I heard two explosions.

And I rushed outside of the 13 -year
-old wood. Yeah. And saw this column of

smoke rising in the air. And I thought,
that's Court Road.

I'll run down there and see what's
happened.

It was a huge crater and debris and
damaged cars and rubble

and a mountain of stuff.

And it was then that I found out a lady
had been killed in that explosion.

This was Ivy Millichamp? Ivy Millichamp,
yeah.

Great tragedy.

But so many lives were lost through that
campaign of their V weapons.

What do you think they were trying to
achieve? They were trying to achieve a

destruction of our morale, the British
morale.

And how did it affect your morale?

Well, it put our backs up, didn't it?

Instead of that, it was quite the
reverse.

We were more defiant than ever.

The V -2 rocket was the brainchild of
Werner von Braun, who post -war would

become a pioneer of aerospace technology
in the United States.

He'd been working on rocket design since
at university in the early 1930s, and

supervised the V -2 development at the
research facility at Peenemunde, until

was obliterated by RAF bombers in 1943.

A new underground production facility
was established at Mittelberg, where

between September 1944 and February
1945, some 5 ,000 V2s were made

using slave labour from a specially
created concentration camp.

They were powered by a volatile mix of
liquid oxygen and ethyl alcohol, which

this stage in the war was being
distilled largely from potatoes.

Each rocket could hurtle 50 miles high
and 200 miles downrange.

There's a surviving V2 at the RAF Museum
at Cosford, alongside other rockets

that Nazi scientists have been
developing from as early as the 1930s.

To help me understand its history and
its impact on the post -war world, I've

been joined by Richard Osborne, who is a
rocket scientist.

I mean, you look at it.

A, it's enormous, but B, it looks comic
book.

But I suppose you realise it looks comic
book. I mean, it looks like something

out of Tintin or Dandere.

Because that's where Tintin and Hergé
and Dandere are getting their

from, right? Exactly.

So actually this comes first rather than
the comic book. Very much so.

Because aerodynamically, there's only
certain shapes that you can adopt if

you're designing a rocket.

Right. You need a pointy end up the
front.

Yeah, you need fins.

You need fins and you need all the hot
stuff coming out the back.

And generally you don't want to vary
that too much because if you do, the

generally doesn't go the right way.

Britain had also been developing rockets
since before the war.

By 1940, anti -aircraft defences on both
land and sea were deploying rocket

technology.

But these were small, short -range
weapons relying on solid fuel to power

Quite unlike the liquid fuel being
developed by the Germans.

Of D -Day, for example, there's landing
craft stuffed full of rockets.

That's right. But they are rockets,
right? But they're solid fuel rockets.

are solid. So they're short -range.

Unguided. Yeah, much smaller warhead.
Yes. They weren't as efficient as

something like the V -2.

Why does solid or liquid fuel have a
difference on the size?

With the solid...

You've got a lot of thrust in a very
compact, dense form. But generally,

solids are not as efficient as a liquid.

A solid rocket is basically like a
firework. Whereas a liquid rocket,

the German ones, they had lots of
plumbing because rocketry is basically

-pressure plumbing.

Right. And this is the difference
between a liquid rocket...

and a solid rocket.

Right.

But as a weapon of war, I mean, it's
fatally flawed, because it's not guided,

you can point it in roughly the right
direction, but you can't do much more

that, can you? Well, it was guided.

Was it? It had a guidance system.

It was more of what you'd call more of a
mechanical, a sort of clockwork -type

guidance system.

Right.

You basically told it before launch,

roughly what trajectory you wanted it to
go on. Instead of saying, right, I want

to hit that factory, you say, I want to
hit South England.

Right. And that's pretty much the sum of
it. Do we have any idea about how

much it cost in terms of resources,
effort, time, and so on? I mean, do

Well, it was actually... It tied up the
German...

because they would probably have been
better putting their time into more

fighters, more bombers. But of course
they didn't. They spent their time

building weapons like the V2, which were
less effective overall than having more

fighters and more bombers.

So from that perspective, it was
actually a false economy for them.

The numbers involved in creating the
Nazi rocket program are absolutely

extraordinary. It costs around 50 % more
than the Manhattan Project that

developed the atomic bomb.

And used a level of resources the
Germans could simply no longer afford.

I'm just reading here, 3 ,500 kilograms
of an ethyl alcohol mixture.

and 5 ,250 kilograms of liquid oxygen.

I mean, that's just huge numbers. And
really, you've got to say that the V -2

project is clutching at straws. I mean,
it's a desperate gamble.

And these V -2 rockets, brilliant and
incredible though they were, are just

tying up unbelievable numbers of
resources, thousands of men. The cost of

is just absolutely...

And to create that amount of alcohol,
for example, just for one rocket, you

would need 30 tonnes of potatoes.

The V2 certainly didn't deliver the
killer blow that Hitler wanted.

It was a wonder weapon.

just not in a way that was going to be
decisive in the war.

So just how impressive is this
technology, especially when you consider

this has been developed from the 1930s
and 1940s? It's extremely impressive.

And the reason why it's extremely
impressive can be seen in the fact that

development of the V2 was followed on by
copies of the V2, effectively, by the

Russians and the Americans.

And that is why it made this such a
pivotal rocket. And in the history

of rocketry, it is the one we all come
back to because so many future rockets

were based on the V -2.

As the war approached its endgame, the
lessons learned from the rocket

were not to go to waste.

The Luftwaffe was about to unleash the
power of the jet engine in aerial combat

for the first time.

Nazi Germany secretly experimented with
increasingly ambitious and impractical

aircraft designs.

The Messerschmitt 163 was one of the few
that saw action.

The only rocket -powered intercept
fighter to enter operational service.

Known as the Comet, these stubby rocket
planes were blindingly fast by the

standards of World War II fighters.

On the 6th of July 1944, a Comet set an
unofficial world record of 702 miles per

hour, a speed unmatched for another
decade.

To get an insight into what this might
have been like to fly, I'm exploring its

performance with former fast jet pilot
Matt Doncaster at RAF Cosford.

I mean, you know, when you're looking at
experimental aircrafts, you know,

developed in World War II, this is
absolutely it, isn't it? You've got this

of very, very short fuselage and nose
made of metal.

Amazingly, these are sort of largely
wooden wings.

I mean, that's incredible.

And powered by a rocket.

It is. If somebody rolled this out
today, you'd go, you know, what's going

here? Let alone in the 40s.

No tail?

No tail, no. Very interestingly, I'm not
going to go down some aerodynamic

rabbit hole regarding no tail, but
clearly you can design a flyer craft

a conventional horizontal tailplane.

You simply control pitch by control
surfaces on the wings, which is exactly

they did with the Comet.

But equally, the rocket exhaust is at
the back as well.

So my gut feeling might be that to hang
a tailplane on the back with the

mechanism involved, etc., etc., next to
what is fundamentally a very hot piece

of the airframe.

might have proved problematic, but very,
very high risk.

The comet was powered by a highly
volatile mix of peroxide oxidiser and

hydrazine fuel.

These were held in separate fuel tanks
to prevent spontaneous combustion.

Nevertheless, the planes were in as much
danger of blowing up from their rocket

fuel as they were of being shot down by
enemy fire.

The fuel for this is...

hydrogen peroxide, which is incredibly
volatile.

You've got just seven and a half minutes
of powered flight.

So you climb up incredibly fast, dive
down, you've got one pass, shoot up what

you can, and then basically you've got
to burn up all your fuel, and you've got

to land with no fuel, because what
happens is the wheels come off, you

the wheels, and you land on, the skid
comes down.

I mean, that's a backbreaker, if ever
there was one. You want to land slowly

without wheels.

You want to land slowly with wheels,
arguably. But equally, the airframe is

built to do 700 -odd miles an hour.

And you've got to make sure you land
with not a drop of that hydrogen

in your fuel tank, because if you do,
boom. Yes. I mean, this is a really

aircraft to fly, however brilliant and
fast it might have been.

The rocket -powered Comet was just too
far ahead of its time, but the next

aircraft we're going to look at was a
stunning creation.

The Me 262, the first operational jet
aircraft in the world, truly set the

course for the future of aviation
history.

It first saw combat in July 1944.

Its twin jet engines were built around
gas turbines being developed by BMW.

Armed with four 30mm cannons and 24
rockets, some 1 ,430 were built,

although only around 300 saw operational
action.

It could reach speeds of 540 miles per
hour, making it highly effective against

Allied bomber streams.

So, Matt, looking at this, this is the
ME -262. It's the kind of first

operational jet, really, fighter jet. I
mean, what do you make of it? You look

at aircraft like these, and, you know,
as a pilot, I think, you know, would I

want to go? And the simple truth is,
yes, I'd love to go in one of these.

There's an old adage, you know, if it
looks right, it is right. Yeah, it does

look right, doesn't it? It does look
right.

And quite a pioneering airframe for
Second World War, you know, the swept

wings and all that. I mean, you know,
you haven't got that on fighter planes

until that point. No, the sweep is
definitely key, because the faster you

the more sweep you need, you know,
aerodynamically.

Well, there's no question about it. The
German pilots were just, you know, every

single one of them wanted to get in this
for obvious reasons. I mean, everyone

wants to be in the fastest, most modern,
best.

Plane available, don't they? Yeah,
absolutely.

Speed is key.

Speed up until jet engines is gained by
getting height and then trading height

for speed once you've eyeballed your
target below. But if you've already got

that speed, you don't have to worry
about that. You just go straight in.

Exactly. You can attack from below, from
above, from level. It doesn't really

matter.

Say you're coming up against
comparatively slow bombers. I mean,

about, you know, bomber stream of B
-17s, for example. They're flying at

240 miles an hour, something like that.
You're hurtling along at the kind of

best part of 600, yeah.

What's your approach?

The approach would still be to get in
and get out fast, without a doubt,

the B -17 festoons with 20mm, 30mm, 50
cals and all that sort of stuff. So

you're going to get to your target
quicker.

You're going to be in the thick of it
quicker, but you don't want to stay

for long.

What this aircraft gives you, of course,
is the ability to stay around for less

time than, say, a Fokker -Walker or a
Messerschmitt 109.

So pretty impressive.

Yeah. I've always been impressed by
this. It looks like a shark, doesn't it?

It's got that shark nose to it. It's got
the shape that sort of says it fits the

purpose.

But yet again, engine reliability was to
prove an issue for the 262.

By the time it got into production...

The Nazi regime no longer had access to
the resources it required, and as a

result of Allied bombing of its
factories, it just didn't have the

to make effective jet turbines.

Here once lay the warworks of Essen,
busy, prosperous Essen, thriving on what

was the highest concentration of
industry for death.

So they were relying on cheaper, more
plentiful substitutes.

And these just couldn't cope with the
intense sustained heat required by the

262's jet engines.

It's the whole development thing in
Germany, isn't it? The engines are

not as reliable as the engines being
developed in the UK.

When your engine's not reliable, there's
a bit of doubt in the mind. But

notwithstanding the fact that they don't
last very long, you know, they're

there, they're doing the job.

Because they're going super fast.

Yeah, I'm sure if you speak to a German
pilot who, you know...

got airborne in one of these and came
back with two sets of engines, I bet

had a good day.

Just like the Junkers 88 before it, this
potential game -changer was also to

fall victim to interference from above.

Hitler's personal insistence that the
fighter should be reconfigured as a

bomber.

So this was built and designed as a
fighter aircraft.

Hitler, personally, is set up becoming a
bomber. Yeah. But hasn't got any bomb

bays. Because if you haven't got bomb
bays, you've got to hang them on

underneath. Exactly. You've got to put
racks on. The racks themselves have

The bombs on the racks have drag. It all
adds up.

So if you're clean, as we call it, you
know, nothing under the wings at all,

then you'll be flying at a certain...

Thrust selling. To stoon them with
draggy bombs and that sort of stuff and

racks, for that speed, you have to
increase the power because the drag

is significant.

Gallant, who was the general of fighters
at the time, he was just sort of going,

oh, my God, I can't believe this was the
most insane decision ever. We finally

got a fighter aircraft that could take
on the P -47s, high -marked Spitfires,

the P -51Ds and all the rest of it, and
we're not allowed to use it. I mean,

that's just ridiculous.

Yes. Bit of high -level meddling going
on there. Yeah, I think so.

Once again, it was the lack of a
coherent strategy amongst the Nazi top

that failed this brilliant invention.

For years, Goering had clung to the
belief that mass production of

aircraft was a better option than
investing in the research and

the jet engine.

By the time he had realised its
potential, it was way too late and the

were catching up.

The Me 262 never had the chance to
fulfill its early promise.

But it became an important step in the
development of combat aircraft,

the designers of early jet fighters
around the world.

Germany began the war with the finest
air force in the world, but by May 1945,

it had been crushed.

The demands upon it had just been too
great, and they'd been unable to keep up

with the production and technological
advances of their allies.

The problems had been compounded by
faulty strategy, the internecine

of the designers and a convoluted
procurement process, and although they

heralded in the dawn of a jet age, it
had just come too little, too late.

Their legacy, however, cannot be
ignored.

The inventiveness of their designers and
engineers was eagerly embraced by their

victors.

The jet engine went on to transform both
aerial warfare and civilian air travel,

shrinking the world in a way
unimaginable in the 1940s.

And, of course, their rocket technology
captured the imagination of millions as

it powered its way to putting a man on
the moon.