Comments by "Keit Hammleter" (@keithammleter3824) on "The V2 rocket was pointless, and here's why" video.

@wcg19891 : Not applicable to the V2 as it was sub-orbital. Von Braun proved that you need a 2- or 3-stage rocket to attain orbital velocity. The V2 was only single stage. All weapon rockets can and are fired in any desired direction - it makes no difference, because they are not intended to put the payload in orbit. Not much point in blowing up a vacuum. The V2 was always fired west, simply because London was west of where Germans had launch sites. While going east helps attain orbit, the main reason for going east of the Kennedy Space centre or if you like, choosing the location to launch from, is that it means going over ocean and not land where people live, so that if there is a malfunction people won't get hurt.
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Hardly a huge mistake, as it delivered a payload about the same as half the bomb load of Germany's main heavy bomber the He-111. And coming at you at Mach 3, there was absolutely no defence against it - it was years before the USA developed a way of destroying ICBMs in flight. At a cost of about 50,000 reichmarks each, it was far cheaper than half a He-111 bomber (>400,000 RM) and just as accurate. Hitler and Goering's only mistake was in not allocating more boffins to von Braun's team to get the teething problems solved in a timely way.
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Obviously not. you can drive a car or throw a rock in any direction you please, can't you?
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I laughed at 7:34 when the narrator said a guy was a policeman in Australia, and a photo of a chap in a British police uniform was shown. Those archaic helmets were not used in Australia.
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@heywoodjablowme8120 Of course you can throw a rock backwards. I exercise my dog by throwing tennis balls for her. As she has learnt to look well ahead in front of me, I sometimes throw the ball backwards over my shoulder to trick her.
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@Boppy-B-B : Don't confuse aiming error due to British spy skullduggery with the weapon's basic accuracy. Don't forget that German bombers were often sent well off target due to British measures eg using fluent German speakers pretending to be German air controllers, and messing with the German crossed beam navigation system. The specification for the V-2 was a basic target accuracy of 1.5 km (circle 3 km diameter), more than adequate to hit cities. As time went on it was improved. Since it relied on internal gyros and not external radio beams as the He-111's did, the accuracy was reliable. 1.5 km may not sound very good, but He-111's were no better. British bombers were even worse - many times crews could not even find the right city.
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@wcg19891 : The thread was about V2 rockets - that's what the original poster asked about, not NASA space missions. However, it is not true that you can only launch west - that's ridiculous. Sub-orbital rockets can go in any direction, for the same reason any mode of transport can go in any direction - it already has rotational inertial before launch. Further, it is not impossible to reach orbital velocity going west (or north or south), just harder, needing more missile complexity and fuel. When Australia at out Woomera station was testing British military missiles, ICBM's, and launching satelites (eg WreSat), they were sent north-westward - for the same reason NASA launches east - to avoid flying over populated areas. Here in Australia, our government is buying ICBM defence systems because North Korea is thought to have developed ICBM's just capable of reaching Australia - these would fly due south - because Australia is south of North Korea.
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