Peacetime Uses for V2 Rocket, by Arthur C. Clarke (2024)

This article by science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, of 2001: A Space Odyssey fame, suggested the use of surplus German V−2 (Vergeltungswaffe 2; i.e., Retribution Weapon 2) rockets for launching scientific payloads into space rather than for launching terrorizing attacks on European cities. The October 1945 publishing date was after Germany had surrendered in the spring of that year and Allied forces were rounding up war criminals and confiscating documents and equipment. Clarke describes how an "artificial satellite" could be caused to circle the earth "perpetually" and was published in the October 1945 edition of Wireless World magazine. The pilot-less V−2, along with the V−1 "Buzz Bomb," were launched from within Germany and caused massive structural damage and human death and suffering. For war progenitor and aggressor, Germany, to call it a retribution weapon was a gross misnomer, especially considering it was the second time (WWI andWWII) in three decades that the country had attempted to bring Europe under its dominance with brutal assaults.

See alsoExtra-Terrestrial Relays.

Peacetime Uses for V2

V2 for Ionosphere Research?

By Arthur C. Clarke

One of the most important branches of radio physics is ionospheric research and until now all our knowledge of conditions in the ionosphere has been deduced from transmission and echo experiments. One of the more modest claims of the British Interplanetary Society was that rockets could be used for very high altitude investigations and it will have escaped your readers' notice that the German long-range rocket projectile known as V2 passes through the E layer on its way from the Continent. If it were fired vertically without westward deviation it could reach the F₁ and probably the F₂ layer.

The implications of this are obvious: we can now send instruments of all kinds into the ionosphere and by transmitting their readings back to ground stations obtain information which could not possibly be learned in any ether way. Since the weight of instruments would only be a few pounds - as compared with V2's payload of 2,000 pounds - the rocket required would be quite a small one. Its probable takeoff weight would be one or two tons, most of this being relatively cheap alcohol and liquid oxygen. A parachute device (besides being appreciated by the public!) would enable the rocket to be reused.

This is all immediate post-war research project, but an even more interesting one lies a little farther ahead. A rocket which can reach a speed of 8 km/sec parallel to the earth's surface would continue to circle it forever in a closed orbit; it would become an "artificial satellite." V2 call only reach a third of this speed under the most favourable conditions, but if its payload consisted of a small one-ton rocket, this upper component could reach the required velocity with a payload of about 100 pounds. It would thus be possible to have a hundred­weight of instruments circling the earth perpetually outside the limits of the atmosphere and broadcasting information us long as the batteries lasted. Since the rocket would be in brilliant sunlight for half the time, the operating period might be indefinitely prolonged by the use of thermocouples and photoelectric elements.

Both of these developments demand nothing new in the way of technical resources; the first and probably the second should come within the next five or ten years. However, I would like to close by mentioning a possibility of the more remote future - perhaps half a century ahead.

An artificial satellite at the correct distance from the earth would make one revolution every 24 hours; i.e., it would remain stationary above the same spot and would be within optical range of nearly half the earth's surface. Three repeater stations, 120 degrees apart in the correct orbit, could give television and microwave coverage to the entire planet. I'm afraid this isn't going to be of the slightest use to our post-war planners, but I think it is the ultimate solution to the problem.

Arthur C. Clarke, British Interplanetary Society.

Many thanks to RF Cafe visitor Terry W., from the great state of Oklahoma for sending a scan of the article!

Posted December 12, 2019
(updated from original post on 7/5/2011)