That's completely false. Tsiolkovsky, Goddard, Oberth, and Esnault-Pelterie had developed as much spaceflight theory by 1933 as anyone in Britain had in WWII, and the from then on the progress by Goddard, von Braun's team, and the RNII were steady, if underfunded.
Each test helped solve problems and the rockets slowly grew bigger to sizes that were impossible when the tests started.
In the theoretical work the British were on par with those mentioned it was the practical where they lagged badly which was my point. Actually Goddard and GALCIT had hit some significant snags by the mid 30s and Goddard himself was shutting down contacts with most others due to patent fears and public ridicule he'd received. Sadly it literally took the outbreak of war to get him moving again and sadly he never fully trusted the government or other researchers enough by then to take full advantage of the opportunity. Luckily the Navy managed to get his interest and help. Testing the theory is important, I'm not arguing that. What I'm saying is getting official interest and support would have helped the British efforts early on as well.
Of those researchers only von Braun's team was well-supported from 1933 onwards, and they were able to build a ballistic missile after 9 years of tests, the only ones to do so during WWII. Making an airframe that can survive and be controllable from a standstill (immediately after takeoff) through Mach 4, and building a large high-pressure combustion chamber that burns fuel steadily instead of exploding or shaking apart from shockwaves, took up most of that 9 years. Those problems could not be solved by theory (the combustion chamber was not understood theoretically until 1954-55, and then by a talented US researcher with the aid of much experimental data). They were solved by 9 years of wind tunnel tests, drop tests, engine thrust stand tests, and lots of rapid unscheduled disassembles.
No arguments but by the late 30s the international rocketry community had a good handle on most of this except for the high speed aspects and that was only going to be found out through testing and more testing. (And let us all stop and ponder for a moment that the only way to get the proper data for some of that testing was to stand near the target and observe the incoming missile... Never tell me Germans don't have some big brass ones
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September 1939 is just too late to start that and have a ballistic missile by 1944. It would get them small and medium rockets up to the size of an AA missile, but not the size of a ballistic missile. They'd have to have started this in 1936-1937 at the latest, and ideally 1930 or earlier when most foreign experimental work started.
Let me be clear here I was joking about a missile duel with Germany I fully understand that's not happening but we're talking over a decade later with what amounts to at least a 5 year head start on organizing and getting used to doing such testing as we've discussed. Heck steady political and financial support post-war would have done wonders as it would have in the US during the same period!
Consider how much even that little experience would have effected things like this:
https://medium.com/lapsed-historian/an-empire-of-stars-d6b24f92cbc7
It's very correct in that Britain's HTP experience, (and good discipline in treating it as it deserved rather than blase like the Americans who learned to hate the stuff) was quite a leg up on moving towards high powered rockets before the rest of the world.
Whilst amusing I doubt that that the UK would put a man into orbit, at least on their own, let alone be the first to do – it's simply too much expense for little concrete gain. Satellites at least can be argued for from a scientific research perspective, and rocketry having a potential double-use from a military one.
First of all you may want to re-read what I wrote I never suggested they could put a man into orbit only 'space' with a suborbital flight. That was quite a popular speculation almost as soon as everyone knew what the V2 could do. As for doing so I'll point out that the times were a bit weird that way as I recall a report on how a British aircraft company got good films of nose gear wobble and high speed taxi characteristics for one prototype aircraft:
Strap the camera and cameraman to the nose gear and do the tests!
Now would they do it? Greatly depends really as quite obviously no one else did even though it was proposed by everybody and there was no shortage of volunteers! (The US Army had to order people to stop bugging the German and US techs, they were NOT going to put a man into a V2 and launch them. And these were people on the base who were well aware of the abysmal flight rate of these things!) Of course change any one of a few things and the "What if?'s" fly.
1) Stalin doesn't die "on time" and maybe he's convinced to give putting a man on a rocket a go
2) Dewey defeats Truman, (my favorite) and the post-war funding spiral gets nipped in the bud and MX-774 never has to go into hibernation
3) Still think better relations between Britain and France post-war would do both of them good.
There are others but getting the needed factors to put a satellite into orbit before the US or USSR is tough. Which is where the fun is?
IIRC the IGY came out of a proposal from a British scientist and several were heavily involved in its administration. Considering that both the US and the USSR stated that they were going to launch satellites into orbit as part of the IGY a couple of years beforehand it would be easy enough for the UK to make a small announcement about looking at possibly also doing so which, if there wasn't much publicity about its progress, being overlooked by many until it was launched.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Geophysical_Year
A Brit was there in James Van Allen's living room in 1950 to discuss the idea yes
Within about 5 years they would have Blue Steel, the SR53, Blue Streak and Black Knight in the works or getting ready to fly so it's possible but it would still take early and more steady support than OTL to get to that point.
RAndy
