Mimoyecques

In 1943, the allied forces had air supremacy, making german airborne operations against Britain more difficult. One way to overcome this was to produce other weapons and preferably some kind of bomb/rocket. V1 (flying bombs) and V2 (missiles) were two such weapons that were developed. These were meant to be launched and spread fear among the British. A third type of weapon and perhaps the least known was the V3 cannon. About 15 kilometers south of Calais in northeastern France is Mimoyecques. There in September 1943 the Germans began to build a military base inside a mountain. The Base was named Wiese and consisted of an extensive tunnel complex. In Mimoyecques, the Germans planned to build 25 V3 guns with a capacity to fire 10 pill-like rockets per minute at London.

The Western allies, however, had received information about the base, but without really knowing what it was, except that it could be a potential threat. Already in November 1943 the base was bombed and in 1944 it was bombed frequently. Because of the bombings the base was never completed and not a single V3 rocket was ever fired. The Base was captured by allied forces in September 1944. In 1945, British prime minister Winston Churchill ordered the base destroyed. Churchill wanted to make sure it could not be used against England. He saw a possible scenario in which communism gained power in France and could thus pose a threat to England.