On a French forum I read for the first time about this strange small guided tank from WWII...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goliath_tracked_mine




Kind regards from Paul.

I can't comment in a knowledgeable way about the above-mentioned tank save to say that its existence was hitherto unknown to me.  I've heard of drones of course, including the smaller ones which people use to get an aerial photograph and I can remember in my childhood boys playing with remotely controlled toy boats on park ponds.  I had no idea that a remotely controlled vehicle existed in World War I.

https://www.baesystems.com/en/heritage/de-havilland-tiger-moth---queen-bee
See the "Queen Bee" section

Also, HMS Agamemnon, one of the last pair of pre-Dreadnoughts (or semi-Dreadnoughts) was converted as a radio-controlled target ship. From wikimisleadia "
She was modified for use as a target ship between 6 December 1920 and 8 April 1921. The ship was rewired for radio control and stripped; the 12-inch turrets remained aboard, but all of her guns and their equipment were removed, as were her torpedo equipment, flying deck, sea cabins, main derrick and boat equipment, lower conning tower, masts and yards, most of her crew amenities, and other unnecessary equipment. Unnecessary hatches, coamings, scuttles, and lifts were removed and plated over, and she was different ballast than she had as a battleship. It was not intended to sink her, so she was assigned a crew of 153 to maintain and operate her when she was not under fire.
Agamemnon's first target service took place before her modifications were completed. On 19 March 1921, she was exposed to a cloud of  poisonous gas to determine the effect of gas on a battleship. It was found that gas could penetrate the ship via her various openings, but the ship had not been sealed against gas before the trial and no accurate results applicable to a commissioned battleship could be obtained. On 21 September, she was subjected to machine-gun fire by strafing aircraft. These trials showed that such strafing could harass a battleship, but could not impair her fighting or steaming capabilities, and helped to determine protection for bridge personnel.
Agamemnon also was used to test the vulnerability of battleships to 6-inch (152-mm), 5.5-inch (140-mm), and 4.7-inch (120-mm) rounds fired at her by ships such as the battlecruisers Renown and Repulse while she maneuvered under radio control. These tests showed that ships protected as well as Agamemnon, such as the later dreadnoughts, would suffer damage to their upper works if struck by such shells, but would not have their steaming or fighting capability seriously impaired even by numerous smaller-caliber hits.

The Fritz-X radio guided bomb:



The Italian battleship Roma blowing up after being hit by a Fritz-X

And the HS-293:

The US "Operation Aphrodite" programme. Not very successful and claimed the life of Joseph Kennedy Jnr , leaving his younger brother, John F, as the Kennedy family's  Presidential hope:

More successful was the Azon project for the USAAF:

Similar idea to the Fritz-X already mentioned;

Azon Bomb

Triceratops,

thank you very much for all these entries about new technology used during WWII. I saw it all. I have a vague rememberance to have seen something about Operation Aphrodite...was it on the Geographical channel? about the search for the explanation of famous plane disasters...I have definitely seen the same footage as about the TV cameras and the commanding of the in my eyes specific gas handle...?
And it was with Dutch subtitles...

Kind regards from Paul.

The control ship for Agamemnon (and later Centurion) was Shikari, one of the WWI destroyers that survived the post-war near extinction of pre-V class TBDs. Here she is : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-class_destroyer_(1917)#/media/File:HMS_Shikari-1929ControlShip.jpg

German anti-aircraft missile in development. It never saw active service:

Triceratops wrote:

German anti-aircraft missile in development. It never saw active service:

Triceratops,

I wanted to ask how the guiding to the target was performed, but found it all on the first line research wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasserfall

In coordination with radar and with a detonation of some 300 Kg explosives spread in a sqaudron bombers it could have had a devastating effect.

If the Nazis had held on some two years more, it could have been a difficult end of war. And as seen in the modern wars, even with the modern stuff it is very difficult to bomb a dertermined ennemy into subjugation and one has to do the meticulous and time consuming work with the ground troops. But the cynicus in me say that they were too small an area and population to take it against the rest even with the help of Japan, especially when Russia joined the allied camp. (was it Churchill: even with the devil, if we can beat the Nazis?).
And again the cynicus in me thinks: it would have only resulted in even more body counts...

Kind regards from Paul.