The Henschel Hs 298 was Germany’s first rocket powered air to air missile developed by Professor Herbert A. Wagner in 1941. Like the Henschel Hs 117 Schmetterling the Hs 298 concept was refused by the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (German Empire Air Ministry) and picked up again in 1943.
The Henschel Hs 298 had swapped wings, tail rudders and a rocket engine designed by Schmidding. It was just over 2 meters long and 1,24 meter wide and weighted 120 kilograms. It was a two-stage rocket, the first stage gave the missile a speed of 938 km/h which was reduced to 680 km/h during the second stage. It had a range of about 1,5 km and was wire controlled by two men. They used wires to annihilate the threat of radio interference. It used a Kehl-Straßburg Manual Command to Line of Sight (MCLOS) radio guidance system, the Funkerat FuG 203. One operator controlled the reflector-type sight and the other a joystick to control the missile. Like the Hs 117 Schemtterling it had a small propeller in the nosecone next to 48 kg explosives. This gave a small generator energy to power the controls. Two Henschel Hs 298 air to air missiles could be carried underneath the wings of a Focke-Wulf Fw 190 or five underneath a Dornier Do 217.
On December 22 in 1944 tests with the missile took place form the Karlshagen development centre at Peenemünde. Three Henschel Hs 298 missiles under a Junkers Ju 88G left the airstrip. One fell from the plane before firing. Two missiles were fired, one exploded premature the last took flight as planned. Mass production of the missile was set to January 1945 but was abandoned in favour of the Ruhrstahl X-4 wire guided air to air missile.
