Blockhaus d'Éperlecques

About

Le blockhaus d'Éperlecques (also referred to as the Watten bunker) is a Second World War bunker located in the forest of Éperlecques in the French department of Pas-de-Calais. As the code name Kraftwerk North West (KNW), it was built by Nazi Germany from 1943 to 1944 to serve as the launch base for V2 missiles targeting London and southern England. Built to accommodate more than 100 missiles at a time and launch 36 per day, the blockhouse would have housed a liquid oxygen plant and a bomb-protected station to supply the site with rockets and supplies from production plants in Germany.

It was built by forced labourers from concentration or labour camps as well as by forced French recruits. The blockhouse was never completed as a result of repeated British and American bombings in Operation Crossbow. The attacks caused significant damage and prevented it from being used in its original role; part of the building was transformed into a liquid oxygen production plant.

The site was captured by the Allies at the beginning of the...