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Aviation History
1940
1940 - 1259.PDF
MAY 2, 1940 397 Germany's slow-flying Fieseler Storch (right) isused extensively for army co-operation. Below is one of a small batch of direet-take-offAutogiros supplied to the R.A.F. before the war. to equip a mobile army co-operation section of the R.A.F. with floatplanes and to make the air head- quarters operate from a floating base provided by a fly- ing boat, or more than one if need be. For example, there might be no better way to conduct some of the air headquarters work for such an army co-operation unit than from the air in a Sunderland. But, with things as they are, I am afraid there is little likelihood of putting such a suggestion into practice soon enough to be of any great value. Thus it would appear that the Allied forces operating on land in Norway will have to carry on for some time without adequate air assistance of the kind which is technically known as army co-operation. And that is a pity. For in country of the kind in which the Allied forces will have to conduct a war of movement, efficient air co-operation is an invaluable factor. The trouble is that all the Services are too water- tight. And the one which ought to have been least hidebound by tradition has been dominated by the narrow outlook of the mind of the ground soldier ever since it has been in existence. Every Chief of Staff which the R.A.F. has ever had has been first a soldier. Pity ! If only the Air Force had set out with the utmost determination to fit itself primarily for air campaigns— instead of reiterating ad nauseam the pernicious doctrine that no Service can act alone, but that all three are interdependent—it would be a more efficient Ser- vice to-day for the purpose of co-operation with the other Services. Anomalous, but true ! But it has been formulated, and upheld by the Air Ministry, that in a major war the K.A.F. cannot operate apart from the considerations of the other Services in accordance with the dictates of the Cabinet in regard to the conduct of the whole campaign. And it is in accordance with that thesis that the R.A.F. is equipped, to conduct orthodox warfare in accordance with the traditional codes of the two older Services, which have always managed to uphold their views in those political circles wherein the fighting Services are subordinated Departments of the Government. Well, no army leader ever imagined that he might have to have air co-operation aeroplanes operating from bases hundreds of miles away from the ground forces, did he ? Such an idea was pure heresy. And so the 1-ysander possesses a range of 600 miles, which is barely enough to take it over the North Sea and back without waiting for a moment on the other side. How then can it co-operate with army units in Norway when its nearest aerodrome is somewhere in Scotland? It can't. It just Can't. What's going to be done ? Is the Lysander going to be put on floats ? Or is some other type going to be substituted until conditions make it possible for Lysan- ders to be used ? Blenheims again, for instance, as in the case of long-range fighters ? And if the second make-shift is employed, how are all the complications of ground co-operation going to be solved with 300 miles of sea between ? In the meantime the only thing the R.A.F. can do is to endeavour to obliterate its failure to provide against the very situation which has now arisen by attempting to prevent the German Air Force from carrying out those duties which the R.A.F. must find so impossible of facile accomplishment. And there is only one method by which the German army co-operation aero- planes can be held down; that is by the bombing of every air base which they can use in Norway and Den- mark so as to reduce them to a state of impotence. And by this act the R.A.F. may bring retaliatory bombing upon the aerodromes in Britain, for it is from British aerodromes that the process of extinguishing German air force army co-operation must be conducted. Independent Action The soldierly mind, visualising the military possi- bilities of the aeroplane, has failed to realise its possi- bilities of independent action. The naval mind has made the same mistake. The Admiralty most, and not far behind it the War Office, fought the air rearmament of Britain during the four and a quarter years of inten- sive rearming that preceded Mr. Chamberlain's declara- tion of war against Germany. Because of that opposi- tion in the interests of their own Services, the Navy and the Army helped to make Britain's air force too small when the inevitable occurred (which almost all the politicians had said was not inevitable). Not only was the R.A.F. too small to wield a decisive effect on Power Politics, but its rearmament was directed towards the requirements of Navy and Army before the requirements of an Independent Air Force. Now the time has come for the Air Ministry to place its own doctrine before the Cabinet, before the People (by suitable publicity), before the Admiralty and the War Office, and at long last to throw over the dog- matism of the military mind. In spite of all that has happened in this war so far, in spite of the quite obvious fact that in the main it has been (on Britain's side) a naval war, I am convinced that it will end when the power, of the air arm can swa)/ the issue to the point of victory. What we have seen is but the prologue. The real war has not yet begun. How is the R.A.F. to be used when it does begin ? Will it have the right kind of aircraft for the job it may be called upon to do ? These are questions I propose to explore in a subsequent article. (Next week: Current Strategic Use of the Air Arm,.)
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