FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1941
1941 - 0678.PDF
Air Strategy—XLV BASES of SUPPLY and MARCH 2OTH, 1941. LOYMENT Britain's Air Lines of Communication apt Lengthening By CAPTAIN NORMAN MACMILLAN, .&.C., A.F.C. THE Imperial flying forces now have two major basesof aircraft supply and two minor bases. The majorbases are, first, the United Kingdom, and, second, the United States of America and Canada ; the minor bases are Australia and India. That means that aircraft are being made in the north and south hemispheres and, taking longitude into consideration, literally in every "quarter" of the globe. Taking the United States alone, 2,500 miles lie between plants in' the east and plants in the west; the factories in Britain are 3,000 miles from the nearest American factories ; east to India is another 4,000 miles; and from India to Australia is as much again This dispersion is a valuable form of protection in war, but, unless it is organised to fit into the requirements of the units ultimately employ- ing the equipment, it may well have disadvantages which will become more difficult to eliminate with the expansion of output. Unquestionably, with the situation in which Britain found herself forced to declare war against Germany, the most important matter in aeronautical supply was to get delivery speeded up ; where the aircraft came from was relatively unimportant provided they were up to a standard of efficiency commensurate with the requirements of the Royal Air Force. It was the Italian declaration of war which took the war outside Europe, and that act changed the character of the conflict immediately. Since Italy entered the war the major strategy of Britain has obviously been directed towards the defeat of the Italian forces outside Italy and, if that aim is obtained in totality, the result will be the confinement of the war within the European continent once more. Hence the counter moves by Japan in the Far East in collaboration with the Axis partners in Europe ; hence, too, the German move into Bulgaria, for the confinement of the war to the continent of Europe spells disaster by strangulation to Germany and Italy. Drang Nach Aussen Europe, as a continent dominated by Germany, can provide many of the requirements of a nation at war to-day. But it cannot provide certain requirements in sufficient quantity and others not at all. Germany must break through and get out of Europe or be defeated just as surely as she was defeated in 1918. Even the complete defeat and subjuga- tion of the British Isles by Germany would not now give her victory, for the British Isles do not in themselves sup- ply the deficiencies which must be the gravest source of worry to those responsible for Germany's power to continue the struggle. That struggle is now defined with the utmost clarity as a struggle to the death between the English- speaking peoples and the German-speaking peoples. On this basis the odds are against Germany. There are (not including the Irish Free State) approximately 190 millions of English-speaking people in the world against 100 millions of German-speaking people. In such a struggle it is funda- mentally race which counts. Allies may be useful, but if they are of a different race, speaking a different language and thinking in a different manner, they may, in spite of the most solemn pledges, let an allied nation down. I am willing to bet that the ties which bind Germany and Japan are looked upon from either end through vastly different spectacles. So, too, with Germany and Italy, closer though these two are in geographical relationship. British propa- gandists should direct their efforts towards the magnifica- tion of the differences which form the race cleavage lines between our enemies. Now, as this is fundamentally a race war between the German- and English-speaking peoples, it can be won only by the ovQT^row of one of these race groups ; with or with- out the assistance of allies on one side or the other. Hitler's policy pi collecting all his Volk in one Reich gave him great initial strength at the beginning of the war., ^flspf as it gave him great war manufacturing capacity prior to the war. But now that policy of his is recoiling upon the heads of the people he has led, for in this modern war of machine versus machine his concentrated millions are herded together on the continent of Europe while the range of the aeroplane is growing so rapidly that there will be no security for any of them before this year is out. On the other hand, the English-speaking peoples dispersed far and wide across the earth's surface can be attacked only piece- meal and many cannot be attacked by Germany at all, but .. only by means of an ally, Japan, whose rise to still greater power as a result of the necessity of Germany (and the con- centration of Britain in European matters) would, of itself, constitute a negation of the Hitlerian theories of Herren- .• volk—which just proves that ev^n the most ardent theorist, like Hitler, cannot have it all ways in this so-called best of all possible worlds Key Points Having had regard to the bases of supply production for the British forces in this conflict, it is necessary to have regard to the major bases of employment of those supplies. The bases of employment (unlike the bases of production) have altered from time to time. Initially there were but two bases of active employment—France and Britain ; at that time there was a static base of employment in the Middle East. With the collapse of France the bases of employment became Britain and the Middle East. More recently Singapore has taken the place which the Middle East occupied during tie first phase of the war. Thus it is obvious that the trend of the conflict is towards the East. This does not mean that Britain is not a bul- wark which may be subjected to heavy attack, but the time has passed when the fall of Britain could spell victory for Germany, and Hitler must know that, as also must his competent generals. Their outlook upon the war must have taken on a much longer aspect than it formerly envisaged. And to succeed it now appears to be impera- tive for Germany to secure the active participation of Japan. Both require access to oil if their war plans arev to be furthered. That must lead Germany still farther to '"' the south and east and Japan to the south and west. There are thus four key points in Britain's chain of defence. These are the British Isles, the Middle East, Singapore and Australia. India lies centrally between the inner two, a vast reservoir of strength if it can be rightly employed. Indeed, tie importance of India as a centre of production supply is hard to overstress in the strategic layout of the implications of conflict which face the English-speaking peoples at this juncture in their history. Apart from its strategic situation as a central area wherein war manufactures would be well situated for supply to either the Middle East or Malaya, India is a remarkably useful central area for aircraft storage, for long-range air- craft can easily fly from India to Egypt non-stop and from India to Singapore non-stop. We already have the advantage of aircraft delivery across the Atlantic. This ought to be augmented by aircraft delivery across the Pacific. Long-range bombers built in America (and flying-boats) could be delivered by the trans- Pacific route to Australia and to Singapore. India could be made a great aircraft depot from which the require- ments of any of the focal points of the British conflict zones in long-range aircraft could be quickly met. The trans- atlantic and trans-Pacific aircraft delivery routes would thus feed both ends of a long line of dispersed strong points
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
