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Aviation History
1943
1943 - 0287.PDF
ma AIRCRAFT ENGINEER FIRST AERONAUTICAL WEEKLY IN THE WORLD .• FOUNDED 1909 Editor C. M. POULSEN Managing Editor G. GEOFFREY SMITH, M.B.E. Chief Photographer JOHN YOXALL Editorial, Advertising and Publishing Offices: DORSET HOUSE, STAMFORD STREET, LONDON, S.E.I Telegrams : Truditur, Sedist, London. Telephone: Waterloo 3333 (35 lines). COVENTRY ! BIRMINGHAM, 2 : MANCHESTER, 3 : GLASGOW, C.2 i 8-10. CORPORATION ST. £ UA' LVD,HAL^ TB,UOL ^ ' **£**' 260' DEANSGATE- 26B. RENPIELDST. Telegrams: Autocar, Coventry. Telegrams : Autopress, Birmingham'. Telegrams : Iliffe, Manchester. Telegrams : lliffe, Glasgow. Telephone: Coventry 52 10. Telephone: Midland 297 1 (5 lines). Telephone: Blackfriars 4412. Telephone: Central 4857. No. 1780. Vol. XLIII. c Registered at the C.P.O. as a Newt(x»pef. February 4th, 1943. IFe Outlook Thursdays, One Shilling, Fleet Air Arm EquipmentW ERE it not for the fact that the subject is serious, one would be tempted to apply to the debate in the House of Lords last week the familiar paraphrasing of a famous soap advertisement that was current many years ago. As applied to the Irish, the paraphrase ran: "They don't know what they want, and they won't be happy till they get it." The debate in the Lords, shorn of all superfluous verbiage, rather indicated that in the matter of air equipment for the Fleet Air Arm the Admiralty does not, or at least did not, know what it wants and will not be happy till it gets it. Lord Winster put it much more politely. "There is," he said, "a controversy between those who say that the Admiralty did not get what they wanted for the Fleet Air Arm and those who say that the Admiralty was not clever at explaining what exactly it was that it wanted."As Lord Winster pointed out, the Admiralty has, since the decision of the Balfour Committee in 1923, obtainedits air equipment from the Air Ministry, but is supposed to put torwaid suggestions as to the types of aircraft itwants. The formation of the Ministry of Aircraft Pro- duction in 1940 did not change that policy except totransfer from the Air Ministry to the M.A.P. the task of supply:Lord Winster did not go much beyond saying that someone is to blame for the fact that the Fleet Air Armis to-day, in the fourth year of war, badly equipped. Lord Gifford introduced a note of realism into the debateby pointing out that the debate was a year too late, and that personnel of the Fleet Air Arm now feel thateverything possible is being done to give them the best equipment. Lord Beaverbrook's plea for greater scope for indi- vidualism, and his insistence upon the fact that it is the firms and not the Ministries nor the Admiralty that ultimately decide the goodness or otherwise of aircraft types, will meet with full agreement in the aircraft industry. It is no exaggeration to say that every ser- vice type which has achieved outstanding success has been either a private venture or has differed so much from the official specification as to be virtually a different aircraft. Lord Beaverbrook .got his names a bit mixed up, but his basic argument was sound. The Admiralty to Blame1 ORD TRENCHARD supported Lord Winster in claiming that if the Admiralty had not got the aircraft they wanted, the fault was theirs and not that of the Air Ministry or M.A.P. The Admiralty requirements had been formulated from a sailor's point of View, and the aircraft types which resulted had failed to stand the test of war. We cannot agree with Lord Trenchard that all Naval aviation should be handed to the R.A.F., but we do not think any fair-minded person would deny that the Admiralty has only itself to blame if it now is dissatisfied with its aircraft. A somewhat debatable point raised by Lord , Tren- chard referred to torpedo aircraft. He claimed that the Admiralty did not believe in torpedo aircraft, and that the R.A.F. did. Lord Trenchard said : "They (the Admiralty) scofied at torpedo machines, but. the Royal Air Force realised the value of them and kept them going all those long years down to 1937."It might be pointed out that in January, 1937 (before handing over the Fleet Air Arm to the Admiralty), the F.A.A. had 13 squadrons, of which three were T.B. squadrons. That percentage does not look like a dis- belief in torpedo aircraft, although we are well aware that there were many Naval officers who thought the torpedo machine would be blown out of the sky long before it could get its torpedo launched. On the subject of fighters for the Fleet Air Arm, Lord n «
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