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Aviation History
1945
1945 - 0481.PDF
MARCH 15TH, 1945 FLIGHT »75 The Air Estimates Sir Archibald Sinclair's Speech ON Tuesday, March 6th, Sir Archibald Sinclair, Secretaryof State for Air, introduced the Air Estimates to theCommittee of Supply of the House of Commons. He commenced by saying that the story of the air war in the past year was the story of the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Force working in the closest partnership and harmony for the destruction of the common enemy. Their tasks were complementary, their fortunes were intertwined. Together they had achieved mastery of the air over Germany and the battle area. The extent of their mastery was illus- trated by the reduction in the casualties incurred by squadrons of Bomber Command. In 1942 the bomber squadrons lost 4.1 per cent, of the aircraft despatched. In 1943 they lost 3.7 per cent. In 1944 the figure feH to 1.7 per cent., and for the first two months of 1945 it had been as low as 1.1 per cent., although an increasing number of operations had been carried out by day. He explained that now we were reducing the air cre-.v training organisation to the level that would be required after the defeat of Germany. He paid a tribute to the training work done during the war by the Dominions, especially Canada. But the air superiority which we had won ^had been at a cost. Between April 1st and September 30th, 1)44, Bomber Command alone had suffered more than 10,000 casualties. The casualty rate had now fallen far below what had been anticipated two years ago. So now it had been decided to transfer several thousands of men from the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force to the Army. Preparations for peace were being made by inviting officers of the R.A.F Volunteer Reserve to apply for permanent com- missions, and early last year airmen were given the chance of becoming regulars." The pattern of the air offensive in Europe, said Sir Archibald, had been reflected in Burma. The blows from the integrated British and U.S. Air Forces* had destroyed the enemy's dumps, airfields, bridges, and all forms of land and water transport. Air supremacy had enabled us both to starve the enemy's troops and to sustain our own. As many as three divisions had been at one time maintained solely by air transport. The Air Minister then paid a tribute to the work of the Mediterranean Allied Air Force, and then alluded to the attempts of the Luftwaffe in February of last year to renew on a small scale the blitz on London, as well as to recent raids, saying that small numbers of fast aircraft might get through from time to time, but not without paying their toll to Fighter Command. On Saturday, March 3rd, 70 long-range fast night fighters carrying a limited number of bombs had tried to attack us but had lost six, or more probably eight, of their number. Sir Archibald briefly alluded to the attacks by flying bombs and V2 weapons, and said that the only way to silence this form of long-range artillery was the physical occupation of the sites from which they were fired. He emphasised the. close partnership of all three Services in opposing the enemy. D—day Operations • This carried the speaker on to the Air Force's share in D-day operations, and he spoke of howjj Coastal Command, working in the closest co-operation with the Royal Navy, had obtained an increasing mastery of the German submarines. Bomber Command had also contributed by attacks on the assembly yards and pens of the U-boats. In the three weeks before D-day Admiral Donitz was trying to move his U-boats from Norway to the Channel coast. Sir Sholto Douglas, A.O.C.-in-C, Coastal Command, anticipated every move they made. The U-boat crews had been given a course of training against air attack, and the boats had been equipped with a 37 mm. A.A. gun. But they were mauled by Coastal Com- mand. When the invasion came the Biscay U-boat fleet moved to the western approaches on the surface. During the first four critical days from D-day the Command madf- 38 sightings which resulted in several destructive attacks. These successes of Coastal Command, won rn unison with the Navy, were decisive. Likewise hardly a motor gunboat or motor torpedo- boat put to sea without being spotted and attacked from the air. Coastal Command was also earning on a deadly cam- paign against the enemy's shipping which had been carrying supplies to bases in Norway or evacuating troops from Norway- Turning to the work of Bomber Command, the Air Minister said that its work and that of the U.S. Strategic Air Force, in preparation for our invasion, had been continuous over a period of years. We had known that the Germans had made a tremen- dous effort to build up the biggest fighter force that the. world had ever seen. They were sacrificing their bomber torce and concentrating on defence. Our bomber offensive was proving to be the most effective defence of our homes and factories against a blitz on the grand scale. iia>! the Germans been left undisturbed, they would have increased their fighter production to 2,500 or 3,000 a month by the end of last year. The British and U.S. bomber forces therefore in the winter of 1943 and the spring of last year turned their main effort against the German fighter factories. The Air Minister recalled that, when introducing his Esti- mates on February 29th last year, he had said that historians of the future might look back on the period when those attacks were being delivered from Italy and from this country as one of the decisive stages of the war, and he quoted General Arnold as having recently said practically the same thing. That great series of attacks had laid the foundation of the air mastery which the Allies had enjoyed on "D-day and since.Seine Bridges In the late spring the destruction oi Grrm.-m communications behind 1he intended invasion front took first place among mir bombing objectives. Twenty-four road and railway bridges over the Seine were selected, and by D-day all had been either demolished or severely damaged. The enemy had naturally assumed that he could reinforce his defensive front by road and rail more quickly than we could reinforce by sea. As things turned out, the weather favoured this calculation, and for throe- critical days it was impossible to land troops or supplies over the beaches. But so thoroughly had the Air Forces done their work that the Allied armies were able to reinforce much more quickly than the Germans. The R.A.F. also successfully delivered two of the largest air- borne formations ever taken into battle. In the first of these operations British and American airborne forces formed the spearhead of the Normandy landing. The second operation succeeded later in forcing the Maas and the Waal. .Moreover, since D-day river 55,000 casuallics had been evacuated by air. In reply to a question, Sir Archibald said that lie .did not think there had been in any theatre of war at any time during this war any case in which an army had been so paralysed by an air force that it had been quite incapable of movement. The Air Minister then spoke of the sinking of the Tirpitz, Two squadrons of Bomber Command, bombing from some 15,000ft., scored three direct hits and two near misses. The aiming was done with a British bombsight of extraordinary complexity, ingenuity, and accuracy. Sir Archibald then mentioned how the RAF. had dropped arms for the patriots in the occupied countries, how some Polish officers had been brought to this country in a Dakota, and how officers of the Women's Auxiliary Air Force had been dropped by night by parachute in France and had helped the Maquis. However, said the Air Minister, the strategic bomber offensive remained the principal role of the British and U.S. Bomber Commands. From time to time targets were bombed in direct support of the Red Armies. The shortage of tanks and other equipment, and, most of all. ot oil, was hampering and en- feebling the power of Germany on every front. Sir Archibald said that it was a big decision of policy when the Prime Minister and the War Cabinet determined in 1941 to launch this tremendous offensive. We knew, he said, that then only a small proportion of our own bombs were hitting the right target, and that the same was true of ih- German Air Force in the blitz. He described some of the difficulties which had to be overcome. For four years, he said, the Allied Air Force was the only force ironi the West carrying the wr*" to Germany. " Had not 1he Luftwaffe been out-fought in the air, hammered on its airfields, ami smashed in its factories, there could have been no invasion of Normandy last year. Every port in southern England before D-day was packed with shipping for the invasion—a bomb-aimer's paradise. . . . Yet not a bomb fell." The combined offensive apainsi German oil production had begun last April. Hy September this production had been cnt 'to about a quarter of the April figure. Now many combat units of the German Army were not allowed to use oil except during actual operations. German oil production had been reduced to such an extent that available reserves were approaching exhaustion.
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