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Aviation History
1946
1946 - 1890.PDF
32° FLIGHT SERVICE AVIATION said Lord Tedder, " whatproportion of the national resources are to be allocatedto the various component parts of the nationaldefence, uniformed and civilian. It is clear on theone hand that such alloca- tion should be such as toensure security against a far more sudden and far heavierattack than we suffered last time; on the otherhand it is equally clear that we must find every possiblemeans of economizing in our defence expenditure—ifwe expend too much on detehce we shall havenothing left worth de- fending." When he said" economy," he did not mean " doing things on thecheap," he referred to the real economy one gets fromefficiency and a proper balancing of forces.C.A.S. believed that the keywords for the futurewere flexibility and speed and felt that the days ofthe leviathan were over, so far as warfare was con-cerned. " I think the future lies with David andnot Goliath," he said. Regarding the ultimatesize of the R.A.F., Lord Tedder could say little. The strength of the Air Forcewas bound up with the strength of the armed forces as a whole and the Govern-ment could make no immediate decision on the ultimate allocation of resources toany one service until they had thor- oughly evaluated the effect of recent de-velopments in the technique of modern warfare. "As to the shape of the Air Force,"C. A. S. continued, "we aim to main- tain a balanced peace-time force cap-able on the one hand of meeting its many peacetime commitments, and on theother hand, in the event of war, of meeting the initial shock and of expand-ing to exert the full and decisive force of air power. In the old days, and evenas late as 1940, there were people who said that all we needed for the defence ofthis country was fighters. I think the history of the Luftwaffe exposes thatfallacy." In our peacetime force, maintainedLord Tedder, we must strike the right Ixdance between defence and offence, be-tween short-range tactical support for the New Aircrew badges.(Top) Master Aircrew, (Centre) Aircrew I,(Bottom) Aircrew II. land and sea forces andlong-range forces capable of operating strategically ortactically as the situation demanded. We must alsomaintain an air transport force to ensure a certaindegree of mobility not only to our air forces but alsoto the land forces. We were doing our besttc attain economy, said Lord Tedder, not only theeconomy attained by cutting out non-essentials (on thisaccount many desirable things had been cut) butalso the economy to be gained by improving effi-ciency. For many months teams of scientific in-vestigators had been ex- amining various aspects ofService administration,' to see where man-power couldbe saved, whether by alter- ing administrative methods,improving or rearranging equipment, diluting skilledlabour with more unskilled, or in other -ways. Cook-houses, unit orderly rooms, accounting svsterhs andofficers' messes were some ofthe items ex- amined which had '' given a line '' onvaluable economies. " It is indeed fortunate,"said C. A. S., " that we have already made some headway in this, for frankly,we are more and more up against it. We are more andmore faced by the vital and urgent need to re-establish the permanent element of the Force.During the war the R.A.F. was not permitted to con-tinue regular recruitment. The only long-term-engage-ment airmen in the Service at the end of the war werethose who had been serving at the outbreak. Their num-bers are small and are dwindling further rapidly.The vast majority of the Service are those who are onwar-emergency engagement, and those are fast beingdemobilized. It is thus a race with time. A race to New Aircrew badges.(Top) Aircrew III. (Centre) Aircrew IV.(Bottom) Aircrew Cadet fill up the Force with volunteers beforethe drain-out of our wartime personnel reduces the whole Force to impotence.I must speak frankly. The position is dangerous—I mean dangerous." A largely technical Force like theR.A.F., which in one sense is always on active service, must have skilled menboth on the ground and in the ah". To get the skill and experience demandedvolunteers were required who hoped to stay in the Service. A National Serviceelement was essential to serve as a basis for expansion in the event of war,in peace-time the National Service en- trant would not be long enough in theR.A.F. to give much productive service or to complete the normal overseas tour." Further," said Lord Tedder, " he won't have sufficient training, much lessexperience, to become a useful member of an aircrew or of the maintenance crewof a modern aircraft." No "Bribes'' A recruiting campaign had begun anda bounty scheme introduced to encourage men to join or re-engage. But again.Lord Tedder said bluntly, that results so far are gravely disappointing and wewere in danger of losing the race. Lord Tedder had heard talk of a " NewDeal" for the Air Force which would help recuiting. Personallyhe was not a believer in bribes; he did not thinkthat '' a policy of bread and circuses" was likely to beany healthier for the Royal Air Force than it was forthe Roman Empire. He knew of no New Deal, butdid believe in a Square Deal. For many months activeplans had been going ahead for replacing some of thescattered and primitive war- time stations with properand decent peacetime ac- commodation, accommoda-tion which would bear comparison with that whicha man could reasonably ex- pect in civilian life. Theseplans had been widely cir- culated and discussed with,all ranks, and specimens erected at Newmarket.Moreover, the R.A.F. was also going ahead as fastmoney and the civilian, housing programme wouldallow towards meeting one of the most urgent needs that of married quarters.. •a** PIN-UP PROTOTYPE : Every aspect of its exceptionally clean linei is emphasized in these four new views of the Super- marine E.10/44 single-jet fighter in which the Rolls-Royce Nene radial-flow turbine-jet unit has been installed to great advantage. 1 4 \ '' 1
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