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Aviation History
1950
1950 - 1281.PDF
FLIGHT, 6 July 195° 33 recent example of such a switch was the Berlin Air Lift.The aircraft of Transport Command are the Handley Page Hastings for long-range operations and the Vickers Valetta forshort-range work, while a number of Avro Yorks and Douglas Dakotas are still in service. Of the newer aircraft, both theHastings and the Valetta have been designed for employment in both the tactical and the strategical role.Although these aircraft are performing their duties well, much thought has been devoted to the basic types which shouldform the future equipment of Transport Command. Seven years of operating experience with many different types, mostof them adapted from civil aircraft or bombers, has made it possible to visualize certain general requirements for Servicetransport aircraft. A minimum of two distinct types is desirable. One shouldbe a 300 m.p.h. long-range aircraft to be used in a purely strategical capacity. The second type would be tactical. It would not necessarilybe smaller than the long-range aircraft, but its most important feature would be the ability to operate from advanced airfields lacking long and costly runways and the other facilities foundat normal trunk-route airfields. It would be slower than the long-range aircraft. In both types, particular attention wouldbe paid to ease of loading and unloading. Transport Command is the youngest of the major Commandsin the R.A.F., having been formed in 1943 to draw together all the various existing formations then dealing with air trans-port, delivery and air routes, and to standardize and co- ordinate their work. The importance of the Command may bejudged by the fact that by the end o. the war it had become the largest R.A.F. Command, controlling nine Groups at homeand overseas. It was transport aircraft which made possible the victoriousmarch of the 14th Army through Burma in 1945. Four hundred of them, British and American, supplied the 14thArmy with 2,000 tons of supplies a day—98 per cent of the Army's requirements. Later, transports were employed in avery different task when they dropped across the Rhine two complete divisions in one-and-a-half hours. For this more than1,000 machines were used, and as many gliders. BRITISH AIR FORCES OF OCCUPATION From Air Marshal T. M. Williams, C.B., O.BE., M.C., D.F.C., Commander-in-Chief, British Air Forces of Occ#£ationW HEN I assumed command of the British Air Forces of Occupation, the Berlin Air Lift was barely four months old. It continued to fill much of our thoughts for a further eleven months, until we were assured that surface communications between Berlin and the West had been restored. Tha Air Lift is probably the best-known feat of the Royal Air Force in Germany and is, I am sure, one that will long be remembered, not only as an outstanding example of sustained air supply but also as an example of joint Anglo-American and Common- wealth action. However, B.A.F.O. has, and has had for five years, other responsibilities, less publi- cized but still very important. We are part of the occupying forces in Germany, with duties to fulfil towards the civil power. We are part of the forces of Western Union, already deployed on the Continent of Europe. Moreover, we are able to train and exercise continuously with the Army and thus practise, and try to improve, the tech- niques of a tactical air force. I cannot, in this space, describe our duties more fully but they provide absorbing and xciting tasks. There is plenty of work, and a wide range of opportunity, for officers and airmen. The Royal Air Force has always been an adaptable and flexible Service, and has constantly aimed at being an efficient, fast and powerful fighting force, capable of meeting all demands made of it. We in B.A.F.O. are striving towards this aim and it is my hope that we perform our varied tasks in a manner worthy of the Service to which we belong THE British Air Forces of Occupation was formed as anan Overseas Command of the R.A.F. on July 15th, 1945,founded on the hard core of 2nd Tactical Air Force, the war-time formation which it superseded. Its primary func-tion was the air policing of the British Zone of Germany. The Economic Advisory Commission of December, 1944,. had divided Germany into territorial zones and the capital city of Berlin into sectors for occupation by allied forces atthe conclusion of the war in Europe, which 2nd T.A.F. at that time was still prosecuting. This was the original authorityfor the existence, in the British Zone of Germany and the British Sector of Berlin, of units of the R.A.F. subsequentlyknown collectively as the British Air Forces of Occupation. B.A.F.O. was accorded the status of a Command and headedby an A.O.C.-in-C.; in November, 1949, the title was changed to Commander-in-Chief. It is natural that the policy and organization of the Com-mand has undergone many changes during its five years of occupation. Before the Command could settle to its primaryduty of policing the British Zone, there were destructive and constructive tasks to face in connection with demilitarization.When the war ended there were nearly half a million Luftwaffe personnel in the British Zone and nearly 4,000 aircraft. By theend of 1945, most of the Luftwaffe had been disbanded, and personnel were absorbed by the British-controlled German CivilLabour Organization. A few aircraft were preserved for record and museum purposes; the remainder were '' reduced to pro-duce." Vast quantities of munitions were disposed of through a special Air Disarmament Branch at Headquarters, B.A.F.O. Selected airfields for use by the B.A.F.O. required restorationand rehabilitation. An early major project was the building of the communications airfield at Buckeburg to serve theR.A.F. and Army Headquarters in the British Zone. This air- field also functions as the R.A.F. entry and exit airfield forthe Zone. During the Berlin Air Lift, R.A.F. Airfield Con- struction Wings rebuilt whole airfields to improve the flow of supplies to Berlin, maintaining at the same time a high stan-dard in repair and rehabilitation work at all R.A.F. establish- ments in Germany.B.A.F.O.'s early internal air-transport commitments were heavy. Subsequently, B.E.A. from the British Zone, and othercivil companies, linked Berlin with the rest of Europe. An R.A.F. service still links Warsaw and Berlin with Londontwice weekly, Buckeburg and Gatow serving as staging posts. Additional services operate between Buckeburg and Northoltfor the British Service element. During the war criminals' trials Mosquitoes ferried documents daily between Germany andLondon; in the heavy winter of 1946-47, supplies were dropped in the Friesian Islands, normal communications channels hav-ing been closed by abnormal weather; later, B.A.F.O.'s heavy responsibility in the sphere of air transport was illustratedduring the blockade of Berlin. It was laid down that B.A.F.O. should provide air defencefor the British Zone of Germany and the British Sector of Berlin indefinitely. Air policing was achieved by training androutine flights by tactical and reconnaissance squadrons. Arma- ment training and support roles for British Army of theRhine were carried out, and, from the earliest days, the Command's tactical forces have taken part in exercises,manoeuvres and displays both on the Continent and at home. The Command employs two types of German Labour—directly employed, and members of the German Civil Labour Organization. Both types played a vital part in support of theCommand's contribution to the Air Lift. Much of the work of the Air Ministry Missing ResearchEnquiry Section was carried out in B.A.F.O. by a special R.A.F. unit. By the end of September, 1949, the bodies of30,000 officers and airmen of the R.A.F., Dominions and Allied Air Forces, missing from operations over North-West Europe,had been located and identified. Some 5,000 unknown cases remained and 10,000 are considered to have been lost in thesea or have no known grave. No fewer than 82 per cent of
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