# A better Coastal Command?



## Shortround6 (Dec 29, 2017)

Somebody questioned a while ago about the number of threads that were concerned with improvement of German capabilities and the relative lack of such threads/suggestions for the allies. 

So here is one.

Coastal command was in pretty dismal shape in the early part of the war and an "improved" Coastal Command might have made a significant difference. This would require several "AH HA"  moments in the early/mid 30s. 

1.  The realization that early Asdic, on it's own, did not end the threat of submarines. It was big help compared to hydrophones of WW I but a few flotillas of Asdic equipped destroyers were NOT going to sweep the seas/oceans _clean_ of enemy subs. It was going to require both better AS weapons and a better way of finding the subs to begin with (before they torpedoed something). 

2.  Aircraft had proved quite useful in WW I at finding subs even if not very good at killing them. The larger the area aircraft could cover the more restricted the subs movement and vision was. More and longer ranged aircraft to look for subs would be a good idea.

3.  It might be a good idea to *actually test* planned/approved anti-sub weapons against a soon to be scrapped WW I submarine to see the actual results. This would lead to the conclusion that the 100lb anti sub bomb was total failure well before the war and force a rethink of aircraft weapons and indeed, aircraft needed. 

4.  Coastal Command might actually be useful for attacking enemy surface ships at some distance from the British coast, at least if equipped with something other than the Vickers Vildebeest





This was a huge airplane that first flew in 1928. 




It's ability to deliver a torpedo to a modern warship would be rather dubious even in 1936.


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## tomo pauk (Dec 29, 2017)

If we want from the CC to reach as long as possible, it will be needing 4-engined aircraft ASAP. Not just because of payload it will be lifting, it is that engine-out sizuation in a 4-engined job is far less a dangerous affair than it is for a 2-engined type. Gratnted, plenty of 2-engined aircraft will be needed, too, in order to cover the big ocean, at distances closer to the UK.


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## Shortround6 (Dec 29, 2017)

At the start of the war CC had 18 squadrons. 10 of which had Avro Ansons. two Vickers Vildebeest, two Short Sunderland, three Saro London and one Supermarine Stranraer squadrons. The engine out situation can be solved (somewhat) by using higher powered engines and by using feathering propellers and cross feed fuel systems. Duplicate hydraulic pumps and generators help also. 
As an example the Lockheed 10E transport of Early 1936 (certified in Dec 1935) using 550hp P & W wasps had a single engine ceiling of 9500ft at full load. It may not have had some of the features I mentioned but was popular for the safety it provided in mountainous areas. Using 450hp Wasp Juniors the one engine ceiling was 4000ft. 
Coastal Command was also saddled with 4 squadrons of biplane flying boats (the AIr Ministry in the early 30s seems to have believed the monoplane was a passing fad  

Saro London




Top speed 155 mph clean range, range could hit 1700 miles but only with a reduced bomb load (max 2000lbs) and fitted with the over fuselage fuel tank shown in photo. It first flew in 1934 and entered squadron service in 1936. RAF still believed gunners in open cockpits made effective lookouts after 6-8 hours?? 
Please note that the Catalina was in production and entering squadron service in 1936 (although with 900hp engines and not the 1200hp engines most WW II versions had) but had ranges over 2000 miles. 
Sikorsky had also flown the S-43 in 1935 and sold a number in 1936.




Including this one sold to Norway in 1936. top speed was 190 mph but range was a bit short (775-800miles) however could passenger capacity be traded for fuel/weapons? Payload with 400 gal of fuel and 3 crewmen was 3300-3600lbs. One specification claims the plane could make 125 mph at 7000ft on one engine (doesn't say for how long). Constant speed propellers were an option and controllable props were standard. Saro London may have been using fixed pitch props.

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## buffnut453 (Dec 29, 2017)

The problem you face in 1939 is that, no matter how good the aircraft are, they won't have much impact on the U-boat threat until the advent of ASV and even then it was the combination of radar and Leigh light that enabled consistently accurate attacks against U-boats.


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## swampyankee (Dec 29, 2017)

Even unarmed, radar-free aircraft would tend to force submarines to submerge -- the submarine commander can't assume that a spotting report wasn't passed to somebody with weapons capable of putting a teeny little hole in the pressure vessel.

Since I am far from expert on RAF history and, especially, its internal politics, I can't really give a good reason for why its aircraft were what they were. Since WW1 had demonstrated that submarines could be severely damaging to the UK -- while there was no actual starvation in the UK, there was what is euphemistically called food insecurity, including resulting malnutrition -- it would seem prudent to put Coastal Command rather higher on the list of priorities than was actually done.

Send me back in time with enough bullion to pull some weight, and I'd have somebody like Shorts buy a license from Martin or Sikorsky to produce patrol seaplanes and to have the Vildebeest replaced with something much more modern. And spend some money on ASV radar and associated tactical development.


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## buffnut453 (Dec 29, 2017)

swampyankee said:


> Even unarmed, radar-free aircraft would tend to force submarines to submerge -- the submarine commander can't assume that a spotting report wasn't passed to somebody with weapons capable of putting a teeny little hole in the pressure vessel.



But the aircraft has to find the U-boat in the first place. Without radar, the aircraft only has a chance of finding the U-boat in daytime...but even then the odds of a successful engagement are vanishingly small.


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## dogsbody (Dec 29, 2017)

Shore-based torpedo aircraft with a good range. The Vickers Wellesley:


Chris

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## Shortround6 (Dec 29, 2017)

Aircraft had proved their worth in WW I for anti-sub work. It had been noticed that U-Boat activity (attacks) were lower in areas that aircraft patrolled even if there were NO sinkings attributed to AIrcraft in WW I (there was one shared kill?) 
The U-boats also had no radar and depended on visual spotting of ships/convoys. Of course the U-boats visual range was dependent on weather but in clear weather even smoke on the horizon was a good indicator. However that meant the U-boat (or anybody else's submarine) had to run on the surface at 10-18kts in order to get actual visual ID of the target. Depending on sea state the wake could be seen for some distance from the air. U-boats often spotted a target (ship or convoy) during the day and maintained contact until night when they could attack on the surface using their superior speed. Things changed as the surface escorts got radar. So limiting the subs daylight activity puts a big dent in it's overall activity as it has the same problem at night as the aircraft and surface escorts, poor visibility at night. Closing on a convoy that a sub has been tailing for hours during the day is one thing. Finding a new convoy at night, even surfaced, is another thing altogether. 

If the aircraft can keep the sub under water then the subs visual search range shrinks considerably and most subs cruised at about 4kts underwater so their ability to close on even a 7kt convoy was extremely limited. Subs could peak at 8-9 kts but the extra power and the discharge characteristics of lead acid batteries often mean that 16-20 hours of endurance at 4 kts shrank to around 1 hour at full underwater speed. 

Chances of a successful engagement go up with 1. a higher attack speed 2. a bigger spread of anti sub bombs 3. bombs with a bigger blast radius. 
The faster a plane can reach the subs position the less time the sub has to dive and evade. A German type VII could dive in 25-30 seconds so a 120kt (138mph) airplane has to be within 1 N mile of the target when spotted by the sub. 

early tactic was to drop one or two bombs per attack which pretty much meant a direct hit was needed and for the Anson even a direct hit by the 100lb anti sub bomb was no guarantee of a kill. A stick of four bombs gave a much longer lethal pattern if the bombs used had some sort of lethal radius. 

Please note that the standard MK VII depth charge used by surface ships weighed about 420lbs and had a 290lb charge. testing later in the war showed it had a 19-20ft lethal radius which certainly puts the 52lb charge in the MK I anti sub bomb in perspective. 

The standard surface depth charge was used from aircraft when fitted with nose and tail fairings (which broke off when hitting water) total weight 450lbs but it was large in diameter and would not fit on 250lb bomb racks/carriers or internally on Hudsons. It also was unreliable if dropped from over 100ft and 100kts. This was later improved to 150ft and 150 kts. 

There were 250lb and 500lb anti-sub bombs but information is sketchy and they were not popular. the explosive used may have had problems in a salt water environment or not been particularly violent. It took until 1941 to get 250lb airborne depth charges. and while anti-sub bombs and depth charges had priority for better explosives it took a while.

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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

If they had built even 12-20 of the 100lb anti-sub bombs at some point in 1934/35 and tested them against a mock-up hull or scrapyard bound ex-WWI sub the failings of the 100lb would have been found out and a larger more effective weapon could have been built, however a larger, heavier bomb means the Anson, as built, can't carry them. You either need a bigger plane or an Anson with bigger engines and better propellers. 

British have an engine gap, there is nothing in existence between the 7 cylinder Cheetah and the 9 cylinder Mercury. Armstrong Siddeley had built several two row ten cylinder engines in the 20s and very early 30s, perhaps a modern version of one them? stick 9 Cheetah cylinders on one crank throw? 
Bristol had built the 7 cylinder Neptune in the 20s with Mercury sized cylinders but the 4 valve cylinder seems expensive. 
Ansons were built in Canada using 450hp P&W Wasp Juniors so a more powerful Anson doesn't seem unreasonable. 
I would note that the Sikorsky Flying boat pictures above used 750hp P & W Hornet engines so either using Mercuries or build a British twin monoplane using Mercuries doesn't seem unreasonable either. 

Building a few more Harrows or Bombays might have been useful for land planes. Again make sure they have feathering propellers. 

The Anson is doing well if it can *patrol *200 miles from land. A patrol means flying out and then turning and covering an arc before flying back, or flying to an area and performing a search pattern, *not *simply flying out and immediately turning around and flying back. This left the 6 squadrons of flying boats to actually cover anything more than 200 miles from the coast or to escort convoys (fly circles around the convoy for several hours at a time). Even 3 squadrons of planes would be a 50% improvement and planes that could operate (spend several hours) at 600 miles from the coast would mean an extra day of steaming for a convoy over a 400 mile distance and 2 days steaming over a 200 mile air patrol distance.

Even if the "improved" Coastal Command doesn't sink many U-boats (2-3?) if they can keep the number of sinkings down during 1939/40 will the Germans keep pouring resources into the U-Boat campaign or will they reconsider and spend the resources elsewhere?

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## tomo pauk (Dec 30, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> ...
> British have an engine gap, there is nothing in existence between the 7 cylinder Cheetah and the 9 cylinder Mercury. Armstrong Siddeley had built several two row ten cylinder engines in the 20s and very early 30s, perhaps a modern version of one them? stick 9 Cheetah cylinders on one crank throw?
> Bristol had built the 7 cylinder Neptune in the 20s with Mercury sized cylinders but the 4 valve cylinder seems expensive.
> Ansons were built in Canada using 450hp P&W Wasp Juniors so a more powerful Anson doesn't seem unreasonable.
> I would note that the Sikorsky Flying boat pictures above used 750hp P & W Hornet engines so either using Mercuries or build a British twin monoplane using Mercuries doesn't seem unreasonable either.



I'm not sure that there was an 'engine gap'. Use the Mercury as entry-level engine. Will do just fine in a 2-engined job (a Blenheim-sized A/C, or indeed Blenheim itself), in a 4-engined it will be even better.



> Building a few more Harrows or Bombays might have been useful for land planes. Again make sure they have feathering propellers.
> .....
> Even if the "improved" Coastal Command doesn't sink many U-boats (2-3?) if they can keep the number of sinkings down during 1939/40 will the Germans keep pouring resources into the U-Boat campaign or will they reconsider and spend the resources elsewhere?



Good points. 
Going out on a limb here - each long range patrol A/C might saw a convoy arrive with just one or two ships sunk instead of half dozen, plus perhaps one damaged or sunk sub? A net gain for the British/Allied war effort.


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## wuzak (Dec 30, 2017)

Could they have got some Whitleys earlier?


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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

wuzak said:


> Could they have got some Whitleys earlier?



Probably not unless there was a huge change in thinking in the RAF/Air ministry.

The Armstrong Siddeley Tiger engines engines were so bad that the early Whitleys using them were banned from long over water flights before the war broke out. That leaves the Merlin powered versions as the only viable bombers and Anti sub planes. About 150 Whitley's had been built with the radial engines. Even the Merlin powered versions could not maintain height on one engine.


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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

tomo pauk said:


> I'm not sure that there was an 'engine gap'. Use the Mercury as entry-level engine. Will do just fine in a 2-engined job (a Blenheim-sized A/C, or indeed Blenheim itself), in a 4-engined it will be even better.



The British had no engine in the Wright Whirlwind 9 (R-975), Wasp JR (R-985) or Wasp (R-1340) catagory, aside from the De Havilland V-12 and so the Mercury was in high demand for even such things as training aircraft. 
The jump pre-war goes from the 335-355hp Cheetah right to the 745hp Kestrel or the Mercury. 
While it would have been nice to replace the 10 squadrons of Ansons with 10 squadrons (or more) of 4 engine long range patrol planes it was probably out of the question. Granted this is a "what if" and even a 1/2 dozen squadrons of Blenheims would have been a major improvement.


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## tomo pauk (Dec 30, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> The British had no engine in the Wright Whirlwind 9 (R-975), Wasp JR (R-985) or Wasp (R-1340) catagory, aside from the De Havilland V-12 and so the Mercury was in high demand for even such things as training aircraft.
> The jump pre-war goes from the 335-355hp Cheetah right to the 745hp Kestrel or the Mercury.
> While it would have been nice to replace the 10 squadrons of Ansons with 10 squadrons (or more) of 4 engine long range patrol planes it was probably out of the question. Granted this is a "what if" and even a 1/2 dozen squadrons of Blenheims would have been a major improvement.



The engines of 600 HP for late 1930s are in the category of 'why bother?'. UK has plenty of the 700-900 HP engines that will make much more sense for actual military aircraft of late 1930s, in any number of engines per aircraft, even if it is a 'low threat' enviroement of Atlantic.

Anson was pressed in the role of patrol aircraft because it was only 2-engined aircraft RAF was willing to give to the Coastal Command, not because it was suitable for the job. One squadron of Bombays, Blenheims or Harrows would've cost the UK less than two squadrons of Ansons, while offering better/longer coverage.



wuzak said:


> Could they have got some Whitleys earlier?



With Mercury or Pegasus engines the reliability (neccessary for long over-water flight) should've improved.
On the other hand, the A-S Ensign shows that a 4-engined job was there when needed. link


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## stona (Dec 30, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> Probably not unless there was a huge change in thinking in the RAF/Air ministry.



I'll quote from chapter 1 of Christina Coulter's excellent 'A Forfotten Offensive-Royal Air Force Coastal Command's Anti-Shipping Campaign, 1940-1945'

"When the First world War broke out, the aeroplane was in its technical infancy. A practical flying machine had only existed for a couple of years, but the impetus of war was such that by the end of hostilities in 1918, most of the problems associated with maritime aviation had been discovered, and considerable progress made towards solving them. Yet, in the time between the two wars, virtually nothing was done to advance the science of maritime aviation, so that the technology, in particular, with which Coastal Command entered war in 1939 was, in many respects, essentially the same as that perfected by the Royal Naval Air Service.
There are two principal reasons for the lack of progress. The first, and most important, was inter-Service rivalry and related predominance in the interwar years of strategic bombing doctrine, which overshadowed other ideas on the employment of air power. The other factor was the amalgamation in 1918 of the Royal Naval Air Service and the Royal Flying Corps to form the Royal Air Force. The RFC, being the larger of the two air branches, dominated the new service, and hence lost sight of valuable research work and conclusions drawn from the RNAS's four years' operational experience. The Naval Staff, as a whole, had a positive attitude towards aviation, and their interest intensified in the course of the First World War, while the War Office demonstrated less ambition."

That's a good summation of the situation of British maritime aviation in the interwar years, and why it was in such a hopeless state at the outbreak of WW2. It's worth bearing in mind whilst indiulging in flights of fancy regarding what might have been done 

Cheers

Steve


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## buffnut453 (Dec 30, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> Granted this is a "what if" and even a 1/2 dozen squadrons of Blenheims would have been a major improvement.



I think we're over-applying the retro-spectroscope here. Building up Coastal Command by an additional 6 squadrons needed to start before 1939 in order to have the personnel and equipment necessary. At that time, nobody expected France to fall in such rapid order. It was that fall which isolated Britain and imposed such a heavy dependence on materiel from the US. Ergo, before they could bolster CC, the Air Ministry would need to invent a really, REALLY good crystal ball to discern the future path of the war in Europe. Yes it's a what-if but the justification for a bigger CC simply wasn't there at the time when expansion of CC resources could have impacted the operational fight much sooner than it did in reality.

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## stona (Dec 30, 2017)

Between 1930 and 1939 Coastal Command almost disappeared entirely. Not all sections of the RAF enjoyed the fruits of an injection of funds into defence spending after 1933. Maritime aviation suffered heavier cuts in the post WW1 disarmament than other branches and then grew most slowly when expansion of the air forces did occur.
Everyone, civil and service, was pre-occupied with the threat of strategic bombers from Continental Europe (first France, then Germany), against which the best defence was considered the establishment of an equivalent and deterrent force. The Air Staff claimed that if the RAF were to be called upon to perform tasks outside strategic bombing it could be done with minimal diversion of effort from the main bomber force. There was a general satisfaction with the results of bombing trials against naval targets, and the development of a specialised maritime strike force was not even considered.
Coastal Area, and its successor organisation, existed as a Fleet support body. After the Admiralty took over responsibility for the Fleet Air Arm in 1937, the maritime branch of the RAF became an orphan child, all but losing its raison d'etre. It was lucky to survive at all.
Nobody had any idea what Coastal Command's role was to be in a war and without such plans operational requirements could not be established. It's why the Command was in the state it was in 1939, and nothing but a fundamental change in priorities, years earlier, could have changed this.
Cheers
Steve

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## buffnut453 (Dec 30, 2017)

Hi Steve,

As always an insightful and informative post. Your statement "Nobody had any idea what Coastal Command's role was to be in a war" pretty much makes the same point I was trying to make. We're looking at this problem after the fact with an understanding of how things truly played out as regards the Battle of the Atlantic. Such insight was not available, indeed the actual battle as it evolved wasn't even imagined, at the time when decisions could have been made to make Coastal Command more effective in the opening stages of the war. Focusing on longer-ranged aircraft and more/better depth bombs might help a little but it isn't going to substantively improve CC's effectiveness to make an earlier impact on the U-boat war. The biggest single impact on U-boat losses was the deployment of ASV radar...and that's a tough technology to bring forward in time given the other pressures on the radar designers.

Cheers,
Mark


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## tomo pauk (Dec 30, 2017)

buffnut453 said:


> <snip>



The ww1 proved that U-boat is a potent threat to the UK shipping, the shipping itself being vital for survival of the UK in the wars centuries ago. WW1 also proved that aircraft are very capable as recon platforms. Threat and asset were sure pointers into the usefulness of the Coastal command in keeping the UK in a future war where enemy uses submarines.
No crystal ball needed, just like Dowding didn't needed it.

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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

I forgot another "AH AH"  moment.

When the Germans negotiate their Naval treaty with the British that "limits" their naval surface tonnage to 35% of the British but gives them 45% of the tonnage in submarines. in fact the wording of the paragraph in question :
" In the matter of submarines, however, Germany, while not exceeding the ratio of 35:100 in respect of total tonnage, shall have the right to possess a *submarine tonnage equal to the total submarine tonnage possessed by the Members of the British Commonwealth of Nations.* The German Government, however, undertake that, except in the circumstances indicated in the immediately following sentence, Germany's submarine tonnage shall not exceed 45 percent. of the total of that possessed by the Members of the British Commonwealth of Nations. The German Government reserve the right, in the event of a situation arising, which in their opinion, makes it necessary for Germany to avail herself of her right to a percentage of submarine tonnage exceeding the 45 per cent. above mentioned, to give notice this effect to His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom, and agree that the matter shall be the subject of friendly discussion before the German Government exercise that right."

should have been a real tip off that the Germans were planing a submarine campaign in the future and even a very fuzzy crystal ball would give the answer that it would be the British that such a campaign would be directed against. There simply being no other logical target. France being nowhere near as dependent on imported food/raw materials. It shouldn't take the sharpest knife in the drawer to figure out that the Germans were claiming the right to build submarine tonnage equal to what Australia and Canada were building (in addition to Great Britain) but the German tonnage would be concentrated in European waters (or North Atlantic) 

I am not advocating the enlargement of Coastal Command (more squadrons) so much as the replacement of aircraft/weapons that had more capability. 
10 squadrons of Ansons which had neither the bomb lifting capability to carry effective weapons or the range to patrol areas of vital interest to the British forces like the Shetlands-Norway gap should have been seen as a _very poor _bargain even in 1935/36. 
If they had tested the 100lb A/S bomb in 1934-36 they would have realized the Anson needed to carry 500lbs (or more) instead of 200lbs of A/S weapons and planned accordingly. 

As it was not only did CC go to war to too few aircraft and aircraft that were substandard but the weapons they carried took until 1942 or so to sort out. (improve size of charges, improve explosives used, improve drop envelopes) which needed to be done regardless of what improvements were made to detection gear.


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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

stona said:


> Coastal Area, and its successor organisation, existed as a Fleet support body. After the Admiralty took over responsibility for the Fleet Air Arm in 1937, the maritime branch of the RAF became an orphan child, all but losing its raison d'etre. It was lucky to survive at all.
> *Nobody had any idea what Coastal Command's role was to be in a war* and without such plans operational requirements could not be established. It's why the Command was in the state it was in 1939, and nothing but a fundamental change in priorities, years earlier, could have changed this.



If nobody had any idea what coastal commands role was to be in war then everybody making the decisions in the 1930s had flunked WW I history in stunning fashion. 
How many squadrons of flying boats and shore based aircraft had been flying anti-sub patrols in 1917-18? 
What was going to substitute for them in a future war? 

as an example the *US Navy* claimed in WW I 
"The first recorded attack on an enemy submarine by a U.S. Naval Aviator was made by Ens. John F. McNamara on March 25, 1918, while serving at the Royal Navy Air Station, Portland, England. During the Great War the US Naval Air Force, Foreign Service, executed 30 attacks against enemy submarines, of which ten were considered to have been at least partially successful; it dropped 100 tons of high explosives on enemy objectives, and it had to its credit a total of 22,000 flights in the course of which it patrolled more than 800,000 nautical miles of submarine-infested areas."

One wonders what the British numbers were like????

and less than 20 years later (or even 15) *nobody had any idea????*

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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

I would note there is a book on the RN aircraft in WW I but the price is a bit steep.






about $42.00 in paper back and $44.00 for an electronic edition. 

256 pages.


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## EKB (Dec 30, 2017)

Studies done 25 years ago showed that Coastal Command got far better results for sinking ships by dropping mines into the sea. 
Direct attacks on ships had been more expensive and less productive.


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## pbehn (Dec 30, 2017)

With many things on all sides at the outbreak of war it was amazing what hadn't been considered. Did anyone seriously "wargame" what would happen to Wellingtons and Hampdens if attacked by single engine fighters in daylight. Did anyone test out Defiants against SE fighters?

The UK had submarines in the 1930s and had seen how dangerous they were in WW1, to not properly research how to deal with what you yourself have is an oversight bordering on stupidity. As for solutions more priority for Sunderlands and a land based version like a B24 instead of Stirling bombers?


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## pbehn (Dec 30, 2017)

EKB said:


> Studies done 25 years ago showed that Coastal Command got far better results for sinking ships by dropping mines into the sea.
> Direct attacks on ships had been more expensive and less productive.


But if you drop mines in the open sea they act at random and the Allies had more ships in the Atlantic than the Axis.


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## Shortround6 (Dec 30, 2017)

Coastal Command had several responsibilities.
1 was the anti-sub effort.
2. was the support of the Navy in areas near Britain, as in reconnaissance and strike efforts.
3. would be the interdiction of enemy shipping in areas neat Britain.

Mining is not a simple as it seems. To get the best effect you cannot just randomly drop mines in enemy waters. You have to put them into areas where there are a high number of enemy ships passing through. You can "maximise" the effect of your mines by putting them in choke points and using the threat of bomb, torpedo, rocket, gun strike missions to help "herd" the enemy ships into those choke areas. 

Mine entrances to harbors and coastal areas and attack ships/convoys in more open waters so the enemy stays closer to shore where the mines are. 
For instance mine the area of the Dutch/German coast behind the row of barrier Islands and attack the convoys that try to sail outside, and or mine passages between some of the islands.


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## Graeme (Dec 31, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> If nobody had any idea what coastal commands role was to be in war then everybody making the decisions in the 1930s had flunked WW I history in stunning fashion.



A sentiment shared by John Terraine in his book "The Right of the Line".

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## Graeme (Dec 31, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> If they had built even 12-20 of the 100lb anti-sub bombs at some point in 1934/35 and tested them against a mock-up hull or scrapyard bound ex-WWI sub the failings of the 100lb would have been found out and a larger more effective weapon could have been built, however a larger, heavier bomb means the Anson, as built, can't carry them. You either need a bigger plane or an Anson with bigger engines and better propellers.



Terraine again - on the ineffectiveness of the 100 - pounder...

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## Airframes (Dec 31, 2017)

Heck, had it been a 200 lb bomb, the six light bulbs might have been broken !


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## stona (Dec 31, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> If nobody had any idea what coastal commands role was to be in war then everybody making the decisions in the 1930s had flunked WW I history in stunning fashion.
> How many squadrons of flying boats and shore based aircraft had been flying anti-sub patrols in 1917-18?
> What was going to substitute for them in a future war?



Almost all the lessons learned by the RNAS in four years of operations were either willfully or woefully lost when that service ceased to exist on amalgamation with the RFC. It was the RFC that completely dominated the newly formed RAF. The RAF/Air Ministry had no clear idea what role shore based maritime aviation would have in a future war, everything was dominated by a concentration on strategic bombing.

In 1937 the Admiralty, as part of its efforts to regain control of shore based maritime aviation, relieving the RAF of Coastal Command, argued that the role of the Command should be "North Sea reconnaissance and trade defence", which required careful coordination with the RN's surface forces. It argued that air operations over sea were essentially naval in character. "The methods employed in air attack and defence at sea are the universal naval methods which differ fundamentally for those overland."
The Admiralty was correct, but nobody at the Air Ministry was listening. The Air Ministry simply pointed out that shore based units were not provided exclusively for naval work. This was accepted by Inskip, Coastal Command remained an orphan child of the Navy, in the hands of the RAF. Furthermore, Inskip regarded the Air Ministry, not the Admiralty, as the "central authority for developing air power". The Admiralty did get the FAA, swayed by the Admiralty argument that the FAA's pilot environment was entirely naval and that it made sense that jurisdiction be passed to the Navy.

It is difficult to overestimate the malign influence of this inter Service rivalry. Between July 1937 and September 1939 Coastal Command and the FAA undertook just two combined exercises. In 1936 the RAF was restructured into the Commands that we are all familiar with (Fighter, Bomber, Coastal and Training) but it wasn't until 1938, as war loomed, and at the suggestion of the AOC Coastal Command (Joubert), that an Area Combined Headquarters was established in each Group to coordinate the efforts of the RAF's maritime squadrons and the RN's vessels. At an operational level there was subsequently cooperation between the two services just as war began. This is in stark contrast to the situation existing between the Admiralty and the Air Ministry where there was virtually no cooperation, all the lessons learned by naval airmen in the First World War would be re-learned at great expense by the airmen of the RAF in the Second World War.

Cheers

Steve

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## Shortround6 (Dec 31, 2017)

Thank you. 

What could have been changed, and when, to make CC more effective in the first few years of the war and what knock on effect would this have had. 

We know they screwed up big time. But without fantasy aircraft and weapons (Lancasters using sonobuoys and air dropped homing torpedoes in 1939 

what could have been done? 

Somebody in the Air Ministry seemed to think that something should be done because they issued the Air MInistry Specification R.1/36 for a monoplane flying boat to replace the Biplane flying boats, unfortunately this resulted in the Saro Lerwick which was one of the few planes that could make a Botha look good. 





In my opinion the big 4 engine aircraft aren't needed in 1939-40 because the mid-atlantic gap didn't exist yet. The Germans still had easy pickings closer to the British Isles and they really didn't have that many subs that could operate effectively in the mid-Atlantic, especially from bases in Germany, Fall of France obviously changes things, as does the introduction of U-boats with bigger fuel tanks and additional spare torpedoes. But the Germans ability to operate in the mid-Atlantic in numbers is 1 to 2 years away in 1939.


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## swampyankee (Dec 31, 2017)

One rather obvious thing would have been to use bombers -- real bombers, even if obsolete for strategic bombing -- in place of the Ansons, which were basically trainers. Even the Vickers Wellesley or Handley-Page Heyford would have been a better choice than the Anson -- at least they could carry a significant warload.


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## Shortround6 (Dec 31, 2017)

What seems to have been a major disconnect or oversight is that any plane intended for long over water flights _should _have been able to keep flying on one engine (or land in water). 
This lets out the Wellesley and the Battle, engine failure pretty much meaning loss of crew. Unfortunately all too many of the British twins were under powered and could NOT keep flying on one engine even at low altitudes except in unusual circumstances. The lack of feathering propellers tipped the scale on some aircraft from staying in the air at low altitude to ditching. 

The Lerwick in the photo above not only could not maintain height on one engine, it couldn't even fly in a straight line with one engine out. And several were lost when a wing float parted company with the plane on landing causing the plane to flip over so it's ability to land with one engine out is suspect. 

It shouldn't take any more (or many more) ground personnel (Erks) to take care of satisfactory aircraft than the unsatisfactory ones so low purchase price tends to blur into ongoing operational costs over time.

Going back to WW I they used a lot of single engine float planes because of their ability to at least attempt to land on water if an engine failure should occur, which they did all too often in WW I but it seems this lesson was forgotten also.


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## swampyankee (Dec 31, 2017)

Shortround6 said:


> What seems to have been a major disconnect or oversight is that any plane intended for long over water flights _should _have been able to keep flying on one engine (or land in water).
> This lets out the Wellesley and the Battle, engine failure pretty much meaning loss of crew. Unfortunately all too many of the British twins were under powered and could NOT keep flying on one engine even at low altitudes except in unusual circumstances. The lack of feathering propellers tipped the scale on some aircraft from staying in the air at low altitude to ditching.
> 
> The Lerwick in the photo above not only could not maintain height on one engine, it couldn't even fly in a straight line with one engine out. And several were lost when a wing float parted company with the plane on landing causing the plane to flip over so it's ability to land with one engine out is suspect.
> ...




If a two-engined aircraft doesn't have enough power to maintain altitude on one engine _and the range to get to a safe landing site_, the only benefit to that second engine is that there's a longer period of time before the crash, but, overall, it's arguably worse than a single, as a twin-engined aircraft has twice the chance of engine failure. The Anson's twin engines may have provided some operational safety, but the aircraft was basically a trainer with a trivial warload.


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## ChrisMcD (Dec 31, 2017)

What about the Lockheed Hudson?

Clearly someone realised the Anson was not up to the job and that there was nothing else available in the UK.

Lockheed Hudson - Wikipedia

In all fairness it was ordered in time for 78 to be in service in September 1939 and it did a creditable job - not the least of which was to ensure that Lockheed was a rapidly expanding company in time for WWII!


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## Shortround6 (Dec 31, 2017)

Something like the Hudson is what the British should have been building in 1937,





Bombing up a Hudson of No 224 squadron. First to be equipped with Hudsons.

It took almost a year to get 5 squadrons operational with Hudsons. Completed aircraft at Lockheed's factory being weeks, if not months away from operational use. Not all Hudson's went to CC even in the first year of the war. Some also went to both the RCAF and the RAAF.


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## stona (Jan 1, 2018)

At the beginning of the war Coastal Command received the lowest of all priorities. Even Beaverbrook wanted to sever it completely from the RAF and dump it on the Navy.
The Command's role was largely limited to reconnaissance for the Navy (as in the Norwegian campaign) and anti-invasion duties. Unsurprisingly, from June 1940 Britain's air defences took priority over all else, even within the Air Ministry, where the building up of Bomber Command was always a major pre-occupation.

Incidentally one Hudson squadron was involved in reconnaissance, performing 'line patrols' between the Shetlands and the Norwegian coast just above Stadlandet down to a line extended out into the North Sea from the Tyne. The other five General Reconnaissance squadrons comprise Ansons which couldn't make the Norwegian coast, the last 60 miles was supposed to be covered by RN submarines.

As far as obtaining aircraft, Coastal Command asked for Blenheim IVs in September 1939. Unfortinately the Air Ministry had other aircraft in mind, the Botha and Beaufort. These were to replace the aircraft operated by the two Vildebeest squadons (an aircraft ACM Bowhill describes as "of such limited range and performance as to make them of very little value for the purpose for which they were designed".).
Trials with Nos. 22 and 608 Squadrons soon showed that both the Beaufort and Botha were, in their existing forms, unsuitable. It wasn't until late the following year (1940) that an 'up-engined' Beaufort, emerged. Until then operational restrictions limited sorties to UK coastal waters and torpedo training. The Botha was simply a disaster.

By 1941 Coastal Command did have it's Blenheims, more Hudsons, and was prising some Hampden's from Bomber Command's grasp. By mid 1941 Joubert was competing with Bomber Command for so called 'very long range' aircraft to close the Atlantic Gap. The B-17 and B-24 seemed up for grabs. Liberators with ASV equipment were promised in June 1941, but didn't arrive until July 1942!

Given that two years into the war Coastal Command was still receiving obsolescent aircraft from Bomber Command and having to fight for the types it had needed since 1939 it is hard to see what could have been done to ameliorate the situation.

Cheers

Steve


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## swampyankee (Jan 1, 2018)

stona said:


> At the beginning of the war Coastal Command received the lowest of all priorities. Even Beaverbrook wanted to sever it completely from the RAF and dump it on the Navy.
> The Command's role was largely limited to reconnaissance for the Navy (as in the Norwegian campaign) and anti-invasion duties. Unsurprisingly, from June 1940 Britain's air defences took priority over all else, even within the Air Ministry, where the building up of Bomber Command was always a major pre-occupation.
> 
> Incidentally one Hudson squadron was involved in reconnaissance, performing 'line patrols' between the Shetlands and the Norwegian coast just above Stadlandet down to a line extended out into the North Sea from the Tyne. The other five General Reconnaissance squadrons comprise Ansons which couldn't make the Norwegian coast, the last 60 miles was supposed to be covered by RN submarines.
> ...



This sounds less like a funding issue than a political issue: Coastal Command may have been seen as "too defensive" or "not strategic bombing enough" for both the politicians -- including Churchill -- and the Air Marshalls, like Trenchard. Considering the sheer amount of material that can be brought in by ship -- one ship sunk on in one of the Atlantic convoys carried three weeks of sugar for all of Great Britain -- one does wonder, in retrospect, "What were they thinking?"


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## Shortround6 (Jan 1, 2018)

One does wonder what they were thinking.

Looking at the 1935 treaty it seems rather obvious that the Germans still believed in the submarine and were willing to sacrifice surface ships to get them.

Even if they built submarines up to the 100% limit of British submarines every ton of submarine construction had to come out of the 35% total. Which might mean the German surface fleet (if they kept their word) could be under 30% of the British surface fleet.

Despite the experiences of WW I it seems few, if any, of the decision makers in the mid to late 30s and even 1940 had any real idea of how submarine warfare really worked. Harris criticized the use of aircraft to go swanning about all over the ocean looking for subs, yet that is precisely what some naval commanders not only wanted to do but did do with expensive ships with large crews burning oil fuel by the hundreds of tons per day. (and lost the Courageous in the process).
A sub that is sitting in the middle of ocean a hundred miles from a merchant ship or convoy is no more effective than one in port.
A convoy not only limits the chances of a sub finding a target it brings the sub to where the escorts are. The sub has to try to sneak past the escorts instead of escorts/anti sub ships roaming the ocean. You are bringing the subs to where you can concentrate your ani-sub ships and your aircraft.

as far as aircraft flying patrols (swanning about the ocean) the early subs in WW II had somewhat limited range. Most of the Type IIs were lucky they could go 2000 miles and the first ten type VIIs were good for 6500 miles. What is more important was the amount of food/water they had. Every day spent under water and running on batteries was a day they weren't able to effectively search for targets and a day closer to when they had to turn around and head for home. a day spent at 4 kts instead of ten needs the same amount of food/water for the crew.
This "endurance" problem was, or should have been known to military planners ( who had been working out such things as the amount of feed needed for horses since the 1700s, or the amount of food and water on sailing ships).

I tried to point a few moments in time or a few factors that might have changed the historical flow. Like the 100lb anti sub bomb. The sooner it was realized that it wasn't even close to an effective weapon the sooner a substitute could have been worked on and the sooner an "operational requirement" formulated for an airplane to carry at least a pair of the more effective weapon. Like a 660lb weapons load instead of 360lbs.

Making a requirement that a twin engine aircraft had to be able to stay in air on one engine (even if at 1000ft).

It would also help, if once the _plans_ shifted to monoplanes, they actually tested and developed weapons that could be dropped at monoplane speeds and altitudes. There was a months if not year gap between issuing monoplanes and development and issue of weapons that could be dropped at over 100kts and 100ft. One book claims Beauforts in 1940 could not use torpedoes because the higher speed of the Beaufort caused the torpedo to malfunction when dropped (a big reason for that tail and perhaps a forward shroud). Please note that most(all) photos of the pre war biplanes the torpedoes do not have to break away tail structures. They didn't need them at the speeds altitudes they dropped from.
This incompatibility is also surprising given the requirements for big bombers to carry torpedoes although one shudders at the thought of an Avro Manchester trying to fly at 100ft off the water and under 100kts into anti aircraft fire. 

None of this requires engines that didn't exist at the time or fuel that didn't exist or radar/sensors that didn't exist. It just requires a few people to lokkback at WW I and see what worked and what didn't and go from there. Add in some minimal testing of the weapons you plan to use instead of living in LA-LA land that some tiny bomb that was 44% the size of the most common light case bomb used in WW I was actually going to work. They had over ten years to figure that one out.

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## swampyankee (Jan 1, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> One does wonder what they were thinking.
> 
> Looking at the 1935 treaty it seems rather obvious that the Germans still believed in the submarine and were willing to sacrifice surface ships to get them.
> 
> ...




I think a very basic problem -- and this may have been worse in the British Armed Forces than in others -- is that many people in the armed forces were very averse to change and unwilling to listen to those geeks with glasses who ... etc.; in other words, their opinions were stronger than their belief in evidence.


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## EKB (Jan 1, 2018)

I should clarify that the survey of Coastal Command operations focused on merchant vessels not submarines, and economic warfare against the shipping routes of high grade iron ore going from Scandinavia to Germany. 

Aerial mine-laying could be done at night, with a much lower risk to aircraft and crew. And it was not necessary to use high-performance machinery for this sort of tasking.

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## Shortround6 (Jan 2, 2018)

While mining was very useful/productive it had to wait for both suitable mines to be developed and the aircraft to carry them.

Most of the mines dropped from aircraft By the British in WW II being of 1000lbs weight or more and due to their bulk often needed larger size bomb carriers. The ground mines MK I, II, III, and versions of them going around 1500lbs or better and originally designed to fit the dropping gearof the MK XI 18 in torpedo. The MK III** was dropped from Mosquitoes but was hung from the 4000lb bomb gear. 

There was a 1000lb air dropped moored mine but it was little used, minimum depth was 60ft and with a 100lb charge it may not have been very effective against large ships. 
There were some very small mines for rivers and estuaries. Most of theses seem to have been built during 1940. Possibly for use against operation Sea Lion? 

CC had a rather distinct lack of aircraft in 1939-40 capable of carrying a 1000lb store let alone a 1500lb one. 
only choice was the Vildebeest and perhaps the Sunderland. 





Sunderland could carry the weight but the bomb racks retracted into the fuselage and the size of the hatch could restrict the size of the stores used. 
Short range mining operation _might _be done with racks outside but loading the racks might be difficult and take-offs might require calm seas.

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## stona (Jan 2, 2018)

The first order for 30 aircraft dropped, trial, magnetic mines was placed by the Admiralty in July 1939, just two months before the outbreak of war.

What the trials showed was that neither the Beaufort, ear marked as a mine layer by Coastal Command, nor the Fleet Air Arm's Swordfish and Albacores had the range to reach ANY of the areas selected for mine laying.
This was the reason that it was decided to give the Hampden a mine laying capability. The mine needed extensive modification due to the increased speed and height from which the Hampden would drop the device. A nose fairing and a drogue parachute were fitted.

The trial program ended in March 1940 and production models of the modified mine, designated A Mk I became available in April 1940. It weighed a nominal 1,500 lbs.

The first British aerial mine laying operation of the war took place on 13/14 April 1940 when Hampden's of 5 Group *Bomber Command* laid 14 mines off the Danish coast. The Luftwaffe had eaten the RAF by five months.

By June the Germans occupied 1,600 miles of coast and inland waterways stretching from Northern Norway down to the Franco-Spanish border. Now there were areas within range of Coastal Command aircraft would mine relatively close to home, Bomber Command in the western Baltic, Kattegat, the Great and Little Belts, Kiel Bay and the approaches to the Elbe.

The saga of the anti submarine bomb!
There were three anti-submarine (AS) bombs available at the beginning of the war, 100lb, 250lb and 500lb. By 1940 all were Mk IVs, with a solid nose and clip on tail. The solid nose and deletion of the nose fuse was because in 1934 trials the nose fuse was shown to effect the underwater trajectory of the bomb in an unpredictable fashion. The design was of 1926 vintage. No trials were undertaken to determine the thickness of case needed to withstand impact with the water, it was arbitrarily decided to have a charge to weight ratio a little over 50%. They were very unreliable, suffering a 40% failure rate (in the No. 30 tail pistol) in trials, largely due to difficulty in guaranteeing detonation at a depth of 20-25 feet, that considered optimal for attacking a surfaced submarine.
These bombs were not completely ineffective, but the failures did far outweigh the successes. In 1939 Coastal Command aircraft spotted 57 U boats, attacked 40, but damaged only 8. Nonetheless, in the early days;
Two 100lb AS bombs, dropped from a Swordfish, sank U-64 in Herjangs Fjord (near Narvik) on 13th April 1940
U-55 and U-26 were both sunk or 'encouraged to scuttle' with the help of 250lb and 100lb AS bombs dropped by Sunderlands of Nos 228 and 10 Squadrons respectively, in January and July 1940.
U-46 was seriously damaged by four 100lb bombs whilst in Norwegian waters in November 1940.

Eventually, given the shortcomings of the AS range of bombs, they were replaced by air dropped depth charges, starting with an adapted version of the 300lb naval Mk VII depth charge. The first live one was dropped from a Sunderland, off the Isle of Wight, in April 1940. Many improvements and different versions followed, but not here!

Cheers

Steve

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## fastmongrel (Jan 2, 2018)

Nice info Stona. Do you know how the No30 fuse worked I always assumed the Anti Sub bombs were impact fused but obviously if they were expected to explode at 25 feet thats not the case. Was it a delay fuse activated by the deceleration when the bomb hit the water.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 2, 2018)

Thank you!

Effective as mines turned out to be the situation in 1935-39 was not conducive to a mine strategy. _Without hindsight _the distances needed to be flown to place mines in German waters would have to be flown by medium bombers. Once the Germans took Belgium, Holland and France distances were much shorter but this could not be foreseen in the late 30s.
It was just over 300 miles from Hull to Emden and a slight dog leg is needed to avoid flying over Dutch Airspace. 

Moored mines are not very efficient from an air drop point of view. You are lugging hundreds of pounds of anchor/mooring point and steel cable for each package of explosive and moored mines tend to often be too deep to be effective or too shallow which exposes them at low tide.


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## parsifal (Jan 2, 2018)

The early battles with the Uboats occurred within about 100 miles of the British coastline, so the need for a long range aircraft was not necessary in the early stages. There were glaring weaknesses in the make up of CC that needed to be addressed before anything useful could be accomplished. these included


Re-learning basic patrol procedures, to provide scouting capabilities for convoys so that they could be re-routed to avoid wolfpacks.
Development of an effective airborne ASW weapon
Development of functioning ASV radar
numbers, numbers, numbers
Types were adequate at the beginning of the war, and were able to drive the uboats away from the coastal areas within 6 months, along with a veritable armada of light forces. but the Uboats with constantly increasing operational ranges and the capture of French Atlantic ports, simply moved to their favourite klling area, now known as the Atlantic gap.
Development of high performance interdiction forces, built around Mosquito and Beafighter squadrons mostly to interdict the movement of U-boats in the Biscay area. not that many U-boats were sunk in these attacks but many were damaged, or otherwise interdicted so as to reduce their times on station.

It would take another 15 months to make any real progress in this zone (ie the mid atlantic), and required LR and VLR aircraft to do the job. There was a ready supply of aircraft and crews available, but controlled by BC, who were obstinate, stupid, and voracious in their refusal to hand over anything like an adequate number of aircraft for long range maritime patrol. I am convinced that BC were prepared to lose the war if necessary to prove their point that Germany could be defeated by direct air attack alone. as I said, it was a stupid, obstinate and short sighted policy, that for a very long time was supported by Churchill. Only just in time for the return to the mid Atlantic gap in 1943 were sufficient resources of VLR aircraft diverted to support Atlantic Command.


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## Graeme (Jan 2, 2018)

stona said:


> These bombs were not completely ineffective, but the failures did far outweigh the successes.



I've read the 100-pounder was considered to be...
_*
"probably ineffective, even with a direct hit, that the 250-pounder would have to explode within six feet of the pressure hull to do serious damage, and the 500-pounder at about eight feet".*_

Another problem was flying low to hit their elusive targets proved to be dangerous to themselves and the enemy. At least one Anson and two Fleet Air Arm Skuas were destroyed by their own bombs in September 1939 alone.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 2, 2018)

I would disagree your points 3 and 5. at least partially.

The Anson was far from an an adequate type and it was armed with a far from satisfactory weapon. 

As Stona has told us the aircraft did spot 57 U-boats in 1939 alone (4 months) which isn't too bad considering the Germans probably didn't have more than 20 in operatianal areas at any one time. Radar would obviously improve things but the 20% damage record (8 damaged out of 40 attacks) doesn't look to good. 
A plane with load of 1000lbs (four 250lb weapons?) might have been much more effective or even two 250lb weapons? 
It might have converted a few more those "damaged" to kills and few more failed attacks to a least damaged. A damaged sub in German yards (not French) is out of action for at least a week if not more (3-4 days each way around Scotland minimum?) 

The Anson used a crew of 3-4 men and needed almost as many mechanic, fitters, armament specialists, and so on as Blenheims or Hudsons. 
For ten squadrons to be equipped with such a marginal plane borders on criminal. 
And with an endurance of only about 4 hours (or less) it's ability to patrol at any distance was limited and even close patrols needed a fair number of aircraft per day. 
A Blenheim looks like a super plane compared to the Anson. 
Lets remember that a DC-2 finished 2nd and Boeing 247 finished 3rd in the 1934 London to Melbourne air race so a decent all metal aircraft was far from out of the ordinary in 1937-38. 

Using a low powered trainer as a reconnaissance plane was false economy. Simply replacing 6-8 squadrons of Ansons with more capable planes requires little more man power but could, if given a better bomb than the 100lb, a much better chance of success. Replacing the biplane flying boats with something equal to even an early Catalina also expands CC _ability _without increasing man power. 

the advantage is not only few more U-boats damaged/sunk but more merchantmen NOT sunk in 1939/early 1940. Which means the Germans are getting less results for the effort.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 2, 2018)

Had testing and development received higher priority in the mid to late 30s (1939 is a bit too late) then perhaps a decent 250-300lb weapon could have been designed.
However it also needed to be able to be dropped at monoplane speeds and monoplane atitudes. Unfortunately this was not the case and the speed and altitude requirements were slow and low meaning the dropping aircraft was still close. They also found the bigger bombs were going too deep to really hurt a surfaced or sub in process of diving. 

A faster approach might also result in a few more attacks for the same number of sightings (or more successful attacks?) by giving the sub less time to dive and evade. Plane can cover a greater distance in the same amount of time.

Ansons cruised at 140-145mph at low altitude (max speed at sea level was 170mph) and the biplanes were even slower. 

It took until 1941 for them to design a 250lb depth charge (as opposed to the 250lb anti sub bomb) which weighed 246lbs and had a charge weight of 170lbs (and this was soon considered too small) that would fit the standard 250lb bomb rack/carriers. 

Had they started the war with such a weapon, even if filled with TNT and not Amatol, a t least a few attacks would have been more effective. 

Later depth charges had flat or concave noses to reduce the tendency to ricochet (bounce), something else than might have been found with testing. 
The MK XI depth charge first introduced in 1942 later achieved a drop envelope of 1250ft and 250kts. 

It wasn't just radar that improved the kills, it was better weapons (later production of these depth charges used torpex fillers.) that helped turn contacts/sightings into successful attacks.


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## parsifal (Jan 2, 2018)

All CC had to do was find and report U-Boats in 1939-40. Sinking uboats was an added bonus, but not an absolutely necessary capability, whilst ever the battle was being fought in Coastal waters. that part of the battle can be broken into two sub-parts. firstly the battle around the inshore areas, including the north sea. initially the u-Boats (and indeed the KM surface units), were able to operate with a fair degree of impunity. but as the coastal forces were built up and organised, and began to work in concert with these early short range coastal aircraft, things began to change. The early aircraft types used, like the Walrus and the Anson, were the best things to use in this role. They were available,and they were cheap. they had a high serviceability rate because of their simplicity. introducing a new type, just as the battle for the inshore areas was getting underway was absolutely the wrong thing to do. Adopting more complex, less familiar types at this time unquestionably in my mind would have been a grave mistake.

The second phase of this early part of the battle, began about February 1940. most u-Boats were being pushed back out to sea, as a result of the large numbers of Coastal escorts, but importantly assisted by the Ansons (and similar aircraft) that were now able to complete one of the functions of CC ....coastal search, very efficiently. When the u-Boats moved further offshore, one of the things they did was expose the limitations of these early types. It was necessary to retain the Anson type forces, for the continued domination of the coastal waters, but also now add medium range twin engine bombers like the Blenheim, the Whitley and the PBY so that the waters now referred to as the western and north western approaches could be similarly covered. It took time to get this force organised, mostly because of the intransigence of BC. Losses began to climb again, But the real spike in losses occurred after the fall of France.. The RN was caught badly short of long range escorts that could operate to the MOMP (its standard fleet DDs did not have the range at that time for escort to the MOMP, though this did change with the development of Iceland), but just as badly, lacked the long range VLR aircraft to provide search capabilities. For the RN it became an undefended wilderness, both in terms of surface escorts, and also a/c. The SR coastal escorts and patrol aircraft....the ansons, were not responsible for this failure, but were still just as essential as they were in 1939 for the defence of coastal waters. what was missing from the force structure was the result of years of neglect, and near suicidal pre-occupations of a sister command, as they soaked up massive resources, and then refused to share them, or allocate them where they were most needed.

The question posed initially, was how to field a better CC. the automatic assumption is that the s/r coastal forces could be somehow passed over so that the later more deadly battle fought in the mid Atlantic could be fought more effectively. that is a wrong assertion, however. The battle of the coastal waters was actually more vital than the one fought later. It still needed aircraft, and the anson was more than adequate for that role. At the beginning training was so poor, and numbers so few that it took a while to get organised but organised it got.

The debacle in the mid Atlantic had nothing to do with that early fighting. It had everything to do with bad choices made by the RN and the RAF in the interwar ears, and during the early phases of the war.


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## stona (Jan 3, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> The Anson used a crew of 3-4 men and needed almost as many mechanic, fitters, armament specialists, and so on as Blenheims or Hudsons.
> For ten squadrons to be equipped with such a marginal plane borders on criminal.
> A Blenheim looks like a super plane compared to the Anson.



This is something calculated as the Load/Personnel factor. Generally heavier aircraft carry a heavier load, but the requirement of large numbers of personnel to operate them lowers the factor, below that of smaller aircraft.
For example, from the Desert Air Force:

Mustang (at 2,000lbs per aircraft) on three squadron missions per day = 54,000 lbs.
Total personnel required = 243. L/P Factor 297

Marauder (at 4,000lbs per aircraft) on two squadron missions per day = 96,000 lbs
Total personnel required = 521. L/P factor 184

You can argue that the Desert Air Force got more 'bang for its buck' from the fighter bomber than from the medium bomber, when engaged in similar missions.

I don't have figures for the Anson, but they are not going to be great, particularly given it's large crew and light load (I imagine the numbers needed to maintain it and operate it on the ground would be similar to the Blenheim)!



fastmongrel said:


> Nice info Stona. Do you know how the No30 fuse worked I always assumed the Anti Sub bombs were impact fused but obviously if they were expected to explode at 25 feet thats not the case. Was it a delay fuse activated by the deceleration when the bomb hit the water.



I believe the No.30 was a pistol/detonator combination which allowed for a delay calculated to explode the bomb at about 25 feet below the surface. It wasn't a hydrostatic fuse and it wasn't instantaneous. A No.28 pistol was to be substituted when this bomb was used for 'land bombardment'.





The main filling on the Mk IV was either 45 lb of RDX/TNT at 60/40 or 44 lb TNT.




Graeme said:


> Another problem was flying low to hit their elusive targets proved to be dangerous to themselves and the enemy. At least one Anson and two Fleet Air Arm Skuas were destroyed by their own bombs in September 1939 alone.



The two Skuas were from 803 Squadron Fleet Air Arm, operating from _Ark Royal._ The boat they attacked was the U-30 of none other than Fritz-Julius Lemp which had just sunk the first ship of the war, the _Athenia._ Some reports say that they were shot down, but in fact their bombs skipped off the water, exploding under their aircraft, damaging both so that they were forced to ditch alongside their intended victim, which was undamaged. Kapitan Lemp took the airmen as prisoners and continued on his way. U-30 survived the war and was eventually scuttled at Flensburg in 1945. She had a long career, having been launched on 4th August and commissioned on 8th October *1936.*

The Anson you mention is an even sorrier case. This time it was the RAF which came to grief, the Anson was from 233 Squadron based at Leuchars. On the second day of the war this Anson attacked an 'enemy' submarine off the Scottish coast, only to be damaged by splinters from its own bombs. It nearly made it home, but was forced to ditch in St Andrews Bay. The shaken but unharmed crew of the submarine _Snapper_ were left wondering just who the enemy was at the beginning of the war 

Cheers

Steve


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## Shortround6 (Jan 3, 2018)

parsifal said:


> All CC had to do was find and report U-Boats in 1939-40. Sinking uboats was an added bonus, but not an absolutely necessary capability, whilst ever the battle was being fought in Coastal waters. that part of the battle can be broken into two sub-parts. firstly the battle around the inshore areas, including the north sea. initially the u-Boats (and indeed the KM surface units), were able to operate with a fair degree of impunity. but as the coastal forces were built up and organised, and began to work in concert with these early short range coastal aircraft, things began to change. The early aircraft types used, like the Walrus and the Anson, were the best things to use in this role. They were available,and they were cheap. they had a high serviceability rate because of their simplicity. introducing a new type, just as the battle for the inshore areas was getting underway was absolutely the wrong thing to do. Adopting more complex, less familiar types at this time unquestionably in my mind would have been a grave mistake.



The Blenheim IV was being introduced to it's first squadron in Jan 1939, 14 squadrons were equipped with it by the end of the year. 
5 squadrons of the RAF had received Blenheim Is by the end of 1937 (I don't know when they were declared operational), By Sept 1938 Blenheim Is had been delivered 16 home squadrons and one in Iraq. The Blenheim IV had been designed, in part, for overseas sales, and for the Canadian requirement for a coastal patrol aircraft. 
Giving roughly 1/2 of those MK IV Blenheims to Coastal Command (and few dozen MK Is for training of ground crew) would have allowed for a much improved capability and very few technical difficulties. 
I don't believe any Walruses were actually issued to Coastal Command, I am not saying that FAA squadrons didn't fly patrols with them, just that I have not seen (and could be wrong ) any sources that say a CC squadron was equipped with them. They were used (and very well) by air/sea rescue squadrons.
If pressed into anti-sub duty they were rated to carry SIX 100lb bombs or two 250lb bombs or two 250lb depth charges when they became available which obviously makes them a potentially more lethal opponent for the U-boat. They may very well have been used as anti sub aircraft in other areas than the British isles. 

Had the British actually tested the 100lb anti sub bomb and it's cousins the 250lb and 500lb AS bombs in 1935/36 they may have found out how bad they were and given up the idea than a plane with two of them was even remotely effective. Wither this calls for an Anson with bigger engines to carry a pair of bigger bombs or a different aircraft is speculation but that is one "turning point" or "AH HA" moment.

The 100lb anti sub bomb was first designed to have 52lbs of HE with a steel tail, the MK II with an aluminum tail had 62lbs of HE but by the time you get to the production version in 1938-39 the MK IV had 44lbs of TNT, other fillings did change the weight slightly. Unfortunately so much was already invested in the 100lb bomb (existing bomb racks/layouts and techniques?) that production continued well into 1942 and in order to give it a slightly better chance of success it had a priority for the use of tNT/cyclonite (RDX) explosives that lasted until near the end of 1942. Which menas other ordnance had to make do with less powerful explosives. 
The 250lb anti sub bomb carried 134lbs of explosive and the 250lb depth charge carried 170lbs and while thousands of those were dropped it was considered too small. 




> The question posed initially, was how to field a better CC. the automatic assumption is that the s/r coastal forces could be somehow passed over so that the later more deadly battle fought in the mid Atlantic could be fought more effectively. that is a wrong assertion, however. The battle of the coastal waters was actually more vital than the one fought later. It still needed aircraft, and the anson was more than adequate for that role. At the beginning training was so poor, and numbers so few that it took a while to get organised but organised it got.
> 
> The debacle in the mid Atlantic had nothing to do with that early fighting. It had everything to do with bad choices made by the RN and the RAF in the interwar ears, and during the early phases of the war.



My interest is what could have been done to field a better CC in 1939-40. A better CC in that time period, should have, almost automatically, meant a better effort later on. And there are several possible knock on effects.

Every merchant ship saved in 1939-40 could make many more sailings in the years to come. According to U-Boat.net 728 ships were sunk or damaged in 1939-40 so saving just 10% would seem to be worthwhile. 

If the Germans suffer higher losses (even U-boats tied up in port repairing damage) and sink fewer ships at what point do they decide that their resources are better spent elsewhere?

You also have about year from the start of the war until the French bases start to become effective?? Not just refueling but with torpedo storage and repair facilities (with parts) for the U-boats?


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## stona (Jan 3, 2018)

The British were not slow off the mark in developing depth charges to be dropped by aircraft.

I already mentioned what became the 450lb DC, complete with Mk VII hydrostatic pistol. It contained 290 lb of Amatol. It was too large to be carried by the Anson or Hudson and too few could be carried by the Sunderland or Catalina flying boats. Nonetheless, with a modified pistol (Mk X) the device remained in service throughout the war.

The impetus for something smaller came from the Fleet Air Arm, desperate to replace the anti-submarine bombs currently being carried by its aircraft. The new air dropped depth charge was an entirely naval project, undertaken by the Admiralty's Superintendent of Mine Design. *This became the Depth Charge Type F, it weighed 246 lb and contained 170 lb of Amatol, and was available to both the FAA and RAF by November 1940.*
It was redesignated Depth Charge Mk VIII, but was better known as the 250 lb DC. Officially known as the MK VIII DC (250 lb) it was cleared for general operational use on 23rd January 1941. 

It was not perfect. At its lowest depth setting the pistol could detonate the device at a depth of 50 feet, double the optimal 25'. the 170 lb Torpex charge lacked sufficient punch even though it was 20% larger than that of the 250 lb AS bomb. These issues were solved by early 1942. Torpex was replaced by the 30% more powerful Amatol. The fuse was modified to work at a depth of 22 feet to 25 feet. Tail fittings were weakened to ensure a rapid breakaway on impact with the water and the nose was reshaped to concave to slow down the rate of sinking (not to prevent skipping off the surface). As a result of these improvements the depth charge was redesignated (again) as the Mk XI and the pistols to Mk XIV and Mk XVI. This was the version that remained almost unchanged from mid 1942, when it entered service, until the end of the war. It was on this version that production was concentrated.

Cheers

Steve

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## Shortround6 (Jan 3, 2018)

They were and they weren't. The converted surface ship depth charge was too large to be carried by just about any of the aircraft in CC service (and initially had some rather sever drop limits) Perhaps the biplane flying boats could carry one under each wing? Once the problem was identified (the anti-sub bombs weren't very good) they did move with good speed. 

Had they found out the 100lb bomb was pretty much a dud and the 250lb marginal back in 1935/36 perhaps they could have started development of the 250lb depth charge sooner and had it in service in 1939 or early 1940. Even if development of the better explosives doesn't advance as fast as development of the bomb casing/fuse. 
Having a weapon with about 4 times the explosive of the 100lb A/S bomb would have to have had some impact on damage/losses suffered by U-boats.

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## stona (Jan 3, 2018)

It's difficult to test these things on submarines. Obviously they did test drop them and sort some of the more obvious problems as best they could. It did take a long time, between 1924 and 1939!
In 1926 five 100 lb AS bombs had been dropped and four of them were rated as 'satisfactory' because they did not break up and did detonate below the surface. A sixth was detonated statically underwater and the fragmentation declared satisfactory. It was declared fit for service, in its MK I version, by 1928. 
The Mk II, with a lighter nose and tail (and therefore better CWR) was tested in 1930 and deemed satisfactory, based on the 1926 criteria.
The Mk III followed with a strengthened suspension lug, allowing the aircraft carrying the bomb to be catapulted from an aircraft carrier without fear of leaving the bomb behind.
It was only in 1934, following trials with the larger 250lb and 500lb versions that the need for an extensive redesign became evident. It took two years before the Mk IV range with a solid nose and tail fusing was developed.
When the entire range proved less effective than had been imagined the Coastal Command Staff at RAF Northwood did begin to seek an alternative. This led to the adaptation of naval depth charge into the Depth Charge 450 lb Bomb Mk VII, with an added nose and tail to make a depth charge vaguely bomb shaped, later designated the 450 lb Depth Charge (DC).

I've covered the almost parallel development of the 250 lb depth charge by the Admiralty already. Experiments were undertaken in 1942 using HMS Graph which essentially showed what everybody already knew, that a charge detonated below the hull was more effective than one above it. German boats, particularly the most numerous Type VIIs, proved to be very strong and robust, withstanding considerable damage.

The British may have taken some time to develop a really effective air dropped anti submarine weapon, but far more important were the other technical developments, like ASV radar, that could actually put an aircraft in a position to attack a boat, 24 hours a day in combination with a Leigh Light

It's only fair to mention that a 600 lb AS bomb was developed, but not much used, 97 were dropped on submarines and a few on the Tirpitz! A 35lb AS bomb was also developed. This used a shaped charge and was only supposed to explode on contact with the boat, not the water. This was not the case, only 96 were ever dropped operationally before it was discontinued.

Cheers

Steve

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## Shortround6 (Jan 3, 2018)

The British scrapped and broke up something like 24 submarines (mostly L class) between 1930 and 1937 (and few more in 1938-39) so there should have been some sort of test target/s available if wanted.


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## stona (Jan 4, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> The British scrapped and broke up something like 24 submarines (mostly L class) between 1930 and 1937 (and few more in 1938-39) so there should have been some sort of test target/s available if wanted.



It may be pertinent that when the Admiralty wanted to test its 250 lb depth charge HMS Graph was available to suffer the consequences, but that when the RAF wanted to test its AS bombs no submarine was available.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, it is impossible to overestimate the malign effect of inter service rivalry on maritime aviation in the inter-war period. The Admiralty scrapped submarines, not the 'British'.

Cheers

Steve


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## Shortround6 (Jan 4, 2018)

The Graph was not used as a test target until 1944, three years after her capture and rather late in the game to affect things one way or the other. 
However full scale models of her pressure hull had been built in 1942 and used for under water tests of shaped charge anti-sub bombs.

RAF, if they were serious, could have purchased either a hull or section/s of hull from the breakers (although the uproar in parliament might have been something to hear or built a mock-up/model. 

We know the reasons Coastal Command was so poorly equipped in 1939 but none of them are really good ones or ones that couldn't have been changed with a little less head in the sand mentality. 

They knew war with Germany was likely, they knew the Germans would probably use submarines in quantity (see 1935 treaty) and aside from Asdic, did very little to actually improve things from WW I and indeed, actually went backwards in some areas. 
Even the 100lb AS bomb wasn't placed in production and issued until 1939 so the scores of Ansons available to fly in 1937 and 1938 having little to drop except 20 and 40 lb fragmentation bombs and smoke floats/flares. 

Situation with torpedoes wasn't much better. You have told us how few there were available for CC but what was worse was that the ones available were only suitable for dropping by the Vildebeest or Swordfish. The Available torpedoes were supposed to be dropped at 100kts or under and from 100ft or under. The later wooden tails performed at least two functions. One was to act as an air brake to slow the torpedo from drop speed to water entry speed and the other was to try and insure a good entry angle to prevent/lessen damage to the torpedo. Of course the size of the tail made a joke of all the specifications calling for carrying torpedoes in inclosed bomb bays. 
Unfortunately the restricted drop envelope was still in force during the early days of the Beauforts use. With both the Beaufort and Botha in pipeline (hundreds ordered) it seems strange that little or no work was done to see if the existing design of torpedo would work at higher speeds. Or did they expect the twin engine monoplanes to slow down to 100 kts for the final approach and release of the torpedoes? 
Their own AA gunnery would stop enemy aircraft but enemy AA gunnery would not be able to stop planes flying at 100kts and 100ft?


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## stona (Jan 4, 2018)

There were plenty of 100 lb AS bombs available in 1939. A decision was taken to use only the Mk IV versions operationally and to keep the earlier suspect Marks as a war reserve against urgent contingency plans, pending a build up in numbers of the Mk IVs.
This was an operational decision, not a shortage per se.

During WW1 a bewildering variety of bombs were used against submarines, from 16 lb to 230 lb. By the time the RAF was formed in 1918 only two were specifically deployed for this purpose, the 230 lb and a new thin cased 520 lb RL.
The Admiralty agreed the need for two new anti submarine bombs of 250 lb and 500 lb in 1924, but contrary to Air Ministry requirements, amended its decision the following year, excluding the 250 lb version and substituting a 100 lb bomb.
The need to have two bomb sizes available provoked a conflict between the Admiralty and the Air Ministry/RAF as to what these should be. 
One had to be big enough to be dropped alongside a submarine with the expectation of a single bomb making a kill. Both services agreed that the 500 lb bomb would do this. Both services also recognised that hitting a small and elusive target from anything but suicidal heights might require that a stick of bombs be dropped. The question was which was the smallest bomb worth using. The Admiralty went for the 100 lb and the RAF the 250 lb bomb. This had little to do with any evidence or research and more to do with conjecture and with what their aircraft could actually carry.
A typical British compromise was struck and three bombs, 100 lb, 250 lb and 500 lb were all developed.

Anti submarine bombs were by no means the only inadequate air dropped ordnance with which Britain entered WW2. Bomber Command started the war with the inadequate (I'm being polite) 250 lb and 500 lb GP bombs and the even more useless 40 lb GP and 20 lb F bombs.

Cheers

Steve


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## Shortround6 (Jan 4, 2018)

I am not sure the the 40lb and 20lb bombs were useless, mis-applied perhaps 
As anti-personnel weapons for ground support they had some use or for bombing supply columns or vehicle parks.

For destroying buildings or ships they were not the best choice  

The British seem to have had a real thing about using cheap steel/iron in bombs and artillery shells. Which often lead to small HE payloads which, instead of being economical, required more bombs, shells to dropped/fired to get the same effect. The knock on effect from that is more aircraft/guns are needed to delivery the greater quantity of bombs/shells so the supposed economy of using the cheaper materials really goes south in a hurry. 

Getting back to the AS bombs some accounts claim the MK I and MK II were never put in production and so there was no reserve. One account (could very well be wrong) claims first production order placed in 1938 was for 50 bombs of each size. FIrst deliveries in 1939, how fast further orders were placed I have no idea and how fast further deliveries showed up after the initial ones is also unknown to me. 
I don't know when the change was made from the MK I and II to the MK IV. A lot could have happened in the 9 months from January of 1939 to Sept. Perhaps those first 50 100lb bombs were MK I/IIs and the MK IV was introduced during 1939?

Point is, according to some accounts (which could be wrong) The Ansons, which were the quick and dirty substitute, were essentially unarmed during 1937-38(Munich crisis) which also points to how screwed up things were.


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## stona (Jan 4, 2018)

Yes, the GP bombs mostly had a CWR of around 30%. The early 250lb version had a CWR of just 23%!

the 20 lb F anti-personnel bomb and the 40 lb GP bomb were results of a 1935 recommendation from the Aircraft Bomb Sub-Committee. They were to replace some of the old WW1 bombs. 
The 20 lb F replaced something called the 'Cooper Bomb' ( a 24lb fragmentation bomb of which just 4lb was HE, the other 20lb was cast iron and wood!). 
The 40 lb GP was a new bomb designed for use against 'vehicles, houses and aircraft on the ground'.

Cheers

Steve


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## nuuumannn (Jan 4, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> How many squadrons of flying boats and shore based aircraft had been flying anti-sub patrols in 1917-18?



It is worth noting the almost universal ignorance that everyone has for the use of aerial maritime patrol assets in the Great War, notably airships, which were quite effective in that role. By the end of the Great War the RAF, formerly RNAS had over 100 maritme patrol airships at air stations dotted up and down the United Kingdom. The non-rigid airship made an excellent maritime patrol asset for several reasons, they could carry a sizeable load across a great distance and had excellent endurance, they had sets of eyes in numbers and could be deployed from any sizeable field with personnel for mooring; aside from the main airship stations, there were satellite mooring-out stations to assist long patrols when crews couldn't make it home.

As for their effectivity, the use of maritime patrol is as much a deterrent to U-boat attack as much as brining about the destruction of enemy submarines. At the end of the war (WW1) it was officially claimed that no enemy attack was successful against vessels escorted by airships, not strictly true, as two freighters were torpedoed whilst under escort from airships near Cornwall, but that is a pretty good record considering that from 1915 to 1916 the RNAS began building up its maritime patrol airship fleet. The Germans dithering over whether they would launch a sustained campaign meant that U-boat successes until 1917 were not large by comparison to that year, which meant British maritime patrol assets were not as numerous in the first few years.

From 1917 and the declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare, sinkings trebled. By the end of 1917 a greater tonnage of Allied merchant ships had been sunk in the previous 12 months than during the previous three years of the war. This caused a boosting of funding and concentration of effort to produce anti submarine assets, including airships, - nearly 200 non-rigid airships served with the RNAS/RAF during the war. Oh yes, and submarines were sunk by airships during WW1. The U-boat UB 115 was sunk by the rigid airship R.29 with help from the destroyer HMS Ouse (which was the pattern of aerial attack to call in surface help once a submarine was spotted) in September 1918.

U-boats tended not to attack if there was an airship present and post-war research (carried out by a chappie I once knew called Patrick Abbott, who wrote an excellent little book on Britain's use of airships during the Great War) showed that German U-boat commanders typically abandoned attacking ships because aircraft posed a serious threat to their survival. Once they were spotted, they would dive, but because their sub-surface speed was low, they could be caught by surface vessels relatively easily. Best to remain invisible and slink away without making an attack, rather than make an attack and be caught and sunk.

It is interesting to note that the United States was the only country to use maritime patrol airships during WW2, retiring the last, in training use in 1961. As for the use of hydrogen, the British only lost a couple in lifting gas related accidents, employing strict handling procedures, which the Germans, who lost quite a few airships due to accidents with lifting gas, did not employ.

What did the RAF require on the eve of WW2? More of everything, basically. More aircraft with greater range and better sensors. I (vaguely) remember reading something that was said post war by the then head of CC stating that specifically two things that helped win the Battle of the Atlantic was the VLR Liberator and the cavity magnetron. Now, if only I can remember who said it.

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## stona (Jan 5, 2018)

nuuumannn said:


> I (vaguely) remember reading something that was said post war by the then head of CC stating that specifically two things that helped win the Battle of the Atlantic was the VLR Liberator and the cavity magnetron. Now, if only I can remember who said it.



I really hope it wasn't Sholto-Douglas  

More likely Slatter, who had a solid background in maritime aviation.

Cheers

Steve


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## Graeme (Jan 5, 2018)

stona said:


> The Anson you mention is an even sorrier case. This time it was the RAF which came to grief, the Anson was from 233 Squadron based at Leuchars. On the second day of the war this Anson attacked an 'enemy' submarine off the Scottish coast, only to be damaged by splinters from its own bombs. It nearly made it home, but was forced to ditch in St Andrews Bay. The shaken but unharmed crew of the submarine _Snapper_ were left wondering just who the enemy was at the beginning of the war



Thanks Steve. Obviously Dr Alfred Price has the wrong submarine here. Couldn't find anything about this on the Wiki HMS Seahorse entry.

HMS Seahorse (98S) - Wikipedia


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## Graeme (Jan 5, 2018)

Do we blame Churchill and Roosevelt?
The quote at the top is a calculation from Professor Patrick Blackett.
(Page 372 of Johnathan Dimbleby's book - The Battle of the Atlantic)


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## Graeme (Jan 5, 2018)

stona said:


> As a result of these improvements the depth charge was redesignated (again) as the Mk XI and the pistols to Mk XIV and Mk XVI. This was the version that remained almost unchanged from mid 1942, when it entered service, until the end of the war. It was on this version that production was concentrated.



The Mk XVI pistol. Not that I have one in the back shed - but where do ya adjust the depth setting?

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## stona (Jan 6, 2018)

I don't know, but step 3 "Screw in depth setting pillar...." should give a clue. I'm not sure which bit that is!

Cheers

Steve

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## nuuumannn (Jan 6, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> The Anson was far from an an adequate type and it was armed with a far from satisfactory weapon.



Yes, indeed, but let's put it into perspective. When the Anson I first entered service (early 1936), the Gloster Gauntlet biplane was the RAF's front line fighter. The Anson was a hangover from a previous era, and by the time WW2 kicked off, it was in service in numbers. Let's also not forget that the Short Sunderland was about as advanced as you could get in terms of maritime patrol asset when it entered service in 1938; four engined, all metal monoplane with internal weapon storage, possessing decent endurance and fitted with a range of modernities, such as variable pitch props and power operated gun turrets - no other such MP asset was so equipped in the world at that time. The Sunderland was the RAF's first modern four engined 'bomber'.

A lot happened technological advance wise in the couple of years prior to WW2 and the shortcomings of the RAF's approach to maritime patrol was only exposed due to the exigencies of war. There were few other countries in Europe, or indeed the rest of the world that were as well equipped. France, the USA, Germany. Not many other countries had such modern equipment in the types of numbers that the RAF did in mid/late 1939, as inadequate as it all was to deal with Germany's U-boats.

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## Milosh (Jan 6, 2018)

Ansons flew navigator training missions out over the Gulf of St Lawrence from 1GRS in Summerside PEI even mid war. The crew was also tasked with looking for U-boats.

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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

nuuumannn said:


> Yes, indeed, but let's put it into perspective. When the Anson I first entered service (early 1936), the Gloster Gauntlet biplane was the RAF's front line fighter. The Anson was a hangover from a previous era, and by the time WW2 kicked off, it was in service in numbers. Let's also not forget that the Short Sunderland was about as advanced as you could get in terms of maritime patrol asset when it entered service in 1938;




I quite agree with the Sunderland, trouble is there were only two squadrons of them, which is somewhat understandable as they are large, expensive and somewhat difficult to build.

Unfortunately the Anson, advanced as it was for the RAF, was rather out of date on the world stage.
in the 1934 London to Melbourne Air Race the 2nd pace finisher was a DC-2 




first flight of DC-2 was May 11th 1934
Third place finisher was a Boeing 247




First flight was in Feb 1933 in a somewhat different form. 
The Lockheed 10 first flew in Feb 1934




The Anson first flew March 24th 1935 and entered service with No 48 squadron on March 6th 1936. While a significant improvement on what the RAF was using at the time it shouldn't have taken a world class genius (or crystal ball) to figure out that the Anson was NOT on leading edge of *world aviation*.

BTW the Dornier 17 V1 first flew on November 23rd 1934




Picture of the V2.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

To continue, first flight of the PBY Catalina was on March 28th 1935. It did take until Oct 1936 to get the first one/s into service.




these early ones used a 900hp rated engine for take off (850 max continuous at 8000ft)

The Saro London did beat the PBY into service by 8-9 months but they still had 3 squadrons flying Londons in Sept 1939( with only 31 built the number per squadron was?)

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## stona (Jan 6, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> The Saro London did beat the PBY into service by 8-9 months but they still had 3 squadrons flying Londons in Sept 1939( with only 31 built the number per squadron was?)



I don't know specifically but several Coastal Command 'Squadrons' in the immediate prewar period were little more than expanded Flights operating a handful of aircraft.

Cheers

Steve


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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

I don't really have any trouble with that, Flying boats were large and probably maintenance intensive. ANd yes, it takes time to work up full squadrons, in terms of ground personnel on addition to flying crews.
Perhaps (or probably?) some of the Anson squadrons were under strength also but it does point out that even comparing squadron numbers leaves the Anson as shouldering too much of the burden.


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## pbehn (Jan 6, 2018)

nuuumannn said:


> Third place finisher was a Boeing 247
> View attachment 478264
> 
> First flight was in Feb 1933 in a somewhat different form.
> .



Reading the Wiki article on AA Griffith about turbines I found it also says this on brittle fracture and even mentions the Boeing 247 in connection with it.

*The work, published in 1920 ("The phenomenon of rupture and flow in solids"),[2] resulted in sweeping changes in many industries. Suddenly the "hardening" of materials due to processes such as cold rolling were no longer mysterious. Aircraft designers immediately understood why their designs had failed even though they were built much stronger than was thought necessary at the time, and soon turned to polishing their metals to remove cracks. The result was a series of particularly beautiful designs in the 1930s, such as the Boeing 247. This work was later generalised by G. R. Irwin and by R. S. Rivlin and A. G. Thomas,[3][4] in the 1950s, applying it to almost all materials, not just rigid ones.*


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## stona (Jan 6, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> I don't really have any trouble with that, Flying boats were large and probably maintenance intensive..



I've just checked and the size of a flying boat 'squadron' was just four aircraft, certainly for the reasons you give.
It's worth bearing in mind when looking at Coastal Command strength, to imagine that such squadrons had twelve operational aircraft, as the land based squadrons were supposed to, would give a very false impression.

Maintenance really was an issue across the entire RAF. In the year from July 1938 to July 1939, under the expansion schemes, 31,600 aircrew entered the RAF. Recruiting for many RAF trades also went well, but maintenance was an issue. It was almost impossible to recruit such men (there were no women) from civilian life, as they were already required within the aircraft industry. This meant that they had to be recruited from within the service, with the result that in September 1938 a shortage of maintenance personnel, across the RAF of 8,486 was forecast for 1940. How they arrived at such a precise figure I have no idea!

Cheers

Steve

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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

Thank you for that information.
I would say that the best aircraft for Coastal Command in 1939 would have been the smallest and simplest that _would do the job. _

However I would say that the job required 500-1000lb bombload (two to four 250lb anti sub bombs at the least if you couldn't get depth chargers in time) and an endurance of 8 hours or so (range 1000 miles?) which could be done with a smallish twin, not so small as an Anson but twin Hercules or 4 engines certainly not required in 1939/40. 

With a 600 mile range and roughly 4 hour endurance (at about 150mph) an Anson was good for a bit over 2 hours "on station" at about 100 miles from base. Flying a search pattern or orbiting a convoy. A plane with 6 hours endurance could stay on station about 4 hours under the same conditions or patrol that much further from base. If you want dawn till dusk air coverage on a 12 hour hour day you need 5-6 flights from Ansons but only 3 flights from the larger aircraft. that should help even out the maintenance requirements somewhat.


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## tomo pauk (Jan 6, 2018)

Use the Blenheim.

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## Airframes (Jan 6, 2018)

They did.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

But not until the spring/summer of 1940 and only after Bomber command howled and complained like a soccer fan cut off from beer after his team loses 
And then it was four squadrons of bombers and two squadrons of fighter Blenheims from fighter command.

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## nuuumannn (Jan 6, 2018)

> I quite agree with the Sunderland, trouble is there were only two squadrons of them, which is somewhat understandable as they are large, expensive and somewhat difficult to build.
> 
> Unfortunately the Anson, advanced as it was for the RAF, was rather out of date on the world stage.



But in 1936, no other country had a comparable land based maritime patrol aeroplane. The Do 17 was not in service and in 1934 the DC 2 and Boeing 247 was an aberration in world service. Advanced all metal airliners were _just _entering service, not the status quo. The point I'm trying to make is that yes, I agree with you in that the Anson was obsolete in 1939, but as I have pointed out on so many occasions, you go to war with what you have, not what you want. Yes, the RAF was behind in certain technologies, but ahead of everyone else in others. Yes, government was reluctant to spend on military equipment in the mid Thirties as the British wanted peace sooo much; its politicians had seen their sons march off to war and not return, so the Anson was it in 1936.



> Third place finisher was a Boeing 247
> View attachment 478264
> First flight was in Feb 1933 in a somewhat different form.



Wasn't me who said this, pbehn. Try Shorty.

None of the offered aeroplanes above were dedicated maritime patrol aircraft, and on the world stage the only profferable machine comparable to the Sunderland offered thus far is the PBY, which between 1937 and 1938 some 14 squadrons were so equipped - good numbers. In 1938 the German maritime patrol aircraft in service was the Heinkel He 59. The Ha 138 was in prototype form and the BV 138 derivative would not go into service until 1940 and the He 115 was not yet ready for service, it entered production at the very end of 1939.

Yes, the RAF only had a small number of Sunderlands in service in 1939, but my point is that by then no other country (with the exception of the United States) could match the RAF's aerial assets in quality or quantity to deal with a sustained U-boat campaign. The Sunderland was the world's most modern maritime patrol bomber in service.


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## Freebird (Jan 6, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> I quite agree with the Sunderland, trouble is there were only two squadrons of them, which is somewhat understandable as they are large, expensive and somewhat difficult to build.
> 
> .


Sunderland would be good, Stirling would be better.

Perhaps the B-17 would be a better option.


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## fastmongrel (Jan 6, 2018)

freebird said:


> Sunderland would be good, Stirling would be better.
> 
> Perhaps the B-17 would be a better option.



The Stirling didnt have great endurance it wasnt much longer ranged than a Wellington with the same load

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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

fastmongrel said:


> The Stirling didnt have great endurance it wasnt much longer ranged than a Wellington with the same load


Stirling is a perfect example of what not to use. Too large, too expensive to operate in terms of crew, maintenance and fuel burn.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 6, 2018)

nuuumannn said:


> But in 1936, no other country had a comparable land based maritime patrol aeroplane. The Do 17 was not in service and in 1934 the DC 2 and Boeing 247 was an aberration in world service. Advanced all metal airliners were _just _entering service, not the status quo. The point I'm trying to make is that yes, I agree with you in that the Anson was obsolete in 1939, but as I have pointed out on so many occasions, you go to war with what you have, not what you want. Yes, the RAF was behind in certain technologies, but ahead of everyone else in others. Yes, government was reluctant to spend on military equipment in the mid Thirties as the British wanted peace sooo much; its politicians had seen their sons march off to war and not return, so the Anson was it in 1936.



The point was that there were all metal, multi-engine monoplanes with retractable landing gear not only being built _somewhere_ but in the headlines of major newspapers and in cinema/movie newsreels. Not to mention two, if not all three "aberrations" had been in Britain, on British airfields even if only for a few days at the time of 1934 race let alone in 1935/36. IF the RAF and AIr Ministry were patting themselves on the back for putting the Anson into service they were delusional. 
The situation was so bad, and so well known that Lord Rothermere commissioned the Bristol 142 "Britain First"





surprisingly he was almost talked into canceling the order by Brigadier General P R C Groves, a former Secretary-General of the Air League of the British Empire who claimed that Rothermere was being taken for a fool and the plane would kill anyone foolish enough to fly in it. 
As we all know the 142 was turned into the Blenheim. 




> None of the offered aeroplanes above were dedicated maritime patrol aircraft, and on the world stage the only profferable machine comparable to the Sunderland offered thus far is the PBY, which between 1937 and 1938 some 14 squadrons were so equipped - good numbers. In 1938 the German maritime patrol aircraft in service was the Heinkel He 59. The Ha 138 was in prototype form and the BV 138 derivative would not go into service until 1940 and the He 115 was not yet ready for service, it entered production at the very end of 1939.
> 
> Yes, the RAF only had a small number of Sunderlands in service in 1939, but my point is that by then no other country (with the exception of the United States) could match the RAF's aerial assets in quality or quantity to deal with a sustained U-boat campaign. The Sunderland was the world's most modern maritime patrol bomber in service.



That is not really the point. I have never argued that the Sunderland was not a first class airplane. However the rest of coastal Command (at least 14 squadrons worth) was in no way up to snuff. A much more effective Coastal Command could have been fielded using different aircraft in the squadrons that didn't use Sunderlands and without using much more in the way of crewmen or ground support personnel. None of the of the planes I offered up were maritime patrol aircraft but simply show that the Anson was hardly a first class or even up to date aircraft when first issued in 1936 let alone being the backbone of CC in 1939. This was obviously well known By the RAF and Air Ministry or there wouldn't have been the Programs for the Botha and the Beaufort and the Saro Lerwick. Unfortunately the first and third crashed and burned (or sank) and the 2nd ran much later than it should have and was crippled (in it's first year) by unreliable, overheating engines. 

The French and Italians had pretty much given up on biplanes well before the British. The French and Italian aircraft should have been somewhat familiar to the British industry due to the air shows and competitions of the 20s and 30s. 

I would be bit careful about other countries abilities in 1938-40. Italy supposedly had about 200 Cant 501s when they went to war in 1940.




first flown in 1934 it was hardly a Sunderland but it was a lot closer in ability (speed, range, bombload) to the Saro London than to a Walrus despite the single engine (amazing what a monoplane could do). These were supplemented by about 95 CANT Z.506S with over 30 delivered before Sept 1939




First flight August 1935, 15 commercial examples before military version built. There were other Italian Maritime aircraft. 
The S.M. 79 first flew in 1934 but was too late to compete in the London-Melbourne air race, It did set several records in the next few years (and around two dozen more before WW II) so it to should have been known by British authorities. 

Yes, you go to war with what you have but the British screwed up in many ways leading up to WW II, in ways that should have been noted and corrected at the time with the knowledge and experience that existed. In some ways they were leading the world. In other ways they were 3-6 years behind the world and paid for it in blood and treasure for several years at the start of the war.


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## swampyankee (Jan 6, 2018)

The problem wasn't so much that the Anson was obsolete; it's that it was too small to be capable of carrying a worthwhile warload. 

Coastal Command had two overlapping but different roles: maritime strike, that is attacking surface ships, and maritime patrol, the latter including anti-submarine patrol. The Anson could probably due something like checking to see if fishing boats were sneaking past customs, but they didn't have enough warload for a serious maritime patrol aircraft.


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## KiwiBiggles (Jan 7, 2018)

But didn't earlier posts assure us that there mere presence of an aircraft over a convoy was enough to deter U-boats? In which case the Anson's negligible bombload wouldn't impact the primary mission of getting the convoy though.


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## stona (Jan 7, 2018)

I think it's a little unfair to compare the state of British maritime aviation with other European nations.

Britain was Europe's (and the world's, still, just) premier maritime power, and to have allowed the state of maritime aviation, particularly shore based, because that is where the emphasis should have been placed, to deteriorate to the nadir at which it found itself in 1939/40 was a bad mistake, even without the benefit of the hindsight we enjoy today.

It happened for many reasons, many of which have already been discussed in this thread, but that doesn't justify it.

I'm not a fan of the Blenheim. This was yet another British 'Stopgap' aircraft. It was a feature of the Air Ministry's propensity for ordering aircraft which were at least available over more advanced types which were encountering problems in development. It led directly to an increase in the numbers of superseded aircraft in service, and further delayed the supply of more advanced aircraft.
Between 1937 and 1938 a total 1,770 Blenheims were on order. The term 'Stopgap' was first applied to the Blenheim in March 1938 when it was mentioned as the only aircraft available (not the best aircraft) to fill certain General Reconnaissance squadrons. By 1939 the Blenheim was considered by the Air Ministry as 'beyond effective operational value' but another 62 were ordered to 'fill the gap' until the Beaufort came into production. 
All these obsolescent aircraft could be put to work somewhere, something appreciated by the Air Staff. Coastal Command lay in a distant third place behind Bomber and Fighter Commands, barely a nose ahead of Training Command. It was not only issued with obsolescent aircraft, like the Blenheim, but also received them when other Commands found no further use for them. The Hampden and Wellington are both examples of this.

At the end of 1939 Coastal Command (Bowhill) asked for three Blenheim IVs for trials. Sholto-Douglas replied that

_"...it is agreed that it will be necessary in the future to provide reconnaissance aircraft with increased range, manoeuvrability and defensive power."_

I don't know if the three requested aircraft were ever delivered, but In December Coastal Command received 20 Bothas, which was not what Bowhill had in mind.

The Blenheim was not a favoured son. In January 1942, 16 Blenheims from No. 143 Squadron were allocated to N0. 489 Squadron. These Blenheims had been 'operating' from Northern Ireland, but just how much 'operating' they had been doing is arguable. A report at the time found grass growing in their wing sections!

Cheers

Steve


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## tomo pauk (Jan 7, 2018)

stona said:


> I think it's a little unfair to compare the state of British maritime aviation with other European nations.
> 
> Britain was Europe's (and the world's, still, just) premier maritime power, and to have allowed the state of maritime aviation, particularly shore based, because that is where the emphasis should have been placed, to deteriorate to the nadir at which it found itself in 1939/40 was a bad mistake, even without the benefit of the hindsight we enjoy today.
> 
> ...



Nobody was suggesting that UK produces less ships, but rater to improve the long-range patrol maririme recon and attack abilities. And they don't need many hundreds for this, a hundred or two (but capable ones) will do. Those aircraft will save british sipping from losses, thus making the UK have easeir time in war that was looming.


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## stona (Jan 7, 2018)

That's my point.
For a maritime power to so neglect maritime aviation is not excusable. The saddest aspect is that hundreds of men would die in obsolescent aircraft, re-learning lessons already once learned twenty years earlier.
The British obsession with strategic bombing (it was the RAF not the Navy that was charged with attacking the German fleet, just one result of this) had dire consequences for what would become Coastal Command in 1936.
Cheers
Steve

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## Shortround6 (Jan 7, 2018)

KiwiBiggles said:


> But didn't earlier posts assure us that there mere presence of an aircraft over a convoy was enough to deter U-boats? In which case the Anson's negligible bombload wouldn't impact the primary mission of getting the convoy though.



Presence did deter, but there also has to be credible threat. 
A Destroyer 7-8 miles away would take 15 minutes to reach a dropped smoke float and a submerged sub could be anywhere in a 2 mile radius if running at max underwater speed. A 12kt trawler takes??????

Earlier the figures for 1939 were posted. AIrcraft spotted (or reported) U-boats 57 times, they managed to convert 40 of those sightings to attacks (dropped or fired weapons) Of the 40 attacks they claimed 8 damaged ?(or sunk, it was very hard to tell). 

If you are going to use a twin engine aircraft with 3-4 men and the ground personnel that requires, a better plane (bigger warload) might give at least slightly better results. 
AS mentioned earlier, due the short range/endurance of the Anson you need a lot of flights per day to cover a convoy. 

The site U-Boat.net says that the U-Boats claimed 165 ships hit in 1939, Hit does not always mean sunk. Would better planes/weapons/tactics have reduced that???? and by how much, 10%? 15%? 20?

Please remember in 1939 the Germans were doing very good to have even 20 boats in the combat areas at any given time. most of the time it was much less.


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## swampyankee (Jan 7, 2018)

KiwiBiggles said:


> But didn't earlier posts assure us that there mere presence of an aircraft over a convoy was enough to deter U-boats? In which case the Anson's negligible bombload wouldn't impact the primary mission of getting the convoy though.



Presence was an annoyance, which reduced effectiveness in a way that could be easily fixed: more submarines. Obviously, sunken submarines can be replaced, but it's harder to get a net increase when the annoyed submarine can return to dock with a live crew than when a submarine is sunk and its crew are all captured or dead.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 7, 2018)

I kind of like the Blenheim. Granted it was pretty much obsolete at the start of the war (let alone taking part part in 1000 bomber raids in 1942) 
but it wasn't all that bad compared to some of it's contemporaries. Contemporaries meaning planes designed in 1933-35 and first issued in 1935-36. 
Like the Tupolev SB first flight in 1934




Those are V-12 engines with really bad radiators. Unlike the Blenheim the SB got more powerful engines and some better streamlining. 





The British faced a number of problems, many traceable to too few engineers/technical people. New aircraft took too long to design and build. Existing engines (at least Bristol radials) got frozen as available resources went to new engines. 
As an example counter to the latter, the PBY Catalina started with 900hp engines for the -1 & -2 versions, shifted to 1050hp engines for the -3 & -4 and finally to 1200hp engines for the -5 and latter. the 1200hp engines showing up in the fall of 1940, 33% increase in take-off power in 4 years to help offset increased operational weights.

British _seemed _to have a strange idea that new airframes designed around existing engines (or similar powered ones) would somehow have significantly improved performance. (may have been true in the 1920s?) I have no other explanation for the Botha and Beaufort. 
The Beaufort MK I wound up weighing more empty than a Blenheim I did loaded. A 20-35% increase in power was not going to make up the difference.
I don't know what the Taurus was initially proposed as but it wound up as a low altitude engine, so low that it makes a Merlin MK VIII look like a high altitude engine. Fine as a torpedo bomber engine but then it runs counter to the RAFs seeming plan to swipe as many Beauforts as possible for regular bombing. Peak engine power at 3500 to 4000ft doesn't sound good over land where there are AA guns.


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## fastmongrel (Jan 7, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> The Beaufort MK I wound up weighing more empty than a Blenheim I did loaded. A 20-35% increase in power was not going to make up the difference.



The Beaufort was originally planned to use the 900hp Perseus. It might have been more reliable but given a performance worse than the lighter Botha.


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## nuuumannn (Jan 7, 2018)

> Yes, you go to war with what you have but the British screwed up in many ways leading up to WW II, in ways that should have been noted and corrected at the time with the knowledge and experience that existed.



Screwed up? That's a little harsh and easy to say with _heaps_ of hindsight, which you possess in spades. Yes, the technology existed and it was applied, in aeroplanes such as the Sunderland! The Anson entered service in 1936 amd was based on an aeroplane that first flew in 1934! Britain wasn't at war in 1934, or 1936 when the Anson entered service, so why was it a bad decision then, when there were no U-boats prowling British shipping and the highest performing enemy fighter the British were likely to encounter was the Heinkel He 51? Geez, you expect Britain to build a Liberator when it didn't need it and couldn't! And remember, the Anson was conceived as a landplane to supplement the more numerous flying boats in patrol duties, not to replace them and out strip them in capability. Let's also remember that of the existing Anson units in 1939, 10 were with CC and 16 with Bomber Command in a training capacity. The warlike stance adopted by Britain around the Munich crisis brought about the Sunderland and Beaufort etc, but what Britain had in service could not be discarded, so, as I said it went to war with them.

Screwed up? Not really. Bad planning, maybe with a big hindsight telescope, but not a screw up. After all, in 1939 Germany had precious few U-boats and dodgy torpedoes, yet what it did do was remarkable in spite of this and the British could be thankful for the fact the Germans didn't have a greater capability. If Britain was brought to its knees owing to German successful sinkings that caused unsustainable losses, then you could regard their effort as a screw up, but since the Germans were in no position to do that, Britain hardly 'screwed up'; it survived against the odds, suffering enormous losses owing to decisions made in the past, _before _the war, but made with awareness of the situation as it existed _before_ the war. Again, what are you basing this on? Some fictional wargame in your mind where everyone is equipped with aircraft with B-29 like capabilities except the British and their Ansons?

As Steve has pointed out, CC took a distant third in RAF planning and yes, perhaps in the years prior to WW2 more could have been done to bolster CC's capabilities, but wasn't because, rightly or wrongly, it just wasn't regarded as much of a priority as bombers ("The bomber will always get through" - Stanley Baldwin in 1932). When Gloster was instructed to build Hurricanes in its new factory instead of Wellingtons, the head of BC was very disappointed, but it was a sensible decision; it also goes to show how much emphasis was placed on bombers, not fighters until such decisions were made.

Remember, the fears that were held proved largely unfounded in the crucible of war, but in 1934 to 1936 the British could hardly be blamed for getting it wrong. For example, during the Great War there was a huge scare around the threat of airship raids against Britain in 1914, but they didn't (and couldn't) eventuate. The Brits couldn't be blamed for that either. The Royal Navy based much of its defensive strategy on defeating airships, from bombing airship sheds to devising fighters (scouts) to fly from improvised turret platorms to intercept them and building aircraft carriers to accommodate aircraft used to counter airships (it's remarkable how much of the strategic decisions the navy of WW1 made were based on the threat of airships attacking Britain).

Fears, regardless of how irrational in hindsight were very real at the time and Britain believed it had the strongest navy in Europe in the mid Thirties, that's how submarines could be defeated, it was assumed. In the meagre budgets of the mid 30s, remembering that the front line fighters and bombers were biplanes capable of little more than 200 mph and armed with only two machine guns, (not to mention the fact that the rest of Europe was so equipped, too) then what do you expect?! Britain's aviation industry worked slowly in peacetime and the competition to the Anson specification 18/35, was a modified de Havilland DH.89!

No, I'm not making excuses, but I have to question your benchmark by which you are judging Britain's efforts, SR. Certainly not by the standards fo the time, which is my point; no other country could have done what Britain was faced with any better, based on decision their governments had made before the war. Could the US have done it any differently? Not likely. Look at what happened off the coast of the USA in late 1941, early 1942 with the large number of sinkings of merchant shipping, with all those squadrons of modern, all metal flying boats, B-17 bombers and maritime patrol airships! How many U-boats were sunk compared to merchant ship losses? The US didn't even impose blackouts on the coast! And this was _after_ the Brits had warned them of what was about to happen. The German U-boat crews regarded it as the 'Second Happy Time'.


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## stona (Jan 7, 2018)

Re: Coastal Command in a distant third place.
In all the expansion schemes proposed and implemented before the war Coastal Command, if we take the torpedo bomber and general reconnaissance aircraft as yardsticks, never had a larger than 12% share of the total, the average is just 11%.

We must understand the size of the Command. From a pre-expansion strength of just five squadrons, four of which were flying boat 'squadrons' whose operational strength has already been explained,* the maritime figure rose to 18 squadrons by September 1939. Total operational strength 176 aircraft.*
The growth areas were only in general reconnaissance and trade defence, 16 of the 18 squadrons being assigned to these roles, a modern anti-shipping strike force was simply not considered, Bomber Command would take care of that. 12 of those 16 units were operating aircraft that were considered deployable as bombers, should the bomber offensive need reinforcement. An Air Staff memorandum summarised quite nicely the attitude to maritime aviation and what was considered the real air war.

_"Such shore based air forces should be available equally* for the air war proper* and for deployment in support of naval operations in accordance with the requirements of the situation at any given time."_

My bold.

By the way, the other two units not involved in general reconnaissance or trade protection duties were operating the Vildebeest. At the outbreak of the war they had 12 operational and serviceable aircraft between them. It was built to a 1926 specification and was obsolete, not obsolescent. It was supposed to be a torpedo bomber (with an operational radius of 150-185 miles!) but had been originally designed as a light bomber before modification to a torpedo carrier. An Air Staff note of 1935 entitled 'The classes of aircraft required for the Royal Air Force and the policy on which obsolescent aircraft should be replaced' noted of the Vildebeest that

_"Our mistake has been to make a bomber and then add a torpedo instead of vice versa"_

And yet men were still expected to go to war in them in 1939. They were saved because the aircraft were mostly unserviceable and they were practically useless..

Cheers

Steve

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## Juha2 (Jan 7, 2018)

as a defence of the Faithful Annie (Anson), the view from its cockpit was fairly good even if it was a low wing a/c. One of the reason why the only sqn that flew operational patrols with Botha, 608, wanted its old Ansons back was that even if Botha had shoulder wing, view from it was much worse than from Anson. Anson was also very easy to fly, so easy that it wasn’t very good training a/c.


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## Juha2 (Jan 7, 2018)

stona said:


> ...By the way, the other two units not involved in general reconnaissance or trade protection duties were operating the Vildebeest. At the outbreak of the war they had 12 operational and serviceable aircraft between them. It was built to a 1926 specification and was obsolete, not obsolescent. It was supposed to be a torpedo bomber (with an operational radius of 150-185 miles!) but had been originally designed as a light bomber before modification to a torpedo carrier. An Air Staff note of 1935 entitled 'The classes of aircraft required for the Royal Air Force and the policy on which obsolescent aircraft should be replaced' noted of the Vildebeest that
> 
> _"Our mistake has been to make a bomber and then add a torpedo instead of vice versa"_
> 
> ...



But the crews of Nos 36 and 100 Sqns were not so lucky and were shot to pieces in early 1942 off Endau (Malaya) by japanese fighters when attacking a Japanese landing force, still flying Vildebeests.

The CC was unlucky with its new a/c, 2 out of 4 were outright failures (Botha and Lerwick) and one badly delayed (Beaufort).


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## swampyankee (Jan 7, 2018)

Juha2 said:


> But the crews of Nos 36 and 100 Sqns were not so lucky and were shot to pieces in early 1942 off Endau (Malaya) by japanese fighters when attacking a Japanese landing force, still flying Vildebeests.
> 
> The CC was unlucky with its new a/c, 2 out of 4 were outright failures (Botha and Lerwick) and one badly delayed (Beaufort).



Part of that first may be because India and Malaya were not as critical as Britain; part may be because of a general European underestimate of Japanese capability. 

I think Shortround6 also has a good point: not enough engineers to create the aircraft needed in a timely enough fashion.


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## buffnut453 (Jan 7, 2018)

swampyankee said:


> Part of that first may be because India and Malaya were not as critical as Britain; part may be because of a general European underestimate of Japanese capability..



Although underestimating Japanese ability was part of the story, the bigger issue is one of priorities and the completely unexpected situation the British Government found itself in following May 1940. No British defence planning considered a situation where France would be knocked out of the war so quickly. That event simultaneously imposed greater dependence on trans-Atlantic trade with the US and opened the window for Japan to complete further aggressions in the Far East (eg moving into Indo-China and forcing Britain to close the Burma Road). 

Far East Command was at the bottom of the totem pole when it came to reinforcements. By mid-1941, Britain was alone and the air war was alive and well not only in western Europe but also north Africa and the Mediterranean (Greece, Malta, Crete, Iraq etc). There simply weren't the resources available to reinforce everywhere at the same time. It had been long planned to replace the Singapore-based Vildebeests with Beauforts but they arrived too late, and the performance of the latter was so poor, that they were, with one exception, flown back to Australia. That left the poor Vildebeest crews to soldier on in their biplanes. That said, up until the Endau debacle, they did sterling service operating at night where they were safe from Japanese fighters. It's just that the extreme situation in late January 1942, coupled with some rather poor decision processes in AHQFE, forced a daylight operation at Endau...with disastrous results for 36 and 100 Squadrons.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 7, 2018)

nuuumannn said:


> Screwed up? That's a little harsh and easy to say with _heaps_ of hindsight, which you possess in spades. Yes, the technology existed and it was applied, in aeroplanes such as the Sunderland! The Anson entered service in 1936 amd was based on an aeroplane that first flew in 1934! Britain wasn't at war in 1934, or 1936 when the Anson entered service, so why was it a bad decision then, when there were no U-boats prowling British shipping and the highest performing enemy fighter the British were likely to encounter was the Heinkel He 51? Geez, you expect Britain to build a Liberator when it didn't need it and couldn't!



I don't wish to argumentative and name calling. 
The "_heaps_ of hindsight" should have been in 1935-36 by the people in charge looking at what the experience of WW I showed. No need for post WW II hindsight. 
Adopting the Anson as a trainer would have been a good decision. Adopting it as a maritime patrol plane when it carried less bomb load (and untested bombs at that) than the WW I anti sub planes and fewer guns than some is best classified as????? you are adopting a plane 17-18 years after WW I that is less capable than planes being used at the end of WW I aside from being a bit faster. Planning of aircraft and ship purchases/programs should always have been looking 5-10 years ahead. The Germans were not the only bench mark of aviation progress. The British could look at the French and Italians. 




First flight in 1932 and entering squadron service in 1935. speeds up to 250mph and armament varied form two mGs to four or one 20mm and two mgs. Even if the Germans have nothing better than He 51s in 1935-36 doesn't mean that is all they will have in 1937-38.
and please point in which post I ever advocated the British build a Liberator or equivalent during this or any other time period under discussion.
Please do not put words in my mouth or twist my positions. 



nuuumannn said:


> Screwed up? Not really. Bad planning, maybe with a big hindsight telescope, but not a screw up.


 Bad planning equals screw up. For Bristol building the 9 cylinder 24.9 liter Mercury, the 9 cylinder 24.9 liter Perseus, the 14 cylinder 25.4 liter Taurus and the 9 cylinder 28.7 liter Pegasus equals what? 



nuuumannn said:


> Fears, regardless of how irrational in hindsight were very real at the time and Britain believed it had the strongest navy in Europe in the mid Thirties, that's how submarines could be defeated, it was assumed.



Again, it doesn't take hindsight from after WW II to realize that this was an error. It takes remembering the lessons of WW I when Britain had the strongest navy in the world. The invention of asdic did not render the U-boat impotent. 



nuuumannn said:


> In the meagre budgets of the mid 30s, remembering that the front line fighters and bombers were biplanes capable of little more than 200 mph and armed with only two machine guns, (not to mention the fact that the rest of Europe was so equipped, too) then what do you expect?! Britain's aviation industry worked slowly in peacetime and the competition to the Anson specification 18/35, was a modified de Havilland DH.89!



See above French fighter. Also see several French and Italian bombers of the time that were NOT biplanes (lets assume that the German bombers were developed in total secret ) or even the S 55 flying boat of 1924




Granted the two hulls are a bit archaic but 24 made a mass formation flight from Italy to Chicago in 1933,(with a number of intermediate stops) 

I am sorry but congratulating the British on getting a monoplane into service in 1936 is a bit like giving the stable master an award for putting a lock on the stable door after all the horses are gone. 

BTW the Fairey Hendon first flew in 1930 but delays in procurement meant it didn't enter service until 1936




Unfortunately is was slower than the flying boats pictured above.


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## Milosh (Jan 7, 2018)

Juha2 said:


> as a defence of the Faithful Annie (Anson), the view from its cockpit was fairly good even if it was a low wing a/c. One of the reason why the only sqn that flew operational patrols with Botha, 608, wanted its old Ansons back was that even if Botha had shoulder wing, view from it was much worse than from Anson. *Anson was also very easy to fly, so easy that it wasn’t very good training a/c.*



The training missions mentioned in a previous post - the WO would sometimes become the pilot of the Anson. Also, some pilots allowed the WO to take off and land the Anson. This ended when a seagull crashed thru the nose of the a/c and it crashed when taking off (no casualties).


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## Graeme (Jan 7, 2018)

Elsewhere Terraine also mentions it was a "difficult" aircraft to fly.....?






*
*
*(EDIT > My error - he was referring to the early HUDSON as "regarded at first by aircrew as a difficult aircraft to fly".)*


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## nuuumannn (Jan 7, 2018)

> please point in which post I ever advocated the British build a Liberator or equivalent during this or any other time period under discussion.
> Please do not put words in my mouth or twist my positions



I'm not twisting your position, what I'm saying is that you are judging Britain based solely on hindsight by assuming that it should have built equivalents to these modern aeroplanes you keep posting pictures of and that it would have made a difference. My angle is that there was no need to build them at the time. The British were not at war in 1934 to 36. Aircraft being developed in Britain in that time included the Supermarine Spitfire and Hawker Hurricane, two of the most modern fighters in service around the world, not to mention the specs that produced modern heavy bombers and the Sunderland - again, the most modern maritime patrol bomber in service anywhere in the world in 1938. This is why I find your argument bewildering, SR, Britain _was_ developming modern advanced aircraft; it was very much at the status quo, so there's no way that the MS.510 monoplane fighter, or prototypes of the Dornier Do 17 or Italian twin hulled flying boats was going to make a lick of difference.



> Bad planning equals screw up. For Bristol building the 9 cylinder 24.9 liter Mercury, the 9 cylinder 24.9 liter Perseus, the 14 cylinder 25.4 liter Taurus and the 9 cylinder 28.7 liter Pegasus equals what?



Planning in peacetime doesn't equal screw up, which Britain did not endure; yes, some of these engines didn't work as planned, but why bring that into the equation? It's not like they planned it! Britain was not at war in the early 30s when these engines were developed! Why were they a screw up?! Again, _what is your benchmark?!_

Here's an example of a "screw up". John Terraine's words in _Business in great waters_ on the losses of merchant shipping off the coast of the United States from 1941 to the end of 1942;

"The unpreparedness for war of a democratic civilian population, thee thousand miles from any warlike scene, reared on isolationaism and having enjoyed over three-quarters of a century of peace at home, is an understandable, if in such respects distasteful phenomenon. The equal unpreparedness of those charged with the defence of the nation, with the recollection of 1918 and the vivid example of Britain since 1939 before their eyes, is something less understandable and less forgiveable. For what now transpired was that the US Navy, for all the talk of 'Security Zones' and all the readiness to join in the Battle of the Atlantic, was simply not designed to protect America's own shipping. *At the root of the matter lay one simple fact; the sheer lack of anti-submarine vessels and anti-submarine aircraft*; and at the root of that lay the far less simple fact of a two-ocean war, with a second enemy of a totally different kind..." Blah blah blah for a bit... 

In bold: so much for all those squadrons of modern, all metal, long range flying boats and four engined land based patrol aircraft put into US Navy service in the 30s, then! According to losses quoted in a couple of books I have, over four times the number of ships were sunk off the US east coast coast between January and June 1942 as there was off Britain's entire coast between January and June 1940. Terraine offers these figures as totals: for the entire North Atlantic totals in January to June 1940 were 94 ships sunk by U-boats; a gross tonnage of 492,130 tons. Forward to 1942, the same time period and same vicinity - the North Atlantic: 526 ships sunk with a gross tonnage of 2,831,689. In the book _Fighting Ships of World War One and Two_ on my shelf, hence its use, is the figure of 505 ships sunk by U-boats off the United States' east coast alone to June 1942, hence the 'Second Happy Time"!

Here's the point and something those of you who still choose to blame Britain for its lack of preparedness for WW2 need to consider; blaming a country for its lack of preparation for war in peacetime (let's reiterate for a minute, *Britain was not at war in the early to mid 30s and there wasn't a big sign saying "War in 1939! Prepare!"*) offers nothing to the argument and is just foolish, because it is based almost _completely on hindsight_, which the British did not have. What is foolish is the lack of preparation during war that could have been avoided by just paying attention to what was going on, and what was being learned from overseas, as in the USA's case. That_ was_ foolish and the US government's lack of preparation should be attacked here, if we are attacking the British, SR. Britain, once the war kicked off - _did_ act and put into place measures to defeat the submarine threat by scavenging ships and aircraft from the USA until production could equal what was required to sustain a campaign against the enemy. In essense it learned from its lack of preparedness, as every other country did during the war, with the possible exception of the United States, it seems - granted, it was not at war, but the Britis were advising the admirals and look where that got them, they refused to adopt convoys until June 1942 despite the Brits stating they should.

Terraine again;

"Like the British Admiralty until 1939 the Navy Department had neglected the small craft in large numbers which WW1 had shown to be essential for dealing with submarine attack, believing that they could be improvised and quickly mass poroduced in the smaller yards at short notice..."

This statement also contradicts one of Steve's points, that assuming the RN could tackle the U-boat threat with surface ships was an error of judgement. It wasn't. During the Great War the majority of U-boats were sunk by patrol vessels and convoy escorts. _Fighting Ships_.. again: Total U-boats lost, 178, total sunk by patrol vessels and convoy escorts; 71. What was needed was numbers, numbers, numbers. The problem was that between the wars the British had an almost universal acceptance that Britain could and would defeat a future submarine threat by its surface fleet, equipped with asdic and its maritime patrol aircraft. (Terraine, page 179). This was an error of judgement, of course, but one made in light of experience gained during the Great War and also based on the fact that Britain was NOT AT WAR. Yes, an error of joudgement then because after the Great War, Britain's military was stripped to the bone.

Here's something else, as I made the point earlier; no other country in the world could have been prepared for WW2 as Britain was, bearing in mind it was very unprepared for it. None expected, nor was planning for WW2 in the mid to late 30s, with the exception of Germany, of course. If the tables had been turned and it was Britain planning to launch war against Germany and the same tactics were used, the Germany would have been as poorly prepared for it as Britain was; unprepared, as was _every _country in the world, not least the United States, as has been proven, so again SR and Steve, I ask, *what are your benchmarks for blaming Britain for being unprepared for war in 1939?*

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## nuuumannn (Jan 7, 2018)

stona said:


> And yet men were still expected to go to war in them in 1939



Yep, 'fraid so, because Britain should be blamed for getting involved in a war in 1939. Yes, Steve, jokes aside, it is reprehensible that the Vildebeest was still in service in 1939, heck, the RNZAF still had them in 1941! It should have been replaced - I agree, and that's what the Beaufort was, wasn't it? Let's look at it slightly differently. Let's say that Britain had only PBYs and Sunderlands in service in 1939, would it have made a difference in the beginning of the war? Probably, but by how much, and would it have stopped the Germans from achieving what they did? Look to the US example. The figures I quoted in my above post give an indication of shipping losses suffered off the US east coast at the hands of U-boats; more than four times those suffered in British waters in 39 - early 40, some 500 ships lost to June 1942, yet, the US Navy had 14 squadrons of PBYs in 1938, the year the Sunderland entered service. I don't have a figure for US maritime patrol aircraft assests in service at the end of 1941, but I can assume that it was be higher than CC totals in 1939, and with more modern equipment, to boot. So, bearing that in mind and the disastrously high losses suffered by merchant shipping in US waters that the difference might not have been as great as we expect, or at least that it takes a lot more than modern combat aircraft to win a war against a determined submarine fleet.

Also to add that this is not an excuse for keeping the Vildebeest or the Anson in service, and I do wholeheratedly agree with both you and SR regarding these aircraft and their unsuitability in a modern combat environment, but, my point is that modern combat aircraft might not (that is a _might not_, not a definite _would not_) have made much of a difference in what the British and US were faced with, all things considered.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 7, 2018)

Going somewhat in reverse, Britain as a whole was not unprepared for war, I don't believe I have said that it was. The RAF alone having a succession of expansion schemes to vastly enlarge the RAF as a whole in numbers of squadrons, numbers of planes, personnel and numbers of Airfields. The Army was being enlarged by large amounts and the RN was building a large number of new ships. 

There was a gradual realization during the 30s that war was coming, Nobody knew when but they knew that not preparing was not an option (at least in Europe, Americans hoped to stay out.) 

That doesn't mean that Coastal command was NOT unprepared or perhaps we should say woefully ill equipped for the duties it was supposed to do.


There are two aspects to anti-sub warfare. One is stopping the subs from sinking your ships. the other is sinking the enemy subs. They are NOT the same thing. During WW I just about all the sub killing had been done by surface ships. However it had been well noted that air patrols quite noticeably affected submarine activity in the areas patrolled. Much like the claims in both wars that conveys escorted by lighter than air aircraft suffered either very low losses or no losses even though lighter than air aircraft sank (or damaged) almost zero submarines. This does not really mean that unarmed or poorly armed aircraft can do the job as effectively as a well armed aircraft. 

The effect was there, it had been noted and acted upon with hundreds of aircraft devoted to anti sub work by the end of 1918. This experience was almost ignored leading up to WWII. And it seems to be ignored in the interest of promoting a different mission, strategic bombing. The RAF was not alone, I have no idea why the RN thought they could go back to "offensive patrols" as an anti-sub tactic after abandoning such tactics in WW I. 

I will say that this part of your post " *Britain was not at war in the early to mid 30s and there wasn't a big sign saying "War in 1939! Prepare!"*)" is pretty much nonsense. Yes Britain was not war and yes, nobody knew that the war would start in 1939. However the *whole shadow factory scheme started in 1935 *so somebody was planning something.* 
*
If you want to start a thread on how the US screwed up (or failed to plan properly) be my guest but two wrongs don't make a right. The US screwing up by the numbers doesn't excuse the British mistakes. 

Even with the vast increase in spending in the mid and late 30s there wasn't enough money for new "regular" warships and small craft and/or coastal escorts. Unfortunately for the British the small amount of spending on small craft during the 20s and early 30s had left them without the infrastructure (read engine supply for one thing) to support much of a building program of motor launches or fast small craft. This meant buying the engines from other countries. 
Yes the RN waited a bit too long to investigate the Corvette/Frigate option but until the naval treaties collapsed completely such ships might count to total tonnage and building such ships instead of modern destroyers was seen as a mistake (at least at the time). 
RN was also more than a little lax in investigating better ways of actually killing submarines, Asdic helped you find them, using WW I depth charges (literally, some were still in storage) shows that while preparing in some ways there was a lack of preparedness in others. But with restricted budgets you can only do so much. 

Getting to the First part of your post 
" _what is your benchmark?!"
_
How much of a benchmark do I need to criticize a 100lb antisub bomb that was designed in 1924, modified on paper, sealed in 1926, taken out, dusted off, in 1930 but NOT ORDERED until 1938? and *never *with a live shot against even a simulated submarine hull. 

At least the Army fired their anti tank guns at real pieces of armor plate. 

The reason for showing all those aircraft was to get by the notion that the Anson was a modern, up to date aircraft when it went into service. It wasn't and all the protesting in the world about how _everybody _was flying biplanes won't change that. Everybody else was changing to monoplanes and doing it faster than the British, even if biplanes took a while to totally die out. Being the _last major power_ in Europe to adopt a monoplane at least for some sort of use is hardly leading the way, or reason for self congratulation. 
I was also trying to show what was common knowledge, German and Russian aircraft at the time not being well publicised. French and Italian and AMerican Commercial aircraft should have been much better Known in England.


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## buffnut453 (Jan 7, 2018)

Sorry SR but your arguments are going in circles. If all it required to deter submarines was to have an aircraft in the air over likely sub patrol areas, what does it matter whether that aircraft was modern or obsolete, biplane or monoplane? 

Yes, there was a need for longer-ranged aircraft and certainly more of them but constantly haranguing the UK for not having modern aircraft seems counter to your point that ANY aircraft would cause a submarine to dive.

British war plans fully expected a strong French ally to help patrol the Mediterranean and Channel area. The French capitulation in May 1940 drastically altered the strategic situation in a way that NOBODY (not even the Germans) foresaw. I'm not sure how Britain could have better prepared for an eventuality that nobody expected.

The other question that must be asked is what would you stop producing, or which other Command would suffer, as a result of bolstering Coastal Command? With a finite amount of production capacity, something had to give in order to free up resources for Coastal Command. Yes, there were wasted resources and aircraft built that turned out to be duds, but that's the case in EVERY nation in the run-up to WW2. If we accept that as a fairly standard amount of "noise" in the system, what gets cut in order to improve CC?

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## Shortround6 (Jan 7, 2018)

Leading up to Sept 1939 replace most of the Ansons with Blenheim IVs.
That is the quickest and easiest way to get a better aircraft into the hands of Coastal Command.
It also has the least impact on Bomber Command as it only takes 3-4 MK I Wellingtons to replace an entire squadron of Blenheims for bombing long distance targets(short range a pair of Whitley's can do it) . Lets face the fact, the idea of strategic bombers carrying 1000lb payloads was more than a little wasteful. Granted they weren't available in 1939 but single Halifax or Lancaster could carry about the same amount of bombs as a 12 plane squadron of Blenheims so for perspective the transfer of 6-8 squadrons worth of Blenheims wouldn't actually change Bomber Commands _capability_ all that much.
That also puts bomber Commands whining and moaning into perspective.

Ditching the 100lb antisub bomb in 1935-36 would have meant the Anson was almost out of the running anyway. Unless up powered or otherwise modified to carry a greater war load. The Blenheim could carry four of the 250lb AS bombs which is far from ideal but far ahead of the Anson.

Carry on with the plan to build the Beaufort, if it works, great, if it falls on it's face (as it did historically, at least temprorarly) at least you have the Blenheims in place.

as far as some of the "duds" go the Botha was a poster child for Dud aircraft and one that should have been seen coming. The Mercury and the Perseus used the same bore and stroke ( same displacement ) and ran at the same RPM so what miracle (the sleeve valve?) was going to endow it with enough extra power to handle the extra weight compared to the Blenheim?  That doesn't need the hindsight from after WW II to figure out. 2nd chance was when the mock up was inspected. They couldn't figure out the vision wasn't very good? That is what mock-ups are for, to check things in 3 dimensions that might look OK on flat paper. The instability or control problems probably wouldn't have shown up (or thrown a warning flag) until actually flown. But you don't need math geniuses to figure out power to weight ratios.
Every air ministry is _supposed _to have technical officers that evaluate proposals before contracts are signed to weed out the bad ones. Most (or all) also check things periodically to see if things are on track (like no excessive weight gain).

No 2 would be to either spec another monoplane flying boat or buy 1-2 dozen Catalinas in 1938. The two they did fund both dropped in the crapper,
Both designed to a March/1936 specification (which shows there was some interest and money) the Blackburn B-20 was rather ambitious.




A pair of RR Vultures and an experimental hull form, it wound up not flying until 1940.
They did by 21 Saro Lewricks which turned out to be a waste of money but these did not have the warning flags the Botha did. At least not until flown. But a number of planes didn't handle well until modified, unfortunately no amount of changes seem to turn the Lerwick into a good handling aircraft.
I don't if the plane gained a lot of weight during detail design and construction but even with a pair of Hercules engines it was under powered and would not stay in the air on one engine. At any rate it was bad enough that No 240 squadron stopped flying them in Oct of 1939 and went back to their old biplanes. Unfortunately too much was already invested in the production train and even though it was recommended to scrap the project in Dec 1939 the remainder of the aircraft were completed which took until May of 1941. ( a production rate that averaged one a month or less) 

I would note that the US blimps of WW II carried four 325lb depth charges so while they may not have "killed" more than one U-boat (over 100 blimps built) they were far from toothless. Problem with blimps is the 60-70mph top speed which makes it hard to close the range before the Submarine goes under water. However a couple of depth charges dropped near the last position of the submarine is a good reminder that submerging was good idea  

You do have to provide the majority of your aircraft with a credible threat. If a sub is in the receiving end of a number of "fake" attacks how long before they don't submerge at the sight of an aircraft? 
WW I aircraft used 116lb bombs, 165lbs and 230 light case bombs and if big enough 520lb light case bombs. One of these damaged a WW I German sub and allowed a surface ships to catch it and finish it off. 
Who ever thought reducing the standard AS bomb to 100lbs remains an unsung non hero. 

I would note that over 200 flying boats were used by the British during WW I (and almost two hundred more built post war) and hundreds of floatplanes and land planes for antisub patrol 
Going into WW II with less than 200 operational aircraft and the vast majority being Ansons seems to show that something slipped.

Granted the British had ordered the Hudson back in June of 1938 Minimum of 200 aircraft but all that could be delivered up until Dec 1939, max 250 aircraft and all 250 had been built by Oct 1939 (Built in California sure doesn't mean operational in England) 
So again, interest and money were there, if a little late and for a country at peace they were sure buying up as much stuff as they could. 
Australia had ordered 50 Hudsons during this time.

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## stona (Jan 8, 2018)

In the eyes of the Air Ministry the submarine threat was not going to be defeated by Coastal Command, not even the Royal Navy. It was going to be defeated by the RAF's strategic bombers who would bomb the factories building the vessels, the shipyards assembling them, and the ports from which they operated. It never occurred to them that this might not work, given the capabilities of Bomber Command in 1939-1942. These were reflected in the Western Air Plans of 1st December 1939, generally W.A.5(a), specifically W.A.7 and W.A.10. Almost all the aviation eggs were put in one basket, which then got dropped.
Cheers
Steve

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## Shortround6 (Jan 8, 2018)

Going back to the opening post in this Thread;

"Somebody questioned a while ago about the number of threads that were concerned with improvement of German capabilities and the relative lack of such threads/suggestions for the allies. 

So here is one.

Coastal command was in pretty dismal shape in the early part of the war and an "improved" Coastal Command might have made a significant difference. This would require several "AH HA" moments in the early/mid 30s." 

What could have been done differently if there had been a change in thinking (politics if you will between the various groups) or a more realistic assessment of capabilities of weapons. aircraft ships?

We know what happened historically and we know the positions many of the decision makers held. 
What would it have taken to change some of those positions/policies or what would some changes in policy have resulted in?
There seems to be a black or white argument in a lot of these discussions. Or among the leaders of the day. Like Bomber Command refusing to give up even few squadrons of their 2nd or 3rd _worst _bombers to augment CC in the first year of the war. They (and some modern commentators) immediately jump to not wanting to send many score (or hundreds) of large bombers roaming all over the ocean which is understandable but not really the issue. The issue was using a few score of light/medium bombers in selected areas or orbiting actual convoys, groups of ships or choke points. 
Unfortunately in history you had the new service (the RAF) so desperate to prove itself and it's _unproven/untested _theories_/_doctrine that they ignored the _proven _tactics of the past. 

Now with the purchase/funding of the Hudson and the specification that lead to the Lerwick there was obviously a somewhat belated realization that better aircraft/equipment was needed, so what is so terrible about proposing either an earlier shift or a somewhat larger shift? 

Especially considering some of the more obvious short comings/ like the 100lb ant-sub bomb and it's lack of testing.


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## nuuumannn (Jan 8, 2018)

Shortround6 said:


> Britain as a whole was not unprepared for war,



If not WW2, which 'war' was Britain prepared for, exactly? Britain was quite unprepared for the ensuing conflict, otherwise we wouldn't be having this discussion! Yes, SR, like Mark said, you are going round in circles. You can't criticise Britain's lack of modern aircraft and equipment on one hand, then say it was prepared for war on the other.



> However the *whole shadow factory scheme started in 1935 *so somebody was planning something.



That's called strategic planning. In peacetime it is advisable to at least put something toward defence. ! You're using that as an excuse to prove Britain was preparing for WW2, yet are still accusing it of being drastically unprepared?! Yes, you are going in circles.



> If you want to start a thread on how the US screwed up (or failed to plan properly) be my guest but two wrongs don't make a right. The US screwing up by the numbers doesn't excuse the British mistakes.



No one is saying it does; my point for adding the USA into the mix is two fold; 1) to enforce my statement that no one was really prepared for what unfolded in WW2, regardless of their pre-war planning, and 2) to prove that regardless of what was equipping the armed forces, the U-boats still (initially) triumphed; your criticism of Britain for not building more advanced aircraft pre-war is flawed and that it takes a lot more than modern aircraft to defeat a determined submarine offensive. To add to that, though, as I did mention, Britain _did_ have advanced aircraft, just not many of them. As did the United States and according to Terraine, not as many as it should have.



> How much of a benchmark do I need to criticize a 100lb antisub bomb that was designed in 1924, modified on paper, sealed in 1926, taken out, dusted off, in 1930 but NOT ORDERED until 1938? and *never *with a live shot against even a simulated submarine hull.



That's it? You are holding up your defence with a bomb?

My angle on this is that it is futile to accuse Britain of screwing up because it can only be done in hindsight, which nullfies the argument as the British were not privvy to what we are 80 years later, also, it's not like they did it deliberately! That doesn't mean that for the sake of argument we can't say whether this or that decision was a dumb one or not, but to universally condemn them for what they really had no control over is fruitless. In peacetime it is hard to justify planning for war; invariably things won't always work out the way that even the best strategists expect. Britain was not alone in this and this is why I keep asking what your benchmark is, because _no-one_ could foresee what happened in WW2 - and again why I brought the USA into this - and as Mark pointed out, not even the Germans, and they kicked it all off.

Again, hindsight is a wonderful thing.


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## KiwiBiggles (Jan 8, 2018)

But, in the end, would it have made a difference if Coastal Command had been better equipped and managed right from the start? Shipping losses in the first couple of years of the war were relatively low, compared to 1942/1943. Even if Bomber Command had been eviscerated, and all its heavy equipment given solely to CC,it wouldn't have made that much of a difference.

I know Terraine gets quite heated in his opinion that CC was the critical command for Britain during the war. But a sober look at the statistics for the Battle of the Atlantic shows that the threat was really not as great as was perceived at the time. Over the course of the war only 10% of convoys were attacked at all, and in those convoys, on average only 10% of ships were sunk. Overall, more than 99% of voyages reached their destination successfully.

I think any discussion of an improved Coastal Command has to at least attempt to show that Britain would have been significantly better off if CC had been better equipped, given that any better equipment could only come at the expense of other commands.


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## parsifal (Jan 8, 2018)

Coastal command did not need to carry any "credible threat" in 1939 to do its job. The issues affecting the uboat war in 1939 were the paucity of uboats, so any sighting report that could re-route a convoy away from a uboat was going to avoid an attack on that convoy. The average number of boats at sea in 1939 was a paltry 13, so a sighting report by a CC a/c ahead the convoy would almost certainly thwart the entire attack. The first wolfpack attack did not occur until March 1940, and was not repeated until June, just to clarify. once the uboats resorted to pack attacks it did become necessary for the CC to provide augmenting fire power additions to the convoy escorts but this was totally unnecessary in 1939. what you needed in 1939 was a command structure for escort command, and training standards that allowed accurate and timely sighting reports to be passed out to the convoys in quick order. The convoys needed a command ship to send and receive messages and issue orders to the convoy elements, particularly relevant since most convoys lacked any escort at all at this time, except until the convoy got to within 100 miles of the british coast.

Despite all this, the Uboats were not all that successful in the first three months of the war. somebody mentioned a figure of 165 vessels sunk in the first month of the war. nearly all these sinkings were of neutrals operating in the Baltic and narrow seas, Polish and Finnish flagged vessels (Finn vessels were treated as enemy vessels by BDU until well after the March 1940 peace treaty with the USSR), but the vast majority of losses were neutral ships sailing independently in the belief that BDU would observe the rules of war and not attack unescorted and clearly marked neutral shipping. BDU did not observe those rules, and in a short sighted approach decided to attack neutral shipping regardless, gradually extending the unrestricted campaign to cover all manner of ships in any location. It was short sighted, because it had the effect of turning nearly all of the neutral ships, amounting to about 5.5 million tons from Europe alone, to the direct control of the allied (ne british) control commission. Far more shipping ran to the british to escape German atrocities at sea than the germans were ever able to sink at sea in those opening months. 

in 1939 CC was not able to do even that basic function of search and report. , and therein lies the chief problem facing the command. no amount of fancy aircraft would change that. in the situation facing the british at that time they needed numbers, an effective command system and training, not any new types to worry about.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 8, 2018)

I think at this point we are all going around in circles.

The British churned out a lot of what turned out to be crap while preparing for war. So in a way they were both preparing for war and yet unprepared for the war they had to fight. Leaving the field of aviation Britain built 1342 MK VI light tanks between 1936 and 1940. This is after build around 170 light tanks from 1930 through 1935. About 465 of those MK VIs were built from 1936 though the 3rd quarter of 1938 At what point does it take hindsight to figure out that tanks with 14mm armor or less won't last long on the battlefield? 1935 ? when design of the Matilda I started? 

Yes other countries did make mistakes. Some a lot of them. 

The British were falling behind in aerodynamics during the early/mid 30s. It was taking too long to get planes into service after the initial specifications. 
And too many planes were put into production without adequate (or even any) testing of the theories behind them.


You keep referring to hindsite while ignoring the experience of WW I. You refer to hindsight when I bring up the British tardiness in adopting production monoplanes. Or that there was no need since they weren't at war.
That is a monoplane of practically any type, Wood or metal, fixed landing gear or retractable, braced monoplane or cantilever. 
The British were certainly behind the curve on variable pitch or constant speed props. You may call that hindsight but with scores of airlines (not airliners) adopting such propellers and such propellers being licensed to a number of countries and winning awards they were hardly a secret at the time. 

Perhaps the long time needed to bring new types into service was due to the sudden change over in designs/forms of construction? 
It takes time to learn how to design all metal monoplanes with retracting landing gear. And time to learn how to make them. And too many planes were being build to make up "numbers" in the RAF expansion schemes that may have hindered changing over.
528 Hawker Hinds starting in Nov 1935? Plus Hectors? 
Aside from being built quickly and cheaply what did they have in their favor? 

As an indicator to how much hindsight is really needed here is a four page article from Flight magazine August 23rd 1934 issue.
air corps | air force | army air | 1934 | 0860 | Flight Archive

I do like the line " ....and it will be interesting to see if the American " Monoplane Vogue" will spread to this country."

we also have this page from a slightly earlier edition (May 24th 1934) which reveals how delusional some people were at the time.
air ministry | station sports | air force | 1934 | 0527 | Flight Archive

with the line describing the Overstand bi-plane bomber. 

"When one recalls that the " Sidestrand III," fitted with " Jupiter " X.F. engines cowled by Townend rings, had a speed of 167 m.p.h. at 11,000 ft., it is apparent that the "Overstrand," with engines of a more modern type than the " Jupiter," will have a top speed comparable with those attained by some of the latest American cantilever monoplane bombers with retractable undercarriages. And, into the bargain, it will be much more manoeuvrable, will have a higher ceiling and rate of climb and will land much more slowly than these."

In service the Overstrand had top speed of 143-148mph. Unless the more modern engines were rockets the Overstrand had zero chance of having a top speed comparable to the Monoplanes with retracting landing gear. 

Criticizing an organization or individual decision makers for throwing out hard won knowledge/experience paid for in lives for untested theories/weapons doesn't really require much hindsight.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 9, 2018)

parsifal said:


> Coastal command did not need to carry any "credible threat" in 1939 to do its job. The issues affecting the uboat war in 1939 were the paucity of uboats, so any sighting report that could re-route a convoy away from a uboat was going to avoid an attack on that convoy. The average number of boats at sea in 1939 was a paltry 13, so a sighting report by a CC a/c ahead the convoy would almost certainly thwart the entire attack. The first wolfpack attack did not occur until March 1940, and was not repeated until June, just to clarify.....



Looking at the maps on U-boat. net (there is a map for every month)
in Sept there were 52 ships _claimed_ as hit (not sunk) of which 14 seem to off the coast of Norway. 4 off the east coast of England 1 off the Faroes Islands and one off Weymouth. all the rest are west of line drawn through the Irish Sea. 

In Oct 37 ships were hit (initial -boats are back in harbor?) None of the coast of Norway, four near Hull, another near Weymouth and two near Swansea. Eight around northern Scotland up past the Shetlands.the rest are all west of Lands end and south of Belfast.

In Nov numbers drop to 30, One off Norway. Ten between John O'Groats and Dover, another one off Weymouth and couple north of the Orkney's. A few are hit in the Bay of Biscay but that should be France's problem. 

In Dec things get nasty, while 46 ships are hit a full 25 are in the North Sea north of Hull. 5 more off great Yarmouth and 3 off north west Scotland. 
The rest are in the south west approach. 

Jan sees the number rise to 58 from the Orkney's to Portugal and includes 3 sunk off liverpool by the U-30. 
Feb sees 54 .

Some would be out of range for anything CC could put in the air on a regular basis, Patrolling the Portuguese/SPanish coast even with Sunderlands from Gibraltar wasn't practical on a continuous level. Crap winter weather and short days means less effective air patrols.

However the previous statistic of 57 sightings in 1939 and 40 attacks, 8 claimed damaged shows that something more could have been done with better aircraft/weapons. Slow planes can't reach the sub in time to make an effective attack. Small bombs needed direct hits, a near miss of even a few feet doesn't work, with the 100lb bombs even direct hits are no guarantee of success. (a hit on the deck is several feet away from the pressure hull). and all too many of the early bombs turned out to be duds (lack of testing?) 

I am not claiming that better planes/weapons would stop the U-boats in their tracks. But just raising the damage rate a bit would help, Or longer patrols keeping subs under for longer? Were they really providing dawn to dusk coverage? Or just occasional flyovers? 
The loss of the Courageous sure shows a lack of operational knowledge. They sent all aircraft into the air to search at one time, landed them all and took almost two hours to service the planes prior to launching another search. Ship was torpedoed near the end of the two hour window. U-Boat commander sure didn't know the timing and perhaps having planes in the air wouldn't have made any difference bu tit sure seems like poor procedure, this is with hindsight.


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## parsifal (Jan 9, 2018)

what your figures are not looking at is the breakdown of whether the ships hit were neutral, or under the control of the allied control commission. For example in September, a total tonnage of 226000 tons of ships were lost to all causes, however of this total, only a little over 100000 tons were lost whilst in allied service (and moreover, more german ships were seized by the allies in this period to replace losses than were sunk by the germans), and none were lost whilst travelling in convoy. this trend continued until well into 1940. the neutrals operated in the mistaken belief that they were safer to sail independently, and so long as they were not in the service of the allies, would not be targeted by BDU. BDU kept their official policy as "stop and search" to add to the confusion for quite some time, to sow confusion with the neutrals mostly, but in reality from the beginning of the war many Uboat skippers were incensed that ships would transmit course, speed and attacker info clearly in contravention of the 1930 and 1936 conventions, and as a result would simply sink on sight any ship neutral or allied (or in one or two cases even german ships sunk by uboats) without warning. a better or worse coastal command could not alter these losses to the neutrals who were not under allied protection. In the end these illegal attacks on neutral shipping by the germans yielded vast tonnages to the allies for relatively few losses to the shipping companies.

The point is this. The early battle was firstly a battle to win over the neutrals to trust the allies and work for them rather than remain neutral. The allies won this hearts and minds battle hands down, and CC played virtually no role in that element of the early battle. Much of the often quoted losses of the early part came from neutral shipping being attacked whilst defenceless and unprotected by a uboat arm prepared to ruthlessly break the rules of war in the name of their tonnages. they were actually not that successful in their tonnages but did manage to deliver the neutrals shipping fleets to the allies, including the vital Norwegian tanker fleets in that time.

The other element of the early battle was a battle to organize the defences to make convoy protection a viable war strategy. Initially as you point out, the majority of attacks on allied controlled shipping were in the local waters, including the north sea (much shipping was being used to buy out the Norwegian and Swedish ore markets so many allied ships were traversing the North sea to Norway to pick up this cargo. many of the other battles, as you confirm and as ive said for some time now, within 100 miles of the british coast, in places like the Irish sea. these early battles were really a race between how quickly the convoys could be reinforced, local waters made safe by the extemporized commissioning of over 1000 coastal escorts and the organizing of a somewhat effective escort command, including an integrated CC into that command. the allies won that part of the battle as well, forcing the uboats further offshore, outside the range of both the coastal escorts (for example, like the black swan class sloops) as well as the CC aircraft that by January 1940 were providing effective patrol services in the coastal waters of britain 

The early battle should be awarded to the british in my view. Where things went horribly wrong was later as the battle moved offshore. The CC types in service at that time lacked the range and the numbers of long range surface escorts pitifully small and totally inadequate . The Germans began to successfully use _rudel taktiks_ at this time and losses started to enter the catastrophic zone. This was the point...September 1940 to March 1941 that Britain was almost brought to her knees as she was battered relentlessly by heavy and sustained losses. there was no effective or quick fix to the challenges of this part of the battle until the escort famine was solved and longer ranged patrol aircraft with ASV radar became available that could operate from the new bases in Iceland (and later from Gibraltar). that CC was not equipped adequately during this and the later 1942 phase of the battle can be placed mostly at the feet of BC, who almost scored a fatal own goal by their stupidity.


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## swampyankee (Jan 9, 2018)

The RN knew about trade warfare; they’d been dealing with piracy since Alfred and the “Sea Dogs” of the Elizabethan era were the U-boat captain analogues of their day. Convoy and associated procedures introduced much more quickly than in WWI. The problem was more with Coastal Commands hardware and, early on at least, integration with RN coastal and anti-submarine efforts. 

This is, to some extent, the opposite problem to the US, which had aircraft, some with the USN and some with the USAAF (Maritime patrol with landplanes was in the USAAF’s purview) but the US didn’t have the procedures in place to deal with the U-boats operating against coastal and Caribbean shipping. Later, the US did have light, single-engined aircraft impressed from civilians flying patrols because there was far too few aircraft like B-10s and Catalina on hand.


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## michaelmaltby (Jan 9, 2018)

... and some in the US Navy were obsessively opposed to convoys.


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## tomo pauk (Jan 11, 2018)

There was a monoplane flying boat design from the UK that almost went into production - Blackburn Sidney. 1st flown in 1930.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 11, 2018)

Blackburn also built two aircraft to try to do a comparison test.
Blackburn C.A.15C - Wikipedia
Nearly identical fuselage, tail, engines and landing gear. 









And while a they never really did a side by side fly-off test the numbers available DO NOT point to the superiority of the Biplane. 
Both planes made first flights in 1932.


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## Shortround6 (Jan 14, 2018)

From Alfred Price's book Aircraft versus submarine please see between the red lines.






This should have been known to the planners during the 30s and not post WW II and so not require much hindsight.
Mr Price does make a few mistakes in other places.
However he claims two major deficiencies in anti-sub equipment at the start of WW II in addition to the 100lb anti-sub bomb.
of which here is a photo of the U-46 after it made it back to port after a direct hit.




Oct 25th 1940.
the 2nd deficiency was the lack of a bombsight. He claims the standard RAF bombsight wasn't useful below 3000ft (rather useless for Anti-sub work) and required a period of straight and level flight in any case. Compound this with few, if any, 100lb bombs being available for training or testing bombsight with in early 1939 (first deliveries of production bombs) obviously leads to poor results. Pilots were reduced to flying low and dropping "by eye" which resulted in at least three aircraft lost and perhaps more due to their own bomb fragments.

3rd deficiency was only the Hudson was fitted with an intervalometer that allowed the the bombs to be dropped as a string instead of a salvo or pilot trying to hit switches/releases a fraction of a second apart. Now perhaps he is in error and the Sunderland had the intervalometer but the fact seems to be that the vast majority of aircraft (the Ansons) had two bombs only, no effective bombsight and no intervalometer.

These are deficiencies that should have been known at the time.

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## ChrisMcD (Jan 14, 2018)

Two points need to be borne in mind.

Firstly, the RAF needed aircraft - almost any aircraft - to train it's greatly expanded manpower. That meant ordering aircraft that were available rather than waiting for the "best". This explains the huge numbers of Ansons, Battles, Harts and Blenheims that were built in the late 30's. 

It also explains why aircraft like the Botha were ordered "off the drawing board". The Beaufort was a "stretch" of the Blenheim and was not a great improvement - but it was quicker to develop.

Secondly, Bristol took longer than was planned to get the Hercules into full scale production. Thus the Beaufort was cursed with the underdeveloped Taurus while the Botha was seriously underpowered with the Perseus. Blackburn tried to get the Hercules for the Botha and Bristol made sure that the Beaufighter did get the Hercules. It ended up as a very successful CC strike aircraft.

I give you the Banff Wing Sorties flown by RAF Banff Strike Wing 1943 - 1945, Scotland - UK 

But, bear in mind that only the British and the Japanese commissioned purpose built torpedo bombers (AFAIK) - even the SM79 was an adaptation.

So you can make a good case that Coastal Command, even if it came third behind Fighter Command and Bomber Command, was still getting a lot of strategic thought and money.

Pity that the Lerwick and Botha were rubbish and even if the Blackburn B-20 looked great, the money would have been better spent on more Sunderlands!


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## Shortround6 (Jan 14, 2018)

Coastal Command was always going to need a sort of high/lo mix in modern terminology. Good as the Sunderland was it was too large and too expensive to equip a large proportion of the needed squadrons with. Unfortunately the Anson was too small and a bit too cheap. Having over 50% of your operational squadrons (and an even higher percentage of operational aircraft) still equipped with what were essentially "scarecrow" aircraft 4 years after the Anson first flew is where a big part of the problem was. 
There is a large spectrum between the "Best" and a glorified "scarecrow" aircraft. Something in middle should have been do-able. It was do-able as shown by the purchase and use of several thousand Hudsons. There shouldn't have been a "need" to wait for Hercules engines. Mercury's, Pegasus or Perseus engines (or purchased Wrights/P&W engines) would have good enough for a low-end maritime patrol plane. Just a few hundred planes while waiting for the "Better/Best". 
Leave the Ansons to the training commands. 

Decide that the 100lb bomb was useless and that 250lbs bombs are a _minimum. _
Get some built in time to test and check bombsight. 
Build simplified bombsight for low altitude use, should be simple as you are only dealing with 2 or 3 different kinds of bombs, not a dozen or so. 
Train crews in low altitude attacks (or not so low, dropping from too low causes bombs to skip) 
Fit the intervalometer so you can drop a stick or liner pattern to improve odds. 3 bomb minium (not two ) with 4 bombs preferred. 

Simplest solution is to allocate several hundred Blenheims to CC during 1938/early 1939 to replace Ansons. 
As problems crop up with the Botha (and to a limited extent the Beaufort) cancel Botha on the drawing board and have BLackburn build several hundred more Blenheims. Fool around with a sightly improved versions (NO EXTRA CREW). 
Order a few dozen Blenheims with external torpedo carrier. At least they would have found out that the existing 18in torpedo didn't take well to "high speed" drops and start working on a torpedo that would work when dropped from the Beaufort sooner. 
Think about that one for moment. Bothas and Beauforts ordered by the hundreds (if not over a thousand) in 1938 and yet it would be 1941 before they had a torpedo that work when dropped at even 150kts. 
Too much procurement was based on paper plans.

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