The Naval Review The copyright of this article rests with the author, or the author's estate.

Maintenance of the Object

HERR SCHUECKLEGRUBER has unfortunately not attended our Staff College. Hence he thought out his own principles of war. His first (and about his only) principle is roughly this: to get hold of an aircraft, tank, gun, etc., which is good enough, build it by the thousand, dope the troops, raise the right arm, shout "Heil Hitler," and off to victory. On that principle he has made one hell of a mess of the world. The lesson that we seem very loth to learn is that it is essential to produce for each specific job a weapon that is good enough, i.e. able to defeat that of the enemy. Our best is almost everywhere better than his, and yet we persist in trying to do the job with something less than the best. The particular case that I have in mind is that of fighters in the Fleet Air Arm.

Surely the time has come when it must be obvious to some at least of the vast hordes of officers who sit about in various departments of the Admiralty dealing with matters aeronautical, that we have NOT got the most suitable tools for the job. Ex-Battle-of-Britain Hurricanes are now being given to the F.A.A. That is something. But why? Why not the latest Hurricanes and Spitfires as being supplied to the R.A.F.? Why are perfectly good firms going on building Fulmars? The air is just the same over the fleet as over the land. What is required is the best machine to deal with the enemy in the air; and the R.A.F. have it. Of course the answer is that a Mark II Hurricane cannot be landed on. And the answer to that is the good old-fashioned cry of "B----." Nor could any Hurricane three years ago; but now, all of a sudden, it can. Same deck, same aircraft. About two years of war, that took. What is wanted for convoys to Malta, etc., is fighters, carriers full of fighters; real fighters, the best we've got. Good fighters essentially have a short range, so they must be in carriers with the convoys.

Also required, in case the Wop fleet does one day come out, are torpedo bombers, good aircraft that can carry torpedoes. Again the RA.F. have them. These should be shore based, long range, big ones; but directly under the control of the Admiral as F.A.A. aircraft. General reconnaissance is now, as it should be, done by shore-based aircraft. These aircraft are now under Coastal Command and this system seems to work quite well.

There remains the problem of night searching and anti-submarine screens generally. For this purpose the Swordfish appears eminently satisfactory. With the latest devices it is perfectly suitable for day and night anti-submarine work. These aircraft should be carried on catapults in the cruisers and merchant ships of a convoy, flown off as requisite, refuelled in the carriers; they should remain in the air more or less continuously till due for inspection, when they would fly on to the convoy's destination and be replaced by others from shore or cruisers. Spare pilots should be carried in the carriers to act as reliefs. They need not interfere with the carrier's operation of fighters as they can land on and be accelerated off with the carrier out of wind.

For searching for ocean raiders (South Atlantic, etc.) the principle of one aircraft carrier and a sufficiently powerful surface craft appears the best. Here again the Swordfish is an adequate aircraft, provided that, if it is required for a torpedo attack, such attack is carried out under cover of darkness. A small number of fighters should be carried in case the raider has aircraft, or to deal with a stray Focke-Wulfe.In conclusion, the Navy wants only the best and latest fighters as being supplied to the R.A.F.; with arrester hooks; nothing else different at all. There is no point in a vast staff at the Admiralty working out what is a good fighter. The RA.F. can do that quite well. The rival concern is a waste of war effort. The Navy wants Swordfish (strange as it may seem at first sight), a very adequate aircraft for certain purposes, but not for attacking heavily-escorted ships in the Channel. It also wants long-range shore-based torpedo-carrying aircraft able to fend for themselves to a certain extent. I would suggest a Stirling would make an admirable aircraft for this purpose and could be easily adapted to carry several torpedoes. Building Fulmars, Albacores, Walruses, and others is a waste of time and effort. They are neither one thing nor the other. The aircraft in capital ships and cruisers should be regarded as a reserve for the carriers. There is no point in carrying seaplanes. Future battleships should be designed entirely for their own business of fighting on the sea. They must be escorted by fighters when near possible enemy aircraft; spotting for the guns in a fleet action is more likely to be successful in a war game than in practice. The fitting of hangars for Walruses in a capital ship is, to say the least of it, pointless.

AUDAX.