Preparing for Normandy: Developing an Airpower Doctrine in the Desert
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- čas přidán 22. 04. 2024
- Preparing for Normandy: Developing an Airpower Doctrine in the Desert
With Matthew Powell
Part of our Build up to DDay and Operation Overlord series
• Build up to DDay and O...
In today's show we will talk about how the doctrine and procedures of tactical air power that would be used at Normandy and beyond was developed by Army Co-operation Command and the Western Desert Air Force.
Dr Matthew Powell is a Teaching Fellow in Air Power and Strategic Studies at the Royal Air Force College, Cranwell and the University of Portsmouth Business School.
The Development of British Tactical Air Power, 1940-1943: A History of Army Co-Operation Command by Matthew Powell
UK uk.bookshop.org/a/5843/978134...
USA bookshop.org/a/21029/97813497...
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Top, top presentation. The importance of a concerted, effective joint plan, highlighting communication stuck out to me.
i'm no expert but i know just watched a masterclass in presentation by matthew powell. FACT: this is the only current channel where you get deep dive info on subjects which others are unwilling to take on with such open generosity and disarming charm. thank you WW2TV.
You get it
Woody/Matthew. Top presentation! Full of detail. Thanks. Bob
Thank you kindly!
The air force played a part in why the British struggled with combined arms at times. Although Monty did manage to get a tight grip on things. One of Montys first orders on moving into Egypt was moving his HQ next door to the DAF HQ. Leigh-Mallory really stuffed it up continuously fighting for RAF Operations to be independent of the army, and refused to have ground controllers sent in with the landings.
On a doctrine (and Spitfire 😁) issue that wasn't addressed it was sheer bloody murder to hold back hundreds of Spitfires from the Desert in 1941-42. Certainly after Barbarossa had begun when any potential invasion scare had receded well out of sight. The Me109 F & G were a quantum leap ahead of the beat up old Hurricanes and underpowered lend-lease stuff they sent over instead of Spitfires. The Air Marshals frittered the Spits away in pointless cross-channel 'Circuses' while the poor Desert Airforce pilots were sent up in the blue as literal cannon fodder.
As soon as Spits were there in numbers it made the ground attack option easier as they established the air superiority. Anyways this is just more of my waffle for the algorithm and thanks Matthew & Paul.
Good point
@@WW2TV Blame Sholto Douglas and Leigh Mallory, Plus Portal for putting them in charge of Fighter Command.
This was very true , the losses in the Circuses particularly were horrendous . Is it an irony that clowns were organising them . If they had sent 60 Spitfires to Malta much earlier they would have been able to avoid the problems of the siege . It's not publicised much the loss ratio of RAF planes in 1941-42 to German was very high , much worse than the Battle Of Britain . Tactically a bad defeat .
czcams.com/video/nbUfqb5Skt8/video.htmlsi=Kp2jxfJehb9xc8dy this link goes into detail about 4.2 to 1 loss ratio RAF in France and the failure to get more Uk based Spitfires to the Middle East
Thanks
It was James Holland's book about the Desert War and Gazala that explained the Desert Air Force and the escape back to El Alamein that got my interest for this excellent programme. Nice one.
If you go to The Crusader Project website, there's an absolutely brutal review of Holland's book. The list of blatant factual errors destroys faith in the work.
"He invents a German tank push to Bardia prior to the ‘dash to the wire’."
Top notch stuff. An important part of understanding the path to Normandy.
Another excellent presentation. Dr. Powell obviously has mastery of his subject and he’s very good at distilling and communicating the salient points. I certainly feel like I have a better understanding of the evolution of British close air support in the early/middle period of the war.
Lovely stuff from Matthew and Woody.
Another outstanding show, Woody and it was a pleasure to listen to Matthew’s incredible knowledge of the subject. 10/10.
Much appreciated!
Howdy folks! Interesting presentation on the development of RAF ground attack doctrine. Fascinating how tactical situations resulted in field solutions that became codified.
Three points about Collishaw:
First, he did not provide either close air support nor fighter cover for the troops. CAS was impossible because the communications and direction system didn't exist. CAS was impractical because of the aircraft that the RAF had available and their small numbers.
Second, his overwhelmingly important contribution was that he fought an *operational* air war. He concentrated his very limited resources to attack Italian airbase and to put them on the back foot. This indirectly freed the army from major Italian air attacks. It allowed him to pressure Italian supply lines from the Via Balbia to the ports. The was disproportionately effective because logistics were utterly key to war in the desert and the lines of communication were so restricted.
Finally, Collishaw was a master of improvisation, not a master of organization. Later air commanders probably would have failed if they had been thrown into the chaos of the start of the desert war, with almost no support structure behind them. What his replacements did was to build a robust, efficient support system for the fighting squadrons. The system for recovering crash-landed planes returning the to the Delta, repairing them, and returning them to the operational squadrons was an astounding accomplishment and more than made up for inadequate reinforcements. However competent Collishaw was, this was probably beyond his capabilities.
excellent presentation
I went to the university of portsmouth. Sadly i did politics for my degree so never got to have this lecture when i was there. Would have been amazing at the time.
I've read that divisions transferred from 8th Army to NW Europe felt that air support wasn't initially as good. Interesting to hear some reasons why. Great presentation.
(31:50) I think he forgot Claude Auchinleck. "Strafer" Gott too.
There are several outstanding historical podcasts on the interweb. I enjoy all of them. However, when I see Paul has published a cast I quit what I am watching and go to his podcasts.
Great presentation, though Mike Bechtold's work on Collishaw and the precursor to the WDAF is sorely missing here. They did a lot with the resources they had before the Luftwaffe arrived in strength in 1941.
I do sometimes wonder if the RAF missed a trick in 1940 from not having pursued further development of the Hawker Henley. Could a viable dive bomber have made a difference during the Battle of France? I realise of course that having a decent CAS aircraft means very little if you don’t have the doctrine or equipment to be able to employ it effectively.
3-C principle (Command, Control, Cooperation) is simple only on papers. You must spending enough time and resources for result. Germans had a huge exp. from 1936 (legion "Condor") and spent a lot of to improve their Air Force before the war, but Britain didn't have battle exp of close air support before 1939
USA only had the pvt P40 to offer for the time.
Churchill "Our most vital need is therefore the delivery at the earliest possible date of the largest possible number of Curtiss P-40 fighters."
page 86 The Burning Blue Addison and Crang
I have to disagree about US aircraft being ready due to changing course . None of there best aircraft were ready.in December 1941 . The P51 D really only Available in large numbers Mid1944 the main types of heavy bomber B17,,F or B24 later models Mid 1943 . Around the same time for the F6F and P47d . We had to lend the Americans Spitfires in 1943 to give them a better fighter than the P40 and P39
I didn't say they were totally ready, just that they had 2 years more to think about the issues. Certainly they had more time than DUKE nations
@@WW2TV The problem was that the isolationist movement was so strong that the government couldn't put the money into rearmament early enough . I think Roosevelt did as much as he dared but in late 1941 the US was not ready for a conflict and had to spend the next 2 years building their forces . They almost performed miracles in those 2 years and had learned quite a bit from arms tested from lend lease . You see it more in the Pacific because the first 6 months they had no answer to Japanese aggression ( nor did the British Empire ) Midway was to some extent good fortune and Guadacanal was very dicey . The fact that Marshall thought the allies could invade Europe earlier than 1944 , showed how unrealistic and inexperienced the US command was . All the more impressive was their response to their bad start .
Good points
their best aircraft
Churchill "Our most vital need is therefore the delivery at the earliest possible date of the largest possible number of Curtiss P-40 fighters."
page 86 The Burning Blue Addison and Crang
@@AnthonyBrown12324 The Two-Ocean Navy Act, also known as the Vinson-Walsh Act, was a United States law enacted on July 19, 1940
The Beatles suck