Originally Posted by
The B Word
The Envoy I, II and III designators were not the RAF’s - they were the manufacturer’s
. Airspeed made the AS6 Envoy I, the AS6D Envoy II and the AS6E/J/K Envoy III.
From
Wikipedia: "During May 1937, the
King's Flight took delivery of a single Envoy III as a replacement for a
de Havilland Dragon Rapide; this aircraft received the registration
G-AEXX and was painted in distinctive red and blue colours."
If we accept that No.32 (The Royal) Squadron is a direct descendant of the King's Flight, I can live with the choice of using the Envoy IV name. While a tenuous link, at least someone took the trouble to look at the history of the Squadron instead of just assigning something meaningless. I'm sure the type's job will be more of a diplomatic nature than is implied by it operating in the Royal Air Force.