One further thing about Guy Gibson, we think of him as a Wing Commander, but I would suggest we are used to Wing Commanders nowadays being in their thirties and forties and with the maturity and judgement that age brings. Guy Gibson was 19 when he was flying Hampdens at the outbreak of war in 1939, he was 23 when he won the VC leading the Dams Raid, and 24 when he died. When I was that age I knew nothing, but thought I knew everything and I hadnt won the Victoria Cross. I think that we should not sit in judgement on a young man sixty years after his death no matter what his "faults" or perceived chracter defects.
Tony Fallows,
Swanwick ATC Centre