Originally Posted by
Bismark
I think the RAF would fare better if they appeared more Joint in their thinking. Their problem is that their (Torpy) attitude is "if it flies it must be RAF".....relax chaps and do not feel constantly threatened by the other Services.
Embrace JHC, JHF, CVF, etc and you will find that you get more support from the other 2 Services. Drop the attitude that SAR is for the Air Force, Harriers must be flown by the Air Force (but look what 800 NAS are doing in Helmand), AH should really be flown by the Air Force, SH must be flown by the Air Force.
So why not start the New Year on a friendly note RAF, be more Joint and you may find you have more friends.
I know this is going to be a mistake but, hell, I'll bite! Of course the FAA and the AAC are skilled, capable and professional operators, but their operations are of necessity of a tactical nature and usually for the tactical needs of their parent service. The philosophy of the RAF is to use Air Power at that level as well, but also (and often with the same assets) at a strategic level. So when Dowding insisted that the RAF element of the BEF be withdrawn from France to the UK in 1940, to preserve it for the inevitable Battle of Britain, it was a Strategic decision at the expense of the Tactical needs of the Army, and not a popular decision amongst those making that bloody withdrawal. When Harris insisted that the 4-engined bomber force be used solely for the Strategic Bomber Offensive it caused great friction with the Royal Navy who wanted sustained attacks on the Kriegmarine's Bases and U-boat Pens, and he had to be ordered to switch the effort to Northern France for the tactical requirements of the Army before and after D-day. Both led to a bitterness between the three services that lasts to this day.
On the whole the Army's and the Navy's assets are their own, and neither has a great interest in interfering in the other's environment. The Air however is part of all military operations, and there is rarely a sufficiency of supply to meet the demand. The RAF has always to keep an eye on the strategic woods at the expense of the tactical trees. A lot of discussion is going on now re Typhoon. Very expensive in monetary, resource and manpower terms to ensure an Air Superiority that is not even threatened
at the moment!
So Joint is good, but only up to a point! The Luftwaffe was very joint, making the Wehrmacht's Blitzkrieg tactics seemingly unstoppable. But the lack of a Strategic Bomber Force later in the war meant that Soviet War Production could grow unmolested, churning out the thousands of T34s that would overwhelm that same Wehrmacht. The customer is not always right, and Air Power must be independent to be a war winner, which was what Trenchard intended when he founded the RAF in 1918, and which the present CAS has got to push now just as hard!
Rant ends, take cover, very heavy incoming!