One cannot fully understand the strategy of Bomber Command without looking at some "experimental" raids that went on in early 1942 following the introduction of the Lancaster. These raids include the precision daylight attack on the MAN factory in Augsburg when 7 out of 12 Lancasters were lost. This famous raid was folowed 3 weeks later by a precision low level night attack on the Heinkel factory in Warnemunde where 16 Lancasters (out of a force of 214 aircraft which also attacked Rostok) were directed to attack the factory from very low level between Z+ 50 mins and Z+ 60 mins - only 2 of 44 Sqn's Lancasters survived from this raid - four failed to return. Of the surviving aircraft, one attacked from a height of 70 ft! (the other was coned by searchlights and the pilot climbed when he was blinded by the light - he went round again and bombed from 2,500 ft which he considered much safer despite the intense flak). The Waddington aircraft each carried an extra navigator to act as a bomb aimer (in the early days, the Navigator left his seat to lay under the nose gunner to drop the bombs) so that the low level attack could take place without the navigator playing musical chairs (S/L Nettleton's surviving Lancaster from Augsburg used the same extra crew member).
No 44 Sqn from Waddington had lost 9 Lancasters from 12 sent out over a short period to attack precision targets which could only be done (at that time) at low level. There is little wonder at the lack of enthusiasm for precision attacks at Command after these experiments.