OP Reply - Small Apology
As the OP I’d like to say thanks all for the replies even if some did some of them did stretch credibility a bit.
I mean, female choosing FJ Pilot over Nimrod Crew.
As if.
Imagine the scene. Nimrod crew member and FJ Pilot vying for attention of very attractive lady.
She already knows what the FJ Pilot does because he told everyone within the first 30 seconds of meeting them and then spent the next 60 seconds explaining that he doesn’t have a rare facial birthmark it is the marks of his Oxygen mask, which he has to use because “I like to fly really high, don’t I”
She asks the Nimrod chap “What do you do in the RAF then”.
Nimrod God takes a small sip of his ice cold Chardonnay, looks into her eyes and says “I’m afraid what I do is so secret that even the Prime Minister does not know what it is. But because of our incredible endurance we stay up for absolute ages, making sure every position we find our self in is perfect, and that after the mission climax we can get back on task with a very short turnaround time”
Quick flash of the pearly whites and a suggestive wink and that’s it.
Job Jobbed.
But on a somewhat more serious note.
I am finding it slightly hard to articulate exactly what I mean but it is along these lines.
I’m thinking mainly of the Cold War years so no offense meant to any aircrew post 1990 or thereabouts
Air Defenders and the Strike/Recce groups obviously practiced their missions and at Spade had the privilege of seeing them in simulated action. As a young ScopeDope fresh out of training at Drayton having learnt about CRC/CRP’s, Type 84/85, Nodding Height Finders, UKADR etc.
I suddenly found myself having to learn what a ‘4 Ship FRA on Prior Lancey’ meant along with a whole crap load of new TLAs and Exercise names.
A10’s on CAS, Jags doing BAI, F4G Weasels doing SEAD and GR1s on OCA. Not to mention that F-111’s wanted to bomb various villages in Cumbria for some reason.
The Air Defenders were there as well. RAF F4s, USAF F15s and F16 on things like Mallet Blow.
And all of them lost aircrew at some point practising for what they all hoped would never come, but if it did come they would be the very best at the job they had to do.
But I think the point I was trying to make with ‘All but dropping the weapon’ was that the MPA fleet were practising against, for the most part, the actual Soviet Subs and Surface craft they would engage in War. And over the actual ‘ground’ they would be doing it over. The plans they made and missions they flew would require very little changes to go from ‘Track Target’ to ‘Engage Target’.
I know that is a simplification but I hope it makes sense and please correct me if I am wrong.
So when I said ‘A Silent War’ I meant it as no disrespect to any of the other Aircrew that flew the vast disparate types that hurled themselves all over Europe during that period.
Thinking about it I should give a nod to the Royal Navy Hunter-Killers and ASW types bit this an aviation forum after all and ANY RAF Aircrew trade would pull the lady before the Navy got a look in.
By the way I believe a poster thought I should have said ‘All but dropping a weapon’ instead of ‘the Weapon’. I think they felt I was implying a nuke but I wasn’t. The weapon could have been a Torpedo, depth charge etc.
Did MPA carry depth charges?
Have a good weekend all.