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Royal Air Force Historical Society Journal 46 ROYAL AIR FORCE HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL 46 2 The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the contributors concerned and are not necessarily those held by the Royal Air Force Historical Society. First published in the UK in 2009 by the Royal Air Force Historical Society All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing. ISSN 1361 4231 Printed by Windrush Group Windrush House Avenue Two Station Lane Witney OX28 4XW 3 ROYAL AIR FORCE HISTORICAL SOCIETY President Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Michael Beetham GCB CBE DFC AFC Vice-President Air Marshal Sir Frederick Sowrey KCB CBE AFC Committee Chairman Air Vice-Marshal N B Baldwin CB CBE FRAeS Vice-Chairman Group Captain J D Heron OBE Secretary Group Captain K J Dearman FRAeS Membership Secretary Dr Jack Dunham PhD CPsychol AMRAeS Treasurer J Boyes TD CA Members Air Commodore G R Pitchfork MBE BA FRAes *J S Cox Esq BA MA *Dr M A Fopp MA FMA FIMgt *Group Captain A J Byford MA MA RAF *Wing Commander P K Kendall BSc ARCS MA RAF Wing Commander C Cummings Editor & Publications Wing Commander C G Jefford MBE BA Manager *Ex Officio 4 CONTENTS OPENING ADDRESS – Air Chf Mshl Sir David Cousins 7 THE NORTHERN MEDITERRANEAN 1943-1945 by Wg 9 Cdr Andrew Brookes AIRBORNE FORCES IN THE NORTH MEDITERRANEAN 20 THEATRE OF OPERATIONS by Wg Cdr Colin Cummings DID ALLIED AIR INTERDICTION LIVE UP TO 37 EXPECTATIONS IN THE ITALIAN CAMPAIGN 1943- 1944? by Wg Cdr ‘Archie’ Spence MORNING Q&A 55 THE BALKAN AIR FORCE by Wg Cdr ‘Jeff’ Jefford 63 AIR POWER AND SPECIAL OPERATIONS: THE RAF 81 AND SPECIAL DUTIES IN YUGOSLAVIA, 1941-1945 by Dr Sebastian Ritchie THE RAF IN COUNTER-INSURGENCY WARFARE: 104 BRITISH INTERVENTION IN GREECE, 1944-45 by Sqn Ldr Alexander Zervoudakis and Dr Christina Goulter RAF REGIMENT NORTH MEDITERRANEAN 133 OPERATIONS 1943-1945 by Air Cdre M S Witherow SPECIAL DUTIES OPERATIONS – THE POLISH 147 DIMENSION by Wg Cdr Colin Cummings CLOSING REMARKS – Air Chf Mshl Sir David Cousins 160 THE AEGEAN CAMPAIGN – A PERSONAL 161 PERSPECTIVE by Tony Ross BOOK REVIEWS 173 5 SELECTED ABBREVIATIONS AA Anti-Aircraft AAA Anti-Aircraft Artillery AI Air Interdiction AK Armia Krajowa (Polish Home Army) AMP Air Member for Personnel AMT Air Member for Training CAS Close Air Support COS Chiefs of Staff DAF Desert Air Force DZ Dropping Zone EAM Ethniko Apeleftherotiko Metopo (National Liberation Front) ELAS Ellinikos Laïkos Apeleftherotikos Stratos (Greek People's Liberation Army) ELG Emergency Landing Ground FAC Forward Air Control(ler) FLOT Forward Line of Own Troops IAD Istrebitl’nyi Aviatsionnyi Diviziya KKE Kommounistikó Kómma Elládas (Greek Communist Party) LOC Lines of Communication LRDG Long Range Desert Group LZ Landing Zone MASAF Mediterranean Allied Strategic Air Forces MiD Mention in Dispatches OPLA Organosi Prostasias Laikoy Agona (Organisation for the Protection of the People’s Struggle; the acronym also means ‘weapons’) ORBAT Order of Battle OSS Office of Strategic Services PFF Pathfinder Force RCDS Royal College of Defence Studies SAF Strategic Air Force(s) SBS Special Boat Section (later Squadron, later still Service) SD Special Duties SIS Secret Intelligence Service SOE Special Operations Executive TAF Tactical Air Force(s) TNA The National Archives 6 THE SOFT UNDERBELLY (THE NORTHERN MEDITERRANEAN 1943-45) RAF MUSEUM, HENDON, 8 APRIL 2009 WELCOME ADDRESS BY THE SOCIETY’S CHAIRMAN Air Vice-Marshal Nigel Baldwin CB CBE FRAeS Ladies and gentlemen – good morning – good to see you all. As always, a sincere thank you to Dr Michael Fopp and his splendid staff here at the Museum. As I always say, we could not do without them. Before I introduce our Chairman for the day, a word about our title – The Soft Underbelly. While explaining, during a face-to-face meeting with Stalin in Moscow in August 1942, the attractions of a Mediterranean campaign, in the absence of a Second Front in the west that year, Churchill illustrated his concept by comparing Europe to a crocodile, which he sketched, with a soft underbelly. The image was so vivid and convenient that he subsequently used it elsewhere and it became permanently associated with the Prime Minister’s strategic overview. Our Chairman today, Air Chf Mshl Sir David Cousins, was a Lightning and Buccaneer pilot in his youth (and more importantly for us, was the Personal Staff Officer to our President Sir Michael Beetham during the Falklands War). He commanded Laarbruch in RAF Germany in the early 1980s which, at the time, was operating Tornados and Jaguars. Amongst other appointments he was Commandant of the RAF College at Cranwell, and SASO at HQ Strike Command. He completed his RAF career as AOCinC Personnel and Training Command and a member of Air Force Board as AMP. When he retired in 1998, he spent eight years as Controller and Chief Executive of the RAF Benevolent Fund, and in August last year he became the Honorary Air Commodore of No 7630 (Volunteer Reserve) Intelligence Squadron. So, with all that in his background, he must be well qualified to lead today’s seminar. Sir David, you have control. 7 OPENING ADDRESS Air Chf Mshl Sir David Cousins KCB AFC BA Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. It is a great privilege to chair today’s meeting. Having said that, I am very conscious that my credentials for doing so are pretty thin. Although I have been a member of this society for several years, my participation has been somewhat passive, and my only significant contribution to the Second World War was to have been born during it! But I am here today for two reasons. First, the persuasive powers of the Society’s Chairman, and secondly to my increasing interest in studying the campaigns of that war. The latter stems, at least in part, from hearing of the experiences of my father who had, in common with many others, what might be described as a pretty tough war. He was in the 2nd Battalion, Coldstream Guards and, as such, he fought in Tunisia and throughout the Italian campaign. It always seemed that the Guards Brigade was pitched against Germany’s best and, having sustained a very bad head wound at Cassino, he considered himself very lucky to have survived. Sadly, my father died early and I never had an opportunity to ask him many of the questions that I would love to ask him now – and, of course, to have told him how very proud I was of him. In the context of today’s seminar, therefore, it was interesting to find, when rummaging through one of those inevitable boxes in the attic the other day, some notes, made a few days after he had been trying to fight his way into Cassino. Here is a short extract which says: ‘Our next attack, on the 15th of March (this would have been 1944) was preceded by another terrific aerial bombardment by over 500 bombers. This attack lasted eight days and, when it was abandoned, our troops had suffered over 4,000 casualties (and it is, I think, sobering to reflect on that statistic in a modern context). The aerial bombing has proved a mixed blessing on this occasion. Undoubtedly it has caused great damage to the Germans but, morally and physically, it has made a shambles of Cassino. This shambles was an embarrassment to our side almost equal to the damage inflicted on the enemy. The town was impassable to tanks and several New Zealand tanks 8 Intensive bombing rendered Cassino town impassable to tanks. were stuck in the ruins and remained there as armoured pill boxes until we finally captured the town.’ Now I am quite sure, knowing my father, that this was less a criticism of air support than the candid, and immediate, observations of a beleaguered and very tired infantryman. But you can, I am sure, imagine the sort of questions that I would have liked to ask him now about what he said then. I do not, of course, expect to hear specific answers to my questions about Cassino, but I am quite sure that many other aspects of air operations in the Northern Mediterranean are going to be explored and that, by the end of the day, we shall all be the richer for that. 9 THE NORTHERN MEDITERRANEAN 1943-1945 Wg Cdr Andrew Brookes Having gained a degree from Leeds University, Andrew Brookes completed his flying training in 1968, subsequent tours providing experience on Victors, Canberras and Vulcans. He held appointments in Hong Kong, at HQ Strike Command, at the Greenham Common cruise missile base, with the Inspectorate of Flight Safety and the DS at Bracknell. He is currently the Aerospace Analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. He has written a dozen aviation books, his Air War Over Italy, for Ian Allan, being of particular note in the context of this seminar, Setting the Scene Today, the battle for the Northern Mediterranean is largely forgotten. Yet at its inception it was no sideshow. Chronologically, the invasion of Italy was a sequel to the conquest of Sicily, but in grand strategic terms the two events were widely separated. The fall of Sicily marked the end of the opening stage of the Second World War. The invasion of mainland Italy initiated a new, offensive phase which climaxed in the final defeat of Germany. Up to the fall of Rome in June 1944, the Mediterranean was the major theatre of Anglo- American war operations.
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