Chapter CLXI: A Season for Decisions Part 3
Chapter CLXI: A Season for Decisions Part 3.
A reasonable starting point for this chapter is the question 'What did the RAF actually mean by the designation General Reconnaissance'? It is sometimes defined as equivalent to a modern Maritime Patrol Aircraft and certainly it is correct that a General Reconnaissance (GR) squadron would be expected to conduct patrols over the seas, watch enemy ports, locate and track enemy shipping, attack them if possible and generally co-operate and co-ordinate with the Navy. However there is a reason the name was General Reconnaissance and not something more obviously naval or maritime related, and it was not just the institutional pettiness of the RAF leadership. In addition to their maritime duties the GR squadrons were also earmarked for supporting the "counter air offensive" against enemy land targets, this being one of the many euphemisms the Air Staff liked to use to describe the heavy bombing of enemy cities. The Air Staff generously allowed that this would only occur if the air threat to the country was greater than the seaborne threat and that this approach gave the RAF more flexibility and prevented aircraft sitting idle if certain threats didn't develop. The claim was that this meant fewer aircraft would be needed overall and so it was the 'fiscally efficient' option, a phrase carefully calculated to please the Treasury. Understandably the Admiralty were suspicious of this entire approach, correctly suspecting that as the Air Staff would be doing the assessment the scales would always be heavily weighted towards the aerial threat. It must be stressed though that the Admiralty were far from impartial on the subject as they had their own self-serving agenda, specifically they wanted Coastal Command transferred to them as happened with the Fleet Air Arm (FAA), though they would be prepared to compromise on just getting operational and planning control. The Air Staff were well aware of this scheme, the Admiralty were very open in their campaigning and had their tails up after the success with the FAA, and were not taking it well. The RAF leadership of the time were institutionally insecure at the best of times, the only reason their response cannot be called paranoid is that paranoia is by definition unjustified and in this case the Admiralty was genuinely trying to take another chunk out of them. It should also be said the Admiralty's arguments were broadly correct, the RAF had a dim view of all maritime operations and Coastal Command (and Coastal Area before it) had been neglected both in terms of funding but also planning and doctrine. The Air Staff started from the position that properly applied strategic air power would win any future war long before the navy could do anything significant, a belief that had been somewhat shaken by the Abyssinian War as the Bomber Barons realised that politicians would not 'fall in line' and approve such a campaign. Their fall back position was that if a longer term economic warfare plan was pursued then systematic bombing and aerial mining of the enemies ports would be far more efficient than trying to establish a blockade or hunting down ships at sea. This was in line with the new 'precision' bombing doctrine that the RAF was developing with the Lindemann Committee, as we saw in Chapter CXLIX, so had a degree of official approval from Committee of Imperial Defence (CID) which was generally in favour of economic warfare as this was believed to play to Britain's strengths. Had the Air Staff stopped there then things would have been relatively straightforward, however there was the matter of coastal defence, the approved catch-all phrase for stopping an enemy bombarding the coast or even launching an invasion. This was a mission all the services had an interest in, perhaps in part because they believed it important but mostly because politicians believed it was important and so kept it well funded. The Army had control of the coastal defence guns, which we shall consider in a future chapter, the Navy argued for a strong Home Fleet and a series of local squadrons and flotillas along the east and south coasts, while the RAF maintained that airpower was obviously the best way to sink any enemy shipping. Unsurprisingly this was a very contested position, made complicated by how the Air Staff approached it.
A Vickers Vildebeest from No.22 squadron conducting a torpedo drop during a training exercise, clearly showing the very low altitude flying required. No.22 Squadron had technically served in the Abyssinian War, operating patrols out of first Gibraltar and then RAF Aboukir in Egypt. Perhaps fortunately for the crews they were never called upon to make a torpedo attack on the enemy, the massacre of the Spanish Republican Vildebeests showed how vulnerable the design was to even biplane fighters. This experience would have hastened the development of a replacement, but for the fact it was already a high priority within the Air Ministry. Until a replacement was available the Vildebeests would soldier on both in the Home Squadrons and the Far Eastern squadrons based out of Singapore.
Given the above it could be concluded that the RAF had neglected the anti-shipping mission, but this is to miss the subtle difference. Specifically dedicated aircraft had indeed been neglected in favour of multi-purpose designs, however the capability had not been ignored and could be found even in the main bomber force. The B.12/36 heavy bomber specification we looked in an previous chapter included the requirement that one permutation of it's 14,000lb bomb load be seven 2,000lb armour piercing bombs. After a brief dalliance with an 'all small bomb' policy by the mid-1930s the 2,000lb bomb was the Air Staff's weapon of choice against warships. Designed around a thick all forged steel casing testing had shown the 2,000lb AP could punch through seven inches of naval armour, far more deck armour than any battleship in service or even planned possessed. However, as we have seen the Admiralty took a dim view of the ability of level bombers to hit capital ships, particularly ones which were actually moving and firing back, especially from the relatively high altitude the bomb would have to be dropped from to achieve such impressive armour penetration. The RAF kept faith with the weapon and argued the new bombsights and tactics being developed would dramatically increase accuracy even against well defended moving targets, however for inter-service argument terms they were forced to accept it was not an effective anti-shipping option. The Admiralty also dismissed the Air Staff's latest invention, the buoyant bomb, and while the FAA had a dive bomber in service the RAF was still arguing about whether to specify one, as we shall see later. This left the torpedo, where once again we can see the Air Staff's distinctive approach to maritime warfare; the dedicated torpedo squadrons were in a bad shape with obsolete aircraft, yet their next general purpose 'world wide use' bomber had been specified with a torpedo carrying capability. This was not a minor concession, a standard 18" air-launched torpedo was lighter than a 2,000lb AP bomb but 50% longer and had a wider diameter. Bombers were designed around their bomb bays and the bomb bay shape was defined by the size of the torpedo, it was little exaggeration to say the next generation of RAF bombers would have been built around the anti-ship mission.
A brief discussion on the torpedoes themselves would be of value at this stage, starting with the point that the air-launched torpedo was a distinct weapon from it's ship or submarine launched brethren. The obvious difference was size, the air launched weapons were a nominal 18" diameter and half the mass of the heavyweight 21" weapons the surface and sub-surface fleets used, resulting in them having a warhead half the size while also being slightly slower and shorter ranged. The more serious difference was that the air-launched torpedo could withstand being dropped from an aircraft and not only still function but then run at the correct depth and in the direction it had been launched. This may seem a trivial point, however it was remarkably difficult to achieve in practice particularly if you wanted to drop from anything above wave top level at any reasonable speed. An air launched torpedo required considerable internal stiffening and reinforcement, special tail units and eventually cable drum units in the launching aircraft to ensure the torpedo launched and entered the water at the correct angle. The summer of 1937 had seen the Mark XII 18" torpedo enter service which increased the maximum drop speed and altitude to 180mph and 70ft respectively, though this was with a 'tolerable' level of failure. For the FAA's torpedo biplanes these were perfectly acceptable numbers, most of them could barely do 180mph in a dive and the crews were trained to fly at wavetop height. The problem came from the RAF side as most of the aircraft they wanted to use were far faster even at cruising speed, slightly more seriously they had been expecting a 200ft dropping height for torpedoes. This was not based on any technical requirement but a concern about the ability of 'general purpose' bomber crews to fly and fight at such low altitudes; removing the need for low level training would get the Air Staff one step closer to eliminating dedicated torpedo bomber squadrons. As torpedoes were a naval weapon the Admiralty had full control over design and production, however the Air Staff had learnt from previous experiences so invoked the threat of the Ministry of Defence Co-ordination, suggesting that as torpedoes were a joint weapon shared by the two services a co-ordinated approach might be appropriate. Keen to avoid outside interference, and begrudgingly accepting the point, the Admiralty agreed that they would prioritise a significant increase in acceptable dropping speed and altitude in the Mk.XIV torpedo they had just stared development on for their own new torpedo bomber. In passing it is interesting to see some superstitions were observed and there would be no Mk.XIII torpedo of any size produced or even designed. The wider significance of this clash was the Air Staff engaging with the new attitude of inter-service 'co-operation' and starting to play the necessary political games rather than just trying to argue their needs were more important. On the less positive side is the fact that such games were still necessary and the unfortunate reality that the main grease for the wheels of inter-service co-operation was the threat of getting politicians or the MoDC involved and not any actual commitment to joint efforts.
A cut-away labelled schematic of a B. 250lb Mk.IV, also know as the Buoyant Bomb. The theory was simple, the bomb would be dropped in the path of the target, sink down 50ft or so, arm it's fuse and then rise back up, hopefully hitting a ship's hull on the way, if not the buoyancy chamber would slowly flood and the bomb would sink back down to the depths. The bomb itself had taken a decade of development work to produce and in practice was not without drawbacks, most notably it needed to be dropped in large numbers if a tight pattern to have any chance of hitting anything, though when one did hit it was devastating and would easily break the back of most ships despite it's relatively low weight. It was soon noted that if you had a squadron that could fly in tight formation, at low level, and launch all at the same time then they would also be capable of making a devastating torpedo attack. As a torpedo attack was a well understood and proven technique it was unclear what the practical advantage of the 'B-Bomb' was. Development work would continue but the Air Staff were never able to dispel the suspicion that the project's main aim was to avoid needing to procure any torpedo capable bombers rather than producing a serious weapon.
The project we are considering began in late 1935 with the issue of M.15/35, a specification for a multi-role aircraft capable of both torpedo bombing and reconnaissance work, though inevitably a level bombing requirement was soon added. Why the bombing requirement had not been included at the start is somewhat unclear, though it was most likely a gesture towards their critics (not least the Admiralty) that they were taking the maritime mission seriously, if so it fooled no-one. It is sometimes claimed the usual processes were disrupted by the Abyssinian War, which is true but the disruption started during the preceding 'Crisis' phase when reinforcements were rushed to the Mediterranean Theatre. Amongst the aerial assets sent out were the UK based torpedo bomber and GR squadrons and even during the pre-war 'show of force' patrols the problems with their aircraft soon became apparent. The obsolescence of the biplane Vickers Vildebeests was obvious, but as we have seen the brand new Avro Ansons of the GR squadrons also disappointed even if they did prove capable of carrying out the reconnaissance mission once at war. Consequently the new designs were ordered off the drawing board in the spring of 1936, the Air Ministry agreeing there was no need to wait for formal post-war 'lessons learnt' to confirm the urgent need to re-equip Coastal Command. To somewhat mitigate the risks of this the Ministry selected two designs, the Bristol Beaufort was a development of the proven Blenheim which was felt to make it lower risk, while the Blackburn Botha was a fresh design but it came from a company with experience of naval aircraft. Assuming a typical 18 month period for the first aircraft the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE) should have been starting testing on the new types in the autumn of 1937, however the Air Staff had proven fundamentally unable to stop fiddling with the specifications and thus both were badly late, albeit for different reasons. The Botha suffered due to the many changes made to try and turn it into a medium bomber; a high cruising speed at altitude was required, the nose redesigned to improve bomb aiming over 'strategic' targets and an ungainly dorsal turret was added with a dedicated gunner, increasing weight and compromising the aerodynamics. The demand for greater speed on a heavier aircraft had prompted Blackburn to request higher power engines be made available, however this would result in yet more delay on an already late 'urgent' project. The Beaufort in contrast had a far simple life, while it was not quite the simple modification that the Air Ministry had envisaged it had proven relatively straightforward to stretch the Blenheim to fit in both a fourth crew member (the dedicated radio operator that the RAF felt the reconnaissance mission required) and an internal torpedo. Unfortunately Bristol had come to the same conclusion as Blackburn, the specified Bristol Perseus engines were far too under-powered for the now much larger aircraft and had requested an engine change. Worse their proposed change, swapping in the slightly larger Taurus engine, was now impossible as the Ministry had just officially killed that engine.
At this point the Admiralty entered the picture as the FAA were also working on a new torpedo bomber, having issued a new specification to industry earlier in the year. The details were heavily tied up in ongoing Admiralty arguments about carrier doctrine, detection and the value, or otherwise, of multi-role aircraft, so we will be looking at S.24/37 and the resulting aircraft in the context of those discussions in a later chapter. The relevance for our current purposes is that the FAA were also looking for a torpedo bomber with reconnaissance capabilities and to many in government that was seen as broadly similar to what the RAF were looking for in their new aircraft. Given the issues around the RAF's efforts outlined above there were voices in the Treasury, and to some extent the MoDC and CID, that argued for a common aircraft focused on the FAA's effort. On first glance this seems implausible as the specifications were wildly different, the FAA wanted a single engined small aircraft while the RAF was looking at a twin engine medium bomber sized design. However it is a fact of procurement that most politicians merely saw numbers of aircraft and did not enquire too deeply (or at all) about the details, making it a more feasible option than the facts would suggest. Thus this political idea was revised by the CID into the more practical suggestion of once again splitting apart the GR and torpedo roles that the Air Staff had combined, so the torpedo bomber squadrons could use the new FAA aircraft while the GR squadrons could get a dedicated machine. A joint procurement would get the benefits of scale for the torpedo bomber as the two small service specific orders combined would make one worthwhile order, while if the GR machine could be based off an existing light bomber and benefit from the scale there, so the industrial logic was sound enough. The long standing RAF habit of giving the FAA 'navalised' version of their own aircraft was cited as a precedent, the Admiralty doubtless enjoying being able to use this practice against the Air Force. Naturally the Air Staff were opposed to the entire concept for reasons far beyond just the practicalities, in particular they feared any "joint" project would actually result in the land based torpedo bombers all being Naval Air Squadrons under Admiralty control. At the political level the Air Ministry was also opposed, cancelling both aircraft after the orders had been placed would throw into question many of the measures that Air Minister Churchill had implemented to 'speed up' procurement and his rush to scrap the biplanes. Even those senior civil servants who took the pragmatic view that taking the blame was the main purpose of a Minister were opposed, because the cancellations would be expensive (Blackburn were building a new factory just to meet the order, so would be due compensation) and so attract unwanted Treasury and political attention. There was therefore considerable pressure with the Air Ministry that the proposal be resisted and the Beaufort and Botha not fail, or more precisely not be seen to fail.
A Handley Page Hampden having just taken off from the Handley Page factory at Radlett, passing an LMS Garratt pulled coal train on the mainline. The Arctic Hampdens of the Royal Canadian Air Force had been modified to be torpedo capable, somewhat crudely as it required the bomb bay doors to be fixed open but even with that extra drag it was still almost 100mph faster than a Vickers Vildebeest. It was suggested that if the Botha and Buckingham were cancelled some of the RAF's Hampdens could be similarly converted to provide an interim capability, until the joint FAA torpedo bomber was ready. The Bomber Barons had already 'lost' several squadrons of bombers to Strike Command and so would bitterly resist losing any of their Hampden squadrons.
There was also an Imperial and indeed international dimension to the matter. While the effect of this should not be overstated, domestic defence priorities still dominated, the Dominions actually attending and engaging with the CID was having an impact. The government's shift of focus away from Europe and towards 'Far Eastern Imperial Defence' also raised the importance of Dominion considerations; Canada, Australia and New Zealand were far more concerned about the Japanese threat than anything in Europe and as we have seen all had aircraft and support deployed to Singapore. Starting with Australia the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) was very interested in the Beaufort as an interim aircraft until their domestic Vickers Wellingtons came off the production line, a date which kept on slipping as the challenges involved became apparent. Despite some exceptionally optimistic voices calling for Australian production of the type the Lyons Administration had decided that the Hurricane and Wellington factories were already close to over-stretching Australian industry. Entire new industries and production lines were having to be established and supported, none of which was proving as straightforward as the politicians and aviation industry backers had believed. There was also the matter of balancing the economy, as in Britain the Department of the Treasury was raising concerns about the impact of the defence programme on the Australian economy. The concern was not particularly the spending (though no Treasury in any nation was ever entirely happy with spending) but the bottlenecks and sector specific shortages as a large number of projects chased after a small pool of specialist resources and manpower. Trying to build yet another aircraft type, with a different construction method and completely different engine, would just make this much worse and start to seriously impact the civilian economy. The RAAF had already acquired a batch of 40 Bristol Blenheim light bombers to serve in the GR role and acquiring the Bristol Beauforts for the torpedo role would allow for a degree of commonality in training and maintenance. This acquisition would 'just' take money and with the ongoing export boom this was something Australia could more easily afford than disrupting the wider economy.
The position of the Canadian government and the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) was somewhat different as the Canadian economy could support an additional aircraft production line without undue stress or impact elsewhere. The larger population and larger industrial economy helped but so did the 'brain gain', the steady flow of American engineers and designers drawn across the border to work by the steady work and good salaries offered by the Canadian aeronautical industry. Given the later panics over this it is interesting to note that, to the extent anyone in the US government or industrial circles was aware at all, this was viewed as a benign if not positive trend; American staff getting experience and 'trained up' at the expense of others, the unspoken but incorrect assumption being that said staff would later 'come home' and bring that knowledge and training back to the US. One trend that had been noticed was the inability of any US firms to get involved with the RCAF rearmament schemes or even win any significant sub-contracts. Despite a faction of the Canadian government still being in favour of this outcome, a mix of British pressure and steep tariffs pushed US manufacturers to the bottom of the list. Canada could have added a defence exemption to the tariffs, and many US firms spent large sums lobbying for this outcome, but even if the Canadian government would have been prepared to 'blow up' Imperial Preference and defy the still brand new Imperial Trade Council they would not do so unilaterally. Had the US been offering some meaningful and significant tariff exemptions of their own then Imperial unity may have been tested, but fortunately for the Imperial Trade Council the US State Department remained committed to a unique vision of free trade where everyone else dropped their tariffs while the US didn't. Consequently when the Canadian government decided to put together a second aircraft producing consortium (the Canadian Vickers lead CAA were still working away on the Wellington Project) this too would be led by the Canadian arm of the relevant British manufacturer, the question was which manufacturer? The Canadian government remained focused on the maritime reconnaissance mission, looking for modern planes that could patrol and protect Canada's considerable coastlines on the Atlantic and Pacific. The RCAF Air Staff did not disagree with this priority but were agitating for a multi-role design, one which could perform maritime reconnaissance but was also able to attack anything it found. In the background lurked the Japanese threat and Singapore, just a pair of fighter squadrons had given the RCAF an importance and profile they had not previously enjoyed. A GR/torpedo bomber squadron or two would give RCAF Singapore a real offensive punch and raise their domestic and Imperial profile still higher, perhaps higher than the RAAF detachment in Singapore with whom there was a very real undeclared rivalry. The Canadian government were concerned this was exactly the sort of slippery slope they had been trying to avoid, but conceded the financial and logistical logic of combining the GR and torpedo squadrons was tempting. While the Beaufort or Blackburn ticked the box perfectly there was an alternative; the Handley Page 'Fat' Hampden. As we have seen an interim torpedo carrying variant of the Hampden already existed but Handley Page had not been content with that, they had been one of the losing tenders for the M.15 specification that produced the Beaufort/Botha and so they had a paper design for a fully torpedo capable aircraft ready. Marginally longer and significantly wider than the original, hence why it was the 'Fat' Hampden in contrast to the famously thin fuselage standard Hampden, on paper this was an equally acceptable option which also had considerable logistical commonality with the Arctic Hampden soon to enter service. Handley Page were prepared to set up a new Canadian factory to allow local production and were proposing an engine swap to the Merlins used in the Snow Hurricanes, partly to ensure the larger Hampden maintained performance but also to head off concerns about the performance of the Napier Daggers in the tropics.
A contemporary cut-away drawing of the Bristol Beaufort as printed in The Aeroplane magazine. The torpedo is drawn to scale, clearly showing why the bomb bay and thus the bomber had to be designed around its considerable length. The dedicated radio operator position was a matter of technology as much as doctrine, voice communication (R/T, Radio Telegraphy) had a range of perhaps 35 to 40 miles which was far too short for reconnaissance work, in contrast morse code (W/T Wireless Telegraphy) was good for 500 miles or more. The other role of the radio operator was operating the D/F (Direction Finding) equipment, the un-numbered teardrop shaped item above his head was a D/F loop aerial inside an aerodynamic fairing. From this bearings could be taken from radio beacons, allowing the radio operator to determine the aircraft's location.
On a purely design level the Air Staff technical staff had no issue with the 'Fat' Hampden, indeed doctrinally it had much to recommend it as the larger body would give it more capacity when serving as a level bomber. The concern was capacity, Handley Page did not have a large design staff and the firm was busy working on both the existing Hampden variants and the more important P.13 medium bomber, hence there were grave doubts the firm could manage any work on another major re-design, let alone support setting up an overseas subsidiary and production facility. The Air Staff wanted them busty churning out medium bombers to modernise and fill out the ranks of Bomber Command, too many bomber squadrons were still equipped with biplane Hawker Hinds or worse. The Air Ministry's decision was simple if somewhat risky, the Beaufort would get a new engine but it would be the Hercules not the cancelled Taurus and Bristol's airframe division were instructed to make the re-design a high priority. As we have seen the Hercules was still under development itself and projected to be at least 50% more powerful than the Perseus engines the Beaufort had been designed around originally, the Air Staff were hoping both that the engine worked and that it would not prove too powerful for the airframe. For inter-departmental purposes however the Air Ministry downplayed those risks and used the Dominion interest in the design to enlist the CID's support in killing off any idea of a 'joint' future torpedo bomber. This left the question of the short term impacts, because if the Beaufort was to be a higher priority then something else would have to be lower. The selected victim was the Blenheim Mk.IV, a substantially improved version of the original Blenheim including a longer nose for better navigator visibility, much larger fuel tanks for longer range and the new 100 octane capable Mercury Mk.XV engines. A first prototype was being tested and was flying well, but as always work would be needed to make the design ready for mass production and it was this work that would slip. In the interim the Blenheim Mk.I would remain in production, both for the RAF and for the large numbers of overseas buyers from Finland to Turkey for whom it was arguably the better choice. As we have seen 100 Octane was only available in limited quantities from limited sources so sticking with the Mk.I meant existing supplies and stockpiles of standard fuel could be used, a considerable plus for smaller air forces and indeed for the more remote RAF squadrons, such as those on the North West Frontier with RAF India that did not need absolute maximum performance. The Blenheim Mk.IV would eventually see production later in the decade, serving in the strategic reconnaissance squadrons and finding a niche as a night fighter
The Blackburn Botha prototype, the distinctive 'high wing' profile is clear as is the terribly misshapen dorsal turret just aft of the wing. There is a somewhat notorious quote that is attributed to many test pilots and aircraft "Gaining access to the cockpit is difficult. It should be made impossible". Whether it was first said about the Botha or not is unclear, but the fact it is such a favoured candidate is very telling about the aircraft and it's reputation. While possessing the usual Blackburn robustness and structural strength, it was badly underpowered, had stability issues and the high wing and engine mounting restricted visibility anywhere other than straight ahead, which was unfortunate in a reconnaissance aircraft. Poor as these features were the combination was lethal, should an engine fail the aircraft was unable to maintain altitude on the remaining engine, while the turret blocked the airflow to the tail fin and rudder so the aircraft became uncontrollable.
In contrast to the depth of effort and thinking put into the decision to proceed with Beaufort, very little appears to have been expended on thinking about the Botha. Officially it remained the backup and some efforts were made to deal with the power issue that Blackburn had highlighted, the design was allocated the improved 100 octane fuelled Perseus engines. Unfortunately the extra 80 odd HP in the new engines didn't even compensate for the extra weight and drag of the Air Staff's changes, let alone address the underlying problem. This could have been justified as a minimal change decision to avoid delay, switching to the latest model of Perseus engine kept the engine the same size and weight, so avoided any need to look at the structural design or re-do any other aspect of the design. However with Blackburn were busy on other projects, the majority of which were deemed a higher priority, work on the Botha slipped considerably and while a prototype (technically the first production aircraft) was produced it wasn't until near the end of the decade. The initial, very unfavourable, flight test reports, along with other aircraft already being in service, were used as justification to cancel the large scale orders that had been made. This is somewhat suspicious as while some of the problems may have come as a surprise, the key issues around lack of power and poor visibility had been apparent since the mockup stage, yet apparently only became serious enough to justify a cancellation much later. The contractual and commercial issues around cancellation that the Air Ministry had raised proved to be relatively simple to resolve, Blackburn were paid the standard development fees for the prototype and the new factory was given other aircraft to work on along with compensation for the few items that had been stockpiled for Botha production that could not be re-used or re-cycled. It is likely there was an element of carrot and stick to this, the Air Ministry agreeing to a bit more compensation than was perhaps strictly necessary while also making it clear that Blackburn's continued membership of 'The Ring' of approved suppliers depended on them not making a fuss about the changes. The truth of the matter appears to be that the Botha survived to reach prototype because it was less politically costly to cancel a failed prototype after a poor flight test than cancel it early and admit a mistake had been made in ordering off the drawing board. From this perspective the Air Ministry approach to the Botha was not a missed opportunity to fundamentally re-design it into a decent aircraft, but a carefully managed plan to minimise the political cost of the mistake of ordering it by delaying things long enough that they had some acceptable reasons to cancel it. This does point to an underlying issue with the Air Ministry's approach to risk, while it was internally accepted that some designs would fail and not every decision would be correct (particularly ones made under the accelerated approach championed by Churchill), the political and media culture was rarely as tolerant. In the scheme of things the Botha was a relatively low profile affair, our next subject was the subject of far more attention.
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Notes:
There is a lot in this one but I think it is all relevant, the plans to draft the GR squadrons of Coastal Command were OTL for the period as was the Admiralty lusting after a take over. In 1940 they got Operational command of Coastal Command and the RAF only kept overall ownership because it was thought a transfer would be too disruptive, it was a vicious debate in the 30s.
The B-Bomb is OTL and worked well in the lab and in trials, but was just too fiddly to deploy and never worked in action before being abandoned mid-war. The RAF did hate the the maritime mission while also including anti-ship AP bomb and torpedo capability in many aircraft. It was seemingly contradictory but I think was a "This is pointless, but if you insist on doing it then we can do it best" attitude. Couldn't fit it in but another issue with the 2,000lb AP bomb was it contained very little explosive, the case was so thick and heavy (to get that massive armour penetration) there wasn't much space left for any explosives.
The British torpedo establishment was a mess of competing fiefdoms; the Admiralty did control the weapon, but the FAA and RAF had parallel training and testing organisations. It is tempting to call this inefficient, because it was, but it also avoided the problems the US had with it's torpedoes as the RAF had every incentive to find fault with them. That said it was far from perfect as the RAF mix up over dropping height/speed shows.
OTL the Beaufort never worked because it was stuck with the awful Taurus engines, here it skips straight to Hercules so will be fine. Australia got a licence in OTL and built them as the DAP Beaufort, while Canada got a licence for the Bristol Bolingbroke (which is almost the same as the Blenheim Mk.IV but without the new engine). The details are far more complex than that, the RAAF tied themselves in knots trying to pick a bomber and the RCAF were frankly worryingly obsessed with recon aircraft, but those are not our rabbit holes to probe too deeply. In any event in Butterfly that all gets shaken up a bit, so Australia just buys them in while Canada goes for the more flexible Beauforts but with British contractors and not US Fairchild. The Bolingbroke effectively never exists outside a proposal, getting killed so Bristol have more time for other stuff.
The Botha frankly should have been killed but got swept up in the general "Build loads of stuff, we need numbers" re-armament effort. That the Botha was a better level bomber probably helped convince the Air Staff to keep it alive, or at least it could have been a better bomber but all the problems listed are OTL. It probably was saveable, a proper (or removed) dorsal turret and Hercules engines might have made it an average(ish) design, but there are other priorities and the Air Staff are making mistakes and politically motivated decisions, so it sadly lives to at least be a prototype.
This chapter could have included some background detail on radios, W/T, Medium frequency vs high frequency, aerial design theory and transmission/reception ranges, but luckily it didn't. However I hope the short blurb explains enough of this, certainly I had often wondered about the seemingly strange radio or morse code fit outs of RAF and FAA aircraft and understanding the technical limitations of the technology at the time made it all much clearer to me.
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