Trafford Leigh-Mallory commanded the fighter squadrons of 12 Group and so was responsible for defending one of the large areas into which Britain had been divided by the new Fighter Command system. Leigh-Mallory’s Group, in central England, was vital for the defence but not so vital as 11 Group, which covered south-east England and London, a region which would undoubtedly bear the brunt of enemy attack, and which contained the greatest number of fighter squadrons.
In the spring of 1940, as the war began to heat up, Dowding changed his Group commanders. Many would have said that Leigh-Mallory, who had commanded 12 Group since 1937, must be a prime choice for command of the more vital 11 Group. Instead, Dowding assigned his SASO, Keith Park, to this command. If Leigh-Mallory felt himself slighted it is possible to understand why.
The separation of the RAF’s resources into specialised Commands was partly a response to the political atmosphere that Hitler’s aggressive speeches had generated. The senior ranks of the RAF remained convinced that Bomber Command was the key to victory, but after the Munich crisis the inadequacy of the defences gave some priorities to Fighter Command.
And the Munich crisis gave Dowding an importance that had not been foreseen by the Air Ministry. He was the Commander in Chief of a command that included not only the fighter squadrons but the control network, the balloon barrage (steel cables suspended from balloons to impede low-flying attackers) and anti-aircraft guns. Although technically the latter were under army orders, Dowding’s suggestions were never ignored. Now he pressed for money to be spent on the Observer Corps (volunteer skywatchers who reported aircraft movements across the whole of Great Britain). He also asked for Operations Rooms at all levels of Fighter Command and all-weather runways at the fighter airfields.
It was in this year of the Munich crisis that Dowding received the first of a series of official letters, terminating his service with the RAF, and then, at the last minute, extending his service. To what extent these letters were the result of muddle and inefficiency, and to what extent they were the work of cruel and spiteful rivals, is still argued. Certainly Dowding, a desiccated old widower, was totally devoid of charm and made no attempt to be diplomatic to men who questioned his judgments. Dowding showed an old-fashioned correctness when dealing with senior officers. They were all junior to him in both rank and service and many of them had once been his subordinates. That did not make their jobs easier. But such a man as Dowding could never deserve the years of uncertainty that the sackings and reinstatements caused, nor the final curt dismissal that told him to clear out of his office within 24 hours.
But Dowding was no paragon. Too often he resorted to caustic comments when a kind word of advice would have produced the same, or better, results. And it was during Dowding’s time that the RAF was equipped with the egregious Fairey Battle bombers and Boulton Paul Defiant fighters that were totally inadequate against the Luftwaffe. Dowding was the responsible officer when the R.101 airship flew to its doom. Dowding was too ready to defer to the advice of his specialists. He did not challenge the men who told him that self-sealing fuel tanks were too heavy for fighters (they showed him the calculations for crash-proof fuel tanks).
Dowding was indifferent to the boardroom politics of higher office, impatient and abrasive to men who failed to understand his reasoning. When he told an Air Ministry conference that he wanted bullet-proof glass for the Hurricanes and Spitfires, everyone laughed. ‘If Chicago gangsters can have bullet-proof glass in their cars I can’t see any reason why my pilots cannot have the same,’ he said, and was irritated by their laughter. He delegated authority readily and seldom interfered with subordinates he trusted. Not unreasonably – but unrealistically – he expected the same treatment by the men in the Ministry.
Although Dowding’s concern for the fighter pilots was central to every decision he made, he seldom met them or talked with them, believing that the presence of the Commander in Chief would merely provide an extra burden for them. But it is an attractive aspect of this reserved man’s character that his staunchest supporters should be low-ranking subordinates who worked at his HQ, including his personal assistants and his office staff.
Dowding understood men well enough to issue an order that his fighter squadron commanders could not continue in that job after reaching the age of 26. In the same way it was logical that his fighter pilots would take orders more readily from Sector Controllers who were experienced fighter pilots, and so many of them were. His icy logic was expressed in the order that German air crews descending over Britain were prospective prisoners and therefore must not be shot at, while RAF pilots parachuting were potential combatants, and therefore fair targets for German guns. What Dowding failed to understand is that although men might revere logic to the point of death, few revere it to the point of admitting their mistakes.
Captain Basil Liddell-Hart – whose theories of military strategy are often expressed in social terms – spoke of the importance of leaving your opponent a line of retreat. This Dowding failed to do. Perhaps his ethics would have considered such ‘scheming’ bad form. Bad form or not, he was to confront Churchill in such a way that he made an enemy of him, and so was deprived of Churchill’s aid at a time when he desperately needed it. The freedom Dowding gave his Commanders, and the high morale of his pilots, were the two greatest contributions to victory. Ironically it was these same two factors that brought Dowding’s downfall.
Flying Training
It would not be true to say that the Battle of Britain was decided by flying training. And yet it would not be very far from the truth. Just as the all-metal monoplane had to be created from scratch, so was the new sort of fighter pilot like no other aviator.
One of the worst set-backs suffered by the pre-war RAF was the repeated refusal of Mackenzie King, the Canadian Prime Minister – from 1935 onwards – to discuss the Empire Air Training Scheme. By denying the British government a chance even to submit their proposals, he was able to claim later that no peacetime training scheme was ever suggested to him. Australia and New Zealand had responded warmly. But in wartime these distant training schools would not be as useful as the relatively nearby Canadian ones. South Africa and Rhodesia were willing to assist the RAF but it was not until war began that any of the flying schools trained men other than their own nationals.
So in 1936 the British government announced the formation of the RAF Volunteer Reserve. It provided a chance for civilians aged between 18 and 25 to learn to fly at the tax-payer’s expense. These spare-time flyers were made sergeants. Weekend flying instruction was given by local flying schools (fees paid by the RAF), and there were compulsory evening classes in armament, signals and navigation.
University Air Squadrons were created for part-time training of student volunteers. Another source of spare-time air crews was the Auxiliary Air Force. Starting in 1926 with four squadrons, by 1939 twenty squadrons had been recruited from various districts and bore their names. There was 601 (County of London) Squadron, 610 (County of Chester) Squadron, from Yorkshire 609 (West Riding) Squadron and so on. By August 1940, one quarter of RAF fighter resources were AAF squadrons, although casualty replacements had brought many VR men and regulars into them.
In theory the AAF was to the RAF as the Territorial army was to the British army. These squadrons were essentially spare-time local formations with regional support. But no Territorial regiment wore bright scarves, and lined their jackets with red silk, as did so many of the AAF’s exclusively officer pilots. And none of the Territorial regiments had reputations to match that of the ‘millionaires’ squadron’ that was to carve such a name for itself during the Battle. At the outbreak of war the ‘millionaires’ were concerned about the prospect of petrol rationing and how it would affect their private transport. An officer was assigned to the task of buying petrol. He came back having bought a service station but announced that the pumps