History, Politics And Current Affairs

Sorry about the brevity of this, I'm just nibbling away at this one really, and I had hoped myself there would be more by now- it's the first half of a chapter really.

Red Seas ch 3


'Right, settle down.' Major Peter West addressed his unruly crew of dangerous lunatics, sprawled on a variety of deckchairs and other camping furniture. Most of them were vaguely appropriately dressed, in bits and pieces of flying gear.

It was not that unusual a sight, and one the station commander, Colonel Lewis, quietly refused to do anything about. He was a decorated flier from the olden days, which were 1916 in aviation terms, and somewhere deep down still believed in the three week lifespan of the average RFC pilot.


It would be wrong to put words into his mouth like “oh, the tragic beauty of it all,”but essentially that was at the root of it. The three squadrons based out of RFC Bardney were knights of the air, champions of their nations- and ruthless, highly skilled technicians of murder.

Also, betimes, immature young men frantically driven to strange chances among the clouds, exalted and terrified at the same time- somehow, because he had been there himself, and was of an older generation, the colonel managed to grasp the illusion and reality both, and bring the two closer together.


No, it wasn't that, there were plenty who had been there and had chosen to forget, wilfully or from the horror of remembering. West could understand that part at least, although it was too soon to start looking back, because there was still more to come. Lewis was an excellent station commander, that was what it came down to.

He could give the pilots exactly what they needed at any given moment, whether they understood it or not, and shelter them from all sorts of Corps and Ministry nonsense that they didn't, for which West at least knew enough to be thankful.

Which was probably why the colonel had been landed with one of the hottest potatoes in Scout Command, elements of the not-quite-officially-incorporated Air Brigade of the King's German Legion.


West's 196 Squadron were the only English unit on the three squadron base, and they were English, not a man from the Celtic fringe or the colonies. No. 19 RCAF shared it with them, and they had more than enough oddities to make up for that- three Americans, two Brazilians, a Paraguayan, an Irishman, a Rhodesian and a London- born emigre Siberian.

Technically, they were air force rather than army, despite being a dominion they had followed the rest of the world in that; they were led by a squadron leader, a rank that sounded as if it really ought to belong in a circus, although it at least made more sense than staffelkapitan.


Squadron Leader Strawson didn't look like a fighter pilot, although at least the big, beefy outdoorsman hadn't actually been the lumberjack he did resemble.

He had been a cadet mountie in training for some sort of mad air- patrol scheme, decided he really liked flying and really didn't like the idea of crashlanding a hundred miles from anywhere in arctic wilderness, and signed up. God only knew how he managed to fit in a fighter cockpit.

The Germans didn't look as if they had that problem, they were the remains of their own cut-short attempt to build an air force, picked and chosen men rigorously selected, lean and ready. How committed were they, though, and to what?


196's veterans were a little dog eared by comparison, having experience of half a dozen brushfire wars between them, all the minor contre- temps of Empire. The unofficial clashes with the russians that were already being nicknamed the one and a halfth Crimean war, Tibet, Persia, Hong Kong, Ethiopia, Portugal, name it.

Now that it looked as if the war, proper, had begun, the royal flying corps was well geared up for it. Of course, there were still some bugs to be got out of the system.

West had not enjoyed trying to cram this bunch of cynically self- reliant freelancers back into Lieutenant-General Dowding's metropolitan control network, but the Colonel had been a tower of professional strength, training and teaching and explaining.


The base intelligence officer stood up, walked to the easel up on the raised platform, was stopped by the station commander raising a hand.

'We are not deliberately going back to the old tradition of the dawn patrol, but the Navy are being chivalrous, aiming to deliver their bombardment before the first shift begins at the factories, and we have been tasked by Division to cover them in case of emergency.

There may be a certain element of rivalry with the RNAS; no matter, it doesn't affect how you do your duty. We have a good mix of types, so you'll all be going over together, covering the battle squadron from 0700 to 0830, when second brigade should be there to relieve you.

I use the word 'should' advisedly. We all know how wrong things can go in war, and your defence against that is to use your eyes and your wits. Accept what help the controllers can give you, as you have been taught, but remember that they do not see as you see, and learn to use the best of both.


Major West, your Blizzards will be the high element of the brigade, primarily covering the rest against any organised fighter force.' That was no great surprise, that was exactly what the shiny new Martin- Baker fighters were for. Four cannon, long square-tipped wings, sleek, sharklike fuselage. High altitude, high speed.

'Staffelkapitan Galland, your Spitfires will be orbiting at medium altitude, and must be prepared to react as circumstances dictate.' The thin, oval- headed German nodded. The Spit was still the closest thing the RFC had to a completely ambidextrous fighter; a descendant of the Navy's armed racing seaplanes, agile, unbelievably graceful.

West had felt at first there was something wrong about giving them to Germans, but they were in good hands. Galland was a brilliant pilot, but more than that he was an inspiration. Indefatigable, that was the word.

If the situations were reversed, if Britain had been destroyed from within- perhaps by that frothing idiot Moseley and his thugs- West doubted that he would be remotely as credible a leader.

To command a band of warriors in exile, far from home and without roots, with hell behind, chaos ahead and nothing but a few thin sheds of civilised purpose to cling to- there were not many men in the royal flying corps who could carry that off. Colonel Lewis could, maybe. God save them all from ever having to try.


'Squadron Leader Strawson, torpedo and dive bombing is a low altitude business, so that's where your Hurricanes will have to be. We are aware of no great formations facing us, so any response is likely to be random and incoherent- which may give them the element of surprise. Eyes open for that.'

The Hurricane was a dwindling presence in scout command, serviceable and robust, but far behind the peak of performance now; good enough for blasting the likes of Italian and ex- Russian biplanes, or the remains of the interwar generation. They had an excellent turning circle, but that was because they were almost a hundred and fifty miles an hour slower than the Blizzard.

They were due for replacement really, Close Support Command would take all the ex- fighter Hurricanes they could get, strip out the machineguns and fit tank- busting light cannon to them, rocket and bomb racks and get some more use out of them. If there were enough to go round, they would be replaced with Spits, otherwise Hawker's new Tempest. Once the bugs were worked out.

The colonel sat down; he would have more to say at the end, but this was a straightforward reminder of what they were supposed to be doing. He handed over to the brigade intelligence officer.


'Aircraft identification.' The intelligence officer began. He had been a policeman in civil life- suffering from the supremely unfortunate name of Gerald Lestrade- and had almost torn the postman's arm off when the telegram came, activating him from the voulnteer reserve.

'We have more than enough variety to be getting on with on our own side, never mind the enemy.' Lestrade held up a foolscap- sized card with a silhouette on it. 'You should already know all the usual RNAS types, what's this?'

There were a few shouts, they really weren't the sorts to put a hand up like schoolboys. Most of them thought it was a Mosquito. 'Trick question. It's a russian light-medium bomber, Petlyakov PE2. It does have a tail turret, so if you mistake it for a Mossie on the day, you could get a nasty surprise. And a twin tail, so you've got no excuse.'


There were a few more like that. Lestrade added 'We know that the russians were exporting their castoffs- old biplanes and such. We know, thanks largely to the KGL, what the german aircraft industry had on the drawing board and in prototype form.

What is rather more worrying is that the russians now seem to be doing what we did in Spain- sending or selling their coming generation for what amount to live trials.

It is possible that you could face anything over there, from reactivated museum piece Eindekkers to Gourevitch's prototype rocket fighters. What is likely, their mainstay types, are these;' he held up a series of three three-view drawings of sleek monoplanes. 'Lavochkin radial engine fighter type 1, Yakovlev type 1, Bayern type 1.


'I know, not very imaginatively named, are they? The Lavochkin is apparently their best night and cold weather fighter, the Yakovlev looks almost like a Hurricane and is comparable to one of the late marks, and the Bayern design was one they got from cannibalising the remains of the german aircraft industry. The Fascist German air force would probably have been built around it.

In theory, our aircraft are faster, more agile, and better armed. The russian types are very simple, very reliable, and apparently quite hard to kill. They all seem to have been designed- the Bayern Works fighter redesigned- with armoured bombers in mind, they tend to carry a small number of heavy cannon, thirty and thirty- seven millimetre.

Devastating if they hit, but whether or not they can hit a fighter... as 196 knows, there are a few incidents that indicate generally not.' That got nervous laughter; West remembered one particular incident, in the 'Defence of Portugal', huge fat yellow-orange tracer flashing by his cockpit as if the sun was trying to kill him.


That had been a nasty little war; the coalition government had committed them to supporting the legitimate government of Spain, and a couple of months into the campaign had what amounted to a mutiny on it's hands as what had always been a random, amateurish war descended into squalid brutality and banditry.

Supporting the fascists had been unpalatable enough, anti- communist or not; there had been several cases of officers being activated from the reserve, for their parent regiment to find that they were unavailable because they had volunteered for the other side. Which had probably seemed like a good idea at the time, although from what they had heard, not for long afterwards..

The men on the ground, and in the air, were increasingly convinced that neither side had any claim to be fighting a just war; both seemed to regard atrocities as an end rather than even a means to an end, murder as a sport and torture as an art.

Before the situation could turn into something like the Curragh Camp all over again and become completely public, the ministry had come up with the legal fiction that they were there purely to defend Britain's oldest ally on the continent, and the naval base of Gibraltar, and withdrawn them accordingly. It had still left bad blood. Hadn't done Spain much good, either.


There was more about naval reconnaissance aircraft, a bewildering mixture of types from both sides- and the Bayern fighter and the Hurricane looked worryingly similar, too. 'What it amounts to,' Lestrade said, 'is check the markings. Not as easy as it sounds. The Russians use the red star, but the German People's Flying Force still hasn't quite made up it's mind.

Some of their verbande use a hammer and sickle, some of them use a red Maltese cross, some of them have a crude stencil of a fist- red of course- it's all very chaotic and revolutionary, but basically if it isn't a roundel, shoot it.'

The KGL used markings similar to the RFC, but replaced the blue in the outer ring and fin flash with good Teutonic black- it looked close enough that there was no great mental contortion involved in recognising them as being on 'their' side. Probably more mental contortion involved in actually doing it, in fact...


Colonel Lewis was on his feet again, and West held his breath. That was one thing about the colonel, he was notoriously far to the left by british army standards- believed in the brotherhood of man, pantheistic reincarnation and international policing or some such. Hard to say which was more shocking. How carefully was he going to tiptoe around the politics?

Not very carefully at all, it seemed. 'We have seen good and noble causes tainted and brought down by the low quality of the men who follow them, pointless, murderous causes which do not deserve the quality of the supporters they have. The world would be much simpler if it were the case, but good men do not automatically and always make wise choices, nor vice versa.

Some of the men you are going to fight undoubtedly believe themselves crusaders for a better world, and will do their utmost for it. Let us hope that there is an ex post facto effect; service in the better cause eventually moulds the better man.


Practically, you will be operating with an extension of the air control network, a radio-interference airship, which will be able to direct you. Ideally, the navy would even be willing to cooperate.'

That got a laugh, a nervous one admittedly. 'You have your routes and timings to the mouths of the Scheldt, fifteen minutes to take off. Study the intelligence material, ease your bowels, as appropriate. Good luck and good hunting.'