THE COLD WAR
Recent military activity has involved our armed forces operating in areas far from home, including Iraq and Afghanistan, requiring them to maintain a mobile capability for deployment anywhere in the world. We forget that from 1961 when the Berlin Wall was erected, to 1989 when it was demolished, our armed forces prepared for a very different war; a static war over the whole of mainland Europe where NATO forces faced those of the USSR and its Eastern Bloc allies. As one side developed a capability, including nuclear weapons, it was quickly matched by the other until vast armies, navies and air forces faced each other across the borders of the western world from north to south.
This period of some thirty years after World War II was known as the Cold War, and many of the tales and anecdotes in this book are told by Air Force wives who were caught up in that confrontation as their husbands prepared to combat the very real threat posed by the Soviet Union.
This short explanation is important in order to understand much of the jargon and many of the abbreviations used in several of the stories. Two in particular stand out: QRA and Battle Flight. Quick Reaction Alert involved a small number of our aircraft being held at readiness, fully armed and fully manned by crews able to get airborne within minutes – the bombers to attack Soviet targets and the fighters to defend against Soviet bombers. Typically, aircraft on QRA had to be airborne within ten minutes. Battle Flight was the equivalent force in Germany held by the fighters but, because they were based only thirty-five miles from the East German border, they had to be airborne within five minutes.
QRA and Battle Flight usually involved two aircraft positioned in small hangarettes at the end of a runway. They were fully armed and ready to scramble instantly. The aircrew and groundcrew were normally on duty for twenty-four hours, and on Battle Flight the aircrew would sleep in their flying kit in order to maintain their five-minute state of readiness. Aircraft on both QRA and Battle Flight were scrambled almost daily throughout the Cold War in response to Soviet activity spotted on their side of the border. Although very necessary, QRA and Battle Flight placed a huge burden on the squadrons who held it, and was much disliked by aircrew and groundcrew alike (and by their wives whose husbands could disappear for days at a time). Spare a thought, therefore, for the Typhoon crews who continue to hold QRA in the Falklands today.
REFLECTIONS
Jill
It is easy to forget that when my husband joined the RAF in 1965 it was only twenty years since the end of the Second World War, and that when we were married three years later in 1968 the RAF was still very much a male-orientated club. Rank, privilege and status counted for everything and everyone was expected to toe the line without question or favour. Collecting and writing some of these tales has reminded me of the good times, the fun and the laughter we had as a family following ‘in the slipstream’ of the RAF. It was certainly a different era in those days, and RAF wives had to put up with a lot.
I never realised before getting married that I would not be able to follow my own career, that I would have to move house twenty-six times, that my children would have to go to boarding school, that I would be left on my own for weeks at a time, that my husband would be sent to war, that we would lose many good friends through aircraft accidents, and that I would be constantly on edge in case one day it might be my own husband. It always annoyed me that on every holiday my husband could not wait to get back to his squadron for fear of missing out on his beloved flying, and I really resented being referred to as ‘Wife of …’.
However, these things aside, we were given opportunities and experiences beyond the wildest dreams of most of our civilian friends, and I hope others find as much humour and pleasure in reading these stories as we did in putting them together.
Alison
Collating stories from friends and other RAF wives has been an interesting experience. It has awoken hitherto forgotten memories and made me reflect on my time as an RAF wife. Looking at our collection it would appear that we led a very privileged existence and a life full of tea and buns – nothing could be further from the truth, but like childbirth I think we have all managed to remember the glorious parts and forget the heartache, loneliness, irritation and fear that often accompanied our lives. Moving constantly, never living in your ‘own’ home, children in boarding school, far away from family, absent husbands on exercise or at war, no career, permanently changing jobs, a CV that most employers shuddered to see, leaving pets behind, all these played their part in our lives. But on the upside we had a very varied and interesting life, we saw places and did things that few others ever get the chance to, we made hundreds of acquaintances and some very special friends who supported us in the most bizarre range of emergencies, we developed independence, enjoyed a community spirit and, for the most part, we had fun.
My daughter and son-in-law are both in the RAF now, as a doctor and a pilot respectively. It has been refreshing to know that the professionalism, camaraderie, and fun still exist, but they are in a different Air Force. It is much smaller, the demands are different and both have been on active service from the outset of their careers. The patriarchal society we once enjoyed no longer exists. Life does not revolve around the ‘married patch’, most young people live in their own homes and commute, the Officers’ Mess is a shadow of its former self – you can’t even get a coffee from a machine there nowadays, let alone be served by an attentive steward. Young wives are likely to have their own career and may even be the primary earner; they do not follow blindly. Communications are infinitely better and it is more a job than the total way of life that we experienced.
However, they still need our help and the help of our wonderful RAF charities such as RAFA and The Benevolent Fund. My daughter experienced this first hand: husband in Afghanistan, she had to be on call for a month at Brize Norton with two hours’ notice to move to collect casualties from across the world, usually a minimum of a forty-eight-hour trip. Where do you live and who looks after the baby? Thankfully three charities have refurbished and fitted out a small number of surplus married quarters which were able to become our temporary home. Grannie, of course, had to do the baby sitting – the Royal Air Force still hasn’t quite recognised that its womenfolk may also be mothers!
During the time we were in Brize Norton, my daughter’s husband was due to return from his six-month tour in Afghanistan – sadly my daughter flew out to the same destination to collect a casualty the night before he landed, their flight paths probably crossed. On returning from war he was met not by his adoring wife but by his mother-in-law – the blow was softened a little as his baby son took his first steps and gave him a rapturous welcome.
Holly
It has been a privilege to have been involved in the compilation of these stories and to have read the personal memories of wives who were, without doubt, the supreme ‘camp followers’. Their tales give a fascinating glimpse into a social/military history, narrow in its field and generally not appreciated in the civilian world.
Readers might be surprised to find so much fun, frivolity and humour in these cameos, which cover the period from the 1950s onwards. Being able to see the lighter side of life, and actually living it, compensated for those inevitable periods of anxiety, stress and grief. This is a largely bygone era, when fortitude and the ‘get on with it’ spirit still prevailed. Life on a bleak airfield under the heavy cloud of the Cold War was not easy, while the difficulties of moving abroad, or simply living ‘behind the wire’, presented their own problems. These wives were the ultimate home-makers who could, at the drop of a hat, convert damp and dreary quarters into cosy homes for their husbands and children. It is hard to convey the atmosphere of those pre hi-tech days or to make comparisons with family life in the modern Royal Air Force. So much has changed over the past five or six decades.
As the manuscript of this book neared its completion, I was left wondering who had vacated all of those less-than-clean quarters, when it seems our writers had all handed theirs over in immaculate order!