Chapter 28

Planning for Peace.

While the Committee on the Composition of Air Crew had concentrated on what changes might usefully be made to air crew categories for the remainder of the war, it had also given some consideration to longer-term arrangements (see Chapter 27). The Douglas Committee had not been set up in isolation, however, and several other bodies had been working on a number of closely related, topics at much the same time. Among these were: the Post-War Manning Committee and the Committee on Post-War Personnel Reserves, both of which were chaired by DGM, AVM J W Cordingley; Air Mshl Sir Roderic Hill’s committee to determine the Future of the Technical Branch and a committee, chaired by Air Mshl Sir Philip Babington, to decide the RAF’s Future Administrative Requirements.

All of this activity was prompted by the realisation that in 1946, just as it had had to do in 1919, the RAF would have to deal with massive demobilisation and reorganise itself on a peacetime basis. One lesson that had been learned from WW I was that the national economy, which would be in the throes of switching from a wartime to a peacetime footing, with all that that implied in terms of cancelled military contracts, would be unable to absorb several million men overnight. To avoid creating mass unemployment, demobilisation was to be done in phases with release dates being broadly decided on a ‘first in, first out’ basis with priority being given to older personnel.

While the government’s imposition of this formula had settled the demobilisation issue, the RAF had to find its own solutions to the problems of internal reorganisation. While the questions that had to be answered in 1946 were much the same as those of 1919, the circumstances in which they were being asked were very different. The Armistice of November 1918 had come as something of a surprise and, with no previous experience of how to run a peacetime air force, and no guarantee that there would even be one, it is perhaps understandable if some mistakes were made. None of these uncertainties applied to the end of WW II. With the Allies firmly re-established on the continent by the autumn of 1944, victory in both Europe and the Pacific was only a matter of time. It came rather sooner than had been anticipated, but, as the establishment of the various ‘Post-War’ Committees shows, the end had been predictable enough for planning for it to have been put in hand in good time. Furthermore, a permanent air force was a matter of fact, not conjecture, and there was ample experience upon which to draw. The RAF should, therefore, have been able to make a much better job of its second transition from war to peace. So far as its air crew were concerned, it failed to do so.

The nature of the problem.

It will be recalled that the days of the omnipotent commissioned pilot, assisted, when unavoidable, by a parttime airman gunner or a corporal observer, were already over by the time that war had broken out. Somewhat reluctantly, the RAF had accepted that its part-time air crew would have to become full-timers and that some of them, the observers, would have to be sergeants. The introduction of these ‘instant’ SNCOs in 1939 had caused some protest which AMP, AVM Portal, had dismissed at the time (see page 177), although it would seem that these objections had been registered. By early 1940 it had been agreed that all gunners would also have to be sergeants. This development was bound to lead to a further proliferation of very junior ‘senior’ NCOs which, in turn, provoked another wave of concern for the social and disciplinary well-being of the Service. AMP had, therefore, been obliged to reconsider the problem.

Portal, by now an air marshal, eventually suggested a scheme under which all airmen air crew, including pilots, would become a discrete corporate entity.¹ They were to have no executive authority outside their own community and were to live and mess together, segregated from ‘proper’ NCOs. It was proposed that they should all wear three chevrons but in a different colour from those of real sergeants. Among themselves, air crew would be graded as Class I, II or III, the first two being distinguished by an appropriate numeral in the vee of their stripes, with selected Class I airmen possibly being authorised to wear a flight sergeant’s crown.

Reading between the lines of this proposal, one can see that after only six months of wartime experience the RAF was already finding it difficult to work within the constraints imposed by the traditional military rank structure. The root of the problem was that, broadly speaking, seniority in rank was supposed to come with age and experience, and it implied an increased level of responsibility. Very few wartime air crew could satisfy any of these criteria as most were very young, very inexperienced and responsible only for their own actions within a crew. Yet, if they were going to be able to handle complicated equipment, under fire in an airborne environment, air crew needed to be very capable people. It followed that they needed to be accorded an appropriate level of pay and respect and, within a military society (of that era -see page 338), this could be done only by granting them an appropriate rank. Portal’s ideas were an attempt to break out of this straightjacket but, at the time, they were not adopted.

This problem was not confined to NCOs, of course, and, in some respects, it was even worse where officers were concerned. Reference has previously been made to changing attitudes towards commissions, notably in the context of the Ottawa Conference of 1942 (see page 220). Although the RAF had continued to accept that about 50% of its air crew might have to be officers (which was, after all, its own invention) this had never been more than a rather hastily devised wartime expedient. Unfortunately, the educational and behavioural standards, the degrees of enterprise, mental alertness and courage, and the sense of responsibility which were expected of an officer were much the same as those demanded of many air crew. The inescapable conclusion was that (as the Canadians had argued) it had been entirely appropriate that so many wartime air crew had been commissioned. If this approach were to be sustained in the peacetime RAF, however, it would make the Service permanently ‘top heavy’ with what would be, in effect, quasi-officers who had little, if any, executive function.

Many years later, the unreality of the wartime situation would be succinctly summed up by an ex-navigator of 1944-45, Frank Musgrove, who wrote: ‘…as a senior NCO, and as a commissioned officer, I never gave an order, and I never received one.’ 2

While Portal’s suggested solution to the problem had been shelved in 1940, the problem had not gone away and there was a constant undercurrent of concern in the upper reaches of the air force hierarchy over the attitudes displayed by wartime air crew. In the course of a review of the situation, conducted by AMP towards the end of 1942, he quoted AOCinC Bomber Command, Air Mshl Harris, as follows:

‘These newly promoted officers and sergeants have little or no idea of discipline, and the old tradition that the NCO is the backbone of the Service has completely disappeared. NCO members of air crew have now assumed large proportions, and attempts by more experienced NCOs to enforce any sort of service discipline are swamped by the multitude.’

In amplifying these remarks, Air Mshl Sutton added that air crew tended to ‘consider themselves as a race apart who need take no interest in their aircraftmen or in general administration.’ This was hardly surprising, of course, because, until they gained their ‘wings’, all wartime air crew had the status of mere aircraftmen. Only on graduation did they actually become NCOs or officers, and even then they were provided with little in the way of instruction as to their wider responsibilities. This was also true of those commissioned later; a transformation which involved little more than the purchase of a new uniform and transferring one’s personal effects from the Sergeants to the Officers Mess, as often as not on the same station – there was no mandatory formal ‘conversion course’.

One consequence of this exercise was the establishment of the Air Crew Officers School and the Air Crew NCOs School (see Note 19 to Chapter 25) but it had also included dusting off Portal’s idea of abandoning the attempt to integrate air crew into the traditional rank structure and accepting that they really were a different, special kind of animal that needed to be classified separately. While Sutton appreciated the superficial attractions of such an approach, he also foresaw all manner of adverse practical implications and he advised the Air Council most strongly against attempting to introduce such a scheme in wartime; advice that the Air Council accepted.³

Against this background, it was almost inevitable that the end of the war would be seen to present an ideal opportunity for restoring a more traditional balance between commissioned and non-commissioned personnel and, perhaps, for finding a means of avoiding the over-ranking of air crew. In re-considering the idea that Sutton had rejected in 1942, the Post-War Manning Committee suggested that the problem might be solved by treating air crew in the peacetime air force as a new form of, what was loosely termed, ‘subofficer’ who would fall somewhere between warrant and commissioned officers. This rather outré proposal was subsequently circulated to all Command HQs, both at home and abroad, and a wide cross section of opinion was sought at other relatively senior levels within the command structure, a total of sixty-eight addressees in all.

The response could fairly be described as inconclusive. Consider, for example, the replies to a question regarding the need for separate messes for sub-officers. Of those who had been asked, 43% had been in favour and 9% had been against. Unfortunately, since the remaining 48% had declined to offer any opinion at all, this had left the question substantially unanswered. Similarly indeterminate views were expressed over the desirability of reintroducing short service commissions. Twenty-one responses were in favour; nineteen were opposed, leaving twenty-eight who either knew or cared not. Nevertheless, when reduced to a crude ‘for’ or ‘against’ assessment, 63% of the responses could be considered to be broadly in favour of the ‘sub-officer’ idea. Most of those who dissented counter-proposed a reversion to a form of ‘tradesmen air crew’, some going so far as specifically to recommend the reinstatement of pre-war practice.⁴

Devising the solution to the problem.

With the ending of the European war the urgency attached to the deliberations of the various committees increased and it fell to the recently appointed AMP, Air Mshl Sir John Slessor, to consider their recommendations and to adopt or adapt them as necessary to create a coherent policy. He concluded that, whatever proposal emerged, it would have to possess three fundamental characteristics. First, it would have to preserve the coherence of the RAF, that is to say, avoid its polarisation into air and ground factions. Secondly, it would be necessary to reduce the wartime overprovision of officers to the numbers actually required to ‘manage’ the Service. Thirdly, something would need to be done about warrant and non-commissioned ranks which, so far as air crew were concerned, had lost their true significance and become little more than pay grades.

AMP proposed to solve the first problem by accepting the five permanent air crew categories proposed by the Douglas Committee, drawing the engineers, signallers and gunners from ground tradesmen who, after a period of flying duties, would revert to their original occupations. Since these men would be required to maintain currency in their original trades, this was expected to provide sufficient air/ground cross-fertilisation to ensure the desired degree of cohesion. On the other hand, the demands placed on pilots and navigators made it impractical to expect them to be dualqualified as technicians. It was accepted, therefore, that most of them would have to be directly recruited as professional aviators, from which it followed that any serving airmen who were selected for pilot or navigator training would also have to be permanently remustered as air crew.

There was no dispute over the second problem, since there was widespread agreement that it would be necessary to reduce significantly the overprovision of air crew officers. It followed that the majority of air crew would not be commissioned in the future, which led directly to the third problem, that of the status which they were to be accorded. In view of the Service’s ambivalent reaction to the ‘subofficer’ idea, this would have to be modified in some way, but AMP remained convinced that air crew were so ‘different’ that this difference needed to be made apparent. He also considered that a similar distinction should be granted to certain highly skilled technicians, mostly those of Trade Group I, especially as it was anticipated that three of the five post-war air crew categories would be drawn from this pool. He proposed therefore to treat these tradesmen as a new class of ‘artificers’ and to muster them on the same semi-privileged basis as that envisaged for air crew, perhaps also hoping by this means further to cement the cohesion between ground and air personnel.

So far as air crew were concerned, AMP’s concept involved new rank titles which would have a status equivalent to warrant and NCO ranks within the other traditional groups. While senior members of the new air crew structure were to have notional executive authority over all airmen, it was expected that this would normally be exercised only within the group, Sir John anticipating that ‘in the ordinary way, I do not think that the question of executive command over airmen of other groups will arise.’ To this end, it was envisaged that air crew (and artificers) would be mustered separately on parades and, to reflect their superior status, that they were unlikely to become involved in fire picquets, Orderly Sergeant and other such mundane barrack duties. His thoughts also embraced the need for segregated messes, dedicated rank badges and even the possibility of a different style of uniform for the air crew, the old RFC ‘maternity jacket’ being suggested for walking-out dress.

While some of its details would be discarded, within AMP’s overall mid-1945 concept can be seen most of the key features of the scheme that was to be implemented a year later.5 On the other hand, it also bore more than a passing resemblance to Sir Charles Portal’s ideas of 1940 which, considering that he was CAS when the post-war plans were being laid, is perhaps not too surprising.

Note on terminology.

Introduced informally in 1938, the term ‘air crew’ had had a specific meaning since 1940 (see page 174) but, although it was always supposed to have been rendered as two words, by the end of the war it was becoming increasingly common for them to be run together. In anticipation of the introduction of revised arrangements for the provision of post-war flying personnel, the single word ‘aircrew’ was adopted from early 1946.⁶ Despite widespread use of this style of nomenclature, however, it was March 1947 before officialdom spelled out exactly how it was to be applied.⁷ The new rules specified that pilots, navigators, signallers, gunners and engineers were to be described generically as ‘flying personnel’. Only flying personnel below commissioned rank were to be referred to as ‘aircrew’ or, in the singular, as an ‘airman (aircrew)’. The correct term to describe those who were commissioned was ‘officers (flying)’. To reflect contemporary practice, ‘aircrew’ will be rendered as a single word from here on.

This very precise legislation had been dictated by the concept underpinning the post-war scheme which envisaged that the vast majority of flying personnel would not be commissioned (see below). For them, a new range of aircrew ranks was to be introduced, these being signified by, what were to be known as, aircrew badges. The term aircrew (or air crew) badge already had a specific meaning, however, having been in use since 1942 to describe the range of qualification badges worn by the various categories.⁸ To remove the potential for confusion, therefore, in 1947 it was announced that the pre-existing generic term ‘aircrew badge’ was to be replaced by ‘flying badge’.⁹

Unfortunately, this, in turn, compromised the established use of ‘flying badge’ which had long been associated solely with the ‘wings’ worn by pilots. Thereafter, to conform to the new pattern of navigators, signallers, gunners and engineers badges, these ‘wings’ were to be described as ‘pilots badges’. This is still the correct term today, although the colloquial ‘wings’ remains in widespread use.

As an incidental aside, this is as convenient a place as any to note that it is, and always has been, incorrect to describe any form of flying badge as a ‘brevet’. ¹⁰

Fig 51. Although the post-war aircrew scheme had been implemented in July 1946 and the designs for the associated rank badges had been publicised in the following September, they were not formally introduced until June 1947. Note that for aircrew having an (A) suffix the stars were embroidered in light blue silk, whereas for those with a (B) or (D) they were in white.

The 1946 Aircrew Scheme.

The permanent arrangements for the provision of aircrew in the peacetime air force became effective on 1 July 1946.11 As expected, the only aircrew categories to be retained were those of the pilot, navigator, signaller, engineer and gunner. In September, therefore, the following categories were declared to be obsolete: the overspecialised wartime navigator along with the navigators (radio), (B) and (W); the WOp(air); the WOM(air); the air bomber and the flight engineer.¹² Personnel previously serving in any of these redundant categories who remained in uniform as aircrew were to be given any necessary additional training and remustered as appropriate. This resulted, for instance, in a lengthy series of ABC (ie Air Bomber Conversion) Courses, which had begun at the ANBS at Jurby in the spring of 1945 and were still being run by No 2 ANS at Middleton St George as late as 1950.

Needless to say, it was not quite as straightforward as that. Under the new scheme individual signallers, engineers and gunners were to be graded (A) or (B), as in ‘signaller (B)’, those graded (A) being more technically competent than the (B)s.¹³ The stated requirement was for 100% grade (A)s in all categories. This could only be an ideal, of course, because many of the ex-wartime personnel had been direct entrants whose technical expertise lacked depth when compared to that of aircrew who had previously served in a related ground trade. Many of these veterans would therefore have to pass through an interim (B) stage until their academic and trade skills had been brought up to the required standard.

There were some curious inconsistencies within the new arrangements. For instance, while the flight engineer had apparently been done away with, he had in fact survived the cull with the loss of little more than his ‘flight’ prefix. Conversely, the air gunner, who had not been declared redundant, had also lost his prefix. Then again, the meteorological air observer had not been among the categories which had been abolished, but it had not been listed for retention either. In fact, rather than dispensing with them immediately, it had been decided to allow this small sub-branch to wither away and to use navigators to replace the remaining flying meteorologists as and when they reached the end of their engagements, this course of action being among the many recommendations which had been made by the Douglas Committee.

While the rationalisation of aircrew categories had been relatively straightforward, the RAF’s long-term plans were far less so and they proved to be very unpopular. The root of the problem was status, in that only pilots (and relatively few of those) were to be trained as officers, the RAF College at Cranwell being re-established for this purpose.¹⁴ All other aircrew, which included the majority of pilots, were to be non-commissioned but with entirely new titles and badges of rank (see Figure 51).¹⁵ In effect, the post-war air force was to have a novel, three-tier structure, comprising traditionally ranked officers, traditionally ranked airmen and ‘aircrew’.

Once the necessary domestic facilities could be provided, it was intended that aircrew, who were to be regarded as a quite separate ‘third’ entity, would live in segregated messes. This idea harked back to the separate messes which were to have been provided for the sergeants involved in the NCO pilot trials of 1918 (see pages 99-100). While little had come of this idea during WW I, rather more progress was made in the late 1940s, although separate aircrew messes had still not been provided everywhere before the scheme was abandoned.

Trainee navigators in an Anson I in 1948 wearing the rank badges of an Aircrew Cadet. (CRO RAF Finningley)

While the Air Ministry Order that announced the new arrangements had stated categorically that aircrew were not to be referred to as NCOs, for matters such as marriage allowance, pension rates and the like, it was necessary to define some sort of equivalence with traditional ranks.¹⁶ This was as follows:

Aircrew Rank	Airman Rank
Master Aircrew	Warrant Officer
Aircrew I	Flight Sergeant
Aircrew II	Sergeant
Aircrew III	Corporal
Aircrew IV	Corporal

In the case of individuals, the words Pilot, Navigator, Signaller, Engineer or Gunner were used in place of the generic ‘Aircrew’ in all of the above. Ranks were initially abbreviated as, eg PI, NII, SIII, EIV but from mid-1948 onwards Arabic numerals replaced the Roman ones, thus P1, N2, S3, E4.¹⁷

All previously qualified aircrew were transferred to the new system in the minimum rank of Aircrew II. New intakes were to undergo their basic training as Aircrew Cadets and their operational training as Aircrew IVs followed by entry into productive service as Aircrew IIIs. Promotion to Aircrew II was anticipated after five (and Aircrew I after nine) years of service, which is to say that a typical aviator could expect to complete the whole of his first (and in many cases only) squadron tour as an Aircrew III – roughly equivalent to the man who looked after the Bedding Store.

That said, despite, their notional rank equivalence, aircrew were relatively well paid and there was a substantial differential in their favour, as illustrated by the following table, which shows daily rates of pay on promotion to Aircrew II or sergeant in a ground trade:¹⁸

Rank	Per day
P2 or N2	15/0d
S2(A), E2(A), G2(A)	14/0d
S2(B), E2(B), G2(B)	12/6d
G2(D)	12/6d
Sgt Group A trades	12/0d
Sgt Group B, C and D trades	10/6d

Nevertheless, what had started out as a ‘sub-officer’ proposal had become so debased that many aircrew, those who would follow the initial batch of wartime veterans, were going to be more like ‘sub-SNCOs’, the majority being assigned a rank that equated broadly to that of corporal. Needless to say, the fact that it had significantly degraded the social status of aircrew, even including pilots, meant that the scheme provoked some resentment.

Considerations of status aside, the new scheme offered poor career prospects because it generally involved shortterm contracts. Although it had been envisaged that pilots and navigators would be directly recruited as such, in practice, rather than implementing this principle from the outset, the Service was able to live off its fat. Under an extended service scheme, which had been introduced at the end of 1945, qualified wartime NCO pilots and navigators (and signallers, engineers and gunners), cadets under training and enlisted airmen still waiting to start their courses had all been offered three-year engagements.19 In the case of the trainees, this period was to begin from the date on which they gained their flying badges.²⁰

While this approach sufficed for a time, these interim arrangements were suspended in April 1947 when they were superseded by the recruiting of direct entrant civilians on short service terms.²¹ These offered five-year engagements, followed by four years on the reserve, although there was some prospect of re-engagement for up to twenty-two years, leading to a pension and the possibility of attaining a rank approximating that of warrant officer.

By contrast, under the 1946 Scheme all signallers, engineers and gunners were expected to be internally recruited from airmen serving on twelve-year engagements. But, because they were to fly for only five years, aircrew in these three categories were not expected to attain a rank higher than Aircrew II and this only shortly before they were to resume their duties on the ground. This meant that, in practice, they would spend most of their stint on flying duties as quasi-corporals. While a start was made on internal recruiting, much of the short-term requirement for signallers, engineers and gunners (often abbreviated to SEG when referred to as a group) was met by retaining wartime personnel under the same three-year extended service terms as were (initially) being exploited to provide 100% of pilots and navigators (see above).

The 1946 Scheme included the statement that ‘all aircrew in the post-war air force will be eligible for consideration for commissions.’ This may have provided some grounds for optimism, but, in reality, the numbers involved were bound to be relatively small, because the Service’s immediate needs were largely satisfied by the retention of ex-wartime officers in all categories. Furthermore, the commissions available to most officers promoted ‘from the ranks’ offered terms which compared very unfavourably with those on which the new generation of Cranwell-trained pilots were to serve.

The consequence of all of the above is that, despite the underlying aim of the new manning scheme, because the air force of 1946-47 was still largely composed of wartime veterans, it still tended to reflect the wartime 50% (for pilots and navigators) commissioning policy, the only difference being that the ‘other’ 50% were no longer sergeants; they were now Aircrew IIs. This was a transient situation, of course, and as the wartime legacy officers, most of whom were serving on relatively short early post-war peacetime engagements, faded away, almost all of their replacements would be in the form of the new-style ‘aircrew’. This writer has not found a contemporary forecast, but it seems likely that the wartime 1:1 ratio of officers to NCOs would have become something more like 1:8 or 9 officers to aircrew, with the vast majority of the officers being pilots.

It should be stressed that this summary, represents merely an overview of what was a very complicated plan. Furthermore, it reflects only the regulations as they were originally announced plus a few of the more significant amendments; many other refinements had to be introduced as weaknesses, omissions and defects in the arrangements made themselves apparent.

In the specific case of navigators, for instance, an example of the kind of loose end that needed to be tied off is provided by the regulations governing the promotion of aircrew. When these were published in February 1947, they stipulated that, among the preconditions required for promotion to Navigator I or Master Navigator was possession of a 1st Class Navigation Warrant (it actually said ‘licence’ – for an explanation of the relationship between the RAF’s Navigator’s Certificates and Navigation Warrants and civil Air Navigation Licences, see Annex J).²² As the Empire Air Navigation School pointed out, however, the holder of a 1st Class Warrant had to have passed the Spec N Course, which, since this course was not open to noncommissioned personnel, meant that it would not be possible for anyone to progress beyond Navigator II!²³

The 1946 Scheme in perspective.

With the benefit of hindsight, we can see that much of the content of the 1946 Scheme seems almost deliberately to have flown in the face of more than thirty years’ experience of military aviation, including two World Wars. If nothing else, these wars had surely demonstrated that many aircrew, and particularly pilots and navigators, needed to be officer grade material. The RFC of 1914 had felt this intuitively and, in the case of pilots at least, the NCO trial of 1918 had suggested that it had been right to trust its instincts (see pages 99-101). The RAF of the 1920s had more or less obliterated any remaining distinction between officers and pilots by making most of them one and the same. By 1940 it had once again been found necessary to commission large numbers of non-pilots, particularly observers, and by 1942 the Canadians were advocating the commissioning of practically all aircrew. Yet in 1946 the Air Ministry had simply dismissed all of this.

Despite its reluctance to learn from the past, the post-war RAF did come to terms with one aspect of reality in that it decided to retain a variety of specialist branches to handle non-flying matters.24 In practice, however, a large proportion of the officers in these branches tended to be pilots who had transferred to ground duties. Furthermore, as they climbed the ladder of success, it became standard practice for career officers to alternate their flying tours with periods on the ground, during which they tended to monopolise the more prominent and influential administrative posts at station level. As a result, the RAF of the late 1940s (and 1950s) still looked remarkably like that of the 1930s and the casual observer could have been forgiven for thinking that it was still essential to possess a pilots badge in order to succeed in almost any field.

While the RAF had not, strictly speaking, re-established its officer-pilot dominated ancien regime, even if it did rather look as if it had, its treatment of all other aircrew had certainly represented a step backwards. Although noncommissioned pilots and navigators were to be employed as professionals, albeit many of them on short-term engagements, it had been envisaged that the other three categories would all be ground tradesmen, all of whom were to fly for only a limited period. This was not quite a reversion to the part-time crewmen of the 1920s, but it was not much of an advance either, and the Air Council’s decision to impose such low ranks on practically all aviators seems almost perverse. What the peacetime Service had needed was a scheme which would fulfil its own requirements whilst satisfying the aspirations of its people. What it had produced matched the first of these criteria admirably, but entirely at the expense of the second.

Reduced to its essentials, the basis of the 1946 Scheme had been the creation of a small and carefully groomed corps of officer pilots who were to exercise authority over ‘the troops’. Such an approach does work in an army or a navy, but an air force is neither of these. The fundamental nature of warfare on land or at sea means that, in a combat situation, large numbers of soldiers, or the entire crew of a ship, will be directly involved in an engagement with the enemy. Each soldier or seaman represents a small cog in a large machine which is operated by a handful of officers. In an air force it is only the handful of officers who do the fighting – or, to be pedantic, a handful of men, many of whom need to have much the same qualities as are traditionally associated with officers.

The officer/aircrew relationship is clearly a problem which is peculiar to air forces. Slessor’s 1946 scheme was an attempt to solve it by imposing an army/navy style solution. It was simply the wrong answer. If the RAF was to have high quality aircrew it needed to recruit them from the same pool as its officers, and, if it was to be successful in doing that, it needed to pay them something like the rate for the job and, for pilots and navigators at least, that could be done only by giving them commissioned rank.

But in 1946 it is unlikely that such considerations would have been seen to present a significant problem. At the time the RAF still had thousands of surplus aircrew, adequate numbers of whom were content to remain in uniform, especially as these veterans had some precariously preserved rights, provided that they could find their way through the chicanes of sub-sub-clauses built into the new regulations. Furthermore, conscription continued to provide a virtually unlimited supply of fresh manpower from which, it was anticipated, any gaps in the ranks could be filled by persuading some of them to sign on as aircrew, this source being guaranteed in 1948 by the institution of peacetime National Service.²⁵

The flaws within the 1946 Scheme.

The fact that the 1946 Scheme worked, for a while, does not mean that it was a success. Far from it. Despite its obvious appeal to the Treasury, it proved to be deeply unpopular, not least because of its divisive nature. The postwar UK may not have been a workers’ paradise, but it was certainly a socialist democracy. The RAF’s blatantly class-based system was far too much at odds with the tenor of the times to be tolerated for long. The inevitable result of all this was that recruiting proved to be a problem.

If the RAF had really expected to be able to retain a substantial proportion of its National Servicemen, it will have been disappointed. Some did opt to become regulars²⁶ but, on balance, National Service proved to be of little value to the RAF, beyond the fact that it would have provided a substantial reserve of manpower in the event of general mobilisation. The root of the problem was that the RAF was a highly technical service. This meant that, for ground tradesmen and aircrew alike, it required practically all of a conscript’s engagement to provide him with all of the skills that he needed to fulfil a useful function. Before he had had time to become really proficient, he was ‘de-mobbed’.²⁷

As a result, the RAF was to discover that, while it was obliged to spend a great deal of effort on training personnel, it gained very little return on its investment. In national terms, of course, the Service was making a major contribution to post-war recovery by training the workforce for ‘UK Ltd’. Skilled manpower was becoming a scarce resource in a period of near full employment and it was particularly galling for the RAF to discover that, having provided men with their skills, it was unable to persuade them to stay in uniform. After the trauma of the Great Depression, sandwiched between the devastating experiences of two prolonged World Wars, people sought security above all else. The Zeitgeist clearly called for a ‘job for life with a pension’. The RAF was still offering short-term engagements, even to most of its officers.28

Aircrew flying Yorks on the Berlin Airlift, like these at Gatow (IWM MH30688), or Sunderlands during the Malayan Emergency (this one belonged to the UK-based No 201 Sqn) had little time to spare to keep current in their parent trades.

So far as the SEG aircrew categories were concerned, there had been insufficient takers from among ground tradesmen. It seems that, to airmen who wished to pursue a technical career, a five-year stint of flying was perceived to be a detour during which colleagues who had kept their feet firmly on the ground would forge ahead. It had been intended to prevent this happening by requiring groundcrew to maintain currency in their parent trade while engaged on flying duties. While not literally reinstating the part-time crewman of the 1920s, this concept was close enough to suggest that it had been devised by men who had been familiar with that system in their youth and who had still not really come to terms with the fact that, regardless of which seat one occupies in an aeroplane, flying is a full time job that needs to be done by dedicated personnel.

As in the 1930s, maintaining currency in two very different fields proved to be more easily said than done. For instance, an engineer flying two or three sorties a day on the Berlin Airlift had quite enough to do without having to practise tin-bashing or keep his hand in on a lathe. Similarly, a Sunderland signaller flying lengthy patrols during the Malayan Emergency had little ‘free’ time to spend in the Signals Section or the Radio Bay.

Nevertheless, while such factors seem to have deterred many serving airmen from volunteering, there were still some who were keen to fly. Unfortunately, many of them wanted to fly permanently; but, for the SEG categories, this was not an option under the 1946 Scheme. In short, the whole concept had proved to be deeply flawed and in many respects quite unrealistic.

Since internal recruiting was failing to produce the numbers of aircrew required, the termination of the extended service scheme early in 1947 served only to exacerbate the problem. By the summer the practical implications of this situation were beginning to become apparent. In short, if all signallers and engineers (gunners were less difficult) were to be drawn from Group A tradesmen, which was the stated aim, it would require every ex-apprentice radio fitter, and one in every three ex-apprentice airframe and engine fitters, to volunteer to fly. That would demand a substantial increase in the numbers of (very expensive) apprentices being trained, because many of them would be unavailable in productive service since they would be ‘misemployed’ as aircrew. The situation was further complicated by practical difficulties in the field of career management. While the exploitation of Group B trades provided an apparent solution, on closer examination this also proved to involve recruiting and management problems.29

But, all of these difficulties aside, the fact was that tradesmen simply did not want to fly in the numbers required and a proportion of those who did volunteer fell short of the required medical standard or failed to complete their training. Having considered all of the options, AMP, Sir John Slessor, was forced to conclude that it would be necessary to accept direct entrants into the SEG categories.³⁰

While the option of a flying tour remained available to those Group A and B tradesmen who wished to volunteer, direct entrant recruiting was reintroduced in the autumn of 1948. Furthermore, direct entrant SEG candidates were now being offered eight-year engagements with the possibility of further service to complete twenty-two years.³¹ This abandoning of the air force’s ideal of 100% internal recruiting, struck the 1946 Scheme a mortal blow, although it took almost two more years to die.

The regulations introduced in 1948 had offered similar eight-year contracts to newly recruited pilots and navigators, and to those currently serving on five-year engagements. Curiously enough, however, while the revised terms of service had honoured any existing twenty-two year contracts, this option was specifically denied to new pilots and navigators. It is not known whether this had been intentional, or merely a bureaucratic oversight, but the option of long-term service for pilots and navigators was reinstated less than a year later.³²

Meanwhile, another problem was becoming increasingly apparent among pilots and, especially, navigators. While recruiting adequate numbers was proving to be difficult, because the terms on offer under the 1946 Scheme were so poor, it was, for exactly the same reason, also proving to be difficult to obtain people of the right calibre. By 1948, AVM Sir Basil Embry, who had overall responsibility for training these men, and who had been opposed to the new policy from the outset, had become so concerned about its long term effects that he was becoming increasingly strident in his attempts to persuade his colleagues to recognise the seriousness of the situation. In a memo to VCAS, for instance, he complained about ‘the material we are able to attract by offering a bricklayer’s pay for a Meteor pilot …’³³

A few days later he wrote to AMP as follows:³⁴

‘I am sure our present aircrew policy will not give us the men of the right quality to handle our present-day equipment, let alone the weapons of the future. I believe the right policy is to admit that the majority of flying posts must be filled by commissioned officers if we are to attract the type of men we want to handle the equipment. To think that it will be done by men of lower grade […] can only give us a front line of poor quality which might lead to catastrophic results if it were ever put to the test of war.’

There can be little doubt that one of the causes for the disappointing response to the demand for internal recruits was the widespread antipathy felt towards both the newfangled aircrew rank titles and the unique range of badges associated with them. While it was the badges that generally provided the focus for dissatisfaction, the underlying problem was really one of status because the significance of the unfamiliar emblems was not widely understood and, as a result, many aircrew felt that that they were not being treated with the respect that they considered to be their due.³⁵ This palpable air of discontent will have done little to encourage ground tradesmen to become aircrew.

Meanwhile, aircrew certainly did not hesitate to make their views known to anyone who happened to ask their opinion including, when they could gain access to them, members of the Air Council. It is said, for instance, that when inspecting a group of Hastings crews during the Berlin Airlift, CAS, Lord Tedder, asked them what they thought of the new badges. The response was that, ‘They make bloody fine jam labels, Sir.’³⁶

This sort of lobbying was certainly successful, as several other luminaries who had ‘had their ears bent’ during visits to the coal face are known to have been sufficiently concerned subsequently to have written to AMP to ensure that he was fully appraised of the situation.³⁷ By mid-1949 the establishment could have been in no doubt that aircrew did not like their new ranks or their new badges or their new, that is to say, their lack of, status.

The demise of the 1946 Scheme.

The initial post-war scheme for the provision of aircrew was abandoned in 1950. It was replaced by one which removed ‘certain disadvantages which practical experience of the present policy has revealed,’ which was probably as close as the Air Council could be expected to come to publicly admitting that it had got it badly wrong. The most obvious outward indication that things were changing was the withdrawal of the unpopular alphanumeric soup of N1s, P2s, S3s, G4s, etc and the reinstatement of traditional ranks. All qualified non-commissioned aircrew were transformed overnight into (at least) sergeants. Another sign of the restored status of aircrew was that they were now to wear a gilt eagle in the vee of their chevrons.38 The only element of the old system that was, and still is, retained, is the rank of Master Aircrew and the associated badge, now with a gilt eagle in place of the original embroidered one.

In 1950 non-commissioned flying personnel had their traditional ranks restored, along with their badges, now embellished by a gilt eagle.

As significant as the reinstatement of three stripes, was the introduction of flying pay at 4/6d per day for (sergeant) pilots and navigators and a shilling less for all other categories.³⁹ Flying pay aside, the reversion to proper NCO ranks had been accompanied by an early increase in basic pay. For a junior sergeant, the daily rates of pay were now eighteen shillings for pilots, navigators and air signallers (A), air engineers (A) and air gunners (A). Although the (B) and (D) suffixes had been dropped in 1948,⁴⁰ it was still considered appropriate to maintain a pay differential between SEG aircrew who possessed superior levels of technical expertise and those who did not. Thus, on initially gaining their flying badges, and until they upgraded their qualifications, direct entrants were paid 1/6d per day less than (A) graded ex-tradesman.

Although it was not specifically highlighted at the time, the revised regulations had involved another, subtly cosmetic, innovation. From 1950 onwards gunners had regained the ‘air’ prefix which they had lost in 1946 and the same ‘air’ was now added to signallers, engineers and meteorological observers.

As important as all of the other changes associated with the terms of service introduced in 1950 was a realistic prospect of a full career. As ever, there were a variety of constraints and preconditions. The option of a five-year flying stint was still available to serving airmen but, depending upon their trades, some were now able to remuster permanently to aircrew duties. Direct entrant air signallers and air engineers retained the 1948 offer of an initial eight years of active service with the prospect of re-engagement for a total of twenty-two years as aircrew, but, if mutually agreeable, there was now the possibility of further service, usually in a ground trade, terminating in a pension at age 55. Similar re-engagement provisions applied to serving NCO pilots and navigators, although by this time recruiting in these categories was confined to officers – see Chapter 29.

As a footnote to these developments, it is worth observing that the employment of groundcrew was also being completely reorganised. Depending upon his aptitude, an airman’s career could now follow one of two paths. If deemed suitable, he could pursue a ‘command’ career, which required him to develop his management, as well as his technical, skills. This option was associated with traditional ranks, ie corporal, sergeant, flight sergeant and warrant officer. For those who were temperamentally less well suited to management functions, or who preferred to concentrate on being pure tradesmen, the alternative of a technical career was available. Men who elected to pursue this option were distinguished by the new ranks of junior technician, corporal technician, senior technician, chief technician – all of whom wore their chevrons inverted – and master technician.⁴¹

Interestingly, this innovation contained more than a hint of history repeating itself. It will be recalled that, when Air Mshl Portal had been AMP in 1940, his ideas on how the Air Force ought to handle its non-commissioned aircrew had not been adopted (see page 276). Yet the post-war aircrew scheme, which was devised five years later, towards the end of Sir Charles’ long term as CAS, incorporated many of his earlier thoughts. It would seem that Sir John Slessor may also have been able to realise one of his earlier goals in arrears. As AMP, his proposals for an ‘artificer’ class had not been taken up in 1945 (see page 278) but, five years later, as CAS, he was able to oversee the introduction of the technician scheme, which reflected, at least some of, the ethos of his original concept.

Note on terminology.

One of the divisive features of the 1946 Scheme was that the term ‘aircrew’ had been confined to flying personnel holding non-commissioned rank, which had tended to emphasise a distinction rooted in social class. In 1950 this practice ceased, and since then all flying personnel have been referred to generically as ‘aircrew’, their individual status being distinguished, when appropriate, as ‘officers (aircrew)’ or ‘airmen (aircrew)’.⁴² This change effectively deleted ‘flying personnel’ from the official lexicon but, although it no longer had a specifically defined meaning, this has not precluded its use, when appropriate, as a handy and self-explanatory label.

________________________

¹      AIR2/4456. Unreferenced letter dated 5 February 1940 from AMP, Air Mshl Portal, to all AOCinCs.

²      Frank Musgrove, Dresden and the Heavy Bombers (2005), p59. Practically everything that Musgrove ever did during his time in uniform was, of course, either proscribed by regulations (from how to apply for leave to being bawled at on the parade ground) or done in response to instructions received (or indeed issued by him) within the preordained context of standard operating procedures, so, in a sense, practically every aspect of his life was ‘ordered’. What Musgrove clearly meant, however, was that, outside the routine parameters defined by military service in general and his air crew ‘job specification’ in particular, he never found himself in a face-to-face situation being told what to do or telling someone else what he was to do.

³      AIR6/63. Note by AMP (Air Mshl Sir Bertine Sutton) submitted to the Air Council as AC(1)43 of 29 December 1942.

⁴      AIR2/8638. These examples are taken from PWMC/S.10/P/49, dated 17 March 1945, which had summarised the responses to some of the key questions previously posed by the Post-War Manning Committee in preparation for a forthcoming (its fifty-seventh) meeting.

⁵      AIR2/8494. AMP laid out his conclusions in a ten-page draft paper, A.766116/45 of 25 June 1945. His proposals were refined on 4 July at a meeting, attended by most of the Air Ministry’s Departmental Director Generals and concerned Heads of Finance Departments. As paper AC 31(45), the final version (which differed only marginally from the original) was submitted to the Air Council on 20 July (AIR6/65) and received its general approval on 27 August (AIR6/75).

⁶      AMO A.158/1946 of 21 February. While this Order specifically endorsed the use of the single word ‘aircrew’, it took time for the convention to be adopted universally and there are a few instances of ‘air crew’ subsequently slipping through the official net, eg AMO A.242/1946 of 21 March, but, by the time that arrangements for the provision of aircrew in the post-war RAF were promulgated in June the new style was firmly in place.

⁷      AMO A. 191/1947 of 13 March.

⁸      The changes in the categorisation of aircrew introduced during 1942 had caused the Air Ministry to specify the nomenclature to be used in association with their badges. AMO A.1019/1942 of 17 September stated that a pilots ‘wings’ were to be referred to as a ‘flying badge’, non-pilot emblems being identified as a ‘badge, navigator’, ‘badge, air bomber’ and so on. Endorsing what had already become common practice, AMO A.3/1944 of 6 January formally sanctioned use of the generic term ‘air crew badge’. It went on to state that the pilots emblem would continue to be called a ‘flying badge’ but changed the style associated with non-pilot emblems to ‘navigator badge’, ‘flight engineer badge’, ‘wireless operator (air) badge’, etc.

⁹      AMO A.337/1947 of 1 May.

¹⁰    This malpractice arose because a number of very early British aviators learned to fly at French schools where they gained the certificate – the brevet – of the Aero Club de France. This term was promptly imported and it became common practice to refer to the equivalent Royal Aero Club Certificate, which all British pilots (including, until mid-1916, all military pilots) were required to obtain, as a brevet – see, for instance, Flight for 19 November 1910 (p954) and 26 August 1911 (p745). It clearly could not have meant badge, because the RFC flying badge was not introduced until 1913.

Despite its always having been a misnomer, this term gained some currency during WW I and it continues to be (mis)used today. Until recently, while widespread, the improper use of ‘brevet’ was merely colloquial and it did not appear in formal correspondence, publications, orders, regulations and the like. Sadly, in the 21st Century, that is no longer the case.

¹¹    AMO A.492/1946 of 6 June. Although the new arrangements were actually implemented by this AMO, which provided the necessary fine detail, a broad overview, explaining the rationale underpinning the scheme and making specific reference to the new rank titles, had been published as early as 19 December 1945 in a White Paper (Cmd 6715).

¹²    AMO A.768/1946 of 5 September.

¹³    These suffixes were related to sub-divisions within the early post-war groundcrew trade structure which was divided into A, B, C and D groupings for pay purposes. Broadly speaking, the A Group comprised highly skilled fitter-grade tradesmen; B covered the less skilled mechanics and their equivalents; C embraced clerical trades, and D unskilled aircraft-hands; see AMO A.683/1946 of 8 August. While it was the intention that all future non-PNB aircrew would be recruited from the A Group, provision had been made, where appropriate, for serving aircrew to be graded (B), and it had also been necessary to employ a (D) suffix to cater for directly recruited wartime gunners who had no other trade qualifications.

¹⁴    Although flying training had continued at Cranwell throughout the war years, the formal cadet scheme had been suspended in September 1939. Nevertheless, a certain cachet still attached to a Cranwell-trained officer, even a wartime one, and the commissioning quota allowed for up to 100% of the output from what was known as the RAF College SFTS (until March 1944 when it was numbered as No 17 SFTS, this unit later being superseded by No 19 SFTS) to emerge as officers, as against up to 45% from other SFTSs (not all on graduation). The straight-to-Cranwell-after-ITW sequence followed by a select few was sometimes referred to as ‘Accelerated Training’. The traditional cadet scheme was reintroduced in October 1946, the senior course in residence at the time being identified as No 45 Entry; see AMO A.58/1947 of 23 January.

¹⁵    AMO A.498/1947 of 12 June introduced the rank badges to be used by aircrew, although the designs had actually been formally approved some nine months previously and publicised at that time; see, for instance, Flight for 19 September 1946. In the interim aircrew had continued to wear the conventional badges of rank to which they had originally been entitled.

Incidentally, the same AMO terminated the practice of cadet aircrew wearing a white peak to their field service caps (see Chapter 23, Note 25).

¹⁶    AMO A.492/1946 of 6 June.

¹⁷    AMO N.438/1948 of 3 June directed that Arabic numerals were to be adopted in place of Roman ones. This order had actually been specifically concerned with the mark numbers of aeroplanes and aero-engines, and the designation of a variety of stores, but, following its publication, Arabic numerals were soon adopted universally.

¹⁸    AMO A.514/1946 of 5 June published details of the New Pay Code.

¹⁹    AMO A.1153/1945 of 5 December, the amended provisions of which were subsequently reiterated in AMO A.963/1946 of 14 November.

²⁰    AIR25/676. Some idea of the numbers of untrained potential aircrew in the system can be gauged from an HQ 54 Gp memorandum of 24 October 1945. This reported that the ACDC had 3,647 post-ITW cadets on its books at that time, their currency/interest being maintained via the Rotation Scheme which involved their being recalled to Bridgnorth (previously Heaton Park) for a two-week refresher course following a ten-week detachment to another unit (see page 229).

²¹    AMO A.312/1947 of 17 April made 30 April the last date for applications under the extended service scheme, which meant that the last pilots and navigators to be engaged under these terms would still be serving in 1950.

²²    AMO A.151/1947 of 27 February.

²³    AIR2/4470. Letter EANS/NW/81/P3 dated 3 January 1948 from Commandant EANS to DNav.

²⁴    In addition to the GD Branch, and the equally long-standing ‘professionals’ of the Medical, Dental, Chaplains and Legal Branches, there were by 1947: Technical, Equipment, Secretarial, Education, Catering, Flying Control, Provost and Physical Fitness Branches plus the RAF Regiment. All of these were to become permanent features of the RAF. In addition, although they would be less long-lived, in 1947 the RAF also still had an Administrative and Special Duties Branch plus Balloon, Meteorological, and Medical and Dental Quartermasters Branches.

²⁵    The National Service Act of 30 July 1948 consolidated all related legislation introduced since 1939 and thus effectively extended the current arrangements for wartime conscription (which had never been terminated) with effect from 1 January 1949. Affecting men aged 18 to 26, the obligation was originally expected to involve one year’s full-time service plus six in the reserve but the National Service (Amendment) Act of 16 December 1948 added six months to the period of active service while reducing the overall commitment to five-and-a-half years. In response to the Korean War, the National Service Act of 18 September 1950 altered the balance to two years of active service plus three-and-a-half years on the reserve. Aircrew trained as National Servicemen were expected to meet their reserve commitment via membership of the RAFVR or the RAuxAF.

²⁶    ZHC2/998. For instance, on 11 July 1951, in an answer to a Parliamentary Question, Hansard records that between January and June of that year 18,074 potential National Servicemen (44% of the total – and we are dealing with the entire RAF intake here, not just aircrew) had elected to sign on for an extra year or two in order to take advantage of the higher rates of pay attracted by service as ‘a regular’. A further 1,330, who had entered as conscripts, had also subsequently transferred to regular engagements. Nevertheless, more than half of the intake had declined to do any more than they had to and most of those who had signed on had done so for the shortest possible ‘hitch’.

²⁷    There is some evidence to suggest that this problem was partly of the RAF’s own making in that poor administrative procedures and course phasing considerably extended the time spent in unproductive training and thus wasted much of a conscript’s engagement. See, for instance, an article by an ex-National Service airman in Flight for 20 January 1949.

²⁸    The age of an officer’s retirement depended upon his rank and differed from branch to branch. In the specific case of GD officers serving on permanent engagements, a flight lieutenant could expect to be compulsorily retired at 41 years of age, a squadron leader at 43, a wing commander at 47 and a group captain at 50; see AMO A.278/1947 of 24 April.

²⁹    AIR6/94. The problems involved in the provision of SEG aircrew were laid before the Air Council Standing Committee by AMP, Air Chf Mshl Sir John Slessor, in his undated (but circa May 1947) SC(47)23. With minor reservations, his recommendations were accepted at the Committee’s meeting 6(47) held on 2 June 1947 (AIR6/90).

³⁰    Ibid.

³¹    AMO A.733/1948 of 9 September.

³²    AMO A.335/1949 of 12 May.

³³    AIR20/6638. Memo P/1/2/ACAS(Training) dated 17 February 1948 from AVM Embry, ACAS (Training), January 1947-April 1949, and previously, Director-General of Training since the autumn of 1945, to VCAS (Air Mshl Sir James Robb).

³⁴    Ibid. Memo P/1/2/ACAS(Training) dated 12 February 1948 from AVM Embry to AMP (Air Mshl Sir Hugh Saunders).

³⁵    For example, a disgruntled RAF aviator enlarged on several aspects of the status problem in a letter published in the correspondence column of Flight for 10 February 1949.

³⁶    Stringman, op cit, p66.

³⁷    The Secretary of State (Arthur Henderson) minuted AMP (Air Mshl Sir Hugh Saunders) on this topic on 22 December 1948 (AIR20/9087) as did AMSO (Air Chf Mshl Sir George Pirie) on 23 April 1949 (AIR20/9099).

³⁸    AMO A.545/1950 of 31 August. A public announcement referring to the imminent restoration of traditional NCO ranks had actually been made as early as 24 June 1950 in a statement by the Secretary of State for Air, Mr Arthur Henderson, addressing aircrew at Benson.

³⁹    AMO A.780/1950 of 14 December. For contemporary rates of pay and flying pay for officers, see pages 296-97.

⁴⁰    AMO A.733/1948 of 9 September.

⁴¹    This revision of the trade structure was announced by AMO A.515/1950 on 22 August, although it was not implemented until 1 January 1951. Under the new scheme, what had previously been the classifications of aircraftman 1st class, aircraftman 2nd class and leading aircraftman became ranks and the additional rank of senior aircraftman was introduced. The next major revision, ‘The 1964 Trade Structure’, replaced the AC1 and AC2 with just aircraftman and abolished the ranks of senior and master technician; those of junior and chief technician survived but their stripes were no longer inverted, their special status now being indicated by the addition of a four-bladed propeller in the vee of their chevrons. Although not implemented until 1 April 1964 (hence its title), details of the new arrangements had been promulgated over a year earlier, by AMO A.80/1963 of 6 March.

⁴²    AMO A.721/1950 of 23 November. NB. With effect from 1 April 2003 the term airmen (aircrew) was superseded by non-commissioned aircrew (NCA).