We could always take this discussion back to soc.history.what-if - there are people there who’d take an informed interest in it.

Sure the RFC could claim credit, but then again, the Independent Air Force was technically set up under the Army’s watch as well. The RAF proper was only around for what, 7 months of the war? It couldn’t legitimately claim credit for initiating anything much, so claiming any strategy as its very own was a bit of a fib. Although to be sure, strategic bombing was a huge part of the rationale for the RAF’s creation, so it would have been hard to discard. Anyway, as I said, I don’t think Trenchard could have picked a different strategy. It wasn’t in his nature (after his conversion, anyway!), so it would have needed somebody else in the role (Ashmore would be the logical choice, but he was probably too junior). I guess it comes down to the question of why offence was felt (by politicians and the public) to be the best form of defence, which of course is the eternally recurring question … but given that belief, Trenchard was the man to embody it.

I will leave it to Chris to defend the details of his what-if. But I will just say that (a) airships and flying boats are both way cool - there’s no need to choose between them! And (b) your CCMRO reminds me of CSIRAC, the fifth digital computer ever made and the oldest still in existence (it’s in the Melbourne Museum). Also way cool.

Certainly, Trenchers could have used a pure air defence view to justify his institution-building…if it hadn’t been for the fact that the RFC and RNAS could both claim the credit for doing in the Gothas and Zeppelins, and also that the Airpower School let him portray it as a deterrent on the cheap, rather in the way some people call the British nuclear deterrent “cost effective”.

Regarding yr. what-if, I think you need to give more consideration to carriers and forget about the rigid airships already (flying boats, though, float my boat a bit more).

I’ve just been blogging about a visit to the Battle Box bunkers that were Percival’s HQ in Singapore - your whatif missed the bit where the Japanese fleet lost the battle of the Malacca Straits to the RN with its vast carrier airpower. The Pathe newsreel of the Royal Marines landing from the William Pitt to relieve the 8th Australian Division in its trenches in the suburbs of Singapore was pretty cool, becoming an icon of Commonwealth unity. The empire held together for another forty years, with the 1935 Government of India Act (which was intended to make the subcontinent a Dominion with Australian/Canadian status) going into force as planned.

With this new and democratising influence, the Commonwealth stays neutral between the US and USSR as Ernest Bevin had suggested and the Europeans join the free trade agreement. Nobody cares about communist blackmailers, and when Alan Turing is betrayed as a homosexual to MI5, they don’t bother to pull his security clearance. Instead he moves to Bangalore as the first director of the CCMRO (Commonwealth Computing Machines Research Organisation).

Their work enables dramatic progress in other fields..In 1960, Roland Beamont of the RFC, the first astronaut, goes to space from Woomera atop a Hawker Siddeley rocket controlled by Lyons software developed at CCMRO. Later that year, Prime Minister Bevin, close to retirement, sends a De Havilland Comet to fetch President John F. Kennedy for secret talks. Bevin makes Kennedy an offer - access to computer technology in exchange for nuclear disarmament….

About fighter defence, that’s a fair point. But if it comes to that, there was no real evidence that an independent air force was better at strategic bombing anyway (the Germans carried out their attacks on Britain without one) - it was a matter of faith. Another faith-based belief could have been to argue that it would be better to entrust air defence to a dedicated, independent organisation, that wouldn’t be distracted by the Army’s other missions. I dunno, I’m just making stuff up …

Do you really think the RAF has been a disaster for Britain? How so? (Oh, I’ve just found your soc.history.what-if post … will have to mull that one over!)

Yes, I did read Buckley’s book … but it was a few years ago now, before I started 4th year even, I think. As I recall, it was an admirably concise survey, but I must confess I haven’t looked at it much recently. I should do, my interests have broadened a lot since then.

Mulling over my in mind, the fruit of an off-the-cuff claim on soc.history.what-if some years ago, is the counterfactual where the RAF was never created. Personally, I think that it’s been a disaster for the British state.

Certainly, Trenchard’s going for the cadre option was amply justified by how events turned out. But I wonder if was necessary to tie this to an offensive strategic bombing doctrine? I can think of at least two alternative strategies: army/navy co-operation, or air defence (ie fighters). Both would have had advantages for the long-term survival of the RAF, too: the former would have helped defend it against the predatory senior services; the latter would have been very popular in the pacifist 1920s - at least that’s my naive impression. Having said that, I can’t see Trenchard going for any strategy so inoffensive!

I think air control is a very interesting subject. Most accounts I’ve read so far seem to downplay its influence on air doctrine, but as the major operational activity of the RAF between the wars, surely it was more important than that. But as you say, it didn’t seem to help with close air support any!