RAF Coastal Area

The Committee of Imperial Defence (CID) met in 1909 and decided the direction that British air power would take in the early 20th century.

As far as maritime air power was concerned, First Sea Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill, an advocate of the aircraft in military affairs, pushed for development.

Under pressure from the services, both the Royal Navy and British Army, the Government increased spending and the aviation budget rose from £9,000 in 1909 to £500,000 by 1913.

While the War Office attempted to save money by encouraging civilian aviators such as Samuel Cody to carry out research on their behalf, mostly in the field of reconnaissance and artillery co-operation, the Admiralty undertook its own trials with aircraft built to its own specifications.

On 2 January 1912 Lieutenant H.A Williamson, a submarine officer, who held a Royal Aero Club Certificate submitted a paper dealing with ship-borne aircraft and their use for anti-submarine warfare (ASW).

[2] The Navy was quick to begin experiments to see if surface vessels and submarines could be detected from the air, and started this research in July 1912 at Harwich and Rosyth.

The Royal Flying Corps (RFC) carried out bomb dropping experiments but refused to respond to Admiralty requests for collaboration, this was as late as August 1914.

The RFC, on the other hand, was reliant on the Royal Aircraft Factory and a lack of competition led to its equipment being over-standardised, inflexible in design approach which generally retarded progress in development.

The RNAS was better prepared to carry out effective detection operations at sea and to conduct attacks using bombs against naval and land targets than the RFC.

The Germans favoured airships which carried the advantages of long-range, heavy lift capacity for maritime missions while the British were debating the use of flying boats and seaplanes.

Few forces had the doctrine or capability to deployment their charges on effective sea operations despite manoeuvres involving aircraft being carried out in 1913.

The actual figures obtained were 305 and 382 respectively, but the clear intended expansion was an indication of air power's importance in trade and maritime defence.

But the surrender of Germany in November 1918 and mass demobilisation saw maritime aviation enter terminal decline for the next 20 years.

[19] Despite the fact that Britain had been caused severe difficulty by the U-boat campaign in the First World War, the Admiralty completely ignored the threat of the submarine until the late 1930s.

Even after the rise of Adolf Hitler and the birth of the Third Reich, there seemed little inclination or will toward rearming Britain's ASW air forces.

The failure of the RAF to do so started a power struggle between the Air Ministry on one side and the Admiralty and War Office on the other.

[23][24][25] Maritime aviation and the valuable lessons of the First European war were cast aside,[26] but crucially the appointment of Trenchard and his views, the removal of the weaker personalities such as CAS Frederick Sykes, and the continued support of Winston Churchill saved the Air Ministry from being disbanded.

This meant that maritime, or "auxiliary" squadrons would be radically reduced to allow the focus on land-based bombers and fighters for air attack and defence[28] in line with the RAF's "non-specialisation policy".

The Air Ministry justified this reduction of maritime aviation in light of the 'breakthrough' in ASDIC (sonar), and underwater detection technology capable of locating submarines.

It succeeded in forcing the return of the Fleet Air Arm (FAA) from the RAF in 1937, but made no effort to develop ASW formations.

This resulted in a lack of development of a maritime strike force and lost another early opportunity to garner support for Coastal Area/Coastal Command.

Several Expansion Schemes were heading at such pace to rearm the British military in face of the Nazi threat that "Area" formations were now to be called "Commands".

The Airco DH.6 , the world's first ASW aircraft.
Trenchard 's struggle with the Admiralty resulted in the Air Ministry focusing more on strategic bombing, at the expense of ASW.