Phil Perry

Well NO Geoff,. . .since I left there in 1983. . . . Sorry. . . .I didn't. . .lucky Rich Barstards. . . I hate them. . . . :-) I've been lucky enough to 'BLAG' a couple of flights in Cessna Jets though. . . .AND a couple of Learjet flights to Europe. . .in the right hand seat. . . .Jeeze,. . .don't they like a lot of tarmac ? ? ? ?. . . it was interesting to see for myself the aircraft 'Teetering' on the edge of a stall, whilst being close to VNE at FL 385. . . the 'Coffin Corner' effect . . this was an early model though, and I am given to understand that the later ones can get to FL 400 and fly safely. . .but on Autopilot only of course. . .

I had the honour to fly a Mooney Porsche a couple of times to the Isle of Man ( and elsewhere ),. . .I didn't realise how fast the gear retraction was until I saw a video of me taking off. . .Jeeze. .. that was quick ! ! ! Now you see it - now - you - don't . . . . Unlike the Cessna 210, whose retraction looks rather like a Stork taking off whilst having having a leisurely Krap. . . . ( Followed by YOU having a 'Slightly less than leisurely Krap' when the solenoid fails and it doesn't deploy properly when you really need it to. . . .) Yes,. . I've had to do the 105 Pumps on the handle a couple of times with 210s. . . .All part and parcel of travelling above the ground I guess. . . .But I STILL Lke Cessna Products. . I do. . I really DO. . .

Hiya John. . . . I think ( ? ) that there are a couple of Hummelbirds on the UK register,. . but I have no idea where they are located,. . you could try looking on the CAA website G-INFO. . . and just type in the name Hummelbird in the type field, and you might get some info. The thing with that site is that it gives you the name and address of the owner(S) too. . . so you can contact them directly and ask your questions. . . Otherwise, the Other Homebuild site is the Light Aircrafft Assocition ( LAA ) on their website, you might be able to glean some info Buddy. Good luck and best wishes with your project Sir. . . OH,. . .and WE ALL TAKE A LOT OF CARE JOHN. . . .( ! ) Phil.

Welcome Mr. Nighthawk. I too, trained in Australia in the 1970s, on the ubiquitous Cessna 150 ( Old Guy here ) after doing ALL previous training on the Tiger Moth ( DH82A ) in England. One day, there were no C-150 aircraft available,. . I'd done around 3 1/2 hours by then . . and my Instructor decided to take me up in a C-172. . . WELL, I LOVED that aeroplane,. . it was like driving a very friendly Bus. . . .Lovely, stable thing to fly, and it's no wonder that the type was the most produced civil aircraft in the world, for many years,. . Finally,. . .only outstripped by the Bell Jetranger helicopter. . . but that's another story. . . I hope you enjoy flying the 152. . . .and we would all be delighted to hear about your training progress and your thoughts on this. One thing to remember,. . You may get LOADS of advice and encouragement on this, and maybe other sites, but LISTEN TO YOUR FLYING INSTRUCTOR. Before taking any advice from well meaning mates on this , or ANY other site. Once again. . . . Phil.

Largest engine I ever had was a Taplin Twin diesel, might have been 5cc, memory fails. But this was fitted in a model speedboat. . . but by 1960 I was saving all my newspaper round and other money for a decent guitar ad amplifier. . .I'd bee using an old Hofner Futurama ( horrible ) plugged into the turntable pickup on the huge sideboard sized gramaphone combo. . much to the chagrin of Mum and Granny. . . model flying went on the back burner then. . . .until the girls bought me that sodding uncontrollable drone for my 68th. . ( the aircraft impact cut above my eye has nearly healed )

I feel your pain Nev. . .My fingers are a bit bent and this seriously affected my learning to play the guitar. . . .I mean, without model engines, I coulda been a brilliant player, I coulda been a Pop Star, I coulda been SOMEBODY. . .'stead of just another bum. . . . ( Apologies to Marlon Brando )

I liked the little prop spinner tool he used for startup, I wish I'd had one of those when I were a young modeller; suffering many 'PropFinger' injuries on the larger diesel motors ! A handy use for the high speed electric screwdiriver eh? . . . Mind you, at least on the smaller Cox .049 motors, they kindly provided a convenient spring recoil starter !

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1755493647891597

We've got a couple of those already mate,. . . .up in Scotchland. . . .you don't really NEED that many Nuke subs,. . .One would probably be sufficient. I don't know many retired Submariners, never personally been a Binbag Back aftie, so please don't start dripping or giving me the Harry Threaders mate. . . . Trim the festive norman aft: a guide to submarine slang ***WARNING*** the above link is from The Grauniad. . .who are a bunch of Britain hating A$$holes who are always crying poor. They will ask you for a donation to keep their looney writers and newspaper afloat,. . .( Even though ONLY the BBC buy it. . .) even though they have around £20 million in an offshore account in a tax haven in the Bahamas or somewhere. . . .

I'd volunteer to go search for him Nev. . . so long as HE bought the beer when we found him and got back to the pub. . . . :-)

Sounds about right mate,. . they don't trust us to build ships for the RN either,. . they've signed a contract with Australia to build three of them under licence down your end of the world. I hope that your shipbuilders are better than ours, . . . . a retired RN Commander told me that the build quality / finish inside and out of most British warships was bloody disgraceful. . .and Had been so for a few decades.

This is in stark contrast to the UK Military. . . .we don't even have ONE single coastal patrol vessel. NOT ONE. I wonder what happened to the greatest Navy the world had ever seen ? We also have 2 aircraft carriers with no catapults and NO aircraft. . . the Russian RT news channel jibed that these are the Largest floating Targets in the world. . .No support vessels, they've all been scrapped.

My Apologies for Buggering up and posting part three Twice !. . . .Early Onset Dementia I think. . . Operation Sealion Part 5 22nd April 2018 Battle in and over the Channel – Set the sea on fire and drench them with gas The Petroleum Warfare Department (PWD) was an organisation established in Britain in 1940 in response to the invasion crisis during World War II, when it appeared that Germany would invade the country. Rat catcher has already outlined the work of the department in his excellent essays on FIDO and PLUTO. The department was initially tasked with developing the uses of petroleum as a weapon of war and it oversaw the introduction of a wide range of flame warfare weapons. The closure of 17,000 petrol stations due to mass vehicle requisitions and only issuing of fuel to those on essential duties, meant that fuel was available in abundance. From its inception the PWD was tasked with “setting the sea on fire,” as much for the propaganda value this weapon would have as well as its actual affect. It was all very much within the myths and use of Greek fire during the wars against Islam in the early Middle Ages. Although PWD would go on to work on burning floating oil, a plan was hatched to spread the story that such a weapon already existed even before the first trials were performed. This disinformation was circulated in neutral cities around the world, that Britain possessed a weapon that could turn the seas to fire. The effectiveness of this disinformation was confirmed by the interrogations of captured Luftwaffe personnel, who confirmed the absolute certainty that such a weapon existed. Moreover the story of the burning seas was embellished when an American war correspondent William Shirer based in Berlin, visited Geneva in Swizerland and filed a story: News coming over the near-by border of France is that the Germans have attempted a landing in Britain, but that it has been repulsed with heavy German losses. Must take this report with a grain of salt. But a lie is halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on. However, when Shirer arrived back in Berlin he made the following observation: I noticed several lightly wounded soldiers, mostly airmen, getting off a special car which had been attached to our train. From their bandages, the wounds looked like burns. I noticed also the longest Red Cross train I’ve ever seen. It stretched from the station for half a mile to beyond the bridge over the Landwehr Canal. […] I wondered where so many wounded could have come from, as the armies in the west stopped fighting three months ago. As there were only a few porters I had to wait some time on the platform and picked up a conversation with a railway workman. He said most of the men taken from the hospital train were suffering from burns. Whatever the propaganda, the efforts of the PWD were real enough; they continued with experiments to actually set the sea on fire. While initial tests were discouraging, on 24 August 1940, on the northern shores of the Solent, near Titchfield, ten tanker wagons began to pump oil down pipes running from the top of a thirty-foot high cliff down into the water at the rate of about 12 tons per hour. In front of many spectators, the oil was ignited by flares and a system of sodium and petrol pellets. In a matter of seconds, a raging wall of flame was produced; the intense heat caused the water to boil and people at the cliff edge were obliged to retreat. Unfortunately it was not an unqualified success because the circumstances were improbably favourable; in the sheltered waters of the Solent, the sun-warmed sea was calm and the winds light. The solution was to spray and burn the oil/petroleum mixture over the water rather than on it. By August 1940 Lengths of this flame defence were completed at Deal between Kingsdown and Sandwich, at St. Margaret’s Bay, at Shakespeare Cliff near Dover railway tunnel, at Rye where a remarkable system of remote controlled devices across the marshes was installed and at Studland Bay. The PWD went on to develop and issue a number of flame devices to the defence forces, including portable flame throwers for the Home Guard, vehicle-mounted weapons on armoured trucks and AFVs as well as flame stops at points of concentration. In the hands of determined and able troops, these petroleum weapons would have been extremely effective and terrifying to those they were used against and possibly those who operated them. The Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, usually called the Geneva Protocol, is a treaty prohibiting the use of chemical and biological weapons in international armed conflicts. It was signed at Geneva on 17 June 1925 and entered into force on 8 February 1928. It was registered in League of Nations Treaty Series on 7 September 1929. The Geneva Protocol is a protocol to the Convention for the Supervision of the International Trade in Arms and Ammunition and in Implements of War signed on the same date, and followed the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907. There may be some people who would be shocked that Britain not only contemplated the first use of weapons banned under the Geneva Protocol, but actively produced, stockpiled and made preparations for the delivery of chemical weapons on any invading German forces. At the end of June 1940 Churchill ordered that the production of mustard gas should be increased and by August the RAF had over 264,000lbs of chemical bombs stored in airfields around the country. Apart from the Engineers, the Army had insufficient training to operate chemical weapons so the bulk of the task would fall to the RAF. Lysander, Blenheim and Battle aircraft were fitted with crop spraying devices and a plan for their deployment and use was drawn up. The bombers of No 2 Group who already had experience of bombing the coastal ports, would saturate the embarkation ports with mustard gas bombs. These devices were designed to explode at a predetermined altitude after release and shower the closely packed barges and their troops with persistent blister agent. Those enemy troops that made it to the other side of the Channel would be doused in mustard agent from the Lysander spray aircraft. Whilst first having been issued in 1939, the acceleration of the issue of improved gas masks to the civilian population was possibly more to do with the likely use of chemical weapons by the British rather than any specific threat from the Germans. Additionally, all British troops were issued with the updated respirator with an improved filter system. Very little information is available regarding the disposal of the unused stockpiles of mustard gas, but people are still uncovering mustard gas canisters from ancient, deteriorating stockpiles, such as those recently discovered in the woods around the former RAF Woodall Spa. Blown Periphery 2018 Going Postal blog.

Operation Sealion – Part 4 5th April 2018 The Army and Defence in Depth A number of senior members of the Imperial General Staff thought the likelihood of a German Invasion to be ludicrous. They believed the best strategy was to bolster the crumbling French Army. An additional Brigade of the First Armoured Division was duly sent to France where it lost all of its tanks, infantry carriers, artillery and logistics train. Air Chief Marshall Dowding refused to send any more fighters to France as he was husbanding his forces for defence against the air assault that would have to follow. This made him few friends within the Government and IGS and he was sacked as AOC Fighter Command after the Battle of Britain. The Fighter Command pilots had a valid reason to feel aggrieved that the Army blamed them for their own shortcomings leading up to Dunkirk. Over the nine days of Operation Dynamo, the RAF flew 171 reconnaissance, 651 bombing and 2,739 fighter sorties. Fighter Command claimed 262 enemy aircraft, losing 106 of their own, losses worse than they would experience in the upcoming Battle of Britain. There were recorded instances of RAF personnel, including shot down aircrew being refused entry to the boats out of Dunkirk; a shameful escapade in modern British military history. The defence of Britain was encapsulated in the Julius Caesar Plan that was by now hopelessly static and built around a much larger standing army. General Ironside was the Chief of the Imperial General Staff and on 27th May 1940 was appointed Commander-in-Chief Home Forces. Ironside commanded a force which amounted – on paper – to Fifteen Territorial Infantry Divisions, a single armoured division, fifty-seven home-defence battalions, and the Local Defence Volunteers (later the Home Guard). However, all of these were deficient in training and organisation, as the operational units had already been sent to France. They were also lacking in equipment; the force as a whole had almost no modern artillery or anti-tank guns, and the armoured division had just a small number of light tanks. Intelligence was also hopelessly wide of the mark. Some estimates put the German strength at 44 Divisions with the entire RAF being outnumbered four-to-one. The deficiencies with equipment led to an overall lack of mobility, which coupled with the limited training of the units meant that very few were capable of organised offensive counter-attacks against an invading force. As a result, the only way they could practically be used would be to commit them to static defence; Ironside planned to steadily pull units away from the coast and into a central mobile reserve, but this was not possible until they were trained and equipped for the role. He threw himself into the details of the strategy, laying out plans for the static defence of village strong-points by the Home Guard, patrols of “Ironsides” armoured cars to strengthen the divisions and light artillery mounted on trucks as improvised tank destroyers. The GHQ Stop Lines By early July there was a scanty mobile reserve in the form of an understrength 8th RTR. A network of pillboxes, anti-tank ditches and roadblocks were constructed and were known as the “Stop Lines.” The map above shows the main defensive positions with a fortress around the Bath/Chippenham area. Corsham would be the Government’s final redoubt in England if London fell. This major works programme would have taken five years in peacetime. It was completed in two months. What became known as the “Ironside Plan” consisted of the following defence in depth: A defensive “crust” along the coast, able to fight off small raids, give immediate warning of attack, and delay any landings. Home Guard roadblocks at crossroads, valleys, and other choke points, to stop German armoured columns penetrating inland. Static fortified stop lines sealing the Midlands and London off from the coast, and dividing the coastal area into defensible sectors A central corps-sized reserve to deal with a major breakthrough Local mobile columns to deal with local attacks and parachute landings Disguised pillbox added to a house However, criticism of the “Ironside plan” was soon manifest. On 26 June (only a day after the plan’s approval) at a meeting of the Vice-Chiefs of Staff, Air Marshal Richard Peirse pointed out that many of the RAF’s main operational airfields would be overrun by an invader before reaching the principal GHQ Stop Line. Senior Army commanders complained of the plan: We have become pill-box mad.” There was widespread concern that troops were spending their time constructing defences rather than on the training which they desperately needed. Another critic was Major-General Bernard Montgomery, never known for hiding his light under a bushel, who later wrote that he found himself “in complete disagreement with the general approach to the defence of Britain and refused to apply it.” When Churchill visited Montgomery’s 3rd (Regular) Division on 2 July, he described to the prime minister how his division, which was fully equipped except for transport, could be made into a mobile formation by the requisitioning of municipal buses, able to strike at the enemy beachheads rather than strung out along the coast as ordered. Ironside’s position was also compromised by his relationship with “Boney” Fuller, who was a senior member of the British Union of Fascists. The Ironside Plan was very much of its day, the General making the best use of his limited and static resources. However as the summer of 1940 drew on more formations and transport became available and as importantly more guns and ammunition. Ironside was replaced by General Brooke on 19th July and a new strategy implemented. The coastal crust was to be more strongly defended with anti-tank islands or “hedgehogs,” making use where possible of the stop lines and a large, mobile reserve. Emergency Coastal Batteries were constructed to protect ports and likely landing places. They were fitted with whatever guns were available, which mainly came from naval vessels scrapped since the end of the First World War. These included 6 inch, 5.5 inch, 4.7 inch and 4 inch guns. These had little ammunition, sometimes as few as ten rounds apiece. At Dover, two 14 inch guns known as Winnie and Pooh were employed. There were also a few land based torpedo launching sites. The map above shows the dispositions of the Southern Defensive Area’s formations around late summer 1940. It is a snapshot in time as the placement of the defensive units was extremely fluid. The most likely landing areas are strongly defended with Regular units, while the other coastal areas are covered by the Home Guard. The Isle of White and the Solent, Hastings, Folkestone and Dover are particularly well defended. Blown Periphery 2018 Going Postal blog.

Five more to go. . . .

I'm glad that folks agree that the political back stories are as intriguing as the fact that a lot of it seems to have missed the mainstream history books of the period. 'History is written by the winners' being at the forefront I guess, with certain 'BallsUps' quietly ignored by the Allies ( and by the Germans it seems ) Here's the Third tranche of the tale. . . Operation Sealion – Part 3 More Fifth Columnists, Useful Idiots, Traitors and Spies There was much concern not just from an external invasion, but also the activities of some people in Britain and their lack of wholehearted commitment to the fight ahead. Traitors and German agents were seen everywhere and the paranoia rose to a height after the Norwegian campaign and the activities of the quislings. The Tory arch-appeaser, Sir Samuel Hoare known as “Slippery Sam” was a case in point. He was loathed by Churchill, who on coming to power ordered his expulsion from Downing Street circles. “Tell that man if his room is not cleared by two o’ clock I will make him Minister for Iceland.” There was a more obvious candidate for suspicion, close surveillance and incarceration, Sir Oswald Mosley, 6th Baronet of Ancoats. Former Labout MP and Leader of the British Union of Fascists (BUF), Mosley had become more brazen with his attacks of the Government throughout the so-called Phoney War, although this period was anything but phoney for members of Bomber Command and the Royal Navy. His Britain First rally at the Earls Court Exhibition Hall on 16 July 1939 was the biggest indoor political rally in British history. Unbeknown to Mosley the BUF and been comprehensively infiltrated by MI5 and while his ongoing agitation was tolerated, when the Battle of France commenced in May 1940, Mosley was interned on 24th May 1940 under the Emergency Powers Act, 18B. Mosley’s internment was very cosy compared to other internees. He lived in a house in the grounds of Holloway Prison with his wife, where his son Max was born in 1940. The level of tolerance shown by the authorities to potentially dangerous and toxic individuals and organisations seems not unlike the authority’s tolerance of our current, far more dangerous fifth column. The then Home Secretary Sir John Anderson displayed remarkable forbearance and even though the Nazi/Soviet Pact had carved up Poland between the two countries, the British Communist Party was allowed to freely operate. The War Secretary Anthony Eden became exasperated with Anderson and many of his critics felt that the Home Secretary was failing to grasp the realities of War. However, a plot uncovered in London revealed a number of establishment figures, a global network and a plan that could have brought down the President of the United States. At its heart were three figures, Anna Wolkoff, a White Russian who wanted to see the Third Reich triumphant in heading a united Europe. Captain Maule “Jock” Ramsey, a Conservative MP, war veteran and rabid anti-Semite and Tyler Kent, a US Foreign Service clerk with a penchant for the high-life. This gang of three formed part of the Right Club, a network that was virulently anti-Semitic and wanted to overthrow the British War effort. Another key player was Joseph P Kennedy US Ambassador to London, who held a long hatred of Britain and her Empire and made no secret of his admiration of Hitler. Once again MI5 had infiltrated the Right Club and was astonished at just how widespread the network of Nazi sympathisers was and how it riddled British society like cancer. MI5 infiltrated a number of women into the Right Club who posed as extreme right-wing acolytes and they became trusted within the organisation. What caused the authorities to act was Tyler Kent’s passing of sensitive documents to the Soviets and then onto the Nazis. While Kent had diplomatic immunity, on 20th May Special Branch arrested Wolkoff in the Russian Tea Rooms in Kensington. Kent’s flat was searched and a veritable treasure trove of treachery found. Ramsey was also arrested that day and interned while Kent was deported and prosecuted in America. Finally Anderson acted and had Mosley and large number of the BUF arrested along with most of the 73,533 Germans and Austrians who were over sixteen and resident in the UK. Those not interned in camps on the Isle of Man had restrictions placed on their movement and they were not allowed radios, bicycles or maps. Refugees from Nazi Germany had no restrictions placed on them, and many went on to serve in the Special Forces or as specialist radio operators in Bomber Command. They flew as an eighth crew member on 101 Squadron Lancasters and attempted to spoof the German night fighters, by giving false vectors over frequency agile radio sets. King Edward VIII and Britain’s Narrow Escape Mainstream British newspapers such as the Daily Mail regularly heaped praise on the Third Reich and published membership forms for Sir Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists so that their readers might have the opportunity to join. And while the majority of the British people were wise enough to have no truck with fascism and the Nazis, there were elements of the British Establishment who thought that Hitler should be either appeased or embraced. Indeed, appeasement was the policy of the British government, firstly under Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin and then his successor Neville Chamberlain, well-meaning politicians both who simply couldn’t accept that anyone could be as evil and devious as Hitler. Former Prime Minister David Lloyd George visited Hitler in 1936 and was full of praise, considering him the “George Washington of Germany”. Newspaper barons Lord Northcliffe and Lord Rothermere, who were to be instrumental in hushing up King Edward’s affair with Wallis Simpson, were lavishly entertained by Hitler and subsequently praised him in their newspapers. Following his abdication as King Edward VIII the Duke of Windsor and Mrs Simpson settled in France until war broke out and they were brought back to Britain by Mountbatten on board HMS Kelly. The German Ambassador to the Hague clamed in February 1940 that the Duke had leaked plans for the defence of Belgium, a claim that the Duke denied. When the Germans invaded northern France the Duke and Duchess headed south, first to Spain, then to Lisbon where they lived in the home of Ricardo de Espírito Santo, a Portuguese banker with both British and German contacts. The kindest thing I can think to say about the Duke of Windsor is that he had a poor sense of moral judgement. The German Abwehr concocted a plan codenamed Operation Willi to lure the Duke back to Spain where he could be abducted and taken to Germany as a “Leader of Britain in Waiting.” Lord Caldecote wrote a warning to Churchill: “(the Duke) is well-known to be pro-Nazi and he may become a centre of intrigue. Churchill threatened the Duke with a court-martial if he did not return to British soil. In July 1940, Edward was appointed Governor of the Bahamas. The Duke and Duchess left Lisbon on 1 August aboard the American Export Lines steamship Excalibur, which was specially diverted from its usual direct course to New York City so that they could be dropped off at Bermuda on the 9th. They left Bermuda for Nassau on the Canadian steamship Lady Somers on 15 August, arriving two days later. The Duke did not enjoy being governor and referred to the islands as “a third-class British colony”. The British Foreign Office objected when the Duke and Duchess planned to cruise aboard a yacht belonging to a Swedish magnate, Axel Wenner-Gren, whom British and American intelligence believed to be a close friend of Luftwaffe commander Hermann Göring. The Duke remained in the Bahamas for the rest of the war where he could do as little damage as possible. Sensible British patriots may have breathed a sigh of relief. The Germans had already set up spy networks in Britain prior to the outbreak of war and some of our friends over in the Republic of Ireland were only too keen to support any treachery against the hated Brits. But these networks had been comprehensively infiltrated by MI5, much in the same way as the Right Club. Once the war had started, the German Intelligence or Abwher needed to get agents into Britain, to reinforce and check the viability of the existing networks. What is amazing is that such a bunch of hopelessly prepared and inept agents were used for what was codenamed Operation Lena. They arrived by parachute and by dingy from U-boats, each man carrying a suitcase containing a radio transmitter, maps, a handgun and invisible ink. Their mission was to pave the way for the invasion. They seemed hopelessly prepared for their assignments and some even lacked a basic grasp of English or British customs. One hapless individual was arrested when he walked into a pub and tried to order a pint of cider at 10:00, seemingly unaware of licencing regulations. Another pair were stopped while cycling through Scotland on the wrong side of the road and once the police discovered German sausages and Nivea hand cream in their luggage, their cover was blown. Twelve Operation Lena spies were landed in September 1940 and most were captured within forty-eight hours. Some were shot by firing squad in the Tower of London and the rest were turned to provide a stream of false information for the rest of the war. Some were allowed to operate, but heavily monitored to reveal other spies and Nazi sympathisers. A theory proposed by Monika Siedentopf a German author, argues that the botched spying mission was not the result of German incompetence, but a deliberate act of sabotage by a cadre of intelligence officials opposed to Hitler’s plans. This seems rather fanciful given that the Abwher was only too happy to infiltrate and turn SOE networks, particularly in the Netherlands. Hardly the actions of an organisation that wanted Germany to lose the war. It all rather smacks of the Germans trying to re-write history and cover up the German peoples’ monstrous blindness to the depravity of their government. And Germany never cornered the market in espionage ineptitude, as the hapless agents of MI6 proved in Germany prior to the outbreak of war. Blown Periphery - March 2018 Going Postal blog.

Operation Sealion – Part 3 8th April 2018 Fifth Columnists, Useful Idiots, Traitors and Spies There was much concern not just from an external invasion, but also the activities of some people in Britain and their lack of wholehearted commitment to the fight ahead. Traitors and German agents were seen everywhere and the paranoia rose to a height after the Norwegian campaign and the activities of the quislings. The Tory arch-appeaser, Sir Samuel Hoare known as “Slippery Sam” was a case in point. He was loathed by Churchill, who on coming to power ordered his expulsion from Downing Street circles. “Tell that man if his room is not cleared by two o’ clock I will make him Minister for Iceland.” There was a more obvious candidate for suspicion, close surveillance and incarceration, Sir Oswald Mosley, 6th Baronet of Ancoats. Former Labout MP and Leader of the British Union of Fascists (BUF), Mosley had become more brazen with his attacks of the Government throughout the so-called Phoney War, although this period was anything but phoney for members of Bomber Command and the Royal Navy. His Britain First rally at the Earls Court Exhibition Hall on 16 July 1939 was the biggest indoor political rally in British history. Unbeknown to Mosley the BUF and been comprehensively infiltrated by MI5 and while his ongoing agitation was tolerated, when the Battle of France commenced in May 1940, Mosley was interned on 24th May 1940 under the Emergency Powers Act, 18B. Mosley’s internment was very cosy compared to other internees. He lived in a house in the grounds of Holloway Prison with his wife, where his son Max was born in 1940. The level of tolerance shown by the authorities to potentially dangerous and toxic individuals and organisations seems not unlike the authority’s tolerance of our current, far more dangerous fifth column. The then Home Secretary Sir John Anderson displayed remarkable forbearance and even though the Nazi/Soviet Pact had carved up Poland between the two countries, the British Communist Party was allowed to freely operate. The War Secretary Anthony Eden became exasperated with Anderson and many of his critics felt that the Home Secretary was failing to grasp the realities of War. However, a plot uncovered in London revealed a number of establishment figures, a global network and a plan that could have brought down the President of the United States. At its heart were three figures, Anna Wolkoff, a White Russian who wanted to see the Third Reich triumphant in heading a united Europe. Captain Maule “Jock” Ramsey, a Conservative MP, war veteran and rabid anti-Semite and Tyler Kent, a US Foreign Service clerk with a penchant for the high-life. This gang of three formed part of the Right Club, a network that was virulently anti-Semitic and wanted to overthrow the British War effort. Another key player was Joseph P Kennedy US Ambassador to London, who held a long hatred of Britain and her Empire and made no secret of his admiration of Hitler. Once again MI5 had infiltrated the Right Club and was astonished at just how widespread the network of Nazi sympathisers was and how it riddled British society like cancer. MI5 infiltrated a number of women into the Right Club who posed as extreme right-wing acolytes and they became trusted within the organisation. What caused the authorities to act was Tyler Kent’s passing of sensitive documents to the Soviets and then onto the Nazis. While Kent had diplomatic immunity, on 20th May Special Branch arrested Wolkoff in the Russian Tea Rooms in Kensington. Kent’s flat was searched and a veritable treasure trove of treachery found. Ramsey was also arrested that day and interned while Kent was deported and prosecuted in America. Finally Anderson acted and had Mosley and large number of the BUF arrested along with most of the 73,533 Germans and Austrians who were over sixteen and resident in the UK. Those not interned in camps on the Isle of Man had restrictions placed on their movement and they were not allowed radios, bicycles or maps. Refugees from Nazi Germany had no restrictions placed on them, and many went on to serve in the Special Forces or as specialist radio operators in Bomber Command. They flew as an eighth crew member on 101 Squadron Lancasters and attempted to spoof the German night fighters, by giving false vectors over frequency agile radio sets. King Edward VIII and Britain’s Narrow Escape Mainstream British newspapers such as the Daily Mail regularly heaped praise on the Third Reich and published membership forms for Sir Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists so that their readers might have the opportunity to join. And while the majority of the British people were wise enough to have no truck with fascism and the Nazis, there were elements of the British Establishment who thought that Hitler should be either appeased or embraced. Indeed, appeasement was the policy of the British government, firstly under Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin and then his successor Neville Chamberlain, well-meaning politicians both who simply couldn’t accept that anyone could be as evil and devious as Hitler. Former Prime Minister David Lloyd George visited Hitler in 1936 and was full of praise, considering him the “George Washington of Germany”. Newspaper barons Lord Northcliffe and Lord Rothermere, who were to be instrumental in hushing up King Edward’s affair with Wallis Simpson, were lavishly entertained by Hitler and subsequently praised him in their newspapers. Following his abdication as King Edward VIII the Duke of Windsor and Mrs Simpson settled in France until war broke out and they were brought back to Britain by Mountbatten on board HMS Kelly. The German Ambassador to the Hague clamed in February 1940 that the Duke had leaked plans for the defence of Belgium, a claim that the Duke denied. When the Germans invaded northern France the Duke and Duchess headed south, first to Spain, then to Lisbon where they lived in the home of Ricardo de Espírito Santo, a Portuguese banker with both British and German contacts. The kindest thing I can think to say about the Duke of Windsor is that he had a poor sense of moral judgement. The German Abwehr concocted a plan codenamed Operation Willi to lure the Duke back to Spain where he could be abducted and taken to Germany as a “Leader of Britain in Waiting.” Lord Caldecote wrote a warning to Churchill: “(the Duke) is well-known to be pro-Nazi and he may become a centre of intrigue. Churchill threatened the Duke with a court-martial if he did not return to British soil. In July 1940, Edward was appointed Governor of the Bahamas. The Duke and Duchess left Lisbon on 1 August aboard the American Export Lines steamship Excalibur, which was specially diverted from its usual direct course to New York City so that they could be dropped off at Bermuda on the 9th. They left Bermuda for Nassau on the Canadian steamship Lady Somers on 15 August, arriving two days later. The Duke did not enjoy being governor and referred to the islands as “a third-class British colony”. The British Foreign Office objected when the Duke and Duchess planned to cruise aboard a yacht belonging to a Swedish magnate, Axel Wenner-Gren, whom British and American intelligence believed to be a close friend of Luftwaffe commander Hermann Göring. The Duke remained in the Bahamas for the rest of the war where he could do as little damage as possible. Sensible British patriots may have breathed a sigh of relief. The Germans had already set up spy networks in Britain prior to the outbreak of war and some of our friends over in the Republic of Ireland were only too keen to support any treachery against the hated Brits. But these networks had been comprehensively infiltrated by MI5, much in the same way as the Right Club. Once the war had started, the German Intelligence or Abwher needed to get agents into Britain, to reinforce and check the viability of the existing networks. What is amazing is that such a bunch of hopelessly prepared and inept agents were used for what was codenamed Operation Lena. They arrived by parachute and by dingy from U-boats, each man carrying a suitcase containing a radio transmitter, maps, a handgun and invisible ink. Their mission was to pave the way for the invasion. They seemed hopelessly prepared for their assignments and some even lacked a basic grasp of English or British customs. One hapless individual was arrested when he walked into a pub and tried to order a pint of cider at 10:00, seemingly unaware of licencing regulations. Another pair were stopped while cycling through Scotland on the wrong side of the road and once the police discovered German sausages and Nivea hand cream in their luggage, their cover was blown. Twelve Operation Lena spies were landed in September 1940 and most were captured within forty-eight hours. Some were shot by firing squad in the Tower of London and the rest were turned to provide a stream of false information for the rest of the war. Some were allowed to operate, but heavily monitored to reveal other spies and Nazi sympathisers. A theory proposed by Monika Siedentopf a German author, argues that the botched spying mission was not the result of German incompetence, but a deliberate act of sabotage by a cadre of intelligence officials opposed to Hitler’s plans. This seems rather fanciful given that the Abwher was only too happy to infiltrate and turn SOE networks, particularly in the Netherlands. Hardly the actions of an organisation that wanted Germany to lose the war. It all rather smacks of the Germans trying to re-write history and cover up the German peoples’ monstrous blindness to the depravity of their government. And Germany never cornered the market in espionage ineptitude, as the hapless agents of MI6 proved in Germany prior to the outbreak of war. Blown Periphery - 2018

There isn't much aviation on the early stages of 'Sealion' though mate. . I only post this stuff because I think that the bloke is a very good writer. His fiction stuff is most entertaining and militarily, surgically accurate and superbly researched. I only post the Fiction on WhatsUp though. I've followed his stuff for a few years now. . .I would not be surprised if he is a 'Known' author, operating under a pseudonym for larfs. . .he certainly knows how to spin a story. . .and if you like it,. . that's even better. I cannot take any credit whatsoever for pasting his stuff up.

Albert Ball – The Angel-Faced Killer Breakfast His place was laid, The messroom clock struck eight The sun shone through the window On his chair. No one commented on his fate, Save for a headshake here and there; Only old George who’d seen him die Spinning against the autumn sky, Leaned forward and turned down his plate. And as he did, the sunlight fled, As though the sky he’d loved so Mourned her dead. Hannah M. Hunt On the evening of the 17th May 1917, near Douai in Picardy, a German pilot officer on the ground, Lieutenant Hailer, saw a British SE 5A fighter fall from a thunder cloud, spinning and inverted with a dead prop. The engine was leaving a cloud of black smoke, probably caused by oil leaking into the cylinders. The SE5a’s engine had to be inverted for this to happen. The Hispano engine was known to flood its inlet manifold with fuel when upside down and then stop running. A crowd of Germans hurried to the crash site and found the British pilot dead in the wreckage. Nevertheless, they took the pilot to a field hospital where he was pronounced dead, due to a broken back and a crushed chest, along with fractured limbs. It was noted that the body and the crashed aircraft bore no signs of battle damage. Identification found on the body revealed the pilot to be Acting Captain Albert Ball, the British fighter ace with 44 confirmed victories. It was as though the Royal Flying Corps’ then premier ace, had simply fallen to earth. Albert Ball was born in Lenton, Nottingham on 14th August 1896. His father, also Albert Ball was a successful businessman who would become the Lord Mayor of Nottingham and later knighted. Young Albert had two siblings, a brother and a sister. Albert’s parents could afford to be indulgent with their elder son and he was brought up to have working knowledge of things mechanical and electrical. And what may seem bizarre and trigger today’s social workers, Albert junior was raised with firearms and became a crack shot. He was also a deeply religious young man. He studied at Grantham Grammar School, Nottingham High School and transferred to Trent College at 14. He was not particularly academic but showed a love of mechanical things, carpentry, modelling, the violin and photography. He served in the Officers’ Training Corps at college and when he left in 1913 at the age of 17, his father helped him gain employment at the Universal Engineering Works in Nottingham. When war broke out in 1914, Ball enlisted in the 2/7th (Robin Hood) Battalion of the Sherwood Foresters (Nottingham and Derby Regiment). He was rapidly promoted to Sergeant and commissioned second lieutenant, Gazetted on 29th October 1914. He was assigned to training recruits, a rear echelon role that irked him. He tried to transfer to front-line duties but remained based in England. He managed to find time for a brief engagement to Dot Allbourne, but slightly caddishly, maintained interest in other girls. Ball hit upon the idea of learning to fly to get to the front any way he could, and started private lessons at Hendon Aerodrome. He would wake at 0300 and motorcycle to Hendon for a pre-dawn flight, before riding back to commence military duties at 0645. He seemed to have an indifference to the accidents and suffering of his fellow student pilots that arguably bordered on psychopathy. He wrote to a friend: Yesterday a ripping boy had a smash, and when we got up to him he was nearly dead, he had a two-inch piece of wood right through his head and died this morning. If you would like a flight I should be pleased to take you any time you wish. He was considered to be a less than average pilot by his instructors, but gained his Royal Aero Club Certificate on the 15th October 1915. He was transferred to the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and detached to an aerodrome near Norwich. He soloed on a Farman biplane but his landing was rough after having stood guard all night. When his instructor commented sarcastically on the landing, Ball responded angrily, but would continue to have a series of rough landings. He completed training at the Central Flying School Upavon and received his wings on the 22nd January 1916. Second Lieutenant Ball joined 13 Squadron RFC at Marieux in France, on 18th February 1916. He was assigned to flying reconnaissance flights in a BE2c and was shot down by anti-aircraft fire on 27th March. A few days later on a flight, he had a running battle with a German observation aircraft, during which his observer fired an entire drum of Lewis Gun ammunition before they were driven off by a second German aircraft. In letters home to his father, he tried to dissuade his younger brother from following him into the RFC. I like this job, but nerves do not last long, and you soon want a rest. Ball’s developing skills and penchant for aggressive action allowed him access to the Squadron’s single-seat fighter, a Bristol Scout. He found the small, agile machine a joy to fly and he lavished praise on the machine in letters home. He was posted to Number 11 Fighter Squadron RFC on 7th May 1916, a unit that flew Nieuport 16s and FE 2Bb “pushers.” In one of his letters home at this time he complained of fatigue and the lack of hygiene in his assigned billet in the local village. Ball elected to live on the flight line and built a hut for himself, complete with a garden. One can’t help wondering just how popular this made the newcomer with his fellow pilots. Ball adopted the tactics of a “lone wolf” pilot who stalked his prey from below until close enough to use the upper wing-mounted Lewis Gun angled to fire upwards into the enemy crew, a tactic beloved by German Night Fighters in WW2 against British bombers. He would hold the control column between his knees while he changed the drums of ammunition. He was a “lone wolf” on the ground as well as in the air and because he worked on his own aircraft, he presented a dishevelled and unkempt appearance. He scored his first kill on 16th May 1916, brought down two LGVs on 29th May and a Fokker Eindecker on 1st June whilst flying a Nieuport. He added a balloon to his tarry by destroying an observation balloon with phosphorus bombs on 25th June. On 2nd July he added two more victories and became an ace. As if in premonition, he wrote to his parents asking them “to take it well” if he were killed in action. He requested time off, but was instead detached to No 8 Squadron where he flew BE2s from 18th July until 14th August. During this time he was tasked with dropping off an agent behind enemy lines. Having dodged three enemy fighters he landed in the field, only to have the agent refuse to get out of the aircraft. During his time with 8 Squadron, he was awarded the Military Cross (MC) for “conspicuous skill and gallantry on many occasions.” On his 20th birthday Ball returned to 11 Squadron and destroyed three Roland CIIs during one sortie on 22nd August 1916. He ended that day taking on fourteen German aircraft and struggled back, short of fuel to the Allied lines. He was transferred to 60 Squadron RFC on 23rd August and his new Squadron Commander gave him carte blanche to fly solo missions, plus his own aircraft and ground crew. He had the Nieuport’s propeller boss painted signal red and by the end of the month had increased his kills to 17 enemy aircraft, with three downed on the 28th August. Ball went on leave to England where his feats had received much publicity. It had been British policy to not publicise RFC successes, but the carnage of the Battle of the Somme made all successes something to propagandise. The young pilot much enjoyed the attention, particularly that of the ladies. He returned to France and scored two more kills on 15th September. He scored three triple daily victories and by the end of the month had amassed a score of 31. Making him Britain’s top fighter ace. His superiors ordered him to rest as he was taking unnecessary risks and arranged a Home Establishment posting in England. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order (DSO) and Bar “for conspicuous gallantry and skill” and the Russian Order of St George in the same month. Back in England he was lauded as a national hero and was invested with the MC and DSO and Bar by King George V. He was promoted to substantive Lieutenant on 8th December 1916. Lieutenant Albert Ball was posted on instructional duties to Orford Ness in Suffolk. He was invited to test fly the new SE5a fighter in November, but he was unimpressed with the new aircraft. He found it to be heavy and too stable, compared with the nimble Nieuport. His views contrasted markedly with those of fellow pilots who had flown the aircraft. Perhaps they were looking at it as a type, which would give more inexperienced pilots a fighting chance against the superior German fighters. During this time, Ball met 18-year-old Flora Young and they became engaged on 5th April 1917. It was while serving on the home front that he was able to lobby for the building and testing of the Austin-Ball A.F.B.1 fighter, which he had designed and helped to develop. He hoped to be able to take an example of the type to France with him, but the prototype was not completed until after his death in action. Ball chafed at instructional duties and wrangled a posting back to France as a flight commander with newly- formed 56 Squadron RFC. It was to be equipped with the SE5a and Ball was unhappy, insisting that his aircraft should have modified gun mountings to fire upwards and downwards instead of the two Vickers Guns synchronised to fire through the propeller. He flew the SE5a when on patrol with the rest of the Squadron, and used a Nieuport for his “lone wolf” sorties. During this time he continued to score a steady rate of kills, despite having constant problems of his guns jamming in the SE5a. He reverted to the Nieuport and scored his 44th kill on 6th May, an Albatros DIII. He continued to fly lone patrols, but the German fighter pilots were getting much better as were their tactics and he was increasingly returning with more comprehensive battle damage. On his final letter home, Ball wrote: I do get tired of always living to kill, and am really beginning to feel like a murderer. Shall be so pleased when I have finished. On the 7th May 1917 Albert Ball was leading a patrol of eleven aircraft in his SE5a, when the patrol encountered a large number of German fighters from Jasta 11. The two sides engaged in a confused, running dogfight in decreasing visibility and the two formations became scattered. Albert Ball was last seen in pursuit of a red Albatros DIII, the mount of Lothar von Richthofen, the Red Baron’s younger brother, until the Germans went to the crashed SE5a that had fallen from the thundercloud. The Germans credited Lothar von Richthofen with shooting down Ball, but he disputed this as he claimed that he shot down a Sopwith Triplane and not an SE5a. It is probable that the younger Richthofen was caught up in the propaganda game, spun by the German High Command. It is more likely that Albert Ball became disorientated in the storm cloud and suffered vertigo, inverting the aircraft and cutting out the engine. The fact there was no battle damage on the crashed SE5 supports this hypothesis. At the end of the month that the Germans dropped messages behind Allied lines announcing that Ball was dead, and had been buried in Annoeullin with full military honours, two days after he crashed. Over the grave of the man they dubbed “the English Richthofen”, the Germans erected a cross bearing the inscription In Luftkampf gefallen für sein Vaterland Engl. Flieger Hauptmann Albert Ball, Royal Flying Corps (“Fallen in air combat for his fatherland English pilot Captain Albert Ball.” The tragedy is, there was a certain inevitability about the death of Albert Ball. Notwithstanding the terrible attrition rates of RFC aircrew, Ball was driven and took too many risks. He was a loner and died a loner’s death, disorientated in a dead aircraft spinning to earth. Citation for Posthumous Victoria Cross: Lt. (temp. Capt.) Albert Ball, D.S.O., M.C., late Notts. and Derby. R., and R.F.C. For most conspicuous and consistent bravery from the 25th of April to the 6th of May, 1917, during which period Capt. Ball took part in twenty-six combats in the air and destroyed eleven hostile aeroplanes, drove down two out of control, and forced several others to land. In these combats Capt. Ball, flying alone, on one occasion fought six hostile machines, twice he fought five and once four. When leading two other British aeroplanes he attacked an enemy formation of eight. On each of these occasions he brought down at least one enemy. Several times his aeroplane was badly damaged, once so seriously that but for the most delicate handling his machine would have collapsed, as nearly all the control wires had been shot away. On returning with a damaged machine he had always to be restrained from immediately going out on another. In all, Capt. Ball has destroyed forty-three German aeroplanes and one balloon, and has always displayed most exceptional courage, determination and skill Blown Periphery 2017 Going Postal blog

Operation Sealion – Part 2 1st April 2018 Securing the Home Front, Politics and Preparations Somewhat ironically, it was the disastrous Norway campaign of April – June 1940 that bolstered the British chances of resisting a German invasion later in the year. Despite German success in the land campaign, the Kriegsmarine received a severe mauling at the hands of the Royal Navy and crucially, light cruisers and destroyers had the highest attrition rates. These ships would be needed to escort and protect the invasion convoys across the English Channel. The seizing of Denmark and the Invasion of Norway was an extremely risky undertaking for the Kriegsmarine. The Royal Navy was much stronger and the Germans lost four cruisers, ten destroyers, three U-boats and a torpedo boat. The British lost an aircraft carrier, the Glorious, two cruisers nine destroyers and six submarines. However, the Royal Navy was much stronger and able to sustain these losses with no loss of capability. Admiral Raeder later admitted: “The losses the Kriegsmarine suffered in doing its part weighed heavily upon us for the rest of the war.” Perhaps even more ironically, there was widespread public fury at the inept handling of the Norwegian campaign by Chamberlain’s Government. The man who as First Lord of the Admiralty had masterminded the campaign, gained the most from it politically. There was a public backlash against the previous years’ policies of appeasement and Churchill was remembered for his very vocal opposition to the appeasement strategy of Chamberlain and the Government. There was a general feeling that Chamberlain and his Cabinet were not suited to the rigours of governing in wartime. Churchill on the other hand was seen as possessing boundless energy and optimism, but enemies considered him reckless, particularly in the higher ranks of the Royal Navy, many of whom could remember Gallipoli. Nevertheless, come the hour, come the man and when the Germans invaded the Low Countries and Belgium on 10th May 1940, Chamberlain had to go. Churchill was summoned to the Palace and instructed by King George VI to form a new government. The inter-war years had seen the massive advance of technology, specifically in the performance of aircraft and the evolution of air power doctrine. The more truculent areas of the British Empire had been policed from the air, mainly because it was cheap and the Treasury didn’t want to spend unnecessary money on expensive Army units to sun themselves or heaven forbid, rearmament. Air power doctrine was evolving rapidly, unlike at least in Britain and France, Land doctrine, which seemed to have learned the wrong lessons from the First World War, the Maginot Line being a case in point. However, there were far-sighted military men such as Liddell Hart, who had proposed that infantry be carried along with the fast-moving armoured formations. Due to the work of these pioneers, the British Army of 1939 was truly a mechanised force. In 1940 at the height of the Blitzkrieg, the German Army was still heavily reliant of horses to move its artillery. By being proponents of two of the essential tenets of the principles of war: concentration of force and economy of effort, the Germans were able to defeat the second largest army in the world and a modern, mechanised BEF. The perceived wisdom that “The Bomber Will Always Get Through,” had clouded both military and political thinking. The use of area bombing as a weapon of terror in the Spanish Civil War had skewed perception of the actual effectiveness of the aircraft as a weapon of war. Even with over 1,500 front-line bombers and the latest in technology, Air Chief Marshall Harris had been unable to break the will of the German People or overcome their fear of the Gestapo. But it had one galvanising effect insofar as a Home Office committee was created in 1935, the Air Raid Precautions (ARP) Department. Its remit was to coordinate passive air defence within the British Isles. In 1937 the Air Raid Wardens’ Service was created with the aim of recruiting 800,000 volunteers. On 1 January 1938, the Air Raid Precautions Act came into force. This compelled all local authorities to begin creating their own ARP services. With the threat of war imminent in 1939, the Home Office issued dozens of leaflets advising people on how to protect themselves from the inevitable air war to follow. The setting up of the ARP was the beginning of the networks of volunteers who would become a highly trained and effective civil defence force. They would consist of: Wardens. ARP wardens ensured the blackout was observed, sounded air raid sirens, safely guided people into public air raid shelters, issued and checked gas masks, evacuated areas around unexploded bombs, rescued people where possible from bomb damaged properties, located temporary accommodation for those who had been bombed out, and reporting to their Control Centre about incidents, fires, etc. and to call in other services as required. Report and Control. Central headquarters that received information from wardens and messengers and managed the delivery of the relevant services needed to deal with each incident. Messengers. Often Boy Scouts or Boys Brigade members aged between 14 and 18 as messengers or runners would take messages from wardens and carry them to either the sector post or the Control Centre. Bombing would sometimes cut telephone lines and messengers performed an important role in giving the ARP services a fuller picture of events. First Aid Parties. Trained to give first response first aid to those injured in bombing incidents. Ambulance drivers. Casualties from bombing were taken to First Aid Posts or hospital by volunteer drivers. There were also stretcher parties that carried the injured to posts. Rescue services. The rescue services were involved in getting the dead and injured out of bombed premises. Burberry wasn’t always the Haute Couture of the Chavs Around this time, ideas were circulated about recruiting a citizen army of volunteers in order to provide local, community defence in the eventuality of war or invasion. The Army was unhappy at the suggestion because it was felt that a new formation of this kind would dilute the Territorial Army concept, and a large number of politicians were extremely unhappy with the idea of a civilian force having access to weapons. However, the invasion of the Low Countries and Belgium and lurid tales of German paratroopers dressed as nuns descending on a helpless population galvanised an otherwise reluctant establishment. The Government announced the creation of the Local Defence Volunteers on 14th May 1940 with the initial specific purpose of dealing with German Paratroopers, such was the level of paranoia the use of Fallschirmjäger in Norway and The Low Countries had engendered. Within twenty-four hours, 250,000 men had signed up. While this commendable response was a sign of the times, so was the shortages of uniforms, weapons and other equipment and training. There was also an undercurrent of scepticism directed at the new force, many noting that the parade timings seemed to coincide with pub opening hours. The LDV was known in some circles as the Look, Duck and Vanish, or the Last Desperate Venture. Initially weapons consisted of shotguns, muskets, blunderbuss, swords and of course, pitchforks. While many were indeed veterans from of the Boer, Sudan and World War One, the average age of the LDV was thirty-five. There were doubts about the use of LDV as the title of these units and Churchill particularly disliked the formation’s name. On 22nd June Churchill decreed that the force would be known as the Home Guard. As with all organisations, some were good and some weren’t. Those units with men who had served in the previous war and took discipline seriously became as good as regular troops. Others with lazy instructors became drinking clubs and would likely have been more of a liability in the event of invasion. During one training exercise, a reviewing officer asked a member of the Home Guard: “What steps would you take if you saw German paratroops descending?” “Bloody long ones,” came the reply. Initially finding uniforms and weapons was problematic and the Regular Army had its own problems re-equipping. An exotic selection of weapons came from America, including 1918 vintage machine guns and Winchester rifles from the reforming cavalry units. Improvisation was a must and some units were quite ingenious in the construction of devilish contraptions of killing. And some Home Guard units were so good and so well trained, their existence was a state secret. Britain was the only country that created a multi-layered resistance and guerrilla movement that was state sanctioned. The purpose of the Auxiliary Units was to resist enemy occupation by sabotage, mass murder and the killing of collaborators. They were secretly recruited from the very best of the Home Guard and were told in no uncertain terms that they would not survive and may live for a maximum of two weeks. In that time they were to raise hell. They called themselves “Scallywags” and their modus operandi was known as “Scallywagging.” Remains of an Auxiliary Unit OB at Wangford and Uggeshall, Suffolk They were generally farmers, landowners and poachers, men who knew the country. They operated in units of four or a maximum of eight. Each Patrol was a self-contained cell, expected to be self-sufficient and operationally autonomous in the case of invasion, generally operating within a 15-mile radius. They were provided with elaborately concealed underground Operational Bases (OB), usually built by the Royal Engineers in a local woodland, with a camouflaged entrance and emergency escape tunnel. It is thought that 400 to 500 such OBs were constructed. Some Patrols had an additional concealed Observation Post and/or underground ammunition store. Patrols were provided with a selection of the latest weapons including a silenced pistol or Thompson sub machine gun and Fairbairn-Sykes knives, quantities of plastic explosive, incendiary devices, and food to last for two weeks. Members anticipated being shot if they were captured, and were expected to shoot themselves first rather than be taken alive. The Auxiliary Units were disbanded in 1944 and many joined the SAS or Jedburgh Teams. Blown Periphery 2018 Going postal blog

Zero response from anyone. . . OK,. . .I'll post Operation Sealion Part 2, but I'll give it a new Thread heading.

On another tack entirely. . .my Favourite aircraft on the 'Hire' line at Berwick, was an Aerosubaru Fuji FA200/180 . . . VH-FJL if I remember correctly. . .Lovely thing to fly, Constant speed prop, four seats, but only Two for limited aerobatics. . . I carried out Dozens of spins in that machine, which removed my dread fear of spinning a metal aircraft. . .( I'd done these for years on Tiggers in the UK - very relaxing. . .) Sliding canopy and very nice to fly generally, ie no apparent nasty habits.. . . and at $19.50 per hour wet,. . rather affordable too ! Memories. . . . What could I buy nowadays in Australia for $19.50 I wonder ( Now keep it clean - family site )

I used to regularly hire a Beechcraft Sundowner from the same place, but one night, one of the instructors had a major blue with his Ladyfriend, got ratar$ed. and proceeded to fly aerobatics at night,. . .seriously bending the airframe and flying around below the level of the tall buildings in Melbourne city centre. . . can't recall his name, but some of you old blokes may remember the incident. . . he landed it safely but the machine as a write off.( Mid 1970s. . .) DCA removed his licence,. . .wot a surprise. . . Hence my changeover to the Grumman. . .2 circuit checkride at Moorabbin ? ?