Death of an Industry

Not only have valuable orders been lost by Britain because of this dreadful habit, but the British aircraft industry has slipped back by at least 20 years in terms of technological research and development through politicians’ meddling.

And an estimated two billion dollars has been wasted.

Strangely enough, the type destined to be the first sacrifice on the altar of political expediency was one born while Britain was battling for its life during WW II.

The Miles M 52 supersonic research aircraft – literally a flying bullet with the pilot in a semi-prone cockpit – was Miles’ offering in answer to a Ministry of Aircraft Production call for a Mach 1-plus type (1000 mph at 36,000 ft). The green light for this far-seeing project was given in 1943.

For the purists, designed speeds included a touch-down velocity approaching 170 mph- something unheard of in those days of war.

The war clouds had cleared, and countries were beginning to count their dead and plan for a future when most of the M 52 design work neared completion in 1946.

In Britain, the Labor Government was building its bureaucratic pagodas, including the mammoth and all-embracing Ministry of Supply (an unhappy marriage of Aircraft Production and Supply).

This structure was a classic example of not knowing what was really needed; in the case of Britain’s aircraft industry it was followed up by succeeding governments in a trimming, a blending of the many aircraft companies rich in expertise but lacking in capital in some instances.

The Miles M 52 project was destroyed, completely and utterly, by one devastating direct hit in 1946, soon after Britain had gained a world speed mark with its new Gloster Meteor manned fighter.

Sir Ben Lockspeiser, then Director of Scientific Research, wrote to Fred Miles stating quite bluntly and unequivocally that it had been decided to discontinue the building of a supersonic aircraft and that work must stop at once.

Reasons given at the time included worry about the manned aspect of a venture into the then unknown, Lockspeiser’s personal belief that aircraft would not, in the near future, fly supersonically – if ever, a need for national economy, and a decision to use radio-controlled models for high-speed research.

Miles was forbidden to give any details of the cutback – or even that Britain had, at one stage, begun developing a supersonic type – until late 1946. Meanwhile, Britain’s politicians made an incredible free gift of amassed technical information, wind tunnel test results and other calculations, to the US, obviously for political reasons.

What the Attlee Government did, in effect, was to put the onus on Lockspeiser, ordering a cutdown on expenditure by reducing the number of projects in hand by Britain’s aircraft research teams.

In truth the Labor Government had a hard row to hoe; it was beset with coping with the nation’s tattered economy in terms of housing, social services and production of essentials, and “. ‘as following the traditional socialist way of governing by creating super-Ministries.

Lockspeiser, who has been blamed directly or . . indirectly ever since for the emasculation of Britain’s aircraft industry and technological strangulation, was surely not without his faults in the M 52 affair.

Troubled by the possible cost of the M 52 program, plus the possible cost in human life- and the orders from his masters to chop expenditure – he reached.

In this case, it was Barnes Wallis’s research into swing-wing types, the political belief that swept-back wings were the only surfaces able to get through the popularly-named sound barrier, and Wallis’ humane contention that radio-controlled testing was the only safe way into supersonics.

Quite obviously, the politicians and departmental heads had been influenced by their layman’s reading of earlier German research into supersonics and sweepback.

The departmental chiefs were swayed in their beliefs by one vocal faction which opted for tailless swept-wing types (which eventually resulted in the DH 108).

All this background bombardment resulted in a high-level meeting early in 1946, which chopped the head off the M _ 52 program. It also gave Wallis a clear run for his model testing which cost more than five times that of the M 52 program up to the time of having its neck wrung well and truly.

In its turn Wallis’ test program was abandoned – one of the reasons given by the Attlee Government being high cost for little return.

It wasn’t until 1955 that a Government White Paper admitted that Britain’s aeronautical research had been hamstrung by axing the M 52 program. And, to rub salt into the wind, Rolls-Royce mentioned in an internal memo that re-examination of the M 52 in the light of current knowledge showed that it incorporated sound principles – and was capable of achieving the specification requirements!

While the politicians were busy hammering in the nails of the M 52’s coffin, Attlee’s Government were industrious, to be fair to socialist ideals, quite unwittingly sharpening their Government thought differently . . .

Logic decreed that the next step in military fighter development was that of producing an interim type. Britain’s Labor government thought differently . . .

Looking at the immediate postwar world, Britain’s new administration believed there would be no ma1or conflict for at least another 10 years, using US development of the atom bomb and Britain’s projected capability of producing her own as a datum point.

To this end, the British Government issued an edict stating that the provision of new types for the Royal Air Force and Fleet Air Arm wouldn’t be called for until 1957.

(Shades of something similar which happened in Australia a few years back. . . )

A concession was, however, made by the issue of specs for three “experimental” types, plus specifications for two other types destined to form a basis for future day and night rapid climb, high-speed interceptors.

In the experimental field, the Boulton Paul P 111 delta, the swept-wing version of the Hawker Sea Hawk, and the first parent of what was to later become the Vickers-Armstrong Attacker were not long in appearing.

The years drifted by; the RAF planes almost leisurely plotted their long-term needs but forgot the interim. The Royal Navy, despite a successful Vampire deck-landing during 1945 trials decided that jets were too risky for the average earner pilot and ‘about-turned to order more obsolescent Seafires, Sea Furies, Fireflies and Sea Hornets.

Hawkers nearly scored a success in 1945 when it submitted a swept-wing P 1040; the Board of Admiralty almost succumbed to then Rear-Admiral Matthew Slattery’s urgings to get a really effective naval fighter – he’d issued requirements which neatly fitted the P 1052.

Hawkers queried. the requirement with the Ministry of Supply, and that started a battle in which the opponents used every trick possible. There were allegations of Dutch Roll, undercut strength and even the hook’s position . . .

Slattery lost in the end but got the straight-wing split-pipe Seahawk, instead of the swept-wing P 1052.

The RAF didn’t get the P 1052 either; that Service was more interested in something with a higher performance. And so neither Service got an interim swept-wing fighter with an added ground attack capability.

The P 1081, powered by a Tay and capable of Mach 0. 89 at 36,000 ft, with an excellent climb performance and armed with cannon plus rockets or bombs, was developed from the 1052 but was not proceeded with. The only one to fly killed its test pilot, Wimpey Wade.

Net result: Britain could have had a fighter to bridge. The late ’40s-early ’50s gap, but didn’t because of lack of operational needs by top RN brass, and the RAF backing the still-young Hunter and unsuccessful Swift.

Came Korea – the Fleet Air Arm flew with tried but slow piston-powered types. The RAF couldn’t match US jet muscle and eventually had to procure nearly 500 Canadian-built Sabres until the Hunter came into service. Reason? Official policy – again.

The RAF issued new Operational Requirements, resulting in the Gloster Javelin and Hunter. At least the Hunter went on to great and noble things; the Javelin development program was cut back “for reasons of economy”, and the DH Sea Vixen development project dropped out of sight altogether for the same reason.

The Javelin entered squadron service – in 1956, and the Sea Vixen reached Naval squadrons two years later.

I had personal experience of these two types’ efficiency while flying with the RAF and FAA; while crewing a mock bombing run on Malta on board a Canberra at 40,000 ft, our Canberra was bounced by a defending Javelin which went past like the proverbial dose of salts – going straight up!

I also crewed in Sea Vixens, constant components of Carrier Air Groups embarked in HM Ships during the late ’50s, and they were fine, if demanding aircraft. (But they could have been in service much sooner if only the bureaucrats had kept their noses out of other people’s business. . . )

The RAF’s Swift was undoubtedly a fine aircraft, but one doomed to failure because of Service demands in equipment and performance. True, the Swift had a key problem in that it tended to pitch up and tighten up in the turn above 20,000 ft, but it was also completely screwed up by having too many Service requirements.

Armament changes, sweep mods on the wings to take more power and speed, afterburner mods, fuel deficiencies and other factors were loaded, and added; mods followed mods before the original mods had been fitted . . .

Basically, because the Government had abandoned the original supersonic program and no good interim fighter had been allowed to logically flow – even from a non-existent first phase.

It was a ghastly situation – and worse was to follow. .

It was the Swift that really hammered home the bad name of aviation projects way back in the mid-’50s, that decade of decision leading to decline.

There was a scandal, of course. The Press saw to that, in their role of public watchdog. It transpired that the Swift program had cost £20,000,000 before the fighter version hit the papers.

Ministers of the Government thereafter began to place aviation and aircraft projects in a non-vote-catching light which could only draw public criticism flak.

The sufferers were the Royal Air Force and the aviation industry in general . . .

While all the mud-slinging was at its height, the RAF and British design teams were working on an exciting prospect: Mach 2 fighters used reheat, and rocket power and were armed with infra-red heat-seeking missiles, new construction techniques and materials, new engines and wing shapes.

Objectives were the English Electric P 1 Lightning and the superb Fairey TSR 2.

Meanwhile, a transonic gp fighter was needed.

At Kingston, Hawkers were working on a Super-Hunter. 1951 saw preparations for the first flight of this supersonic Hunter, the Ministry of Supply had issued Instructions To Proceed, all seemed set fair, and it looked as if the RAF would have a supersonic type in service by 1956 at the latest – several years before the Lightning got operational.

The Super-Hunter (1083) got the chop in 1953 in an amazing way. Air Commodore Wally Kyle (later Air Chief Marshal Sir Wallace Kyle, one-time Governor of Western Australia) called on Sydney Camm and, in effect, said, “Sorry, we don’t want it. ”

Cause of this bombshell was, quixotically enough, another aircraft company – Vickers-Supermarine.

They had been working on the 545 and a 545 derivative, redesigns of the basic Swift with area rule and more powerful engines, and the RAF was definitely interested as there were long-term aspects here.

These two magnificent types-to-be flopped when the Swift program was also cancelled. And so, like the fourth little pig, the RAF got none . . . and nobody seemed game to mention GP interceptor/ground attack aircraft any more after that.

Britain’s rocket fighter development program was another sad episode, but it gave rise to all manner of exciting aircraft – good aircraft, worthy of further development, like the saunders-Roe SR 53, the Avro 720, the SR P 177; pure rocket fighter versions submitted in answer to Spec. 124 T, like the Blackburn B 97, the Short PD 7, Blackburn B 99, Bristol Type 178, and Avro 720, the Saro SR 53, which all finished up as turbojet/rocket types in answer to a Saro suggestion that the rocket fighters should have a turbojet capable of getting the fighters home after the rocket fuel had run dry.

Magnificent research was done on engines, airframes, and other aspects of design and development during this period, as was progress in the design, development and production of rocket engines like the Screamer, the Spectre, Sprite, Snarler, long-life Viper turbojet, and the Gyron Junior and missiles including the Firestreak.

But, the first casualty in a long list of “fatal” was Avro’s 720. The Ministry cancelled the contract, and effectively nobbled the naval version of the 720, the 728.

One of the reasons given in the washup was that the Services couldn’t afford to run two rocket fuel programs side-by-side, and the Avro 720s Screamer motor used liquid oxygen which, said the Navy, involved the risk of undesirable aircraft-carrier fires.

That left Saunders-Roe as the sole contender, with their SR 53 and P 177, and the high-test peroxide Spectre rocket motor plus Viper turbojet.

By 1954 the Ministry had trimmed Saunders-Roe’s contract down to two prototypes. Then two things happened, unrelated, which put paid to yet another British project . . .

One of the prototypes crashed, killing test pilot John Booth. And Britain’s defence policy changed.

The exact cause of John Booth’s death and the “killing ” of SR 53 XO 151, have never been ascertained.

During this time, Saro were concentrating on the SR 177, destined to be a very large scale project for the RAF and RN. Design and development went on apace, and Germany became interested in making the 177 under licence.

But the infamous Sandys Axe fell in April 1957, when Defence Minister Duncan Sandys announced in a White Paper on Defence that all other fighters bar the English Electric P 1 were dead as far as RAF acquisition was concerned.

A chilling and irreversible result of that Defence White Paper was that the original RAF Air Staff Requirement was cancelled. The entire project rested on the naval NA 47 requirement and German interest.

Sandys, who was apparently more interested in guided missiles than manned fighters, shot down the naval requirement with a signature.

Politicians had done their work again . . .

A rearguard action by Supply Minister Aubrey Jones was gallant in its tenacity. But on December 24, 1957, the Minister of Supply capitulated under enormous pressure and wrote off the contract for the 177, endorsing public accusation that there was little, if any, inter-departmental collaboration in the field of technology.

Enough has been written by aviation experts on the FD 2 to fill a good-sized hangar; the project was a brave one, skilful in its concept and far-reaching in its potential. It first saw the light to day as far back as late 1949 when Fairey answered a Government request to look at a transonic research type using a single engine.

Delayed by lack of research and the Korean police action, the FD 2 program didn’t see significant development until late 1952, a year after the brilliant Derwent-powered FD 1 made its first research flight.

Using an Avon for urge, the FD 2 had just about everything good in it – plus an eye to military orders. It had a droop snoot, afterburner, radar and missile capability.

In 1955, after a setback caused by a collapsed fuel collector tank and a subsequent belly-landing, the FD 2 went supersonic without afterburner. It was obvious that Britain had a winner on its hands. A record bid was in the offing – but the Ministry of Supply did a Pontius Pilate, washing its departmental hands of anything connected with a record!

What happened is history; Peter Twiss sent the FD 2 hurtling around a figure-eight course between Bascombe Down and Beachy Head. The wonderplane’s speed was an average of 1132 miles an hour, more than 300 mph faster than America’s record-holding Super Sabre.

Fairey, elated at this magnificent achievement of man and machine, immediately gave birth to a whole family of projected military fighters.

First up was to be Gyron-powered – or Rolls-Royce RB 122-powered – with reheat.

Next in line was to be the Fairey ER 103/C single-seat fighter in the Mirage class – but way ahead of anything Dassault had in train at that time.

Mach 2. 26 was projected for the ER 103/C, at 55,000 ft. The initial rate of climb was to be 1100 ft per second, with time to 45,000 ft of just under two minutes.

Fairey also had their eyes on yet another variant, a twin-seat radar and missile-toting fighter, the F 155 T. This type’s projected performance was out of this world, using a reheat Gyron and a brace of DH Spectre Junior rocket motors.

Fairey believed it could get the wonder plane flying in 2. 5 years from contract receipt, using experience gained in the FD 2 program.

In late 1956 Fairey made a revised submission, an attacker type against Mach 2 bombers, using twin reheat RR engines instead of the Gyron Junior and carrying a brace of massive Red Dean missiles.

The Royal Air Force was enthusiastic. Fairey had played the entire vision cool, paying for its own design work on the family series.

The whole sorry business started. On April Fool’s Day 1957, a leak from MoS tipped that Fairey would get the F 155 T as favourites.

This was despite British PM Harold Macmillan’s deadpan statement in the House on January 24 that year, stating that Defence Minister Duncan Sandys’ new brief would be the revamping of a defence policy that would cut down expenditure and manpower, plus reshaping the armed forces.

Sandys issued his infamous statement on April 4, 1957 . . . Fighter development for the Royal Air Force was to cease forthwith.

The Fairey dream was shattered in one speech . . .

There was nothing left but to pick up the pieces and go home. Attempts to get France (Dassault) to come into a collaborative venture, with Belgium as a part-maker, the idea being to flog the project to West Germany, failed in the face of a well-organised USAF lobby.

The West Germans perhaps had later cause to regret their decision, in the light of a significant number of “Widow-Maker” fatal crashes.

Part II of This Exclusive Series Continues in the June Edition of Aadr, Don’t Miss It!