July-Dec 1917

[steven brown]

Russ,
Obviously there were German pilots that were aggressive to a fault, but I agree with your image of their tactics as a wolf pack and not lions. I also don't consider that to be pejorative. Rightly or wrongly, they believed in preserving their force and generaly fought with an eye to avoiding losses. That example you gave supports your idea about the importance
of the clouds in April. I think you're on to something there.

[totalspoon]

The German's didn't always fight as wolf packs, even in 1918.

Between 27th May 1918 to 19 June 1918, they could often be found alone or as small groups who were willing to fight to the death against single all conquering SE5a's....

Spoon

[Romani]

I will pretend to not having read that last comment and I will share what Morrow wrote on British air operations from this period of 1917, I encourage and recommend to the interested reader to buy the book if he wants to know more.

I have included the note number for sources , but most of them you can figure them out from the text. If you want to know a specific source, I will look it up and post it.

The headers are mine, to organize somewhat the excerpts, as they are taken from pages 235 to 242, there's much more stuff but I concentrated on the fighting at the trenches during the British offensives.


Projected Expansion of the RFC after Arras

The RFC's offensive efforts [at Arras] did impress BEF commander Douglas Haig who informed the War Office on 18 May that the success of the artillery and infantry depended largely on the efficiency of the RFC's artillery, photographic, and contact patrols, whose protection in turn depended on fighter squadrons equipped with sufficient superior machines to seek out and destroy enemy fighters in a sustained, vigorous offensive. Haig wanted the RFC to have at least two fighters for each artillery plane, to increase corps squadrons from 18 to 24 planes, and to have new units before the end of the year to prepare for spring 1918. The number of army cooperation squadrons peaked in spring 1917, and the demand for fighting aircraft absorbed all production increases for the rest of the war. 112


June to July- Messines - Artillery cooperation success - Arrival of new types


In the limited siege operation at Messines (7 to 14 June), air-artillery cooperation reached its peak in preparation for the battle, and both sides intercepted the other's air-ground wireless transmissions to locate enemy batteries. British fighters provided continuous cover for army corps planes and sought to keep the enemy behind their own stationary observation-balloon six miles behind the front. In June the shortage of reserves impeded the RFC's continuous offensive, and Trenchard's determination to make all patrols offensive fighting efforts without concentrating his force undermined the attack's effectiveness. At least by July, 37 of his 51 squadrons, as opposed 22 of 51 in May, were equipped with new types, just in time for the climactic attack at Ypres. 113

[Romani]

Ypres- July

Before the Battle of Ypres (31 July to 10 November) the RFC once again sought to keep the Germans behind their balloon line. In the assault 31 July, the weather and poor communication with ground units limited - RFC's artillery cooperation, photoreconnaissance, and contact patrols, the offensive army wing squadrons staged random, uncoordinated strafing acks on the German rear but failed to check for German units advancing to attack. 114

RFC offensive policy

In August and October memoranda on air policy, RFC headquarters continued to preach the offensive, noting that since early 1916 the evolution of air fighting, the main task of the army (offensive) wings and the headquarters wing, had determined RFC expansion. It relegated reconnaissance to an increasingly minor role and did not even discuss the corps squadrons crucial responsibilities of infantry cooperation and contact patrols. The memorandum of 12 October, echoing Haig's of 18 May, sought two fighter for every corps squadron and then suggested 30 squadrons of long-range bombers with Bristol fighter escort in 1918. 115

British fighter tactics evolution

British fighters, following the German lead, operated in units of ever larger size. By the end of August formations functioned in three layers, and as many as 60 machines engaged in lengthy skirmishes. 116

[Romani]

High casualties during summer - Morale suffers - Despite lossess, air supremacy achieved by autumn

Casualties were high during the summer. The RFC lost 434 officers in the 50 days from 31 July to 19 September. In mid-1917 it assumed the following aircrew "wastage": The life of a night bomber or corps pilot was 4 months; of fighter reconnaissance and bomber pilots, 3 1/2 months; and of a fighter pilot, 2 1/2 months. 117

By August, overtaxed aircrew suffered serious morale problems, as RFC brigade commanders added ground support tasks to Trenchard's constant offensive patrols. Though most squadron' stayed the course, not all did. On 28 September, Naval 10, ordered to bomb and strafe Rumbeke airfield at low level, did not descend below 300 feet. When ordered to repeat the mission, the commander informed Wing Command that the squadron was "not for it," a direct disobedience of order that led to the squadron's transfer to the Fourth Wing RNAS at Dunkirk.
Yet the worst was already past, as the RFC was gaining aerial ascendancy over the Germans, and its losses fell to 247 in the 60 days before the Battle of Cambrai, from 20 September to 20 November. 118

Frontline strengths during 1917

Haig, in correspondence to the Army Council on 20 November, the day the Battle of Cambrai began, continued his support for further development of the RFC. Noting that he had 54 squadrons with 997 planes compared with 52 with 794 planes on 5 June and 39 with 717 planes on 8 January 119

[Romani]

Failure of recon and strafing at Cambrai

At the Battle of Cambrai, which lasted from 20 November to 7 December, the British dispensed with a preliminary bombardment in order to surprise the Germans; the RFC planned to locate enemy batteries and bomb and strafe from low altitude during the attack. The day of the attack however, misty weather limited air operations and prevented artillery co-operation so the RFC repeated its roving ground attacks of Ypres. Its low-level missions suffered high casualties, as four scout squadrons assigned to attack lost 26 of 72 aircraft (35.5 percent), with 14 officers dead, or wounded. On 22 November low-flying single-seaters suffered 40 percent aircraft losses, and the next day, with better weather, more than 30 per cent casualties in combat against the Richthofen Circus. The RFC finished this difficult period by failing to detect the concentration of German troops to counterattack on 30 November, when the Germans unleashed masses of low-flying aircraft in coordinated attacks immediately in front of their infantry that "caused many casualties and proved very demoralising." In contrast to the success of the German ground attack planes, British attacks at the beginning of the battle had been too diffuse, with excessive casualties.

Attrition forces RFC to conserve resources

As this last major battle of 1917 raged, RFC headquarters advised its commanders on 28 November to husband their resources and train for the spring 1918 campaign. They were to maintain 10 serviceable machines per squadron, reduce work over the lines to the absolute minimum neccessart for training and operations, and refrain from operations in bad weather. New pilots being prepared for combat were not to cross the line for three weeks. 121

Decline of effectiveness of corps squadrons

At the end of the year the artillery and the RFC were concerned about ... quality of cooperation had declined from the level of Messines.
...
In fact, fighting had become the main goal of two-thirds of the RFC, while the corps squadrons were overburdened with many duties—artillery observation, contact and photographic patrols, bombing and ground strafing, infantry protection, even leaflet dropping.



There's a lot more stuff, citing veterans of the 1917 campaign and others, critical with the offensive a l'outrance strategy, high casualties, inadequate training of air crews, and aside from fighter types, obsolete material.

Now my personal conclusion is that the overall picture is of the British succeeding in gaining air superiority in a gruelling attrition contest thanks to technical superiority in fighters, numbers, and tenacity, offsetting the inadequacies of training and the obsolescency of most 2-seater types.

Courage is a given, and in regard to fighters units, skill levels were about the same, as the British copied German tactics. Attrition consumed both forces, but it hurt more the Jastas as they found themselves technically outmatched and outnumbered, while their quality declined as aces fell and the training of replacements also worsened.

[R Gannon]

Totalspoon

Having run up a detailed day by day combat log I cannot agree with your statement at all re 27 May to 19 Jun - maybe you will be so good as to provide dates & units????

Romani

Morrow's book sounds like a nice overview - probably your cup of tea (or coffeee) but I'm into the real day by day detail and not blindly accepting, or worse still selectively reading other peoples work. Work in this case which sounds like it has leant heavily on HA Jones.

Cheers Russ

[totalspoon]

Sorry Russ,

I was just having a light hearted poke at that certain allied ace who, despite poor weather and a lack of German aerial activity, managed to find bucket loads of German aircraft alone or in small groups and shoot down 25 in 24 days.

I couldn't help myself.... ... I'll shut up and be good now...

[Romani]

I have an opinion that is different to yours, live or die with it. Also, nothing wrong with overviews, without them, the trees don't let us see the forest.

I just contribute what I learn. Like your signature says: You don't need to follow anybody. You got to think for yourselves. Your'e all individuals.

Given your penchant for shooting the messenger, I will take another page from that book, straight from the horse's mouth (pp237-238)

The view from those that were there

Veterans of the 1917 campaign, some of them squadron commanders who later rose to Air Marshal's rank, have severely criticized RFC policies during the spring and summer. Joubert considered the RFC attempt to maintain strength all along the front in order to provide individual army commanders with their own private air force inferior to the German policy of concentrating at the decisive point of struggle. Sholto Douglas, commander of 43 Squadron, which suffered over 100 percent casualties in April, condemned the cost of the RFC's rapid expansion and the shortsighted policy of the relentless offensive, which pressed insufficiently trained aircrews and obsolescent airplanes into service. In Balfour's opinion, the moral ascendancy gained from rigidly scheduled, two-hour, twice-daily patrols on "terribly obsolete" Sopwiths [Strutters] was not worth the cost in lives, while the use of BE2Cs for artillery spotting was "a reckless waste of human life." Arthur Gould Lee cursed the "irrational obduracy" of Trenchard's Distant Offensive Patrols (DOPs), while Norman Macmillan recalled bitterly the belief among junior officers that casualty lists had no effect on Haig, Trenchard or their brigade commander, Brig. Gen. T. I. Webb-Bowen. Macmillan and Douglas condemned Webb-Bowen and Trenchard, respectively, for refusing escorts for Sopwith two-seaters and accepting the ensuing losses. 123

RNAS ace Canadian Raymond Collishaw commanded Naval 10 from 26 April until late July, when constant combat during the summer led to high casualties—10 of 15 pilots killed, wounded, or captured— and a decline in the squadron's fighting efficiency. While Collishaw recognized that commanders occasionally had to be ruthless, he believed that were asking them to do too much. One or two senior officers without combat experience seemed firmly convinced that the more casualties a fighter squadron suffered, the better its performance. In June, when Trenchard ordered brigade commanders to conserve resources yet maintain offensive spirit, Collishaw wryly commented that their brigade commander either did not receive the message or read only the last part, as they experienced no lull in operations.124

The high toll of new aircrew stemmed from their inadequate training for frontline combat through mid-1917. Although the RFC training establishment had grown by that time to 32 schools, with 15 under construction, the rapid expansion of frontline units and the severe casualties led to shorter training time for replacement crews. Macmillan recalled the crudeness of even advanced instruction and the "so many needlessly killed” in flight training with ineffective instructors. In May 1917 Lee obsserved that most new pilots had 15 to 20 hours' flight time and "can't even fly let alone fight."125

[bristol scout]

Hi Romani---I was just wondering---if your going to go through the whole book, page by page, as it were, i'll just----to paraphrase V.M.Yeates a bit------set the adjustable tailplane,calculate speed and distance, wind up the alarm clock, and go to sleep with the sober certainty of waking up right at the last page.....

Just having a laugh you know...
Dave.