The British Carrier Strike Fleet. David Hobbs
to counter these tricks; phony camouflage was looked at carefully, reported and only attacked after careful photographic reconnaissance and analysis. It was normal to fly at 3000ft in transit, above the danger of small-arms fire and never attack targets more than once. Line astern formation was never used in attacks as the enemy could easily shift accurate fire onto the second and subsequent aircraft after the first had made its pass. Instead, converging attacks from different angles were made to disperse anti-aircraft fire and flak suppression was carried out by specialised sections of Sea Furies. These countermeasures resulted in fewer aircraft being hit and more damage inflicted on targets.
Captain Evans of Ocean warned his pilots not to regard MiG-15 jet fighters, when they were first encountered over Korea, as ‘something legendary as we had done with Rommel in the desert’ after claims on Radio Tokyo that they were shooting down Allied aircraft.24 Lieutenant Carmichael’s flight encountered a group of MiGs at 06.00 on 9 August 1952. His number 2, Lieutenant Haines called ‘MiGs at five o’clock’ but Carmichael did not see them himself at first. His number 4, Sub Lieutenant Ellis, called a break and the Sea Furies all turned towards the enemy aircraft and good hits were obtained by Carmichael and others on two MiGs, one of which went down trailing smoke and flame and the other broke away, clearly damaged. The remaining enemy aircraft broke off the engagement to escort the damaged aircraft away after the first MiG crashed. Carmichael considered the main reason for his flight’s success was the ruggedness and dependability of the Sea Fury. His men had kept a good lookout and used their aircraft to better advantage than the enemy, taking their opportunity to knock down a superior aircraft. Despite their piston-engined fighters’ supposed limitations, they had not been intimidated by the enemy and the skill and experience of the Sea Fury pilots was, clearly, also a significant factor.
All bombardment spotting by RN aircraft used American procedures regardless of the ship carrying out the shoot. Some were pre-briefed, some impromptu and some briefed whilst the aircraft were in flight to the target area. A special card was printed for pilots’ guidance with the correct procedure sequence, definitions and terms. It was found to be extremely useful. Cruisers with their 6in guns and fire control systems were the most accurate and pilots preferred to spot for them; destroyers’ 4.5in guns were less accurate and frigates with their small 4in guns were the least accurate of all. Their usual inaccuracy led to them being used to engage area targets although they were sometimes used against enemy guns. The most frustrating discovery was that, in general, American ships did not know the American procedures and nor did their pilots. There were a number of cases of Sea Fury pilots having to give lectures on bombardment procedure to a USN ship whilst actually flying over the target! 1:50,000 scale maps were used for spotting and found to be satisfactory; gridded photographs were not used.
Pilots flying armed reconnaissance sorties were usually given an area or line along which to search and tasked to answer specific questions. For close air support sorties pilots were briefed on the position of Allied forward troops which they plotted on 1:50,000 scale maps. Targets in this static phase of the war were most likely to be dug-outs, bunkers or underground shelters and, therefore, 500lb bombs with 30-second delay fuzes were the preferred weapons. Once close to the forward edge of the battle area (FEBA), pilots reported to a forward air control pilot or ‘Mosquito’ in a North American Harvard aircraft who talked him onto the target with a six-figure map reference and/or accurately dropped smoke markers. Under Plan ‘Victor’, all friendly artillery ceased fire while the attack went in but after experience and discussions with Army officers ashore, RN pilots became confident that they could keep out of the way of shells if warned of the line of fire and ‘Victor’ was used less often. Close air support sorties were generally popular because pilots felt they were directly helping their colleagues in action on the ground. Through necessity the enemy became adept at camouflage and it took time for pilots to get used to their methods. On a number of occasions even experienced pilots had returned with reports that nothing was going on in the area they had covered but analysis of their photographs revealed good targets which had been well concealed. Successive carriers found that enemy movement stopped in their areas of interest by day and that enemy guns would not open fire against ships when aircraft were overhead.
Aircraft Maintenance
It proved difficult to apply consistent lessons to the carriers deployed off Korea because seasonal variations had a significant impact. Fewer hours of daylight and worse weather in winter meant fewer sorties per day but far higher averages could be maintained in summer. There was, thus, no such thing as a standard figure for logistic requirements, aircraft wastage or the consumption of air stores. To achieve an average of seventy-five sorties per day, a number often exceeded by both Glory and Ocean, maintenance personnel had to carry out very quick turnarounds with unserviceable aircraft. If an aircraft could be made serviceable for the next Event, work had to start on it as soon as its engine had shut down and it had been lashed to the deck. This included refuelling, re-arming and re-spotting into the launch range aft within a very tight time frame. It was vital that pilots reported problems immediately so that ‘Snag Parties’ could have the right tools and ground equipment ready together with serviceable spares. There was no time to fetch things from deep storage. Striking down aircraft that needed more extensive repairs in the hangar also needed careful planning. If a series of engine runs would be required to prove an aircraft serviceable, care had to be taken not to lock it into the back of the hangar. It was also important to avoid continually moving aircraft that were actually being worked on by mechanics to enable serviceable aircraft to be ranged on deck. In fact such movements could be rendered impossible if aircraft under repair were on jacks or had a wing spread.
When pilots made their post-flight reports in the aircraft control room (ACR), there was often a lot of congestion as aircraft, electrical and radio snag parties, flight deck marshallers and arming parties with notebooks poised attempted to get the information they needed quickly. Flying started before dawn and ended shortly after sunset, after which the range for the next day’s first two Events had to be moved into position, accurately spotted, fuelled armed and lashed to the deck. Since the ship was darkened it was not possible to carry out routine inspections while these aircraft were ranged on deck. Daily inspections were, therefore, carried out between Events during the day’s flying and this required careful supervision to ensure that aircraft were not lost to the flying programme for this reason alone. Other routine inspections were easier to plan. Daily starred inspections were carried out every six days instead of once per week since this fitted in better with the programming of a war patrol. By doing them on a replenishment day in the middle of a patrol, on return to harbour and just prior to leaving harbour, none fell due on a flying day. Minor inspections were either anticipated or extended and engine changes anticipated to coincide with a period in harbour since every aircraft in any way immobilised in the hangar at sea was one more obstacle to overcome. In harbour there was the luxury of space and the ability to use ‘Jumbo’, the mobile crane, to help speed the work.
After each patrol there was always a heavy programme of ammunitioning and the embarkation of new aircraft, air, naval, armament and victualling stores to be completed and aircraft maintenance ratings were naturally called on to do their part. This was most satisfactorily solved by virtually abandoning all attempts at doing any maintenance on the first day alongside while up to 150 maintenance ratings helped to take in ammunition. From then on no further call was made on the Air Engineering Department (AED), or squadrons for the remainder of the period in harbour. To conserve spares while the ship was on a patrol or even to make them available at all sometimes, it was necessary to rob aircraft with major damage fairly extensively; aircraft thus stripped were known as ‘Christmas Trees’. In nearly all cases the item removed was replaced by the original unserviceable one with the result that aircraft returned to Unicorn were usually deeply unserviceable. The most common items in this respect were arrester hooks, oleos, hydraulic piping, G4F magnetic compasses, oil pressure gauges and artificial horizons. Quite often it was possible to use a mainplane off a damaged Sea Fury to service another aircraft rather than use a new spare. One of the more inexplicable aspects of Korean operations was the constant recurrence of a certain type of defect during a particular patrol, it neither having appeared previously nor subsequently. To the air maintenance sailors, patrols frequently became known by their common defects rather than by any other particular incident. For example there were ‘over-speeding’,