Page 159 - Demo

159%u0009*4%&*%u0015++$)%u0006%u0010(7%u0015,(%u0016%u0013% by Air Cdre John Mitchell (with Sean Feast). Pen and Sword, 2010. %u00a320. There is a growing trend in the aviation book business for writers to take the memoirs of an aviator and to edit and %u2018improve%u2019 them to produce a book for publication, in this case, a 2168page hardback. I have no problem with that in principle, but if one is going to embellish the original manuscript, one must be very familiar with air force lore. In this case there is quite a lot of duff gen and, with joint authorship, one cannot be sure who introduced it. To make my point, I will cite just a few examples. On page 5 we are told that circumstances conspired to deprive Mitchell, then an RAFVR LAC trainee observer, of the opportunity to attend a pre8war Initial Training Wing. This was never an option, of course, as the first ITW was not formed until 15 September 1939. On page 6 the author (but which one?) states, categorically, that, on the outbreak of war, the VR was %u2018mobilised%u2019 and not %u2018called up%u2019. That was not actually the case. Conscripts were %u2018called up%u2019; reservists were %u2018called out%u2019 while the Auxiliary Air Force was %u2018embodied%u2019; %u2018mobilisation%u2019 is a term applicable to units, not people. G8AFZR was not a %u2018code%u2019 (page 8); it was a civil aircraft registration. On page 22 we are told that %u2018the danger of operations in these early stages of the war cannot be understated%u2019. Really? I think that they can. On page 32 we have Portal, as AOCinC Bomber Command in August 1940, ranked as an air chief marshal %u2013 he did not get his fourth star until he became CAS in October. On page 51 the EATS is described as a %u2018scheme that had been well constructed and well planned before the outbreak of war%u2019, whereas it was not even a formal proposal until October 1939 and work did not start until 1940. On page 70 we are told that HM King Georg VI%u2019s cover name was General Lion %u2013 it was Lyon. On page 103 there are references to the American 7th Air Force in Italy. This should probably have read 12th Air Force %u2013 the 7th was based on Hawaii. On page 155 the Sqn Ldr Alan Frank of 1949 is said, to have eventually become AOC 5 Gp. This is quite inexplicable, as 5 Group had disbanded four years earlier and never reformed, and, while Frank did become an AVM and SASO Support Command, he was never an AOC. There are more, but these alone suffice to create a sense of insecurity. So, my reservations aside, what of the story itself? Mitchell%u2019s