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20allied air effort and for the purposes of this presentation I intend to treat them and their contribution in line with the others. Whilst Riverdale was signed off at the end of 1939, there followed an hiatus before the fruits of that agreement began to be harvested. In the meantime, the nations involved contributed as best they could from the resources they had available. In practice, it can be accepted that the Article XV agreement and the bi8laterals that followed were not taken as a rigid commitment but as a flexible and pragmatic arrangement geared to the operation of an air force comprised of many disparate parts. By way of a caveat, it is worth remembering that within the scope of Article XV, although the Dominions operated squadrons carrying their badges and insignia and crewed nominally by their air force personnel, there never was nor could there be a national exclusivity. There are many reasons for this and in summary they include: %u0001 The majority of ground crew personnel were RAF. %u0001 In the early years, there was a shortage of experienced Dominion personnel to fill the higher echelons and hence many RAF personnel were appointed to command positions within the contributing nations%u2019 air forces. %u0001 In some aircrew specialisations; notably the flight engineer, the RAF trained and provided the majority of personnel throughout the war years. %u0001 The natural ebb and flow of personnel made it difficult, if not impossible, to preserve a %u2018national identity%u2019, as indicated by the table at Figure 1 which illustrates the multi8national composition of the aircrew element of a nominally %u2018British%u2019 squadron. Starting then with the Royal Australian Air Force. Shortly before the outbreak of hostilities, the RAAF formed No 10 Sqn and its initial complement of crews was sent to the UK for training on the Sunderland, which the Australians had ordered. On declaration, the Australian Government offered the squadron to the RAF and it remained attached to the Service for the entire duration and hence has the distinction of being not just the first Commonwealth unit to serve with the RAF but also the only one to do so throughout the war and in