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Lancaster

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The title of Leo McKinstry's book, "Lancaster: The Second World War's Greatest Bomber", is quite deceptive. It is not really a narrow nuts & bolts history of another warplane. Instead McKinstry has provided a comprehensive survey and analysis of the role, effectiveness and morality of the British strategic bombing offensive against the Reich. The development and use of the Lancaster bomber is the leitmotif providing central continuity for the account, just as it was the central component of the offensive.

As well as considering past official reports and research as well as the earliest accounts of the bombing such as David Irvings 1960's work, McKinstry has made clear use of new research, especially into the effectiveness of the strategy in 1944-45. In doing so he provides a valuable and very readable campaign history making good use of the now rich seam of witness accounts and memoirs collected from the survivors of the bombing as well as RAF crews to illustrate aspects of the unfolding story (although at times, just as with any good student of history, he also provides information to qualify and place in context several of these insertions).

The key thread may be the Lancaster, but the figure who is most dominant in the account is not Chadwick, the Lancaster's designer, but Sir Arthur Harris, Commander in Chief of bomber command from 1942 onwards. He is behind the policy of area bombing, focusing on the means of production (ie the civilian population), rather than the precision bombing of key strategic targets such as oil stores and arms factories, believing that the destruction and collapse of morale created could bring victory on its own. With the deliberate bombing of civilian areas in raids with up to 1000 bombers officially called "dehousing", this shows that spin is nothing new. Whilst it is possible to argue that Harris's policy was most justifiable in 1942-3 when Britain had no other way of returning the fight to Germany and of taking pressure off the Red Army in the east, McKinstry shows clearly the flaws in Harris's stubborn refusal to amend this policy in 1944-45 when precision bombing of military targets alone, he believes, could have shortened the war by several months. The US daylight raids had taken this approach in 1944 (as had the RAF in assistance of the D Day landings) and it was later shown to be more effective than the RAF night attacks on cities such as Berlin and Dresden. What is surprising from the book is how little Harris's superiors did to force him to change policy when they were clearly unhappy with it. It is clear Harris bullied them, they themselves were too weak. (Churchill however, appears duplicitous, especially over Dresden, presented here as a means of the UK hoping to use the attack to seek favour/respect with Stalin at Yalta.).

The victims of this inability to manage the C in C were obviously the civilians who continued to die in the ever increasing raids (By 1945 the US is also into area bombing), but also the bomber crews themselves. The irony is that Harris saw the bomber offensive as a way to ensure victory without the horrors of another Western Front, yet by sending his men out night after night to bomb heavily defended targets he ensured their casualty rates were the highest of any of the western theatres of war (over 50,000 killed out of a total of 125,000 aircrew, a 44% death rate, a further 8,000 were wounded in action and nearly 10,000 taken prisoner).

Towards the end of the book I began to feel that too much was being devoted to the context, too little on the final (postwar) years of the Lancaster, yet it was soon clear the end of the war was the end of the Lancaster. It's sole purpose was to bomb Germany. It was not well suited to conversion to the Japanese theatre, yet the atomic bombs stopped the conversion being done. However those atomic bombs also meant that huge bomber fleets were now redundant. More depressingly perhaps, their threat for the future rested completely on Harris's belief in the significance of indiscriminate area bombing. Dehousing indeed..

Don't be put off by the book's comic style cover, this is a serious and comprehensive study of the Avro Lancaster heavy bomber of WWII. Not only is the development and use of the Lancaster described in great detail but the book also presents a detailed study of the operations of Bomber Command throughout the war. The rights and wrongs of the area bombing strategy are discussed in a balanced way as are the strengths and weaknesses of the head of bomber command (and just one of the strategy's main proponents), Sir Arthur Harris. Despite the breadth of the material, Leo McKinstry manages to present it in an easy to read style that is always fresh. A must for all those interested in WWII aircraft and the strategy and tactics of the air war.

Having dealt with the legendary Supermarine Spitfire in a previous book, British author Leo McKinstry examines the other iconic RAF warplane of World War II - the Avro Lancaster - in this 2009 release from John Murray Publishers. McKinstry details the development and combat career of Avro's mighty four-engined bomber - which one wit christened 'The Flying Bomb Bay' - against the backdrop of the RAF evolving strategic bombing campaign and the military career of the head of Bomber Command, Arthur Harris. The thrust of McKinstry's exhaustively-researched yet eminently readable book might be judged by the book's sub-title: THE SECOND WORLD WAR'S GREATEST BOMBER. Ironically, by the end of this 581-page tome, it seems evident that the Lancaster might have achieved that 'Greatest Bomber' status but for the inflexibility of Harris, its foremost champion!

Without the efforts of Avro's chief designer, Roy Chadwick, there would have been no Lancaster. It evolved from the failed Manchester and, in time, became THE RAF heavy bomber of the European war. The Lancaster was a superb design capable of carrying prodigious amounts of bombs of all sizes and was both structurally strong and very maneuverable. Unfortunately, like other British bombers, it was armed with popgun .303 machine-guns, a major flaw that Harris was never able to rectify. As was proved in later daylight missions, the Lancaster could do an admirable job of precision bombing...but Harris wanted only to use it as an aerial bludgeon to flatten Germany's cities. Likewise Bomber Command crews, all of whom were volunteers, were talented, committed and courageous 'press on' individuals capable of greatness - witness the Dams Raid - yet, here again, they existed only to serve Harris' aerial strategy.

Utilizing previously untapped sources, McKinstry presents a wide-ranging account of the creation and combat ops of the Lanc including many first-person reminiscences. The top RAF commanders were firm believers that bombers would decide the course of the war. Harris, in particular, believed his Bomber Command bombers could win the war and would brook no arguments in his singleminded direction of Bomber Command 'area bombing' ops that called for the destruction of Germany's cities by night. The single-minded use Harris made of Avro's mighty bomber, his endless squabbles with the RAF high command, Air Ministry, Ministry of Aircraft Production, etc. and the on-going debate over the efficacy and morality of area bombing - which some characterized as 'terror bombing' - are all interwoven with the combat missions flown by Lanc crews.

Prior to reading McKinstry's book, I had thought LANCASTER would be a straightforward technical/operational history. I soon found the author was painting on a far larger canvas. I did find the other story elements fascinating. However I also felt the Lanc's story was sometimes lost in the endless details of the ongoing political civilian-military command infighting, Harris' latest antic, etc.

While the Lancaster was undoubtedly a superb bomber, neither it nor any bomber existant could have ended the war as Harris believed. Had it been deployed against POL targets rather than mindless destruction of cities, the Lancasters of Bomber Command could conceivably have ended the war SOONER but they could never win the war singlehandedly.

In summary, LANCASTER interweaves various storylines to tell a fascinating tale of one bomber's development and how that warplane played a major role in defeating the Third Reich. Bomber Command Lancaster crews compiled a record of bravery and devotion second to none. Sadly, their commander was their own worst enemy, his inflexibility preventing them from realizing their full potential. It's a complex tale well-told in Leo McKinstry's book. Recommended.

Lancaster is the story of the mainstay of RAF Bomber Command, the mighty four-engined Lancaster. McKinstry follows up his earlier examination of the Spitfire with a "biography" of the Lancaster - "the greatest bomber of WWII" as he puts it. While some might quibble with the description there is no doubt the Lanc was the best British bomber of the second world war. This book is 500+ pages of closely packed text, most of which are a paen to this aircraft and those who flew in her, with an assortment of photographic illustrations.

From humble beginnings as the twin-engine Manchester, the development of the Lanc by Roy Chadwick is covered in detail - such as the fact the huge bomb bay grew out of the original mixed specification for the aircraft to be able to carry a torpedo. The role of the Lanc in the British bomber offensive is covered in detail, including the "diversions" from area bombing such as the famous Dambusters raid.

There is also a look at the men and women who built the Lancaster (and, apparently, often "christened" it before sending it off to the pilots who would fly it into battle). This is an interesting and often overlooked contribution to WWII (the construction, not the christening) and it is a welcome addition here - even noting that the national myth of all pulling together is somewhat undermined by the inconveniant facts!

"Bomber" Harris, a tireless champion of the Lancaster, is often referenced, but it is notable that despite heading Bomber Command, he was unable to focus bomber production on the Lancaster as he wished, and unable to ever up-gun his .303 popgun turrets to something more effective until the end of the war.

But the heart of this book is the stories of the boys who flew the Lanc doing their job, night after night, struggling home, wounded, perhaps dying, with a shot-up plane running on three engines. Or those who died over Germany, or bailed out of a flaming kite and were captured. It should not be forgotten that the RAF lost the Battle of Berlin in early 1944 - as the Germans had lost the Battle of Britain in 1940 - and that, after all, bombing alone could not win a war. The Russians proved that in 1945.

Finally, the postwar role of the Lancaster and its derivative Lincoln and Shackleton is touched on - flying until 1991, but no longer a bomber. The atomic bomb was the death knell for the Lancaster: it was very nearly the pinnacle of obsolescence, having only a few brief years to fill the role for which it was designed.

I found this to be a very good book on the whole. During the first few pages, I rather thought that it was going to be a 'rah-rah' tale of stiff upper-lipped English heroes thrashing the hun but I quickly realized that it was actually a well written history that not only details the story of the Lancaster but also presents a well balanced and sometimes scathing overview of the entire British strategic bombing program. It is an entertain read generally but my one criticism of the book is that it is not terribly well organized. The author tends to skip around a bit to much; touching on a topic only to revisit it many times throughout the narrative. He doesn't become repetitive at all, but the jumping about did rather detract from my overall enjoyment.