In September 1940 a section of the No. 2 Squadron RAF Regiment Company was detached to General Wavell ’ s ground forces during the first offensive against the Italians in Egypt.

After leaving Winchester he joined the operational research section at RAF Bomber Command, where he remained for the rest of World War II.

A small section remains in the care of the RAF, and the Grade II listed chapel ( guarded by replicas of the base gate guardians, a Hawker Hurricane and a Supermarine Spitfire ) is open to the public.

Another long section remains, now the A15, running north out of Lincoln, past RAF Scampton and Caenby Corner, as far as Kirton in Lindsey at grid reference SE9698.

A section was detached to West Africa for anti-submarine and convoy patrols as No. 200 Squadron RAF.

A detachment of No. 219 Squadron RAF used the airfield between 4 October 1939 and 12 October 1940 when the main section of the squadron was at RAF Catterick flying the Bristol Blenheim IF.

In addition it houses the Joint Arms Control Implementation Group ( JACIG ), HQ Specialist Police Wing ( including the Tactical Provost Wing ), the RAF Centre for Aviation Medicine ( RAF CAM ), DE & S, 616 Volunteer Gliding Squadron which operates Vigilant T1 motor gliders and a training section for the Bowman ( communications system ).

This was located immediately opposite the airfield, behind the section of the Berlin Wall which ran along the western side of the airfield, and was clearly visible from RAF Gatow's control tower.

* RAF St Mawgan section of helis. com Helicopter History site

The air operations section of Operation Overlord, the 6 June 1944 Normandy landings ( D-Day ), was also controlled from RAF Uxbridge.

The MT section of the Queen's Colour Squadron relocated to RAF Northolt.

An Air Experience Flight ( AEF ) is a training unit of the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve ( Training Branch ) whose main purpose is to give introductory flying experience to Air Cadets or the RAF section of the Combined Cadet Force.

The boundary passes northwards through RAF Waddington, with the north-eastern section of the runway in the parish.

The RAF section also enter the Ground Training Competition every year ; this year they were ranked as the third best section in the south-west and best mixed-sex section in the south-west.

The RAF section staff includes Flight Lieutenant M. Walker and Flying Officer L. McAuley.

The RAF section visits RAF Cranwell every year for the regional Ground Training Competition where they compete against 15 other schools in order to gain a place in the Finals.

Wellingborough School RAF section is linked to No. 5 Air Experience Flight at RAF Wyton, where cadets are flown on Friday afternoons in the Grob Tutor training aircraft, and to 616 Volunteer Gliding Squadron, at RAF Henlow in Bedfordshire, where cadets go on Sundays to fly in the Grob Vigilant motor glider, and where Flt Lt Walker is a C Category instructor.

The RAF was Britain's weapon of attrition, and flying a fighter plane was the way her sons could serve her best at this point in the war.

The British RAF in the Middle East was equipped with Rolls-Royce Armoured Cars and Morris tenders.

An upgraded version with active radar seeker, called Active Sky Flash was proposed by BAe and Thomson-CSF, but did not receive funding because the RAF opted for other missiles.

The Avro Vulcan was part of the RAF V bomber force

This new design was licensed by the British, who produced ball point pens for RAF aircrew as the Biro ; they found they worked much better than fountain pens at high altitude, the latter being prone to ink-leakage in the decreased atmospheric pressure.

Carl Meinhof was the great-uncle ( the brother of the grandfather ) of Ulrike Meinhof, a founding member of the German Red Army Faction ( RAF ), a left-wing militant group, which operated in West Germany in 1970s and 1980s.

In the early 1960s, the UK was withdrawing its military presence from the Indian Ocean area, not including the base at RAF Gan to the north of Diego Garcia in the Maldives ( which remained open until 1976 ), and agreed to permit the US to establish a Naval Communication Station on one of its island territories there.

Much of this combat was centered around the strategic bombing campaigns of the RAF and the USAAF.

Significant individual contributions to the war effort by Scots included the invention of radar by Robert Watson-Watt, which was invaluable in the Battle of Britain, as was the leadership at RAF Fighter Command of Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding.

In the Zionist movement the moderate Pro-British ( and British citizen ) Weizmann, whose son died flying in the RAF, was undermined by Britain's anti-Zionist policies.

Similarly, a bomber wing was a Kampfgeschwader ( KG ), a night fighter wing was a Nachtjagdgeschwader ( NJG ), a dive-bomber wing was a Stukageschwader ( StG ), and units equivalent to those in RAF Coastal Command, with specific responsibilities for coastal patrols and search and rescue duties, were Küstenfliegergruppen ( Kü. Fl.

It was not until the concluding months of 1943 that the only realized attempt to build a " true four engined " version of the A-series He 177, the He 177B emerged with only three airworthy prototypes produced by early 1944, some three years after the first flights of the Avro Lancaster prototypes, the most commonly encountered RAF bomber pounding Germany on strategic night raids from 1942 to the end of the war in Europe.

Deliveries of new aircraft were insufficient to meet the drain on resources ; the Luftwaffe, unlike the RAF, was failing to expand its pilot and aircraft numbers.

He was in time for the bombing of Germany, serving on the Handley Page Halifax with No. 76 Squadron RAF, initially at RAF Breighton and then at RAF Holme-on-Spalding Moor.

In World War II, he volunteered for all services when the war broke out ( the RAF was his first choice owing to the influence of his father's experience ), but was initially rejected because of his father's nationality.

He went on to join Robert Atkin's Shakespearean company in Regent's Park, London, until he was called up for service in the RAF.

He was appearing in a Shakespearean play in doublet and hose in the open-air theatre in London's Hyde Park when two RAF MPs marched on stage and arrested him for desertion.

Although Meinhof was not considered to be a leader of the RAF at any time, her involvement in Baader's escape from jail in 1970 and her well-known status as a German journalist led to her name becoming attached to it.

Although no airlines ordered the Type 173, it led to military designs, of which the Type 192 went into service with the RAF as the Belvedere.

His first attempt in the " Virgin Atlantic Challenger " led to the boat capsizing in British waters and a rescue by RAF helicopter, which received wide media coverage.

The fall of Singapore led to the evacuated RNZAF pilots, in the RAF there, becoming available in New Zealand and they provided an experienced nucleus around which new fighter squadrons were formed.

Looking back over Trenchard's time as Chief of the Air Staff, while he had successfully preserved the RAF, his emphasis on the Air Force providing defence at a comparatively low cost had led to a stagnation and even deterioration in the quality of the Service's fighting equipment.

Trenchard's work in establishing the RAF and preserving its independence have led to him being described as the Father of the Royal Air Force.

Adolph Gysbert Malan, DSO & Bar, DFC & Bar ( 24 March 1910 – 17 September 1963 ), better known as Sailor Malan, was a famed South African World War II RAF fighter pilot who led No. 74 Squadron RAF during the height of the Battle of Britain.

* C R Samson – Initial commandant of the RFC Naval Wing, led the first armoured car units on the Western Front, later Air Officer Commanding RAF units in the Mediterranean

Poor eyesight led him to desk jobs in the RAF intelligence branch where he rose — as a " Wingless Wonder ", as officers who were not qualified to wear pilot's wings were called — to the rank of Flight Lieutenant ; he was then appointed Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Air, Sir Archibald Sinclair.

On the night of 5 June 1944, a force of 181 men, led by Major John Howard, took off from RAF Tarrant Rushton in Dorset, southern England in six Horsa gliders to capture Pegasus Bridge, and also " Horsa Bridge ", a few hundred yards to the east, over the Orne River.

Even before the end of the Iraq campaign, this had led to RAF attacks on airbases in Syria.

Wing Commander Guy Penrose Gibson, RAF ( 12 August 1918 – 19 September 1944 ), was the first CO of the Royal Air Force's 617 Squadron, which he led in the " Dam Busters " raid ( Operation Chastise ) in 1943, resulting in the destruction of two large dams in the Ruhr area.

The station's high level of involvement is operational activities led to RAF Kinloss being awarded the coveted Stainforth Trophy for the best operational performance in 2004.

The increasing tension of the Cold War led to a re-evaluation of these deployments and by 1953 SAC bombers began to move further west, behind RAF fighter forces, to Brize Norton, RAF Greenham Common, RAF Upper Heyford, and RAF Fairford.

In the North African campaign, although a Flight Sergeant, he periodically led his unit, No. 260 Squadron, RAF, into battle, a function normally reserved for an officer ; in fact during one flying operation his wingman ( i. e., subordinate ) was the United States Army Air Force lieutenant-colonel commanding the U. S. 57th Fighter Group.

The team was formed informally in the summer of 1963 by a group of flying instructors, led by Flight Lieutenant Lee Jones, at No 4 Flying Training School at RAF Valley.

All three RAF attacks on Tirpitz were led by Wing Commander J.

No. 9 fought with RAF Bomber Command in Europe all the way through the Second World War, took part in all the major raids and big battles, pioneered and proved new tactics and equipment, produced several of the leading figures in The Great Escape, as well as Colditz inmates-including the legendary ' Medium Sized Man ' Flight Lieutenant Dominic Bruce OBE MC AFM originator of the famous ' tea chest ' escape ; they became one of the two specialised squadrons attacking precision targets with the Tallboy bomb, and led the final mainforce raid, on Berchtesgaden, 25 April 1945.

All three RAF attacks on the Tirpitz were led by Wing Commander JB " Willy " Tait, who had succeeded Wing Commander Leonard Cheshire as CO of No. 617 Squadron in July 1944.

This problem seriously upset the usefulness of the Norden, and led the RAF to reject it once they received examples in 1942.