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32 Through a Glass Darkly: The Royal Air Force and the Lessons of the Spanish Civil War 1936-1939 By Sqn Ldr Brian Armstrong The Spanish Civil War (SCW) 1936-1939 saw participation by ‘volunteer’ air forces from Germany, Russia and Italy, in order to test out the new realities of aerial warfare. Although the RAF is generally believed to have ignored the SCW to concentrate on preparing for war against Germany, in fact between 1937- 39, the British armed forces purposely studied the SCW through two special joint Air War intelligence committees. This paper provides a broad picture of the work of the Air War committees, exploring the influence of SCW air power lessons as applied by the RAF leadership to bomber, fighter, close-support, army co-operation and weapons policy.
‘For now we see through a glass darkly: but then face to face…’ I Corinthians 13, verse 12 The Spanish Civil War of 1936- 1939 saw direct participation by the air forces of Germany, the Soviet Union and Italy in the guise of volunteers, seemingly intent to test out the new realities of aerial warfare and to learn vital lessons. Yet, in Great Britain, the Royal Air Force – the very torchbearers of air power – apparently regarded Spain as little more than an alarming distraction from the urgent need to plan and prepare for war against Nazi Germany. One historian bluntly stated that ‘…the attitude of the RAF towards the events in Spain can be described as one of general indifference.’ 1 It is difficult to believe that the RAF would choose to pay little heed to the first air war since 1918 and not seek to draw lessons from it, particularly when the stakes were so high. Some authorities claim that this decision created the ignorance of the developments that threatened to be Britain’s nemesis in France during 1940 – the blitzkrieg weapons of the tank and close air support. 2 Instead, the RAF remained devoted to strategic bombing, their ‘matter of faith’, which was quickly shattered, in disastrous early raids on the German fleet. 3 An inevitable episode given one commentator’s belief that the RAF was prepared to ‘…blithely ignore the lessons of Spain about the vulnerability of bombers to modern fighters…’. 4 The question has to be asked: Why should such perceptions have arisen? Most studies of the interwar RAF have concentrated on the rise of strategic bombing as the central pillar of RAF strategy. 5 However, Air Ministry analysis of the Spanish Civil War resides in the Air Intelligence branch files, most of which were opened long after the release of most official documents. Many well-known works were written before the files were available and research naturally centred on better-known, more accessible sources. Furthermore, the picture was blurred by the ambivalent attitude of many RAF leaders, whose biographies often portrayed Spain as a dark cloud on the international horizon, not as a subject worthy of attention per se. 6 Yet, clear indications that the RAF did take note of the lessons of the Spanish Civil War do exist. John Terraine’s impressive ‘The Right of the Line’, does not ignore Spain, but makes several telling points about the influence, or lack of it, on the RAF. Terraine cites the Air Staff (AS) as having a tendency to learn the wrong lessons or to simply refuse to face the facts. To RAF eyes, the German Condor Legion ‘…gave the world a new lesson on the meaning of air power with the destruction of Guernica. Unfortunately, this lesson was so much taken to heart that equally important ones were discarded [author’s italics]’. 7 There was little mileage in seeking to identify Spanish Civil War lessons if such lessons were to be considered heresy: …the airmen could not see – let alone admit – that others might think differently [about strategic bombing]. Practical demonstrations did not convert them…the Madrid and Barcelona air raids…obscured the day-in and day-out activities of the air forces of both sides in 33
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Page 44: 30 RNAS, 3 Mar 1916, TNA AIR 1/2319
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Notes 143
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Notes 145
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Notes 147
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