January-February - Air Defense Artillery

19-H BRITAI:0rS AA DEFE~SES 37
isolated positions far from comforts and the amenities
of home life. They do not enjoy either the glamour or
the excitement which falls to the lot of the gun detachments:
yet their ,mrk is not in the slightest degree
lessimportant.
A searchlight may "hold" a plane for three minutes
and not one member of the detachment may be able to
5ee it; vet, thanks to the skill of each individual and the
~eam{,;ark of the ,,,,hole, that plane may ,veIl be destroyed.
It may be below or above cloud: skilled work
"ill follow it; the night fighter will have a good chance
of a kilL
Another task for the searchlights is to guide home
our returning bombers under bad weather conditions.
At home, in Malta, in T obruk, in Burma, in Malaya,
indeed throughout the battlefields, units from AA Command
have fought and are fighting \vith a skill and
courage which should be a source of pride to themselves
and to the commander who has done so much to
organize, train and equip them.
"Antiaircraft gun and searchlight batteries playa vital part in our
horne defense system, and the safety of this island depends greatly
upon the devotion and skill with which the men and women who
man these posts perform their duty.
"Their vigilance cannot for a moment be relaxed. Though we do
not in the present lull hear their guns or see their searchlights so often
as we did, they must still remain at their stations, constantly on the
alert, and ready for instant action.
"These men and women, standing to their guns and searchlights
in summer and winter at a thousand posts throughout the length and
breadth of the country, deserve our gratitude. They have served us
nobly and with all too little public recognition of their prowess and
devotion.
"They have taught the enemy a bitter lesson in the past. In the
present lull they continue to take their full toll, and I know that they
will do so with ever increasing success if and when the enemy increases
his bombing effort against this country."-AIR CHIEF MAR-
SHALSIR SHOLTODOUGLAS,Commander in Chief, RAF Fighter
Command.