AIR MARSHAL, CAN YOU RECALL THE TIME WHEN YOU WERE IN THE UNITED STATES WHEN THE NEWS OF SPUTNIK CAME THROUGH, AND WHAT THE REACTION WAS AT THE TIME?

Certainly, I shall never forget it. I was on the tarmac at the Pinecastle Air Force Base in Florida at the United States Strategic Air Command bombing competition. And when the news came through of the, of the Sputnik, the surprise, really, the astonishment of the Americans that they could have been beaten to it was very apparent.

DID THEY DRAW ANY CONSEQUENCES FROM IT THAT YOU RECALL?

My main impression that I still have was their astonishment that anyone could have beaten the to it. That was the, that was the impression that I remember. The, the defense aspect wasn't immediately apparent.

WHAT WAS YOUR OWN REACTION?

Not really. The full implications of, came to be apparent when we thought about it later. But at the precise moment I was I was just an interested party.

A LOT OF PEOPLE IN EUROPE -- AND PARTICULARLY THE FRENCH, I'M THINKING AMONG OTHERS OF GENERAL GALLOIS -- DREW THE CONCLUSION FROM SPUTNIK THAT NOW THE UNITED STATES WAS VULNERABLE TO ATOMIC ATTACK BY THE RUSSIANS AND THEREFORE THE NUCLEAR DETERRENT THAT THE AMERICANS HAD, THE NUCLEAR UMBRELLA OVER EUROPE, WAS NOT AS SECURE AS IT HAD BEEN. DO YOU THINK ANYONE ELSE WAS DRAWING THAT CONCLUSION IN THE RAF?

No. I can't, I can't recall that was the immediate reaction of the people in the service. Because it wasn't long afterwards that the arrangement for us to man Thor in this country was made and in fact, we had a deterrent with a ballistic missile as well as with the manned bombers. I think that really that was the impression that we had in Bomber Command, in the service generally.

COULD YOU TELL ME OF THE CHANGE OF ATTITUDE THAT TOOK PLACE IN THE RELATIONS BETWEEN SAC AND BOMBER COMMAND?

When we first went to the States to Omaha to see the Strategic Air Command headquarters and their commander, first of all, General LeMay and then shortly afterwards General Power the were always very welcoming, but it was very apparent that it was not a business visit. When we participated in the bombing competitions and had done very well in them, and the bomb was blown off at Christmas island, the megaton bomb, their whole attitude changed. It seemed to me that they didn't recognize us as a worthwhile business partner. And from that time onwards, cooperation was complete.

WHAT PARTICULAR THINGS CHANGED?

Well, we had our own, for instance, an independent plan to implement the deterrent if that was necessary. After this time there was great consultation on the SAC plan and the Bomber Command plan to the benefit of both. And, and to see that there was no crash of interest.

WAS THERE ANY DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE KINDS OF TARGETS THAT THE RAF WAS PLANNING TO HIT WITH ITS MUCH SMALLER FORCE AND THE KIND OF PRIORITY TARGETS THAT SAC WAS AFTER?

My recollection is that SAC recover, we covering a great many targets of different categories. Our targets, as fitted into one of their categories but not into all three of them. That was that was my remembrance of it.

WHAT BASICALLY WERE THE RAF'S TARGETS? IT HAD TO BE A COUNTER-CITY OPERATION, PROBABLY?

It was, it was primarily a counter-city operation.

COULD YOU EXPLAIN WHY THAT WAS NECESSARY AS WELL?

Well, I can't because I was, I was, I just did it as I was told. This is the unfortunate -- I got we have this list of targets from Whitehall and that was it. We, and we didn't query them. We, the only, this is, I hope this isn't...the only queries that we had were when they were extreme range and this sort of thing. We would prefer not to do that or do this one -- which is saying, well, there were very many more targets than we had a capability of attacking so there was no problem on that side of it.

BUT I MEAN THE STRATEGIC AIR COMMAND HAD A VERY ELABORATE INTELLIGENCE OPERATION OF ITS OWN WHOSE PRIME PURPOSE WAS TO IDENTIFY TARGETS, WAS THERE ANY EQUIVALENT WAY OF DOING THINGS IN THE RAF OR DID YOUR TARGETS COME FROM...?

Our, our list of targets came from the Ministry of Defense and how they arrived at those targets, I was not privy to. I was not consulted on the targets...and only from operation reasons did, was there any discussion on targets with Bomber Command.

CAN WE JUST GO OVER THE GROWTH OF THE V-BOMBER FORCE? AT AROUND THE TIME THAT IT WAS REALLY COMING INTO ITS OWN IN THE LATE '50s, IT BECAME FASHIONABLE IN BRITAIN TO TALK ABOUT IT BEING ALREADY VULNERABLE TO MISSILE ATTACK, PARTICULARLY FROM THE SOVIET UNION, AND THEREFORE ALREADY OUT-OF DATE. YOU WERE IN COMMAND OF IT AT THAT POINT, WHAT WAS YOUR REACTION TO CRITICISMS LIKE THAT ONE?

I was not at that time Commander in Chief. I was with the Group Commander of the First V-Bomber group...

BUT YOU WERE COMMANDER BETWEEN 1960 AND '63...

Certainly, but, as you remember there was a period before the Sputnik where the vulnerability of the V-bombers on the ground was not relevant. The was plenty of time to get off before the Russian manned bombers could have arrived. After the... with the arrival of the Sputnik and the corollary that we could now be bombarded with missiles, the whole of the V-Bomber force became vulnerable on the ground. We therefore went from very wide dispersal plan, dispersing the aircraft down to small packets, four on airfields all over the country, and we, by technical means and by hard training, plus the use of the Fylingdales warning radar, we worked up a capability of getting the whole command airborne in four minutes. This, this meant that with the warning from Fylingdales of the, of the missiles, by the time they arrived, the whole of the V-bomber force would have been in the air.

THAT'S A REMARKABLY SHORT TIME. SAC WAS PRETTY PLEASED TO GET ITS FORCE OFF IN 15 MINUTES.

Yes, we were much quicker than SAC. Of course, SAC had more warning for their, for their aircraft in the States. They didn't have the same warning as we did for their aircraft in England. But we really were very much faster off the ground than Strategic Air Command. One of the reasons was the we by technical arrangement managed to start all engines simultaneously.

WHAT WAS YOUR PERSONAL REACTION WHEN YOU HEARD THAT SKYBOLT WAS GOING TO BE CANCELLED?

One of great disappointment. Looking ahead and seeing the way the Russian air defenses were building up, it became very apparent to us that it was going to be increasingly difficult to penetrate those defenses. And Skybolt, of course, allowed us to go to the edge of the defenses and then launch the missile outside, without penetrating the defenses. So the cancellation of Skybolt was a very great disappointment to me.

IN A WAY IT REALLY SPELLED THE END, IN THE LONG RUN, OF THE RAF AS THE BEARER OF THE BRITISH DETERRENT?

It certainly did. We prolonged it for a time, as you know with the air launched Blue Steel missile, shorter range. We wouldn't have had, penetrate the full defenses, but we couldn't stand outside them as we could have done with the Skybolt, so we prolonged the life of the V-bombers at altitude in that way, and then finally the V-bombers went down underneath the radar for the remainder of their life and then until Polaris took over.

...COULD YOU PERHAPS PUT THAT IN YOUR OWN WORDS, THAT THE CANCELLATION OF SKYBOLT DID DOOM THE RAF AS THE CARRIER OF THE DETERRENT?

Yes. The, the thing was that it wasn't a thing in which was ever a big tragedy or anything of that sort because living with the thing you could see it coming. It was a very gradual business that we would be fading out and it was much too big, if I may say so, much too big a subject to be anything to do with inter-service rivalry or anything of that sort. We were, we were against the Polaris for one reason only, that Skybolt would have been much cheaper in terms of money than Polaris. But once Strategic Air Command had lost interest in Skybolt, we could see the writing on the wall, that we wouldn't be able to afford to procure it ourselves without help from the States. So we were disappointed, but that was, that was the most we were, I think.

DURING THE PERIOD YOU WERE COMMANDING BOMBER COMMAND WAS PROBABLY THE PEAK PERIOD FOR DEMONSTRATIONS, MANY OF THEM OUTSIDE RAF BASES, BY THE CND AND THE ANTI-BOMB MOVEMENT IN BRITAIN -- WHICH SUBSEQUENTLY FADED AWAY FOR SOME 20 YEARS UNTIL IT CAME BACK IN THE LATE '70S. SOME OF THOSE PEOPLE TENDED TO SAY THAT AIR MARSHALS AND GENERALS AND SOLDIERS WERE CULPABLE FOR EVEN AGREEING TO DEAL WITH THESE WEAPONS. IF YOU HAD BEEN TALKING TO SOMEBODY LIKE THAT IN THIS ROOM AND THEY SAID HOW CAN YOU DO THIS TERRIBLE IMMORAL THING, WHAT WOULD YOUR REACTION HAVE BEEN TO THAT?

I would have said to them that the invention of the nuclear weapon was the greatest blessing that ever struck mankind because from our knowledge of the power of the weapons, it made major war between two major powers or more unthinkable, and therefore, it avoided the sort of slaughter which we saw in the First World War and to a lesser extent, in the Second World War, they're the same in Russia. Therefore, it was a blessing, not a... nothing else.

DID YOU EVER HAVE ANY DOUBTS THAT IT WAS RIGHT FOR BRITAIN TO DEVELOP ITS OWN NUCLEAR DETERRENT AS OPPOSED TO RELYING ON THE UNITED STATES?

Frankly, I didn't think about it, because by the time I was involved in the, in the business, the policy had been made, so I didn't, I had no doubts. It wouldn't have made any difference if I had, the government had decided the policy by this time.

BUT WHEN WE TALKED EARLIER YOU SAID THAT YOU MET THE AMERICANS, YOU LIKED THE AMERICANS, BUT THEY WERE BUSINESSMEN...

Not really, because I was thinking of ordinary war...on that side. They took their orders from the Pentagon. We took ours from the Ministry of Defence. So that, on our level, this sort of discussion never occurred, and nor did I really get any impression in the context of nuclear operations the sort of... occasional thing where they were looking after their own interests.

JUST CUT...

We had, we had demonstrations at first around the Thor stations and they spread then to the airfields as well. But as far as our, the force who were manning the aircraft and the, and the missiles, these demonstrations had no effect whatsoever. The attitude of the -- from the bottom to the top was that these people didn't understand what the business was about. And they had certain amount of amusement and contempt for these people who they considered were wasting their time demonstrating. That was the, that was my lasting memory of that period in Bomber Command.

OK...YOU SAY THAT YOUR IMPRESSION OF THE AMERICANS BEING SURPRISED...WOULD IT BE FAIR TO SAY THAT MAYBE THAT...

They didn't they didn't, I don't know why, they welcomed us -- that would probably be the way to say it -- they welcomed us being in the same business, and at that time, we were the only other people in the Western world in that business.

DID YOU HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE FRENCH DURING THE PERIOD YOU WERE IN COMMAND?

They visited...when they were building up their Force de Frappe they came to Bomber Command with the agreement of the government and we briefed them, or explained how we, how we did it. Readiness, quick takeoff and so on. It was entirely a one-way, one-way traffic. I learned nothing about the Force de Frappe, which at that time, of course, didn't exist. They were just starting to build it.

DID YOU HAVE ANY VIEWS ABOUT THE FRENCH ABILITY TO DO THE JOB?

No. Because I had left Bomber Command by the time the Force de Frappe got going, so I never had any inside knowledge of their capabilities.

DO YOU RECALL...ANYONE FROM THE PENTAGON -- NO, I REMEMBER WE TALKED ABOUT THIS AND YOU DIDN'T, SO...I THINK THAT'S ABOUT IT. LET'S CUT THERE.

It's very difficult to judge the effect of deterrence, except as long as you remain at peace, you assume it's working. I suppose you could say that the Cuban Missile Crisis was one of the first tests of the deterrent force in Bomber Command. We very quickly brought the whole force to readiness without any fuss or without any bother. Attention was focused elsewhere, but our friends, the Americans and the Thor force were all up to instant readiness, and the Americans knew exactly that they had a friend at their side fully at readiness. That's how I remember the Cuban Missile Crisis.