The Invasion of 1950

Chapter Thirty-Two

Over North Sea

A cold air blew across the landing field as the pilots marched out to their aircraft. The fires might have been put out a fortnight ago, but the airfield still bore the mark of the German assault, with blackened buildings and ruined outposts where the German bombs had fallen.

Flight Lieutenant Stanley Baldwin had flown over the wreckage of Home Fleet when his Gannet aircraft had landed at Scapa Flow and he had been awed by the sheer scale of the devastation. It would be years before the ships could be recovered, repaired, and pressed back into service… if they could be salvaged at all. The remainder of Home Fleet had departed to the Clyde. In their absence, the base seemed somehow smaller.

It still thronged with activity. Thousands of repairman and engineers had flooded into the base after the German raid, trying desperately to repair as much as possible. The airfields had been one of the first priorities, and while the original aircraft had been destroyed on the ground or killed in the air, the heavy Fleet Air Arm force had landed and was primed to respond to the German assault. The Germans hadn’t given them an opportunity to take revenge, however, until now. The pilots, lost in their own thoughts, barely noticed as they boarded their aircraft.

The briefing had been surprisingly clear. “The Germans intend to send a raiding force into the Atlantic,” the Group Commander had said. “Our job is to put them off the idea.”

The pilots had laughed then, although they knew that it wasn’t going to be easy. The RAF and the Royal Navy had fought a series of political battles, every bit as intense as actual fighting in the air, over who should command the maritime aerial strike force until the Prime Minister had ordered the command be given to the Royal Navy. The FAA existed, at least in part, to provide support to the Royal Navy, and Atlee had ruled that the Royal Navy would therefore have primary command, although some of the FAA’s facilities were shared with the RAF.

They’d trained endlessly for assaults against shipping and had practised as best as they could with the RAF, but attacking a single German ship wasn’t easy. There were five large German ships in the fleet they were expecting… and one of them was a carrier. The Germans had copied Japanese designs and it showed. Their carriers held more aircraft and were regarded as being more fragile than British designs.

Baldwin’s lips quirked. That piece of wisdom would be tested today, along with the mettle of the squadron. The Germans were known to have powerful radars mounted on their ships and, unless the attack was timed precisely, they would have the support of land-based aircraft as well. He ran through his check-list as the propellers began to spin, before watching the first of the RAF Meteors leaving the landing field and climbing into the sky. He didn’t like the Meteors — the FAA didn’t have many jet aircraft and wouldn’t until someone produced a jet aircraft that could launch from a carrier — but there was no doubting their prowess in the air.

The Germans had developed a habit of timing their own raids in hopes of catching tired British aircraft landing on their airfields. If they tried it this time, they would run into a full flight of Meteors, all out for revenge. It wasn’t too likely. However, as time had ground on, the Germans had switched more and more to close air support missions, preparing for the assault against the British lines that everyone knew was coming.

His radio hissed and crackled. “Red Three, go,” the Group Commander ordered.

Baldwin released the aircraft and it lunged down the runway, before slowly nosing into the air, staggering slightly under the weight of the weapons it carried.

“Form up on lead and maintain radio silence.”

Baldwin looked down at the Orkneys below as his plane rose higher into the air. They looked so peaceful, so untouched by the modern world, from his height. They would have been perfect were it not for the Germans. As it was, they were in a great position for a harbour, allowing the Home Fleet to sail out and intercept their German opponents whenever they came past Denmark, a piece of wisdom that had fallen when the Germans launched their air raid. He knew, now, that they needed to prove that there was still bite in the British armed forces… and hopefully scale the German fleet back a few ships.

The plane rocked slightly as one of the escorting meteors flew past. The jets had topped off from the orbiting tankers, something that the RAF had been experimenting with for the past few years, before racing ahead towards the German ships. The flight would still take a long time, but unless the Germans had changed course at once they were on a direct line towards the German ships, or, in theory, where the German ships would be when they arrived.

It was easy to see what the German ships had in mind. They would vanish out into the Atlantic, intercept and sink a few dozen freighters and then escape before they encountered anything powerful enough to stop them. They were more modern than the remaining battleships in Home Fleet and, perhaps, more powerful as well. They could escape, or fight, at will.

He remembered his brother, a Midshipman onboard one of the sunken battleships, and silently promised Peter a bloody revenge. The Germans would pay for what they had done to his family whatever it took. He was already determined to sink a German ship or die trying. His mother had cried on the telephone, but his father, an old soldier himself, had merely told him to go get them. This time, Baldwin hoped that Churchill was right, and the mad dog Hitler would be put down once and for all.

“Enemy fighters rising from the enemy carrier,” the radio squawked. Baldwin frowned as he considered his position. The Gannet was probably slower and less nimble than the German fighters, even if they were supposed to be no match for the Meteors. Any smart enemy commander would order his planes to ignore the Meteors and go for the torpedo-bombers; if all of the bombers were shot down or chased away from the task force, the Germans would have won. “Advance fighters are engaging the enemy.”

He peered into the distance, wondering if he would see anything, but all he saw were columns of smoke and aircraft trails as the British Meteors engaged the German carrier-borne fighters, hopefully clearing a path for the bombers. He’d listened carefully to the survivors of the British carrier aircraft at Scapa Flow — those who had made it into the air and fought the Germans — and he’d deduced that it was actually possible to take out a jet with a propeller-driven fighter, assuming that one was careful and lucky. The Germans, like the British, would only allow the best pilots to fly from a carrier; the odds were that they were as good as the boys who had engaged German fighters and lived to tell the tale. That wasn’t good news…

The German fleet appeared, four battleships and one carrier escorted by a spread of destroyers. According to his elder brother in one of his infrequent letters, the destroyers were regarded with particular dread by British submariners. They were far too good at detecting and destroying a submarine trying to slip into attack position. Rumour had it that the Germans had some kind of homing device for their torpedoes, something that allowed them to fire with only a vague contact, but no one had been able to prove or disprove it so far. The fleet was bunching up as it turned, firing all of its anti-aircraft guns into the air and trying to shoot down or drive away the British aircraft before it was too late.

Baldwin laughed as he altered course and fell in with the remainder of his squadron, slipping down into attack formation. The Germans surely knew that wasn’t going to work very well. It rarely did; the Germans and the British might have deployed radar-guided guns and proximity fuses, but unless the explosion was very close to the aircraft, it wasn’t often enough to bring it down. Their fighters were in just as much danger as the British fighters. It would be amusing if the Germans lost an aircraft through their own ground fire, which was something of an occupational hazard in any air force.

“Red Squadron, engage,” the Wing Commander said. The wary excitement in his tone made Baldwin smile to himself. “Your target is the carrier.”

Baldwin didn’t say what came to his lips; they had all known what their target was, the only ship that posed a real threat to the land-based aircraft. He saw out of the corner of his eye a German fighter trying to take a bead on him before covering fire from one of the Meteors blew it apart, shaking his aircraft like a leaf. The lead aircraft tilted and dove towards the carrier; a moment later Baldwin followed, feeling the sudden loss of gravity as he plummeted down towards the German carrier, and smiled as he reached for his lever.

The German carrier looked little different from any British carrier; he could see a handful of aircraft on the deck and men scurrying around like mice, all-too-aware of the flight of British aircraft falling on their position. The German guns were still trying to shoot at them, but it no longer mattered; if one of the British aircraft lost control and smashed into the carrier, the result was likely to be the same as if the bombs had hit and the aircraft had escaped. At the last possible moment, he yanked back the stick and pulled the bomb release cord, sending the bombs falling down towards the carrier’s deck. A few seconds after they were released, a rocket ignited on each of the bombs, forcing them down towards the enemy deck. In theory, they would punch right through the deck and detonate inside the ship.

The aircraft fought him as he struggled to pull out of his dive, almost as if it wanted to crash into the ship or take him down into the waters. In the space of a full second he pulled right out of his dive and flew right at one of the German battleships. It was one of their older ships, he saw now, the Deutschland or… he couldn’t remember the name of the other ship. He came close enough to the enemy ship to see the bridge crew staring at him, and then he was away, rising up into the air to avoid any fire from the German ships…

A flash of light caught his attention as the German carrier went up. Carriers were uniquely vulnerable, even the armoured British designs, because by their very function, they stored vast quantities of fuel and ammunition, far too close to the deck. If only one bomb had smashed into the carrier’s deck, it might well have been fatal… and each aircraft had intended to release three bombs. The German ship literally disintegrated.

His aircraft hopped now as he rose higher, no longer held down by the weight of the bombs. He fell in with the rest of his squadron, noting the loss of four of his friends with a corner of his mind. There was no way of knowing what had killed them, or even if they had made a mistake rather than been shot down by the Germans, but he knew what he would have preferred to believe. The second flight of Gannets was approaching now, flying low and preparing for torpedo attacks, and he saw the German battleships trying to evade. They knew what the primitive Swordfish aircraft had done to the Bismarck and what their countrymen had done to Home Fleet. One by one, the aircraft made their attack runs, concentrating on the largest German battleship, and Baldwin whooped as it slowly heeled over and started to sink.

“All aircraft, return to base,” the Group Commander ordered. Baldwin nodded; without any weapons, but their cannons, there was little point in remaining around and strafing the surviving German ships. They would reload and perhaps head out to engage the survivors again, but if the Germans managed to get back within range of land-based air, the RAF wouldn’t risk massive losses to get the remaining ships. Besides, a few British submarines might be lurking along their path now. The Germans would have to run the gauntlet to get home.

He checked his instrument panel again before relaxing slightly as the flight returned to base. The handful of surviving German aircraft harried them for a few moments, and then lit off towards the east, hoping to reach a German controlled airfield on Denmark or Norway before their fuel ran out and condemned them to a watery grave. He hoped they would make it, surprisingly; the odds of them getting picked up in the cold sea were very low. Coastal Command did try to pick up RAF pilots who had landed in the drink, and the Germans didn’t shoot at the seaplanes as long as the RAF left their rescue aircraft alone, but the odds were still very much against their survival. Out so far from German bases, or British bases for that matter, they would be lucky to last an hour before succumbing to the cold and fading away.

“All aircraft, be advised that we have a major raid inbound,” the Group Commander said, suddenly. His voice broke into Baldwin’s thoughts as they approached Scapa Flow. The Germans had clearly decided to take a break from pounding at the defences to destroy as many as possible of the FAA’s aircraft. Baldwin checked his fuel gauge and cursed; the Gannet had quite extraordinary endurance, but he had only a few minutes before his fuel gage slipped into the red. The Meteors could top up from the tankers but that wasn’t an option for the Gannets. “Prepare for orders.”

There was a long pause. Someone down on the ground would be working out what to do next. “Red and Blue Squadrons, land at once on your airfields and taxi immediately into the hardened shelters,” the Group Commander ordered finally. Baldwin couldn’t argue with the logic, or with the determination to preserve as many aircraft as possible. “Fall into emergency landing pattern and land at will.”

He watched as Red One dove towards the airfield, followed by Red Two, and then Baldwin slipped into his own position. Emergency landing routines were rarely required outside a few drills each year; they involved each aircraft landing within seconds of each other, carrying the risk of a collision and damage to the runway in the explosion. Red One descended down… down… and touched the runway; Red Two followed a moment later, flying through where Red One had been, just as the leader moved towards the revetment. The revetments had been built during the first blitz on Britain, back in 1940, and should withstand anything short of a direct hit. Baldwin caught his breath as he landed, bounced down the runway, and finally came to a halt. There was no time to waste. He gunned the engine gently, moving along the taxiway as Red Four landed behind him, and he steered directly for the revetment.

A flash of light caught his eye as the Germans raged over the harbour. The RAF, in an attempt to lock the barn door after the horse had bolted, had moved several more fighter squadrons into Scapa Flow, but they didn’t present the Germans with enough problems to prevent them from strafing the runways as the FAA aircraft tried to land. Baldwin found himself gasping out a prayer as he concentrated on driving right into the hanger and getting under cover away from German cannon fire. The Germans behind him were intent on completing the destruction of the airfield and the remaining facilities in the harbour. Too drained, too emotionally spent to go on, Baldwin sat back in his aircraft and waited patiently for the bombardment to end.

He smiled, suddenly, as he realised what they’d done. They’d sunken a German aircraft carrier and a battleship, all done at the cost of only a few lives. However they looked at it, it was a victory by anyone’s standards and one that would resound with the best traditions of the Royal Navy. In these darkest days, he felt, it was a symbol of hope.

They needed all the hope they could get.