In the early part of the Second World War, Royal Air Force Bomber Command were attacking targets in Germany by day. These raids were not as successful as the pre-war theorists had expected and the losses were unsustainable, which resulted in a change from majority daylight raids to majority nighttime raids.[1] These nighttime raids were also not providing the results, that were predicted in the pre-war period, and Bomber Command were being viewed as unsuccessful and that opened Bomber Command up to questions about its resourcing in a time where resources were limited.[2] This led to the Government commissioning an examination of the effectiveness of Bomber Command, in ‘targeted’ bombing. The examination was led by David Bensusan Butt, using photographical evidence. The report, which was presented to the War Cabinet on the 18th August 1940, highlighted the stark realities of the inaccuracy of Bomber Command, with in some raids, only 9% of bombers hitting within an area around a target with a radius of 5 miles.[3]
This report, highlighting major issues, was highly politically sensitive.[4] The War Cabinet understood that fixes had to be found, and if they could, it would make every raid more effective without committing any extra resources.[5] Whereas the RAF understood that improvements had to be made to keep political favour and finances, from His Majesty’s Treasury, during the conflict, as well as being able to strike at the enemy more efficiently.[6] It could be argued, despite the fact some issues had been considered previously, such as cloud, that the Butt Report’s stark statistics ended the political and military positivity regarding the bombing offensive and the losses it was entailing for negligible attacks on target.[7]
The prior reactionary shift to night bombing highlights that there was learning being conducted to attempt to rectify some of the issues of Bomber Command, but the Butt Report, began a wide process of change, improvements, and development within Bomber Command.[8] Bomber Commands Operational Research Section was given the task of remedying the problems that the report highlighted.[9]
The work of the Operational Research section fed into the design of aircraft, including defensive armament and armour while also considering the roles that the aircraft could be expected to conduct.[10] The work of the Operational Research section also considered new technology and technological improvements.[11] One area where technology was vital in the post Butt Report period was navigation, as Butt highlighted 66.6% of planes failed to find the target area.[12] This was politically and military valuable to Bomber Command in the wake of the report, due to navigation and a larger percentage of bombers reaching target could multiply the bomber force without any expansion compared to previous raids.[13] It was decided by Bomber Command that a technological fix to navigation would be preferable to utilising more difficult manual methods and less prone to any inclement weather.[14] The initial response was Gee and Oboe, this increased navigational accuracy to between 600 yards and 1 mile, delivering a drastic improvement compared to the area that Butt used in his analysis.[15] These systems, developed in the wake of the statistical analysis of Butt, enabled Bomber Command to conduct operations with a greater level of accuracy that then enabled the RAF to conduct the precision attacks in preparation for D-Day.[16] The Oboe system was capable for limited usage, such as by pathfinders and master bombers, utilising illumination ordinance to guide the main force to the target, along with the other systems, such as H2S.[17] The ability of illuminating the target had also been a consideration post-Butt Report to enable a greater percentage of aircraft in a raid to strike at the target area.[18]
The post-Butt Report research and development by the Operational Research section shows the positive reaction by RAF Bomber Command to the contents of the report and, though a long process, changed the way Bomber Command conducted operations and resulted in a more accurate force, which by 1944 was able to conduct operations with precision against targets such as railways.[19] The Butt Report, from its deeply statistical view had large effects on the RAF, their conduct and methods of bombing and the way the Second World War was fought. It drove technological innovation that aided the RAF in the conflict, especially due to navigational systems, but it also laid the foundation for later developments.
[1] Tami Davis Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, International History Review, 21 (3) (1999), p. 629, https://doi.org/10.1080/07075332.1999.96408711 ; Ibid, p. 631-2; John Buckley, Air Power in the Age of Total War, (London: University of London Press, 1999), p. 157; Ibid, p. 78; Phillip S. Meilinger, Airpower Theory and Practice, (London: Frank Cass Publishers, 2003), p. 26; Ibid, p. 47 – 49; Randall Wakelam, “Bomber Harris and Precision Bombing – No Oxymoron Here”, Journal of Military and Strategic Studies, 14 (1) (2011), p. 3, https://jmss.org/article/view/58013/43660.
[2] Richard G. Davis, Bombing the European Axis Powers, (Alabama: Air University Press, 2006), p. 27 – 29.
[3] David M B Butt, AIR 14/1218: Report on Photographs of Night Raids and Statistical Analysis (Butt Report), (London: Offices of the War Cabinet, 1941, rept. William Thomas, 2014), p. 1 – 2, https://etherwave.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/butt-report-transcription-tna-pro-air-14-12182.pdf; Ibid, p. 6.
[4] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 635; Thomas Childers, “”Facilis descensus averni est”: The Allied Bombing of Germany and the Issue of German Suffering”, Central European History, 38 (1) (2005), p. 85, https://www.jstor.org/stable/4547498
[5] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 634; Will Iredale, The Path Finders, (London: W H Allen, 2021), p. 72; Buckley, Air Power in the Age of Total War, p. 157.
[6] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 634; Tami Davis Biddle, Rhetoric and Reality in Air Warfare, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002), p. 160; Ibid, p. 169.
[7] Williamson Murry, “Reflections on the Combined Bomber Offensive”, Militärgeschichtliche Mitteilungen, 51 (1992), p. 76, https://doi.org/10.1524/mgzs.1992.51.1.73; Wakelam, “Bomber Harris and Precision Bombing – No Oxymoron Here”, p. 3; Buckley, Air Power in the Age of Total War, p. 157.
[8] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 631 – 632; Buckley, Air Power in the Age of Total War, p. 157.
[9] Buckley, Air Power in the Age of Total War, p. 143 – 144; Air Ministry, Air Publication 3368 The Origins and Development of Operational Research in the Royal Air Force, (London: Her Majesty’s Stationary Office, 1963), p. 44, https://www.raf.mod.uk/our-organisation/units/air-historical-branch/second-world-war-thematic-studies/ap3368-operational-research-in-the-royal-air-force/; Victor Bissonnette, “Operational Research and the British Bombing Offensive against Germany, 1941 – 1945”, War in History, 25 (4) (2018), p. 538 – 539, https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/26538751
[10] Ibid, p. 537; Kenneth P. Werrell, “The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War II: Costs and Accomplishments”, The Journal of American History, 73 (3) (1986), p. 704, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1902984
[11] Davis, Bombing the European Axis Powers, p. 30; Werrell, “The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War II: Costs and Accomplishments”, p. 704.
[12] Butt, AIR 14/1218: Report on Photographs of Night Raids and Statistical Analysis (Butt Report), p. 2.
[13] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 634; Butt, AIR 14/1218: Report on Photographs of Night Raids and Statistical Analysis (Butt Report), p. 6.
[14] Davis, Bombing the European Axis Powers, p. 29 – 30; Werrell, “The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War II: Costs and Accomplishments”, p. 704.
[15] Davis, Bombing the European Axis Powers, p. 30; Biddle, Rhetoric and Reality in Air Warfare, p. 197 – 198; Bissonnette, “Operational Research and the British Bombing Offensive against Germany, 1941 – 1945”, p. 541; Air Ministry, Air Publication 3368 The Origins and Development of Operational Research in the Royal Air Force, p. xii.
[16] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 645.
[17] Tami Davis Biddle, “Dresden 1945: Reality, History, and Memory”, Journal of Military History, 72 (2) (2008), p. 417, https://doi.org/10.1353/jmh.2008.0074; Wakelam, “Bomber Harris and Precision Bombing – No Oxymoron Here”, p. 14; Davis, Bombing the European Axis Powers, p. 31; Ibid, p. 59 – 60.
[18] Ibid, p. 30; Air Ministry, Air Publication 3368 The Origins and Development of Operational Research in the Royal Air Force, p. 60i; Ibid, p. xiv.
[19] Biddle, “Bombing by the Square Yard: Sir Arthur Harris at War, 1942–1945”, p. 645.
Major History 