Coastal Command (WWII – Royal Air Force)
RAF Coastal Command was a formation within the Royal Air Force (RAF). Founded in 1936, it was to act as the RAF maritime arm, after the Fleet Air Arm became part of the Royal Navy in 1937. Naval aviation was neglected in the inter-war period, 1919–1939, and as a consequence the service did not receive the resources it needed to develop properly or efficiently. This continued until the outbreak of the Second World War, during which it came to prominence. Owing to the Air Ministry’s concentration on RAF Fighter Command and RAF Bomber Command, Coastal Command was often referred to as the “Cinderella Service”, a phrase first used by the First Lord of the Admiralty at the time A V Alexander.
Its primary task was to protect convoys[citation needed] from the German Kriegsmarine’s U-boat force. It also protected Allied shipping from the aerial threat posed by the Luftwaffe. The main operations of Coastal Command were defensive, defending supplies lines in the various theatres of war,[citation needed] most notably the Mediterranean, Middle East and African theatres[citation needed] and the battle of the Atlantic. It also served in an offensive capacity. In the Mediterranean[citation needed] and Baltic it carried out attacks on German shipping moving war materials from Italy to North Africa and from Scandinavia to Germany. By 1943 Coastal Command finally received the recognition it needed and its operations proved decisive in the victory over the U-boats.
The service saw action from the first day of hostilities until the last day of the Second World War. It flew over one million flying hours[2] in 240,000 operations, and destroyed 212 U-boats.[3] Coastal Command’s casualties amounted to 2,060 aircraft to all causes and some 5,866 personnel killed in action. During 1940–1945 Coastal Command sank 366 German transport vessels and damaged 134. The total tonnage sunk was 512,330 tons[4] and another 513,454 tons damaged.[3] A total of 10,663 persons were rescued by the Command, including 5,721 Allied crews, 277 enemy personnel, and 4,665 non-aircrews.
