Book on French AF 1939-40?

Many thanks for this Ruy. Who typed these long quotations? You? It must have been a lot of work! So thanks again - much obliged. Said quotations are very interesting.

I am really sorry but I can't reply in detail today, not to Nick Beale's post either, which I regret : I have the tax office on my tail and I MUST do something about it - in particular that hated paperwork. Rats!

It seems clear that they really meant June 3, 1940. As I already explained several times I consider this impossible. You don't round up any top-ranking generals and admirals to an airfield on the very day you know the Huns are going to bomb that same airfield! This is absolutely hair-raising. Any airfield was a most dangerous place anyway during the war. Darlan was the Commander-in-Chief of the whole French navy (it was much smaller than the British navy but much bigger than the German one, with six battleships, 60 good submarines (twice the German sub force), 1 aircraft carrier, many cruisers and destroyers etc. and more of these being made, under Darlan's top responsibility too : several fast battleships and several aircraft carriers, etc. - this work was stopped by the armistice). Vuillemin was the C-i-C of the French Air Force. I think nobody can imagine that these four most important men would have gathered under falling German bombs just for fun. Possibly S. Douglas mixed up different days when he wrote this (such errors will happen often).

In any case it is a FACT that no French fighter unit was based at Villa on June 3. If really 3 fighters took off these were the airfield's own protection fighters (so-called local flights or "chimney flights") for several important aircraft factories were situated at or near Villacoublay and the new AC were test-flown there : Breguet (Br 693 / 695), LeO (LeO 451), possibly more. Nevertheless there was no local defence flight at Villa, probably because several well-armed fighter airfields were situated around Paris. Often the few defending fighters were flown by local test pilots (one of them, having started from Châteauroux or Bourges, won a victory flying a prototype fighter - as a civilian! Probably a very rare occurence in WW II.) Of course it is quite possible that some fighters were parked there, in particular awaiting repair of battle damage. The Morane-Saulnier factory of Puteaux was not far away and the new AC were flight-tested there (at Villa), but MS 406-production was being phased out : the Armée de l'Air received 7 in April, 10 in May and the last 4 in June. During the same months they received 371 D.520s (including 196 in June only - in 24 days not 30! In a complete month of June well over 250 D.520s would have been delivered), production rate still rising strongly (made far away from Paris : in Toulouse, where I was borne, heh heh heh, which is not surprising for a future old owl).

"The aircraft (MS 406) are assembled and flight-tested at Vélizy-Villacoublay" (sic : I think the double name didn't exist yet 1940). Found in the book "Le MS 406", a remarkable monograph published by "Avions"-Lela-Presse (12 authors including Mathieu Comas, Christophe Cony, Michel Ledet, Lucien Morareau, Lionel Persyn et al). So yes Villa was Morane-Saulnier's aerodrome too so possibly a dozen or more MS 406s can have been there on 3 June 1940 but with no fighter pilots, no ammunition and probably they were not airworthy.

Remember, please, that the Breguet 690 series had been originally designed and ordered as heavy twin-engined fighters (hence probably the powerful armament of one cannon and several MGs in the nose, more firing backwards) and were produced at Vélizy, which later merged with Villacoublay : nowadays the city's name is Vélizy-Villacoublay. Not surprisingly the produced Br 691, 693 and 695 were test-flown at Villacoublay airfield and yes, they could very much look like fighters - they had been designed as fighters! But if SD's story is true at all, which I strongly doubt, these were new Br 693s / 695s he saw; they had just rolled off the factory and were being or would have been test-flown in those very days. The "fighter-pilots" he "saw" in the officers' mess were certainly no fighter-pilots but test-pilots at best, possibly no pilots at all but other personnel (there were about 100 men for 1 fighter pilot in the A.A.). In any case these AC, whatever the type (most probably Br 693/695), had not been test-flown and certainly carried no ammunition to shoot at the naughty German bombers. Taking off among exploding bombs is a lot of fun (why did SD not take off himself with one of the 50-60 "fighters"?) but not really useful if you're unable to fire your guns.

Enough now : this in-credible story quite simply is not true, that's all.

Originally Posted by Ruy Horta

When Geoffrey Blake and I landed at the military aerodrome at Villacoublay, just outside Paris

Grozibou : actually it was more the aerodrome used by the surrounding aero-industry producing Breguet, LeO and Morane-Saulnier aircraft. This means a production of hundreds and hundreds of aircraft. No wonder the LW wanted to bomb it. Obviously during a war the Air Force will use any aerodrome which suits their needs.

With nature of our welcome determined, Colyer and Blake and I rushed off to the nearest air-raid shelter. It was a not very reassuring mound of sandbags and corrugated iron, and just as we got to it the first bomb came down, bursting on a hangar about thirty or forty yards away. And then came a whole salvo of bombs which fell all over the aerodrome and the hangars.

- Visibly he was scared out of his wits by a few harmless small bombs. This'll kill me! (I'll be an innocent victim of those nazi bombs over 68 years later!)

There were some fifty or sixty fighters of the French air force standing parked around the aerodrome, and we saw a number if them blow up in the raid. Just as we were landing I saw three of the French fighters take off, but as far as I can ascertain these were the only fighters that attempted to go into action from Villacoublay that day.

- Yes, if this story is not 100 % invented for some reason, it is even surprising that as many as 3 airworthy fighters were to be found there, for French HQ had concentrated elsewhere all fighter units they could get their hands on. But perhaps 3 test-pilots just wanted to fly one aircraft each to safety in order to avoid its destruction. The other guys in the mess most probably were mechanics or possibly pilots of any kind (including bombers) who had not got any airworthy AC to fly at the moment, all other AC not being able to fly. In any air force of the world it is very difficult to know what kind of a pilot you are seing : they all wear the same pilot's badge. (I was an officer with the A.A. myself and I am used to this) Only the unit's badge can give you a clue but you have to be an expert to make the difference between hundreds of different, mostly strange or even weird badges. A pilot wearing his pilot's badge (RAF : his "wings") can be a bomber pilot or a young lad flying only light liaison AC (commandeered tourism AC), ambulance AC etc.

He continues describing visits to both Darlan and Vuillemin, finding these encouraging and reassuring, having completed arrangements for cooperation with the French both at sea and in the air.

- This is ludicrous. Such arrangements had been completed as early as 1938 and possibly 1939, which didn't make some refinements or changes impossible but the main work had been performed long ago.

What types of aircraft could Douglas have seen at Villacoublay? He must have recognized fighters for what they were, but might he have overlooked if they were operational or not?

- You hardly can tell by just looking at them. An aircraft must have sustained really heavy damage if you want it to be obvious to the onlooker that it can't fly at the moment.

Those men in the Mess, were they fighter pilots?

- Certainly not. The fighter pilots were in their fighter units, based on all possible airfields but not at Villa. Civilian test-pilots of the companies Breguet, LeO and MS at best, most probaly unable to perform air-to-air shooting, in particular without any ammunition. In France no civilian person, no matter his competence, is authorised to use any military weapons in anger at war, not even a simple pistol or rifle.

Could culture and circumstance be part of the mix up, mistaking sang froid and nonchalance for lack of keenness?

- French personnel were used to be attacked, British generals were not. What's more, even the most eager test-pilot or bomber-pilot is unable to fly a fighter in combat if this fighter is a Br 693 bomber which is not airworthy and has got no ammo.

...giving it the weight of rank and thus credibility.

- Yes! Frankly I can't imagine how an RAF general or AVM or whatever should have known everything on the various insignia and badges of the FRENCH Air Force : this was not his business, he had to deal with quite different matters at top-level. His rank does not make his story more credible. As I already mentioned a top-ranking German general published a book in which he stated that the Japanese had conquered Midway (Adolf Galland). You could say : "Come on! Galland was a general! He could not possibly be wrong!" Bullshit.

IMHO it is not worth the energy to fight this one piece of writing (two if we count Townsend) as it is to discuss French operations and their effects in general. By constructive debate we can create a better picture and even help dispel the notions of the defeatist and ineffective air force. To villanize an author is not the way to be taken seriously. Dispel the myth by reason, and reasonable debate.

- In theory you're perfectly right. Unfortunately Sholto Douglas is a very famous man, Peter Townsend, princess' lovelace, even more so, in particular in... France! His book is widely spread and often quoted from. You can be sure that even in 500 years people are going to "prove" French airmen's cowardice "thanks to" Townsend's book. This will never end so it must be fought "with every ounce of energy". Books, in particular historical books - here we have got TWO, written by S.D. and by P.T. - have an important characteristic (feature) : they never disappear, once they are here they are here to stay so such insulting libelling must be fought immediately (if possible) and with the last ounce of energy.

A last "small detail" : according to excellent airpower historian Raymond Danel ("Icare" N° 54) the huge German attack on June 3 gave the following results : on operational airfields 6 (!) French AC were destroyed on the ground, 7 were damaged, 32 men killed. 5 non-operational Amiot 351s were destroyed at Le Bourget and 5 D.520s of the naval aviation at Orly totalling 16 AC destroyed on the ground (none at Villacoublay, as you can see : zero aircraft destroyed by boms at Villa on 3 June). Damage to railways, factories etc. was insignificant.

And now back to the tax office. Sorry. HELP!