Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Strategic Air Command in the United Kingdom

Article promoted by Gog the Mild (talk) via MilHistBot (talk) 21:20, 4 November 2020 (UTC) &laquo; Return to A-Class review list

Strategic Air Command in the United Kingdom
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 * Nominator(s): 

I am nominating this article for A-Class review because... I am not sure what to do with it. Originally this article was mainly about nose art and tail markings. I overhauled the article, but it was ineligible for DYK. Hawkeye7  (discuss)  03:15, 16 August 2020 (UTC) No copyright or layout issues (t &#183; c)  buidhe  00:03, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Image review—pass

Support by Nick-D
Great topic for an article! I have the following comments:
 * I came to it from Nuclear weapons and the United Kingdom.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  02:56, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Nick-D (talk) 10:49, 22 August 2020 (UTC) Support My comments are now addressed. For FA, I'd suggest adding a para or section at the end noting that USAF strategic bomber deployments to the UK have continued after SAC's disbandment/re-designation (from memory, this has included further B-52 combat sorties and the establishment of facilities in the UK to allow B-2s to operate from USAF airfields there. I think that there's still a huge USAF munitions storage facility in the UK which is geared towards strategic bombers as well. Nick-D (talk) 05:14, 30 August 2020 (UTC)
 * I'd suggest adding a para in the Early Cold War Tensions discussing the huge USAAF infrastructure and bomber force in the UK during World War II, as well as the close relationship between the RAF and USAAF developed during the war.
 * ✅ Added a new first paragraph.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  02:56, 23 August 2020 (UTC)
 * "No B-29 operations were conducted from the UK during the war" - not sure if it's worth mentioning, but a single B-29 did visit in 1944 to confirm whether the type could operate from airfields in the UK and as part of an unsuccessful attempt to convince the Japanese that the B-29s would be used against Germany not Japan.
 * ✅ Added a couple of sentences about this.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
 * This section doesn't seem to discuss the consideration of operating B-29s against Germany and modification of some airfields to accommodate them during the war noted in the lead
 * ✅ It says "there were three bases in the UK that met these requirements: RAF Lakenheath, RAF Marham and RAF Sculthorpe, which had been extended to a width of 200 ft and length of 8000 ft when there were still plans to use B-29s against Germany". Added a little bit more about these plans.
 * " Shell-Mex gave the USAF access to 30,000,000 litres (250,000 US bbl) of aviation spirit, enabling tankers at sea to divert to Bremen to supply the airlift" - this is a bit unclear
 * ✅ Tried to clarify.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
 * "On 23 July, four B-29s" - the year here is unclear. Also, do we know why the British soldiers decided to damage the B-29s? Was this driven by ideology, or were they disgruntled national servicemen?
 * ✅ 1950. Officially, they were disgruntled servicemen. But Young notes that there is a strong sense that the matter was swept under the rug.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Was the SAC force in the UK in the 1940s and 50s and/or their training and war plans integrated with RAF Bomber Command? (which remained a pretty formidable force)
 * ✅ Yes. Added a section about this.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  02:56, 23 August 2020 (UTC)
 * "to permit operations in the scorching heat of the English summer" - hmm. I'd suggest either deleting "scorching heat", or tweaking to something less cynical.
 * ✅ Deleted "scorching".  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Did the SAC tankers in the UK have a role in US nuclear war plans (for instance, to refuel bombers headed from the US to the Soviet Union), or were they there to support tactical operations in Europe?
 * ✅ SAC tankers were purely to support SAC.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
 * "The British government was troubled by the 1956 U-2 incident, but clung to the cover story that they were for weather surveillance" - did the British Government know what the true purpose of the U-2s was? It's not clear from this wording.
 * ✅ Yes, it was aware. Added this.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Is the 'Emblem gallery' section needed? I'm not sure what value it adds.
 * ✅ Me neither. Deleted.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:51, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

Comments Support from Hog Farm
Looks interesting, I'll give it a look. Based on length and being generally busy, it might take me a few days to get all the way through this one. Hog Farm Bacon 20:00, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
 * You don't have to review the whole thing; you can look at just part of it. I normally recommend looking at the bottom half, as most reviewers start at the top. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  20:59, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm too Type A/OCD to not review a whole article, so you'll be getting the whole review. In all honesty, I should be able to get through this in less than 24 hours, I just gave the longer span as a disclaimer.


 * Lead
 * "The bases were initially manned by the RAF, were handed over to the USAF in 1951" - You've actually never introduced the United States Air Force before this point in the lead, so go ahead and gloss and link the full name here.
 * ✅ Added. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * " and the deport at RAF Burtonwood " - Is deport a typo for depot?
 * ✅ Typo. Corrected. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Link North Sea? I consider myself to be a fairly well-educated Midwesterner, and I barely know where the North Sea is.
 * ✅ Linked. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Early Cold War Tensions
 * Since this is a rather long article, I'm not going to harp about most duplinks, as they're split up enough they're conceivably helpful. However, linking the Soviet Union and the USAAF twice in the first two paragraphs of this section is a touch excessive.
 * ✅ Cleaned up.
 * " Since there was insufficient clearance for a Fat man under a B-29" - Capitalization here.
 * ✅ capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * "although a lone YB-29, Hobo Queen (41-36963) - Is there a way to gloss the type of plane the Hobo Queen was? I had to Google this.
 * ✅ Linked YB-29. The "Y" means "prototype" (presumably because the letters P, R, O and T were already taken.) Hobo Queen was the only one to deploy though.
 * "ten aircraft of the 340th Bombardment Squadron ," - Extra space before the comma
 * ✅ Removed. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Base development
 * Link North Sea
 * Already linked (sea above)


 * Nuclear weapons
 * " that personnel carry side arms in case of sabotage" - I've always seen this spelled as one word. Is the two-word form a British English concept?
 * ✅ Spelt as one word. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Be consistent with Communists vs communists
 * ✅ capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

More to come. Hog Farm Bacon 23:49, 24 September 2020 (UTC)


 * B-36 deployments
 * Link Texas
 * ✅ Linked. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  04:18, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * "Another six B-36Ds had set out from Carswell Air Force Base in Texas but has been forced to return due to bad weather" - Weird tense switch here
 * ✅ Typo. D is next to S on the keyboard. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  04:18, 25 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Reconnaissance deployments
 * "The first deployment was 8 RB-47s from the 3 squadrons of the" - MOS:NUMERALS on 8 and 3
 * ✅ Corrected. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  04:18, 25 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Cooperation with the RAF
 * "under Project E. when Air Chief Marshal Sir" - Capitalize the start of the sentence at When
 * ✅ Capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  04:18, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * " Mills argued that in view of the thermonuclear weapons could cause in the UK, " - This doesn't read right to me
 * ✅ Word missing. Corrected. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  04:18, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * "who had succeeded Le may" - Le May
 * ✅ Capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  04:18, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Through that section. Gonna take a pause here for the night. I'll get the rest of it tomorrow. Hog Farm Bacon 01:51, 25 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Thor missile deployments
 * "provided technical support to the RAF Thor squadrons" - sentence fragment
 * ✅ Replaced full stop with comma. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:36, 25 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Refuelling operations
 * "It relocated to RAF Mildenhgall on 1 July 1978," - spelling
 * ✅ Corrected. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:36, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * "US Navy aircraft carriers USS America " - Three links in a row, MOS:SEAOFBLUE
 * ✅ Tweaked wording. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:36, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

That's it from me. Good work on this. Hog Farm Bacon 14:20, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
 * U-2 deployments
 * CIA Detachment A is all three words capitalized, but CIA detachment G only has two. I feel like they should have the same capitalization procedures
 * ✅ Capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:36, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Source review - pass
I'll take a look at this soon. Hog Farm Bacon 16:14, 6 October 2020 (UTC) All sources reliable with the possible exception of Wooldridge. A handful of formatting things above. No source checks done. Hog Farm Bacon 19:51, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Add a publishing location for Boyes
 * ✅ Added location. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Clark & Angell - Be consistent with the use of title case, so capitalize diplomacy
 * ✅ Capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * worldcat suggests that Duke 1985 has an OCLC
 * ✅ Added. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * WP:SCHOLARSHIP says Masters dissertations and theses are considered reliable only if they can be shown to have had significant scholarly influence. Does Wooldridge have this sort of influence?
 * ✅ Switched source. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Capitalize Documentary and History in the Wynn citation
 * ✅ Capitalised. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * worldcat gives an OCLC for Wooldridge
 * ✅ Added. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)


 * All issues addressed. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  21:22, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

Comments from Harry
As usual, Hawkeye, this is top-notch. I'm trying really, really hard to pick up bits to criticise, if only to show that I've read it and this isn't a drive-by support! The only real criticism I have is that the article wanders away from the core subject in a few places, which may be allowable for a short article on a narrow subject but large articles on big subjects need to stay focused or they end up sprawling. —HJ Mitchell &#124; Penny for your thoughts? 20:53, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * As a Midlander myself, I was surprised to see Brize Norton et al described as being in the Midlands. Those bases are all in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire, which are usually considered to be southern England.
 * ✅ Corrected. It was probably referred to as such in one of the sources. (In my Master's thesis I referred to a place in southern England as "Perham Downs"; it is referred to as such in the official history, the war diaries, and letters from John Monash and my own uncle. Imagine my surprise after it became available on the internet to receive an email from one of the locals saying that his town was actually called "Perham Down".) Are all the bases in the correct locations? I had a lot of trouble with the map. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Sir Arthur Henderson, announced that the two groups were in the UK on temporary duty, and noted that: What prompted him to make such a statement? And was it a statement to the press or to the House of Commons?
 * ✅ Hmm. The book sources the quote to "HC debs 454 col 123 (written answers 28 July 1948". So it was to the House of Commons. I have a added a few more details. Since it was a government back bencher, I presume the question was Dorothy Dix.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I notice you have a couple of red links for USAF colonels. There's nothing wrong with red links but have you determined that these officers are notable enough to sustain an article should somebody write one?
 * Both were subsequently promoted to major general, and have entries on the USAF web site
 * Tanker is probably an unnecessary link, ditto sidearm
 * ✅ Unlinked. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * familiar problems of different terminology and work practices familiar from where, and can we have an example if you can fit it in concisely?
 * Not sure... Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅ Removed sentence. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  19:22, 4 November 2020 (UTC)
 * personnel carry sidearms in case of sabotage Was this on-base only? And how standard was this for US personnel in (relative) peacetime? Noting of course that this is about 40 years before the UK's blanket handgun ban, though we've always been more restrictive of firearms than our cousins.
 * ✅ It wasn't normal for peacetime deployments, hence the order. Source doesn't say whether it was on the base only. Changed to "be equipped with". Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Soon after, Steed himself was put out of action "soon after" begs the question, and I wonder how relevant the whole sentence is to the article. It seems like a tangent seeing as the narrative picks up where it left off afterwards.
 * ✅ In July. I thought it was a noteworthy incident. Deleted. 22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * General Lauris Norstad, the Commander in Chief of United States Air Forces in Europe (USAFE). The USAF Director of Plans and Operations, Major General Samuel E. Anderson, proposed that a new air division be created within SAC to control the deployments. This proposal was accepted by the Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force, General Hoyt Vandenberg, That's a lot of ranks, names, and positions in quick succession which rather hampers readability. Can we trim it a little bit? Perhaps right down to "a new air division was created"? At 9,000 words I think we can afford to sacrifice a little detail for readability.
 * ✅ Trimmed this. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * the Douglas C-124 Globemaster II aircraft carrying Cullen, his staff, and personnel of the 509th Bombardment Group to the UK caught fire and was forced to ditch into the Atlantic. There were no survivors. Major General Archie J. Old, the designated commander of the 5th Air Division in French Morocco assumed temporary command of the 7th Air Division until Major General John P. McConnell, Johnson's deputy, took over on 24 May, and Old moved on to Morocco Quite a lot of detail on a peripheral subject.
 * It's about the command. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Okay, but do we need the model of the plane and the unit name and the details of the crash? Can we not just say he died in a plane crash (which has its own article)? HJ Mitchell &#124; Penny for your thoughts? 23:41, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅ Since the crash has its own article, I think it is safe to trim this back. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  00:30, 1 November 2020 (UTC)
 * The wing remained returned to the US remained returned??
 * ✅ Deleted "remained". Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * worth £55 million (equivalent to £1.2 billion in 2019) to the British economy.[69] Reflex was terminated at RAF Fairford I'm not sure how the second sentence follows on from the first.
 * ✅ Reorganised this a bit. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * seized control of the US embassy in Tehran and took the staff hostage, demanding the return of the Shah of Iran, who had fled to the United States There's a lot of detail there for an operation whose only relevance is that one of the refuelling tankers took off from the UK.
 * ✅ Trimmed this back. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * aircraft carriers USS America and USS Coral Sea of the US Navy in the Mediterranean Sea  Not really relevant to SAC in the UK
 * ✅ Trimmed this back. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Is there scope for a sentence or two about residual USAF deployments in the UK? Lakenheath and Mildenhall are still USAF bases.
 * Yes, there is still a presence. There's also an article on the United States Air Force in the United Kingdom. The end of SAC just seemed like an appropriate place to stop. What do you think it should say?
 * I'm not sure. I guess the reader could be forgiven for thinking that that was the end of the USAF in the UK if they don't click the "see also" or scroll down to the navbox at the bottom. HJ Mitchell &#124; Penny for your thoughts? 23:41, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅ Added a paragraph that said that. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:00, 1 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Are these changes okay with you? Hawkeye7   (discuss)  19:22, 4 November 2020 (UTC)
 * My apologies. I've been back to this twice with the intention of declaring support but somehow got distracted both times. Yes, I'm happy with the changes and I believe the A class (and FA, assuming you're heading that way) criteria are met. Support. HJ Mitchell &#124; Penny for your thoughts? 20:32, 4 November 2020 (UTC)