RAF Bomber Command was right to ignore Freeman Dyson’s foolish idea - Lancaster bomber of the Royal Air Force, 1942.jpg

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...s-foolish-idea

In your obituary of Freeman Dyson (Theoretical physicist and mathematician with
far-fetched ideas about the future, Journal, 4 March), you note correctly that
Bomber Command “ignored” the 19-year-old Dyson’s proposal, in 1943, to remove
the gun turrets from Lancaster bombers. But it was – like some of Dyson’s later
wheezes, such as powering a spaceship with nuclear bombs, or planting trees on
comets – an unsound notion.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/...dyson-obituary

Dyson claimed that the Lancaster would gain 50mph in cruise speed, but
experience with unarmed Lancasters on the transatlantic mail route showed that
the actual gain was just 15mph-20mph, not enough to stay ahead of German night
fighters. (Dyson may have been misled by the high eastbound ground speeds of the
mail Lancasters, but these were assisted by the prevailing winds. The westbound
flights were slower.)

In addition, Luftwaffe records later showed that half of all night-fighter
interceptions failed because the Royal Air Force gunners saw the fighter coming
and enabled the bomber to evade.

If Dyson’s suggestion had been adopted, the fighters would have doubled their
success rate and destroyed Bomber Command in short order. As it was, Lancaster
losses totalled only 2% from 156,000 sorties and the monthly intake of new
Lancasters and crews was, as a rule, twice the loss rate. In only one month,
January 1944, at the height of the battle of Berlin, did Lancaster losses exceed
production, and then only by five units.

On the other hand, monthly production of the main German night fighter, the
Messerschmitt 110, was below the loss rate as often as not, and the
non-accidental losses were usually due to RAF air gunners. Dyson’s modest
proposal is much cited, but it was foolish, and Bomber Command was right to
dismiss it.

Hugo Barnacle
London



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