1957 Defense White Paper
The 1957 Defense White Paper (Cmnd. 124, Command Paper 124) was a white paper created in March 1957 to set out the future direction of the British armed forces. Officially titled Defense: Outline of Future Policy , the paper had a profound impact on all aspects of national defense, but especially on the UK aviation industry well beyond the 1960s. The paper was created and presented on April 4, 1957 by the recently appointed Secretary of Defense, Duncan Sandys .
Two factors were mainly responsible for the decisions outlined: the country's financial situation and the approaching missile age. Until then, aerial battles between high-flying bombers equipped with nuclear weapons and fast interceptors were seen as decisive, but now guided missiles, especially surface-to-air missiles, generally came to the fore as a threat to aircraft. It was also foreseeable that missiles could carry nuclear weapons to any point in the world.
content
The total of 68 paragraphs of the White Paper are individually numbered, with several paragraphs having a common title.
| heels | Original section title | central message |
|---|---|---|
| 1 and 2 | without | General Introduction |
| 3 and 4 | Scientific Advances | Sandys discusses the scientific progress of the last few years. After that, the missile weapon has reached such a stage of development that a realignment of defense can and must take place. |
| 5 and 6 | Demands on Economic Resources | The paragraphs deal with the UK's defense burden, which was 10% of gross domestic product |
| 7 and 8 | Britain's Responsibilities | Britain's responsibilities in association with the Allied States and for its colonies. A long-term alignment of the defense is therefore necessary. |
| 9 and 10 | Collective Defense | A defense of Great Britain is only possible in an alliance. In the western network, however, the country would take on a disproportionate share of the burdens. |
| 11 to 15 | Nuclear Deterrent | Nuclear deterrence: Paragraph 15 refers for the first time in the paper to air defense. The intention is therefore to supplement or replace the V-class bombers with medium-range ballistic missiles. |
| 16 and 17 | Defense of the Deterrent | Defense of deterrence: According to paragraph 16, a number of manned fighter planes should be kept available to protect the bomber airfields and equipped with guided air-to-air missiles. In due course, the fighters are to be replaced by surface-to-air missiles. |
| 18 and 19 | Civil Defense | Civil protection is necessary as it cannot be ruled out that nuclear deterrence will fail. |
| 20 to 24 | Europe and Atlantic | Europe and Atlantic: In paragraph 21, the UK's contribution within NATO is viewed as too high and should be reduced. 22: The strength of the Rhine Army is to be reduced from 77,000 to 64,000. 23: The Second Tactical Air Force in Germany is to shrink to half of its current strength by March 1958. The number of light bombers in the UK should also be halved, but these armed forces should be equipped with atomic bombs. 24: The naval forces are also to be reduced. |
| 25 to 28 | Middle East | Middle East |
| 29 to 32 | Far East | far East |
| 33 and 34 | Overseas Garrisons | Bases abroad |
| 35 to 37 | Central Reserve | The central army reserve in the UK must have a high degree of mobility, which in an emergency must be increased by civil aircraft and ships. |
| 38 to 40 | Sea power | Sea power: Aircraft carriers are becoming more important. Other ships are being reduced and equipped with guided weapons. |
| 41 to 51 | Man Power and Recruitment | Crew strength and recruitment: The total strength of the armed forces is to be reduced from 700,000 men to around half by 1962. |
| 52 to 55 | Reserve Forces | The Royal Auxiliary Air Force and Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve is disbanded. The reserve forces of the Navy and Air Force will remain as such, but will be reduced in scope. |
| 56 to 58 | Expenditure | Expenditures: Defense expenditures amounted to £ 1,600 million in 1956/57, but are to be reduced to £ 1,420 million in 1957/58 by means of various savings measures. |
| 59 | Research and Development | Research and development: no text available |
| 60 to 61 | Commonwealth Co-operation | The development of guided missiles in Woomera is cited as an example of the good previous Commonwealth cooperation . |
| 62 to 64 | Switch of Resources | There will be large numbers of displaced armed forces who are to be deployed elsewhere. |
| 65 to 67 | Conclusion | Conclusion: The fleet should be equipped with modern ships. The army is to receive artillery with nuclear shells and high strategic mobility. The Air Force receives atomic bombs in the megaton range from British production. In addition, a missile system for air defense is to be developed and ballistic missiles are to be introduced to complement the V-bomber fleet. |
Effects
Reorganization of the aviation industry
As a result of the specifications of the paper, the reorganization of the aircraft manufacturing industry was laid down in such a way that several smaller companies were to merge into one large company. State contracts were only to be awarded to these company alliances, whereby in the aircraft sector only the BAC TSR-2 was excluded as the only potential new project to be commissioned.
Under this pressure, English Electric , Bristol Airplane Company and Vickers-Armstrong merged in 1960 to form the British Aircraft Corporation or BAC. Hunting Aircraft joined a short time later. In the same year, de Havilland , Blackburn Aircraft and Folland finally became Hawker Siddeley , which was formed in 1935 as a merger of Armstrong Whitworth , Avro , Gloster and Hawker .
Thereafter, with Handley Page and the smaller companies Auster , Boulton Paul , Miles Aircraft , Scottish Aviation and Short Brothers , only a few independent companies remained. In the 1970s, however, these were also dissolved and only Scottish Aviation remained, which merged with British Aerospace in 1977 , and Shorts, which was bought by Bombardier in 1989 .
Engine manufacturers were also asked to merge. In 1959, Armstrong Siddeley and the Bristol engine division merged to form Bristol Siddeley . The latter company was bought by Rolls-Royce in 1966 , which remained the only major manufacturer in this sector.
Cancellation of manned aircraft projects
The public reception of the paper was such that it was assumed that Sandys saw Britain's future defenses secured by surface-to-air missiles alone. In fact, with one exception ( English Electric Lightning ), all ongoing projects for the procurement of manned aircraft were canceled. The discontinued projects included the supersonic interceptors, which were to be used against high-flying bombers. The calls for tenders F.155 and the Saunders-Roe SR.53 and Saunders-Roe SR.177 fighter planes planned for the transition period up to the introduction of the F.155 in 1963 were affected . The light supersonic bomber Avro 730 was also deleted, as was the Blue Rosette nuclear weapon intended for it. Contrary to expectations, the development of the surface-to-air missile Blue Envoy was also discontinued, although its use could apparently have been carried out in accordance with the paper. The English Electric P.1 was left out because it was already in an advanced stage of development towards the Lightning. The Royal Auxiliary Air Force was dissolved, as was the aviation division of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve .
Restructuring of the British Army
The British Army was reduced in size and restructured. This went hand in hand with a changeover from previous service in the National Service , a conscript army , to a volunteer army, carried out in two stages in 1959 and 1962 . 51 larger and a large number of smaller units were disbanded, after which the army still had a staff of 165,000 officers and men. The Royal Artillery lost 18 large and many smaller units; the Royal Horse Artillery was cut to three regiments. Regiments of the infantry were regrouped into brigades.
Web links
- pdf-file of the original document with the full text of the white paper (accessed December 26, 2015)
- "The Defense Statement", Flight, April 12, 1957, p. 464 online (accessed January 9, 2016)
- "The H Bomber will always get through" on airminded.org (accessed January 9, 2016)
- Statement by UK Representatives on February 14, 1957 in the North Atlantic Council (accessed January 9, 2016)