大象传媒

Written on behalf of Lesley Baker by Crawley Library.

In 1942, Lord Mountbatten decided that the Royal Airforce should have it鈥檚 own commando units. This met with some opposition from the RAF but eventually in 1942, it was decided to form 15 separate units each comprising approximately 150 personnel. The requirement was basically for skilled technical personnel, mainly from fighter command, who would be willing to train at an appropriate commando school for operating with squadrons who would be supporting invasion forces. The training was done in Scotland at Inverrary and after completion of the commando training these units were dispatched to various theatres of war. The first being with the invasion of North Africa. This took place in December 1942, and there were three commando units involved, each of which landed with the invading forces and thereafter serviced aircraft at fowarrd aerodromes and came under the command of the First Army. These units were used throughout the campaign in Tunisia and eventually they were transferred to join the invading forces going into Sicily.
After the Carmal 5 campaign these units were engaged on the mainland of Italy and landed at Salerno in September 1943. This was a very dangerous Bridgehead and the units involved were able to service fighter and other aircraft from small airfields in the locality. The invasion of Italy at Salerno was a particularly dangerous operation and for some ten days or more all units in this area were being shelled and dive-bombed and there were many casualties. Subsequently the area of the Bridgehead increased and we were released onto dealing with aircraft on larger airstrips.
This kind of operation was carried out by other RAF units in various Theatres of War. It wasn鈥檛 until many years afterwards that these units were granted permission for their own standard. They do have their own service association which meets once a year for a reunion. It is hoped that they are now recognised as a very useful arm of the RAF.

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