Peter ? Air Force snipers????

[breakeyp]

Peter I was reading with interest your comments regarding Scout/Observer's telescopes. Am I misreading your comments that seem to indicate that the Air Force had sniper rifles on issue? Or is it just that they had the telescopes? I am having trouble seeing air force personnel with sniper rifles===air field protection yes but snipers?

[jmoore]

British SAS aren't AF, never mind me, nothing to see here, move along....

[Thunderbox]

Possibly the RAF Regiment, rather than the actual fly-boys. The Rock Apes have snipers today, but I'm not sure this specialisation existed before the 1980s/90s.

[Peter Laidler]

Yes, the RAF Regiment did have snipers but quite how they fitted into the order of battle has always been quite beyond me. They regularly used to come onto the sniper courses here at Warminster into the late 80's and would bring with them their No4T's when the rest of the regular Army and Territorials were using L42's.

Capt CHristopher Shore, author of With British Snipers into the Reich was an RAF regiment Officer who was i/c their snipers. Yes......, RAF regiment snipers ......... Sounds strange to me - but they did exist! Don't see them now though. They wouldn't be able to fathom out the new S&B telescopes!

[breakeyp]

Thank you Peter! I now will be having strange dreams of air crews carrying cases of bomb sights and No.4 Mk1(T)s to their Halifax bombers for a run over the fourth reich. Deflection shots with a No.4 from a Defiant would be quite a challenge. I agree that a TO&E chart for RAF ground security would be most interesting. I shudder to think of what they did with the bayonet. best, p.

[Badger]

Thank you Peter! I now will be having strange dreams of air crews carrying cases of bomb sights and No.4 Mk1(T)s to their Halifax bombers for a run over the fourth reich. Deflection shots with a No.4 from a Defiant would be quite a challenge. I agree that a TO&E chart for RAF ground security would be most interesting. I shudder to think of what they did with the bayonet. best, p.

:rofl:

Regards,
Badger

[Terry Hawker]

Dad was a bomb aimer on a Halifax with my Uncle Tim the pilot, and, as they didn't even carry pistols, ("Wot's the point, if you went down they wouldn't be looking for you with pistols... pistols would only get you shot!"). A transit chest for a No.4 (T) on their "kite" would have been a very strange sight indeed!

[BIG D]

Yes they do have snipers today and with all the latest kit, they do their job and do it well, we have a Regiment squadron on our Airbase and they have spent many a long tour in the latest hotspots and you can rely upon them,
their roles are also exspanding.

BIG D

[breakeyp]

Yes they do have snipers today and with all the latest kit, they do their job and do it well, we have a Regiment squadron on our Airbase and they have spent many a long tour in the latest hotspots and you can rely upon them,
their roles are also exspanding.

BIG D

Wow! Bless them and their endeavors. It guess it fits, the US Army at one time and maybe today has the second largest air fleet and during WWII had more ships than the Navy and had their own railroad equipment. What next, the Submarine service fielding jet fighters!

[crunch]

This M113 is used by USAF Security Police, to patrol a prison camp at Camp Bucca, Iraq.

The boxes on the front and side contain Claymore mines that can be detonated from inside.

I guess that would be the antithesis of sniping!

http://i178.photobucket.com/albums/w274/crunch1000/800px-USAF_M113_APC_at_Camp_Bucca_I.jpg

[Surpmil]

Capt. C. Shore, RAF Regiment: "With British Snipers to the Reich".

[Thunderbox]

Capt. C. Shore, RAF Regiment: "With British Snipers to the Reich".

Have you found a reference which actually confirms C Shore's regiment? I ask, because in his book he is very careful to obscure which unit he is actually commissioned into. Most of the narrative seems to indicate that he is actually in the Army, rather than the RAF - use of Army ranks & terminology, etc. Because he spends most of his service attached to various other units & schools, the RAF references tend to be of third parties.

The main photo of him - on page 135 of the version I have - shows him wearing the uniform & Tam O'shanter of a Scottish battalion. He does include a photo of the "first RAF Regiment sniper course" at Sylt between Dec 45 and Jan 46 - but he is again wearing the same Scottish headgear. I'm not sure the RAF or RAF Regiment have ever worn "regional" uniforms.

Reading his book with a military eye, it looks like he was in the RAF (but not the RAF Regiment; this only formed in 1942, and Shore appears to have been in service since 1939) up to the rank of corporal, then transferred via officer school into an Army unit.

[Peter Laidler]

It's most common to wear the hat of the units that you happen to be attached to. For example, Corps troops attached to the Guards wear their kakhi colourse beret and those attached to the Jocks wear the tan-o-shanters too. It's taken a turn for the worse recently because those attached to 16 Para Brigade are now wearing the Paratroopers maroon beret. Wearing the Maroon Beret was FIERCELY protected by real Paratroopers who have done 'P' Company AND passed the course AND been awarded their parachute wings AND were Airborne troops. (Yep, did P Company and the proper full course and got the wings but never went into Airborne forces and therefore never wore the coveted Maroon Beret..... Hence the wings but standard navy/black beret in the Sten gun book since you ask!) Alas, even those not even parachute trained now wear the maroon beret. Where were we........? Yes..., wearing the unit beret/hat was always acceptable.

Capt Shore does half indicate that he was RAF Regiment in the book but it was confirmed to me by Major McCaw who ran the sniping school at Bisley that he was RAF. He is believed to feature in a photo of sniping school personnel as wearing the usual combat stuff of the time but just visible in the cap is an RAF badge. Incidentally, the RAF badge could easily be mistaken for the Lovat Scouts badge too...., so don't be mislead.

Where were we? Ah, yes..., RAF snipers. And yes, made a phone call and they do attend the current sniper courses and are employed in 'hot climes'. They usually 'ply their trade' with and alongside Army snipers.

[Surpmil]

Capt. Shore was a great admirer of the Lovat Scouts from his comments in the book and no doubt considered it an honour to wear their headdress, if he could.

[duggaboy]

love those clays, especially when I planted them. CLICK CLACK anyone?

[Thunderbox]

As an all-arms-P-Company maroon beret & wings wearing individual I did once have to save some "hats" from an airborne lynch mob, when the new Brigade Commander gave the order for all Brigade personnel (including - gasp! - women!) to wear the maroon beret..... The outraged toms were slightly mollified when the attached Royal Marines personnel also had to dump their cabbage hats and wear maroon. In para logic, this grouped the RM along with the women and remfs.... Cue a few massive punch-ups on the next "purple" exercise... :D

C Shore's status is confusing - I'm sure all wartime RAF Regiment personnel continued to wear RAF headgear, even when they were "attached arms". The ranks he uses - including his own, of course - are Army. Today's Rock Apes use RAF ranks, e.g. Flight Lieutenant instead of Captain. As far as I am aware, this was also true during WW2.