ROYAL AIR FORCE (AIRCRAFT SUPPLY, UNITED STATES AND CANADA). (Hansard, 26 April 1938)

Mr. Mender

I desire to call attention to the despatch to the United States of America of the Air Ministry's mission, a matter which has created great interest throughout the country and, indeed, I should imagine, throughout the whole world. I do not want it to be thought that I am opposed to the sending of this mission. I do not think the country has sufficient information on which to make up its mind. It may be a very wise move from a military point of view and a political point of view, but I think it is a matter on which we should have information which will satisfy this House. I desire to see every possible step taken so that the defences of this country shall be up to the necessary standard, but it cannot be denied that there is in the country a great deal of misgiving, doubt and mystification about this mission. There are many people who hold the view, possibly quite wrongly, that it is the result of gross mismanagement at the Air Ministry, and that the present state of affairs is one which ought not to be tolerated any further. As an evidence of this may I quote from a moderate journal, the "Spectator "? Under the heading "Aircraft from Abroad" the "Spectator" says: The Air Ministry's decision to buy, if it can and as soon as it can, very many hundreds of aeroplanes across the Atlantic invites two comments. First, it throws an appaling light on the Ministry's failure during the past three years to organise British aeroplane production on an adequate scale. Remember that by Mr. Baldwin's confession the policy of expansion started two years too late, so that lost time had to be made up. Instead, owing to the Government's refusal to take the tasks of supply away from the fighting departments and its silly self-restriction to the Inskip makeshift, more time has been lost, and Germany's superiority over Great Britain in the air not only has not been removed, but is probably greater now than it ever was. The official statements made on behalf of the Government in 1934 were these. Lord Baldwin said: The National Government would see to it that in air strength and air power this country shall no longer be in a position of inferiority to any country within striking distance of our shores. At a later stage he said: His Majesty's Government are determined in no conditions to accept any position of inferiority with regard to what air force may be raised in Germany in the future. I do not think anyone will pretend that these pledges have as yet been carried 109 out, or that there is anything like parity Let me read some words in the "Empire Review," a paper which is friendly to the Government: The fact stands out that with all our efforts at expansion we are getting into a worse position than when we started. When you get statements of that kind no wonder there is anxiety at the situation and with the apparently desperate efforts which are now being made to cope with it. And this is happening at a time when the foreign policy of the Government, which certainly impinges on our air defences, is decreasing the support which we can get from foreign governments. I am not going into that question, except to point out that their Spanish policy is going to halve, or at any rate enormously reduce, the value of support from France, and that their policy towards Germany is going to 110 strengthen enormously Germany in her extensions in the East, made even more pointed by the events of the week-end and the speech of Herr Henlein in regard to Czechoslovakia, which makes it clear that Germany at all costs is going to drive through and take what she wants. I should have thought that there was an alternative to seeking aircraft in America, and that was to seek the assistance of the loyal Powers in the League of Nations. There are plenty available, but the policy of the Government is set against any assistance of that kind.