Challenge: Victor = B-52

Your challenge is to have the Handley Page Victor remain in service with the RAF to the present, albeit upgraded continually like the B-52 has been by the USAF.

People who really want to "win" the challenge will detail its combat service since it entered service (Falklands? Desert Storm? Afghanistan? Iraq Round 2?), as well as its current mission capabilities.
 
I have been looking at it but its very tough to do so in a front line role. I am working on a UK doesn't go to Polaris line but that I think in the long term that just means a larger Avro Vulcan run and not the Victor. I can think up something where the Victor stays in the front line roll longer... but the Vulcan is going to shove it out sooner or later.

Michael
 
Your challenge is to have the Handley Page Victor remain in service with the RAF to the present, albeit upgraded continually like the B-52 has been by the USAF.

People who really want to "win" the challenge will detail its combat service since it entered service (Falklands? Desert Storm? Afghanistan? Iraq Round 2?), as well as its current mission capabilities.
Didn't the Victor hang around in the tanker role after the Falklands?
So it really it isn't all that hard a challange.

Of cause if you want to keep it as a bomber that's more difficult.
 
I have been looking at it but its very tough to do so in a front line role. I am working on a UK doesn't go to Polaris line but that I think in the long term that just means a larger Avro Vulcan run and not the Victor. I can think up something where the Victor stays in the front line roll longer... but the Vulcan is going to shove it out sooner or later.

Michael

Didn't the Victor hang around in the tanker role after the Falklands?
So it really it isn't all that hard a challange.

Of cause if you want to keep it as a bomber that's more difficult.

Yes, I want it to remain a bomber.

Why would the Vulcan shove it out of the way, just out of curiosity?

And what could kill the Vulcan? ;)
 
My idea:

Post World War II the US and USSR ended up on opposite sides of the Cold War, and while the nations of Western Europe, fearing American hegemony and Soviet Power, worked together to build a capable military force. They decided to divide up the various responsiblities. Each nation kept a useful-size force of all types (air, ground, naval) but the nations divded the work, and all the best weapons of the European forces went to everyone.

Britain took on the challenge of the Air Forces. As such, Britain and its empire took on and kept developing the best air force in the world, one that many considered to be an equal of the USAF or Soviet Air Force. The majority of British military development money went towards the RAF, and as such the RAF developed one after another of the best in the world, and Britain in many cases not only sold to their European allies but also to their friends in the world and the remaining parts of the empire.

The V bombers were the centerpiece of the nuclear-armed air forces of Britain, in the heavy bombing role. The V bombers, along with the TSR.2 ultra-high-speed bomber and the highly versatile Avro Arrow providing the backbone of the RAF. The V bombers once Britain went to missiles to use nuclear weapons stayed in service as heavy conventional bombers.

The Hadley Page Victor was the most unorthdox of the designs, but also one of the strongest. The Victor, which was also supplied to more than a dozen other nations (including, interestingly, the USA). Along with the English Electric Canberra and the Boeing B-52, the Victor would be a staple of many airforces around the world, and would see service in numerous wars.

In the RAF, after the removal of their nuclear deterrent, the Victor and its brothers, the Avro Vulcan and Vickers Valiant, would be assigned to conventional bombing duties. In the 1970s, the Victor would see service in wars in Indonesia, India/Pakistan, Rhodesia, South Africa, Kenya and Vietnam. None of these were for the RAF however. The Valiant was retired in the early 1970s, leaving the Vulcan and Victor to have the bomber roles for the RAF.

Their baptism of fire came in the Falkland Islands in 1982. Argentina's March 1982 invasion was responded to by Britain, and the Victor and Vulcan led the way in doing so. Launching from Britain and tanking several times, the bombers managed to hit both the Falklands and mainland Argentina. In an act that caused huge outrage, Argentine intelligence agents on May 25, 1982, bombed a department store in London, killing 27. The Argentines had figured attacking Britain itself would make the Brits back off.

That turned out to be a big mistake.

After 5/25, Thatcher went ballistic and Britain lined up behind her. The Victor and Vulcan would lead Britain's air campaign against the Falklands, dropping thousands of tons of bombs on Argentina and the captive islands. Britain all but eliminated the problem of air attack responses when HMS Invincible found sank Argentina's carrier, the Veintincinco de Mayo, on June 18. The Falklands War proved to be a massive loss for Argentina, culminating in Britain using air to ground missiles mounted on Avro Arrow Mk.2 fighters to demolish the Argentine Junta on July 20, 1982. The Argentines surrended on July 25, two months after the attack in London.

After the Falklands War, when combined with President Reagan's insistence on much increased defense spending in the USA, led to a massive rebuild of the RAF. The long-delayed Avro CF-180 "Destroyer" fighter went into service, and the Avro Vulcan went into service as the chief bomber of the RAF for a while. But the Victor, with its heavier payload, stayed as the RAF's primary "bombtruck" well into the 21st century.
 
Yes, I want it to remain a bomber.

Why would the Vulcan shove it out of the way, just out of curiosity?

And what could kill the Vulcan? ;)

The Vulcan had 3 times the range and nearly the same speed. The edge that the Victor had was a 2/3 again larger bomb load, 21,000 lbs vs. 35,000 lbs. Also if the UK goes with some version of an air launched missile in place of SSBN's the Vulcan designed could be expanded to support up to 6, while I don't think they could mount any on the Victor.

In short the Victor was short ranged and couldn't carry out a long range strike role for nuclear defence in the age of SAMs.

Michael
 
The main problems with the Victor were it's lack of ground clearence for blue steel and more importantly skybolt, underpowered engines and too much wing flex for low level ops. Otherwise it was better than the Vulcan, but in the early 60s these were the things which doomed it. IOTL the wing flex was solved in tankers by clipping their tips. The conway turbofan eventually made 22,000lbs of thrust instead of the 17,000 which was the most the Victor got. The Victor was so aerodynamically clean that with afterburning it could go supersonic, so perhaps giving these 22,000lb conways afterburners would be possible as well.

That leaves the weapons problem, lack of ground clearence for skybolt and lack of role with Polaris. That would be surmounted with the turbojet powered blue steel mk2.
 
One thing which may se the Victor lasting longer than the Vulcan is if the Victor used podded underwing engines and was thus easier to re-engine with the later high bypass ratio turbofans in the same way as propsoed every now and again for the B52.

There was a Handley Page design that had this engine mounting on what looks very much like a Victor fuselage.
 
It probably has less to do with the aircraft itself than the politics at the time. British govts declared manned aircraft obsolete at the time, as well as forcing Brit areospace companies to merge and only buying from those who did. Niether of these things helped HP. So perhaps a victory at Suez could be the POD. This might make the 1957 Defence White Paper different enough not to declare manned aircraft obsolete and not to force a rationalisation of the Brit aircraft industry.

Also an early combat mission or 2 which could show up the advantages of the Victor would be a feather in it's cap. So perhaps some recon and bombing missions against Indonesian forces in 1963 flying from small Indian Ocean island bases.
 

CalBear

Moderator
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There is also the very low fleet size (under 100, including the dedicated tankers) to go with short legs, low bombload, and general lack of need.

The B-52 became what it is, in many ways, simply because there were so damned many of them (750+) and the U.S. was in enough wars that they weren't needed for strategic roles, but they were in such great numbers the USAF couldn't afford not to use them. The BUFF also has six time the unrefueled range (9,000 miles), at least double the bombload (60,000 LB with enough overengineering and underwing space to carry an additional 30,000 LB). Even today, with all the operational losses, SALT, START, and the rest, there are more operational Stratoforts in service that the total Victors ever built.

Given the huge cost of operating strategic bombers, and the overall lack of need, it is also difficult to see many countries beyond the nuclear powers that would even consider operating heavy bombers, which are really only needed if you are planning on attacking someone on the other side of the Planet.
 
There was a Handley Page design that had this engine mounting on what looks very much like a Victor fuselage.

It was the HP.99 - HP's response to Specification B.126T and OR.324 for a high speed low-altitude bomber.
 
It probably has less to do with the aircraft itself than the politics at the time. British govts declared manned aircraft obsolete at the time, as well as forcing Brit areospace companies to merge and only buying from those who did. Niether of these things helped HP.

Handley Page being one of the two major aircraft manufacturers that didn't end up getting merged, the other was Shorts but as this was government owned and in an area of high unemployment it had an advantage over HP otherwise it would have gone the way of HP, ignored when contracts were placed.
 
IIRC it was the Victor's weakness (vs the Vulcan) in the low level penetration role that drove its conversion into an air-to-air refueling tanker (the Vulcan's delta wing is much stronger and could cope better with the low level buffeting). So, if they'd been kept as bombers they would all have had to be retired (or totally rebuilt I suppose) by now.

The Vulcan however could easily still be in service as a 'bomb truck' in low threat environments IMO.
 
We have to compare apples to apples here, and the Victor isn't comparable to the B52, Bear or Bison. It's a theatre bomber in the vein of the Badger, B47 and Blinder, and in that company it's range and bombload are more than adequate. Bases in Britain and elsewhere gave these theatre bombers nuclear coverage of the entire European part of Russia, I don't think they needed much else.

CalBear's comment about fleet size is important, I think only about 85 Victors were made but about 30 were cancelled during the time the line was open. In contrast about 130 Vulcans were built. Those extra planes could have made all the difference, as could the development of the Blue Steel Mk2. So if the role was there and the fleet was bigger the Victor's latent advantages over the Vulcan could have been developed and it would be the one bombing the Falklands and perhaps even in Desert Storm.
 
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