Apparently the high casualty levels affected Wallis quite deeply. That's given as one of the reasons why he was so dead set against the Miles M.52 and lobbied against it, partly he wasn't convinced about whether it would work and in large part due his fears over the life of the pilots. Just one of several factors that turned the whole affair into a complete disaster.Because there were serious casualties on the initial try, with surprise.
So standard bombing then not anything fancy? Makes a certain amount of sense, if the crews are going to be going out bombing targets anyway and you've already spent the lives of 617 Squadron you might as well keep hitting them to get maximum benefits.IIRC, Wallis wanted to disrupt the repair work.
So standard bombing then not anything fancy? Makes a certain amount of sense, if the crews are going to be going out bombing targets anyway and you've already spent the lives of 617 Squadron you might as well keep hitting them to get maximum benefits.
This criticism could be applied to a very large part of Bomber Command missions Riain; factories were often repaired and operational within days of bombings when, had a follow-up raid been conducted, they could have been rendered out of service for months if not indefinitely.
"Nonsense, those were German bombers, different thing completely..."Something you'd have thought that the experiences of the Battle of Britain might have taught him wasn't true...
As I understand the objection, it wasn't intended to be a specialist mission, but more of a "regular" one, & would have bombed the dams under repair. This would actually have been very beneficial, since it would have absorbed the manpower & material to repair them, and left the dams incomplete & not providing power.Dathi THorfinnsson said:Because there were serious casualties on the initial try, with surprise. The Germans surely defended their dams better thereafter. Also, that particular manoeuver requires the dam be full, or close, or there won't be the water pressure to help the bomb kill the dam. The Germans might even have built the replacements stronger, I don't know.
A rerun might be close to a suicide mission. IMO.