Bomber Boys

0:00:02 > 0:00:05Between 1939 and 1945,

0:00:05 > 0:00:10125,000 young men faced the most dangerous task

0:00:10 > 0:00:12of any British serviceman in the war.

0:00:14 > 0:00:18They suffered the highest casualty rates.

0:00:18 > 0:00:21Nearly half of them, 55,000, were killed.

0:00:21 > 0:00:26It looks like hell. And you really think this is going to be it.

0:00:28 > 0:00:34They were the bomber crews, who took on Hitler when airpower was the only way of striking back at Nazi Germany.

0:00:36 > 0:00:41We were involved in total war. We were involved in fighting for our lives.

0:00:41 > 0:00:44I'm Ewan McGregor, and this is my brother, Colin.

0:00:44 > 0:00:48We've always had a fascination with the Royal Air Force during the Second World War.

0:00:48 > 0:00:51Last year we made a documentary about the Battle of Britain.

0:00:51 > 0:00:53But we wanted to know what happened next.

0:00:53 > 0:00:58The few had saved us from invasion, and the RAF was already building a huge force

0:00:58 > 0:01:00that would take the fight over into Germany.

0:01:00 > 0:01:05And that force was Bomber Command, and during my career in the RAF, I, too, was a bomber pilot.

0:01:05 > 0:01:07I flew this supersonic Tornado, unlike my predecessors,

0:01:07 > 0:01:10who flew the legendary Lancaster,

0:01:10 > 0:01:14and I'm going to get the chance to see if I can fly the last remaining Lancaster in Britain.

0:01:16 > 0:01:21The pilot was one of a team of seven who lived, fought and often died together.

0:01:21 > 0:01:26I'm going to explore what it was like to be part of this band of brothers in the air.

0:01:26 > 0:01:31Their story is one of endurance, teamwork and understated heroism.

0:01:31 > 0:01:35No, I'd never flown before. Hadn't even driven a motor car before.

0:01:35 > 0:01:37You'd got a job on.

0:01:37 > 0:01:39And that's what you just did, you just sat there and did it.

0:01:39 > 0:01:44But it's also a story that is dogged by controversy.

0:01:44 > 0:01:45Despite the undoubted heroism,

0:01:45 > 0:01:49the men of Bomber Command found themselves to be ignored after the war.

0:01:49 > 0:01:53The massive attacks on Hamburg and Dresden killed thousands of civilians

0:01:53 > 0:01:56and were judged by many to be unnecessary.

0:01:56 > 0:02:00There was a war on, and we had to win,

0:02:00 > 0:02:04because God knows how it would have turned out if we hadn't have won.

0:02:18 > 0:02:23In 1940, the RAF's fighters repelled invasion in the Battle of Britain.

0:02:24 > 0:02:29But the German Luftwaffe continued to bomb Britain's cities in the Blitz.

0:02:29 > 0:02:32And with the British army defeated at Dunkirk,

0:02:32 > 0:02:35Prime Minster Winston Churchill identified the only way to hit back.

0:02:36 > 0:02:41"Our supreme effort must be to gain overwhelming mastery of the air.

0:02:41 > 0:02:47The fighters are our salvation, but the bombers alone provide us the means of victory."

0:02:50 > 0:02:52Winston Churchill, 1940.

0:02:56 > 0:03:01And one aircraft, more than any other, symbolises that struggle for victory.

0:03:03 > 0:03:08RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire is home to the last flying Lancaster Bomber in Britain.

0:03:10 > 0:03:14It's maintained by the RAF's Battle of Britain Memorial Flight.

0:03:16 > 0:03:19Squadron Leader Ian Smith is its guardian.

0:03:19 > 0:03:22She is one of two airworthy Lancasters in the world.

0:03:22 > 0:03:24There's only two left flying?

0:03:24 > 0:03:26Yeah. And the other one's in Canada.

0:03:26 > 0:03:30- And here she is, in all her glory. - Wow! Absolutely incredible.

0:03:30 > 0:03:33- Isn't she stunning?- Yeah. So many would they have built then?

0:03:33 > 0:03:36- 7,377 Lancasters were built.- Yeah.

0:03:36 > 0:03:39But circa three and a half thousand were shot down over Germany.

0:03:41 > 0:03:45Lancaster was the best aircraft ever during the war.

0:03:45 > 0:03:47It could hold a very big bomb load,

0:03:47 > 0:03:50it could take a lot of punishment,

0:03:50 > 0:03:53and it was a real pleasure to fly.

0:03:53 > 0:03:57Four beautiful Rolls Royce Merlin engines at the age of 22?

0:03:57 > 0:03:59Who wouldn't enjoy that?

0:03:59 > 0:04:02Ah, a fantastic aeroplane, beautiful.

0:04:02 > 0:04:04She was a real lady.

0:04:04 > 0:04:05And like all ladies,

0:04:05 > 0:04:07if you treat them right, they go!

0:04:10 > 0:04:15The Lancaster carried the heaviest bomb load of any bomber in the war.

0:04:15 > 0:04:17It meant there was little space inside.

0:04:18 > 0:04:20Mind your head.

0:04:21 > 0:04:23And what will be transparent straight away is just how,

0:04:23 > 0:04:26despite the fact that it's an enormous aeroplane.

0:04:26 > 0:04:28- Yeah.- Just how little room there is in here.

0:04:28 > 0:04:30Just think, you're just in normal gear here.

0:04:30 > 0:04:32- Imagine you had a flying kit on. - Yeah.

0:04:32 > 0:04:36I can't actually do it with my jeans, cos they are slightly too tight anyway.

0:04:36 > 0:04:39Imagine with a flying jacket on.

0:04:39 > 0:04:41It's all very well doing it in daylight,

0:04:41 > 0:04:45but if this aeroplane was on fire, spinning out of control in the dark,

0:04:45 > 0:04:47it would be a bit of a challenge, wouldn't it?

0:04:47 > 0:04:48Ah, just a bit!

0:04:51 > 0:04:52God!

0:04:55 > 0:04:56Oh yeah, look at this.

0:04:59 > 0:05:03Oh, it's incredibly open at the side, it's amazing.

0:05:03 > 0:05:08This is exactly as she would have been when she was flying in wartime.

0:05:08 > 0:05:10- All these instruments are original, are they?- Yeah, absolutely.

0:05:10 > 0:05:13So, the pilot, the captain of the aeroplane would have sat

0:05:13 > 0:05:14in the left hand seat in front of you, Ewan,

0:05:14 > 0:05:16and this is the bullet proof plate here at the back there,

0:05:16 > 0:05:18which would have protected him to some degree.

0:05:18 > 0:05:21You've got a really good view and all the rest of it,

0:05:21 > 0:05:23but it does feel very vulnerable, doesn't it?

0:05:23 > 0:05:24You do feel really vulnerable up here.

0:05:24 > 0:05:27I mean this is, literally, only three eights of an inch Perspex,

0:05:27 > 0:05:31and the side of the walls of the aeroplane is two millimetres of aluminium,

0:05:31 > 0:05:33which won't stop anything.

0:05:35 > 0:05:39To realise my dream of piloting this precious and iconic aircraft,

0:05:39 > 0:05:41I need to train first on some other heavy planes from the era.

0:05:49 > 0:05:53The roar of a wartime Spitfire heralds the arrival of the man

0:05:53 > 0:05:55the RAF trusts to supervise that training.

0:05:57 > 0:06:00This fellow taxiing in in his Spitfire now is your instructor.

0:06:00 > 0:06:01Oh right!

0:06:01 > 0:06:03And he's going to take you through the training

0:06:03 > 0:06:08- for you to be able to see what the boys went through to fly the Lancaster.- OK.

0:06:08 > 0:06:14Making this dramatic entrance is Air Marshall Cliff Spink, a former RAF pilot.

0:06:14 > 0:06:19He's an expert on Second World War planes, and recently taught me to fly the Spitfire.

0:06:20 > 0:06:22- Hello!- Hello!

0:06:22 > 0:06:24There's a pilot we recognise.

0:06:24 > 0:06:27They told me that the McGregors were here,

0:06:27 > 0:06:30so I thought I'd better come and make sure you didn't get up to any mischief.

0:06:30 > 0:06:33- Good to see you again. - Good to see you, Colin.

0:06:33 > 0:06:35Going to see if you remembered all that you learned last year.

0:06:35 > 0:06:39Yeah, exactly, yeah. I'm going to have to shift my view a little higher up next, I think.

0:06:43 > 0:06:49Last summer, Cliff guided me through the basic training all wartime RAF pilots experienced

0:06:49 > 0:06:52before I was allowed to pilot a single-engine Spitfire.

0:06:55 > 0:06:59But this time, I'll have to master a two-engine World War Two transport plane

0:06:59 > 0:07:02before I'm allowed to pilot the four-engine Lancaster.

0:07:04 > 0:07:09For me, as a member of 617 Squadron, it's probably the greatest privilege that you could ever get

0:07:09 > 0:07:13just to fly a Lancaster, so, you know, certainly a career-long ambition of mine to do.

0:07:15 > 0:07:19The Lancaster would become the most successful bomber of the war,

0:07:19 > 0:07:22but it only came into service two and a half years into the conflict.

0:07:24 > 0:07:27In the early days of World War Two, Bomber Command was ineffective.

0:07:30 > 0:07:36Its force of just 280 light bombers, flying in daylight, sustained losses of up to 50%.

0:07:37 > 0:07:43In one disastrous attack on Alburgh in Denmark, all eleven planes were shot down.

0:07:47 > 0:07:51Then, on November 14th 1940,

0:07:51 > 0:07:55a German night raid on Coventry showed the RAF how to bomb effectively.

0:07:59 > 0:08:03Steven Bungay, an expert on the Air War, has brought us to look at newsreel of the attack.

0:08:05 > 0:08:09- NEWSREEL:- All the available German night bombers were put into the air.

0:08:15 > 0:08:20On the night of November 14th, a million pounds of bombs were dropped on the city.

0:08:21 > 0:08:24It was the most devastating raid of the war so far.

0:08:26 > 0:08:29Coventry was smashed as bad as Warsaw and Rotterdam.

0:08:29 > 0:08:3560,000 buildings were destroyed, and 568 civilians lost their lives.

0:08:35 > 0:08:39Coventry was a centre of aircraft manufacture,

0:08:39 > 0:08:44but instead of targeting just the factories, the Luftwaffe chose to flatten the whole city.

0:08:56 > 0:08:58- Incredible.- Yeah.

0:08:58 > 0:09:03The mass grave and things, I had never seen that, I didn't know that went on.

0:09:03 > 0:09:08What the Germans achieved in Coventry was a concentration of bombing.

0:09:08 > 0:09:11It wasn't just scattering things over quite a wide area.

0:09:11 > 0:09:17And that's very important for the consequences that the RAF drew from this.

0:09:17 > 0:09:21They realised that if you had some specialists using specialised equipment,

0:09:21 > 0:09:24which we didn't have at the time but quickly started to develop,

0:09:24 > 0:09:27then you could achieve concentration.

0:09:27 > 0:09:30And concentration had a big impact.

0:09:30 > 0:09:32Bomber Command now knew what it had to do.

0:09:35 > 0:09:38If it couldn't hit individual factories,

0:09:38 > 0:09:42it would destroy everything around them in concentrated raids.

0:09:42 > 0:09:44This became known as area bombing.

0:09:46 > 0:09:50The objective was industrial disruption.

0:09:50 > 0:09:54By destroying infrastructure, simply the means that people use to get to

0:09:54 > 0:09:58work in the morning, you can produce a dip in industrial production.

0:10:00 > 0:10:03The targets were the major German industrial cities,

0:10:03 > 0:10:05like Berlin and Hamburg,

0:10:05 > 0:10:07and the manufacturing heartland of the Ruhr.

0:10:10 > 0:10:15But it would take nearly two years before Bomber Command could put its plan into action.

0:10:22 > 0:10:27If I'm going to fly the Lancaster by the end of the week, I'll have to start my training.

0:10:29 > 0:10:34So I've come to White Waltham, a former RAF base, to learn on this wartime Dakota.

0:10:35 > 0:10:39My supervisor, Cliff, is hooking me up with Kath Burnham.

0:10:39 > 0:10:40Hi, Kath.

0:10:40 > 0:10:43She's one of only two qualified Dakota instructors in the country.

0:10:43 > 0:10:47- Nice to meet you.- Colin McGregor. - He's your new student.- Very good.

0:10:47 > 0:10:51I hope he doesn't let me down. He flew the Tiger Moth and the Harvard and the Spitfire last year.

0:10:51 > 0:10:54I hate him already(!) Yeah. Go on.

0:10:54 > 0:10:56- Back on the heavy metal now. - Great stuff.

0:10:56 > 0:10:59- So, best of luck and I'll see you tomorrow.- Yeah, cheers.

0:10:59 > 0:11:00- Shall we go in?- Yeah, let's do it.

0:11:00 > 0:11:04This is a pretty solid old aeroplane, the DC-3.

0:11:04 > 0:11:07It's excellent for him to get a feel for that,

0:11:07 > 0:11:14before he gets on to something which is extra tonnage of the Lancaster.

0:11:14 > 0:11:15That's it.

0:11:15 > 0:11:19Now I've got Kath next to me, and I've got to make sure that when she asks me to do something

0:11:19 > 0:11:21I do it correctly.

0:11:21 > 0:11:24It's going to have to happen like that, so I'm quite nervous about it.

0:11:24 > 0:11:26He's asking all the right questions, it's always a good start.

0:11:26 > 0:11:30And, um, looking a little bit apprehensive, I think.

0:11:30 > 0:11:32You tell me it's turning.

0:11:32 > 0:11:35This World War Two veteran is so unlike the type of plane

0:11:35 > 0:11:38I fly today in my job as a commercial pilot.

0:11:38 > 0:11:42And even though it needs Kath to help me get it off the ground,

0:11:42 > 0:11:46I'm going to have my hands full piloting this beast.

0:11:48 > 0:11:50Cliff will be passing a critical eye over the proceedings.

0:12:01 > 0:12:04If I shout "bird" just put your hands over your eyes. This is glass.

0:12:04 > 0:12:05OK, it'll smash, yeah.

0:12:08 > 0:12:13Now, after all the pre-flight checks, it's time for the real test.

0:12:13 > 0:12:14Take off.

0:12:14 > 0:12:16There's so much to concentrate on.

0:12:20 > 0:12:24It's so difficult to control this type of plane on the ground.

0:12:24 > 0:12:26I'm straining to keep it on a straight track.

0:12:33 > 0:12:35Oh, yes!

0:12:40 > 0:12:43Woo-hoo-hoo-hoo! That was nice.

0:12:44 > 0:12:48That looked all right, didn't it? Nice and straight.

0:12:48 > 0:12:50Cor, sounds amazing, doesn't it sound brilliant, that plane?

0:12:50 > 0:12:52He's a very good pilot, of course, one of the best.

0:12:57 > 0:13:01It's hard to describe what it feels like.

0:13:01 > 0:13:06It's like driving a vintage bus with manual gears, after being used to a modern sports car.

0:13:11 > 0:13:15That was good. To me, anyway. When you're in the back of a big aeroplane like this,

0:13:15 > 0:13:20you sense the yaw, and he was not paddling too much,

0:13:20 > 0:13:24which suggests he was keeping it reasonably straight.

0:13:27 > 0:13:30I've been flying for more than 20 years and this tough.

0:13:30 > 0:13:34It makes you think about those 18-year-old trainees flying

0:13:34 > 0:13:37a monster like this for the first time.

0:13:37 > 0:13:38Attention!

0:13:41 > 0:13:46At RAF flying schools, potential pilots were cherry-picked from the raw recruits.

0:13:46 > 0:13:50The remaining volunteers went on to specialise in other crew disciplines.

0:13:56 > 0:14:01All pilot recruits were then sent abroad to one of the 333 Empire air training schools.

0:14:02 > 0:14:06They were scattered throughout the British Empire.

0:14:06 > 0:14:1118-year-old Desmond Pelly went straight from Charterhouse School to learn to fly in Canada.

0:14:12 > 0:14:17Canada, of course, happened to be an extremely good place for training.

0:14:18 > 0:14:21Because there were no blackout conditions,

0:14:21 > 0:14:25and you flew in completely peacetime conditions,

0:14:25 > 0:14:26which was wonderful.

0:14:27 > 0:14:31Reg Barker was just 19.

0:14:31 > 0:14:35To be up in the sky, on your own, in a beautiful aeroplane,

0:14:35 > 0:14:37with the freedom of the sky.

0:14:37 > 0:14:40Oh, fantastic. What a privilege it was.

0:14:40 > 0:14:44No, I'd never flown before. Hadn't even driven a motor car before.

0:14:52 > 0:14:55- Remind me when you take flat one again?- With the gear.

0:14:55 > 0:14:57- With the gear, so that's already done.- That's it, yeah.

0:14:57 > 0:14:59So when you're at final and you're stable...

0:14:59 > 0:15:02On my training flight in the skies above Berkshire,

0:15:02 > 0:15:06I'm still wrestling with this demanding twin-engine workhorse.

0:15:08 > 0:15:14But now I've got the measure of the controls I'm really enjoying it. This is real, physical flying.

0:15:17 > 0:15:20He's on final approach. They've got the gear down.

0:15:21 > 0:15:25So, as you can see, he's working pretty hard.

0:15:32 > 0:15:37What I'm nervous about now is getting this plane back onto the bumpy grass runway.

0:15:37 > 0:15:40The tricky part is stopping it swerving on landing.

0:15:42 > 0:15:47OK, this is the big moment, let's see if he does it.

0:15:47 > 0:15:53- Bingo!- And take the flap down. Busy with your feet. OK, pop the tail down.

0:15:53 > 0:15:56- Now the fun really starts, is keeping it straight.- Well done!

0:15:56 > 0:15:59- That was, that was very good. - Good man.

0:15:59 > 0:16:01He's just trying to show me up now.

0:16:03 > 0:16:07Landing's one thing, but with a tail will aeroplane,

0:16:07 > 0:16:09the next thing is keeping it straight.

0:16:11 > 0:16:13Where is it? There. Ooh!

0:16:13 > 0:16:15KATH LAUGHS

0:16:15 > 0:16:16You did that on purpose!

0:16:17 > 0:16:18I didn't kill anybody!

0:16:18 > 0:16:21Yeah, well done. Mind the little red sign.

0:16:21 > 0:16:24Yeah, got it. I think we'll quite while we're ahead, shall we?

0:16:24 > 0:16:25KATH LAUGHS

0:16:35 > 0:16:36Woo-hoo-hoo!

0:16:38 > 0:16:41All right Colin?

0:16:41 > 0:16:43Good job!

0:16:43 > 0:16:46I'm a bit sweaty! It was hard work.

0:16:46 > 0:16:49Considering you've never flown one at all, ever, I think not too bad, eh?

0:16:49 > 0:16:51- It was very good.- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:16:51 > 0:16:53How does it feel, what does it feel like to fly?

0:16:53 > 0:16:56- It's beautiful in the air, it's really solid, you know?- Yeah.

0:16:56 > 0:16:58I mean you, like you say, you've gotta come in and command it,

0:16:58 > 0:17:01you've gotta, you know, tell it where you want it to go.

0:17:03 > 0:17:08Before I finally get my hands on the Lancaster, Cliff has a much tougher task up his sleeve.

0:17:14 > 0:17:19If you went to the cinema in 1941 you'd have believed that the bombing campaign was going very well.

0:17:19 > 0:17:21Let go of a thousand pound, Mick.

0:17:21 > 0:17:24Bomber Command had switched to night-time raids,

0:17:24 > 0:17:28and the crews were reporting that they were hitting their targets.

0:17:31 > 0:17:33I got a ghoul there with the last one!

0:17:33 > 0:17:35Good man. Make a Nazi cigar.

0:17:35 > 0:17:40But Prime Minister Winston Churchill was about to discover the shocking truth.

0:17:43 > 0:17:47At the National Archives in Kew, I'm meeting archivist Jessica Lutkin,

0:17:47 > 0:17:51who's going to show me what was really going on in 1941.

0:17:52 > 0:17:58Right, this is an important document for the history of Bomber Command and it was written in 1941,

0:17:58 > 0:18:01and it's an analysis of the success rate

0:18:01 > 0:18:05of the bombing campaigns that went on over in Germany.

0:18:05 > 0:18:10It was the first scientific report that was done, so the first time they had statistics.

0:18:10 > 0:18:16Before that, it was just the crews reporting back and saying whether they'd hit target or not.

0:18:16 > 0:18:19How did they gather that evidence? How did they get scientific evidence?

0:18:19 > 0:18:23They used photographs. They used photographs on the undercarriages of the planes

0:18:23 > 0:18:27that would take pictures of when the bombs were set off,

0:18:27 > 0:18:31and from those photographs, they could then write a report.

0:18:31 > 0:18:34I want to make a sort of snooker joke but I can't think of one.

0:18:34 > 0:18:39"For those of you watching in black and white, the pink is next to the blue."

0:18:39 > 0:18:44Right. So, let me turn to a report for you. So there you are.

0:18:45 > 0:18:51"An examination of night photographs taken during night bombing in June and July

0:18:51 > 0:18:53points to the following conclusions.

0:18:53 > 0:18:59Of the aircraft recorded as attacking their target, only one in three got within five miles.

0:18:59 > 0:19:04And over Germany as a whole, the proportion was only one in four.

0:19:04 > 0:19:06And over the Ruhr, it was only one in ten."

0:19:06 > 0:19:09- Yes.- Does that mean only one in ten got over the target?

0:19:09 > 0:19:11Or the bombs dropped hit the target?

0:19:11 > 0:19:14Only one in ten actually reached the target.

0:19:14 > 0:19:19So what would the reaction have been when this report was read by the top brass?

0:19:19 > 0:19:21And what was, what was the reaction to it?

0:19:21 > 0:19:23It was shock. It was simple shock.

0:19:23 > 0:19:26They couldn't believe just how bad things were.

0:19:26 > 0:19:28Wow!

0:19:29 > 0:19:35Surprising to see how ineffective the bombing campaign was early on.

0:19:35 > 0:19:42And clearly to Churchill, and to the powers that be at the time, that it was so ineffective.

0:19:42 > 0:19:46And yeah, it'll be interesting to see how they put that right,

0:19:46 > 0:19:50what they put in place to try and improve matters.

0:19:53 > 0:19:55For Churchill, the answer was simple.

0:19:55 > 0:19:59Bomber command needed a complete overhaul, and he started at the top.

0:20:03 > 0:20:08In February 1942, Arthur Harris was appointed its new Commander-in-chief.

0:20:09 > 0:20:15We're meeting author Patrick Bishop to find out more about Harris.

0:20:15 > 0:20:20The one name that keeps cropping up during our journey through this research is Bomber Harris.

0:20:20 > 0:20:24Well, Bomber Harris was the name that the general public knew him by,

0:20:24 > 0:20:26but among his peers he was Burt Harris,

0:20:26 > 0:20:29and to his men he was Butch.

0:20:29 > 0:20:34He had a bristly little moustache that gave him this air of porcine belligerence,

0:20:34 > 0:20:37and you crossed him at your peril.

0:20:37 > 0:20:43But what he did have was enormous drive and enormous energy and enormous confidence,

0:20:43 > 0:20:47and he brought all those qualities to Bomber Command.

0:20:47 > 0:20:49He arrived at a good time,

0:20:49 > 0:20:52these big four-engined bombers were just arriving at the squadrons,

0:20:52 > 0:20:57and he turned these heavy bombers into weapons of mass destruction.

0:20:57 > 0:21:00I mean, you can date from his arrival,

0:21:00 > 0:21:04the time when things start getting very unpleasant for the Germans.

0:21:04 > 0:21:07Was he liked, do you think, by the crews?

0:21:07 > 0:21:11I think he was respected enormously.

0:21:11 > 0:21:16And they, I think, understood what it was that he was doing,

0:21:16 > 0:21:19and the fact that their lives were being put on the line,

0:21:19 > 0:21:22I think they, they understood that that's what had to be done.

0:21:22 > 0:21:25I mean, hard men are needed in wartime, and he was certainly that.

0:21:27 > 0:21:33Harris had an unflinching belief that bombing alone could win the war. And he didn't mince his words.

0:21:35 > 0:21:37"The Nazis entered this war

0:21:37 > 0:21:38under the rather childish delusion

0:21:38 > 0:21:41that they were going to bomb everybody else

0:21:41 > 0:21:44and nobody was going to bomb them.

0:21:44 > 0:21:49At Rotterdam, London, Warsaw, and half a hundred other places,

0:21:49 > 0:21:53they put that rather naive theory into operation.

0:21:53 > 0:21:58They have sewed the wind and now they are going to reap the whirlwind."

0:22:00 > 0:22:04That whirlwind had four engines and it was called the Lancaster.

0:22:04 > 0:22:10With a top speed of nearly 300 miles an hour, it was faster than any of its predecessors.

0:22:11 > 0:22:15It also carried the biggest bomb load of any aircraft in the war.

0:22:15 > 0:22:18- COMMENTARY:- It's 33 ft long. When it's released its load,

0:22:18 > 0:22:21another two or three acres of Germany will never be the same again.

0:22:23 > 0:22:26Harris now had the weapon he needed.

0:22:26 > 0:22:29He placed it at the centre of his plans to build a huge force

0:22:29 > 0:22:33that he believed could break the Germans by area bombing alone.

0:22:35 > 0:22:40He dreamed of assembling a thousand bombers for a single raid,

0:22:40 > 0:22:43so he doggedly pursued the Air Ministry to build more planes.

0:22:46 > 0:22:51The drive to get the new heavy bombers out of the factory demanded a huge workforce.

0:22:56 > 0:22:59I'm meeting Susan Jones, who, as a teenager,

0:22:59 > 0:23:02worked as a riveter on the new, state-of-the-art Lancaster.

0:23:04 > 0:23:07So Sue, this is the first time you've seen your plane for a little while, isn't it?

0:23:07 > 0:23:14- It's so emotional. You know, I could just cry now, looking at her.- Yeah.

0:23:14 > 0:23:16She's absolutely brilliant.

0:23:16 > 0:23:20How long did you build these planes for?

0:23:20 > 0:23:21Five years.

0:23:21 > 0:23:24- From what age?- 16.

0:23:24 > 0:23:29- 16.- Regular nights. Seven at night to seven in the morning.

0:23:29 > 0:23:33- For five years?- Five years. Happiest days of my life.

0:23:33 > 0:23:34Oh, they were brilliant.

0:23:36 > 0:23:39These four-engine bombers were affectionately known

0:23:39 > 0:23:43as 10,000 rivets flying in close formation.

0:23:43 > 0:23:45- You hold it upright, go on.- Yep.

0:23:45 > 0:23:47And then I'll hold onto the back, and then when I call "rivet",

0:23:47 > 0:23:50- just give it a couple of seconds on the gun.- Just a touch.

0:23:50 > 0:23:51Rivet!

0:23:51 > 0:23:52That's it.

0:23:52 > 0:23:56- There we go. That's one done.- That's it?- Yeah.- OK, let's have another go.

0:23:56 > 0:23:58Oooh, you'll have to be quicker than that.

0:23:58 > 0:24:00Rivet!

0:24:00 > 0:24:03- There we go.- That's a good rivet, though, no?- Let me see. - Yeah, it's not bad.

0:24:03 > 0:24:05- Can you get that underneath there?- Yeah.

0:24:08 > 0:24:11- Oh sorry, I didn't wait for your command, I beg your pardon.- Oh!

0:24:11 > 0:24:13That will definitely not pass inspection!

0:24:13 > 0:24:15I think you should have a go.

0:24:17 > 0:24:19- It's a bit heavy for me, this one. - OK, I'll hold it with you.

0:24:22 > 0:24:23Right.

0:24:23 > 0:24:24Rivet!

0:24:24 > 0:24:28- There we go.- OK.- Oh, that's a professional one, you see!

0:24:28 > 0:24:30That's a real pro, that one.

0:24:31 > 0:24:33Think I'll get a job here?

0:24:35 > 0:24:40In 1942, 700 of the revolutionary new Lancasters

0:24:40 > 0:24:42were delivered to frontline bases.

0:24:43 > 0:24:46The Lancaster was, you know,

0:24:46 > 0:24:50something else. It was a real war machine,

0:24:50 > 0:24:51it looked the part.

0:24:51 > 0:24:54It's still, to me, a powerful, powerful machine,

0:24:54 > 0:24:57I'm very proud, you know, I was associated with it.

0:24:57 > 0:25:01Whatever manoeuvre you wanted it

0:25:01 > 0:25:04to do, it did. It did. It did.

0:25:05 > 0:25:07Brilliant.

0:25:08 > 0:25:10You felt comfortable in it.

0:25:12 > 0:25:14It could take a lot of punishment.

0:25:14 > 0:25:16It could fly on two engines

0:25:16 > 0:25:18and one side quite easily.

0:25:18 > 0:25:19In fact, I do know of one chap

0:25:19 > 0:25:22who brought a Lancaster all the way back from Germany

0:25:22 > 0:25:23on one engine.

0:25:25 > 0:25:30To fly the new bombers, trainees were pouring out of the flying schools.

0:25:30 > 0:25:32And it wasn't just the pilots.

0:25:32 > 0:25:38Each Lancaster needed six more crew members. Two gunners, the flight engineer,

0:25:38 > 0:25:43the navigator, the bomb aimer, and the wireless operator.

0:25:44 > 0:25:49Bomber command was also a multi-national force.

0:25:49 > 0:25:54One in four of its recruits came from overseas. All were volunteers.

0:25:55 > 0:25:59In a wartime hangar, wireless operator John de Hoop recalls

0:25:59 > 0:26:02the reasons he joined up when he was just 18.

0:26:02 > 0:26:05One, you got more money.

0:26:05 > 0:26:08Two, you got sheets with your blankets,

0:26:08 > 0:26:10- which I thought was so civilised. - Yeah.

0:26:10 > 0:26:15Three, you were given a pair of shoes and a pair of boots,

0:26:15 > 0:26:18rather than two pairs of boots, I hated wearing boots.

0:26:18 > 0:26:22And fourthly, because once you'd got your wing,

0:26:22 > 0:26:26using a colloquial term of the time, it pulled in the birds.

0:26:26 > 0:26:28COLIN LAUGHS

0:26:29 > 0:26:35The process of turning the individuals into a team was known as crewing up.

0:26:35 > 0:26:38This wasn't the usual hierarchical military process.

0:26:38 > 0:26:40It was rather more democratic.

0:26:40 > 0:26:44Looking back, it seemed a bit chaotic,

0:26:44 > 0:26:46because you'd be put in a hangar and they said,

0:26:46 > 0:26:49"Right, get on with it, get crewed up", and closed the doors.

0:26:49 > 0:26:51So you were stuck in a great big room.

0:26:51 > 0:26:54Full of pilots and navigators,

0:26:54 > 0:26:57bomb aimers, wireless operators

0:26:57 > 0:26:58and two gunners.

0:26:58 > 0:27:00And told yourself, get yourself crewed up.

0:27:00 > 0:27:04You stand around wondering what's going to happen next, who should you go with?

0:27:04 > 0:27:09And this chap came up, he was obviously older than we,

0:27:09 > 0:27:14and he said, "I'm a rear gunner," he said, "Are you two chaps looking for a crew?"

0:27:14 > 0:27:18We said, "Yeah, yes we are." And he said, "Well I've found a pilot.

0:27:18 > 0:27:22I've questioned him, and he told me he had a crash while he was training,

0:27:22 > 0:27:25so I think he'll be bloody all right in future, he'll do for us!"

0:27:25 > 0:27:28So I said, "Well, OK, that suits us." So off we went.

0:27:28 > 0:27:29So that was the crew!

0:27:31 > 0:27:33This was a remarkable mixing of classes,

0:27:33 > 0:27:37ages and nationalities, unthinkable before the war.

0:27:37 > 0:27:40A crew might consist of a former public schoolboy,

0:27:40 > 0:27:45a London docker, a farmer from New Zealand and a Canadian bank clerk.

0:27:47 > 0:27:51All of a sudden, we became blood brothers.

0:27:51 > 0:27:55We helped each other out in everything. And we were a good team.

0:27:55 > 0:27:58If we hadn't have been I wouldn't be here today.

0:27:58 > 0:28:03The one thing that I remember with some emotion is the fact

0:28:03 > 0:28:08that in the billet, sharing with another crew, all Kiwis,

0:28:08 > 0:28:12and I recall both crews went on an operation,

0:28:12 > 0:28:18and when we came back all their kit had gone, and bed stripped,

0:28:18 > 0:28:25and I remember sitting on our beds and being quite shattered

0:28:25 > 0:28:29by this experience of losing these guys who'd been with us.

0:28:29 > 0:28:32So we did what most blokes would do in that case,

0:28:32 > 0:28:36there's only one thing to do, go down the pub and get sozzled.

0:28:38 > 0:28:42The crews were now setting out nightly in the new four-engine bombers

0:28:42 > 0:28:47to carry out Harris's grand plan of defeating Germany by area bombing alone.

0:28:50 > 0:28:52A mission could last up to ten hours,

0:28:52 > 0:28:55targeting industrial centres deep in the heart of Germany.

0:28:56 > 0:29:00The telephone perhaps would ring.

0:29:00 > 0:29:05Then the Flight Commander would call "That's it, boys! It's on."

0:29:05 > 0:29:07Then there'd be a deadly hush.

0:29:07 > 0:29:10That meant that night, we were going to be on ops.

0:29:12 > 0:29:16We would disappear up to the mess for your meal,

0:29:16 > 0:29:20always eggs and bacon and sausage, a bit of fried bread.

0:29:22 > 0:29:25Then you would go up to the briefing room and there

0:29:25 > 0:29:31they would draw back the curtain and you could see where your target was.

0:29:31 > 0:29:36Then there'd be a big "ohh!" if it was, you know, a long one.

0:29:38 > 0:29:43Once the planes were loaded up with bombs and fuel, the crews were ready to go.

0:29:45 > 0:29:49Once you got on the end of a runway to take off,

0:29:49 > 0:29:53then the tension was really wound up.

0:29:53 > 0:29:56There was no talking at all. None.

0:30:01 > 0:30:06You waited for a green aldis lamp, and you took off and saw them waving to you to take off.

0:30:10 > 0:30:15Used to think, "Am I going to be back here in a few hours' time?"

0:30:22 > 0:30:25Navigator Douglas Hudson recalls an extraordinary moment

0:30:25 > 0:30:28just as his bomber force headed out across the North Sea.

0:30:30 > 0:30:34There was a flight of German bombers coming almost on the reciprocal,

0:30:34 > 0:30:37on the opposite track.

0:30:37 > 0:30:41So the skipper said, don't do anything unless they do.

0:30:41 > 0:30:46And you know what they did? They just gave us a wing salute.

0:30:46 > 0:30:49And they went on to bomb Goole. And we went on to bomb Stuttgart.

0:30:51 > 0:30:53The crews would have to remain alert for many hours,

0:30:53 > 0:30:57and something stronger than coffee was on offer.

0:30:57 > 0:30:58Amphetamine pills.

0:31:00 > 0:31:02They gave us wakey-wakey tablets.

0:31:02 > 0:31:04Well, we used to call them wakey-wakey tablets!

0:31:04 > 0:31:08Personally, myself, I never, ever took them.

0:31:08 > 0:31:12I used to stick mine with a bit of chewing gum on the side,

0:31:12 > 0:31:15to the inside of the rear turret, you know?

0:31:15 > 0:31:18I only did it once. I didn't need them again.

0:31:19 > 0:31:24I was wound up before I went anyway, like the seven in the crew.

0:31:25 > 0:31:30Stan Bradford was a mid-upper gunner. He's also a decorated ace.

0:31:30 > 0:31:33He shot down five German fighters.

0:31:33 > 0:31:39Never, ever, ever in my life was I ever comfortable. No. No.

0:31:39 > 0:31:41Frightened to death.

0:31:41 > 0:31:44And anybody that says he wasn't, well, he's a bloody liar.

0:31:46 > 0:31:50The crews were about to run the gauntlet of the German air defences.

0:31:57 > 0:32:03Back at White Waltham, I'm ready for the next stage of my training on another Dakota.

0:32:03 > 0:32:06It brings me one step closer to flying the Lancaster.

0:32:11 > 0:32:13And Cliff wants to use the flight to give me a flavour

0:32:13 > 0:32:18of how difficult the most basic navigation task was during World War Two.

0:32:20 > 0:32:26I've plotted the course and I need Colin to fly at a set speed to get to the destination on time.

0:32:27 > 0:32:30- So, what sort of speed do I need to fly?- 120.

0:32:30 > 0:32:31- 120 what?- 120 knots.

0:32:31 > 0:32:33- Knots?- Knots.

0:32:33 > 0:32:35No, this is in miles per hour.

0:32:36 > 0:32:38- It is.- Is it?- Yeah.

0:32:38 > 0:32:41Well, we've worked it all out in nautical miles.

0:32:41 > 0:32:44I'm not mucking around, man. It's in miles an hour?

0:32:44 > 0:32:47What's the speed dials in this one?

0:32:47 > 0:32:48Miles an hour.

0:32:48 > 0:32:50- That's what I thought.- OK. - Can you manage that conversion?

0:32:50 > 0:32:53I don't know how to convert it. What is the conversion?

0:32:53 > 0:32:55Were you not taught? What, come on, basics!

0:32:57 > 0:33:00What are the basics? Go on, how do you convert it from knots to miles then?

0:33:00 > 0:33:03Well, I'll just have to fly 138 miles per hour.

0:33:03 > 0:33:05- And that will equal 120 knots. - Is that right?- Yeah.

0:33:05 > 0:33:10OK, good, good, good on you! No-one told me about the nautical miles.

0:33:10 > 0:33:13Thankfully World War Two navigators were better informed.

0:33:13 > 0:33:16It's properly exciting to be here.

0:33:16 > 0:33:20I'm a bit nervous about the navigation, but we'll just have to see how that goes.

0:33:20 > 0:33:23But it is unbelievably exciting to be in this aeroplane.

0:33:23 > 0:33:29Yeah, maybe we'll end up somewhere fancy in Normandy or something, and we can have a crepe!

0:33:36 > 0:33:40Modern planes have GPS, radar and air traffic control.

0:33:41 > 0:33:46But all trainee navigators had was a map, a compass and a watch.

0:33:59 > 0:34:05First, Cliff wants me to navigate south to a point on the Isle of Wight.

0:34:05 > 0:34:08This is exactly the kind of training trip a new crew would have undertaken.

0:34:16 > 0:34:19INAUDIBLE RADIO CHATTER

0:34:25 > 0:34:29What I need to do now is use landmarks along the way to make sure I'm on course and on time.

0:34:35 > 0:34:37You should be crossing a road.

0:34:40 > 0:34:43Yeah, I've got a main road we're just crossing now. It's quite heavily wooded.

0:34:43 > 0:34:46Bang on. Well done, pilot!

0:34:48 > 0:34:51But after a good start, I think I may have lost an entire town.

0:34:52 > 0:34:56You wouldn't happen to know where Haslemere is, sir, would you?

0:34:56 > 0:34:59- No, no, I'm not a navigator here. - Haslemere?

0:35:00 > 0:35:06How big is it? Well there's a town there, just west of the nose. Looks quite big.

0:35:09 > 0:35:14- We are three minutes to target, three minutes.- OK.

0:35:14 > 0:35:18- A little bit over to the right, Colin. Two degrees.- Good man. You've got it, you've got it.

0:35:22 > 0:35:25And we're coming a little...the target's just a little way to the right there, Colin,

0:35:25 > 0:35:27that building on the...

0:35:27 > 0:35:30The building, is it? All right. Just here.

0:35:30 > 0:35:33- Bugger me, Ewan, you've found it!- Yeah.

0:35:33 > 0:35:35Yeah. There you go, smack over the top. Well done, mate.

0:35:35 > 0:35:38- Going out to there now. Target now.- Yep.

0:35:38 > 0:35:43We've reached the first destination. Not bad for a beginner.

0:35:43 > 0:35:46When we were flying the Lancaster,

0:35:46 > 0:35:48my Canadian navigator was able

0:35:48 > 0:35:51to produce a fix every six minutes

0:35:51 > 0:35:52throughout the flight,

0:35:52 > 0:35:57which I think was a tremendous achievement of concentration,

0:35:57 > 0:36:00in order that we would arrive at our target dead on the time that

0:36:00 > 0:36:02we'd been instructed to arrive.

0:36:02 > 0:36:06Look at that, dead on, zero nine zero. Very nice, pilot, carry on.

0:36:10 > 0:36:12Now for the tricky part.

0:36:13 > 0:36:17Cliff wants to take me on a simulated bombing run over water.

0:36:18 > 0:36:23It's the closest I'll get to night flying. So, no landmarks to help me at all.

0:36:31 > 0:36:33Target's just on the left there, captain.

0:36:33 > 0:36:35Right, so that's the lighthouse, is it?

0:36:35 > 0:36:38There it is, my destination. The lighthouse at Beachy Head.

0:36:40 > 0:36:43Ah, we're going to be over it, but we're going to be one...

0:36:43 > 0:36:45Going to be a bit early, I think.

0:36:45 > 0:36:47Maybe a little early, yeah. One minute now. So.

0:36:47 > 0:36:50We've got to the target a minute early.

0:36:50 > 0:36:5360 seconds that mark the difference between success and failure.

0:36:53 > 0:36:59In a night bombing run, we would have dropped our bombs into the darkness.

0:36:59 > 0:37:01We're going over the top now.

0:37:04 > 0:37:08On a raid to Berlin, we would have overshot by a disastrous 20 miles.

0:37:12 > 0:37:16But navigating at night wasn't the only problem the bomber crews faced.

0:37:18 > 0:37:21As they crossed the North Sea, they were picked up by German radar.

0:37:24 > 0:37:27The closer they got to their destination,

0:37:27 > 0:37:31the more intense the searchlights and the flak from the anti-aircraft guns.

0:37:32 > 0:37:37We were caught in searchlights and they had us for 35 minutes.

0:37:37 > 0:37:42Now, you could guarantee, basically, that if you were caught

0:37:42 > 0:37:48in searchlights, you could say goodnight, nurse, that was your lot.

0:37:48 > 0:37:51But fortunately for us, we came through it.

0:37:53 > 0:37:58The Germans had the ideal anti-aircraft weapon in the 88mm gun.

0:37:58 > 0:38:03Thousands were diverted from the Russian front to stop the RAF getting through.

0:38:06 > 0:38:13You can view the target on flames and surrounded by millions of shell bursts.

0:38:13 > 0:38:15It looks like hell.

0:38:15 > 0:38:17And you really think

0:38:17 > 0:38:21that this is going to be it.

0:38:23 > 0:38:27To overwhelm the enemy's defences, the bombers travelled through

0:38:27 > 0:38:31the target area in a tightly packed bomber stream.

0:38:31 > 0:38:34It meant there was always the danger of mid-air collision.

0:38:36 > 0:38:41Another Lancaster came out from our starboard side

0:38:41 > 0:38:44and stuck his wing tip straight into us.

0:38:45 > 0:38:47Just under the mid-upper turret.

0:38:49 > 0:38:53There was, putting it crudely, a bloody big bang.

0:38:55 > 0:38:59Even though the tail of the aircraft was close to breaking away,

0:38:59 > 0:39:01Dave refused to abandon his position.

0:39:01 > 0:39:07The skipper said to me, "Well David, you can bail out if you wish."

0:39:08 > 0:39:12We could still have been attacked by enemy aircraft.

0:39:12 > 0:39:17My turret was still operational. So why should I jump out?

0:39:17 > 0:39:18What, leave my mates?

0:39:30 > 0:39:32If the plane made it to the target,

0:39:32 > 0:39:36then the most dangerous part of all. The bombing run itself.

0:39:38 > 0:39:42The pilot had to fly straight and level, no matter what.

0:39:42 > 0:39:47You say bombs away, and you could also look into the bomb bay

0:39:47 > 0:39:50from the bomb aimer's position to make sure they've all gone.

0:39:50 > 0:39:53And if they have, close the bomb doors

0:39:53 > 0:39:56and then the pilot gets out of the trouble.

0:39:57 > 0:39:59Then the aircraft lifted,

0:39:59 > 0:40:00having got rid of the weight,

0:40:00 > 0:40:02we were all very relieved,

0:40:02 > 0:40:03shut the bomb doors,

0:40:03 > 0:40:04and away we went for home.

0:40:14 > 0:40:17Bomber Harris was a man in a hurry.

0:40:17 > 0:40:20By May 1942, just three months into the job,

0:40:20 > 0:40:25he mustered enough resources to unleash 1,000 bombers in a single raid.

0:40:26 > 0:40:28The target was Cologne.

0:40:29 > 0:40:31The first wave was so successful,

0:40:31 > 0:40:36that by the time the second wave took off they didn't need their navigators.

0:40:38 > 0:40:40"Before we crossed the English coast,

0:40:40 > 0:40:42the skipper said to the navigator,

0:40:42 > 0:40:45"I think I can see a red glow in the sky.

0:40:45 > 0:40:47It's a long, long way away."

0:40:47 > 0:40:50The navigator replied, "That's Cologne.

0:40:50 > 0:40:53You don't need me any more, just head for it."

0:40:53 > 0:40:56We could actually see Cologne burning from England.

0:40:56 > 0:41:00Looking out, it was just a small red glow on the horizon.

0:41:00 > 0:41:03When we got there, the whole place was a sea of fire

0:41:03 > 0:41:06and we dropped out bombs into the middle of it.

0:41:06 > 0:41:08It was a piece of cake really.

0:41:10 > 0:41:14The raid destroyed 2,500 industrial buildings.

0:41:14 > 0:41:21It killed 469 civilians and bombed more than 40,000 out of their homes.

0:41:23 > 0:41:27It shook the Nazi high command so much that Cologne survivors

0:41:27 > 0:41:31were ordered to remain silent about the devastation on pain of death.

0:41:34 > 0:41:39For Harris, it was confirmation that his masterplan would work.

0:41:39 > 0:41:45There are a lot of people who say that bombing can never win a war.

0:41:45 > 0:41:49Well, my answer to that is that it has never been tried yet,

0:41:49 > 0:41:50and we shall see.

0:41:51 > 0:41:53Soon, the Ruhr, Essen, Berlin

0:41:53 > 0:41:55and countless other cities were

0:41:55 > 0:41:59the targets of area bombing, being hit night after night.

0:42:01 > 0:42:04The bomber crews were now undertaking large-scale

0:42:04 > 0:42:05raids into the heart of Germany.

0:42:07 > 0:42:11They were often flying twice a week to targets up to six hours away.

0:42:13 > 0:42:16And with US entry into the war in January 1942,

0:42:16 > 0:42:20Bomber Command now had a formidable ally.

0:42:22 > 0:42:26In the summer, the US began to bomb by day.

0:42:26 > 0:42:30It meant the Allies could hit German war industry around the clock.

0:42:38 > 0:42:41But there was a price to pay.

0:42:41 > 0:42:44The German defences were becoming ever more deadly.

0:42:44 > 0:42:48A Lancaster lasted for, on average, just seven missions over Germany.

0:42:48 > 0:42:53Only one in six of the crews was expected to survive a tour of 30 operations.

0:42:57 > 0:43:01The biggest threat was German night fighters.

0:43:01 > 0:43:05The tail gunners were the bomber's first line of defence.

0:43:05 > 0:43:10Learning how to hit a fast moving fighter plane involved constant practise.

0:43:15 > 0:43:1987-year-old Dave Fellowes wants to show Colin and I how he did it.

0:43:21 > 0:43:25So you did use clay pigeon shooting as, you know, these clays as practise, didn't you?

0:43:25 > 0:43:29We did, a lot. Right from the very elementary gunnery school.

0:43:29 > 0:43:33Because it was the best way of teaching deflection,

0:43:33 > 0:43:35and also your line of sight.

0:43:35 > 0:43:36Pull.

0:43:38 > 0:43:43Gunners were given a regular allocation of clays, so that they continued to practise.

0:43:45 > 0:43:47Pull.

0:43:50 > 0:43:5218 inches ahead.

0:43:53 > 0:43:55Oh, dear.

0:43:55 > 0:43:58< Try a bit more over towards me.

0:43:58 > 0:44:00Try a bit more up in the air.

0:44:00 > 0:44:04I feel the fraternal competition kind of starting to swell.

0:44:04 > 0:44:05Pull.

0:44:06 > 0:44:08It's hard to hit these fast-moving clays.

0:44:08 > 0:44:10Pull.

0:44:10 > 0:44:13Shooting down night fighters must have been infinitely more difficult.

0:44:13 > 0:44:14OK!

0:44:18 > 0:44:19Really close.

0:44:21 > 0:44:23Ha-ha-ha!

0:44:23 > 0:44:25From going through the training,

0:44:25 > 0:44:29to actually flying in the rear turret there for a real mission must have been a big, big difference.

0:44:29 > 0:44:32- I had eyes sticking out like organ stops.- Did you?

0:44:32 > 0:44:37Looking for an aeroplane that was an enemy one.

0:44:38 > 0:44:39Up!

0:44:41 > 0:44:43- Cor, he's right in there, isn't he? - He's right quick, isn't he?

0:44:46 > 0:44:51- Oh, you got a bit off the side of that one.- Yeah. We winged it.

0:44:51 > 0:44:54You winged it, you definitely winged that last one there.

0:44:54 > 0:44:59Having trained with a shotgun, Dave then had to master the .303 calibre machine gun.

0:45:01 > 0:45:03Armourer David Main wants to show us how effective they were.

0:45:06 > 0:45:08- Ready?- OK.- OK.

0:45:11 > 0:45:15I'm shooting at metal plate the same thickness as the armour on a German night fighter.

0:45:16 > 0:45:18OK, Ewan, in your own time, go on.

0:45:26 > 0:45:28OK. Clear.

0:45:29 > 0:45:32- This was protection for the pilot and air crew.- Yeah.

0:45:32 > 0:45:34Usually round his seat.

0:45:34 > 0:45:38And it's actually failed to penetrate in the armour piercing or the ball.

0:45:38 > 0:45:41- Oh, yeah, yeah. The ball didn't go through.- No.

0:45:41 > 0:45:44- And the armour piercing sort of didn't go through either.- No.

0:45:44 > 0:45:46It broke the back but it didn't go through.

0:45:46 > 0:45:48More than survivable, that kind of thing.

0:45:48 > 0:45:50Dave's chance of shooting the aircraft down was purely

0:45:50 > 0:45:55hitting a fuel line, a hydraulics line, or a control service.

0:45:55 > 0:45:58That is the only thing that was going to bring that aircraft down using a .303.

0:46:01 > 0:46:05The tail gunner strikes me as the loneliest and toughest job of all.

0:46:05 > 0:46:09I want to get some sense of what it was like for Dave, aged just 19.

0:46:09 > 0:46:12So, I'm going to squeeze into a Lancaster turret, wearing all

0:46:12 > 0:46:15the gear he wore to withstand the sub-zero temperatures.

0:46:31 > 0:46:34That would shut behind me.

0:46:36 > 0:46:37That's quite weird.

0:46:39 > 0:46:43I mean that is quite, that's quite a claustrophobic feeling.

0:46:43 > 0:46:48So, that's your world, now. For nine hours or more, this is my world.

0:46:51 > 0:46:56Well, if we'd have had a thermometer in there, it would never have got above zero, that's for sure.

0:46:56 > 0:46:58It was cold.

0:46:58 > 0:47:00It was no good taking a flask,

0:47:00 > 0:47:05because at around 20-odd thousand feet or more it used to freeze up anyhow.

0:47:05 > 0:47:10They gave you a bar of chocolate, but that froze so hard you couldn't even chew it.

0:47:10 > 0:47:13You couldn't stand, couldn't do anything.

0:47:13 > 0:47:18All you could do is move like this. That's all you could do.

0:47:20 > 0:47:22It's difficult enough getting in,

0:47:22 > 0:47:24but getting out in a hurry was another thing altogether.

0:47:26 > 0:47:29So, if I had to bale out of this, my parachute's out there.

0:47:29 > 0:47:33OK, I would have to turn the turret into this position,

0:47:33 > 0:47:35so the doors were there.

0:47:35 > 0:47:39I'd have to open the doors like this.

0:47:43 > 0:47:44This is when it gets a bit stuck.

0:47:45 > 0:47:48I'd have to lean back,

0:47:48 > 0:47:53grab my parachute here, off that,

0:47:53 > 0:47:56and get it back here, clip my parachute on,

0:47:56 > 0:48:01then I'd have to turn the turret round so that my back was

0:48:01 > 0:48:07outside here, and then fall backwards out, into the night.

0:48:07 > 0:48:13And if the plane was on fire, or if the plane was in a spin,

0:48:13 > 0:48:17which it often was, it would be, I mean, almost impossible, I think.

0:48:17 > 0:48:21Which is why so many of the poor rear gunners didn't make it,

0:48:21 > 0:48:23you know, they didn't get out.

0:48:23 > 0:48:25I knew where my parachute was.

0:48:25 > 0:48:30If the skipper gave the orders to bale out, I knew exactly what to do.

0:48:30 > 0:48:33We had an attitude in our aircraft, in our crew,

0:48:33 > 0:48:36if the aeroplane stays up there, we stay with the aeroplane.

0:48:36 > 0:48:37Simple as that.

0:48:39 > 0:48:41"From my mother's sleep I fell into the state,

0:48:41 > 0:48:43"and I hunched

0:48:43 > 0:48:44"in its belly

0:48:44 > 0:48:46"till my wet fur froze.

0:48:46 > 0:48:47"Six miles from Earth,

0:48:47 > 0:48:49"loosed from its dream

0:48:49 > 0:48:50"of life,

0:48:50 > 0:48:53"I woke to black flack and the nightmare fighters."

0:48:54 > 0:48:58"And when I died, they washed me out of the turret with a hose."

0:49:05 > 0:49:09With limited firepower, the crews employed another tactic to avoid German night fighters.

0:49:09 > 0:49:10The corkscrew.

0:49:12 > 0:49:17This was a series of fast dives and climbs more suited to a fighter.

0:49:17 > 0:49:20But the brilliant Lancaster was more than up to it.

0:49:22 > 0:49:23If your gunner suddenly said

0:49:23 > 0:49:24"Corkscrew port",

0:49:24 > 0:49:26you went right the way,

0:49:26 > 0:49:27turned it, right down

0:49:27 > 0:49:28like that, you screwed around

0:49:28 > 0:49:30at the bottom, you went up the gauge,

0:49:30 > 0:49:32screwed over the top and down.

0:49:32 > 0:49:34And you can imagine the strain on that aircraft.

0:49:34 > 0:49:38And with a full bomb load on, you were doing this sort of thing.

0:49:38 > 0:49:42We were attacked four times on one night by fighters.

0:49:42 > 0:49:44And we escaped from them every single time by corkscrewing.

0:49:49 > 0:49:52But the corkscrew was only useful if you could see the enemy coming.

0:49:52 > 0:49:59In 1943, crews reported seeing other planes blow up in mid-air for no apparent reason.

0:50:00 > 0:50:05The Luftwaffe had developed a new deadly secret weapon,

0:50:05 > 0:50:08known, rather bizarrely, as jazz music.

0:50:08 > 0:50:09Schraege Musik.

0:50:09 > 0:50:12German night fighter pilots realised

0:50:12 > 0:50:14that the bombers had a blind spot,

0:50:14 > 0:50:16namely underneath.

0:50:16 > 0:50:18They were able to come up underneath,

0:50:18 > 0:50:24and they had a couple of guns pointing up at an angle through the cockpit.

0:50:24 > 0:50:27The bomber they were attacking wouldn't see them,

0:50:27 > 0:50:28it wouldn't hear them.

0:50:28 > 0:50:30The first thing they would know is there'd be cannon shells

0:50:30 > 0:50:32ripping through the aircraft from beneath.

0:50:32 > 0:50:38If the thing was below you firing this jazz music cannon, there was no way out.

0:50:40 > 0:50:44One of the pilots who used this deadly weapon was Rolf Ebhart.

0:50:44 > 0:50:48He flew the Messerschmitt 110, hunting down British bombers.

0:50:50 > 0:50:52He shot down eight.

0:50:52 > 0:50:56Tell us about the first time you engaged a Lancaster.

0:50:56 > 0:50:59I saw it about 120 yards higher.

0:50:59 > 0:51:04So I was shaking and my heart was throbbing, of course.

0:51:04 > 0:51:10And I said to me, "Don't miss, don't miss, so I positioned myself under the Lancaster,

0:51:10 > 0:51:14and not thinking that the Lancaster

0:51:14 > 0:51:18was on the flight to the target,

0:51:18 > 0:51:21so it had all the bombs in,

0:51:21 > 0:51:25I aimed in the middle of the fuselage

0:51:25 > 0:51:28and the thing exploded after a second.

0:51:29 > 0:51:36And the result was I couldn't see anything any more,

0:51:36 > 0:51:41I was so blinded, for about five minutes, then slowly the sight came back.

0:51:42 > 0:51:47Rolf was so close to his victims that he was able to record their serial numbers in his logbook.

0:51:52 > 0:51:56Abschluss, Lancaster. Abschluss, Lancaster.

0:51:56 > 0:52:02I've got the code number from some of them.

0:52:02 > 0:52:06It was a third, Halifax.

0:52:06 > 0:52:09And here, three in one night, within 15 minutes.

0:52:11 > 0:52:14The new upward firing cannon meant that in 1943,

0:52:14 > 0:52:18the night fighters were accounting for 70% of Bomber Command losses.

0:52:22 > 0:52:26One man lived to tell his story of this invisible enemy.

0:52:28 > 0:52:31Reg Barker's Lancaster was torn apart by Schraege Musik.

0:52:33 > 0:52:38His plane went into an uncontrollable dive and Reg began to black out.

0:52:39 > 0:52:41I couldn't move a little finger, even,

0:52:41 > 0:52:45I was pinned up against the canopy of the roof, the roof canopy of the cockpit.

0:52:45 > 0:52:48And I could see the fires burning below,

0:52:48 > 0:52:50the fires that we'd started in Kiel.

0:52:53 > 0:52:58And it was quite evident that it would only be seconds,

0:52:58 > 0:53:00perhaps, before we hit the earth.

0:53:00 > 0:53:04Then suddenly it, all was peace. All went quiet.

0:53:04 > 0:53:09Had I arrived in the place, in the heavenly abode

0:53:09 > 0:53:12to which, no doubt, the Almighty had intended? I don't know.

0:53:15 > 0:53:18Suddenly there was a swishing sound,

0:53:18 > 0:53:21which I realised afterwards

0:53:21 > 0:53:24was the wind tearing through my clothes.

0:53:24 > 0:53:27I was out in the sky, I wasn't in the cockpit any more.

0:53:27 > 0:53:31How that happened really is only a matter of conjecture.

0:53:31 > 0:53:35And I could see my aircraft coming down beside me,

0:53:35 > 0:53:38very much ablaze, of course.

0:53:39 > 0:53:45The parachute opened and I could see below me the trees of a wood,

0:53:45 > 0:53:48floodlit by the flaming aircraft.

0:53:48 > 0:53:51At that moment, I dropped into the treetops.

0:53:51 > 0:53:55So that was a miraculous escape.

0:53:55 > 0:53:58Reg spent the rest of the conflict as a prisoner of war.

0:53:58 > 0:54:02So these are my identity tags, dog tags as we called them.

0:54:02 > 0:54:06One was my RAF officer's tag,

0:54:06 > 0:54:11and the other one is the one issued to me by the Germans

0:54:11 > 0:54:15when I became a guest of the Nazis.

0:54:15 > 0:54:19Stalag Luft 1, it says. 5182, that's me.

0:54:21 > 0:54:26The nightly dice with death was a horrendous strain for the young men of Bomber Command.

0:54:26 > 0:54:32Gunner Stan Bradford remembers a crew-member who cracked up on a mission.

0:54:32 > 0:54:39During one trip, we had a problem with our engineer.

0:54:41 > 0:54:44To this day, Stan won't reveal his name.

0:54:45 > 0:54:49There was no Ginger. I'm not letting his name out.

0:54:49 > 0:54:51Ginger, he was ginger haired.

0:54:51 > 0:54:56And Ginger, he wasn't available.

0:54:57 > 0:55:00He was hiding behind the pilot's seat.

0:55:01 > 0:55:04He was just took away. We never saw him again.

0:55:06 > 0:55:11Your documents would be stamped LMF, lack of moral fibre.

0:55:12 > 0:55:15And that put you in a terrible situation afterwards,

0:55:15 > 0:55:19if anybody would have asked to see his documents, service documents.

0:55:25 > 0:55:26Cases of LMF were rare.

0:55:28 > 0:55:31For the rest, their stress was released in other ways.

0:55:33 > 0:55:35There were some extreme cases,

0:55:35 > 0:55:37people were shooting off revolvers

0:55:37 > 0:55:39out of the windows at night,

0:55:39 > 0:55:45and, you know, really low level beat-ups of the aerodrome,

0:55:45 > 0:55:49and all sorts of things, and they would just get told off.

0:55:49 > 0:55:52They realised that you had to let off steam.

0:56:01 > 0:56:06Across the East of England, hundreds of bomber bases were bursting with thousands of young men,

0:56:06 > 0:56:10desperate to get away from the war for a few short hours.

0:56:10 > 0:56:12We always did everything together.

0:56:12 > 0:56:17So, when we went out together, we had to get on by two-seater MG.

0:56:17 > 0:56:22So, we sat three on the hood at the back, three on the front seat,

0:56:22 > 0:56:24and two on the front mud guards.

0:56:24 > 0:56:26And we used to strap them round their waist

0:56:26 > 0:56:29and over the bonnet so they didn't fall off.

0:56:29 > 0:56:31And only on one occasion was I stopped by the police,

0:56:31 > 0:56:34not because we were breaking the law, but he wanted to make

0:56:34 > 0:56:37quite sure the two on the front mudguards weren't going to fall off.

0:56:44 > 0:56:47Ewan and I have come to the Bluebell in Lincolnshire,

0:56:47 > 0:56:49a favourite haunt of the Bomber boys.

0:56:49 > 0:56:52Here, the crews would drink the pub dry.

0:56:53 > 0:56:57We're meeting Dave, pilot Tony Iveson

0:56:57 > 0:56:59and navigator Douglas Hudson.

0:56:59 > 0:57:01A lot of silly things happened.

0:57:01 > 0:57:04But I guess you were young guys, weren't you? You were 20, 20 years old?

0:57:04 > 0:57:07- There wasn't any malice aforethought at all.- No.

0:57:07 > 0:57:10Like the burning of the pianos that took place

0:57:10 > 0:57:13and all the other things, motorbikes in the mess.

0:57:13 > 0:57:15- Oh, that!- Oh, yes!

0:57:15 > 0:57:16Doing a doughnut in the mess.

0:57:16 > 0:57:19Doing doughnuts round the mess. Now that appeals to me!

0:57:19 > 0:57:21Well, the boys with me brought a cow in the mess one day.

0:57:21 > 0:57:23They got this cow in the mess and it didn't half make a mess!

0:57:27 > 0:57:31Many of the young men were inexperienced, baffled by the opposite sex.

0:57:31 > 0:57:35Most of us were to bloody young to understand female company at that age.

0:57:35 > 0:57:38We were all fingers and bloody thumbs!

0:57:38 > 0:57:42And we were also told and shown films,

0:57:42 > 0:57:46vivid, vivid American films about VD.

0:57:46 > 0:57:50You know, the horrors of what could happen to you.

0:57:50 > 0:57:53Well, that used to put you off for life! Nearly.

0:57:53 > 0:57:55"If she's easy, she's got it."

0:57:57 > 0:58:01"If she's got it, you'll get it."

0:58:01 > 0:58:04"And remember, a blob on the knob slows demob."

0:58:04 > 0:58:07LAUGHTER

0:58:07 > 0:58:10Yeah, I haven't heard that one before. Very good!

0:58:14 > 0:58:19By 1943, Bomber Command was fighting the war with an even greater ferocity.

0:58:20 > 0:58:24It was dropping more and more bombs.

0:58:24 > 0:58:27But German industry didn't appear to be collapsing.

0:58:27 > 0:58:29After a while, people began to suspect that

0:58:29 > 0:58:31factories could be repaired

0:58:31 > 0:58:34and got working again fairly quickly,

0:58:34 > 0:58:36so the next point of vulnerability

0:58:36 > 0:58:38was actually seen to be the workers,

0:58:38 > 0:58:41and this was the beginning of the sinister thought that,

0:58:41 > 0:58:46actually, the real target is civilian workers.

0:58:46 > 0:58:50The term used to describe this policy was "de-housing".

0:58:52 > 0:58:56The aim was not just to blow up, it was to burn as well.

0:58:56 > 0:59:01Bomber Command was now dropping more incendiaries than high explosives.

0:59:01 > 0:59:07In July 1943, Harris used this lethal cocktail to devastating effect.

0:59:14 > 0:59:17- COMMENTARY:- Hamburg, second largest city of the Reich,

0:59:17 > 0:59:20is being liquidated in a series of record attacks by the RAF.

0:59:20 > 0:59:25The main attack started on Saturday, 24th July, and for nights afterwards,

0:59:25 > 0:59:28hundreds of our four engine bombers kept it up hot and strong.

0:59:32 > 0:59:36We're travelling to Hamburg to find out more about the impact of the raid.

0:59:37 > 0:59:40A number of factors made this attack so shattering.

0:59:46 > 0:59:50RAF deception diverted the German night fighters away from the bomber force

0:59:50 > 0:59:53and the elite pathfinders marked the target perfectly.

0:59:56 > 1:00:00The combination of a hot dry summer and the high proportion

1:00:00 > 1:00:05of incendiaries created a phenomenon never seen before. A firestorm.

1:00:09 > 1:00:14Temperatures reached 800 degrees. Winds, 150 miles an hour.

1:00:16 > 1:00:20Nadia Convery is a Hamburg resident and researcher.

1:00:20 > 1:00:22She's brought us to St Nicholas' Church.

1:00:24 > 1:00:29It was so prominent in the landscape that the RAF used it as an aiming point.

1:00:29 > 1:00:32Today, it's a memorial to those lost in the bombing.

1:00:37 > 1:00:41- God! That's unbelievable, isn't it, the destruction.- Yeah.

1:00:41 > 1:00:46The blockbuster bombs, they would drop first to sort of lift the roofs of the houses,

1:00:46 > 1:00:50and then they would drop the incendiary bombs into houses

1:00:50 > 1:00:52where there was a lot of wood inside.

1:00:52 > 1:00:56They would just go up in flames, and the streets were quite narrow,

1:00:56 > 1:00:58so it was easy for the fire to spread.

1:01:01 > 1:01:07And that was the aim, to set fire to them?

1:01:07 > 1:01:13That was the aim, and apparently the British researched into how flammable German cities were.

1:01:13 > 1:01:18In one area, 96% of the houses were completely gone. Destroyed.

1:01:18 > 1:01:19Bloody hell.

1:01:19 > 1:01:25The Nazis feared six more raids like it would finish the war.

1:01:25 > 1:01:2942,000 men, women and children were killed.

1:01:29 > 1:01:33Quite an eye opener, really, when you see those pictures and you see the endless,

1:01:33 > 1:01:37endless empty shells of buildings,

1:01:37 > 1:01:39and the tons and tons of rubble.

1:01:40 > 1:01:42I just keep thinking about families, and children,

1:01:42 > 1:01:45and trying to get, you know, as a parent, trying to get your

1:01:45 > 1:01:50kids out of that hellhole must have been beyond awful, you know.

1:02:05 > 1:02:07Nadia has invited us to a city centre hotel

1:02:07 > 1:02:11to meet some of the victims of the Hamburg firestorm.

1:02:15 > 1:02:20Hans Werner Prell was 13 at the time. Helga Hunter was 16.

1:02:20 > 1:02:21Very nice to meet you, hello.

1:02:21 > 1:02:26The story of this suitcase is a special one, actually,

1:02:26 > 1:02:31so in this suitcase were important documents, a bit of, you know,

1:02:31 > 1:02:33jewellery, that's all that remained.

1:02:33 > 1:02:37It's the only thing he saved. He was clutching it through the firestorm.

1:02:38 > 1:02:42HANS SPEAKS GERMAN

1:02:45 > 1:02:48They could hardly move because of the force of the winds.

1:02:48 > 1:02:52And so he's described it quite powerfully.

1:02:53 > 1:02:56He said there was this red wall coming towards him,

1:02:56 > 1:02:59and then they'd get pushed over and have to get up again,

1:02:59 > 1:03:02and try and sort of battle against that force.

1:03:02 > 1:03:05So that's quite a powerful image.

1:03:05 > 1:03:09He says that just as you're sitting next to me,

1:03:09 > 1:03:13people would, would go up in flames next to him.

1:03:13 > 1:03:18It's unimaginable, it's just, what he saw, it's just, yeah.

1:03:19 > 1:03:25Yeah, I was 16 at that time, on that night. Can I speak German?

1:03:25 > 1:03:27Of course.

1:03:27 > 1:03:30HELGA SPEAKS GERMAN

1:03:33 > 1:03:37The streets had been hit. And everything had gone up in flames.

1:03:37 > 1:03:43And so, walking home, she had to pick her way across, you know,

1:03:43 > 1:03:47people lying in the streets dead, dead bodies.

1:03:49 > 1:03:52Because of the intense heat, the tarmac melted,

1:03:52 > 1:03:56and she saw people trying to walk across, and getting stuck,

1:03:56 > 1:03:58and then, yeah, not being able to, to free themselves,

1:03:58 > 1:04:01and no-one else could help, because they would get stuck then too.

1:04:14 > 1:04:18I think when you read about the area bombing campaign,

1:04:18 > 1:04:23and how that was described by senior officers and what have you,

1:04:23 > 1:04:25there's ways that you can phrase it

1:04:25 > 1:04:31to sound like it's not the indiscriminate bombing of civilians, you know,

1:04:31 > 1:04:37you can justify it in words by saying that it's a legitimate tactic

1:04:37 > 1:04:43to damage the industrial might of the country you're fighting against.

1:04:43 > 1:04:46I don't know if you can ever justify one way or the other.

1:04:46 > 1:04:49You know, you can't say, you know,

1:04:49 > 1:04:55there's a statistic, there was 42,000 civilians killed here in a week in Hamburg, in one raid.

1:04:55 > 1:04:58You can't ever justify that.

1:04:58 > 1:05:01You can't ever justify the killing of innocent people,

1:05:01 > 1:05:04you can't justify the killing of six million Jews and homosexuals

1:05:04 > 1:05:06in concentration camps, either, extermination camps,

1:05:06 > 1:05:12but it's not really about that, I suppose, it's just trying to understand it.

1:05:14 > 1:05:18Yeah. What it took to ultimately defeat that evil.

1:05:18 > 1:05:21Yeah, Nazism. Yeah, yeah.

1:05:23 > 1:05:29And 70 years ago, things were very different. The war was far from won.

1:05:29 > 1:05:34Bomber Harris felt that more raids like Hamburg would bring victory by the spring.

1:05:36 > 1:05:39We propose to entirely emasculate

1:05:39 > 1:05:44every enemy centre of war production if necessary.

1:05:44 > 1:05:47We are well on the way now to that end.

1:05:50 > 1:05:54The shadow of raids like Hamburg has influenced the way we've fought wars ever since.

1:05:56 > 1:06:01The RAF now uses air power in a much more targeted way.

1:06:01 > 1:06:05Bosnia, Iraq, where I served, Libya and Afghanistan,

1:06:05 > 1:06:08are so different from the area bombing of World War Two.

1:06:11 > 1:06:15We are all use to seeing images of precision strikes.

1:06:15 > 1:06:18Collateral damage is no longer acceptable.

1:06:23 > 1:06:27My old squadron, the Dambusters, was at the forefront of developing

1:06:27 > 1:06:29this new tactical approach to airpower.

1:06:31 > 1:06:34It's currently on active service in Afghanistan.

1:06:34 > 1:06:37I want to see for myself how the modern RAF copes with

1:06:37 > 1:06:42the conflicting demands of using air power and avoiding civilian casualties.

1:06:48 > 1:06:53To get to the squadron base in Kandahar, I have fly there by night.

1:06:53 > 1:06:55This is to avoid a Taliban attack on our plane.

1:06:56 > 1:06:58I've got a full set of body armour on.

1:06:58 > 1:07:02Obviously we're in a combat zone at the moment, so, yeah, we've got

1:07:02 > 1:07:06to protect ourselves from anything that could get fired up at us.

1:07:07 > 1:07:10It's four years since I've been with my old squadron,

1:07:10 > 1:07:12so I'm looking forward to getting there

1:07:12 > 1:07:15with a mixture of excitement and trepidation.

1:07:19 > 1:07:23We're making the journey in a blacked out Hercules.

1:07:23 > 1:07:27Just before we arrived, a rocket was launched into the Kandahar base.

1:07:31 > 1:07:34This reminds me of what those young bomber crews experienced

1:07:34 > 1:07:36setting off on a night mission, 70 years ago.

1:07:50 > 1:07:54In World War Two, a thousand bombers would set out on a mission.

1:07:54 > 1:07:58Today, the RAF is using a detachment of just eight

1:07:58 > 1:08:00supersonic Tornados to achieve its aims.

1:08:02 > 1:08:06I mean, my experiences from Iraq are pretty similar to this operation really,

1:08:06 > 1:08:08it's a similar sort of size.

1:08:08 > 1:08:13But it's still nothing on the scale of World War Two.

1:08:13 > 1:08:16I mean, you're talking over 100,000 people flying in World War Two.

1:08:18 > 1:08:23The coalition is in the process of handing over power to the Afghan government.

1:08:23 > 1:08:26The highly political situation could hardly be more sensitive,

1:08:26 > 1:08:29and the last thing they can afford is to inflict any civilian casualties.

1:08:32 > 1:08:37But, fortunately, modern planes are much more flexible than the Lancaster of 70 years ago.

1:08:37 > 1:08:42They can perform a variety of roles that range from attacking the enemy

1:08:42 > 1:08:45to identifying improvised explosive devices hidden in the ground.

1:08:50 > 1:08:55Wing Commander Keith Taylor is the current 617 Squadron Commander.

1:08:55 > 1:08:58He's at pains to show how he is using the latest technology to avoid collateral damage.

1:09:03 > 1:09:06Before he even considers using a weapon to support forces on the ground,

1:09:06 > 1:09:10he'll intimidate the enemy first with a low-level fly past.

1:09:12 > 1:09:16I did a show of force, and, you know, we pulled up afterwards,

1:09:16 > 1:09:20back into the wheel, and asked the ground commander if we'd met his intent.

1:09:20 > 1:09:24And his words were, yes, you know, there was a bit of a situation developing down here,

1:09:24 > 1:09:29and I just wanted to show, you know, the bad guys that my dog was bigger than his dog.

1:09:30 > 1:09:34If that fails, only then will he reach for his range of precision weapons,

1:09:34 > 1:09:39from heavy cannon to guided missiles and bombs.

1:09:39 > 1:09:41And to help the crews make the right decision,

1:09:41 > 1:09:43they are also using some of the world's most powerful cameras,

1:09:43 > 1:09:46in what's known as the lightning pod.

1:09:47 > 1:09:49So you can, I mean you basically can, even up at sort of 15,

1:09:49 > 1:09:5220,000 feet, you can pick out an individual person.

1:09:52 > 1:09:54Absolutely, yeah, you can pick out people.

1:09:54 > 1:09:56You know, we can really get up close and, in some situations,

1:09:56 > 1:10:01identify whether or not the guys are carrying weapons or not.

1:10:04 > 1:10:08On the current tour, the Squadron has flown hundreds of missions deterring insurgents,

1:10:08 > 1:10:10without dropping a single bomb.

1:10:17 > 1:10:20All this makes you realise what a blunt but effective instrument Bomber Command was

1:10:20 > 1:10:22for the first years of the war.

1:10:26 > 1:10:31But in 1944, Churchill wanted to use the bombers differently.

1:10:31 > 1:10:35He felt they were now capable of a much more precise role.

1:10:37 > 1:10:41In the build up to D-Day, he wanted Harris to move from bombing German cities

1:10:41 > 1:10:45to hitting specific communication and transport targets.

1:10:47 > 1:10:52Bomber Command had made huge advances in the last two years of total war.

1:10:52 > 1:10:56It had become the most destructive force in history.

1:10:56 > 1:11:01But it was now more than capable of carrying out this new task of precision bombing.

1:11:04 > 1:11:05The switch to new methods,

1:11:05 > 1:11:08it was now safer to fly in daylight,

1:11:08 > 1:11:09so some of the raids

1:11:09 > 1:11:10took place in daylight,

1:11:10 > 1:11:12was not welcome to Harris.

1:11:12 > 1:11:15He still stuck to his doctrine that the way to win the war

1:11:15 > 1:11:19was to flatten as many German cities as possible.

1:11:19 > 1:11:23So he put up quite a strong rear guard action, as only he could,

1:11:23 > 1:11:28against a move that everyone else seemed to think was the right one.

1:11:28 > 1:11:32Bomber Command had been a very blunt instrument indeed.

1:11:32 > 1:11:36At this stage in the war, it's now becoming a surgical instrument,

1:11:36 > 1:11:42something that is capable of carrying out applied violence in a very precise way.

1:11:47 > 1:11:50My old squadron, the Dambusters, was pivotal in developing these new tactics.

1:11:53 > 1:11:57They were formed in 1943 to attack the dams of the Ruhr Valley,

1:11:57 > 1:12:00using inventor Barnes Wallis's revolutionary bouncing bomb.

1:12:05 > 1:12:10In 1944, they undertook perhaps the most audacious precision raid of the war.

1:12:13 > 1:12:17We've come to the squadron's former officer's mess, now the Petwood Hotel,

1:12:17 > 1:12:22to meet Squadron Leader Tony Iveson to talk about his part in the raid.

1:12:24 > 1:12:27The Tirpitz was the largest remaining German battleship.

1:12:30 > 1:12:33She represented the most powerful single threat to Allied shipping,

1:12:33 > 1:12:36and it became a British obsession to sink her.

1:12:38 > 1:12:43She was sheltering in the safe haven of the Norwegian Fjords, almost out of range.

1:12:45 > 1:12:49They adapted the Lancaster with more powerful engines,

1:12:49 > 1:12:52and took out the mid-upper turret and the front guns,

1:12:52 > 1:12:59and lots of other heavy stuff, including the armour plating behind my seat.

1:12:59 > 1:13:04The Lancaster could then reach Tromso from northern Scotland,

1:13:04 > 1:13:06which was about, well, it turned out to be

1:13:06 > 1:13:08a twelve and a half hour flight.

1:13:11 > 1:13:13The bomb chosen to sink the Tirpitz

1:13:13 > 1:13:18was the latest Barnes Wallis wonder weapon. The 12,000 lbs "Tallboy".

1:13:18 > 1:13:21We lined up for the run in.

1:13:22 > 1:13:27And the first nine bombs of 617 Squadron went down in 90 seconds.

1:13:27 > 1:13:30So, had you been standing on Tirpitz,

1:13:30 > 1:13:33you had nine five ton bombs arriving,

1:13:33 > 1:13:35through the speed of sound on the way down.

1:13:35 > 1:13:39And there were two direct hits and three near misses.

1:13:39 > 1:13:45And then the 56,000 ton battleship was doomed from that moment.

1:13:45 > 1:13:50- COMMENTARY:- The ship still firing as the bomb bursts flash and gleam.

1:13:50 > 1:13:53In the smoke of giant explosions, the Tirpitz capsizes and sinks.

1:14:00 > 1:14:04It was an astonishing demonstration of how far Bomber Command had come.

1:14:04 > 1:14:09And it had been achieved with the mighty Lancaster.

1:14:09 > 1:14:13Today is my chance to fly it.

1:14:16 > 1:14:19I think for me, as a member of 617 Squadron,

1:14:19 > 1:14:22it's probably the greatest privilege that you could ever get,

1:14:22 > 1:14:28to fly in a Lancaster, and obviously it's the only one that's left in the UK.

1:14:29 > 1:14:34But the fact that I'm going to be able to do it with Ewan on board as well is really incredible,

1:14:34 > 1:14:37that both of us are going to be able to experience this at the same time,

1:14:37 > 1:14:40and that's what it was all about, it was about being a crew,

1:14:40 > 1:14:44it was about that, that band of brothers kind of feeling,

1:14:44 > 1:14:50so to do it with the person that you feel the closest to is really quite something.

1:14:53 > 1:14:57It's as iconic, the Lancaster, as the Spitfire was.

1:14:57 > 1:15:03The Spitfires were fighting one against one in the air against the enemy.

1:15:03 > 1:15:08And the Lancaster, you know, it's much more complicated than that.

1:15:08 > 1:15:13They were bombing towns and cities, and over the week that we've been doing this,

1:15:13 > 1:15:16the time that we've been doing this has been, you know,

1:15:16 > 1:15:19I've been getting more and more of a sense of how complicated that is.

1:15:23 > 1:15:26The last flying Lancaster is so precious

1:15:26 > 1:15:31that the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight will only take her up in ideal conditions.

1:15:31 > 1:15:33So it's great that the weather is perfect.

1:15:36 > 1:15:39Can't believe you arranged a piper, that's pretty good!

1:15:39 > 1:15:43You've got to remember that this is a war machine, really,

1:15:43 > 1:15:48and people went to war in it, and some, a lot of them didn't come back, so...

1:15:48 > 1:15:52Cor, the pipes make you feel quite emotional as well, don't they, yeah?

1:15:52 > 1:15:54Very nice. Nice touch, that.

1:15:54 > 1:15:58A large crowd, including some of the veterans,

1:15:58 > 1:16:03is here to see the Lancaster on one of the few occasions in the year she takes to the air.

1:16:04 > 1:16:07- This is your end of the aircraft, wasn't it?- That's right.

1:16:07 > 1:16:10Then when we got the word to go, up the ladder.

1:16:11 > 1:16:15- And then I used to turn to the left. - Yeah.

1:16:15 > 1:16:17Back in, slide myself into there.

1:16:17 > 1:16:21- Check the rotation of the turret, once the engines had started.- Yeah.

1:16:21 > 1:16:22Just check everything through.

1:16:22 > 1:16:27Anyone who says he's not afraid is not a human being.

1:16:27 > 1:16:32And the worst period I felt was before a flight, when we knew where we were going,

1:16:32 > 1:16:36and you had the hours getting ready, and you couldn't stop this churning around over your mind,

1:16:36 > 1:16:42but once you were in the aeroplane you had a job to do, and it was a different situation,

1:16:42 > 1:16:45and she was a beautiful aeroplane,

1:16:45 > 1:16:51and you, as a pilot, will understand how thrilling it is to handle such a big machine on take off,

1:16:51 > 1:16:53and feel her ready just to...

1:16:53 > 1:16:58Yes, flying was still, even in those days, exciting.

1:16:58 > 1:17:01Did you shake hands, before you got on, with each other or not?

1:17:01 > 1:17:03Was there none of that sort of thing?

1:17:03 > 1:17:07No, the crew would, the crew would piss on that wheel, but...

1:17:07 > 1:17:10We would do that, but there's just too many people standing around watching,

1:17:10 > 1:17:12otherwise we would do that, we would do that very thing.

1:17:12 > 1:17:14- Thank you very much though.- Yeah, good luck to you.- Brilliant.

1:17:14 > 1:17:16- Yeah, cheers.- Enjoy that trip.

1:17:16 > 1:17:18- Yeah. Thank you very much indeed. - Thank you very much, thank you.

1:17:18 > 1:17:20- You enjoy that trip. I'm sure you will.- Thank you.

1:17:39 > 1:17:44INAUDIBLE RADIO CHATTER

1:18:00 > 1:18:04Ah, it's an amazing feeling. Exhilarating, as the tail lifts.

1:18:07 > 1:18:1070 knots. 80 knots.

1:18:14 > 1:18:19Air brakes, air brakes off, feel that breeze.

1:18:20 > 1:18:22Easy level travelling.

1:18:23 > 1:18:25- Travelling left.- And right.

1:18:40 > 1:18:42Colin up front, now.

1:18:57 > 1:19:01And then it's the moment I've been waiting for.

1:19:01 > 1:19:03I'm handed the controls.

1:19:05 > 1:19:09I'm piloting the RAF's only flying Lancaster.

1:19:09 > 1:19:12And we're just coming up on the left hand side. Is that what you want?

1:19:30 > 1:19:33OK, Ewan's in position. Ewan, you all right in the nose? Thank you, yeah.

1:19:35 > 1:19:38And I'm in the nose of the Lancaster with my brother at the controls.

1:19:38 > 1:19:40What a moment.

1:19:44 > 1:19:47Unbelievable view, isn't it? Fantastic visibility up here.

1:19:49 > 1:19:53We're flying in the Lincolnshire skies that, 70 years ago,

1:19:53 > 1:19:56would have been full of hundreds of bombers about to head off to Germany,

1:19:56 > 1:20:01containing thousands of nervous young men, some who would never come back.

1:20:09 > 1:20:13Then, all too soon, I have to hand back the controls.

1:20:13 > 1:20:14You have control?

1:20:37 > 1:20:40We buzz the crowd below, and then it's time to land.

1:21:08 > 1:21:13The last flying Lancaster in Britain, one of the 7,000 or so

1:21:13 > 1:21:18that flew 156,000 sorties, is safely back on the ground.

1:21:26 > 1:21:28Don't fall out!

1:21:29 > 1:21:31That was unbelievable.

1:21:31 > 1:21:34That was really, properly amazing. Properly amazing.

1:21:34 > 1:21:36It was all kind of angles that I've never seen before in my life,

1:21:36 > 1:21:40taking off from there was just extraordinary, because you see the whole of the wings,

1:21:40 > 1:21:43watch all the four engines starting up in front of you.

1:21:43 > 1:21:46I went through to the front, there's a view I've never seen before,

1:21:46 > 1:21:50like lying on my belly looking down, out at the ground, and the sky,

1:21:50 > 1:21:54and an experience that you can't imagine. Well done.

1:21:54 > 1:21:57Well done. That was really good flying, Colin. Really good flying.

1:22:00 > 1:22:05The Lancaster was a brilliant plane, but it was still a devastating weapon of war.

1:22:06 > 1:22:11And nearly 800 of them took part in the raid in 1945

1:22:11 > 1:22:14that defined how some have judged Bomber Command ever since.

1:22:18 > 1:22:22The D-Day invasion had led to a combined push by land and air forces from the west.

1:22:23 > 1:22:26The Russians, too, were pressing from the east.

1:22:29 > 1:22:34Stalin called on the western allies to help clear the way for the Red Army.

1:22:34 > 1:22:40So, Winston Churchill agreed to the last great bomber offensive of the war.

1:22:40 > 1:22:42The one that everyone remembers.

1:22:43 > 1:22:44The irony is that

1:22:44 > 1:22:47when Bomber Command was finally able to

1:22:47 > 1:22:50do what it had always been trying to do,

1:22:50 > 1:22:53trying to do it had lost a lot of its sense.

1:22:54 > 1:22:57But, Harris being Harris, he carried on.

1:22:58 > 1:23:03And one can say that with Dresden, it turned out to be a city too far.

1:23:05 > 1:23:11In February 1945, the Allies unleashed Operation Thunderclap on the city of Dresden.

1:23:12 > 1:23:14- COMMENTARY:- Dresden, the capital of Saxony,

1:23:14 > 1:23:18becomes a fantasy of the destructive pyrotechnics of the air war.

1:23:20 > 1:23:25The city was a railway hub through which German troops travelled to the Eastern Front.

1:23:25 > 1:23:30But it was also packed with a million refugees, escaping the Russian onslaught.

1:23:35 > 1:23:40The bombing was so devastating that it whipped up another firestorm.

1:23:44 > 1:23:46It killed 25,000 people.

1:23:52 > 1:23:56Churchill had approved the plan, but within weeks he had changed his tune,

1:23:56 > 1:23:58perhaps with an eye to the imminent peace.

1:24:00 > 1:24:03"The destruction of Dresden remains a serious

1:24:03 > 1:24:08"query against the conduct of the Allied bombing."

1:24:08 > 1:24:09Winston Churchill, 1945.

1:24:12 > 1:24:15Harris was appalled by Churchill's comments.

1:24:15 > 1:24:18To his dying day, he defended the policy of area bombing.

1:24:21 > 1:24:22Harris had been

1:24:22 > 1:24:23an outstanding leader.

1:24:23 > 1:24:25He motivated his men,

1:24:25 > 1:24:26he did what he was told

1:24:26 > 1:24:27very effectively.

1:24:27 > 1:24:30But by the end of the war, it has to be said,

1:24:30 > 1:24:32he was wrong to persist in this notion

1:24:32 > 1:24:35that they should carry on battering German cities when the

1:24:35 > 1:24:37war was obviously won, it was doing no good,

1:24:37 > 1:24:38in fact it was doing harm.

1:24:40 > 1:24:45At the end of the war in Europe, on May 13th, 1945,

1:24:45 > 1:24:49Winston Churchill went on the radio to thank our armed forces.

1:24:49 > 1:24:53He chose not to mention Bomber Command at all.

1:24:57 > 1:24:59I thought we got a rough deal.

1:24:59 > 1:25:03Not so much us, although they didn't give us a medal,

1:25:03 > 1:25:06but that's only a little trinket, really.

1:25:08 > 1:25:10But I thought the treatment that Bomber Harris got

1:25:10 > 1:25:14was absolutely, utterly disgraceful,

1:25:14 > 1:25:18because he was only carrying out the orders of Churchill.

1:25:20 > 1:25:26Harris's vision of a war won by heavy bombers alone never came to pass.

1:25:26 > 1:25:30German war industry was damaged, yet never collapsed.

1:25:31 > 1:25:37But a million troops, and thousands of anti-aircraft guns, were pinned down defending the Reich.

1:25:37 > 1:25:42For those who fought in the campaign, there are few doubts about its value.

1:25:42 > 1:25:48Total war is total war, and we were involved in total war.

1:25:48 > 1:25:51We were involved in fighting for our lives.

1:25:51 > 1:25:56And Bomber Command was the only force that could take the war to Germany for four long years.

1:25:56 > 1:26:00They started it. They were, what did they do?

1:26:00 > 1:26:03Auschwitz and all these places, I mean, Christ Almighty,

1:26:03 > 1:26:07they're the ones that started the bloody war, we didn't.

1:26:07 > 1:26:12And, well we finished it off, Germans went off with their tails between their legs.

1:26:12 > 1:26:15I felt badly about it, in many respects, and yet, you know,

1:26:15 > 1:26:20I mean, the war doesn't have Marquis of Queensbury rules.

1:26:20 > 1:26:22And, of course, immediately after the war,

1:26:22 > 1:26:25we got all the screen of what had happened

1:26:25 > 1:26:28in the concentration camps, and the extermination camps,

1:26:28 > 1:26:32and I suppose, you know, it rather hardens one's heart.

1:26:34 > 1:26:38Today, the controversy around the bombing campaign of World War Two still remains.

1:26:42 > 1:26:47Only in the summer of 2012, nearly 70 years after the war,

1:26:47 > 1:26:50will there be a memorial in London

1:26:50 > 1:26:53to honour the 125,000 men of Bomber Command.

1:26:58 > 1:27:04It's very sad that the 55,500 young men in Bomber Command

1:27:04 > 1:27:08who were killed have never been recognised until now,

1:27:08 > 1:27:15which is too late in my view, it's a pity, but it is a little late.

1:27:15 > 1:27:19But, thank goodness, a memorial is now going to be put up for them.

1:27:28 > 1:27:30I knew when we started this project

1:27:30 > 1:27:34that it was going to be a really difficult journey in places, and it has been difficult.

1:27:34 > 1:27:40You know, our visit to Hamburg has raised some questions in my mind.

1:27:41 > 1:27:47But what this journey has taught me is that these very young men who joined Bomber Command

1:27:47 > 1:27:51joined the only force that was taking the fight to Germany.

1:27:55 > 1:28:00What has struck me is how young they were, and what a terrible price they paid.

1:28:01 > 1:28:04Almost beyond any of the controversy,

1:28:04 > 1:28:07I'm also unmoved in my feelings about the men who flew in those planes.

1:28:07 > 1:28:11Because they were demonstrating such unbelievable bravery to

1:28:11 > 1:28:16get in those bomber planes, night after night after night after night,

1:28:16 > 1:28:20twelve hour missions, freezing cold, cramped, frightened,

1:28:20 > 1:28:24and the fact that they would lose friends and they would still get back in the planes.

1:28:24 > 1:28:26So I haven't changed my mind about them,

1:28:26 > 1:28:29other than they're the heroes that I always thought that they were.

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