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ANNEX.
Draft Telegram from Chiefs of Staff to Joint Staff Mission.
63
The protection of our shipping in the Western Approaches during the coming Winter is causing us the greatest anxiety because our resources in long-range patrol aircraft are completely inadequate. We have sufficient short-range aircraft, which have proved the effectiveness of air escort as a deterrent to subinarine attack and have driven the enemy to operate mainly beyond their range.
For the zone 400 600 miles from our shores in which the enemy is likely to operate with greatly increasing force this Winter, we require at least 108 initial equipment Catalinas or
aircraft of equivalent range. We have at present only 37 Catalinas, and the expected deliveries from U. S. A. and Canada through April 1942 will not suffice to replace wastage, let alone expand this force. We are thus compelled to leave convoys without air protection for 85% of their time of passage through this zone.
We therefore ask that the U. S. Chiefs of Starf should give full and early consideration to this problem. from the broad viewpoint of the balance of strategical needs and should decide whether it would be expedient to divert, at least temporarily, further long-range aircraft or units to the Eastern Atlantic for a purpose so vitally important to the common cause.
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