Prologue

It was suggested to me some years ago by one of the Curators at the Royal Air Force Museum at Hendon that I should record my experiences in the RAF. He emphasised that the 1950s period of the Cold War would never appear in the annals of the RAF unless people like me wrote down everything we could remember. There is no official RAF history of this period. After much consideration and thought, bearing in mind both what had been suggested to me, and my fading memory, I eventually decided, before it was too late, to record what I could. What follows is the result.
I have set out my narrative from an entirely personal viewpoint, telling what happened to me and what I did, mostly from memory yet supported by entries recorded in my two Log Books. Some additional dates, however, were extracted from official service documents relating to my first tour in Germany.
I apologise in advance for any errors, both of fact and time, which I may have made, as everything I have written about dates back to half a century ago.
I have presented my experiences in what I hope will be regarded as a logical format, although several sets of events did run concurrently and have therefore had to be described in separate chapters. This is particularly the case in Part Three.
Undoubtedly there will be inaccuracies. Please excuse me for these, but I thought it better to record what I could recollect rather than nothing at all. There are also some outspoken views expressed, as well as incidents of an extremely vulgar nature, for this is the way life was. Times change, and I hope these incidents do not offend. They were typical of parts of Service life and behaviour in a mostly all male environment.
To readers who can recall some of the happenings of which I tell, please remember that in a very few years there will only be people reading this who are younger (as there are today) who have never experienced what we did, and who have very little concept of what Service life was like. This is why I have explained some things more fully than if they were being read solely by ex-RAF personnel of my age.
To my critics, and there will probably be many, I say this: None of us knows everything; we all make mistakes, therefore if you know better or more than me, don't contact me and expect a rewrite. That won't happen. Write your own stories yourselves and lodge them in appropriate places, as have I. Only by your contributions can future generations have a wider view of the 1950s Cold War as far as it concerned those of us in the Royal Air Force serving as a part of the 2nd Allied Tactical Air Force in Germany.
Ken B. Senar

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