Concorde for the RAF? (Zombie Thread from 2006)

A good few years ago I was in the Concorde archive legitimately looking for something but couldn’t resist from typing ‘Military Concorde’ into the search. Only two documents came up;- the first dated 1970, was a study on how much of military value could be learnt by the Chinese if they bought a few, but the second dated 1974, was a proposal to the RAF for military versions. This report was about 40 pages and detailed 3 potential versions;- The first was a transport version , a drawing shows a swing nose and landrovers driving down a long ramp. This proposal was covered by just 2 of the 40 pages and really had very little detail. The next is a supersonic strike aircraft. A drawing shows 3 nuclear strike missiles (looking a bit like AGM-69 SRAM’s) within the fuselage launched on angled tubes exiting the fuselage underside. This proposal runs to about 10 pages. There’s quite a bit of info on mission profile, tactical equipment fit etc. The third proposal is for a tactical recon version. This occupies the majority of the report. Lots of info on camera / radar / eves dropping kit / decoys / ECM mission profiles etc. I would suggest the number of pages in the report probably represents the relative interest from the customer.

Good stuff, all history now.

Well its taken me nearly 8 years after the event to do so, but nevertheless thanks Rlangham for posting that, that’s exactly what I was thinking of :-).

I’ve seen images in 2 tone green/grey

Reading all this bought back memories of reading a comic, must been late 70’s early 80’s. It was a “Victor” or “Warlord” (anybody else my age!?) anyhow, there was a write up on how a global crisis could unfold. Concorde would have been (according to the comic) impressed into service as SST courier planes flying diplomats around the world. They had one painted up in the grey/green wrap around similar to V-bombers of the time.

Without reading all of this strange thread, I can see many reasons against a military Concorde, I can’t see how range would have been a problem though, it could fly faster for longer than any military type of the time, and as been suggested, this would be increased by flying subsonic for some of its mission.
A Skybolt armed Concorde dosen’t seem a bad idea though.
Cannot sea any reason why Transport Command would even entertain the idea of a Concorde.

I would have loved to see one visit Washington in full Queens flight colours. Put that rather vulgar Boeing in the shade a touch eh 😎
Be lucky
David
British by birth
English by the grace of god
Non EU by choice.

Someone was asking in the thread about an RAF Transport Command liveried Concorde, here’s one i’ve just knocked up for some work i’m doing. Not fantastic quality but it gives you a rough idea! Also looking for more information as to whether there were any plans to acquire Concorde for RAF Transport Command

UK Military Supersonic Transport.

In 1953 stainless steel and straight wings were seen as basis for cruise >M2.2, Bristol T.188 funded as demo, Avro 730 as recce, later bomber. In 1954 ex-GW Morien Morgan became DD/RAE and knew 60,000 ft. would not be a good place for Bomber Command by c.1962.

Slender deltas and aluminium seemed better, yet at the affordable M2.2, vulnerable even to (to be Lightning) interception. The ledger name “Transport Aircraft” was used to cover RAE/industry discussions from 1956, because Avro 730 faced deletion: what might be “transported” remained to be seen. By 1959 MoS’ natter forum had reached the point that real money would be needed to explore “thick” or “thin” wings. That could not come from the military research budget, because Deterrence was to be on (to be) Skybolt ALBM on Phase 6 Vulcan and then Blue Streak IRBM; France was enhancing Mirage to deliver its A-Bomb and was exploring an IRBM follow-on. ONERA, too, settled on slender deltas to carry something far, fast. De Gaulle had flexible budget in his nationalised, nationalistic system to “show” the Anglos that Caravelle was no one-off, but the next step would have been very costly.

PM Macmillan had shared PM Eden’s disdain of the Roman Club, opening in 1957: all Brits assumed that it would close without our civilising presence. By 1959 we knew we had missed a trick. Mac first thought to put Blue Steel on Mirage IV as a ticket into the Club, then to pool Yellow Sun H-Bomb, but US, owning relevant data, objected. So as 1961 unfolded the notion grew that we could buy entry to EEC with Blue Streak as a civil payload launcher (to be ELDO Europa), and with a joint SST.

After CDG blackballed UK from the Club, PM Wilson tried but failed to chop it. We did get out of “futile” space. If Churchill/Eden had taken UK into Iron&Steel Community and EEC in 1953/54, UK would not in 1959 have pursued an SST on a basis of 100% State funding of solo Study and then joint R&D. Maybe 50% Launch Aid would have been offered by Minister of Aviation Sandys, as he did for (to be) VC10/Trident/1-11, but the owners of BAC would never have raised their 50%.

This page is a real smack in the face of far more likely ‘might-have-been’. What a list!

http://www.concordesst.com/history/orders.html

The best that could be said for this concept now is that it would make a good basis for a British version of those interminable ‘Flight Of The Old Dog’ novels featuring a modified super B52 doing heroic stuff crewed by sky-gods of unlimited ability.

Moggy

…The CIA also always shared what they knew with SIS, and in turn one would imagine the RAF would also benefit…

😀 You are kidding, right?

Given the CIA have demonstrated a basic inability to inform their own government of fact rather than conjecture, and given the fact that the US have regarded the Brits as ‘leaky’ and not fully trusted at times (with varying justification), for a give value of ‘share’ and ‘knew’ – that’s still not supportable even outside the classified world!

Kind of like a ‘Transport Command’ liveried Concorde, or a bomber. It’s fun speculation…

With all this shouting about range, one is presuming a return mission. This wasn’t always in the Cold War thinking at the time for the V’s.

Hi Super Nimrod

I hear what you are saying about cutting back on the Concordes speed to save fuel!

I take it your name is due to your like of the Nimrod MP aircraft yes?

Well why not like the Nimrod, shut down (put into minimal thrust) one or two of its engines while in transit to Eastern Europe. Then when in range of predicted enemy intercrptor range, light all four engines up and go supersonic into the target!

Or what about what the French did to max their Mirage IV bombers range!
Use another Mirage IV (or in this case another Concorde) as a refuelling aircraft on the way to its target (extrem and costly I know, but so is nuclear war!)

What would the Concordes low-altitude, high speed handling have been like?
For like the American’s the Bomber Concorde would still have had to have gone high-speed, low-altitude to survive modern Soviet Air Defences.

My idea of a bomber version of the Concorde would have a min of two internal weapons bays each armed with 4-round rotary launchers for a total of 8 x AGM-69A SRAM’s, and with the forward fuselage and rear fuselage equiped with built in fuel tanks.
Added to this a comprehensive defensive and offensive Electronic Warfare systems.

Well thats what I think would have made the ‘Bombcorde’

Regards
Pioneer

Would the range of a Concorde have been much greater than a Vulcan or Victor at that time ? Also if a concode flew part of its ‘mission’ subsonic was its range significantly increased ?

Best resource on Concorde on the net is here…

http://www.concordesst.com/.

The Old Airfix page on Battle Picture Weekly had a RAF Concorde as a modification project in one of its issues.

In short, concorde as a bomber would only have been practical if the target was in Western Europe ( assuming a UK basing).

Well the French do sometimes need putting in their place.

Moggy 😉

Concorde was considered as a bomber. It went a little further that the drawings in that RAF year book and the talk of “rolling back the iron Curtain”. I believe that certain provisions were made on Concorde 002 ( the one now at Yeovilton) to facilitate a demo conversion should the necessity have arisen. Perhaps somebody now at Yeovilton who can get access below the main cabin floor could confirm. If so, do contact me PM for further details.
99 Sqn RAF -(Brits in the late 60’s ) did put it about that they had been earmarked to have 5 RAF Concordes – how much of this was just to p*ss off “shiny” 10 with their VC7 Mk 2’s I don’t know.

According to Christopher Orlebar’s book “The Concorde Story” 6th edition page 192 there was supposed to have been a ‘B’ version of Concorde with various improvements, such as leading-edge slats, greater fuel capacity, extra engine compressor stage and no reheat with 25% greater range but the limited production run put pay to that. An order by Transport Command (and/or its French counterpart) for a transporter or by Strike Command for a strategic recce version might have extended the Concorde production run sufficiently for the improved version to go into production.

where can I find more details about this improved version?

Here’s mine…

Here’s a Concorde bomber (or Bomborde)
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i24/Archibaldlecter/Bomborde/101_0788.jpg

The B model would certainly have helped…

AS for the SR-71/ KC-135 relationship there are certain crucial differences.. the Sr used JP-7 fuel, not JP-5 as other USAF aircraft…and the booms were equiped with a secure ‘intercomm’ via hard wire to permit secure comms, remember this was prior to the frequency jumping radios..

The need to have the hardwired booms, keep the main refuelling tanks clear of JP-5 and the mod to the engines to allow the JP-7 to be burned by the tanker meant a dedicated fleet.

Concorde burns the same grade fuel as other aircraft and so this dedication would not be needed.. even if better comms were required.