LMF justified or not?

No, absolutely not, but it was a drastic measure to prevent the deterioration of morale.

Cees

In many ways LMF mirrored & replaced the Firing squads of WWI,but the effect was stronger on the individual affected,i.e. If you were shot,you would no longer suffer the stigma but your family would,whereas with LMF as it has already been pointed out the individual suffers.

That said,I agree that A, it was grossly unfair & B, it was drastic but prevented a trickle becoming a flood.

The Luftwaffe way during WW2…

An Iron Cross or a wooden one.Any LMF was dealt with swiftly…and savagely.

As I have stated on another site “Why were NCO Aircrew who were found guilty of LMF stripped of their rank and given the most menial jobs and Commisioned Officers that were found guilty of EXACTLY the same offence simply posted and did not loose their rank or privalages ???:confused: :confused:

For exactly the same reason that the DFM was awarded to NCOs and the DFC was awarded to Commissioned Officers and for exactly the same level of bravery. Seems pretty warped today, but that’s how it was.

As I have stated on another site “Why were NCO Aircrew who were found guilty of LMF stripped of their rank and given the most menial jobs and Commisioned Officers that were found guilty of EXACTLY the same offence simply posted and did not loose their rank or privalages ???:confused: :confused:

I’ve often thought that there’s a degree of misunderstanding here. It was rare for crews to operate ‘night after night’. Mostly, there were periods of inactivity between operations caused by the weather, the identification of a suitable target, aircraft availability and rotation between Squadrons within Groups and indeed crews within Squadrons.

I suspect it was at least partly the suspense of waiting between ops, for whatever reason, that exacerbated the potential for an airman to take the drastic step of being asked to be removed from operational flying.

Justification for branding someone with LMF? There isn’t one if we compare the issue of stress management and PTSD then to the way it is treated now. Their Airships obviously considered that allowing people to remove themselves from operational flying would open the floodgates for thousands to follow. Nowadays we pay people hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation for sustaining an RSI! Go figure?

Regards,

kev35

LMF

Many thanks for these most interesting /thoughtful responses i certainly wouldnt begin to understand what depths these men plumbed to go out and face the ultimate end night after night, never knowing if your number was up,or if you,d eat breakfast, imagine tucking into bacon and eggs then keeping it down with your stomach turning over (knowing it was all to do again tonight and tomorrow night if you came back) its interesting reading Arthur Smiths book “Halifax Crew” he was on ten squadron or “shiny Ten” & had a very bad bout of ops flying nerves after a close mate of his was killed in an accident close to base,his M.O didnt think he was genuine so branded him LMF or return to his crew ,his crew virtually sent him to coventry arguing that they had to fly so why shouldnt he? in the end he just had to grit his teeth and get on with it as it were,imagine todays youth coping with the stresses ,no helplines or social workers then!:cool: 😎

From my time in the RAF Police in Germany in the eighties; any aircrew that refused to fly their Jaguars on a one-way trip with a bucket of instant sunshine attached, were judged to have LMF, and we were under orders to force them back into the cockpit or shoot them!
Alternatively, if the jockey got a bit keen and wanted to taxi before he was cleared by us, we had to threaten to shoot out one of the Jag’s tyres or, as a last resort, chuck our trusty Sterlings down an air intake….happy days…….. 😮 😀

The way sterlings were made, I doubt that they would have made much of a difference!

Interesting topic this…

The threat of LMF was a means of preventing a breakdown of discipline of the masses, as alluded to earlier. It was probably the only way of stopping people quitting that the top brass had. Although a very cruel and crude method, it was quite effective and, if I may say so objectively, cynically clever.

The onus was placed wholly on the individual; the system thus played on fear (can I face humiliation?) and sensibilities (can I let the side down?). The RAF branded people LMF only when THEY had withdrawn themselves from Ops, not when the RAF deemed them unfit to continue and rested them. Quite crafty really. I too am not sure if there was any other way though.

From my time in the RAF Police in Germany in the eighties; any aircrew that refused to fly their Jaguars on a one-way trip with a bucket of instant sunshine attached, were judged to have LMF, and we were under orders to force them back into the cockpit or shoot them!
Alternatively, if the jockey got a bit keen and wanted to taxi before he was cleared by us, we had to threaten to shoot out one of the Jag’s tyres or, as a last resort, chuck our trusty Sterlings down an air intake….happy days…….. 😮 😀

That’s why I (and a lot of people I know) have a profound and deep respect for what these men did.:o
Every veteran I have met over the years and their numbers dwindle more and more as time goes by, have impressed me by their character and also admitting that they were scared stiff. Who wouldn’t be!!! Someone who would say not to be afraid was lying……. But they kept it under their hats. Talking about it was taboo.
I have some personal experience with post traumatic stress and to a very very very very small extent I know what they must have felt (and that hundreds of times over). They had a job to carry out and they did that, but against impossible odds. Not surprisingly that some cracked, but mental aid was nothing compared to what’s going on now with people coming back from war zones.

Chees

Cees

I agree something had to be done to stop any mass drop outs of aircrew but to call them LMF [Cowards] is just plain and simply wrong.
I am not certain i would want or could strap myself into a freezing death trap for 8 hours at a time every night knowing the last breathe taken may be my last breathe at all.
I would think that just wondering how your end will come would be frightening enough,will i burn,will i fall a huge distance fully concious,will i be dismembered and hours from help, [how many of us don’t like ladders or peering over the edge of a cliff].
I apply the same thoughts to those poor souls in WW1 who were tried for cowardice,wrong just wrong. 😡

There was never justification in branding some members of aircrew LMF,
although with the benefit of hindsight, we can probably understand why the authorities, or heirarchy, clamped down on crew members who showed outward signs of fear. The possibility of having more crew members shying off of duty due to the presence of one who is seen to be troubled, or showing hysteria could have been seen to open the floodgates. Whisking those affected off to Psychiatric units quickly was probably the only way they knew then of controlling what they thought might set off mass hysteria amongst the crews.

With the benefit of our cosy armchairs, we can understand both sides of the story. I for one dont know how these brave chaps plumbed the depths to find that courage to go night after night on raids. I have never been in a situation where every time I go to work, I know my life is in mortal danger. I for one dont know how I would react under that pressure day after day, especially as a volunteer.

It is so easy to have such a profound interest in air operations that many of us share, but how many of us could truly say we could cope, until we were faced with the same fears.

Therefore in my eyes, the Air Ministry were wrong to brand anyone LMF, it was the fact that no one understood what today we call Combat Stress Disorder or Post Traumatic Stress related incidents. As in all things , we are still learning unfortunately.

LMF Lack of Moral Fibre was this a fair method of dealing with aircrew cracking under the immense stress of endless nightly ops.:mad:

No, absolutely not, but it was a drastic measure to prevent the deterioration of morale.

Cees