England has long dreamed of doing away with Russia. But she always tried to do it with someone else's hands. All the 17th-19th centuries, the British persecuted the Turks on us. As a result, Russia fought with Turkey in the Russo-Turkish War of 1676-81, in the Russo-Turkish War of 1686-1700, in the Russo-Turkish War of 1710-13, in the Russo-Turkish War of 1735-39, in the Russo-Turkish War of 1768-74, in the Russian-Turkish war of 1787-91, in the Russian-Turkish war of 1806-12, and in the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-78. However, we directly encountered British troops only during the Crimean War and during the Allied military intervention during the Civil War. But the British were closest to a war with the Russians in the first months of World War II - between Hitler's attack on Poland and the defeat of France. After the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the British began to consider the Soviet Union an accomplice of Hitler and, therefore, their enemy.
Almost immediately after the start of the war between Germany and Poland, in which the USSR took part since September 17, 1939, the Anglo-French allies showed their attention to the Baku oil fields and the search for possible ways to disable them.
By the beginning of the Second World War, the Baku oil industry produced 80% of high-grade aviation gasoline, 90% of naphtha and kerosene, 96% of automotive oils from their total production in the USSR. The theoretical possibility of an air attack on Soviet oil fields was first considered as early as September 1939 by the liaison officer between the General Staff and the French Foreign Ministry, Lieutenant Colonel Paul de Villelume. And on October 10, French Finance Minister Paul Reynaud posed a specific question to him: is the French Air Force capable of "bombing oil development and oil refineries in the Caucasus from Syria." In Paris, it was meant that these plans should be carried out in close cooperation with the British. US Ambassador to Paris William C. Bullitt, who was, incidentally, at one time the first US Ambassador to the USSR, was also informed of these plans by the head of the French government, Edouard Daladier and other French politicians in connection with the signing of a mutual assistance treaty on October 19, 1939 between England, France and Turkey. He telegraphed to Washington about the discussion in Paris of the possibility of "bombing and destroying Baku." Although the French and the British coordinated their plans, the latter were not far behind them in the development of their similar projects.
On January 11, 1940, the British embassy in Moscow reported that the action in the Caucasus could "bring Russia to its knees in the shortest possible time," and the bombing of the Caucasian oil fields could inflict a "knockout blow" on the USSR.
On January 24, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff of England, General Edwin Ironside - the same one who headed the British mission in Arkhangelsk during the years of military intervention in Russia - presented to the military cabinet the memorandum "The main strategy of the war", where he indicated the following: "in defining our strategy in the current situation it will be the only correct decision to consider Russia and Germany as partners”. Ironside emphasized: “In my opinion, we will be able to provide effective assistance to Finland only if we attack Russia from as many directions as possible and, most importantly, strike at Baku, an oil production region, in order to cause a serious state crisis in Russia. ". Ironside was aware that such actions would inevitably lead the Western allies to war with the USSR, but in the current situation he considered it completely justified. The document emphasized the role of British aviation for the implementation of these plans, and in particular it was pointed out that “economically Russia is highly dependent in the conduct of the war on the supply of oil from Baku. This area is within the reach of long-range bombers, but on condition that they have the ability to fly over the territory of Turkey or Iran. " The question of the war with the USSR moved to the highest military-political level in the leadership of the Anglo-French bloc. On March 8, a very important event took place in the context of preparations for war with the Soviet Union, Great Britain and France. On that day, the British Chiefs of Staff submitted a report to the government entitled "The Military Consequences of the Military Actions Against Russia in 1940."
On March 20, 1940, in Aleppo (Syria), a meeting of representatives of the French and British commands in the Levant was held, at which it was noted that by June 1940 the construction of 20 airfields of the first category would be completed. On April 17, 1940, Weygand informed Gamelin that the preparation for the air strike would be completed by the end of June or the beginning of July.
On March 30 and April 5, 1940, the British made reconnaissance flights over the territory of the USSR. Shortly before sunrise on March 30, 1940, Lockheed 12A took off from the Habbaniyah base in southern Iraq and headed north-east. At the helm sat the best reconnaissance pilot of the Royal Air Force, Australian Sydney Cotton. The task assigned to the crew of four, commanded by Hugh McFale - Cotton's personal assistant - was to aerial reconnaissance of Soviet oil fields in Baku. At an altitude of 7000 meters, Lockheed circled over the capital of Soviet Azerbaijan. The shutters of automatic cameras clicked, and two crew members - photographers from the Royal Air Force - took additional pictures with manual cameras. Closer to noon - after 10 o'clock - the spy plane landed in Habbaniyah. Four days later, he took off again. This time he made a reconnaissance of the oil refineries in Batumi.
The date of the first bombing was set for July 1st. However, the plans of our future allies were destroyed by the German offensive on France. So, let's imagine that the Germans, for some reason, abandoned the ular in France or postponed it to a later date. Or this blow did not bring the Germans a quick victory, and the hostilities took on a positional character. How much real damage would the Anglo-French bombing have inflicted on the Soviet Union?
Everyone knows that the attempts of the British and Americans in 1942-44 to bomb the oil fields in Romania did not lead to the expected effect even when Germany was forced to remove all aircraft from Romania in order to make up for losses on the fronts and protect the German sky. The Romanian aviation, equipped with old French fighters, successfully fought against the naked fighters and bombers of the Allies. So, during the Tidal Wave operation - a massive raid on Ploiesti on August 1, 1943, of the 143 B-24s that took part in the raid, only 88 returned to the base.55 aircraft, that is, 38.4% of the total, were lost: 44 cars were shot down, and another 11, being damaged, landed in neutral Turkey and were interned along with the crews. In 1940, the British, and even more so the French Air Force were equipped with much less advanced aircraft than the B-24. The basis of the French long-range bomber aviation was the Farman-222 type aircraft, produced in 1932-38. They had a 320-kilometer top speed, and could easily be shot down by Soviet I-16 and I-153 fighters. The four-engined British Albatross DH.91, converted into a bomber from a transport aircraft, had somewhat better data. Its maximum speed of 362 km / h allowed him to get away from the I-15. However, with a bomb load, he could only develop 338 km / h, and would have been forced to drop bombs anywhere when meeting with Soviet fighters. British bombers of the Halifax type, created by Handley Page specifically for this task, were also supposed to bomb the Soviet oil fields, but their entry into the troops began only in November 1940.
But most importantly, the distance between the air bases and the targets of the strikes was such that the allies could not enjoy the support of fighters, which would force them to carry out raids only at night, which would make them extremely ineffective.
So the effectiveness of the possible bombing of the Soviet oil fields would be highly questionable.
