Fighters ready to confront threat

Sabres from No. 76 Squadron in a hangar at Darwin during Operation Handover in late 1964. Photo by David Wilson

Twenty-two years after it was bombed by the Japanese, Darwin was thought to be under threat again - this time from the Indonesians - which led to Operation Handover, a largely unknown footnote to the Indonesian Confrontation between 1962-66, as David Wilson recounts

IN September 1964, for the only time since 1945, a RAAF fighter squadron was operationally deployed in harm's way on Australian soil.

This little known deployment of Air Force formations within continental Australia was linked to contingency plans to neutralise Indonesian air strikes against Malaysian targets.

It is a footnote to the history of Australia's involvement in the Confrontation between Malaysia and Indonesia after the creation of the Federation of Malaysia - incorporating Malaya, Singapore and British territories in Borneo - on September 16, 1963.

A contingency plan prepared in January 1964, Operation Handover was prepared to protect Darwin from possible air attack by Russian-built Ilyushin IL 28 medium bombers operated by the Indonesian Air Force (AURI) from bases at Koepang, West Timor, and Eastern Java. In parallel, it was planned to use No. 82 Wing Canberra bombers to conduct strike/reconnaissance operations from Darwin.

The planned first phase of operations under Handover was to secure the Darwin base. It was intended to deploy two squadrons (32 Sabre aircraft) from No. 81 Wing at Williamtown.

This force was to be supported by four Neptune maritime patrol aircraft and Hercules, Dakota and Caribou transports.

An Iroquois helicopter deployed by No. 9 Squadron from Fairbairn was to supply a search and rescue capability.

Handover would be implemented if AURI aircraft struck at targets in Malaysia and the Royal Air Force response, Plan Addington (V-Bomber strikes on Indonesia targets), put into action. Darwin would be one of the bases from which Vulcan bombers would operate.

The landing of Indonesian paratroops in northern Johore on September 2, 1964, was interpreted as an escalation of the Indonesian threat. As a result the Australian Cabinet decided to deploy 16 armed Sabres and 170 support personnel from No. 76 Squadron and No. 481 (Maintenance) Squadron, commanded by Wing Commander G.R Harvey, to Darwin.

Many of the junior officers deployed were later promoted to air rank - Pilot Officer (Air Marshal) Doug Riding, Flying Officer (Air Commodore) I.H. Whisker and Flying Officer (Air Commodore) J.B MacNaughton, for example.

The aircraft arrived during the afternoon of September 8 and were on constant, and various levels, of alert.

The original requirement was for two Sabres to be on five-minute alert and four at 15-minute readiness.

This was reduced to four aircraft on September 18 and then to two on September 22. These requirements remained in force until October 17 when the commitment was again reduced to two aircraft on 15-minute daylight alert.

The improvement in the international situation led to the reduction in the fighter force to eight aircraft on October 20.

An Air Defence Control Centre was activated at the rear of the No. 2 Control and Reporting Unit operations room.

Three Air Force officers - Group Captain A.F. Mather, Officer Commanding No. 81 wing, who acted as the Area Air Defence Commander; Wing Commander W. F. Waldock, Commanding Officer No. 2 Control and Reporting Unit; and Flying Officer R. Budd, the No. 81 Wing Intelligence Officer - manned this facility.

Provision was made for representatives of the Army, Navy, Department of Civil Aviation and the Civil Defence Organisation. Only one interception was made by the Darwin detachment - a Canberra bomber from No. 1 Operational Conversion Unit on September 11.

However, training missions that included practice interceptions, air-to-ground gunnery, aircraft combat manoeuvres, dive bombing, high/low strikes, night ground control interceptions and ground control approach training were flown in parallel with the readiness commitments.

There were serious shortcomings in the active and passive defensive measures then in place at Darwin. The Air Force had been placed on alert in isolation.

Naval coast watch stations remained inactive, and the Army light anti-aircraft battery, a vital element in the point defence of the airfield and other essential facilities, deployed to Darwin but remained non-operational.

The inability of the radar operated by No. 2 Control and Reporting Unit to track aircraft flying at low level was well known.

Although a successful trial of radar fitted to Neptune aircraft had been made during a previous air defence exercise, this rudimentary airborne early warning system was not utilised to compensate for the deficiency of the ground radar surveillance equipment.

RAAF Base Darwin in 1964 was sadly lacking in passive defence measures. Aircraft at the newly constructed operational readiness facility made excellent targets for strafing and rocketing.

The only dispersal areas available were constructed during World War II and could, with a little effort, be converted into blast-proof pens.

However, the bays and taxiways were unsealed and unsuitable for the operation of aircraft; in the wet season they would be completely inaccessible. Personnel, too, were poorly protected.

There were no slit trenches or overhead shelter, and the support areas were located in central, and conspicuous, buildings such as Hangar 172 that still showed damage from the Japanese raids of 1942.

The eight aircraft that remained in Darwin after the decrease in No. 76 Squadron's strength on October 20 later became the No. 81 Wing Detachment, and ensured a fighter presence in the north. No. 75 Squadron assumed this role when it relocated from Butterworth to Darwin in 1983 and in its subsequent move to Tindal in 1988.

It must be conceded that the probability of actual combat, dependent as it was on the activation of Plan Addington and the current international political climate, was minuscule, but this still does not detract from the fact that the squadron was deployed for war.

• David Wilson is the Executive Officer, RAAF Historical Records, Aerospace Centre.

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