Invisible Campaigns

Aerial mining by RAF Bomber Command was a vital part of the Allied war effort – claiming far more tonnage of Axis shipping destroyed than direct attack by either Coastal or Bomber Command itself. Minelaying operations commenced in April 1940 and expanded dramatically as the war progressed, yet today this vital campaign and its wide-ranging achievements against Axis merchant vessels, Kriegsmarine ships and U-boats are virtually unknown.

Invisible Campaigns, based on Air Ministry and Admiralty archival material, together with squadron records, veteran accounts and logbooks as well as contemporary publications and press releases, provides the most detailed account of Bomber Command’s minelaying operations and their effects ever written.

Historian Jane Gulliford Lowes looks at the aims of the campaign and how it was implemented, together with the measure of its success and how it compared against the mining operations implemented by the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine. The role of Arthur ‘Bomber’ Harris in overseeing minelaying operations is assessed and the experiences of the men who delivered the campaign, particularly the hazards they faced, are explored.

Invisible Campaigns sheds new light on a little-discussed but important and ultimately highly successful aspect of Bomber Command and is a must-read for anyone interested the RAF’s in wartime bombing operations.