Who Killed the TSR2?
SIR,—Mr Thorneycroft in his review of my book challenged one technical point and as Julian Amery raised the same point in his review perhaps you will allow me to clear it up. I suggested that Hound Dog should have been selected instead of Skybolt as it was cheaper, more accurate, it could extend the life of the V-bombers into the 'seventies and obviate the Nassau crisis involving Polaris. The former Ministers questioned my view that Hound Dog would have in- teracted on Blue Streak as Blue Streak had been can- celled in 1960 prior to the Skybolt decision.
However, the objection disappears when the chronology is studied in detail. Hound Dog was fly- ing in 1959 and a licence should have been bought as soon as those flights confirmed its great promise. So, I repeat, Hound Dog policy did interact on Blue Streak which would have had to have been cancelled a year earlier, as many of us suggested at the time. Mr Amery's point that Blue Steel was under con- sideration can similarly be disposed of as this system has nothing like Hound Dog's range nor does it have a decisive advantage in electronic cross-section
A question the former Ministers might have poser however was: how could one be sure that Howl. Dog, would have a long life? 1 suggest there are hs, reasons: (i) countdown holds on stationary pads were rife in the early 'sixties and predictably so, therefore the Skybolt's moving pad hideously and. as it proved. fatally multiplied these and (iii the tallow-on map- matching capability with obvious Hound Dog im- plications was visible then on the horizon to poli- ticians with keen eyesight.
Mr Thorneycroft in the rest of his review heaped derision on me and on the hook but clearly he could not find much wrong with it technically. Criticising one's own country is such a thankless task that no- body would do so unless they loved the country.
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