If they were forced to bail out over the Falklands, they were to make their way to designated safehouses, the locations of which they’d be given before the mission. Photocopied sheets explaining the ‘PW One Hand Mute Code’ – a Vietnam-era sign language that provided for silent communication while on the run – were distributed. When they reached the rendezvous they were to stay put until they were pulled out by special forces. If they weren’t found by the Argentinians first. This was also covered. A typed sheet explained how to conceal a secret message in a letter:
CONCEALMENT OF INFORMATION IN LETTERS/MESSAGES – SAMPLE TEXT
(Writer’s daughter was born on 6th October – read every 6th and 10th word alternately of text.)
1st May 1980 (= Contains concealed message)
My darling (= Safety check – not under duress)
You will (= 3 x 4 = 12 words concealed in text) feel after the hours waiting that the three of you can now relax. Time passes, and the best news is always worth waiting the (= ignore rest of sentence) extra few days for. Your memory and the childrens’ lights my way forward. No problems now but perhaps the end will be for western people some way off. There’s room I’m sure for highest level talks which should be kept going on although the (= ignore rest of sentence) chance of doing anything to help things from here is small.
Message reads (in reverse order) KEPT HIGHEST ROOM WESTERN END. NO LIGHTS. BEST TIME THREE (= 0300) HOURS.
It would have been fiendishly difficult to compose, especially under the strain of captivity. Most of the crews simply remembered that if, while being filmed, they scratched their nose, those watching at home would know that they were lying.
Each of the AEOs was given a cassette tape that carried a hissing recording of a message in Spanish. Designed to confuse the enemy air defences, it claimed to be from an Argentine maritime patrol aircraft that had lost an engine and wanted to put down at Port Stanley. No puedo oirle. Usted no esta muy claro (‘I can’t hear you. You’re not very clear’), repeated the coda at the end of the message, precluding further debate. Barry Masefield took the tape to Gibraltarian Nav Plotter, Jim Vinales, the only man on any of the crews who actually understood what was being said. Despite its not using the appropriate Catalan dialect, Vinales thought it was a reasonable attempt – even if the intonation did sound a bit like a ‘Learn Spanish the Easy Way’ course. Broadcast on a long-wave frequency, crackling with static, he told his colleagues, it might buy them time. On the other hand, they all knew, it would alert whoever was listening to the fact that someone was out there. The AEO’s defence of the aircraft was driven by one rule above all others: you never gave anyone anything for nothing; you never showed your hand unless you had to. The tapes got quietly tucked away. Things would have to get pretty desperate for them to come out again.
Some of what was said at the briefings was taken with a pinch of salt by crews looking to relieve the pressure of the work-up. It didn’t do to dwell too much on what could go wrong. Despite efforts to remain in high spirits, though, they were all getting tired. The concentration demanded by the training sorties was intense. Their sleep was curtailed. And underpinning it all was a draining, insidious unease about the mission itself.
But however reluctant the crews themselves might have been to acknowledge the fatigue and stress, others were keeping an eye on them. All of them, eventually, were ordered to visit Squadron Leader Warwick Pike, Waddington’s station doctor. None of them wanted to – it was more time out of an already full schedule – and none of them accepted his offer of Temazepam to help them sleep.
‘I’ve never taken pills, Warwick… sir’ – Monty added a little deference to soften his rejection – ‘and I’m not taking them now!’
‘You will,’ Pike said wearily as Monty turned and left his office, ‘you will…’
On Saturday the 24th, Martin Withers took advantage of a single day’s break in the flying programme to visit his parents in Fakenham in Norfolk. Throughout the day, in the background, was the prospect of war. Nothing was said, but when it was time for Withers to leave his mother and father, their parting felt loaded with significance. A last goodbye. Driving home through the Fens after dark, Withers stopped the Ford Capri behind a queue of traffic to wait for a boat to pass through a raised bridge. When he woke up, the boat was far away, the bridge had been lowered, and the cars in front of him were long gone.
While Simon Baldwin’s aircrew trained for war, supported by a small clique of engineers and operations staff, life for everyone else at Waddington continued much as it always had. The difference now, of course, was that they knew they were being closed down in July. John Laycock did his best to straddle the two concerns, dividing his time between CORPORATE flights and the business of the ceremonials that would mark the run-down of the station and disbandment of its squadrons. The timing was far from ideal, but plans were too far advanced.
As Martin Withers had been with his parents, men and women from four Waddington squadrons and their support Wings, twenty-four Alsatians and their handlers, and the 1 Group Pipe Band marched down Lincoln’s main street to commemorate the anniversary of the base being given the Freedom of the City. As four Vulcans flew low overhead, spontaneous applause broke out. It continued long after the roar of the engines had receded into the distance. The historical reason for the parade was lost. The crowd were angry and proud. It was clear to Laycock that they would not be persuaded that this was anything but a display of military might; a demonstration of the country’s determination to win back the Falkland Islands.