Deployment Support
Deployment Support
A large number of personnel from non-flying units and enablers support operations, or make them possible. Known as Tactical Survive to Operate Headquarters until April 2004, RAF Force Protection Wing Headquarters (FPW HQ) are small, rapid deployment units that control RAF Regiment, RAF Police (from the tactical Provost Wing), RAF Intelligence specialists and support staff tasked with providing Force Protection Command and Control to deployed air assets.
As such the FPW HQs allow enablers to be deployed as an existing package. Each headquarters is parented by an RAF station, with whom it is usually deployed. the six currently in existence are home-based at RAF Leuchars, Fife; Leeming, Yorkshire; Lossiemouth, Moray; Lyneham, Wiltshire; Marham, Norfolk; and Wittering, Cambridgeshire.
FPW HQs are part of the RAF Regiment, itself assigned to 2 Group. Its Headquarters are at RAF Honington, Suffolk, but its units are deployed to many bases in the UK and overseas. The RAF Regiment is primarily responsible for the defence of RAF airfields, for which it has nine Field squadrons (including three Royal Auxiliary Air Force [RAuxAF] units). In addition two CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear) Squadrons (one with the RAuxAF) are trained in detecting, identifying and monitoring nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. The Regiment’s two Ground-Based Air Defence (GBAD) squadrons will disband on 1 April 2008, their role passing to the Royal Artillery.
Another of the Regiment’s tasks is deploying airmobile Tactical Air Control Parties (TACPs), which are embedded within British Army units. TACPs act as a liaison between airpower and the troops in the field.
Communications support on deployment is provided by the Tactical Communications Wing (TCW), whose five squadrons install, operate and maintain transportable tactical communications and information systems in support of RAF assets. in Afghanistan’s Helmand province, airspace management and deconfliction is the responsibility of elements of 1 Air Control Centre, based at Camp Bastion. In addition, cooks, drivers, medical personnel, intelligence, supply, airfield maintenance and meteorological personnel are among the varied staff needed for a deployment to function.