RAF Regiment - Organisation and Role

Organisation and Role

The RAF Regiment comes under command of 2 Group, Air Command. Its members are organised into eight regular squadrons, of which seven are field squadrons and three Royal Auxiliary Air Force (RAuxAF) squadrons. These are intended to counter ground-based threats to the RAF and to this end are trained to move on foot or mounted in helicopters and Land Rovers to defend airfields.

Members of the RAF Regiment are equipped with a range of direct and indirect fire systems and surveillance and night vision equipment. The way a field squadron operates depends upon the airfield they are defending, mounting defensive positions or aggressive patrolling outside the airfield boundary. As air bases are fixed and supporting elements are unable to redeploy quickly, field squadrons must engage an attacking adversary at the earliest opportunity to prevent air operations from being disrupted.

Field Squadrons are divided into flights, which are equivalent in size to an army platoon. Each squadron contains several rifle flights, whose task is to engage the enemy at close range, and a support weapons flight, which provides fire support to the rifle flights using machine guns, mortars, and snipers.

The field squadrons are 171 strong making them larger than an infantry company in the British Army although not all personnel on an RAF Regiment squadron are trained gunners, rather specialist support services such as administrators and drivers etc. A typical RAF Regiment squadron has support elements from the RAF but these personnel are not able to deploy on patrols etc. All regular RAF Regiment personnel are male although the Auxiliary Squadrons do recruit women, it is British Government policy that women cannot serve in close combat units. There are approximately 2,000 regular airmen (i.e. Other Ranks), 300 regular officers, and 500 reservists.

Since 1990, the RAF Regiment has defended airfields in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Croatia, Cyprus, Falkland Islands, Iraq, Kosovo, Kuwait, Northern Ireland, Saudi Arabia and Sierra Leone. Some RAF Regiment officers and Senior Non Commissioned Officers have been seconded to the Army in roles such as Forward Air Controlers with some Tactical Air Control Parties (TACPs) that co-ordinate Close Air Support for the ground forces. The Regiment personnel, when not defending airfields, provide staff for the Defence CBRN Centre at Winterborne Gunner which trains personnel from all three services and the civilian police in CBRN defence skills; a flight of 40 RAF Regiment personnel forms part of the tri-service Special Forces Support Group.

In 2011, as part of the Strategic Defence and Security Review, it was announced that from December 2011, the CBRN role undertaken by the Joint CBRN Regiment, a combined Army/RAF unit, would be transferred to the RAF Regiment (as lead service) under the new Defence CBRN Wing, formed from 26 Squadron, 27 Squadron and 2623 (Auxiliary) Squadron. The army retains involvement through the continued use of the Royal Yeomanry to provide trained battlefield casualty replacements.

The RAF Regiment's basic training increased to 32 weeks to incorporate the airfield defence course.