Graduation Reviewing Officer     

Commandant

46 Entry      15 October 1946 & 3 January 1947 - 8 April 1949

Air Cdre R L R Atcherley CBE AFC                                                                                                                          

Burns John    C

Caillard Hugh    C     

Crowley John    C     

Dawes Julian    B     

Dickson Leonard    A     

Fletcher Geoffrey    B     

Flinn Patrick   A     

Granville-White John    B     

Harben Norman   A     

Kennedy Thomas    B     

Lamb William    C     

Lang Andrew    B     

Le Poer Trench Michael    A     

Ludgate Leonard    C     

McFarlane Arthur    C

Muff David    A

Pendry Richard    A     

Pledger Peter    C     

Read Robert    C     

Richardson Kenneth    A     

Robertson John    A     

Robinson Donald    C     

Sanderson Paul    C

Skinner Peter    B     

Slater William    B     

Stephenson Roy    A     

Tuke Latimer    B     

non-bold did not graduate

He joined No 297 Squadron, flying Hastings aircraft and was immediately made operational for service on the hazardous Berlin Air Lift in 1948/49. The event was one of the first major crises of the Cold War.

The Soviets, without warning, blocked the Allies’ railway, road and canal access to the city, thus closing all supply routes for the citizens’ essential food and fuel supplies. In response, the Allies, with great skill and ingenuity, organised an airlift, in which the RAF played a decisive role.

Kennedy principally flew supplies into Berlin from the RAF’s airfield at Gatow just to the south west of the city; the RAF then transported a staggering 995 tons of supplies per day into Berlin. It was unrelenting and Kennedy and his colleagues flew more than 200,000 flights in one year. By early 1949, Kennedy and his colleagues had built up such an efficient system that in May the Soviets, to their considerable embarrassment, called off the blockade.

Throughout the Cold War, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Kennedy continued to play a crucial role in transporting vital materials to several distressed areas.

After some years serving as a captain in the VIP squadron, Kennedy and his squadron flew bombing missions over Egypt during the Suez crisis. For three years from 1957, he served as a senior pilot at the Royal Radar Establishment, where he tested bombing radars and electronic aids installed in a Valiant and a Canberra. He was awarded a Bar to his AFC.

In 1965, Kennedy was commanding the RAF station at Brize Norton when he was ordered to fly his Britannia aircraft immediately to Tanzania and Kenya. Rhodesia had suspended all oil transfers from its refineries into Zambia so the UK began the airlift. Once again, Kennedy was involved in a mercy mission, this time flying supplies into Zambia following Prime Minister Ian Smith’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence in Southern Rhodesia. These assignments required exceptional flying abilities and immense tact and discretion as both took place under extremely sensitive conditions.

In 1970, he was promoted to Group Captain and after tours of duty as station commander at Brize Norton and as Deputy Commandant of the RAF Staff College Kennedy, in 1977, was appointed Commander of the Northern Maritime Region, with headquarters at Pitreavie Castle in Fife. It was another posting which required a keen awareness of political affairs. During the Second World War, Pitreavie was converted into an underground bunker. During the Cold War, it remained in service, partly because of its proximity to Rosyth, and was the principal maritime control centre in Scotland. In a dire emergency, Kennedy would have controlled all Nato forces operating between the North Sea and the North Pole. He was also responsible for all the monitoring in the North Sea – including all Soviet shipping and submarine activity.

His final appointment was on the Air Force Board as the Air Member for Personnel. He retired in 1986, sat on the board of Dowty & Co, and became a most active and committed Controller of the RAF Benevolent Fund.

Kennedy inaugurated a particularly imaginative scheme to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Britain. He launched a £20 million appeal, suitably named Reach For the Sky, in conjunction with the Fairford Air Tattoo, which raised well over the targeted sum

                                  ACM HRH The Duke of Gloucester