Duncan Sandys (pronounced "sands") is quite possibly the most vilified person in the history of British aviation. He is seen by most aviation writers and enthusiasts as the man who destroyed the British aircraft industry. In 1943 Sandys was appointed chairman of the Cabinet committee to investigate the threat posed by German rocket weapons. He had a great interest in rockets, having been involved in the deployment of the Z-batteries of anti-aircraft rockets. He also happened to be Winston Churchill's son-in-law. As Secretary of State for Defence in the McMillan Government, he presided over one of the darkest periods in British Aviation. He proclaimed that the era of the manned aircraft was over and that rockets and missiles were the way forward. In the 1957 defence White Paper (a report outlining Government policy) he cancelled all manned combat aircraft projects in the pipeline. The exceptions were the Lightning that was about to enter service and the replacement for the Canberra bomber, ultimately the TSR.2. These cancelled projects included the Saro 177 rocket / turbojet interceptor, the Hawker P.1121 multi-role aircraft and the Avro 730 reconnaissance bomber. Some of the finance freed up by cancelling these projects was transferred to rocket projects such as Blue Streak. Having decimated the British Aviation industry he laid the foundations of the process that saw the miriad of aircraft builders merged into two major companies, Hawker Siddley Aviation and the British Aircraft Corporation.
Sandys' policy statements have always been taken as being based on his personal belief in the superiority of the missile. Could it be that the policy may have been based on the realisation that none of these new aircraft in the pipeline, especially a high altitude bomber, could survive in Soviet airspace?