page_title: Bristol Blenheim
section_title: Mediterranean and Middle East
hierarchical_section_title: Bristol Blenheim / Operational history / Mediterranean and Middle East
caption_attribution_description: English: Royal Air Force Operations in the Middle East and North Africa, 1939-1943. Armourers of No. 113 Squadron RAF place 20-lb Fragmentation bombs into a Small Bomb Container, and prepare .303 ammunition, for loading into one of the Squadron's Bristol Blenheim Mark Is at Ma'aten Bagush, Egypt, before a raid on Italian positions at Tobruk.
context_page_description: The Bristol Blenheim is a British light bomber aircraft designed and built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company which was used extensively in the first two years and in some cases throughout the Second World War. The aircraft was developed as Type 142, a civil airliner, in response to a challenge from Lord Rothermere to produce the fastest commercial aircraft in Europe. The Type 142 first flew in April 1935, and the Air Ministry, impressed by its performance, ordered a modified design as the Type 142M for the Royal Air Force as a bomber. Deliveries of the newly named Blenheim to RAF squadrons commenced on 10 March 1937.
  A development of the Type 142M was the Type 149 which Bristol named the Bolingbroke, retrospectively changed by the Air Ministry to Blenheim Mk IV and the Type 142M to the Blenheim Mk I. Fairchild Canada built the Type 149 under licence as the Bolingbroke. Blenheims Mk I and the Mk IV were adapted as fighters by the addition of a gun pack of four Browning .303 machine guns in the bomb bay. The Mk IV was used as a long range fighter and as a maritime patrol aircraft; both aircraft were also used as bomber/gunnery trainers.
context_section_description: On 11 June 1940, only hours after Italy's entry into the war on Germany's side, several Blenheim IVs bombed Italian positions. In mid-1940, reinforcement ferry routes were established throughout Africa, starting in Takoradi on the Gold Coast. By the end of 1940, a total of three RAF squadrons equipped with Blenheim IV aircraft were performing anti-shipping, bombing, and reconnaissance missions in support of Allied ground forces in North Africa.
  By July 1941, it had been recognised that, in response to the increasing intensity of combat in North Africa and in the Middle East theatres, additional squadrons were urgently required. In the latter half of 1941, several Blenheim squadrons were flown out to Malta, many being stationed there into early 1942 before mainly being absorbed in the Western Desert air operations. As Bomber Command gradually took Blenheims out of the Northern Europe theatre, they were often dispatched to other areas such as North Africa. Upon the outbreak of the Pacific War in December 1941, some Blenheim squadrons in the Middle East were relocated from the theatre to the Far East in response to the new threat from Japanese forces.
caption: Armourers of No. 113 Squadron preparing to load a Blenheim Mk I prior to a raid on Tobruk, Libya, circa 1942
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