The 1950s - The Jet Age

By the summer of 1950, 208 Squadron was back at Fayid in Egypt ,and receiving its first jet aircraft in the form of the Gloster Meteor. With a couple of T7s and 2 experienced pilots, conversion was carried out on location and, in January 1951, the first Meteor FR9s arrived. being the only FR Squadron in the region, 208 was the only Middle East unit to receive Meteors of this variety, and 208 celebrated the Coronation of Her Majesty The Queen Elizabeth II with an aerobatic display. The Squadron Commanding Officer at the time was Squadron Leader Morello, and he oversaw the beginning of a period of stability, during which 208 maintained its FR task until the Canal Zone was abandoned. It was during this time, on 18th November 1955, at Abu Sueir, that the Squadron's Standard was presented by its original Commanding Officer, now Air Vice-Marshal Sir Geoffrey Bromet KBE CB DSO. The Standard Bearer on that day was a young Flying Officer named Laurie Jones, who rose to the rank of Air Marshal and followed in Sir Geoffrey Bromet's footsteps by being appointed as Governor of the Isle of Man. Three months later, in January 1956, 208 Squadron left Egypt forever, ending a 36-year association as it withdrew to Malta.

The Squadron's new base was Hal Far, a naval base, but the Squadron was soon on the move again to a trouble spot. In March 1956, it went to Nicosia where it mounted patrols to seek out terrorists in Cyprus. In August, however, it was back in Malta, this time at Ta Kali, although there had been a 208 Squadron detachment in Aden since March, operating against the Yemeni rebels. During the Suez crisis, 208 patrolled Malta, identifying all incoming aircraft. The following year, a detachment went to Bahrain to assist the Sultan of Muscat and Oman against his rebels, after which the Squadron began running down. The Aden detachment joined No 8 Squadron, and the Ta Kali Headquarters was wound up in 1958.

In the meantime, however, a new 208 Squadron was being created from the existing 34 Squadron at Tangmere in England, and 208 Squadron appeared on British soil for the first time since 1919: a period of some 39 years unbroken service in the Middle East and a record unmatched by any other badged RAF flying unit. The new Squadron was equipped with Hunter F6s, which arrived in February 1958, and which were immediately emblazoned with 208's official markings. For most of World War II, 208's aircraft had carried no Squadron identity markings but, from the Italian period onwards, its Spitfires carried the code 'RG' (along with the callsign 'ROGAT') that had previously been used on Hurricanes. This was dropped with the arrival of the Meteors, which eventually carried officially approved markings of sky blue and yellow horizontal bands, to signify 'the sky and the desert.' These markings are also reproduced on the fuselages of the Squadrons current Hawk aircraft, in honour of the Squadron's unique history as a desert reconnaissance unit.

Thus painted, the new Squadron Commander, Squadron Leader J H Granville-White took the Squadron and its Hunters to Nicosia on 21st March 1958 and, within a month, the new Commanding Officer's shiny new Hunter had a hole blown in its nose by a terrorist's pipe bomb. Barely had 208 arrived in Nicosia, however, when the United States Sixth Fleet was called upon to bolster the Governemt of Lebanon, which resulted in a series of combined training exercises with the United States Navy, as well as a detachment to Akrotiri. Shortly after returning to Nicosia, one Flight of Hunters was detached to Amman, in support of British Forces Jordan, to uphold the Government and the Monarchy of King Hussein against a threat from Iraq. For this detachment, 208 began to develop tactics for the use of under-wing rockets. As the Flight returned to Nicosia in October 1858, the Squadron entered a quiet phase during which came the news that 208 was to be disbanded and re-formed in Kenya out of No 142 Squadron, which also sported a Sphinx as its badge, but in profile rather than head on.