No 151 Wing Royal Air Force was a British unit which operated with the Soviet forces on the Kola Peninsula in the northern USSR during the first months of Operation Barbarossa, in the Second World War. Operation Benedict, the 1941 expedition to Murmansk, provided air defence for Allied ships as they were discharging at ports within range of Luftwaffe units in Norway and Finland.
No. 151 Wing Royal Air Force Operations in Russia, September–November 1941 (CR38)
Preserved Hurricane Mk IIB Z5140
Hurricanes of 134 Squadron RAF at Vaenga, 1941
Operation Benedict was the establishment of Force Benedict with units of the Soviet Air Forces in north Russia, during the Second World War. The force comprised 151 Wing, Royal Air Force (RAF), with two squadrons of Hawker Hurricane fighters. The wing flew against the Luftwaffe and the Suomen Ilmavoimat from Vaenga airfield in the northern USSR and trained Soviet pilots and ground crews to operate the Hurricanes, when their British pilots and ground crews returned to Britain.
Hurricanes of 134 Squadron RAF at Vaenga (now Severomorsk), 1941
Preserved Hurricane Mk IIB Z5140
HMS Argus (photographed in 1942 during Operation Torch)
Modern example of a Polikarpov I-16