disbanded and the army took over control of armoured cars, with the units soon coming under the command of the Motor Branch of the Machine Gun Corps. However RNAS experience of the Western Front would not be lost, No. 20 Squadron RNAS was retained under Naval control to further develop armoured vehicles for land battle, these personnel later becoming the nucleus of the team working under the Landship Committee that developed the first tanks. The RAF later inherited some ex-RNAS armoured cars left in the Middle East, and during the Second World War, the Number 1 Armoured Car Company RAF played an important role in the defence of RAF Habbaniya when the base was attacked by Iraqi nationalists. Bases and stations Scotland Caldale, Orkney Cromarty, Ross & Cromarty East Fortune, East Lothian Houghton Bay, Orkney Loch Doon, Ayrshire Longside, Aberdeenshire Scapa Flow, Orkney RAF Turnhouse, Edinburgh Wales Fishguard, Pembrokeshire France Dunkirk Saint-Pol-sur-Mer La Bellevue Vendôme Eastern Mediterranean Imbros, Turkey Moudros, Greece Stravos Thasos, Greece Elsewhere Durban, South Africa Otranto, Italy Malta Mombasa, Kenya Organisations Unlike the RFC, the RNAS was organised on a non-central basis so there were several No 1 Squadrons. Even wings numbers were not consistently given to the same unit, so there are many exceptions in historic data. At the start of the war there were three wings 1, 2 and 3. As the war progressed, other wings were formed. Wing 1 was on both sides of the English Channel in 1914. Wings 2 and 3 were sent to the Dardanelles for the Gallipoli Campaign, but Wing 3 was disbanded when the campaign finished and was absorbed into Wing 2 for service in Salonika. Wing 3 was reformed in 1916 for strategic bombing, disbanded in 1917. Wings 4 and 5 were expanded from Wing 1, the former being fighters and the latter having bombing duties. Wing 6 was formed for patrolling the Adriatic Sea, but was expanded to Malta by 1918. Squadrons serving in France were given numbers from 1 to 17. At the formation of the Royal Air Force on 1 April 1918, they became 201 to 217 squadrons of the RAF. Squadrons serving in the Eastern Mediterranean were given letters (A to G, and Z). In 1918, Squadron A became Squadron 222; Squadron B became Squadron 223; Squadron C became Squadron 220; and Squadron D became Squadron 221, all of the RAF. Squadron Z was