an evaluation team tasked with selecting a heavy lift helicopter for the RAAF. The team was faced with a choice between the Boeing CH-47 Chinook and Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion, and Raw's final report recommended acquiring CH-53s. CH-47s had previously been judged the most suitable helicopters for Australia's needs by a RAAF team headed by Group Captain Charles Read in 1962, and the Army and RAAF were displeased with Raw's recommendation. The Air Board rejected Raw's report, which it judged "somewhat confusing", and asked Read to also evaluate the two types. Read again recommended in favour of the CH-47 on the grounds that it could carry more cargo and was better suited to operations in Australian-administered Territory of Papua and New Guinea, and twelve of the type were ordered in 1970. Raw remained the Director of Operational Requirements until 1970, when he became the commandant of the RAAF Staff College. In 1972 he was promoted to air commodore and assumed command of RAAF Base Butterworth in Malaysia. Raw held this position until 1976 when he returned to Australia and became the senior training and staff officer in the headquarters of RAAF Support Command. He received the National Medal in August 1977. Raw retired from the Air Force on 28 February 1978. In a newspaper interview shortly before his retirement, Raw identified the 1953 London to Christchurch air race as being a highlight of his career. He also observed that RAAF personnel needed higher levels of professional qualifications than had been the case when he joined the Air Force, and there was a greater specialisation in particular fields. Raw said that there was a need to improve the defences of northern Australia on the grounds that "political situations can change overnight". On 15 July 1988 Raw died of lymphoma at Richmond in Melbourne. He was cremated. Raw was posthumously awarded the Warsaw Uprising Cross by the Polish Government in 1992, and Helen Raw was presented with the medal by the Polish Embassy to Australia. Raw's obituary in the RAAF News newspaper described him as "one of the RAAF's most highly decorated World War II and post-war pilots". The Australian Dictionary of Biography states he was "considered to be genial, exuberant, popular and efficient" and "proved to be the type of officer who worked best under pressure". Writing in 2007, Chris Clark noted that while Raw's career was "typical of that enjoyed