An early-1930s program would initially be designed around the Walrus and float-equipped Swordfish, whose few-hundred-mile reach still offered useful regional security near ports such as Cape Town or Durban. By 1938 or 1939 Britain might buy or license the Consolidated PBY Catalina for much longer patrols. Surface raiders would face both direct detection and a narrowing of safe operating areas as regular radio traffic advertised active patrol zones. A tender did not have to carry every aircraft it supported: it could transport stores and a starter air group, then sustain longer-range flying boats that arrived under their own power. An illustrative force of Walrus squadrons plus a Catalina squadron could heavily patrol waters hundreds of nautical miles around a port, giving the mobile base both local and extended reconnaissance layers.
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Walrus, Swordfish, and Catalina offered different patrol reach
British floatplanes could provide regional patrols, while Catalina-class aircraft could extend surveillance hundreds of miles from tender-supported bases.
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