Why two tenders could not close the North Atlantic air gap

The North Atlantic offered few sheltered and politically available operating sites: Bermuda was British, but the Azores were Portuguese and the Faroes, Iceland, and Greenland were Danish. Pegasus and Albatross were too few to create a broad network, while Walrus and floatplane Swordfish range could not bridge the ocean by itself. Earlier access to the Azores through the old Portuguese alliance would have improved the basing options. Tenders could also support aircraft while permanent airfields were under construction. The two ships actually available could make only a limited contribution, so a wider patrol network would depend on a larger prewar program and a different approach to basing. One proposed diplomatic workaround was for a neutral government to tolerate a tender in a bay without establishing a permanent British shore base.