At the start of World War Two Nash was appointed by the War Artists' Advisory Committee to a full-time salaried war artist post attached to the Royal Air Force and the Air Ministry. Nash was unpopular with the Air Ministry representative on the WAAC committee, partly because of the modernist nature of his work and partly because the RAF wanted the WAAC artists to concentrate on producing portraits of their pilots and aircrew. Whilst still a salaried WAAC artist Nash produced two series of watercolours, "Raiders" and "Aerial Creatures". "Raiders", or "Marching Against England", was a set of studies of crashed German aircraft set in English rural landscapes with titles such as "Bomber in the Corn", "The Messerschmidt in Windsor Great Park" and "Under the Cliff". Whilst the Air Ministry could appreciate the patriotic intent and propaganda value of those works, the "Aerial Creatures" series, with its anthropomorphic depictions of British aircraft, displeased the Air Ministry so much they insisted Nash's full-time contract was ended in December 1940. The Chairman of WAAC, Kenneth Clark was aghast at this development and in January 1941 the Committee agreed to put aside £500 to purchase works from Nash on the theme of aerial conflict. Nash worked intermittently under this arrangement until 1944 to produce four paintings for WAAC. The first two of these were "Totes Meer (Dead Sea)" and "Battle of Britain".