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+Project Gutenberg's Aviation in Peace and War, by Sir Frederick Hugh Sykes
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Aviation in Peace and War
+
+Author: Sir Frederick Hugh Sykes
+
+Release Date: April 30, 2008 [EBook #25244]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AVIATION IN PEACE AND WAR ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Stephen Blundell and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+             AVIATION IN
+            PEACE AND WAR
+
+
+                  BY
+
+    Major-General Sir F. H. SYKES
+        G.B.E., K.C.B., C.M.G.
+     LATE CHIEF OF THE AIR STAFF
+                 AND
+ CONTROLLER-GENERAL OF CIVIL AVIATION
+
+
+                LONDON
+         EDWARD ARNOLD & CO.
+                 1922
+       [_All rights reserved_]
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note:
+
+    Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note, whilst
+    more significant amendments have been listed at the end of the text.
+    The oe ligature is represented by [oe].
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                                PAGE
+ INTRODUCTION                                                      7
+
+ CHAPTER I. PRE-WAR                                                9
+
+   Early Thoughts on Flight. The Invention of the Balloon.
+   First Experiments in Gliders and Aeroplanes. The Wright
+   Brothers and their Successors in Europe. The First
+   Airships. The Beginnings of Aviation in England. The
+   Inception and Development of Aircraft as Part of the
+   Forces of the Crown: the Balloon Factory; the Air
+   Battalion; the Royal Flying Corps, the Military Wing,
+   the Naval Wing. Tactics and the Machine. Conclusions.
+
+ CHAPTER II. WAR                                                  44
+
+   General Remarks on War Development. Co-operation with
+   the Army: Reconnaissance; Photography; Wireless;
+   Bombing; Contact Patrol; Fighting. Co-operation with
+   the Navy: Coast Defence, Patrol and Convoy Work; Fleet
+   Assistance, Reconnaissance, Spotting for Ships' Guns;
+   Bombing; Torpedo Attack. Home Defence: Night Flying
+   and Night Fighting. The Machine and Engine. Tactics
+   and the Strategic Air Offensive. Organization.
+
+ CHAPTER III. PEACE                                               96
+
+   The Future of Aerial Defence. Civil Aviation: as a
+   Factor in National Security; as an Instrument of
+   Imperial Progress; Financial and Economic Problems;
+   Weather Conditions and Night Flying; Organization; the
+   Machine and Engine. Air Services: British, Continental
+   and Imperial.
+
+ CONCLUSION                                                      131
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+Since the earliest communities of human beings first struggled for
+supremacy and protection, the principles of warfare have remained
+unchanged. New methods have been evolved and adopted with the progress
+of science, but no discovery, save perhaps that of gunpowder, has done
+so much in so short a time to revolutionize the conduct of war as
+aviation, the youngest, yet destined perhaps to be the most effective
+fighting-arm. Yet to-day we are only on the threshold of our knowledge,
+and, striking as was the impetus given to every branch of aeronautics
+during the four years of war, its future power can only dimly be seen.
+
+We may indeed feel anxious about this great addition of aviation to the
+destructive power of modern scientific warfare. Bearing its terrors in
+mind, we may even impotently seek to check its advance, but the appeal
+of flying is too deep, its elimination is now impossible, and granted
+that war is inevitable, it must be accepted for good or ill.
+Fortunately, although with the other great scientific additions,
+chemical warfare and the submarine, its potentialities for destruction
+are very great, yet aircraft, unlike the submarine, can be utilized not
+only in the conduct of war but in the interests of peace, and it is
+here that we can guide and strengthen it for good. Just as the naval
+supremacy of Britain was won because commercially we were the greatest
+seafaring people in the world, so will air supremacy be achieved by that
+country which, making aviation a part of its everyday life, becomes an
+airfaring community.
+
+Our nation as a whole has been educated, owing to its geographical
+situation and by tradition, to interest itself in the broader aspects of
+marine policy and development. It requires to take the same interest in
+aviation, a comparatively new subject, unhampered to a great extent by
+preconceived notions and therefore offering greater scope for individual
+thought.
+
+The following sketch[1] has been written in the hope that some of those
+who read it may be inspired to study aviation in one or other of its
+branches, whether from the historical, technical, strategical, or
+commercial point of view. Any opinions expressed are, of course, my own
+and not official.
+
+[1] First written and delivered as the Lees-Knowles Lectures at
+Cambridge University in February and March, 1921.
+
+I propose first briefly to trace the history of aviation from its
+beginnings to the outbreak of war; next to describe the evolution of
+aircraft and of air strategy during the war; and last to estimate the
+present position and to look into the future.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+PRE-WAR
+
+
+EARLY THOUGHTS ON FLIGHT.
+
+The story of the growth of aviation may be likened to that of the
+discovery and opening up of a new continent. A myth arises, whence no
+one can tell, of the existence of a new land across the seas. Eventually
+this land is found without any realization of the importance of the
+discovery. Then comes the period of colonization and increasing
+knowledge. But the interior remains unexplored. So, in the case of
+aviation, man was long convinced, for no scientific reason, that flight
+was possible. With the first ascent by balloon came the imagined mastery
+of the air; later, the invention of flight that can be controlled at
+will. To-day we are still in the stage of colonization. The future
+resources of the air remain hidden from our view.
+
+The Daedalean myth and the ancient conception of the winged angelic host
+show how the human mind has long been fascinated by the idea of flight,
+but the first design of an apparatus to lift man into the air, a
+parachute-like contrivance, was only reached at the end of the fifteenth
+century in one of Leonardo da Vinci's manuscripts. About the same time
+lived the first of the long line of daring practical aviators, without
+whom success would never have been achieved, one John Damian, a
+physician of the Court of James IV of Scotland, who "took in hand to fly
+with wings, and to that effect caused make a pair of wings of feathers,
+which being fastened upon him, he flew off the castle wall of Stirling,
+but shortly he fell to the ground and brake his thigh-bone."
+
+Nearly 250 years later the aeronaut had not made much progress, for we
+read of the Marquis de Bacqueville in 1742 attaching to his arms and
+legs planes of his own design and launching himself from his house in
+the attempt to fly across the Seine, into which, regrettably, he fell.
+
+Meanwhile the seventeenth-century philosophers had been theorizing. In
+1638 John Wilkins, the founder of the Royal Society, published a book
+entitled _Daedalus, or Mechanical Motions_. A few years later John
+Glanville wrote in _Scepsis Scientifica_ "to them that come after us it
+may be as ordinary to buy a pair of wings to fly into remotest regions,
+as now a pair of boots to ride a journey," the sceptic proving a truer
+prophet than the enthusiast. By 1680 Giovanni Borelli had reached the
+conclusion, in his book _De Volatu_, that it was impossible that man
+should ever achieve flight by his own strength. Nor was he more likely
+to do so in the first aerial ship, designed in 1670 by Francesco Lana,
+which was to be buoyed up in the air by being suspended from four
+globes, made of thin copper sheeting, each of them about 25 feet in
+diameter. From these globes the air was to be exhausted, so that each,
+being lighter than the atmosphere, would support the weight of two or
+three men. A hundred years elapsed before Dr. Joseph Black of the
+University of Edinburgh made the first practical suggestion, that a
+balloon inflated with hydrogen would rise.
+
+
+THE INVENTION OF THE BALLOON.
+
+It was in 1783 that Montgolfier conceived the idea of utilizing the
+lifting power of hot air and invited the Assembly of Vivarais to watch
+an exhibition of his invention, when a balloon, 10 feet in
+circumference, rose to a height of 6,000 feet in under ten minutes. This
+was followed by a demonstration before Louis XVI at Versailles, when a
+balloon carrying a sheep, a cock, and a duck, rose 1,500 feet and
+descended safely. And on November 21st of the same year Pilatre de
+Rozier, accompanied by the Marquis d'Arlande, made the first human
+ascent, in the "Reveillon," travelling 5 miles over Paris in twenty
+minutes.
+
+England, it is not surprising to learn, was behind with the invention,
+but on November 25th, 1783, Count Francesco Zambeccari sent up from
+Moorfields a small oilskin hydrogen balloon which fell at Petworth; and
+in August of 1784 James Tytler ascended at Edinburgh in a fire balloon,
+thus achieving the first ascent in Great Britain. In the same year
+Lunardi came to London and ballooning became the rage. It was an
+Englishman, Dr. Jefferies, who accompanied Blanchard in the first
+cross-Channel flight on January 7th, 1785. Fashionable society soon
+turned to pursuits other than watching balloon ascents, however, and
+the joys of the air were confined to a few adventurous spirits, such as
+Green and Holland, who first substituted coal gas for hydrogen and in
+1836 made a voyage of 500 miles from Vauxhall Gardens to Weilburg in
+Nassau, and James Glaisher, who in the middle of the century began to
+make meteorological observations from balloons, claiming on one
+occasion, in 1862, to have reached the great height of 7 miles.
+
+
+FIRST EXPERIMENTS IN GLIDERS AND AEROPLANES.
+
+The world seemed content to have achieved the balloon, but there were a
+few men who realized that the air had not been conquered, and who
+believed that success could only be attained by the scientific study and
+practice of gliding. Prominent among these, Sir George Cayley, in 1809,
+published a paper on the Navigation of the Air, and forecasted the
+modern aeroplane, and the action of the air on wings. In 1848 Henson and
+Stringfellow, the latter being the inventive genius, designed and
+produced a small model aeroplane--the first power-driven machine which
+actually flew. It is now in the Smithsonian Institute at Washington. Of
+greater practical value were the gliding experiments by Otto Lilienthal,
+of Berlin, and Percy Pilcher, an Englishman, at the end of the last
+century. Both these men met their death in the cause of aviation.
+Another step forward was made by Laurence Hargrave, an Australian, who
+invented the box and soaring kite and eighteen machines which flew.
+
+From the theoretical point of view, Professor Langley, an American,
+reached in his _Experiments in Aerodynamics_ the important conclusion
+that weight could best be countered by speed. From theory Langley turned
+to practice and in 1896 designed a steam-driven machine which flew
+three-quarters of a mile without an operator. Seven years later, at the
+end of 1903, he produced a new machine fitted with a 52 horse-power
+engine weighing less than 5 lb. per horse-power; but this machine was
+severely damaged ten days before Wilbur Wright made his first flight in
+a controlled power-driven aeroplane.
+
+
+THE WRIGHT BROTHERS AND THEIR SUCCESSORS IN EUROPE.
+
+The Wright brothers directed their whole attention to aviation in 1899.
+By 1902, as the result of many experiments, they had invented a glider
+with a horizontal vane in front, a vertical vane behind, and a device
+for "warping" the wings. Their longest glide was 622-1/4 feet. This was
+followed by the construction of a machine weighing 600 lb., including
+the operator and an 8 horse-power engine, which on December 17th, 1903,
+realized the dreams of centuries.
+
+After an increasing number of experiments, a machine built in 1905 flew
+24-1/4 miles at a speed of 38 miles an hour. It is interesting to recall
+that the new invention was refused once by the United States and three
+times by the British Government.
+
+It was not until September 13th, 1906, that Ellehammer, a Danish
+engineer, made the first free flight in Europe, his machine flying 42
+metres at a height of a metre and a half. About the same time reports
+of the Wrights' successes began to reach Europe and were quickly
+appreciated by the French.
+
+Space forbids that I should enter into the achievements of the early
+French aviators, among whom the names of Ferber, Bleriot and Farman will
+always rank high in the story of human faith, courage and determination.
+It is a record of rapid advance. Farman made a circuit flight of 1
+kilometre in 1908, and flew from Chalons to Rheims, a distance of 27
+kilometres, in twenty minutes. Bleriot crossed the Channel in a
+monoplane of his own design in forty minutes. French designers improved
+the control system, and French machines became famous. The records of
+the Rheims meeting of 1909 serve to illustrate the progress made during
+the first phase of aviation. Latham won the altitude prize by flying to
+a height of over 500 feet. Farman the prize for the flight of longest
+duration by remaining more than three hours in the air, and the
+passenger carrying prize by carrying two passengers round a 10-kilometre
+course in 10-1/2 minutes. The Gnome rotary engine was first used with
+success at this meeting.
+
+Before turning to the pioneer efforts in England and the pre-war
+organization of our air forces, some account of the development of the
+lighter-than-air dirigible is desirable.
+
+
+THE FIRST AIRSHIPS.
+
+The earliest conception of an airship is to be found in General
+Meusnier's design in 1784 for an egg-shaped balloon driven by three
+screw propellers, worked, of course, by hand. The chief interest in his
+design, though it never materialized, lies in the fact that it provided
+for a double envelope and was the precursor of the ballonet. The first
+man-carrying airship was built by Henri Giffard in 1852. It had a
+capacity of 87,000 cu. feet, a length of 144 feet, a 3 horse-power
+engine, and a speed of 6 miles an hour. A gas engine was first used
+twenty years later in an Austrian dirigible, giving a speed of 3 miles
+an hour. About the same time much useful work was accomplished by Dupuy
+de Lome, whose dirigible, with a propeller driven by man power, gave a
+speed of 5-1/2 miles an hour. Twelve years later, in 1884, two French
+Army officers, Captain Kubs and Captain Renard, constructed the first
+successful power-driven lighter-than-air craft fitted with an 8-1/2
+horse-power electric motor, which may be regarded as the progenitor of
+all subsequent non-rigid airships. In 1901 Santos Dumont flew round the
+Eiffel Tower, travelling 6-3/4 miles in 1-1/2 hours, and in 1903 the
+flight of the "Lebaudy," covering a distance of 40 miles at a speed of
+20 miles an hour, led the French military authorities to take up the
+question of airships.
+
+What the French initiated, the Germans, concentrating with
+characteristic thoroughness on the development of the rigid as opposed
+to the non-rigid airship, improved. In 1896 Wolfert's rigid airship
+attained a speed of 9 miles an hour and in 1900 the first Zeppelin was
+launched. Whatever we may think of the German methods of using their
+airships during the war, we cannot but admire the courage and
+determination of Count Zeppelin, who, in spite of many mishaps,
+succeeded in producing the finest airships in the world and inspiring
+the German people with a faith in the air which they have never lost.
+From 1905 onwards development was rapid. In 1907 Zeppelin voyaged in
+stages from Friedrichshaven to Frankfort, a distance of 200 miles in
+7-1/2 hours. Popular enthusiasm is illustrated by the fact that within a
+few months the same airship made four hundred trips, carrying 8,551
+passengers and covering 29,430 miles. Other airships showed similar
+records. Between 1909 and 1913 eighteen of the Parseval type were built,
+and 1912 saw the construction of the first Schutte-Lanz, designed
+expressly for naval and military purposes. If France at this period led
+the world in aeroplane design, Germany was undeniably ahead in airship
+development.
+
+In Great Britain, in 1905, we had one very small airship, designed and
+constructed by Willows.
+
+
+THE BEGINNINGS OF AVIATION IN ENGLAND.
+
+Though the names of Pilcher, Dunne, Howard Wright, and Rolls testify to
+the fact that the science of aviation had its followers in England at
+the beginning of this century, flying came comparatively late, and the
+real interest of the movement centres round the early efforts of
+military aviation from 1912 onwards. Nevertheless this country could ill
+have dispensed with the experiments of that small and courageous band of
+aviators, among whom Dickson and Cody were prominent. By 1908 Cody had
+built an aeroplane and was making experimental flights at Aldershot. In
+1907, A. V. Roe, working under great difficulties, constructed and flew
+his first machine, a triplane fitted with an 8-10 horse-power twin
+cylinder Jap bicycle engine, the first tractor type machine produced by
+any country, and a very important contribution to the science of flight.
+In 1910 and 1911 we find de Havilland, Frank Maclean and the Short
+Brothers, Ogilvie, Professor Huntingdon, Sopwith and the Bristol
+Company, starting on the design and construction of machines, of which
+the names have since become famous. At the same time certain centres of
+aviation came into existence, such as Brooklands, where I well remember
+beginning to fly in August, 1910, Hendon, Larkhill and Eastchurch,
+destined to be the centre of naval aviation. It is significant, however,
+of the slow progress made that by November 1st, 1910, only twenty-two
+pilot's certificates had been issued, and it was Conneau, a French naval
+officer, who in 1911 won the so-called "Circuit of Britain," i.e. a
+flight from Brooklands and back via Edinburgh, Glasgow, Exeter and
+Brighton. Cody and Valentine were the only British competitors to
+complete the full course.
+
+In May 1911 a demonstration was organized by the owners of the Hendon
+Aerodrome to which a large number of Cabinet Ministers, members of
+parliament, and army and navy officers were invited. The War Office
+co-operated by arranging for a small force of horse, foot and guns to be
+secretly disposed in a specified area some miles distant and by
+detailing two officers, of whom I was one, to test what could be done to
+find and report them by air. I remember that I had a special map
+prepared, the first used in this, and I think any country, for the
+aeroplane reconnaissance of troops. After a sufficiently exciting trip,
+and with the troops successfully marked on the map, Hubert, my French
+pilot, and I, returned and made our report to General Murray, the
+Director of Military Training. It was a very interesting flight; the
+weather good; our height about 1,500 feet; the machine a 50 horse-power
+Gnome "box-kite" Henri Farman, which at one period of our 35 mile an
+hour return journey elected to point itself skywards for an unpleasant
+second or two and fly "cabre"; I can see Hubert now anxiously forcing
+his front elevator downwards and shouting to me to lean forward in order
+to help to bring the nose to a more comfortable bearing!
+
+Many pages could be filled with the difficulties and exploits of the
+first British aviators, but enough has been said to show that, compared
+with that of aeroplanes in France and of airships in Germany,
+development in this country started late, progressed slowly and excited
+little public interest. The work of the pioneers was, however, not in
+vain, since it opened the eyes of our military authorities to the value
+of aviation and led to the formation of that small but highly efficient
+flying corps which during the war expanded into an organization without
+rival. Let us now turn to the inception of the air forces of the Crown
+and the position with regard to these and to air tactics at the outbreak
+of war.
+
+
+THE INCEPTION AND DEVELOPMENT OF AIRCRAFT AS PART OF THE FORCES OF THE
+CROWN.
+
+Nations have tended to regard flight as a prerogative of war. A balloon
+school was formed in the early days of the French revolutionary wars;
+the French victory at Fleurus in 1794 was ascribed to balloon
+reconnaissance; balloons were used by the Federal Army in the American
+Civil War, and during the Siege of Paris Gambetta effected his escape by
+balloon in 1871.
+
+
+_The Balloon Factory._
+
+In England experiments were begun at Woolwich Arsenal in 1878, and in
+1883 a Balloon Factory, a Depot and a School of Instruction were
+established at Chatham. The expedition to Bechuanaland in 1884, under
+the command of Sir Charles Warren, was accompanied by a detachment of
+three balloons, and the following year balloons co-operated with the
+Sudan Expeditionary Force, when Major Elsdale carried out some
+photographic experiments from the air.
+
+In 1890 a balloon section was introduced into the Army as a unit of the
+Royal Engineers, and not long afterwards, the Balloon Factory was
+established at South Farnborough, where in 1912 it was transformed into
+the Royal Aircraft Factory. Four balloon sections took part in the South
+African War and were used during the Siege of Ladysmith, at
+Magersfontein and Paardeburg. Colonel Lynch, who served in the Boer
+Army, stated at a lecture delivered in Paris after the war that "the
+Boers took a dislike to balloons. All other instruments of war were at
+their command; they had artillery superior for the most part to, and
+better served than, that of the English; they had telegraphic and
+heliographic apparatus; but the balloons were the symbol of a scientific
+superiority of the English which seriously disquieted them."
+
+I went through a course in ballooning during leave from West Africa in
+1904 and remember that partly owing to the energy of Colonel Capper,
+partly to the impetus given by the South African War, and partly to the
+growing interest in all things aeronautical throughout the civilized
+world, it was noticeable that the activities of the Balloon Factory were
+increasing in many directions. Although the spherical balloon had been
+improved, its disabilities were recognized and experiments were made
+with elongated balloons, man-flying kites, air photography, signalling
+devices, observation of artillery fire, mechanical apparatus for hauling
+down balloons, and petrol motors. A grant for a dirigible balloon was
+obtained in 1903, though it was not until 1907, the year in which Cody
+began the construction of his aeroplane at Farnborough, and Charles
+Rolls his experiments, that the airship "Nulli Secundus" made her first
+flight. She was about 120 feet long and 30 feet in diameter, and was
+driven by a 40 horse-power engine at a speed of 30 miles an hour. On
+October 5th this airship flew to London in an hour and a half, circled
+round St. Paul's, man[oe]uvred over Buckingham Palace, and descended at
+the Crystal Palace. In the same year, be it remembered, a Zeppelin had
+made a trip of 200 miles from Friedrichshaven to Frankfort. The "Nulli
+Secundus" was followed in 1910 by the "Beta" and the "Gamma."
+
+Meanwhile an Advisory Committee for Aeronautics had been appointed, and
+the National Physical Laboratory had organized a department at
+Teddington for the investigation of aeronautical problems in
+co-operation with the Balloon Factory.
+
+
+_The Air Battalion._
+
+In 1911 the authorities could no longer close their eyes, especially at
+a time when rumours of war were rife, to the rapid development of
+heavier-than-air craft on the Continent. So far, as we have seen, the
+aeroplane had been regarded in England as little more than the plaything
+of a few adventurous but foolhardy spirits. A certain amount of
+experience in piloting and handling aeroplanes had been gained by a
+handful of Army officers, but the machines used either belonged to the
+officers themselves, to civilians, or to aviation firms. I was at that
+time a general staff officer in the Directorate of Military Operations
+under General Wilson, now Field Marshal and late Chief of the Imperial
+General Staff, and was the only officer in the War Office who had
+learned to fly. It appeared very important that a study of the military
+possibilities of aviation should be made. The prime role of cavalry,
+reconnaissance, seemed to have passed from it. In addition to my normal
+duties, I visited France, Germany and Italy, collected information on
+foreign activities, wrote reports, and tried to create a knowledge of
+the possible effect of future military aeronautics and to urge the
+formation of a flying corps.
+
+In 1911 the Air Battalion of the Royal Engineers, consisting of
+Headquarters, No. 1 Company (Airships) and No. 2 Company (Aeroplanes),
+was formed and superseded the Balloon School. The creation of No. 2
+Company, stationed at Larkhill, marked the first formation of a British
+military unit composed entirely of heavier-than-air aircraft. The same
+year witnessed the inception of the B.E., F.E. and S.E. type machines in
+the Balloon Factory, but the total of our machines, both for naval and
+military requirements, amounted to something less than twelve aeroplanes
+and two small airships; and the mishaps suffered by the military
+machines on their flight from Larkhill to Cambridge, to take part in
+Army Man[oe]uvres, were significant of their unreliability.
+
+
+_The Royal Flying Corps._
+
+In view, therefore, of the reports received of the progress abroad, the
+Air Battalion was clearly insufficient to meet the demands which might
+be made upon it in the event of war; and at the end of 1911 the Prime
+Minister instructed a standing Sub-Committee of the Committee of
+Imperial Defence to consider the future development of air navigation
+for naval and military purposes. As a result of their deliberations the
+Committee recommended the creation of a British Air Service to be
+regarded as one and designated the Royal Flying Corps; the division of
+the Corps into a Naval Wing, a Military Wing, and a Central Flying
+School; the maintenance of the closest possible collaboration between
+the Corps, the Advisory Committee for Aeronautics and the Aircraft (late
+Balloon) Factory; and the appointment of a permanent Consultative
+Committee, named the Air Committee, to deal with all aeronautical
+questions affecting both the Admiralty and the War Office.
+
+Consequent upon these recommendations, a Technical Sub-Committee was
+formed, consisting of Brig.-General Henderson, Major MacInnes of the
+directorate of Military Training at the War Office, a splendid officer,
+who died during the war, and myself, to draft the new scheme. The
+objects kept in view in framing our peace organization were to suit it
+to war conditions, as far as they could be foreseen, to base it on an
+efficient self-contained unit, and, while allowing for the wide
+differences between naval and military requirements, to ensure the
+maximum co-operation between the two branches of the Service. Success
+beyond expectation was achieved in the first two objects, but, as will
+be seen, the naval and military branches tended for unforeseen but good
+reasons to diverge, until they joined hands again in 1918 as the Royal
+Air Force. The bases of the military organization were, a headquarters,
+the squadron, and the flying depot. These proved their value during the
+war and have remained the units of our air forces to this day. The
+Military Wing was to form a single and complete organization and contain
+a headquarters, seven aeroplane squadrons, each to consist of twelve
+active machines and six in reserve, one airship and kite squadron, and a
+flying depot. All pilots, whether of the Naval or the Military Wing,
+were eventually to graduate at the Central Flying School, whence they
+could join either the Naval Wing at Eastchurch or one of the Military
+Squadrons. In time of war each branch of the Service was to form a
+reserve for the other if required.
+
+
+_The Military Wing._
+
+In accordance with this scheme I received instructions to organize,
+recruit, train and command the Military Wing of the Royal Flying Corps.
+The functions of the Military Wing were quite clear: it was to meet the
+air requirements of the Expeditionary Force primarily for reconnaissance
+purposes, but its organization was framed so that it could easily be
+expanded and the scope of its duties widened. Headquarters were
+established at Farnborough on May 13th, 1912: Barrington-Kennett, an
+officer of the Grenadier Guards who had been attached to the Air
+Battalion, was appointed, and made the best of all possible adjutants;
+and the nucleus of the Corps, consisting at first of the cadres of an
+airship squadron under Edward Maitland, of two aeroplane squadrons under
+Burke and Brooke-Popham, and a flying depot (later the aircraft park)
+under Carden, who was a little later greatly assisted in the complex
+matter of technical stores by Beatty, came into existence. At the same
+time the construction of the Central Flying School was started at
+Upavon, under Captain G. Payne, R.N. With regard to the other squadrons
+provided for, the nucleus of No. 4 Squadron was formed the same year,
+and that of No. 5 Squadron the following year, of Nos. 6 and 7
+Squadrons in 1914, while No. 8 Squadron was not started until after the
+outbreak of war.
+
+Records of the progress and growth of the Corps were left at Farnborough
+when the Headquarters and four squadrons went to France in August, 1914,
+and have been lost. This is particularly unfortunate because without
+them it will be difficult for the historian of the Corps adequately to
+describe the beginnings and to assess the value of the work then carried
+out.
+
+The task of forming the new service, which was to do much to assist the
+Army in saving England, was begun. The time was very short. A great
+energy had to be brought to the work. As with all things new, it had to
+contend with apathy and opposition on all sides. There was no precedent
+to help. The organization of the Corps to its smallest detail of
+technical stores, supply and transport had to be thought out. The type
+of machine required; the method of obtaining it from a struggling
+industry; its use and maintenance; the personnel, its training and
+equipment; these, and a thousand other aspects of the question, required
+the employment of a large staff of experts. But the experts did not
+exist and the duties were carried out almost entirely at Farnborough,
+where in addition time had to be found to compile the official training
+and other text books and regulations required for an entirely new arm.
+
+In addition to the innumerable problems inherent in the organization,
+growth and training of the Military Wing, the two years between its
+inception and the outbreak of war were strenuously applied to solving
+the problems of air tactics and strategy. Until the South African War
+the British Army had been drilled under the influence of stereotyped
+Prussian ideas. Perhaps the South African War led too far in an opposite
+direction, but it taught us one thing, which was to prove of such
+importance in 1914--the value of mobility; and we realized in aircraft
+the advent of the most mobile arm the world has yet seen.
+
+All was new. A new Corps. A new element in which to work. New conditions
+in peace akin to those in war. And there had to be developed a new
+spirit, combining the discipline of the old Army, the technical skill of
+the Navy, and the initiative, energy and dash inseparable from flying.
+There were the inevitable accidents, but training had to be done. We
+existed for war and war alone would show whether we had thought and
+worked without respite aright. We had to prove our value to the other
+arms, many of the leaders of which, owing to a long period of peace,
+found difficulty in differentiating between the normal usages of peace
+and war and in understanding the right use of aircraft. Somehow or other
+time was found during 1912, 1913 and 1914 to write to reviews, to
+lecture at army and other centres of training, to attend Staff rides,
+and to endeavour in every way possible to learn how best to work in with
+the army commands and to teach those commands the usefulness and
+limitations of aircraft.
+
+As Ruskin wrote:
+
+    "Man is the engine whose motive power is the soul and the largest
+    quantity of work will not be done by this curious engine for pay,
+    or under pressure, or by the help of any kind of fuel which may be
+    supplied by the cauldron. It will be done only when the will or
+    spirit of the creature is brought to its own greatest strength by
+    its own proper fuel, namely the affection."
+
+I was intensely proud of my command and often thought of the time when,
+as I had been promised, I should, in the event of war, command it in the
+field. We worked at white heat believing that war was coming soon;
+believing that our efforts would have a real effect on the result; and
+determined that the new arm should rank second to none among the forces
+of the Crown. _Esprit de Corps_ was of vital importance, but as officers
+and non-commissioned officers were drawn from every branch and every
+regiment of the army this was no easy matter and was only achieved by
+the splendid example and precept of such men as Herbert, Becke,
+Longcroft, Chinnery and Barrington-Kennett. We selected our motto: "Per
+Ardua ad Astra." It was in this atmosphere that the Military Wing grew
+in peace. It was in this atmosphere that the soul was formed which later
+under the great strain of war impelled our pilots forward cheerfully to
+face every duty and every danger in the true spirit of manliness and
+fearless confidence.
+
+As in framing the original scheme on paper, so in giving it life it was
+our aim to organize the Corps, so that, whatever its future strength, it
+would be sound and efficient, and its continuity of growth effected
+without even temporary dislocation or waste. The tactical unit of the
+Military Wing--the squadron, consisting of three flights, each of four
+machines with two in reserve--had the advantage that it was of
+sufficient size to act independently, while it was not too unwieldy for
+a single command. It was equally suitable for independent or
+co-operative action, and the full complement of seven squadrons would,
+in addition to a reserve, furnish one squadron for each division of an
+Army Expeditionary force of the size then contemplated, though no
+definite allotment of aeroplanes to the lower commands was at first
+intended. The French and Germans, on the other hand, were building up
+their organizations with smaller units, with the result that they found
+even greater difficulties than ourselves in obtaining sufficient
+experienced officers to command them. It is probable that the consequent
+lack of concentration, knowledge and determination to stick to sound
+principles of action was one of the causes underlying the non-success of
+the German air service in the opening phases of the war.
+
+According to the system employed squadrons were formed, organized,
+equipped, and a certain amount of preliminary training carried out, at
+Farnborough, when on completion the squadron moved to one of the
+stations which I had established or was forming at Netheravon, Montrose,
+Gosport, Dover, and Orfordness, Netheravon being the largest. This
+dispersion of squadrons did not affect the entity and cohesion, under
+Wing headquarters at Farnborough, of the Corps as a whole. No. 3
+Squadron, one of the original two referred to, removed to Netheravon
+from Larkhill in June.
+
+Similarly, and in order to avoid congestion at Farnborough, to foster a
+spirit of self-support and to enable air operations to be carried out
+with troops in Scotland, No. 2 Squadron was sent to Montrose. Five of
+its machines flew all the way, and it became one of the principles of
+training that machines should fly whenever a move was ordered. Thus in
+1913 six machines from this squadron were flown from Montrose to
+Limerick--a great feat then--to take part in the Irish Command
+man[oe]uvres, the crossing of the Irish Channel being successfully
+carried out both ways by all machines. Another flight of an experimental
+nature was made by Longcroft, with myself as passenger, from Farnborough
+to Montrose in a single day with only one landing.
+
+The unavoidable and never-relaxing strain inherent in the daily and
+hourly use of an instrument, in the design, maintenance and improvement
+of which we could only grope our way, was very great. In peace before
+the war, as later in the war, the only variation to strain lay in
+periods of increased strain.
+
+At Headquarters, in addition to the normal duties of command and
+co-ordination, and the supply of all technical stores to squadrons,
+there was carried out all recruiting, and I also formed a specialized
+flight for the study of technical problems, such as the use of wireless
+from aircraft. The bulk of experimental work was originally undertaken
+by the Royal Aircraft Factory, under the Superintendent, Mr. O'Gorman,
+who always helped us in every way possible, but by 1913 I felt it
+necessary to enlarge the duties of the special flight and an
+Experimental Section was formed at Wing Headquarters at Farnborough
+with an officer, Musgrave, in charge. In addition, for each squadron an
+officer was appointed Squadron Officer for Experiments, thus ensuring
+the diffusion of information throughout the Corps, and affording the
+opportunity to each unit of carrying out the experiments best suited to
+the material and apparatus at its command. Similarly other individual
+officers were detailed in each squadron on a co-ordinated scheme, for
+such duties as Officer-in-charge of Stores, Workshops, Mechanical
+Transport, Meteorology, etc.
+
+The formation at Farnborough of the Line of Communications R.F.C.
+Workshop or Flying Depot--later known as the Aircraft Park--completed
+the organization of the Military Wing.
+
+I was very anxious as early as possible to prove the structure as a
+unified self-supporting, mobile and easily handled flying corps as far
+as it had gone, and in June, 1914, this was done by the concentration in
+camp at Netheravon of the entire Military Wing, comprising Headquarters
+and Headquarters Flight, the four completed squadrons and the nucleus of
+No. 6 Squadron, the Aircraft Park and a detachment of the Kite Section.
+Mobilization, a very difficult process when it came, would have been
+almost impossible had the concentration not taken place. The object of
+the camp was a month's combined training to test personnel, both in the
+air and on the ground, and the handling of aircraft and transport both
+by day and night. Endeavours were made to solve by means of lectures,
+discussions and committees the problems connected with mobilization,
+technical and military training, observation, wireless telegraphy,
+signals, night flying, photography, bomb-dropping, workshops, stores,
+meteorology, transport, shifting of camp and aerodrome, supply and
+maintenance of units in the field, etc.--in fact the whole organization
+essential to the efficiency and cohesion of a Flying Corps, under
+conditions as similar as possible to those expected on active service.
+Very valuable experience was obtained from the work carried out. The
+necessarily wide gaps in our knowledge were brought home in more
+concrete form. It was also evident that the force was very small. But
+within three months it was proved under the strain of war that the
+organization and training had been laid down on sound principles.
+
+
+_The Naval Wing._
+
+As in the case of the Army, it was to airships that the Navy first
+turned its attention, and the birth of naval aviation may be said to
+date from July 21st, 1908, when Admiral Bacon submitted proposals for
+the construction of a rigid airship, the ill-fated "Mayfly" which was
+destroyed on her preliminary trials. The Admiralty thereupon decided to
+discontinue the construction of airships, the development of which was
+left to the Army until May, 1914, when it was decided that all
+airships--that is No. 1 Squadron of the Military Wing--should be taken
+over by the Naval Wing. This was partly the result of a report by two
+Naval Officers, who visited France, Austria and Germany, as was the
+purchase of two vessels of the Parseval and Astra Torres types, and a
+small non-rigid from Willows. The construction of a number of other
+airships was ordered, but for various reasons was delayed or never
+completed up to the outbreak of war.
+
+Although at first sight the functions of the Naval Wing--coast defence
+and work with the Fleet--seemed hardly more difficult to perform than
+those of the Military Wing, in practice, as I was to find later from
+personal experience when in command of the R.N.A.S. at Gallipoli, they
+were more complicated, while the slowness of the Admiralty in evolving a
+clear scheme of employment and a definite objective made itself felt.
+Before the war the achievements of the Naval Wing were due rather to
+individual effort than to a definite policy of organized expansion. It
+was the pilot and the machine rather than the organization which
+developed.
+
+As already stated, Eastchurch was chosen by the Short Brothers for their
+experiments in aeroplanes in 1909, but it was not until 1911 that the
+Admiralty bought two machines and established the first Naval Flying
+School at that place. The same year Commander O. Swann purchased from
+Messrs. A. V. Roe a 35 horse-power biplane and began to carry out
+experiments with different types of floats, as a result of which a
+twin-float seaplane was produced--the first to rise off the water in
+this country.
+
+For some time seaplanes were in a very experimental stage and at best
+could only rise from, and alight on, calm water, though it is
+interesting to note that as far back as 1911 the employment of seaplanes
+for torpedo attack, which I think will be one of the most important
+developments of aircraft in the future, engaged the attention of the
+Navy, and a Sopwith seaplane carrying a 14-inch torpedo made its first
+flight at Calshot in 1913. For this reason, therefore, it appeared that
+principally aeroplanes and airships would have to be employed from shore
+bases for coast defence and that "carrier" ships would be necessary to
+enable seaplanes to work with the Fleet.
+
+The first stations set up were Eastchurch, Isle of Grain, Calshot,
+Felixstowe, Yarmouth, Cromarty and Kingsnorth, from which at the
+outbreak of war an organized coastal patrol was established.
+
+From the outset the Naval Wing, assisted by its large percentage of
+skilled technical personnel, paid great attention to experimental work
+of all sorts. Thus in 1912 the detection of submarines by aircraft was
+taken up, in 1913 valuable results were obtained from bomb-dropping, and
+a large number of experiments in wireless, machine gunnery and fighting
+carried out. In addition, efforts were made to extend the power, range
+and capacity of engine and machine.
+
+The second Naval problem, that of co-operation with the Fleet, involved
+the flight of aircraft from ships and the design of aircraft carriers.
+In 1911 an aeroplane for the first time took off successfully from the
+deck of a cruiser at anchor, and the following year an aeroplane flew
+from H.M.S. "Hibernia," while under weigh, but it was not until after
+the outbreak of war that alighting on decks was successfully
+accomplished. The first ship to be fitted up as a parent ship for
+seaplanes was the "Hermes" in 1913.
+
+These specialized technical requirements and developments explain why
+the Naval Wing and the Royal Naval Air Service tended towards
+individualism rather than cohesion. While the Military Wing, or Royal
+Flying Corps, progressed further as an organized fighting force, the
+Royal Naval Air Service, amongst the 100 odd aeroplanes and seaplanes on
+charge which were mainly of the Short, Sopwith, Avro, Farman and Wright
+types, possessed in 1914 the more powerful engines and a number of
+aeroplanes fitted with wireless and machine guns, while their
+bomb-dropping arrangements were also in a more advanced stage of
+development.
+
+An Air Department was formed at the Admiralty in 1912 to deal with all
+questions relating to naval aircraft. Naval officers were trained from
+the beginning at Eastchurch rather than at the Central Flying School,
+and in 1913 the appointment of an Inspecting Captain for Aircraft, with
+a Central Air Office at Sheerness as his headquarters, accentuated a
+growing tendency for the Naval Wing to work on independent lines.
+
+The Naval Wing grew rapidly and in the middle of 1914 was reorganized as
+the Royal Naval Air Service, comprising the Air Department of the
+Admiralty, the Central Air Office, the Royal Naval Flying School, the
+Royal Naval Air Stations, and all aircraft, seaplane ships and balloons
+employed for naval purposes. This placed the naval air force on a
+self-supporting basis and the entity of the Royal Flying Corps as a
+whole, as originally provided for, was lost.
+
+
+TACTICS AND THE MACHINE.
+
+The value of the application of flying to war requires little
+demonstration. The most important attributes of generalship are quick
+appreciation of a situation and quick decision. To the ordinary
+Commander the absence of information is paralysing. In the nineteenth
+century the mass of cavalry was the special instrument of information
+and to obtain it contact with the enemy's main forces had to be
+effected. It thus acted as a shield and also tried to provide the
+information necessary to enable the infantry to take the offensive.
+
+Aviation, by the wide field of observation it commands, by the speed
+with which it can collect and transmit information, to a great extent
+lifts the fog of war and enables a general to act on knowledge where
+before he acted largely on deduction. Information once obtained, its
+mobile and far-reaching offensive power introduces the element of
+surprise, and permits of lightning strokes against the enemy's vital
+points.
+
+Before the war reconnaissance was regarded as the principal duty of the
+aircraft of the Military Wing. This was due to two reasons, first, the
+obvious one that aircraft possessed advantages shared by no other arm
+for obtaining information quickly and over wide areas and reporting to
+Headquarters, and second, that experiment had proved the difficulty of
+loading aeroplanes with offensive weapons, such as bombs or machine
+guns, without impairing speed and climb.
+
+The following statement, which I drafted and which was issued by the
+General Staff before the Army Man[oe]uvres of 1912, summarizes the
+position:--
+
+    "As regards strategical reconnaissance," it says, "a General is
+    probably now justified in requiring a well-trained flyer, flying a
+    modern aeroplane, to reconnoitre some 70 miles out and return 70
+    miles. This would be done at a speed of, say, 60 miles an hour in
+    ordinary weather over ordinary country. Thus within four hours,
+    allowing a wide margin, a report as to the approximate strength,
+    formation and direction of movement of the enemy, if he is within a
+    70-mile radius, should be in the hands of the Commander."
+
+To those imbued with a knowledge of military history this new method of
+ascertaining the enemy's movements might well seem revolutionary.
+
+Let us take two instances illustrating what aircraft, with a radius of
+little over 100 miles, might have done in previous campaigns. For the
+operations which terminated in the capitulation of Ulm in 1805 Napoleon
+concentrated two army corps at Wuerzburg and five along the left bank of
+the Rhine between Mannheim and Strasburg, his main body of cavalry under
+Murat being at the latter place. The Austrian Army under Mack was behind
+the Iller between Ulm and Memmingen, and expected the French to advance
+through the defiles of the Black Forest, where Napoleon did actually
+make a feint with his cavalry. Napoleon, however, crossing the Rhine on
+September 26th, 1805, moved east, and it was not until October 2nd, when
+the French Army had reached the line Ansbach, Langenburg, Hall and
+Ludwigsburg, and his envelopment was far advanced, that Mack realized
+that the main French advance was coming from the north. Aeroplanes of
+the type we possessed in 1914 could have reconnoitred the whole of
+Napoleon's preliminary position, could have detected his line of
+advance, especially as it was concentrated on a very narrow front, and
+could have brought back the information to the Austrian Headquarters
+within a few hours.
+
+Aircraft would have been of even greater value on August 16th, 1870, at
+the Battle of Rezonville, where neither the French nor the Germans were
+aware of the other's movements. On the 14th a battle had been fought
+east of Metz which had resulted in the French retreat. On the morning of
+the 16th Moltke thought the French had retired west by the Metz-Verdun
+road and those to the north of it, and consequently he directed his left
+wing due west towards the Meuse to head off the French, sending his
+right army towards Rezonville to harass their rearguard. The French
+retreat, however, had been slow and two corps were still at Rezonville,
+while three corps and the reserve cavalry were within easy reach, some
+130,000 men in all. At 9 in the morning the German 3rd Corps, unaided
+and far from support, attacked a position within reach of the whole
+French Army, believing it had to deal with a rearguard only. Bazaine, on
+the other hand, thinking that he was faced by the German main army,
+remained on the defensive, and lost the opportunity of defeating in
+detail first the 3rd and then the 10th German Corps. A few aeroplanes
+operating on a radius of 30 miles would have disclosed between daybreak
+and 10 a.m. the true position to either commander. Neither the German
+nor the French cavalry, though both were engaged, obtained any reliable
+information.
+
+The problem as to how far aircraft would reduce the value of cavalry was
+widely discussed before the war. It was seen that by day aircraft could
+obtain quicker and more accurate information, but that cavalry retained
+their power of night reconnaissance, of mobile offensive action and of
+pinning the enemy to his ground by fighting. This was found to be so
+during the retreat, when, in addition to the direct value of aircraft
+for long-distance reconnaissance, an indirect asset of great importance
+lay in the release of the cavalry for battle action in assistance of the
+infantry. The question has become more acute since the offensive action
+of aircraft against ground targets has developed, but although we must
+never forget the splendid work of the mounted arm during the Retreat
+from Mons, and in March, 1918, factors have arisen tending to make the
+use of cavalry a problem of extreme difficulty in European wars, and it
+is possible that, in addition to their reconnaissance functions,
+aircraft will supersede the shock tactics and delaying action of
+cavalry, though this may be modified if, the sabre being a thing of the
+past, cavalry are converted into mounted machine gunners.
+
+Air tactics and training were, therefore, chiefly studied from the point
+of view of reconnaissance. In addition to the possibility of being shot
+at by other aircraft, an important consideration was vulnerability from
+the ground. Before the war reconnaissances were carried out at heights
+varying from 2,000 to 6,000 feet, but it was generally considered that
+the aeroplane was safe from fire from the ground at heights above 3,000
+feet.
+
+Serious difficulties affecting the mobility of aircraft were the means
+of providing a regular supply of fuel and the selection of landing
+grounds when moving camp, which had to be close enough behind the front
+line as not to entail waste of time in flying out and back over friendly
+territory. This was later brought home to us in a very acute form during
+the Retreat from Mons.
+
+As machines improved, increasing attention was paid to bettering their
+power of reconnaissance by air photography, their value in co-operation
+with artillery by wireless equipment, their offensive action by bomb
+dropping and their offence and defence by armament.
+
+The value of a correct initiative and the aeroplane's role as an
+offensive weapon were fully appreciated and brought out in the Training
+Manual of the Royal Flying Corps which we compiled at Farnborough, and
+which was published early in 1914 by the War Office. It says:--
+
+    "It is probable that one phase of the struggle for the command of
+    the air will resolve itself into a series of combats between
+    individual aeroplanes, or pairs of aeroplanes. If the pilots of one
+    side can succeed in obtaining victory in a succession of such
+    combats, they will establish a moral ascendancy over the surviving
+    pilots of the enemy, and be left free to carry out their duties of
+    reconnaissance. The actual tactics must depend on the types of the
+    aeroplanes engaged, the object of the pilot being to obtain for his
+    passenger the free use of his own weapon while denying to the enemy
+    the use of his. To disable the pilot of the opposing aeroplane will
+    be the first object. In the case of fast reconnaissance aeroplanes
+    it will often be advisable to avoid fighting, in order to carry out
+    a mission or to deliver information; but it must be borne in mind
+    that this will be sometimes impossible, and that, as in every other
+    class of fighting, a fixed determination to attack and win will be
+    the surest road to victory."
+
+Speaking generally, the evolution of the machine, as apart from the
+engine, which hung behind, followed upon the evolution of air tactics.
+As soon as experience, often hard won at the cost of a valuable life,
+opened up new fields of activity for aircraft, the designer and
+constructor evolved new designs to meet the new requirements. It was no
+small achievement in this period to have solved the problem of inherent
+stability, both in theory and practice, so successfully, that from the
+aerodynamic standpoint our machines in 1914 compare favourably with
+those in use at the end of the war.
+
+In dealing with the evolution of the machine during the three years
+prior to the war there are three landmarks: in the autumn of 1911 the
+few machines belonging to the Air Battalion failed to reach their
+destination for Army Man[oe]uvres; in May, 1912, the Royal Flying Corps
+was formed and experiments with a view to meeting military requirements
+were for the first time energetically and methodically prosecuted; and
+in August, 1914, four squadrons flew to France with machines which had
+attained a high degree of stability and were not inferior to any of
+those possessed by other countries. When it is remembered in what a
+short time these machines were evolved, it is not surprising that
+attention had been chiefly confined to the problem of the 'plane and
+stability, the engine and speed and reliability. Wireless, bombing,
+photography, night flying and machine gunnery had been discussed and
+experimented with, but no progress was made comparable to that effected
+under war conditions.
+
+Machines and engines before the war were chiefly French. It is
+interesting to note those with which No. 3 Squadron, one of the first to
+be formed, commenced its career in May, 1912. They consisted of one 50
+horse-power Gnome Nieuport, one Deperdussin, which by the way was
+privately owned, one Gnome Bristol, two Gnome Bleriot monoplanes, one
+Avro and one Bristol box-kite biplane. By September, 1912, the Squadron
+possessed fourteen monoplanes, but in that month, owing to the number of
+accidents incurred by them, the use of monoplanes was temporarily
+forbidden, and it was not until April, 1913, that the Squadron was fully
+equipped with B.E. and Maurice Farman biplanes organized in flights.
+
+These types formed the backbone of the Military Wing, which also
+included Codys, Breguets, Avros, and, later, Sopwiths. The B.E.2c was
+produced by the Royal Aircraft Factory in the autumn of 1913 and
+demonstrated its high degree of stability by flying from Aldershot to
+Froyle and from Froyle to Fleet, distances of 6-3/4 and 8 miles
+respectively, without the use of ailerons or elevators. The progress
+made is illustrated by the fact that at the Army Man[oe]uvres of 1913
+twelve machines covered 4,545 miles on reconnaissance and 3,210 miles on
+other flights, accurate observations being made from a height of 6,000
+feet, without serious mishap.
+
+In 1913 I recommended the gradual substitution of B.E.'s for Farmans on
+the ground of the all-round efficiency and superior fighting qualities
+of the former, and to secure the advantage of standardization, but it
+was objected by the War Office that the Farmans were the only machines
+that could mount weapons in front--an objection which was not met until
+firing through the airscrew was introduced--and that the slower Farmans
+offered greater advantages for observation, an idea which was long
+prevalent. As a result, a compromise was effected, and two squadrons
+were equipped with B.E.'s and two with homogeneous flights of Farmans,
+Bleriots and Avros.
+
+At the outbreak of war the most successful machines possessed by the
+Military Wing were the B.E.2 tractor with a 70 horse-power Renault
+engine, a speed of 73 miles an hour, and a climb of 3,000 feet in nine
+minutes; and a Henri Farman pusher with a speed of 60 miles an hour, and
+a climb of 3,000 feet in fourteen minutes. A special study was being
+made in 1914 of the best methods of ensuring clear observation of the
+ground, and partly in this connection staggered planes were introduced,
+culminating in the B.E.2c's, which were not, however, available for
+service in any numbers until 1915.
+
+To sum up, the technical development of aircraft has taken place, and
+will continue side by side with the evolution of the uses to which
+aircraft can be put. While due attention was paid to problems connected
+with the anticipated duties of aircraft ancillary to that of
+reconnaissance, owing to the short space of time between the formation
+of the Royal Flying Corps and the outbreak of war, to the difficulties
+connected with the engine, and to causes inseparable from peace
+conditions, development had been more or less confined to evolving a
+stable and reliable machine with a good field of view.
+
+
+CONCLUSIONS.
+
+The foregoing outline of the development of aviation from the earliest
+times up to the war--a story of human endeavour and achievement in the
+air with its attendant dangers and difficulties--is not without value in
+endeavouring to assess that which has since occurred.
+
+At the beginning of the year 1912 the Royal Flying Corps did not exist.
+At the beginning of the Great War, in 1914, England found herself with
+an air service which, though much smaller than those of Germany or
+France, was so excellently manned and organized, trained and equipped,
+that it placed her at a bound in the front rank of aviation.
+
+The machine was stable, but the engine still unequal to the tasks laid
+upon it. Civil Aviation practically did not exist.
+
+I shall now describe the extension of air duties under war conditions;
+the increasing value of aircraft for general action and air tactics and
+their development and far-reaching effect as the right hand of strategy.
+This resulted in the expansion of our flying corps from a total of 1,844
+officers and men, and seven squadrons with some 150 machines fit for war
+use, to a total of nearly 300,000 officers and men, and 201 squadrons
+and 22,000 machines in use at the end of the war, and in the evolution
+of the machine to a point where we can regard it, not only as a weapon
+of war, but as a new method of transport for commercial purposes in
+peace.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+WAR
+
+
+GENERAL REMARKS ON WAR DEVELOPMENT.
+
+In dealing with the story of the beginnings of aviation and the
+evolution of aircraft up to the war, we have seen that though its growth
+was infinitesimal compared with that which came with the impetus of war,
+the air service took definite and practical shape more rapidly than had
+up to that time any other arm of the Army or Navy in peace.
+
+In 1914 we had reached a point where we possessed a small but mobile and
+efficient flying force, equipped and trained essentially for
+reconnaissance. Although experiments had been made, little had been
+achieved in the use of wireless from aircraft, air photography, bomb
+dropping, armament or the development of air fighting. As with the Army
+and Navy, war quickened and expanded all the attributes of air
+operations in a way which could not have been foreseen before the
+struggle occurred; and, as it would have been impossible for the Army
+and Navy to build up their war organization without the foundation of
+the pre-war service, so it was the splendid quality of the original
+Royal Flying Corps that made this expansion possible.
+
+Before the war the Royal Flying Corps was considerably smaller than the
+air services of either France or Germany, and to attain even the
+strength with which the Military Wing left England the bulk of the
+trained officers and men, and almost all the machines fit for service,
+had to be taken. When I started to raise the Corps, in May, 1912, the
+War Office estimated that its organization, (of a headquarters and seven
+aeroplane and one airship squadrons) would take at least four years;
+instead, there had been little more than two. Even at the risk of
+leaving insufficient personnel and material behind to form and train new
+squadrons, I recommended that four complete squadrons (including the
+wireless machines which had to be thrown in to make up the numbers)
+should be sent overseas to help the British Expeditionary Force in
+bearing the brunt of the terrific blow that was to come. It was a very
+serious matter that so little could be left with which to carry on in
+England, but we considered it essential to dispatch at once to France
+every available machine and pilot, because both political and military
+authorities were of opinion that for economic and financial reasons a
+war with a great European power could not last more than a few months.
+Another reason was that those of us who had been at the Staff College
+during the few years before the war, or who had recently served on the
+General Staff at the War Office, believed that the weight of the German
+attack would be made through Belgium, where, owing to the enclosed
+nature of the country, cavalry would be at a disadvantage, and we
+realized therefore, and urged, the great effect which the air would
+have from the commencement of operations--a view which was not widely
+held, especially among senior officers in the Army. We also felt the
+necessity of using our maximum air strength from the outset, so as to
+prove its supreme importance as quickly and practically as possible. It
+required the Retreat from Mons before even G.H.Q. as a whole would
+accept the fact, though Colonel Macdonogh, the head of the intelligence
+section, was our firm ally. The iron of confidence, both to used and
+user, had to be welded with the first great blows on the anvil of war.
+For these reasons it was vital that every available trained pilot and
+suitable machine should be employed with the Army, even at the danger of
+serious initial depletion at Home. The smooth progress of expansion was
+largely attributable alike to the strength of the pre-war spirit,
+organization and training,[2] and to the results actual and moral
+obtained by the first four squadrons during the Retreat and the
+following weeks of the war under centralized control. The French
+distributed their "Escadrilles," which were approximately of the size of
+our "flight," from the beginning, and it is probable that one cause of
+failure in the German air service during the same period lay in the
+initial dispersion of units and lack of unified control by the higher
+command. The British Expeditionary Force having been saved during the
+Retreat, Paris having been saved at the Marne, the great German army
+having made a retirement, a lengthy war of position having become
+obvious, confidence in the air service, both within and without, having
+been established, the centralized system necessarily adopted up to that
+time could be relaxed, and we were able to send home officers and men
+with greatly increased experience to help build up the many new
+squadrons which would be required to co-operate with the new armies.
+
+[2] On October 17, 1914, Sir J. French wrote: "Such efficiency as the
+R.F.C. may have shown in the field is, in my opinion, principally due to
+organization and training."
+
+Gradually, as the numbers in the field permitted, increased duties were
+undertaken. The Army, though it did not do so at first, yet came to
+understand the immense importance to itself of air reconnaissance. So
+much so indeed that our machines and pilots were generally many too few
+to attempt more than the absolute essentials, and calls were often made
+upon them which were beyond their strength to meet. An ironic contrast
+to this was supplied, however, at the evacuation of the Dardanelles,
+where I was commanding the air service (the R.N.A.S.), and was asked to
+be careful not to do too much air work. This at a time when through
+stress and strain and loss we had, I think, a total of five machines
+left able to take the air!
+
+Observation was, and remains, the prime purpose for which the Royal
+Flying Corps was formed. 1914 was a year of reconnaissance, but with the
+advent of trench warfare at the Battle of the Aisne, the first attempts
+were made to extend its scope by the use of wireless for artillery
+co-operation, and by air photography, both of which developed rapidly.
+Headway was also being made with bombing. Then machines carrying out
+their special duties had to be protected, while it became necessary to
+prevent hostile machines from effecting similar functions, with the
+result that 1915 saw the beginnings of systematic air fighting.
+
+In 1915 the easily man[oe]uvrable Fokker, with its machine-gun
+synchronizing gear for firing through the propeller, gave the Germans a
+temporary lead, but by the Battle of the Somme this was outclassed and
+in 1916 our air superiority became marked. The Royal Flying Corps was by
+that time organized into Brigades and Wings, one Wing operating with
+each Army for fighting and distant reconnaissance, and one Wing with
+each Corps for short reconnaissance and such specialized work as
+artillery co-operation and contact patrols. Both types of machine took
+part in bombing operations.
+
+There is generally perhaps a tendency, when reviewing the army and air
+effort in the war, to deal almost entirely with the Western Front and to
+forget the prodigious work done in many other theatres.
+
+In 1915 the Royal Naval Air Service carried out all air work with the
+Army and Navy in the Gallipoli campaign and showed how a single air
+force could effect really important co-operation with both services. In
+addition to the normal duties of co-operation with the Army and the
+Fleet, and in spite of the difficulties of transport, supply and
+workshop arrangements, photographs were taken from the air of the
+greater part of the Peninsula, and the original inaccurate maps
+corrected therefrom; frequent bombing raids were carried out against
+objectives on the Peninsula, the Turkish lines of communications, and
+even Constantinople itself. In this campaign, too, torpedoes were used
+for the first time by aircraft and three ships were destroyed in the
+Dardanelles by this means. The distance from the hub of affairs, a line
+of supply about 6,000 miles in length, sickness and the climatic and
+geographical conditions rendered maintenance very difficult. Sand and
+dust driven in clouds by high winds greatly shortened the working life
+of engines. The heat during the summer caused the rapid deterioration of
+machines, while long oversea flights entailed loss from forced landings.
+There are many aspects of the deepest interest to be brought out when a
+complete history of the Campaign in Gallipoli comes to be written. It is
+true that the Allies would have lost all if they had been defeated in
+the west, and that the call of the Armies for more and more men and
+munitions for that theatre was insistent; it is equally true, however,
+that in France there could be nothing but batter and counter-batter, and
+the only remaining point where strategic principles could be brought to
+bear was at the Dardanelles. But what is more relevant to the subject of
+these pages is that when in future years the story of Helles and Anzac
+and Suvla is weighed, it will, I think, appear that had the necessary
+air service been built up from the beginning and sustained, the Army and
+Navy could have forced the Straits and taken Constantinople. I
+insistently urged the dependence of the naval and military forces upon
+air assistance and the necessity for carrying out a strong aerial
+offensive, especially by bombing, for which the local conditions
+governing the enemy operations on the Peninsula offered exceptional
+advantages.
+
+From the autumn of 1915 onwards Egypt became the centre of training and
+expansion for operations in the Middle East and, as the organization
+developed, a brigade was formed with Wings in Macedonia, Sinai and a
+training Wing, which by 1918 had become a training brigade, in Egypt.
+The work of the Wing sent to Sinai in 1916, and expanded in 1917 into a
+brigade, is well summarized in the following extract from a telegram
+received from Egypt on October 3rd, 1918:--
+
+    "Before operations commenced our mastery of the air was complete and
+    this was maintained throughout, enabling the cavalry turning
+    movement to be completely protected and concealed. Enemy retreating
+    columns were so effectively machine gunned and bombed by offensive
+    machines that in all three cases the surviving personnel abandoned
+    their vehicles and consequently upset all plans of retirement. An
+    enemy column thus abandoned was seven miles in length."
+
+The Wings in Macedonia and Mesopotamia, though they could not beat the
+record of the Palestine Brigade, gained a marked supremacy over the
+enemy. Air operations in East Africa were originally carried out by the
+Royal Naval Air Service with seaplanes, which in 1915 were brought up to
+the strength of two squadrons and replaced by aeroplanes under the
+orders of the military forces, their duties being carried out under the
+difficult conditions of bush warfare. Valuable work was also done by the
+Royal Flying Corps squadrons which were sent out to operate in the
+south.
+
+In addition to these major operations, air forces were used in the
+expeditions on the Indian frontier, against Darfur and in the vicinity
+of Aden. Five squadrons were sent to Italy after the Italian retreat
+from the Isonzo and took a prominent part in the final Austrian defeat;
+a Royal Air Force contingent was sent to Russia to operate from
+Archangel; and material assistance was given to France and the other
+Allies, but especially to the United States in the training and
+equipment of her air forces.
+
+At the beginning of 1918 the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air
+Force were amalgamated and the Royal Air Force came into existence, and
+during the year achieved a supremacy more complete than that at any time
+since the Somme.
+
+The following description gives a vivid idea of air activity at the
+front in 1918:--
+
+    "All day long there were 'dog fights' waged at heights up to three
+    or four miles above the shell-torn battlefields of France, whilst
+    the low-flying aeroplanes were attacking suitable targets from the
+    height of a few dozen feet. Passing backwards and forwards went the
+    reconnaissance machines and the bombers, and along the whole front
+    observers were sending out by wireless to the artillery the point of
+    impact of their shells. Such was the picture of the air on any fine
+    day at the time."
+
+1918, however, saw not only the accumulative effect of the tactical
+co-operation of aircraft with our armies in the field, but also the
+formation of the Independent Air Force and the carrying out of the
+strategic air offensive against centres of war industry in the interior
+of Germany.
+
+A vast organization was also required at Home to meet the rapid
+expansion of units in the Field and to supply reinforcements. Thus at
+the Armistice there were 199 training squadrons, the pupils under
+instruction including cadets numbered 30,000, and during the war some
+22,000 graduated as efficient for active service. At the beginning of
+the war pilots were sent overseas with only 11 hours' flying experience.
+This was much too little and there is no doubt that increased training
+would have ensured fewer casualties. Fortunately, however, the length of
+training was increased in the latter part of the war and a remarkable
+advance in training was made possible by the use of an entirely new and
+extraordinarily efficient system of instruction evolved by Smith-Barry.
+
+The war demonstrated the beginnings of what air power meant, though in
+November, 1918, it was still in its infancy. Before many years the
+ability to make war successfully, or even at all, will depend upon air
+power.
+
+Let us now briefly survey the development of the several duties of
+aircraft, the evolution of machines and progress in tactics, strategy
+and the organization of our Air Forces during the war.
+
+I had recognized the great difficulty of mobilizing with the clockwork
+precision of older units and, in the belief that war was coming, had
+ordered a provisional mobilization of the Corps some days before it was
+actually declared. Thanks to this step and to the work done at our
+Concentration Camp at Netheravon in June, 1914, the greater part of the
+Royal Flying Corps was enabled to concentrate without hitch at our
+aerodrome at Dover, and the machines flew via Calais to Amiens on August
+13th.
+
+
+CO-OPERATION WITH THE ARMY.
+
+
+_Reconnaissance._
+
+In the event of France and England declaring war concurrently against
+Germany, the strategic plan agreed to by the British and French general
+staffs before the war had been that the British Expeditionary Force
+should be moved to the Le Cateau, Maubeuge, Mons, area and take up a
+line on the left flank of the French Army near Mons. But England had
+withheld her declaration until three days after the French, and on
+landing in France the first words I heard said by a Frenchman were:
+"Oui, l'armee anglaise arrive mais on a manque le premier plan." It was
+not until after the arrival of G.H.Q. at Amiens on August 14th that,
+although late, it was decided that the advanced line should be taken up.
+The Royal Flying Corps moved by air and road to an existing aerodrome
+outside the antique defences of Maubeuge 12 miles from Mons on the 16th.
+On the 19th the first reconnaissance was carried out, and the entire
+country over which the German armies were advancing, as far as Brussels
+and Louvain, was kept under observation. One of the best reconnaissances
+ever made was that of August 21st, which discovered the 2nd German Corps
+moving from Brussels through Ninhove and Grammont.
+
+From Maubeuge we had to retire on the 24th to Le Cateau, on the 25th to
+St. Quentin, on the 26th to La Fere, on the 28th to Compiegne, on the
+30th to Senlis, on the 31st to Juilly, on September 2nd to Serris, on
+the 3rd to Touquin, on the 4th to Melun, where we were thankful at last
+to get orders again to advance on the 7th to Touquin, and on the 9th to
+Coulommiers, reaching Fere-en-Tardennois on the 12th for the Battle of
+the Aisne.
+
+Of the many recollections of the early days one which will remain
+longest in my mind is the terrible sadness of the flocks of refugees, of
+the poor people we left behind. And the glare of villages burning by the
+hand of the Boche. It was indeed war.
+
+Valuable reconnaissances were made during the whole Retreat from Mons to
+the Marne in spite of the tremendous difficulties involved by constant
+movement, transport, and the selection of new landing grounds, but, in
+the words of Sir John French, "It was the timely warning aircraft gave
+which chiefly enabled me to make speedy dispositions to avert danger and
+disaster. There can be no doubt indeed that even then the presence and
+co-operation of aircraft saved the very frequent use of cavalry patrols
+and detailed supports." The Royal Flying Corps was an important factor
+in helping the British Expeditionary Force to escape von Kluck's nearly
+successful efforts to secure another and a British Sedan.
+
+The reconnaissance resulting in the most valuable information of all,
+and, I think, during the whole of the war, was that of September 3rd,
+during the critical operations on the Marne, which formed one of the
+decisive battles in the world's history, when von Kluck's turning
+movement to the south-east against the French left was accurately
+reported and Marshal Joffre was enabled to make his dispositions
+accordingly. "The precision, exactitude and regularity of the news
+brought in," he said in a message to the British Commander-in-Chief,
+"are evidence of the perfect training of pilots and observers." The
+reports of the German air service, on the other hand, would appear from
+von Kluck's movements to have been of no assistance to him.
+
+The system adopted from the first was for the pilot or observer, or
+both, immediately on their return to bring their report to R.F.C.
+Headquarters, whence the Commander, or his staff officer, accompanied
+them to G.H.Q., where the map was filled in in accordance with the
+report. G.H.Q. could then ask questions and obtain any further
+information which the observer could give, while R.F.C. Headquarters
+could ascertain what further reports were most urgently required. The
+form of the reports, which were ready printed, had been most carefully
+thought out at R.F.C. Headquarters in peace and experimented with at the
+Concentration Camp.
+
+The maps thus compiled at G.H.Q. from air reconnaissance reports between
+August 31st and September 3rd were of vital interest, though it was
+sometimes very difficult to get the information put on the map for
+prompt consideration. For instance, at Dammartin on the evening of
+September 1st, when it was thought that German cavalry were within a few
+miles, G.H.Q. made a very hurried departure, and I was unable to find
+anyone to whom to give very important reports.
+
+It was at the Battle of the Marne that machines were for the first time
+allotted to Army Corps for tactical work, while long-distance
+reconnaissance was carried out by other machines operating from
+Headquarters. Later on, this system was established as a part of our
+permanent organization, squadrons being allotted to, and reporting
+direct to, Corps for tactical reconnaissance, artillery co-operation and
+contact patrols, and to Armies for longer-distance reconnaissance and
+fighting.
+
+The last phase of the war of movement was the race for the Channel Ports
+and it devolved upon aircraft to observe the enemy's movements from his
+centre and left flank to meet the Allied movement to the coast, to
+observe the movements of the four newly-formed corps which came into
+action at Ypres and to maintain liaison with the Belgian and British
+forces at Antwerp and Ostend. Information was very difficult to obtain
+and on one occasion I flew from the Aisne to Antwerp, under Sir John
+French's instructions, in order as far as possible to clear up the
+general situation when our G.H.Q. was in doubt as to whether Antwerp was
+completely surrounded or not. It was an interesting piece of work. There
+was a light drizzle, and the forest of Compiegne had to be flown over at
+about 200 feet. The B.E. could not make the distance without refilling,
+and although only a short halt was made at Amiens for the purpose, it
+was too late to fly direct to Antwerp. Instead, a landing was made in a
+very sticky field under light plough, which was selected from the air
+about 4 miles north of Bruges, to which town I rode on a borrowed
+bicycle. At Bruges there was great consternation and uncertainty as to
+the position at Antwerp, but the Commander kindly placed a large open
+car and its very energetic driver at my disposal to try and get through.
+After many difficulties we managed to find our way into Antwerp by
+about midnight, and I was received by the Belgian Commander. He
+explained that though the Germans had broken through the South-Eastern
+sector and his troops were very hard pressed (and pointing repeatedly to
+a piece of an 18-inch German shell in the corner of the room, he said,
+"Mais qu'est-ce qu'on peut faire avec ces choses-la!"), he hoped to be
+able to hold out for a time. After giving him General French's message
+and obtaining as much information as possible, I managed to get clear of
+Antwerp, reaching Bruges again at 3.15 a.m. At 4 a.m. we set out and
+found a very wet machine in a wetter field and after considerable
+difficulty and flying through the top of the surrounding hedge,
+struggled into the upper air on the way back to Headquarters at
+Fere-en-Tardennois.
+
+During the Battles of the Aisne and of Ypres strategical reconnaissance
+was carried out by the few machines available at Headquarters. Shephard,
+the best reconnaissance officer I have ever known, who was killed later,
+used to fly his B.E.2 without observer over the greater part of Belgium
+two or three times a week and always brought in a long, closely packed,
+and extraordinarily valuable report. Tactical reconnaissance to a depth
+of 15 to 20 miles was done by units attached to Corps.
+
+After the Battle of the Aisne, which was the turning point in the
+evolution from the war of movement to trench warfare, pure
+reconnaissance, though still the basis of air work, tended to become a
+matter of routine, while many new and specialized forms of it--such as
+air photography and artillery spotting by wireless--were developed.
+
+
+_Photography._
+
+Though experiments had been made in the problem of photography from the
+air before the war, principally by Fletcher, Hubbard and Laws, and its
+value to survey was recognized, it had not become of practical utility.
+We only took one official camera with us to France on August 13th, 1914,
+and it was not until September 15th that the first attempt at air
+photography was made, when five plates were exposed over positions
+behind the enemy's lines with very imperfect results. Its great value as
+an aid to observation in trench warfare was, however, very apparent,
+fresh brains were brought to the task, Moore-Brabazon, Campbell and Dr.
+Swan, and by the end of the year better success was obtained, though
+positions even then had to be filled in by the observer with red ink.
+Experiments at home during 1915 led to a great improvement in lenses,
+and at the beginning of 1916 air photography was universal. At the
+Battle of the Somme new enemy positions were photographed as soon as
+they were seen, and the camera did invaluable work in the reconnaissance
+of the Hindenburg Line during the German retreat of 1917, and the taking
+of over a thousand photographs was a daily occurrence. On September 4th,
+1917, a record of 1,805 photographs was made.
+
+The development of air photography, very remarkable in itself, is even
+more so when it is remembered that the improvement in enemy
+anti-aircraft guns drove our machines to carry out their work at
+altitudes increasing up to 20,000 and even 22,000 feet, at which heights
+the negatives had to be as distinct as those taken at 4,000 in the
+earlier days of the war.
+
+At the beginning of the Dardanelles operations our apparatus consisted
+of one camera, a printing frame and a dark room lamp. The first
+photographs were taken by Butler in April, 1915, from a H. Farman
+machine at necessarily low altitudes. Butler was wounded in June and was
+succeeded by Thomson, who alone made 900 exposures and sent in 3,600
+prints.
+
+In addition to the assistance of air photography to reconnaissance, the
+war gave it great impetus as the handmaid of survey and mapping. It was,
+in fact, the only means of mapping or correcting the maps of country
+held by the enemy, which in certain cases, as at Gallipoli and in
+Palestine, were very inaccurate.
+
+By the end of the war photographic processes and equipment had reached a
+high standard of excellence. There are still, however, certain
+difficulties in regard to the production of accurate maps, which have
+not been overcome, the most obvious being the necessity of an initial
+framework of fixed points and of contouring. The subject is considered
+so important that an "Air Survey Committee," consisting of
+representatives of the Air Ministry, the Geographical section of the War
+Office, the Ordnance Survey, the School of Military Engineering and the
+Artillery Survey School, has recently been formed. In addition, the
+School of Aeronautics of Cambridge University is studying the question.
+The Survey of India and the Survey of Egypt are also conducting
+experiments.
+
+
+_Wireless._
+
+From the outset, part of the German scheme of tactics was to batter down
+resistance by means of superior weight of heavy armament, and with the
+beginning of warfare of fixed position the observation and direction of
+our artillery fire became as important as distant reconnaissance.
+Besides its immense value in increasing the effect of the batteries, it
+had the indirect advantage of more closely binding the ties of mutual
+understanding between the air and ground troops, a point which
+fortunately seems to have been misunderstood by the Germans. In
+September, 1914, the first attempts were made to signal enemy movements
+from the aeroplanes of a Headquarters Wireless Flight which had been
+formed for the purpose, and this practice was continued with success
+throughout the Battle of the Aisne.
+
+In the earliest stages artillery co-operation was also carried out by
+dropping coloured lights, but from the Battle of Ypres onwards, though
+for some time very few wireless machines were available, this was
+effected by wireless or signal lamps. In his dispatch on the Battle of
+Loos, Sir John French wrote: "The work of observation for the guns from
+aeroplanes has now become an important factor in artillery fire, and the
+personnel of the two arms work in closest co-operation."
+
+By the Battle of the Somme artillery co-operation had assumed very large
+dimensions. For instance, on September 15th, 1916, on the front of the
+4th Army alone, seventy hostile batteries were located, twenty-nine
+being silenced. Counter-battery work was so effective before the
+offensive which opened on the Ypres front at the end of July, 1917, that
+the Germans withdrew their guns and the attack was delayed for three
+days in order that their new positions might be located.
+
+Recognition marks on aeroplanes were at this time, and indeed throughout
+the war, a matter of great difficulty. It had been suggested before the
+war that they would not be necessary, but the reverse was found to be
+the case, as even with the distinctive marks which were adopted our
+machines were often fired at by British troops, and we should
+undoubtedly have lost very heavily if we had flown over our own lines
+with false marks, as was suggested, or none.
+
+
+_Bombing._
+
+The bombing operations, which reached their climax in the raids on
+German industrial centres in 1918, arose from very primitive methods
+used at the beginning of the war. During the retreat from Mons a few
+hand grenades were carried experimentally in the pockets of pilots and
+observers, or, in the case of the larger varieties, tied to their
+bodies, and these were dropped over the side of the machine as
+opportunity occurred. At the Marne, for instance, small petrol bombs set
+fire to a transport park and scattered a mixed column of infantry and
+transport. I think I am right in saying that the first German bombs
+were dropped on us--unsuccessfully--at Compiegne on August 29th, 1914.
+It was not, however, until the beginning of 1915 that special bombing
+raids were started by the Royal Flying Corps, one of the first places to
+be attacked being the Ghistelles aerodrome in West Flanders.
+
+The most important bombing operations and raids into Germany in the
+early days of the war were carried out by the Naval Air Service, units
+of which landed at Ostend on August 27th and operated with the Royal
+Naval Division from Antwerp. They were subsequently withdrawn to Dunkirk
+to form the nucleus of an aircraft centre from which excellent work was
+done in attacking the bases established on or near the Belgian coast
+from which German submarines and airships conducted their operations.
+
+Just before the Germans entered Antwerp, the first raid was made against
+a German town, one machine reaching Dusseldorf, when it descended from
+6,000 to 400 feet and dropped three bombs on an airship shed.
+
+From the end of 1914 onwards the activities of the Royal Naval Air
+Service in this theatre of operations continually increased, the chief
+objectives being the gun emplacements at Middelkerke and Blankenburghe,
+the submarine bases at Zeebrugge and Bruges, the minefield and dock of
+Ostend, the airship sheds near Brussels, and the dockyards at Antwerp.
+The first airship destroyed in the air was attacked over Ghent.
+
+An interesting experiment was the attempt by the R.N.A.S. at the
+Dardanelles to sink the heavy wire anti-submarine net, which had been
+stretched on buoys across the Straits at Nagara by the Turks, by means
+of parachute bombs.
+
+To return to the Royal Flying Corps. During 1915 railway junctions were
+the principal bombing objectives, and raids were carried out on an
+ever-increasing scale, formations of fourteen to twenty machines taking
+part. At the Battle of Neuve Chapelle for instance, the railway
+junctions at Menin, Courtrai and Douai were attacked. One officer of No.
+5 Squadron, carrying one 100 lb. bomb, arrived over Menin at 3,500 feet,
+descended to 120 feet, and dropped his bomb on the railway line. The
+first V.C. of the Royal Flying Corps was obtained at the Second Battle
+of Ypres by Lieutenant W. B. Rhodes-Moorhouse, who in bombing Courtrai
+came down to three or four hundred feet, under heavy fire, but piloted
+his machine 35 miles back to Merville at the height of a few hundred
+feet, and died a few days later from his wounds.
+
+One of the most instructive features of the Battle of Loos in September,
+1915, was the definite co-ordination of bombing attacks with army
+operations. Many types of machines, belonging both to Army and Corps
+Squadrons, carried bombs in order to destroy dumps, communications, cut
+off reinforcements, and the like, while at the Somme bombing was carried
+out by formations of Wings. In October, 1917, 113 tons, and for a period
+of six days in March, 1918, 95 tons, of explosives were dropped. This
+illustrates the enormous progress of bombing which was so largely
+resorted to in the later stages of the war. The hand grenades of 1914
+had become bombs weighing three-quarters of a ton: the pilot's pocket a
+mechanically released rack: and aim, assisted by instruments, was
+becoming fairly accurate.
+
+Night bombing, necessitated by the fact that by day a large machine
+heavily laden with bombs was an easy prey to the fighting scout, came
+into prominence in 1916, increasing in intensity up to the end of the
+war; and raids into Germany recommenced. Early in 1918 these raids
+included the bombing of Maintz, Stuttgart, Coblentz, Cologne, and Metz.
+Machines sometimes dropped their bombs from heights of about 12,000 feet
+and at other times descended to within 200 feet of their objectives.
+
+
+_Contact Patrol._
+
+Contact patrol, the name given to the direct co-operation of aircraft
+with troops on the ground, was first extensively practised at the Battle
+of the Somme, though experiments in this direction had been made in
+1915, messages being dropped at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle at
+pre-arranged points.
+
+The main objects of contact patrols were to assist the telephone (which
+was frequently cut by shellfire), to keep the various headquarters
+informed of the progress of their troops during the attack, so also
+saving them from the possibility of coming under the fire of their own
+artillery, to report on enemy positions, to transmit messages from the
+troops engaged to the headquarters of their units, to attack ground
+formations, and to co-operate with tanks. A system of red flares on the
+floor of the trenches was used to mark the disposition of the troops,
+and aircraft communicated their information by means of signalling
+lamps, wireless and message-bags.
+
+During the German retreat of 1917 contact patrols attacked enemy
+foundations from 100 feet and in some cases landed behind the enemy
+lines to obtain information. The skill of low-flying pilots in taking
+cover by flying behind woods, houses, etc., became increasingly
+important. The fact that 62,673 rounds of ammunition were fired from the
+air against enemy ground targets between November 20th and 26th, 1917,
+and 163,567 between March 13th and 18th, 1918, indicates the rapid
+development of this form of aircraft action, the effect of which was
+frequently more deadly than bombing.
+
+Two of many protagonists of contact patrol were Pretyman and Bishop. On
+one occasion the latter, in attacking an aerodrome at about 50 feet,
+riddled the officers' and men's quarters with bullets, put two or three
+machines on the ground out of action, and three in succession as they
+got into the air. Another interesting example of contact patrol work
+occurred in 1917 when a pilot flew his machine at a low altitude over
+the enemy trenches, and he and his observer attracted the attention of
+the Germans by firing their machine guns and Verey lights. The Germans
+were so busy with the aeroplane that they had their backs turned to the
+front line and our infantry were able to cross no-man's land without any
+artillery preparation, take prisoners and bomb dug-outs.
+
+An article in the _Cologne Gazette_ showed what the Germans thought of
+low "strafing."
+
+    "The operations" (i.e. of June 7th, 1917), it says, "were prefaced
+    by innumerable enemy airmen, who, at the beginning of the
+    preparation for the attack, appeared like a swarm of locusts and
+    swamped the front. They also work on cunningly calculated methods.
+    Their habit is to work in three layers--one quite high, one in the
+    middle, and the third quite low. The English who fly lowest show an
+    immense insolence; they came down to 200 metres and shot at our
+    troops with their machine guns, which are specially adapted to this
+    purpose."
+
+Armour was first employed as a result of Shephard finding at Maubeuge a
+bullet lodged in the seat of his leather suit. Thin sheets of steel were
+at once cut out and placed in the wickerwork seats of aeroplanes. This
+primitive protection developed into the armoured machine mentioned
+later, which was about to make its appearance at the Armistice.
+
+I may mention here the "special duty" flights, which consisted in
+establishing secret communication between our Intelligence Branch and
+agents in the territory occupied by the Germans. Agents, mostly French
+and Belgian, were carried by aeroplane over the enemy lines and landed
+there. This work was started in 1914.
+
+
+_Fighting._
+
+At the beginning of the war it became obvious that it was not only the
+duty of aircraft to obtain information but also to prevent enemy
+aircraft crossing our lines. In addition to the reconnaissance machine,
+and in order to make its work possible, a machine designed purely for
+fighting was required. In August, 1914, the aeroplane's armament
+consisted simply of rifle, or carbine, and revolver, but our pilots
+nevertheless attacked hostile machines whenever the opportunity
+occurred. The first German machine to fly over us was at Maubeuge on
+August 22nd, 1914, and, though fighting on an extensive scale did not
+take place until 1916, as early as August 25th, 1914, there were three
+encounters in the air in which two enemy machines were driven down. One
+interesting report of an early fight is that between a B.E. and a German
+machine on December 20th, 1914.
+
+    "A German aeroplane with one passenger and pilot being encountered
+    over Poperinghe, we followed to Morbecque and then to Armentieres.
+    The passenger of the B.E. fired 40 rounds from his rifle and the
+    German passenger replied with some rounds from his revolver. The
+    B.E. crossed the bows of the German machine to permit the pilot to
+    use his revolver. The German switched off and dived below the B.E.,
+    and is believed to have landed somewhere north-west of Lille."
+
+Another instance of the early air combats was when Holt, single-handed,
+and armed only with a rifle, lashed to a strut of his machine, attacked
+ten Germans near Dunkirk, causing them to drop their bombs in the field
+and make off to their own lines.
+
+We managed to bring down a number of German machines, mainly by rifle
+fire (five had already been brought down by September 7th, 1914), but
+our great difficulty early in the war was to get the enemy into action,
+and, although during October and November, 1914, there was a certain
+amount of fighting, as a rule the German when attacked made for his own
+lines and the protection of his anti-aircraft guns. This, though
+offensive carried to the extent of wastefulness of life is equally bad,
+was a serious mistake in all ways from his point of view, entailing as
+it did a tendency for the confidence of the troops and the morale of the
+air service to be undermined from the outset. The error was rectified,
+but only temporarily, at the Somme.
+
+As the specialized duties of aircraft increased, the Corps machines
+engaged in them needed protection and it was realized that the best
+method of protection was the development of the air offensive. This was
+rendered possible by the adaptation of the machine gun to the aeroplane.
+Early in 1915 the invention of the "synchronizing gear" enabled a
+machine gun to fire through the propeller, and by the end of 1915
+fighting in the air became the general rule. The first squadron, No. 24,
+composed purely of fighting machines, took its place on the Western
+Front in February, 1916, and gradually Wings were attached to Armies
+solely for fighting and the protection of Corps machines. During the
+long months of the Battle of the Somme, for instance, when, though the
+Royal Flying Corps dominated the air, the Germans put up a strenuous
+opposition, bombing machines were protected by fighting patrols in
+formation on the far side of the points attacked. The rapidity with
+which fighting in the air developed is shown by the fact that at the end
+of 1916 twenty new fighting squadrons were asked for on the Western
+Front; the establishment was increased to twenty-four machines per
+squadron, and by the end of the war even night-fighting squadrons were
+operating with considerable success and, had the war continued, would
+have proved a very important factor in air warfare.
+
+The development of aerobatics, air fighting, and formation tactics
+brought many airmen into prominence. For example Albert Ball, who
+ascribed his successes to keen application to aerial gunnery; J. B.
+McCudden, the first man to bring four hostile machines down in a day;
+and Trollope, who later on brought down six. Hawker met his death
+fighting von Richthofen, who describes the fight in his book _The Red
+Air Fighter_ as follows:--
+
+    "Soon I discovered that I was not fighting a beginner. He had not
+    the slightest intention to break off the fight.... The gallant
+    fellow was full of pluck, and when we had got down to 3,000 feet he
+    merrily waved to me as if to say, 'Well, how do you do?'... The
+    circles which we made round one another were so narrow that their
+    diameter was probably not more than 250 or 300 feet.... At that time
+    his first bullets were flying round me, as up to then neither of us
+    had been able to do any shooting."
+
+At 300 feet Hawker was compelled to fly in a zig-zag course to avoid
+bullets from the ground and this enabled Richthofen to dive on his tail
+from a distance of 150 feet.
+
+This indicates a heavy disadvantage under which our aircraft laboured in
+all their work on the Western Front. The prevailing westerly wind which,
+while it assisted the enemy in his homeward flight, made it very
+difficult for a British machine, perhaps damaged by anti-aircraft fire,
+to make its way--still under fire--to its base.
+
+I cannot leave the subject of air fighting without giving one or two
+more examples. One which comes to mind is that of five British machines
+attacking twenty-five of the enemy. One of ours gliding down with its
+engine stopped and being attacked by two Germans was saved by another
+British one attacking and driving off the two enemy. The result of the
+combat was five German machines destroyed and four driven down out of
+control, whilst all of ours returned safely. Another example, that of
+Barker who, whilst destroying an enemy two-seater, was wounded from
+below by another German machine and fell some distance in a spin.
+Recovering, he found himself surrounded by fifteen Fokkers, two of which
+he attacked indecisively but shot down a third in flames. Whilst doing
+this he was again wounded, again fainted, again fell, again recovered
+control and again, being attacked by a large formation, shot down an
+enemy in flames. A bullet now shattered his left elbow and, fainting a
+third time, he fell several thousand feet, where he was again attacked,
+and thinking his machine had been set on fire he tried, as he thought in
+a final effort, to ram a Fokker, but instead drove it down on fire!
+Barker was by this time without the use of both legs and an arm. Diving
+to a few thousand feet of the ground he again found his retreat barred
+by eight of the enemy, but these he was able to shake off after short
+bursts of fire and he returned a few feet above the ground to our lines.
+
+Though at the beginning our machines were rather better than either the
+French or German, it was the marked superiority of our pilots which gave
+us the greatest advantage. We should have been superior even had the
+machines been exchanged.
+
+
+CO-OPERATION WITH THE NAVY.
+
+We have seen that the functions of co-operation with the Navy--Coast
+defence and Fleet assistance--were very complicated, and that at the
+outbreak of war the splendid pilots and excellent equipment of the
+R.N.A.S. were not so highly organized and were wanting in cohesion, but
+that the R.N.A.S. had advanced further than the Royal Flying Corps in
+specialized technical development. In the earlier part of the war, in
+addition to its main duties, the R.N.A.S. ventured in many directions,
+many of them of considerable value to the Army, as, for instance, at
+Antwerp.
+
+
+_Coast Defence, Patrol and Convoy Work._
+
+Immediately war broke out a system of coastal patrols was established
+between the Humber and the Thames Estuary and over the Channel--the
+latter serving as an escort to the Expeditionary Force crossing to
+France. Patrols were at first, through limitations of equipment, mainly
+confined to the Home coast, but, as the war went on and machines
+improved, they were rapidly extended, especially in connection with the
+detection and destruction of submarines; reconnaissances were carried
+out over the enemy's shores, and in 1918 there were forty-three flights
+of seaplanes, thirty flights of aeroplanes, together with flying boats
+and airships, operating from, and communicating with, an ever-increasing
+number of shore stations. Not only was anti-submarine work carried out
+in the vicinity of the coast, but organized hunts were made for
+submarines, ships were convoyed on the high seas, shipping routes were
+protected, and action was taken to bar the passage of submarines through
+narrow channels. This was effected by an intensive system of combining
+and interlocking patrols, and by maintaining, in close co-operation with
+surface craft, a protective barrage across suitable stretches of water,
+such as the Straits of Dover.
+
+Airships from the beginning, when patrols operated from Kingsnorth
+during the crossing of the Expeditionary Force to France, proved
+particularly useful for escort, in addition to patrol work, and
+twenty-seven small airships, known as the S.S. type, were completed in
+1915. In 1916 the Coastal type with a longer range was designed and
+constructed and new airship bases were established.
+
+
+_Fleet Assistance, Reconnaissance, Spotting for Ships' Guns._
+
+The successful use of Drachen kite-balloons borne in ships at the
+Dardanelles led to their extensive development. Up to about May, 1915,
+when the vessels to which they were attached could stand in close to
+shore and overlook the enemy's positions from a distance of three or
+four thousand yards, a large amount of spotting of great value was
+carried out by these balloons for ships at Gallipoli, but when the Turks
+brought long-range guns into position, kite-balloon vessels were obliged
+to lie out beyond 11,000 yards and their services were rendered
+comparatively slight for this purpose. From 1916, however, they were
+towed by merchant auxiliaries and light cruisers to spot submarines,
+observers communicating with the patrol ship by means of telephone. One
+of the most wonderful sights I have ever seen was from the observer's
+basket of the kite-balloon let up from S.S. "Manica" in June, 1915. We
+were spotting for the guns of H.M.S. "Lord Nelson" bombarding Chanak.
+The sky and sea were a marvellous blue and visibility excellent, the
+peninsula, where steady firing was going on all the time, lay below us,
+the Straits, with their ships and boats, the Asiatic shore gradually
+disappearing in a golden haze, the Gulf of Xeros, the Marmora, and
+behind one the islands of the AEgean affording a perfect background. No
+one who was at the Dardanelles, however vivid the horrors and the heat
+and dust and flies, will forget the beauty of the scene, especially at
+sunset, and it was seen at its best from the basket of a kite-balloon.
+
+The ever-increasing assistance rendered by aircraft to surface vessels
+in crippling Germany's submarine campaign is shown by the fact that in
+1915 ten submarines were attacked from the air and in 1918 126 were
+sighted and 93 attacked. Nor was the principle forgotten in countering
+the submarine menace that offence is the best defence, and among the
+many duties of R.N.A.S. aircraft, based on Dunkirk from the early days
+of the war, were anti-submarine patrols along the Belgian coast and the
+bombing of hostile submarine bases, such as Bruges.
+
+As in the case of the Army Corps observation machines, fighting scouts
+became necessary for the protection of patrols and to counter the
+enemy's efforts at raids and sea reconnaissance, and the considerable
+amount of experiment in air fighting which the R.N.A.S. had made before
+the war bore useful fruit.
+
+For the immediate protection of the Grand Fleet seaplane and aeroplane
+bases were established at Scapa Flow and Thurso at the beginning of the
+war, but, owing to damage from a gale in November, 1914, aircraft
+operations with the Fleet were carried out from the seaplane carrier
+"Campania." The problem of using carriers with the Fleet had not been
+seriously tackled before the war, and though experiments were
+strenuously carried out, and there were fourteen carrier ships in
+commission in 1918, and a seaplane carrier operated with the Battle
+Cruiser Squadron at Jutland, the use of aircraft in this way did not
+become very efficient. One of the chief difficulties was limitation in
+size, and consequently in radius of action, of aircraft employed from
+carriers or the decks of battleships. The total number of aeroplanes and
+seaplanes allotted to the Grand Fleet in 1918 was 350.
+
+Seaplane carriers occasionally co-operated with fighting ships. For
+instance in October, 1915, a fast carrier at the Dardanelles accompanied
+ships detailed for the bombardment of Dedeagatch, and her seaplanes not
+only co-operated in spotting but also made a valuable reconnaissance of
+the Bulgarian coast and railway. But as a rule fighting and
+reconnaissance aircraft had mainly to work from shore bases. To assist
+in this direction, units were sent overseas to be nearer their sphere
+of action, as, for instance, the R.N.A.S. squadrons stationed at Dunkirk
+which, besides general reconnaissance, helped the Navy to keep open the
+Straits of Dover, carried out bombing raids against German bases and
+dockyards, such as Ostend, Zeebrugge, and Bruges, and co-operated with
+monitors in the bombardment of the Belgian coast. The development of a
+long-range seaplane or flying boat was also taken in hand, though an
+efficient type was not produced until the last year of the war.
+
+As with the Army, an important part of naval aircraft duties was
+spotting for gunfire; and likewise single-seater fighters were required
+for the protection of our own aircraft, for preventing enemy aircraft
+reconnaissance, for attacking the enemy's fleet and protecting our own.
+The use of offensive patrols steadily increased during the war.
+
+
+_Bombing._
+
+I have already referred to bombing and mentioned the attack on
+Dusseldorf as an instance of the work done. Bombing raids had always
+been looked on with favour by the R.N.A.S. and were used throughout the
+war as a means of countering hostile aircraft operations from bases in
+Belgium. One of the first successful raids was that against the
+Friedrichshaven Zeppelin works by three Avro machines, which flew 250
+miles over enemy country on November 21st, 1914. Another noteworthy
+example was the attempted raid against Cuxhaven on Christmas Day, 1914,
+carried out by seaplanes, which were still in an experimental stage,
+and three carriers escorted by naval units. Powerful machines for
+bombing purposes were ordered and bombs of greatly increased size and
+gear for dropping them were designed.
+
+
+_Torpedo Attack._
+
+The impetus given to bombing helped forward another use of naval
+aircraft: torpedo attack. This is likely to develop in the future into
+one of the most important uses of aircraft in naval operations, but
+during the war it was never given an objective by the German fleet. In
+May, 1915, two Sunbeam Short machines were embarked in the
+"Ben-my-Chree" for operations at Gallipoli, and it was in this theatre
+that for the first time in history ships were sunk by torpedoes released
+from aircraft. I shall never forget the night when we steamed silently
+up the narrow Gulf of Xeros and lay waiting to release our seaplanes in
+the still darkness of the early morning. The machines were lowered
+noiselessly into the water, and, their engines started, flew across the
+narrow neck of Bulair under fire from the old Turkish line; then,
+reaching the northern end of the Dardanelles at dawn, they descended low
+(one machine actually landed on the water and discharged its torpedo),
+sank their targets, and returned. In addition to the possibility of
+submarine attack, the Gulf of Xeros is so narrow that our ship could
+have been hit by the cross fire of field guns. It was a very fine
+performance and, although during many years I have spent anxious hours
+hoping for the distant purr of a safe returning machine, I have never
+been happier than when after a long wait our seaplanes were again
+quickly raised on board. The only torpedo machine employed at the Battle
+of Jutland was a Sunbeam fitted with a 14-inch torpedo, and it was not
+until just before the Armistice that a squadron of torpedo aircraft was
+ready for operations with the Grand Fleet.
+
+The Germans also tried to develop the use of torpedo-carrying seaplanes
+and, as with their submarines, had the advantage over us of a vast
+number of targets close to hand in our North Sea and Channel shipping,
+but fortunately the British fighting scouts were able to destroy several
+of their machines before they had done much damage.
+
+
+HOME DEFENCE.
+
+At the beginning of the war the R.N.A.S. assumed responsibility for the
+defence of Great Britain against attacks by hostile aircraft, and a
+scheme for the defence of London and other large towns was entrusted to
+an anti-aircraft section of the Admiralty Air Department. Its resources,
+however, consisting of a few unsuitable and widely scattered aeroplanes,
+some 1 pdr. pom-poms with searchlights manned by a special corps, were
+inadequate and it was fortunate that only three small daylight aeroplane
+raids, mainly for reconnaissance, were made during 1914--the first
+German machine to visit England dropping a bomb near Dover on December
+21st.
+
+
+_Night Flying and Night Fighting._
+
+In spite of continuous action by the R.N.A.S. against German airship
+bases in Belgium, there were in 1915 nineteen airship and eight
+aeroplane raids--one by night--over England, and, although the new and
+powerful Zeppelin L.Z.38, which attacked London on May 31st, was
+destroyed by an aeroplane counter-attack in its shed near Brussels, no
+real counter measures were evolved until 1916, when Home Defence was
+taken over by the War Office. During that year a Home Defence Squadron
+of B.E.2c's, rapidly expanded to a Wing, was formed; and the systematic
+training of night pilots, the standardization of night-flying equipment
+and armament, and the lighting of aerodromes, was taken in hand. A
+continuous aeroplane and searchlight barrage with night landing grounds
+was gradually formed between Dover and the Forth; the wireless signals
+employed to assist Zeppelins in finding their way were intercepted, thus
+enabling our rapidly improving fighting machines to pick up and attack
+raiding airships; and the constant attacks to which airship sheds were
+exposed in Belgium, caused their withdrawal to positions further inland
+and increased their distance from England. During 1916 there were
+twenty-two raids by airships, six of which were destroyed, the first
+being brought down in September at Cuffley by Leefe Robinson.
+Thenceforward airship raids declined, the destruction of the majority of
+the largest and latest which raided England on October 19th, 1917,
+sealing their fate.
+
+On the other hand, aeroplane daylight and night raids on London, the
+first of which occurred in November, 1916, increased in number and
+strength with the object, in addition to the destruction of material and
+civilian _morale_, of forcing upon us the unsound retention at home of a
+considerable air defence force. The largest of these attacks was made by
+seventeen aeroplanes at midday on June 13th, 1917, but, the Zeppelin
+danger nullified, counter measures to meet the new menace were gradually
+evolved. New squadrons were raised and the number of home defence
+squadrons was raised to fourteen service and eight night training
+squadrons; a Northern Home Defence Wing was formed at York; and the Home
+Defence Group became the 6th Brigade. The first night aeroplane raid
+occurred in September, and the systematic training of night-fighting
+pilots on scout machines was hurried on. Separate zones for aeroplanes,
+guns and searchlights--the latter provided with sound locators--forming
+an outer barrage, were instituted, and aprons, supported by
+kite-balloons, formed a protective barrage up to 8,000 feet. A system of
+wireless and ground telephonic communication was improvised for plotting
+the course of attacking aircraft and thus enabling squadron commanders
+to concentrate machines at the point of attack. By 1918 the
+night-fighting aeroplane, assisted by these means, had countered the
+night-bombing aeroplane. At first, this had been the result of the
+retention of a large number of fighting aircraft and a complete
+organization at home.
+
+Meanwhile, night fighting, especially the protection of night bombers by
+fighting machines, had become of paramount importance on the Western
+Front. The chief feature of activity in September, 1918, was the
+successful co-operation between searchlights in the forward areas and
+No. 151 night-fighting squadron. This was the first night-fighting
+squadron, trained by the 6th Brigade, to be sent to France. It was
+proposed to send four more such squadrons and thus form a first line of
+offensive defence which would react on hostile raids over England. Thus
+once again the old doctrine was gradually observed that offence is the
+only true defence, and that purely defensive measures, however
+efficient, by keeping men and material from the vital point, are
+necessarily expensive out of all proportion to their effectiveness. Both
+the Germans and ourselves made the initial mistake of organizing large
+local defence systems partly to placate public opinion. During the
+German offensive of 1918 a further development of night fighting took
+place in the bombing and low strafing of enemy troops and unlighted
+transport with the aid of flares.
+
+
+THE MACHINE AND ENGINE.
+
+Turning now to the machine and engine, the Military Trials held in 1912,
+when the Royal Flying Corps was started, represented the first organized
+effort to assist the evolution of service aeroplanes in this country and
+a brief comparison will be useful to show the performance of the average
+machines and engines of that date, at the beginning, and at the end of
+the war, and of civil machines of to-day.
+
+At the Military Competitions of 1912, of the eight types--Avro, B.E.,
+Bristol, Cody, Bleriot, Deperdussin, Hanriot, and M. Farman--the first
+four were British, though only the Avro had a British engine, and the
+last four French, fitted with French engines. The average horse-power
+was about 83, the average maximum speed 67, and the minimum 50 miles per
+hour; the climb to 1,000 feet was effected in 4-1/2 minutes with an
+average load of 640 lb., which included pilot, fuel for four hours and
+useful load. The loading per square foot was, for biplanes, about 4-1/2,
+and, for monoplanes, 6 lb.
+
+On the outbreak of war, and until the end of 1914, of the ten types in
+use--Avro, B.E., Bristol, Sopwith, Vickers, M. Farman, H. Farman,
+Caudron, Morane, and Voisin--five were British and five were French and
+all were fitted with French engines. The average horse-power was still
+about 83, but the average maximum speed had risen to 74, and the minimum
+had fallen to 41 miles per hour. The load averaged 609 lb.
+
+A remarkable advance in machine and engine construction is shown by
+referring to the tables for 1918. At the Armistice of the twelve
+types--Avro, Bristol Fighter, Sopwith Snipe, S.E. 5a, de Havilland 4 and
+9a, Vickers Vimy, Handley Page O/400 and V/1,500, Fairey Seaplane 3c, F.
+2 A. and F. 5--all were British and, except the de Havilland 9a, which
+had an American engine, were fitted with engines of British manufacture.
+The F. 2 A., and F. 5, were twin-engined, while one, the Handley Page
+V/1,500, was equipped with four engines. The average horse-power was per
+engine, 344, and per machine, 516; the average maximum speed 111, and
+the minimum 53-1/2 miles per hour, the climb to 6,500 feet was carried
+out in 13 minutes and to 10,000 feet in 24 minutes with an average load,
+including fuel for 5-1/2 hours, of 2,742 lb. The average ceiling was
+15,500 feet; the loading per square foot about 8 lb.
+
+The years following the Armistice have witnessed the conversion of
+military machines and the development of new designs for commercial
+purposes. In 1921 there were thirteen types fitted with British engines:
+Avro, Bristol, de Havilland 4, 16 and 18, Vickers Vimy, Handley Page
+O/400 and W. 8, B.A.T., Westland, Fairey, Supermarine and Vickers
+Amphibians. No British machine had a foreign engine. The Vickers Vimy,
+Handley Page O/400 and W. 8, which had a passenger-carrying capacity of
+15, were twin-engined. The average horse-power was per engine, 387, and
+per machine, 474; the average maximum speed 114, and the minimum 49,
+miles per hour. With an average load of 2,467 lb., including fuel for
+4-1/2 hours, 19 minutes was required for a climb to 10,000 feet. The
+average loading per square foot was about 13 lb., and the average
+ceiling 15,793 feet.
+
+Before the war, in addition to the Royal Aircraft Factory, there were
+only eight firms engaged, on a very small scale, in the manufacture of
+aircraft in England, and an aero engine industry hardly existed. Until
+1916, the greater proportion of our machines, and almost all our
+engines, were French, and we were very dependent upon France for the
+replacement of our heavy losses in material. By the end of the war the
+bulk of our material was of British design and construction, though
+there was still a certain number of British built engines of French
+design. One American engine--the Liberty--was also employed. The fact
+that in October, 1918, the Royal Air Force had 22,171 machines and
+37,702 engines on charge, and that during the ten months January to
+October the output of machines had been 26,685 and of engines 29,561,
+gives some idea of the enormous growth in production.
+
+In the first few months of the war it was not possible to progress far
+with new inventions or improvements. Fortunately, our Aircraft Factory
+had evolved in the B.E. a machine of considerable stability which in
+this respect compared favourably with German machines, and was well
+adapted to its work of reconnaissance.
+
+Technical progress during the war often unfortunately involved the loss
+of valuable lives, as for instance those of Professor Hopkinson and
+Busk, to both of whom heavy debts of gratitude are owed, but gradually
+obstacle after obstacle, problem after problem, was successfully tackled
+by our designers and constructors. With a view to enlarging the field of
+observation, staggered planes were introduced in the B.E.2c. This
+machine also proved that it was possible to calculate the degree of
+stability and thus paved the way for the design of aeroplanes with
+indifference to stability and increased man[oe]uvrability for fighting
+purposes, or with great inherent stability for bombing. During 1915 the
+B.E.2c was used for all purposes, but the extra loading involved by the
+increasing use of aeroplanes for bombing and fighting caused a decrease
+in the rate of speed and climb, and our aeroplanes were temporarily
+inferior in fighting power to the Fokker.
+
+The necessity of preventing the enemy obtaining information soon led to
+the development of air fighting. At the beginning of the war the sole
+armament of aeroplanes was the rifle or revolver. The machine gun soon
+followed, but its use in tractor machines was impracticable on account
+of the danger of hitting the airscrew. The first "fighters" were
+therefore two-seater pushers, such as the "Short-horn" Maurice Farmans
+which, though not designed for fighting, and too slow to chase enemy
+aircraft, were the first to be fitted with Lewis guns, and F.E.'s, the
+first machine designed specifically for fighting, with the machine-gun
+operator in front of the pilot. These "pusher" fighters had an excellent
+field of view and fire forwards, but suffered from lack of speed and a
+large "blind" area to the rear. On the other hand, the single-seater
+tractors were potentially the superior fighters, and in order to protect
+the blades of the airscrew the French were the first to use deflector
+blades on them in tractor machines.
+
+Our early single-seater tractors were fitted with a Lewis gun fixed so
+as to fire over or at the side of the airscrew and actuated by a bowden
+wire, the most efficient, though not the most numerous, fighting
+machines at the end of 1915 being the Bristol Scouts.
+
+By the Summer of 1916, however, we had adapted the "synchronizing gear"
+to our machine guns, enabling them to be fired through the propeller;
+while aircraft engines developed much greater power and full allowance
+was made for all equipment carried. From that time the development of
+our single-seater fighters was steadily progressive. One of the first of
+these was the Sopwith "Pup," which had a speed of 106-1/2 miles an hour
+at 6,500 feet, climbed 10,000 feet in just over 14 minutes, and could
+attain a ceiling of 17,500 feet. In 1917 appeared the Sopwith "Camel," a
+typical example of this type, which was simple, stable, easily
+controllable and possessed two guns. It had a speed of 121 miles an hour
+at 10,000 feet, to which height it could climb in under 10-1/2 minutes,
+and a ceiling of 23,000 feet. The Martinsyde F.4, embodying further
+improvements, was not ready in time for active service.
+
+While the single-seater tractor was developing for purely offensive
+action, the two-seater fighter, of which the field of view,
+man[oe]uvrability and general performance were being improved, retained
+its utility as a reconnaissance machine. In 1916 the "pusher" type was
+superseded by the Sopwith "1-1/2 Strutter" armed with a synchronized
+Vickers gun, which for its 130 horse-power was never surpassed. The
+pilot was close to the engine and had a good view of the ground, while
+the gunner was placed behind him with a rotary Lewis gun turret. Early
+in 1917 these qualities were further developed in the Bristol Fighter.
+
+With the advent of these improved types the B.E.2c was relegated to the
+work of artillery co-operation, until superseded by the B.E.2e. Towards
+the end of 1916 appeared the R.E.8 with a Vickers synchronized gun and
+a Lewis gun, which after many vicissitudes became the standard machine
+for artillery work.
+
+Systematic bombing was practised by nearly all types of machines, but
+real accuracy was never obtained. Thus, the B.E.2c was first used in
+formations, but with a full load of bombs it could not carry an
+observer, and its moderate speed left it an easy prey to hostile
+fighters. Early in 1916 appeared the Martinsyde single-seater bomber
+with an endurance of 4-1/2 hours, and in 1917 the D.H.4 which was much
+used for day-bombing. The F.E.2b pusher, discarded as a fighting
+machine, became the principal night-bomber.
+
+It was comparatively late in the war before special bombing machines
+were evolved. They were then divided into day-bombers and night-bombers,
+the D.H.9 and 9a machines being typical of the former and the Handley
+Page of 1917--a large twin-engine aeroplane, the first really effective
+night-bomber, of considerable carrying power but low performance--of the
+latter. By November 8th, 1918, two super-Handley Pages were ready to
+start to Berlin. They possessed a maximum range of 1,100 miles, a crew
+of seven, four 350 horse-power Rolls-Royce engines, arranged in pairs, a
+tractor and a pusher in tandem on either side of the machine, and, as
+they would be compelled to fly both by night and day, a gun defence
+system. The D.H.10a and the Vickers Vimy, for day and night bombing
+respectively, were also being produced at the date of the Armistice.
+
+In the early days of the war an aeroplane had little to fear above
+4,000 feet. With the improvement of the anti-aircraft gun there was, by
+the end of the war, no immunity at 20,000 feet. Very low flying for
+attack was, however, being rapidly developed, and would have proved of
+great effect in 1919. The aeroplane used for this purpose was the
+single-seater fighter, and the Sopwith "Salamander," with two guns, a
+speed of 125 miles an hour, and 650 lb. of armoured plates, was about to
+make its appearance at the Armistice.
+
+I have previously mentioned how dependent the improvement of design and
+performance of aircraft has been upon the less simple and tardier
+development of the engine. The invention of the light motor made
+aviation possible, and development has synchronized with the evolution
+of lighter, more powerful and more reliable engines. One of the most
+difficult problems still confronting us is the production of a cheap,
+high-powered and reliable engine, but the existence at the end of the
+war of machines weighing 15 tons indicates the progress achieved, while
+British engines of 600 horse-power are now in use, and one of 1,000
+horse-power will shortly be available.
+
+
+TACTICS AND THE STRATEGIC AIR OFFENSIVE.
+
+During the war there were three concurrent movements in process: the
+ratios of the various forms of air tactics were constantly changing, and
+the components of our air forces varied in accordance with the
+development of reconnaissance, artillery co-operation, bombing and
+fighting. Secondly, their total strength was increasing rapidly; and,
+thirdly, it was increasing relatively faster than the Army or Navy.
+
+It was an evident and logical development and in accord with the
+shortage of national man power and the consequent tendency to a
+reduction in the strength of the Army, that, the necessary uses of
+aircraft with the Army and Navy being ensured, any available margin of
+air power should be employed on an independent basis for definite
+strategic purposes. The difficulty was to arrive at an agreement as to
+the minimum tactical and grand tactical requirements of the Army and
+Navy. The British Army was not alone in asserting that there was no
+minimum and that it wanted every available airman, and agreed with the
+French that anything which it could temporarily spare should be lent to
+the French Army. It was argued that the Armies could as easily and
+better arrange for strategic bombing. Fortunately in 1918, when I was
+Chief of the Air Staff, we managed to secure a margin and formed the
+Independent Air Force in June of that year. It was, of course,
+understood that, in the event of either the British or French Armies
+being hard put to it, the Independent Air Force could temporarily come
+to their direct assistance and act in close co-operation with them.
+
+In 1915 in accordance with the old doctrine that offence is the best
+defence, the surest method of protecting specialized machines on the
+battle front was found to be in the attack of enemy aircraft by fighting
+machines. In 1918 it was decided that raids on the centres of German war
+industry would not only cripple the enemy's output of material
+essential to victory, but also relieve the pressure on the Western
+Front, the vital point of the war. The Germans had had the same
+intention in the many raids which started over Dover on December 21st,
+1914.
+
+Long-range bombing had, however, been carried out spasmodically before
+1918. In addition to its taste for bombing in general, the Royal Naval
+Air Service were keenly bent from the outset on long-range bombing in
+particular. The question of forming an Allied squadron to bomb German
+munition factories was first raised in 1915 at one of the monthly
+meetings between the French and British Aviation departments; and in
+February, 1916, a small squadron of Sopwith "1-1/2 Strutters" was formed
+at Detling for the purpose of bombing Essen and Dusseldorf from England,
+but the Army in France, being short of machines, asked that they should
+be sent to the front, and therefore the scheme did not mature; neither,
+for similar reasons, did one for the co-operation in 1916 of British and
+French bombing squadrons, operating from Luxeuil.
+
+It was not until October, 1917, that the first striking force,
+consisting of three squadrons, was formed under the Army with Ochey as
+its base. It was mainly used in raids against the ironworks in the
+Alsace-Lorraine Basin and the chemical industry in the neighbourhood of
+Mannheim. As I have said, a definite offensive policy by means of an
+independent strategic force was later decided upon, and the
+"Independent" Air Force was brought into existence. It originally
+comprised two day-bomber and two night-bomber squadrons. During the
+summer additional squadrons were allotted to it, including D.H.9's and
+Handley Pages. Day-bombing squadrons had to fight their way to
+objectives in close formation, and the problems connected with
+navigation, calculation of petrol supply, action of wind and ceiling,
+were all accentuated. Casualties were heavy, with the result that a
+squadron of Fighters, composed of Sopwith "Camels," was incorporated for
+the purpose of protection. Thus we see the beginnings of an air fleet
+analogous to the naval fleet with its capital ships and protective
+craft.
+
+The main objectives were the centre of the chemical industry at Mannheim
+and Frankfort; the iron and steel works at Briey and Longwy and the Saar
+Basin; the machine shops in the Westphalian district and the magneto
+works at Stuttgart; the submarine bases at Wilhelmshaven, Bremerhaven,
+Cuxhaven, and Hamburg, and the accumulator factories at Hagen and
+Berlin.
+
+It will be seen from a map that three of the main industrial centres
+were situated near the west frontier of Germany; and, therefore, one
+portion of the striking force was based at Ochey, which lies within a
+few miles of the Saar Basin, within 180 miles of Essen, and within 150
+miles of Frankfurt. Another portion was based on Norfolk, where a group
+of super-Handley Page machines were established for the specific purpose
+of attacking Berlin, a distance of 540 miles, and the naval bases within
+400 miles. It was obvious that though aircraft from England would have
+to cover greater distances, they would not expose themselves to the
+strong hostile defences in rear of the battle front.
+
+Three instances of the Independent Air Force's action may be cited. On
+the night of August 21st/22nd, two Handley Page machines dropped over
+one ton of bombs on Cologne Station, the raid occupying seven hours. On
+the night of August 25th/26th two Handley Pages attacked the Badische
+Aniline und Soda Fabrik of Mannheim; bombs were dropped from a height of
+200 feet, direct hits being obtained in every case; and the machines
+then remained over the town, which they swept with machine-gun fire. On
+August 12th the first attack was made on Frankfurt by twelve D.H.4
+day-bombers, every machine reaching the objective and returning safely
+in spite of being attacked, over Mannheim and throughout the return
+journey, by some forty hostile fighters.
+
+During the five months of its existence the Independent Air Force
+dropped 550 tons of bombs, 160 by day and 390 by night. Of these 200
+tons were dropped on aerodromes, largely by the short-distance F.E.2b's,
+as a result of which, hostile attacks on Allied aerodromes became
+practically negligible. Theoretically, machines of the Independent Air
+Force should not have been utilized for attacking purely military
+objectives in the Army zone, such as aerodromes, and their co-operation
+with the Army for this purpose shows that their true role was either not
+appreciated or not favoured by the French and other Commands.
+
+There is ample testimony to the spirit of demoralization which pervaded
+the civil population of the towns attacked.
+
+    "My eyes won't keep open whilst I am writing," reads one captured
+    letter. "In the night twice into the cellar and then again this
+    morning. One feels as if one were no longer a human being. One air
+    raid after another. In my opinion this is no longer war but murder.
+    Finally, in time, one becomes horribly cold, and one is daily, nay,
+    hourly, prepared for the worst." "Yesterday afternoon," says
+    another, "it rained so much and was so cloudy that no one thought it
+    was possible for them to come. It is horrible; one has no rest day
+    or night."
+
+Although, for reasons into which it is not necessary to enter here, only
+a comparatively small percentage of the efforts of the Independent Force
+were directed against the industrial targets for which the force had
+been created, yet by the end of the war the strategic conception of air
+power was bearing fruit, and the Air Ministry had in hand measures for
+bombing which would have gone far to shatter German munitionment. The
+defence measures forced upon the Germans within their own country were
+reacting on their offensive action at the front, which was at the same
+time denuded of fighting aircraft at various points to meet the menace
+of our strategic force at Ochey.
+
+
+ORGANIZATION.
+
+As in peace on a small, so in war on a large scale, the history of the
+organization of aircraft, while we were fighting for our national
+existence and competing with similar enemy expansion, is one of
+continuous development, of decentralization of command and co-ordination
+of duties. Headquarters, the Squadron and the Aircraft Park, as
+originally conceived in peace, though subject to variations in size,
+remained the basis of our organization. For instance, the original
+eighteen machines of our squadron were increased to twenty-four for
+single-seater fighters and reduced to six in the case of the
+super-Handley Page bombers. The four squadrons originally operated
+directly under Headquarters, were soon allocated to Corps for tactical
+reconnaissance and artillery co-operation, while a unit remained at
+Headquarters for strategical and long-distance reconnaissance and a few
+special duties. The next step was in November, 1914, when two Wings,
+composed originally of two, and later, of five squadrons each, were
+formed, R.F.C. Headquarters retaining one squadron and the wireless
+flight for G.H.Q. requirements. The Wing Headquarters co-ordinated the
+work of the squadrons which were allocated to Army Corps.
+
+A further development, in 1916, was the formation for each of the three
+Armies of a Brigade, consisting of two Wings and an Aircraft Park.
+One--the Corps Wing--carried out artillery co-operation and close
+reconnaissance (including photography) with Army Corps, the other--the
+Army Wing--carried out more distant reconnaissance and fighting patrols
+under Army Headquarters. Our air superiority at the Battle of the Somme
+in 1916 led us to expect German counter-measures in 1917, and our
+programme for the following winter contemplated a proportion of two
+fighting squadrons to each Corps Squadron. By 1917 there were five
+British Armies in France and Belgium and our air forces were increased
+to provide a Brigade for each of the two new Armies. The Headquarters
+of the flying force in the field (except in the case of the Independent
+Air Force, which was responsible to the Supreme War Council and the Air
+Ministry in London) remained attached to G.H.Q. throughout the war.
+
+The main difficulty in the higher organization was the lack of
+co-operation between the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air
+Service and their competition for the supply of men and machines--the
+demands of both being urgent and insatiable. As a first step to overcome
+this, an Air Board was formed in May, 1916, to discuss general air
+policy, especially the combined operation of the Naval and Military Air
+Services, to make recommendations on the types of machines required by
+each, and to co-ordinate the supply of material. The Air Board was an
+improvement, but not a remedy, and, therefore, in 1917 it was decided to
+form an Air Ministry responsible for war aviation in all its branches
+and to amalgamate the Naval and Military Air Services as the Royal Air
+Force. This was carried into effect early in 1918, with Lord Rothermere
+as Secretary of State for Air with a seat in the Cabinet, and the air
+became the third service of the Crown, with an independent Government
+department permeated with a knowledge of air navigation, machinery, and
+weather, and closely allied to the industrial world for the initiation,
+guidance, and active supervision of research and experimental work.
+
+I will mention later some of the many arguments for and against the
+retention of an independent Air Ministry and autonomous Air Force in
+peace. The amalgamation was certainly advantageous in war. It effected
+the correlation of a number of hitherto independent services according
+to a uniform policy and prevented overlapping by centralizing
+administration. Under single control it was possible to carry out, on a
+carefully co-ordinated plan, recruiting and training, to supply men and
+material, to organize air power according to the strategic situation in
+each of the various theatres of war, and to form the correct ratio
+between the air forces in the field and the reserves in training at
+home. The difficulty was that the amalgamation had to be carried out
+during the most intensive period of air effort, but by the end of the
+war most of these objects had been attained without jeopardizing the
+close co-operation with the Army and Navy. Co-operation with the Naval
+and General Staffs and with naval and military formations was, in fact,
+improved, independent action was beginning to bear fruit, and we
+possessed an Air Force without rival.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+PEACE
+
+
+THE FUTURE OF AERIAL DEFENCE.
+
+In the evolution of aviation during the war the conclusion has been
+reached that the most remarkable lines of development at the Armistice
+were in the direction of ground and night fighting, torpedo attack and
+long-range bombing, exemplifying respectively the three spheres of air
+operations--military co-operation, naval co-operation, and the strategic
+use of aircraft. It must be remembered that this progress in tactics and
+strategy, in the machine, and the airman's skill, was made in the short
+period of four years, and that every war has started with a great
+advance in scientific knowledge, accumulated during peace, over that
+obtaining at the close of the previous war. We may therefore assume,
+provided the danger is averted of a retrograde movement from recent
+scientific methods to pre-war conditions--sabres, bayonets, and
+guns--that by the outbreak of another war on a large scale, which we
+hope may never occur, the knowledge of Service aeronautics will have
+increased immeasurably since 1918, and may be, not a contributory, but a
+decisive factor in securing victory.
+
+The period since the Armistice has been employed in the reduction and
+consolidation of the Royal Air Force. In England the cadre system has
+been adopted, while abroad the greatest concentration of effort is aimed
+at, with Egypt, at present the most important strategic point in the
+Imperial air system, as the centre of activity. Iraq is being handed
+over to the control of the Royal Air Force, whose share in the policing
+of overseas possessions is likely usefully to grow provided any tendency
+to the concurrent building up of a large ground organization is
+withstood. The advantages of aircraft for "garrison" duties lie, under
+suitable geographical conditions, in their swift action and wide range,
+their economy, and, during disturbances their capacity for constant
+pressure against the enemy without fear of retaliation. One of the main
+problems is at present that of personnel. Service flying is restricted
+to comparatively young men, and therefore the majority of officers can
+only be commissioned for short periods. For this reason the experiment
+is being made of taking officers direct from civil life on short
+engagements, and at the same time endeavouring to ensure, by technical
+and general education, that the Royal Air Force shall not become a
+blind-alley occupation.
+
+Though it is difficult to foretell on what lines aircraft will develop
+for any one purpose, as in the past, the problem of military
+co-operation will perhaps be less complex than that of co-operation with
+the Navy. It will probably consist of improvements along the lines
+already indicated, such as increased range, speed, climb,
+man[oe]uvrability, offensive armament, armour, the assistance of tank
+and anti-tank action, and the utilization of gas. Fighting will
+undoubtedly take place at very high altitudes to keep the enemy's
+fighting machines away from the zone of operations--necessitating the
+development of the single-seater so as to increase climb and
+man[oe]uvrability, and obtain, if possible, a speed of 200 miles an hour
+at 30,000 feet. Cavalry, unless retained, as I think they should be, in
+the form of mounted machine-gunners, will, I think, disappear in
+European warfare, but infantry will remain, and it will be the object of
+aircraft to assist their advance by reconnaissance, ground attack,
+artillery and tank co-operation, and the destruction of the enemy's
+supplies and communications. In this connection ground tactics and air
+tactics must develop _pari passu_ and commanders of Corps and Armies
+must work out during peace training the fullest schemes for the most
+intimate co-operation between air and land forces.
+
+The future of naval co-operation is a difficult problem, more especially
+as there was no major naval engagement after Jutland in which aircraft
+could be used, and consequently we have little to go on in estimating
+their practical value in direct co-operation with the fleet. It is
+impossible at present to judge between the conflicting opinions as to
+the future of the capital ship, but it is certain that aviation will
+materially modify naval tactics and construction. Coast defence,
+reconnaissance, anti-submarine work, escort, and the bombing of enemy
+bases, will doubtless continue and develop with ever-increasing
+machinery and equipment; but torpedo attack by aircraft may reach a
+point where the very existence of opposing fleets may be endangered. It
+is already questionable whether a battleship could survive an attack
+launched by even a small force of this mobile arm.
+
+As was the case during the war, the action of aircraft at sea is
+restricted by range, the difficulty being to find the mean between the
+opposing conditions of radius of flight and limitation in the size of
+aircraft imposed by the deck-space of "carriers," but there is reason to
+suppose that on the one hand engines will be so improved as to afford a
+sufficient radius of action to comparatively small aircraft, while, on
+the other, devices will be found to economize deck-space.
+
+Fleets operating near the enemy's coast will be vulnerable from land
+aircraft bases, and thus close blockade will be rendered increasingly
+difficult. The possibility of gas attack on enemy bases from the air in
+co-operation with submarines and of effecting a blockade by this means
+must be envisaged.
+
+Since the Armistice the operational work of the Royal Air Force on
+behalf of the Navy has been conducted under the auspices of the
+Admiralty. Improvements have been made in large flying boats and
+amphibians, especially with a view to facilitating their landing on
+"carriers" and the decks of battleships. There has also been
+considerable progress in the construction and use of torpedo aircraft.
+
+The war lasted long enough to prove the effect of the strategic
+offensive by air. In spite of the dictates of humanity, it cannot be
+eliminated. It is true that modern war is inimical to the progress of
+mankind and brings only less suffering to the victors than to the
+vanquished. To ensure peace should therefore be our ideal. But a great
+war once joined is to-day a war of peoples. Not only armies in the
+field, but men, women, and even children at home, are concentrated on
+the single purpose of defeating the enemy, and armies, navies, and air
+forces are dependent upon the application to work, the output of war
+supplies, and, above all, the morale of the civil population. Just as
+gas was used notwithstanding the Hague Convention, so air war, in spite
+of any and every international agreement to the contrary, will be
+carried into the enemy's country, his industries will be destroyed, his
+nerve centres shattered, his food supply disorganized, and the will
+power of the nation as a whole shaken. Formidable as is the prospect of
+this type of air warfare, it will become still more terrible with the
+advent of new scientific methods of life-destruction, such as chemical
+and bacterial attack on great industrial and political centres. Various
+proposals, such as the control of the air effort, service and civil, of
+all countries by the League of Nations, and even the complete
+elimination of aviation, have been put forward as a means of avoiding
+the horrors of aerial warfare and its appurtenances, but they are
+untenable, and any power wishing and able to sweep them aside will
+undoubtedly do so.
+
+A future war, as I see it, will begin something after this manner,
+provided either side possesses large air forces. Huge day and night
+bombers will assemble at the declaration of war to penetrate into the
+enemy's country for the attack of his centres of population, his
+mobilization zones, his arsenals, harbours, strategic railways, shipping
+and rolling stock. Corps and Army squadrons will concentrate in
+formation to accompany the armies to the front; reconnaissance and
+fighting patrols will scatter in all directions from coastal air bases
+to discover the enemy's concentrations and cover our own; the fleet,
+whatever its nature, will emerge with its complement of reconnaissance
+and protective machines and torpedo aircraft for direct action against
+the enemy's fleet. A few fighting defence units will remain behind.
+
+But it must not be imagined that these functions will be carried out
+unopposed. Local battles in the air will occur between fighting machines
+for the protection of specialized machines, while the main air forces in
+large formations will concentrate independently to produce, if possible,
+a shattering blow on the enemy and obtain from the outset a supremacy in
+the air comparable to our supremacy on the sea in the last war.
+
+In mobilization the time factor is all-important. Our national history
+has been one of extraordinary good fortune in this respect, but the
+margin allowable for luck is becoming very narrow and, whereas in 1914
+it was some twenty days between the declaration of war and the exchange
+of the first shots, in the next war the air battle may be joined within
+as many hours, and an air attack launched almost simultaneously with the
+declaration of war. In modern war the mobilization period tends to
+shorten, and every effort will be made towards its further reduction,
+since mobilizing armies are particularly vulnerable from air attack.
+
+
+CIVIL AVIATION AS A FACTOR IN NATIONAL SECURITY.
+
+The picture I have drawn may appear highly coloured for the reason that
+no country is likely for some time to possess sufficiently large air
+forces to obtain a decisive victory, or at any rate an uncontested
+superiority, at the outbreak of war. Though in air, as in every other
+form of warfare, attack is more effective than defence, we cannot afford
+to keep our air forces up to war strength in peace any more than our
+Army or Navy.
+
+The problem, from a military point of view, is therefore to ensure an
+adequate reserve and to maintain our capacity for expansion to meet
+emergencies. The number of units maintained at war establishment should
+be the absolute minimum for safety and of the type immediately required
+on mobilization, i.e. long-range bombing and naval reconnaissance
+squadrons. The remainder should be in cadre form. We can, of course,
+maintain a fixed number of machines and pilots in reserve for every one
+on the active list, but, although some such system is necessary, on a
+large scale it is open to many and serious objections. First of all,
+even on a cadre basis, it means keeping inactive at considerable cost a
+number of machines which may never be used and which, however carefully
+stored, quickly deteriorate. Knowledge of aeronautics is still slender
+and improvements are made so continuously that machines may become
+obsolete within a few months. Moreover, the growth of service aviation
+in peace must tend to become artificial and conventional rather than
+natural, and this will react on design and construction, which will be
+cramped, both technically and financially, within the limits imposed by
+service requirements.
+
+It is obvious therefore that the capacity of the construction industry
+to expand cannot be fostered by service aviation alone; furthermore, in
+the event of another war of attrition, expansion will be more essential
+than any amount of machine reserve power immediately available, and in
+the event of a war of short duration that power will win which has the
+greatest preponderance of machines, service or civil, fit to take the
+air. The asphyxiation of a large enemy city, if within range, can be
+done by night-flying commercial machines, and it would require a
+defending force of great numerical superiority for its successful
+defence.
+
+Whether, therefore, from this point of view, or others, which I will
+mention later, another solution must be found, and this lies in the
+development of civil aviation. An analogy in the Navy and the Mercantile
+Marine has long been apparent. "Sea power," says Mahan, "is based upon a
+flourishing industry." Substitute "air" for "sea" and the analogy is
+still true. The Navy owed its origin to our mercantile enterprise and
+to-day it depends upon the Mercantile Marine for its reserve power of
+men and material. In the same way must air power be built up on
+commercial air supremacy. If we accept Mahan, or the dictum of any other
+great naval or military historian or strategist, a service air force by
+itself is not air power, and after a brief if brilliant flash must
+wither if reserves are not immediately at hand. A large commercial air
+fleet will provide, not only a reserve of men and machines, but it will
+keep in existence an aircraft industry, with its designing and
+constructional staffs, capable of quick and wide expansion in emergency;
+and such an industry will not be employed on the design of contrivances
+for use in a possible war, but on meeting the practical requirements of
+everyday air transport and navigation.
+
+Thus a natural, practical and healthy, as opposed to a stereotyped and
+artificial, growth will be ensured. Our naval supremacy is largely
+attributable to the interest which the people as a whole have
+traditionally taken in naval policy; in other words, to the fact that we
+are a seafaring nation. Similarly air supremacy can only be secured if
+the air-sense of the man in the street is fostered, and aviation is not
+confined to military operations, but becomes a part of everyday life. At
+the present time commercial aviation is far too small to play the part
+of reservoir to the Royal Air Force--an object which must constitute one
+of the principal claims for support of the nucleus already in existence.
+
+
+CIVIL AVIATION AS AN INSTRUMENT OF IMPERIAL PROGRESS.
+
+Civil aviation, however, has not only an indirect military, but, with
+its superiority in speed over other means of transport, a direct
+commercial utility. The nation which first substitutes aircraft for
+other means of transport will be more than half-way towards the
+supremacy of the air. Moreover, as the Roman Empire was built upon its
+roads and as the foundations of the British Empire have hitherto rested
+upon its shipping, as steam, the cable and wireless have each in turn
+been harnessed to the work of speeding up communications, so to-day,
+with the opening of a new era of Imperial co-operation and consultation,
+this new means of transport by air, with a speed hitherto undreamed of,
+must be utilized for communication and commerce between the various
+portions of the Empire.
+
+A comparison of the French and British attitudes towards civil aviation
+clearly demonstrates the two policies I have mentioned. Both France and
+England grant subsidies--France the very much larger sum--but the great
+difference lies in the objects aimed at. French policy is fostering
+civil aviation as a part of its military policy and, a portion of the
+subsidy being given to machines fulfilling service requirements, there
+is a strong tendency for French civil aviation to be military air power
+camouflaged. British policy, on the other hand, should aim at fostering
+civil aviation primarily as a commercial concern and believes that air
+commerce is the basis of air power as a whole. We are prepared to face
+the tendency of military and civil machines to diverge if that
+divergence is essential to the commercial machine.
+
+An alternative to the British policy of maintaining a small air force
+and fostering commercial aviation as a reserve is the Canadian plan of
+a small air force training school and a civil Government flying service
+with such objects as forest patrol, survey and coastguard duties, the
+work being carried out on repayment for Government departments,
+provincial governments and private corporations. The former method,
+allowing of independent commercial expansion, is better suited to
+British mentality and requirements, but its success will depend on a
+genuine endeavour to make commercial aviation the real and vital basis
+of our air power. Experience in commercial operation cannot be gained by
+the exploitation of air routes or the carriage of mails or passengers
+under Service auspices. It is only by running transport services, as far
+as possible under private management, that operational data can be
+obtained, economies effected, and the design of strictly commercial
+machines improved.
+
+To sum up. Military air supremacy can best be assured by the intensive
+development of industrial air organization for commercial purposes. The
+conception of civil aviation as the mainstay of air power as a whole is
+right. Service aviation is bound by technical and financial limits; its
+scope confined to the requirements of war. Civil aviation, on the other
+hand, opens out a prospect of productive expansion. The steady growth of
+the Continental services is already beginning to demonstrate the
+importance of air transport.
+
+
+FINANCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROBLEMS.
+
+The commercial exploitation of air transport is passing through a period
+of experiment, and suffering in the general war reaction from the
+incapacity of the public to think of aviation except as a fighting
+service. The machines hitherto used on the lines to and on the Continent
+are principally converted war machines, and to transform military into
+commercial craft and to use them as such is of small assistance to civil
+aviation, which requires reliable, economic machines as one of the basic
+conditions of its financial success. The cost of running an air
+transport service is considerable. Depreciation is one heavy item of
+expenditure. New machines must be evolved suitable to the requirements
+of mail, passenger and freight transport, but, in the present state of
+financial stringency, capital is not forthcoming for experiment unless
+there is every promise of a safe return. Then there are the expenses
+involved in general ground organization, maintenance, fuel, insurance,
+etc. The question is how can we carry on until the really economic type
+of commercial machine is evolved. It will never be evolved unless there
+is continuous flying and a continuous demand for new and improved
+machines for commercial work. To meet this in France, the Government
+came forward with a liberal grant of subsidies which have now been
+increased and placed on a more favourable basis, permitting of a very
+considerable reduction in the fares for transport by air. The British
+Government has also granted a subsidy for British firms operating on the
+cross-Channel routes, which it is hoped will place them before long on a
+sound, self-supporting, commercial basis. Part of this subsidy is
+allocated to assist transport companies in obtaining the latest type of
+commercial machines on a hire purchase system. With a few services
+properly supported by the State we shall pull through the experimental
+period of civil aviation.
+
+The services to the Continent, although the distance is on the short
+side for the merits of air transport to be properly demonstrated, effect
+a considerable saving in time, and it is certain that the amount of
+mail, especially parcels, carried on these routes will continue to
+increase and lead to the eventual adoption of normal rates for air
+postage. An extension of the use of aircraft as the regular means of
+carrying mails will be of great assistance in the development of air
+transport. Aircraft revolutionize the speed of intercommunication by
+letter, and banks and financial houses will gradually realize that large
+savings can be made by utilizing air mails for the transaction of
+business. A difficulty lies in the fact that the area of the British
+Isles is not very favourable for an extensive air mail service, which
+can only operate by day, since by the existing means of transport mails
+are carried during the out-of-business hours and can generally reach
+their destination in a night, while the distances to Paris and Brussels
+are too short to afford outstanding advantage.
+
+Lastly, we require public support and a spirit of confidence in the air.
+This can only be secured by increased reliability, reduction of charges
+and keeping the public informed of the progress made. It is the nature
+of man to distrust new departures. He disliked the introduction of
+mechanical devices into the Lancashire weaving mills. He scoffed at the
+steamship and railway. To-day he is inclined to treat as premature the
+serious exploitation of the air. In spite of the great decrease of
+accidents, in spite of the increased comfort of air travel, in spite of
+increased regularity, the average person is slow to realize that the
+communication of the busy man of the future will be by air. The majority
+of the business world is too conservative to make general use of the
+opportunities offered by aircraft for the quick transmission of its
+correspondence, while, though speed must be paid for, the high fares
+hitherto charged have deterred the general public from substituting the
+aeroplane for the train or boat. The running costs represented by these
+fares are being materially reduced as a more economic machine is
+evolved, and the reduction of fares which helps to place competition
+with foreign subsidized services and with the older forms of transport
+on more equal terms must for a time depend upon the assistance of
+Government grants.
+
+
+WEATHER CONDITIONS AND NIGHT FLYING.
+
+The safety of the machine and the reliability of an air service largely
+depend on accurate weather forecasts. In order to co-ordinate the
+meteorological work of the country as a whole, and for the special
+assistance of aviation, the Meteorological Services of Great Britain
+have been amalgamated under the Department of Civil Aviation, and,
+working in close co-operation with the Communications Branch of the
+Department, have made improvements in the rapid collection and
+distribution of meteorological information for all purposes. In
+addition to the forecasts issued four times daily, collective reports
+are issued hourly by wireless from the London terminal aerodrome at
+Croydon and copies are distributed to transport companies and others
+concerned.
+
+A feature of meteorology which is often overlooked is its economic
+value. By making use of a knowledge of the wind at different heights,
+aircraft can complete journeys more quickly than would otherwise be
+possible, and thereby save their own fuel and their passengers' time.
+This will be specially useful in the tropics where the regularity of the
+surface winds has its counterpart in the upper air, but even in Europe
+time-tables can be drawn up with due attention to the favourable and
+unfavourable effect of prevailing winds. The planning of airship routes
+in particular, must be considered in close connection with this aspect
+of weather conditions.
+
+To-day, however, the aeroplane may be considered as an "all-weather"
+craft, save for mist and fog--the enemies of all transport and
+particularly to that of the air--to which unfortunately England is
+particularly liable during the winter. Experiments have been carried out
+on the dispersal of fog, the illumination of aerodromes by fog-piercing
+lights, and instruments to record the exact position of the aeroplane
+and its height above the ground, but success has not yet been achieved.
+
+Similar to the problems of flying and landing in mist and fog is that of
+night flying. Until night flying is practicable, only half the value of
+the aeroplane's speed is obtainable, since other transport services run
+continuously day and night. Further, as machines become rapidly obsolete
+owing to technical progress, it is essential that they should be in use
+for the greatest number of hours during their life. Much has been done
+in the lighting and marking of aerodromes and in the equipment of
+aeroplanes with wireless telephone and direction-finding apparatus.
+
+It may here be mentioned that there are two methods of obtaining the
+position of aircraft by means of wireless telegraphy, known as
+direction-finding and position-finding. Direction-finding is effected by
+means of two coils set at right angles in the aircraft, by means of
+which the bearing of a transmitting ground station with reference to the
+aircraft's compass can be taken. When two or more bearings on different
+ground stations, whose position is known, have been obtained, a "cut" or
+"fix" of the aircraft is obtained. The position-finding system consists
+of two or more ground stations fitted with apparatus capable of taking
+bearings with respect to true north and connected by direct telephone
+line. The aircraft calls up by wireless one of these stations, requests
+her position and then makes a series of signals for about half a minute.
+The stations take the aircraft's bearings, plot its position, and
+transmit the information to the aircraft. Wireless direction and
+position-finding, as well as wireless telephony, have on several
+occasions proved their value to navigation, but in spite of instances of
+successful night flying, developments have not been such as to render
+night services practicable.
+
+Marine experience has been a valuable guide, but aerial illumination
+has entailed many new problems of its own--the distribution of light
+through very wide angles, the installation of light and powerful lamps
+in aircraft, the elimination of shadows and the prevention of dazzle,
+the provision of apparatus to indicate the strength and direction of the
+wind, and the like.
+
+Very shortly the first organized and equipped night-flying route will be
+available; that between London and Lympne on the Continental air
+highway. The Boulogne-Paris section will probably be ready a little
+later. There will be four lighthouses on the English section, of which
+two will be automatic, requiring no attention for twelve months at a
+time. These, and many other, facilities will much assist the progressive
+establishment of services during the hours of darkness, and will provide
+valuable data for the establishment of other night-flying routes. There
+is no real difficulty given a reasonably clear atmosphere.
+
+
+ORGANIZATION.
+
+I have mentioned the broad lines on which the organization of the air
+services was built up before and during the war. We have seen that the
+initial foundations and framework remained and bore the great systematic
+structural development which was gradually required. In August, 1914,
+there were some 240 officers, 1800 men and 200 machines; in November,
+1918, 30,000 officers, 170,000 men, and 22,000 machines, all of them
+better and of a higher performance than those of 1914. Our casualties
+during the war were about 18,000; air formations had been active in
+some fifteen theatres of operations; 8,000 enemy machines and 300
+observation balloons had been destroyed; some three-quarters of a
+million photographs taken over hostile country, and 12,000,000 rounds
+had been fired from the air at ground targets. At Home two organizations
+had expanded independently from the same seed until, impeding one
+another's growth, their trunks had joined and a single and improved tree
+was the result.
+
+This is the only country where a unified air service has been adopted.
+In war the arrangement was successful. Against its continuance in peace
+the Army and Navy urge that, with the best of wills, there is a great
+difference between having an integral branch of a service to work with
+other services and having to deal with an independent organization, and
+argue increased cost, duplication, competition and disjointed action.
+There is no doubt that the liaison of the General, Naval and Air Staffs
+must be closened, and if co-operation with the senior services was
+really becoming less satisfactory, a return to the old system should be
+considered amongst other alternatives, but I do not think that it should
+be so. It must also be remembered that, although air co-operation is
+vital to naval and military operations, it is fortunately unlikely that
+there will be another war for a long time and, meanwhile, the growing
+essential, independent strategic action would be irretrievably impaired
+by the reabsorption of the Air into the Army and Navy.
+
+On the other hand, even apart from supply, such a reversion would also
+cause much duplication, e.g. training. The solution and the correct and
+logical outcome of the unification of the Air service is the close
+grouping of the three arms in a Ministry of Defence, and this, even in
+face of the obvious practical difficulties, should be adopted and
+co-ordination thus increased step by step. Apart from Supply, some of
+the services in which this could be effected are the medical, education,
+chaplains, mobilization stores, transport, works and buildings,
+accounting, communications, ordnance and national factories. A modified
+scheme might also be studied in which, under a Ministry of Defence, the
+Army and Navy each had tactical air units of seconded personnel for
+artillery co-operation, spotting and reconnaissance, and the Air
+Ministry dealt with supply, research, initial training and reserves,
+civil aviation and an independent air force.
+
+One of many good examples of the necessity of co-ordination is afforded
+by the position of the aircraft supply services at the beginning of the
+war and their development. We have already seen that there were some
+eight private firms manufacturing aircraft in a small way and there was
+practically speaking no engine industry at all. For the Royal Flying
+Corps, the War Office had relied largely on the Royal Aircraft Factory,
+and, although the methods of control adopted had many advantages, there
+was in them a tendency to retard private enterprise and development. The
+Admiralty, on the other hand, had assisted by dealing almost entirely
+with firms for Royal Naval Air Service supply. The conditions in France
+fortunately were very much better than those in this country, and for
+the first year or two French factories helped us out with both machines
+and engines. By the end of the war we had the largest and most efficient
+aircraft industry in the world. There were no less than seventy-six
+great factories turning out vast numbers of complete aeroplanes, in
+addition to thirty-three manufacturing complete engines and over 3,000
+turning out spares and equipment. Such expansion is not possible within
+a few weeks, it took a long time to arrive at this position, and it
+causes one very seriously to think what would have happened had France
+not been our ally, and points the moral which has been mentioned of the
+necessity for a thriving aircraft and engine industry in peace. During
+the war Germany also had a very large number of firms engaged on this
+work.
+
+
+THE MACHINE AND ENGINE.
+
+The general differences between service and civil requirements in
+aircraft fall under the headings of ceiling, load and speed. For service
+purposes very much higher ceiling and greater climb and speed are
+required and the design is much affected by the condensed nature of the
+load. For peace purposes, besides the primary advantage of speed which
+the air has over other forms of transport, regularity must be ensured
+and the correct ratio between speed, duration and load-carrying power
+determined. Great ceiling, man[oe]uvrability and climb are not required.
+
+However great the speed and load, there is no value in air transport,
+whether for passengers or mails or goods, unless it is safe and also
+compares favourably from an economic point of view with the older
+methods. Without these the public cannot be expected to utilize air
+transport, nor is there any inducement to surrender mails and freight
+for carriage by air. Every endeavour compatible with economy is made, as
+far as the equipment of aerodromes and the organization of the routes
+are concerned, to render air navigation as safe as possible, yet, though
+both safety and economy of running have been improved, much remains to
+be done. Safety depends largely on engine reliability, fire prevention
+and the capacity of the machine to land in small spaces.
+
+Though neither roads nor rails have to be laid and aircraft possess the
+great advantages of mobility and point to point transit, the initiation
+and maintenance of an air service is a very complex and costly matter.
+The utilization of converted war machines is no longer sufficient and
+those specially designed for commercial work are beginning to make their
+appearance. Such are the Handley Page W.8, the Vickers, the D.H.18 and
+34, and the Bristol 10-seater.
+
+The first two are twin-engine and the last three single-engine machines.
+Opinions differ as to the relative advantages of the twin and
+single-engine type. The first and running costs of the single engine are
+lower, but the twin has greater power and carrying capacity, while most
+pilots prefer to have a surplus of power over and above that required
+for normal flight. For these reasons, and because of the psychological
+effect on insurance companies and on passengers, the twin engine will
+probably remain in use for large commercial machines, until long-lived
+and economic engines of more than 500 horse-power are available. On the
+other hand, where extra power is not required, the twin-engine is not
+safer than the single-engine machine; no existing twin-engine commercial
+aeroplane can maintain its height and land safely with only one engine
+running. Experiments have been made, especially in Germany, on the
+multi-engined machine with all the engines in the fuselage, but its
+advantages have so far been counterbalanced by loss of efficiency due to
+transmission gearing and shaft drives to the propellers and the
+vibration and weight of the gearing.
+
+High-powered engines are very expensive to run and every effort has
+therefore to be made by aerodynamic efficiency to carry more useful load
+with less horse-power. Improvement is being made in this direction; thus
+the D.H.18 carries eight passengers at 56 horse-power per passenger, the
+D.H.32 is designed for the same number at 45 horse-power each, and the
+D.H.34 for ten passengers at 45 horse-power each.
+
+The two best German commercial machines, the Junkers and the Fokker,
+have a comparatively low horse-power and a low fuel load, but greater
+attention has been paid to the design of the machines, which are
+monoplanes with cantilever wings, offering less resistance to the air
+than our biplanes. One of the most difficult problems is to evolve a
+high-lift wing which does not impair the aircraft's speed in the air.
+For commercial machines we must aim at the largest possible commercial
+load, the smallest possible fuel load and, consequently, an engine which
+uses fuel economically and, conversely, a lighter fuel. The development
+of the engine is receiving constant attention, as are also various
+safety devices, among which may be mentioned those guarding against fire
+and those varying the lift of wings so as to lower the landing speed and
+thus decrease the dangers attendant upon forced landings.
+
+In addition to the high initial cost of machines and engines, their
+maintenance also requires the greatest care. Detailed investigation must
+be made into all serious accidents. This is now compulsory under the new
+Air Navigation Act, and the fitness of pilots is ensured by periodical
+medical examination.
+
+Apart from the weather, the safety of an aircraft depends upon its
+engine, and perhaps even more upon the installation and accessibility of
+engines and their adjuncts, such as the petrol, oil, water and ignition
+systems. During the earlier stages of the war the average life of an
+engine before complete overhaul was necessary was, of stationary
+engines, from 50 to 60 hours, and of rotary engines, about 15 hours.
+To-day these figures stand at 200 hours and upwards and from 50 to 60
+hours respectively. For commercial purposes this must be further
+increased to 300-500 hours as a normal working period.
+
+There are two schools of thought with regard to the efficiency,
+reliability and the economy of engines. One school advocates using a
+light power plant per horse-power, run normally at about half its
+maximum; the other favours a plant of greater weight, more solid
+construction and greater efficiency, running at nearly its full
+horse-power. The former is more expensive in primary cost and upkeep,
+but allows a higher performance and provides reserve horse-power for
+emergency; the latter is cheaper, but involves a certain risk owing to
+lack of surplus power. We have hitherto shown a tendency to adopt the
+former method, the Germans the latter. For commercial purposes a
+compromise will probably be found to be best.
+
+Apart from the initial outlay on "air stock," the maintenance, overhead,
+fuel, insurance and depreciation charges are very heavy. These are much
+affected by such items as simplicity of design, strength against wear
+and tear, ease of assembly and interchangeability of parts, easily
+removable engines, increase in durability by the use of metal
+construction for parts of the machine and the propeller, the elimination
+of rubber joints, substitution of air for water cooling, facilities for
+loading and unloading in a commercial machine, simple and efficient
+navigational instruments and self-starter. Every improvement, however
+small, will assist to reduce running costs. Then revenue must be
+increased and the comfort of passengers, as, for instance, ventilation,
+warmth, luggage capacity and, more than all, a reduction of noise has to
+be carefully considered or they will not travel a second time by air. An
+effective engine silencer is at last well on the way. It is obvious what
+a great advantage this attainment will be both for service and civil
+purposes. Roughly speaking, a high-powered engine without a silencer is
+audible at a distance of some seven miles and at a height of 13,000 feet
+at night time, though these distances are reduced by about a third by
+day when normal ground noises exist. The bulk of noise is caused by the
+exhaust, the propeller and mechanical noises in the engine.
+
+I cannot leave this subject without emphasizing the value of research,
+both abstract and concrete. But, though it is the keystone of progress,
+its results must largely depend on the amount of flying done. It is
+clear that for economic reasons new designs can only thoroughly be tried
+out by commercial use, and therefore again that real progress is
+dependent on commercial activity.
+
+The advance of civil aviation is bound to be slower than was that of war
+aviation. But, as war experience improved old and evolved new types, so
+will peace requirements and experience shape the type and design of
+aircraft and engine best suited to its purposes. Although a good deal
+has under the circumstances already been achieved in peace, much remains
+to be done. Gradually, however, with a modicum of research, improvements
+in the factors already mentioned and the reduction of initial cost and
+maintenance expenses, air transport for mails, passengers and goods will
+take its place as a normal commercial public utility service, and the
+increased speed of communication will assist in the general development
+of trade.
+
+
+AIR SERVICES: BRITISH, CONTINENTAL AND IMPERIAL.
+
+International civil flying commenced officially on August 26th, 1919,
+and gradually expanded, both in the United Kingdom and on the Continent,
+especially during the summer of 1920. France, aided by considerable
+subsidies, conducted services from Paris to London, Brussels and
+Strasburg, from Toulouse to Montpelier and across Spain to Casablanca in
+Morocco; Belgium, from Brussels to London and Paris; Holland, from
+Amsterdam to London; Germany, in spite of the restrictions placed upon
+her, entered the field as a competitor and her aircraft flew regularly
+from Berlin to Copenhagen and Bremen, and from Bremen to Amsterdam. On
+the American Continent, the United States Post Office ran mail services
+from New York to Washington, Chicago, and San Francisco, with extensions
+from Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis, and St. Louis.
+
+For reasons which I shall give, there were no internal services in the
+United Kingdom, but there were four companies operating air lines from
+London to Paris, one of which held the contract for the carriage of
+mails. There were also air mail services between London and Brussels and
+Amsterdam. The mileage flown and the number of passengers and the weight
+of goods carried were considerable, while the number of letters steadily
+increased, especially on the Amsterdam service; and an efficiency of 76
+per cent., 94 per cent., and 84 per cent. was obtained on the
+London-Paris, London-Brussels, and London-Amsterdam services
+respectively.
+
+It must be remembered that these results were obtained without any
+direct assistance on the part of the State, such as was given by the
+French Government to air-transport companies in the form of subsidies.
+British economic policy is traditionally opposed to subsidies, believing
+that enterprise can be healthily built up on private initiative.
+Therefore, until 1921 civil aviation had to content itself with the
+indirect assistance of the State, which consisted mainly in the
+adjustment of international flying; the laying-out and equipment of
+aerodromes on the air routes; the provision of wireless communication
+and meteorological information; research and the collection and issue of
+general information concerning aviation.
+
+This indirect assistance, however, proved inadequate to maintain the
+progress achieved during 1920, and therefore the maintenance of air
+services by means of temporary direct financial assistance had to be
+arranged.
+
+I have already pointed out the difficulty against which commercial
+aviation has to contend in regard to the geographical features and
+position of the United Kingdom. Its comparatively small size, the
+propinquity of industrial centres, our efficient day and night express
+railway services, especially those running north and south, lessen the
+value of aircraft's superior speed and militate against the operation of
+successful internal air services. Possible exceptions might include
+amphibian services between London and Dublin, accelerating the delivery
+of mails five or six hours; between Glasgow and Belfast, where the Clyde
+and the harbour of Belfast could be used as terminals; or between London
+and the Channel Islands. I may point out in parenthesis that the
+development of alighting stations on rivers passing through the centres
+of towns is important, as a great deal of time is at present wasted in
+reaching the aerodromes necessarily situated some miles outside large
+centres of population.
+
+Our immediate opportunities of development near home are therefore
+afforded by the air services to Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam; but even
+here the saving in time is not great, and our position is unfavourable
+compared to that of the United States, where the Post Office saves two
+days in the delivery of mails by air between New York and San Francisco;
+or compared to that of Germany, where Berlin is within a 350-mile radius
+of Copenhagen, Cologne, Munich, Warsaw, and Vienna, which is itself in
+an advantageous situation as the junction for a South European system
+extending to the Balkan States and the Near East.
+
+The ultimate use of the air, however, is not exemplified by a few
+passengers flying daily between London and the Continent any more than
+by a few squadrons of fighting craft. In a decade or two overhead
+transit will become the main factor in the express delivery of
+passengers, mails, and goods. It is the one means left to the Empire of
+speeding up world-communication to an extent as yet unrealized. For the
+price of a battleship a route to Australia could be organized, the value
+of which would be beyond computation.
+
+The British Empire as a whole offers vast fields for expansion. In
+Africa, Canada, and Australia are found the great distances suitable to
+the operation of aircraft, the wide undeveloped areas through which air
+transport may prove more economic than the construction of railways, and
+the trans-oceanic routes over which travel by steamship has reached,
+and in many cases passed, its economic maximum speed. Air transport,
+careless whether the route be over land or sea, unhampered by foreign
+frontiers, gives the Empire precisely those essential powers of direct,
+supple, and speedy intercommunication which ship and rail have already
+shown us to be vital.
+
+Here again the geographical position of England presents a difficult
+problem. England is divided from the rest of the Empire by a wide
+expanse, either of ocean or foreign territory. Egypt, the starting-point
+for air routes to India, Australia, and South Africa, may be described
+as the centre of a circle of which England is on the circumference; and
+it may be some years before an aeroplane can complete the journey
+between England and Egypt with only Malta as a stopping-place.
+
+The future of long-distance oceanic air routes may depend upon the
+airship. Lighter-than-air craft, mainly for reasons of cost and
+vulnerability, did not receive such an impetus from the war as did the
+aeroplane, but the modern airship has claims for use over distances
+exceeding 1,000 miles. It can fly by night with even greater ease than
+by day; fog is no deterrent; engine trouble does not bring it down; and
+it can take advantage of prevailing winds. It would reduce the sea
+journey from England to Karachi from 22 to 5 days; from England to
+Johannesburg from 21 to 7 days; and from England to Perth from 32 to
+10-1/2 days. Its achievements have already been considerable. In
+November, 1917, the German L.57 flew from Constantinople to East Africa
+and back--a distance of 4,000 miles--in 96 hours; in June, 1919, the
+R.34 flew from East Fortune to Danzig and back in 57 hours; and in July
+it crossed the Atlantic, was moored out in America for four days, and
+returned, a total distance of 8,000 miles, in the flying time of 108
+hours for the outward and 75 hours for the homeward journey.
+
+Before and during the war Germany gained wide experience in the design,
+construction, and handling of airships. It is probable that as soon as
+the peace terms and financial position permit she will begin to
+establish this form of transport on a commercial basis. In accordance
+with the Peace Treaty, and the Ultimatum of the London Conference of
+1921, the construction of aircraft of all kinds is at present forbidden,
+but Germany is fostering airship development by the means left at her
+disposal. Her scientists are probing the constructional problems
+connected with large airships, while efforts are being made, by
+financial and other assistance, to maintain her technical staffs and
+airship bases in existence. At the same time German commercial interests
+are negotiating with foreign countries with a view to the development of
+airships abroad, and plans are being discussed for an airship service
+between Spain and Argentina.
+
+The United States, France, and Italy are all interesting themselves,
+either financially or constructionally, in the future of airship
+development.
+
+In Great Britain we have made great strides, particularly in the
+construction of small types, and our practical air experience in
+lighter-than-air craft, during the war, is the greatest in the world.
+With a view to carrying out the experiments necessary further to
+demonstrate the capacity of airships for commercial long-distance
+flights, a few months ago the Department of Civil Aviation took over all
+airship material surplus to service requirements. The main object was to
+test the practicability and value of mooring airships to a mast. Up to
+the present, a principal factor militating against the economic
+operation of airships has been the large and expensive personnel
+required for handling them on the ground, especially in stormy weather.
+The mooring-mast experiments have had considerable success and airships
+have been moored in high winds and over long periods with the assistance
+of a very small personnel.
+
+The Government has decided, however, though recognizing their
+potentialities for speeding up communications between the various
+Dominions and the Mother Country, that the operation of airships cannot
+be carried out by the State on account of the present financial
+position.
+
+Recognizing the limitations of Home services and those to the Continent,
+it was for the purpose of directing attention to the Imperial aspect of
+civil aviation that the great demonstration flights were organized in
+which Alcock flew the Atlantic in a Vickers "Vimy," Scott crossed to the
+United States and back in the R.34, Ross-Smith flew from England to
+Australia, and van Ryneveld from London to the Cape.
+
+These flights necessitated, too, considerable ground organization in
+laying out aerodromes, as the following report on one in Africa vividly
+illustrates: "If aerodromes are left unattended for one year," it says,
+"practically all the work would have to be undertaken afresh,
+particularly in Rhodesia. The growth of vegetation is enormous,
+especially during the rains, and grass will grow to a height of eleven
+feet in six months; and trees stumped two feet below the surface will
+throw out suckers and replant themselves within a month after the rains
+have started.... It is most important that rough drains should be
+traced.... I have just started planting Doub grass. This grass gives an
+ideal surface for landing, kills other grasses, and possesses deep
+interlacing roots which will bind the entire surface of the aerodromes,
+making it permanent and free from washaways and the formation of
+sluits."
+
+The demonstration flights, however, showed what could, rather than what
+should, be done, and what we look for to-day is the inception of
+practical undertakings, however small, in the various portions of the
+Empire. The most important of these is the service contemplated between
+Egypt and India; another instance is afforded by the West Indies, which
+suffer from the lack of inter-island communications, both for mails and
+passengers, and this could be partially rectified by an air service
+employing seaplanes or amphibians for the Leeward and Windward Islands
+and the Bahamas, and between the Bahamas and the American Continent,
+where an American company is actually conducting a service. Another
+project, given up owing to recent disturbances, was one for a
+flying-boat service on the Nile. Services are also being considered from
+Malta to Italy, Geraldton to Derby in Western Australia, Sydney to
+Adelaide and Brisbane, and Melbourne to Hobart in Tasmania. Canadian
+activity takes the form of work carried out by Government-owned civil
+machines in connection with forest patrol, photographic survey,
+exploration, anti-smuggling patrols, etc. It would be a great advantage
+if railway and steamship companies seriously considered the value of
+supplementing their services by air.
+
+With regard to Government undertakings on the Imperial air routes, Malta
+is being equipped with an aerodrome, and a line of wireless stations has
+been established between Egypt and India, but the organization of this
+route has been delayed owing to the recent disturbances in the Middle
+East, and the financial outlay involved in ground organization. As I
+have said, the air route on which we should first concentrate, over and
+above the Continental services, is that between Egypt and India. Both
+strategically and commercially it is the most important in the Imperial
+system; it is a step towards Australia; it offers possibilities of the
+greatest volume of traffic; it should be much simpler to control than
+many international routes, which inevitably have many complications;
+weather conditions are not unfavourable; and the time taken for the
+journey by sea would be reduced by about one-half. If the shortcomings
+in point of distance of the continental routes in reaping the full
+advantages of travel by air, and the importance of the best possible
+communications for the Empire, are recognized, it is essential that a
+practical form of assistance should be given in the near future to the
+conduct of weekly or even bi-weekly services each way between Cairo and
+Karachi. Although it will not be a commercial proposition for some time,
+the Egypt-Karachi route, shortening as it will the delivery of mails
+between England and India by two-thirds, and England and Australia by
+one-third, offers greater results than the various other schemes at
+present contemplated. There are, however, certain considerations which
+will have to be weighed before the immense amount of work necessary to
+its initiation as a commercial air route is begun. The French, for
+instance, hope to push a trunk air route to India via Constantinople,
+and this line has the advantage of avoiding a long sea and desert
+crossing. On the other hand, it will be a very difficult matter to
+negotiate the mountains of Anatolia.
+
+If enterprises of this kind are successfully started, if each of our
+self-governing Dominions and Colonies encourages civil aviation within
+its own territory, and develops the air-sense of its people, each
+portion of the Empire, by a process of natural expansion, and by the
+gradual extension of local air lines to merge with those from other
+portions of the Empire, will assist in eventually forming a continuous
+chain of inter-Imperial air communication. Such a process of internal
+development, supported by close co-operation between the States of the
+Imperial Commonwealth, is the best method of obtaining rapidity of air
+intercommunication and a system of Imperial air bases necessary to the
+strategic security of the Empire.
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION
+
+
+Within the necessarily narrow limits of this survey there has been
+traced the history of aviation from the earliest days; the tremendous
+impetus given to it by the war has been described, during the course of
+which not only did air co-operation become essential to the Navy and
+Army, but the importance of the Air Force as a separate arm, with its
+own strategic action, steadily grew; the increasing preponderance which
+aerial warfare will have in the future, and the horrors which it may
+bring, have been touched upon; and the possibilities of civil aviation
+in peace and war have been outlined.
+
+The conclusion has been reached that we cannot dispense with aviation,
+even if we would. We must consider it as a whole and lay down the broad
+principles on which it should be developed. The air (I write as one who
+during the last months of the war held the post of Chief of the Air
+Staff) materially helped, if it did not actually win, the fight. It has
+greatly complicated and increased the problems of defence. In future its
+influence on these problems will be still greater. The air has no
+boundaries. Great Britain and the Empire are no longer protected by the
+seas. A correct assessment of their needs will entail a growing ratio
+of air force to Army and Navy, and air power will in itself depend on
+the development of civil aviation.
+
+But though air action may be expected with justice to grow in proportion
+to that of the Army and Navy, and will certainly absorb certain
+functions of both, it would be unwise, at this early stage of
+development, for air forces to attempt too much at a time--such as, for
+instance, to garrison geographically unsuitable countries.
+
+A certain amount of reliance could also be placed on civil machines
+temporarily borrowed for purely policing measures in uncivilized
+countries, or for the assistance of Government during civil
+disturbances; and for such purposes it should not be difficult to devise
+a scheme, especially when the State exercises a measure of control
+through the grant of subsidies, for the obligatory enrolment of civil
+commercial pilots in the reserve, and for periodical refresher courses
+for pilots, who are not actually in the service of companies, at civil
+aerodromes. Such systems are in force in France and Canada. In the event
+of war the independent striking air force could thus count upon a large
+proportion of civil reserve pilots and machines.
+
+Air, allied to chemistry and the submarine, will be a difficult
+combination to withstand. The more its potential terrors are grasped,
+the less likely is war to be loosed upon the world, and it cannot be
+realized too clearly how much more easily than any other instrument of
+warfare aircraft and gas can be cheaply and secretly prepared by a
+would-be belligerent. Meanwhile, if civil aviation can be built up as a
+productive organization to a position relative to that held by our
+mercantile marine, we must understand that it will ensure air supremacy
+better than a large unproductive outlay on armaments. And I am convinced
+that, with public support, this can, and will, be done. Others will do
+it if we do not. But air power, although drawing its vitality from the
+expansion of air commerce and the growth of the civil aircraft industry,
+must at the same time rely upon the nucleus of a highly trained and
+technical air force. Service aviation must be the spearhead, civil
+aviation the shaft, of our air effort.
+
+The present isolation of England in terms of air from the rest of the
+Empire, and the geographical conditions already described, certainly
+render the national expansion of aviation, both external and internal, a
+difficult problem. It is clear that for this reason it must rather
+develop on an Imperial basis. The Dominions have already started
+valuable civil air work and have appointed Air Boards. Whatever the
+political settlement of Egypt may be, it is important that our air
+interests at this "hub" of Imperial aviation should be safeguarded. Air
+communication between the various portions of the Empire may prove of
+inestimable value in a future world war, and Dominion air forces may be
+able quickly to concentrate against enemy territory which is out of the
+range of aircraft operating from home. We have seen the value of
+aircraft operating from land bases for naval patrol, anti-submarine
+action, and direct attack on enemy shipping. With the increasing radius
+of action of seaplanes and other naval aircraft, the Army and Navy may
+be relieved of certain of their duties in coast defence and in
+protecting Imperial trade routes. For these reasons, aircraft bases are
+required throughout the Empire, and it is the commercial development of
+aviation which is the best means of ensuring their establishment. It
+will be for the Imperial authorities, while attending to local
+conditions and requirements, to co-ordinate as far as possible the air
+effort of the Empire, so that in peace communications may be developed
+and in the event of war its full power may rapidly be utilized on a
+co-operative basis.
+
+Civil aviation is not, however, merely a method of amplifying service
+air power. It has a vast potential value of its own. Communications
+shape human destinies. The evolution of our civilization bears strongly
+the marks of the systems which at various stages have made the
+intercourse of men and ideas possible. Its history is one of endeavour
+to extend the limits imposed upon human living and mobility in each of
+the great phases through which it has passed.
+
+There was the phase of the coracle and the roller-wheeled vehicle,
+stretching back into the roadless mists of unrecorded time; of roads
+which gradually linked the important areas of the Roman Empire; of
+inland and coastal waterways; of ocean traffic, and its huge advance
+with the discovery of steam-power, which brought England to the fore.
+
+With each phase the world shrinks smaller and the mists of the unknown
+recede. The development of human mobility is the greatest marvel of the
+present age. We can hardly realize that it was only the other day, as
+these things go--in 1819, just a hundred years before the same feat was
+accomplished by air-that the first sailing ship fitted with auxiliary
+steam (and not until 1828 that a real steamship) crossed the Atlantic.
+
+Strain and competition are increasing. Trains vie with ships; motor
+transport with trains. Telephones, wireless, cables, and flying are
+speeding up communications to a degree undreamed of a few years ago. If
+the air is to be a prime factor in the world-phase to come, how will the
+British Empire be affected? Stretching from Great Britain to Australia
+and the Pacific Ocean, the Empire depends more than any other political
+and commercial organization on the most modern and speedy
+communications, and as each of its portions assumes greater
+responsibility there is greater need for co-operation, the distribution
+of information, and the personal contact of statesmen and business men.
+"The old order changeth, yielding place to new"; and in communications
+the new order is air transport.
+
+Equally important is the international aspect. To-day we are deeply
+concerned with the maintenance of peace, and this can be achieved, not
+so much by the action of Governments, or the efforts of the League of
+Nations, as by the personal association of individuals of one nation
+with those of another, and an increasing recognition of common
+interests. I conceive that civil aviation, by reducing the time factor
+of intercommunication, will tend to bring peoples into closer touch
+with each other and will make for mutual understanding. The Peace Treaty
+provided for an Air Convention for the international control of civil
+aviation. The Convention has been signed by all the Allied nations which
+took part in the war, and I hope other countries will shortly be
+included. As soon as the Convention has been ratified, the International
+Commission of Air Navigation will be established, and for the first time
+the world will see the international control of a great transport
+service. I believe this will prove an important practical step towards
+international co-operation and goodwill.
+
+We have no excuse for ignorance of the effects of Imperial and
+international co-operation. The war gave us an example of what the
+British Empire can do, provided its combined knowledge and effort is
+brought to bear for one great purpose; and in no respect was this better
+exemplified than in the utilization and scientific development of
+aviation. The world-position of the Empire as a whole is still the best.
+Commerce and communications are its bonds, and, if we are so determined,
+it is in our power to shape the destinies of the future.
+
+A definite advance has been made since the Armistice and, if all goes
+well, a very much greater one will be made during the next two or three
+years, and in ten years mercantile air services will be operating on a
+self-supporting basis. The science and concentration employed in the war
+must be made to serve the requirements of peace. Readiness for, and
+success in, war are vital when war is unavoidable, but in peace it is
+civil and commercial activity which is vital.
+
+As in its infancy it seemed incredible to those responsible for the
+direction of the older services that the air would be their most
+valuable partner; as, during the war, they grudged its logical
+development to strike widely where they could not reach, and tried to
+tether it closely to them, so now in peace the air is struggling to
+attain the apotheosis of communication.
+
+In the phase of world commerce of which we are on the threshold,
+science, brain-power, energy, and faith must, and increasingly will, be
+harnessed to the work of perfecting air communication so that human
+mobility can be increased, knowledge interchanged, and the fruits of
+production distributed throughout the world.
+
+As a soldier I have of course dwelt on the possibility of war in the
+future and of the part which aviation would play in it, but it would be
+a great mistake--though I think that mistake is constantly made--to
+suppose that soldiers look forward with equanimity to the prospect of
+war. On the contrary, soldiers, more even than civilians, if this be
+possible, realize the horrors of war and recognize that the great task
+rests upon the statesmen of all nations, and upon humanity itself, of
+taking whatever steps can be taken to prevent its recurrence.
+
+We may at least assume that another great war will not be allowed in our
+generation. But war, in spite of its horrors, in spite of its
+bereavements, is only too quickly forgotten. A comparatively few years,
+and those who have passed through its fire are no more. New wealth is
+created; new antagonisms arise; and a new generation remembers only the
+romantic stories and the martial deeds of its fathers, or, more fatally,
+organizes itself to avenge defeat. Then, once again, forgetful of the
+terrible lesson we have learned, the great nations of the world may
+unsheathe the sword as the only solution to their problems. Our only
+hope lies in using the ensuing years to educate mankind to the principle
+that war brings misery and impoverishment to all engaged in it, that in
+the final victory it is not a question of which is left the strongest,
+but which is the least exhausted, and that national are as susceptible
+as personal differences to discussion and arbitration. Above all, let us
+guard against the old mistake of competitive armaments. There is no
+reason, for instance, why, because France, our friend and ally, is
+adopting a policy of air armaments, we should blindly pile up aeroplane
+against aeroplane, pilot against pilot, and thus provoke mutual
+suspicion.
+
+The possibility of war remains, however, and I wish in conclusion to
+emphasize the fact that in my belief the security of this country in the
+event of war will depend upon our strength in the air. The development
+of the offensive powers of aviation have already destroyed "the silver
+streak" on which we relied in the past. When we remember that it is less
+than twenty years since the first successful aeroplane was flown, when
+we recall the almost miraculous development of the fighting powers of
+aircraft during the four and a half years of war, and also the further
+developments which were on the point of being utilized when the war
+ended, it seems certain that from the point of view of war Britain has
+ceased to be an island. The "silver streak" would have been little
+protection but for our naval supremacy, and in the future our security
+will depend as much upon superiority in the air as it has depended in
+the past upon our superiority at sea. And this superiority in the air
+can only be attained in the same way in which we secured our supremacy
+at sea. That supremacy was not really gained by developing great navies.
+It was gained by our mercantile marine, which made the great navies
+possible. Our future security can only be gained by the development of
+commercial aviation.
+
+
+_Printed in Great Britain by_ Butler & Tanner, _Frome and London_.
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Endnotes:
+
+    Variant spellings, e.g. _Frankfort_ and _Frankfurt_, remain as
+    printed. Significant amendments have been listed below:
+
+      Page 67, 'Poperighe' amended to _Poperinghe_.
+
+      Page 117, 'Junker' amended to _Junkers_.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Aviation in Peace and War, by
+Sir Frederick Hugh Sykes
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