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Aviation History
1916
1916 - 0304.PDF
(fySBg be expected to take up meekly. Consequently he has done the only reasonable thing under the conditions, and has also seceded from the Special Committee. At the lime of writing nothing official has transpired as to the why and the wherefore of this conclusion to the promise of reform contained in the appointment of this body. On Wednesday of this week, Lord Montagu is to speak at Birmingham upon the air question, and it is to be hoped that he will then be able to throw such light upon tbe complications which are hindering the smooth working of the Committee, as to either make it clear that nothing short of the immediate creation of an Air Ministry will suffice, or force the Coalition Govern ment to so widen the present Committee's powers as to make it a real reform body. It is persistently rumoured that the old trouble of the antipathy of the two Services to each other is at the bottom of all the friction. If that prove to be the case, to our mind no better evidence could be produced of the crying need for an entirely separate Air Ministry, and that without an unnecessary moment's delay. That accursed hereditary jealousy which has been handed down as a legacy from time immemorial, has been the cause of irreparable mischief in the past, and seems as if it were apparently irre ducible. From time to time we have had gleams of hope that it was on the Air "platform" that this fetish of centuries might at last be sacrificed. But once again human nature seems to have come out on top, and the general welfare must take second place, lest the amour propre of one or other of the services may be slightly touched. That such pettiness can exist in connection with two such glorious services as the British Navy and Army is almost inconceivable. But it always has been upon a par with the mixing of oil and water, and it looks like remaining so. Under such conditions there appears to be but the one way out of the tangle, ami that is by letting each of the great services still " carry on " as hitherto, with whatever they may wish for and it is possible to supply them with, in the shape of aircraft. Let there be created the much-required Ministry of Air, with the widest possible powers, this new de partment to work out a far-reaching and bold policy of offense and defense on its own, whilst providing for all supplies to each of the other Services, as each of the commands intimate the requirements necessary for a successful prosecution of their individual plans of campaign. With the Chairman and the Vice-Chairman of* the Co-ordination Committee gone, the likelihood, under the circumstances, of the Admiralty and War Office representatives endeavouring at the same table to find a way out of the .quandary would appear to be almost hopeless. The appointment of some new political Chairman, with a high-sounding title as his only qualification for the post, will assuredly not meet the case, and if this is attempted, in order to smother up the suppressed fire which is raging for drastic action in matters relating to the air, we can see in it but one more sign that before long the country will demand a clean sweep of the whole political clique of lawyers, who have clung to office far too long, and who to remain in power have ever had before them, in whatever steps they take, the one ultimate guiding aim and principle, the securing of votes when they hand in their tickets for re-election. When they have to put their proposal forward to the country for a " vote of confidence," we fancy they will find the element of the air is a pretty solid mass when it is consolidated by unity of purpose. And to demonstrate this we now have two very earnest advocates in Lord Montagu and Mr. Pemberton-Billing, backed by a number of lesser lights who hope to obtain a little reflected glory by supporting what is gradually dawning upon them as likely to develop into a star of the first magnitude, in the not far off future. A two-seater Avro about to start for Suvla the day alter the evacuation. On the pilot's return he reported that the Turks were still shelling the empty trenches for all tbey were worth. 304
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