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Aviation History
1917
1917 - 0410.PDF
I-*1 fewer months than the years it has taken the Govern- ment to discover that it is cumbrous, had a private corporation been concerned. However, it is being done now, which is altogether to the good. Another good thing the House was told in this connection was that the Air Board has established a very close liaison with our French Allies, and is arranging to keep in similarly close touch with the American Air Service. On the other hand, Mr. Pemberton Billing challenged the last statement by alleging that we had actually refused to give the Americans access to our designs or to our latest types of engines, owing to some commercial cause. If that be so, then it does not appear that the close liaison of which Major Baird spoke is working very effectively. We are out to win the war, commercial considerations or no commercial considerations. If there is anything of the sort operating as a cause, then it must be swept away without an instant's delay. There may be some ques- tion of patent rights, or something of the sort in question, but all these matters are merely a question of finance, and where we are spending the huge sums we are on the prosecution of the war we cannot afford to let a few thousands of pounds stand in the way. The shortest and cheapest way to success lies in perfect co-ordination between ourselves and our Allies, and money spent in co-ordinating the common effort is money well spent. • • • In the matter of the increased production anditlT of aircraft> M.aJor Baird &ave the House Increase. so*ne reassuring figures. As he pointed out, it is impossible to give actual figures, but he dealt with the matter as one of ratios. Taking the figure of production for the whole of last year as l)eing a ratio of eight per month, he said ths.t the output for the first two months of this year was as 16, the anticipated output for the succeeding three months is 19, and it was hoped that by the end of the year even that figure would have been doubled. In making this statement he paid a glowing tribute to the work of the predecessors of the present administra- tion. Anything that can be done, he said, by new an angements which did not come into force until this year cannot show any appreciable effect certainly until the latter half or the third quarter. It was only fair to remembei that the very substantial increase in output was entirely due to the energy and foresight shown by those whom the present administration had succeeded. We say it in no spirit of carping criticism, but we should have felt more pleased if the gallant officer had been able to assure the House that the matter goes deeper than mere increase in output of machines and that type for type we had made equally rapid progress in design. We have never questioned that output has been enormously accelerated. What we have been and are still anxious to know is that we are turning out " best " machines in satisfactory numbers. Mr. Joynson-Hicks raised this point after the statement by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Air Board. As he pointed out, the War Office is doubtless satisfied with the " best " machines we have at the Front, bat the trouble is that we have not enough of them. Mr. Joynson-Hicks averred that the percentage of these machines was only about 4 per cent, of the whole number now in France, and very pertinently asked if the Air Board was in a position to say that there is any possibility of even 50 per cent, of our machines at the Front being replaced by the best type during the course of the coming MAY 3, 1917. summer ? Replying to his own question, Mr. Joynson- Hicks said that he feared there was no such possibility, and proceeded to say that it might have been done had it not been for the confusion and the lack of driving force in the last two Air Boards or Air Com- mittees, or whatever they were called. We agree that the retrospect is deplorable, but there is very little use now. in indulging in recriminations with regard to the past—that is dead, and must now be allowed to bury its dead. What we are immediately and urgently concerned with is the future, and from that point of view we regret that in his reply to the points raised in the debate Major Baird found it impossible to give any definite reply to the question of the replacement of out-of-date machines now in use at the Front. Instead, he indulged in generalities regarding the utter impossibility of prophecy in relation to matters concerning aircraft and the various manufacturing difficulties that have a habit of cropping up. Again we have no desire to be hyper- critical, but we imagine that any manufacturer oi aircraft cou)d have given if not a definite, at any rate a fairly approximate, idea of when he could deliver a stated number of machines. That is all that is implied. The Air Board knows, surely, how many of these new machines it has on order and the dates by which they are contracted for delivery. There is no need to disclose actual figures, but someone must have more than a remote idea when there should be a sufficient number delivered to comply with the terms of the question. The It would have been strange if the subjectof the mastery of the air had not fallen *° ^e discussed in a full-dress debate on the air services. As a matter of fact, Major Baird himself introduced it in the form of a question addressed to Mr. Joynson-Hicks, in which he asked the latter to say what he meant by the term. In reply, Mr. Joynson-Hicks denned it thus: "We should have in relation to the air exactly what the Royal Navy has to the sea," adding " I leave out for the moment the question of sub- marines, which is quite a distinct point." Major Baird disputed that there was or could be anything like mastery of the air, basing his point upon the impossibility of making it impossible to the enemy to get through our patrols or to effectively use the air. For our own part, we do not see any ground for dispute here. We have always stood for the " mastery of the air," for which we completely accept the definition of Mr. Joynson-Hicks. We do not expect, nor do we ask, for such a measure of supremacy that no hostile machine can ascend into the air without encountering the practical certainty of destruction. It were simple lunacy to ask for it. But if we keep to the analogy as laid down by Mr. Joynson-Hicks, we certainly do think that we can secure that same measure of supremacy as the Navy holds at sea. The position there is that the enemy's battle fleets dare not show themselves outside the protection of their coast batteries and minefields, but the Germans have from time to time succeeded* in letting loose raiders on the trade routes, and to a very small extent have been able to get supplies to their forces overseas. But the mere fact that they have met with some small measure of success in these directions does not detract for a single moment from the outstanding fact that we are supreme on the seas—leaving out, as Mr. Joynson- Hicks said, the question of the submarine, which is a different point. 410
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