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Aviation History
1918
1918 - 0116.PDF
JANUARY 31, 1918. that reaches our own old the way of reasoned argument against the contem- it even in a passing plated change. As a mltter of fact, it reminded us According tc, all the .i of nothing \o much as the pathetic pleadings of French Air Service is ^..^ a confirmed Tory newspaper to leave alone the old practically little but the A.R. order of things. The argument seemed to be that is built to an official des gn and, hte our own old whatever is £ right and8 that everything is for the B.E. 2C machine, is hopelessly out of date and un- best in the best of§all possible worlds* suited to work over the lines. The P^s compkin Apparently our contemporary having prophesied that they are difficult to handle that it is impossible confusforS^ confounded Ta Httle ^appointed to see from them-in action against enemy^s that matters are proceeding quietly on their way, the pilots say they can seldom see their opponent without any appearance of "confusion, delay and and that their speed at IO,ooo feet is not more than vexation." Confusion and vexation there certainly i3okiloms. per hour compared with the 210 kiloms is none. Delay there must be. To attempt to of which the best.German^machines are• capable at unduly force the pace would inevitably lead to the the same and greater altitudes. Moreover they corn- two former, and we hold that Lord Rothermere plain that these " A. R machines are expectedI to and his technical advisers are taking the wise and carry out every class of work over the lines, recon- i photography artillery observation andstatesmanlike course of allowing the change to come about gradually rather than to seek to create the new Service in a night. Unbalanced criticism like that of the Morning Post does not help in the task of re- construction, but rather tends to hamper those who are doing their best under admittedly difficult cir- cumstances. From beginning to end of the article under discussion there is not a single constructive sentence. The Government " have chosen the most critical moment of the war for the perpetration of a gigantic blunder," and the first result of it is that the Morning Post has become dyspeptic ! We do not appear to have a monopoly Reform of all the trouble in our own Air F?ench Services. M. Loucheur, the French Air Service. Minister of Munitions, seems to have «? taken occasion at an Aero Club dinner to'talk to his Air Service compatriots about their proneness to criticism, and at the same time to assure them that, in the future, they would have practically all they ask. " If," he said, " you ask for 1,000 h.p. motors, you shall have them." It is always a delicate matter to interfere in the domestic affairs of another, and the delicacy is all the greater when that other is a friendly and an allied nation. That being so, it is with the greatest diffidence that we approach the subject of the French Air Service and the reforms forecasted by the Minister of Munitions. Under ordinary circumstances we should regard it as the merest impertinence to pre- sume to tell our neighbours they are wrong and advise them that their house requires to be put in order. But the circumstances are far from ordinary. France is our Ally in the greatest war of all time, and we thus possess a community of interests which justifies plainer speaking than would be permissible at any other time. To get straight to the point, we are inclined to the view that all is not well with the French Air Service. naissance, photography, artiller observation, an contact patrols. This is certainly not at all as it should be, particularly as there is no lack of designs which fulfil all the requirements of modern aerial war. To quote only two, there are the Breguet and the Spad machines, in both of which the French pilots have entire confidence, but which are side- tracked in favour of the official design. That is the case as it has been presented to us. We have admitted already that interference in the affairs of our ally is a delicate matter, but we can- not afford to ignore these matters when they are brought to our knowledge. Our interests in this war are so bound up in the efficiency of the whole Alliance that we feel we should be doing wrong were we not to ventilate them as though they related to our own Service. Indeed, they do most intimately concern us. We are told that there is only one Allied front in the West, and if that front extends into the air— as it most certainly does—then anything that affects the efficiency of the whole is a matter of joint concern. That being so, we see no reason why weaknesses on one side should not be realised and pointed out by the other. Once again we come on to delicate ground when we arrive at the point where constructive suggestions follow as a matter of course. It seems to us that there ought to be much closer relations between our own and the French Air Service than appear to exist. We hear a great deal about the co-ordination of war aims; the pooling of resources; and singleness of effort. There is an Allied War Council meeting at Versailles every now and then, whose business it is, presumably, to promote all-round efficiency in the conduct of the war. Surely the vital question of air power comes within the purview of that Council, and if there is a weak spot anywhere it should be pointed out and prompt and adequate measures be taken to remedy it. It would seem that all the circumstances point to the necessity for the formation of an Allied Air Council, assuming that the matters involved do Let us hasten to say that we do not mean its per- not directly fall within the province of the War Council. sonnel. The French pilots and observers have proved At the present moment we are engaged in the recon- their skill and gallantry in a thousand and more combats and reconnaissances, and they need no tribute from us to enhance their standing in the eyes of the world. The root of the whole business seems to be that the Air Service is in the same trouble that our own laboured under when the administration of struction of our own Air Services so that we shall eventually have a separate and distinct Air Force. Now, we have the War Council which is charged primarily, as we understand it, with the conduct of the war on land. There is to be an Allied Naval Council, which will take charge of the co-ordination of the R.A.F. could see no virtue in any machine or of naval operations in every theatre of the war at sea. design that did not emanate from Farnborough. We Why not go further and constitute a similar body to need not go over the whole sorry story again. It co-relate the war in the air ? is one of those episodes which, once done with, is If that were done and the best brains of each of the best buried in oblivion, and we should not have revived Allied nations were brought to bear upon the lessons 112
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