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Aviation History
1918
1918 - 0361.PDF
Flight, April 4, 1918. ENGINEER? VV/. First Aero Weekly in the World. ' Founder and Editor: STANLEY SPOONER. A Journal devoted to tbe Interests, Practice, and Progress of Aerial Locomotion and Transport. ' OFFICIAL ORGAN OF THE ROYAL AERO CLUB OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. N*. 484. (No. 14, Vol. X.) APRIL 4, 1918. rweekly. Price 3d.L Post FTM, 4A. Mode!. .. Side Winds Flight. and The Aircraft Engineer. EditorialOffice: 36, GREAT QUEEN STREET, KINGSWAY, W.C. 2. Telegrams : Truditur, Westcent, London. Telephone : Gerrard i8s8. Annual Subscription Rates, Post Free. United Kingdom ... i$s. zd. Abroad aor. ad. CONTENTS. Editorial Comment: • PAGE Tne Royal Air Force .. .. ,, ., ,. ., ,. .. 357 The Royal Air Force and the Army Council 358 The Standardisation of Aircraft 358 Medical Research and the Royal Air Force 359 Honours 360 The Sopwith Triplane (with scale drawings) 361 The Royal Aero Club. Official Notices 366 The Roll of Honour 367 In the Hands of the Enemy .. .. 367 An Albatros Fighting Biplane 368 Uniform of the Royal Air Force .. .. 372 Alrisms from the Four Winds .. _ 3 The Recent and Future Growth of Aerial Law. By Dr. H. D. Hazeltine 375 International Aircraft Standards 376 Personals.. .. „ 377 The British Air Services 380 Aircraft Work at the Front. Official Information 381 383 384 Index and Title Page for Vol. IX. The 8-page Index for Vol. IX of •• FLIGHT" (January to December, 1917) is now ready, and can be obtained from tbe Publishers, 36, Great Queen Street, Kings way, W.C. 2. Price 8d. per copy, post free. EDITORIAL COMMENT. " Newspapers are an essential part of oar war organisation."— (Sir Auckland Geddes, Minister of National Service.) N Monday last the Royal Air Force officially came into being and marked the consummation of all the efforts that have, for three years of war, been made in the direction of securing better co-ordination of manufacture and operation than was possible under the now ^departed system of dual control. It is certainly not too much to say that the ist of April, 1918, marks an epoch in the history of the fighting forces of the British Roval Crown. It has seen 'called into active Air Force, Demg a new Service which, we are fully convinced, will in the time to cpme rival In magnitude the older Services from which it has sprung, even if it does not dwarf them into com- parative insignificance. The future safety of the Empire is in the air as well as on and under the sea, and it is thus impossible to look into that future without being forced to the irresistible conclusion that, while armies as we known them now—and even fleets—may disappear as a means of practical war, our aerial navies must and will continue to increase and multiply until the millennium, when there shall be no more war. As a matter of fact, when we speak of the dis- appearance of armies as we known them now it is in a spirit of sober vision and of calculated outlook that we make use of the phrase. It is because we believe that in the very near future aircraft will render impossible the employment of masses of men on the ground that we speak as we do. There may be some who think we go too far in this, and who hold that even in their highest development aircraft can be no more than an arm subsidiary to ground armies and fleets at sea. Certainly it is an arguable proposition, but to our way of thinking there can be no better answer to such a line of reasoning than to point to the enormous developments which have already taken place—developments that have already compelled the separation of the Flying Services from their elder sisters. The single fact that in less than four years the aerial arm has grown from a veritable toy adjunct to our field armies into a gigantic separate Service whose activities are in all human probability destined to be decisive of the issues of the greatest war in history, is earnest enough of still greater developments to come. Further than that, we can see the writing on the wall in the things that are happening on the Western Front now. Day by day and night after night our air squadrons are making every moment hideous to the enemy.. They have searched his bivouacs and concentration areas with bombs and machine gun fire ; caused holocausts of casualties in his ranks; and have done far more than is yet realised in the holding up of his massed advance. In fact, it is probably not going too far to say that had it not been for the magnificent work of the personnel of what is now the Royal Air Force, the results of the battle, so far as they fall to be written now, would have been far more disquieting to the Alllies. As a matter of fact, it is within our knowledge that this is an understatement of the case, but more cannot be said about the work of the British airmen in the great Battle of the Somme until the necessarily fragmentary stories which are current to-day have been sifted and pieced together. When that time F 2
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