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Aviation History
1919
1919 - 1538.PDF
NOVEMBER 27, 1919 plane down in the ordinary way ; if you shut off your engine you will drop like a stone. " HOWEVER, these long, level Swiss valleys," he continues, " should easily be converted into splendid aerodromes, al though at present most of them are spoilt for flying purposes by telegraph and telephone wires. The military aviation authorities are co-operating with private firms, and are placing the conveniences of the military aerodromes at Dubendorff, near Zurich, at their disposal. A new aerodrome, of which great things are to be expected, is being constructed at Thun, on the shores of the lake, and the factory there is turning out a consider able number of machines, including the new Swiss ' Haefeli D.H. 5.' " There are ' flying weeks ' near many of the chief towns, and, in order to popularise flying among the Swiss people, a novel bcheme has been adopted. In the streets of Berne and other cities you will find lists of recent civilian passengers. And what can be finer than to have your name printed on such a list for all the townsfolk to see ? " WHAT a chance for notoriety ! THOSE air-raids again ! Last week another victim, a solicitor, was sentenced to six months in the second division at the Old Bailey for bigamously marrying a woman whom he met while sheltering from an air-raid. AN excellent idea for a War memorial has been carried out in Lenham Church, Kent, where the brass-bound propeller blades of an aeroplane have been placed to com memorate the memory of those who, bv the air, paid the full penalty of the War.' MORE aerial postage stamps. Two new varieties have just been added from Japan, where they were issued in connection with an experimental air post between Tokyo and Osaka. They consist of the ordinary 1J and 3 sen postage stamps, distinguished by the addition of a device representing a monoplane in flight, in the form of an overprint. The overprint is in red on the i£ sen and in black on the 3 sen. Some thing like 100,000 copies of these special postage stamps were sold by the Imperial Japanese post office in the two cities. TODAY (Thursday) Air-Marshal Sir Hugh Trenchard will, with six other recipients, be placed upon the Honorary Degrees Roll at Cambridge. WE are glad to see Lord Montagu of Beaulieu to the fore again in giving atten tion to the Imperial future of aviation. In an able letter to the Press, Lord Montagu sums up shortly the past of the Air Force, and then handles the " future," during which he once more endorses the chief points of danger ahead, should our Govern ment at the present moment fail to rise to the necessities of the future HERE is the " history " section of Lord Montagu's advocacy :— " The proposal of the Government to put the Royal Air Force again under the War Office should be resisted by every one who has the future of the Air Services at heart, or remembers the past history of the previous bad system now proposed to be revived. " First of all, I desire to allude to the past. When I was a member of the War Air Committee, with Lord Derby and others, in^the spring of 1916, my experience then of the difficulties in regard to supply and administration which arose from the dual control of the Air Force by the Navy and Army, and the impossibility of har monious working, led me to resign as a %&m k ^AmSm ~*&Jt: protest against the waste of time, lives, and money under the old system, and in order to bring to public notice that the independence of the Air Service was essential for its progress and proper efficiency. The same reasons which led the Government to accept this view hold good today. " The Air Force should remain independent, free to work out its own salvation, to create and carry on its own traditions, and alone to be responsible for its own efficiency in offence and defence throughout the Empire. " Then, as now, some Cabinet Ministers and some exalted naval and military authorities were bitterly opposed to the independence of the new force, and some of these authorities had either actively hampered or passively resisted the progress of the Air Force since its early days. Later on three factors compelled the Government to grant the Air Force in dependence :— " (1) The pressure of both Houses of Parliament and public opinion. " (2) The need of an Air Force for war purposes larger than that which could be controlled bv either the Admiralty or the War Office. "j(3) The weighty and explosive argu ments in London and elsewhere of the Zeppelins, which showed every one that war in the air was a very real and in creasingly important part of the great European struggle. " Thus the first Air Ministry and inde pendent Air Force was formed under Lord Cowdray in the autumn of 1917." s, ••Vim *''™ ^"^M The stained glass window in St. James's Church, Spanish Place, in memory of fallen airmen AND then follows a warning and an appeal :— " Now what of the future ? It would be madness to imagine that the need of an efficient Air Force will be less in future. It will be far, far greater. Both by sea and land, air power will become more and more important actually and relatively every year, both in peace and war. And the possibility of sudden, blinding, annihi lating attacks by an enemy, without a declaration of war—an enemy panting for vengeance-—will grow with every year. Has the War Office knowledge, time or ability to think out the special problems of the air, or administer efficiently this novel, peculiar, and wonderful force, whose pilots must always be pilots before they are sailors or soldiers, brave beyond telling, and reckless in initiative to the verge of in subordination ? Of the two, I would rather put them under the Admiralty, where initia tive is understood, and insubordination, if successful, winked at. " And it should be enough for most people to know that Gen. Seely has re signed on this most important question of principle. There has never been a more capable Chief of the Air Ministry, one with more vision, experience, practical know ledge, and belief in the future of the Air Force. He has been Secretary of State for War, still is a member of the Imperial Defence Committee, and has worked the Air Force under both systems, dependent on the War Office and independent of it. " And, finally, let us remember that while we are all war weary, war is still possible, even probable, in the future. Germany is crippled on the sea and on land. In the air she can build up—and is building now —a force for peaceful commerce which in 24 hours could be used for war with deadly effect. The first week's air warfare may decide the next war. " Any independent Air Ministry, though its estimates and personnel be small, is preferable to no Ministry at all, and to the overshadowing and deadening influence of another Department. Three years ago I wrote, ' One element, one Service.' That is as true a motto today as then." 154O
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