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Aviation History
1920
1920 - 0002.PDF
will those who have travelled in Central Africa be able to read into it something almost akin to romance. To prepare aerodromes and landing grounds for the projected aerial line, huge expanses had to be blasted out of the almost impenetrable bush. What the African bush is like no-one but those who have actual experience of travelling in it can possibly imagine. There is nothing with which it can be compared but itself. In some cases thousands of trees had to be removed to make a single aerodrome. In other places vast ant-hills had to be removed, some of the individual hills being 25 feet high by 45 feet in diameter—quite as large as an ordinary English dwelling-house. In one case the removal of these obstructions entailed the shifting of no less than 25,000 tons of material. Nor was the actual work the only difficulty which had to be dealt with. The deadly tse-tse fly forbade the employment of cattle or horses for traction purposes in infected areas. In other places the malarial mosquito abounded, while the white ant, which is one of the worst plagues of Africa, made construction work exceedingly difficult. Not the least interesting, not to say picturesque, feature of the work of the survey was the readiness with which the native chiefs seem to have welcomed the advent of the winged white man. In Bechuana- land Chief Khama laid out a landing ground at his own expense in order that his country might come within the scope of the service to be ultimately opened up. Everywhere the natives seem to have been only - too anxious to assist the work of the survey parties. Land has been freely given or placed at the disposal of th* Air Ministry at a nominal rental. There has been no difficulty in securing all the labour necessary —which is indeed obvious from the wonderful record of progress shown by the report of the work accom- plished. Truly, this is an age of wonders ! It is well within the recollection of many who are still in the full vigour of life that " Darkest Africa " was almost terra incognita to civilisation. Yet now we see the spectacle of the African native welcoming the last triumph of the white man in the shape of the aeroplane and assisting willingly in the development of a mode of transport which little more than ten years ago was almost believed chimerical by many of those who are now among the foremost in its develop- ment. • • • The announcement that the trail has of^h? been blazed from one end of Africa toAir Service the other comes at an opportune moment to focus attention on the utterly un- satisfactory position of the Air Ministry under its present constitution. As The Times aptly puts it, the Air Ministry remains the Cinderella of the public services. The Prime Minister, in spite of all the reasoned criticisms which have been levelled at his policy, still persists in placing it under the control of the Secretary for War. A fortnight ago the Lord Chancellor delivered himself of the opinion that the control of civil aviation might very shortly pass to the Board of Trade. Fortunately, the latter idea has been promptly disposed of by Mr. Churchill himself, so that there is no need to elaborate it—it can be relegated to the limbo of the things that a.re better forgotten. It does not look as though the Government had any policy at all regarding the future of this most important Service. Frankly, we had rather they JAWUARY I, announced one with which we could disagree entirely and from beginning to end than that the present state of uncertainty should persist. There are several aspects of the question which we view with the greatest misgiving. It is not without significance that at this time when, as we have repeatedly pointed out, the Government seems to have no mind of its own, there should have arisen what seems to be a calculated campaign for a reversion to the bad old order of things in which the Air Service was simply an inconsiderable adjunct of the Navy and the Army. Sailors and soldiers—particularly the former and those who voice the opinions of the Navy in the Press—are at great pains to prove to the Government and the public that the only way in which we can secure ourselves against attack from the air is to place the Air Service again in a subordinate position to the older Services. We can quite appreciate the point of view of naval and military officers of senior rank and years of service. They are doubtless absolutely sincere in their convictions, but the worst of it is that they regard the question from an insular standpoint, which looks upon the Navy or the Army as the case may be as the first and only thing that matters, all other services and things being merely auxiliary to that older Service with which they are associated. Therefore, without presuming to doubt the bona fides 01 anyone concerned, it is possible to argue that they are prone to ignore the lessons of the War and to allow Service conservatism to narrow their vision. It seems to us that there are two factors which count, and two only. These are the lessons of the past and the probabilities of the future. As regards the former, we would point out that it was only when the Air Force was established as a separate Service that we secured real efficiency in the air, either by sea or land. We agree that that efficiency was hastened by the efforts which had been put forth earlier, but no-one who watched with grave misgiving the ruinous competition of tne two Services during the earlier years of the War can have any but the opinion that the creation of the separate Air Service enabled us to secure aerial supremacy over the enemy at a much earlier date thar it could have been attained, if at all, under the old regime. That is going as far as any whole-hearted advocate of the separate Air Service would care to go. • • • Some ot the arguments which are being Fallacious adduced for a return to the old system gum s geem £0 j^ utteriy fallacious and merely designed to confuse the issues. For example, a well-known naval writer, Mr. Leyland, in a letter to the Press says : " It is probable that the possi- bility of attack from the air may yet affect the Navy profoundly, and it seems, therefore, imperative that the Navy should be master of its own means. If torpedoes are to be dropped by aeroplanes, they must be dropped by naval officers thoroughly acquainted with the torpedo and its use. The naval air officer must surely be as truly a naval officer as the gunnery or torpedo officer. He must not be merely embarked in an aircraft carrier as an officer owing allegiance to another Force." Again, we understand the point ot view of the naval writer who has given his lite to the study ot naval war—and knows little or nothing of war in the air. The latter is the trouble, first, last and all the time. But if we understand it we certainly do not agree with it. All these arguments are quite capable
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