ENDS AND ODDS.
As a highly irresponsible prophet I am convinced that towards the end of
the war hostilities in the air will become as decisive as hostilities on
land or sea. An obvious corollary is that the how and when of peace's
coming must be greatly influenced by the respective progress, during the
next two years, of the belligerents' flying services.
This view is far less fantastic than the whirlwind development of
war-flying witnessed by all of us since 1914. Indeed, to anybody with a
little imagination and some knowledge of what is in preparation among
the designers and inventors of various countries, that statement would
seem more self-evident than extreme. Even the average spectator of
aeronautical advance in the past three years must see that if anything
like the same rate of growth be maintained, by the end of 1918 aircraft
numbered in tens of thousands and with extraordinary capacities for
speed, climb, and attack will make life a burden to ground troops,
compromise lines of communication, cause repeated havoc to factories and
strongholds, and promote loss of balance among whatever civilian
populations come within range of their activity.
To emphasise the startling nature of aeronautical expansion--past,
present, and future--let us trace briefly the progress of the British
Flying Corps from pre-war conditions to their present state of high
efficiency. When the Haldane-Asquith brotherhood were caught napping,
the Flying Corps possessed a seventy odd (very odd) aeroplanes, engined
by the unreliable Gnome and the low-powered Renault. Fortunately it also
possessed some very able officers, and these succeeded at the outset in
making good use of doubtful material. One result of the necessary
reconstruction was that a large section of the original corps seceded to
the Navy and the remainder came under direct control of the Army. The
Royal Naval Air Service began to specialise in bomb raids, while the
Royal Flying Corps (Military Wing) sent whatever machines it could lay
hands on to join the old contemptibles in France. Both services
proceeded to increase in size and importance at break-neck speed.
The rapid expansion of the R.N.A.S. allowed for a heavy surplus of men
and machines beyond the supply necessary for the purely naval branch of
the service. From this force a number of squadrons went to the
Dardanelles, Africa, the Tigris, and other subsidiary theatres of war;
and an important base was established at Dunkirk, whence countless air
attacks were made on all military centres in Belgium. Many more R.N.A.S.
squadrons, well provided with trained pilots and good machines,
patrolled the East Coast while waiting for an opportunity of active
service. This came early in 1917, when, under the wise supervision of
the Air Board, the section of the Naval Air Service not concerned with
naval matters was brought into close touch with the Royal Flying Corps,
after it had pursued a lone trail for two years. The Flying Corps units
on the Western Front and elsewhere are now splendidly backed by help
from the sister service. For the present purpose, therefore, the
military efforts of the R.N.A.S. can be included with those of the
R.F.C., after a tribute has been paid to the bombing offensives for
which the Naval Air Service has always been famous, from early exploits
with distant objectives such as Cuxhaven and Friedrichshafen to this
year's successful attacks on German munition works, in conjunction with
the French, and the countless trips from Dunkirk that are making the
Zeebrugge-Ostend-Bruges sector such an unhappy home-from-home for
U-boats, destroyers, and raiding aircraft. Meanwhile the seaplane
branch, about which little is heard, has reached a high level of
efficiency. When the screen of secrecy is withdrawn from the North Sea,
we shall hear very excellent stories of what the seaplanes have
accomplished lately in the way of scouting, chasing the Zeppelin, and
hunting the U-boat.
But from the nature of its purpose, the R.F.C. has borne the major part
of our aerial burden during the war. In doing so, it has grown from a
tiny band of enthusiasts and experimentalists to a great service which
can challenge comparison with any other branch of the Army. The history
of this attainment is intensely interesting.
The few dozen airmen who accompanied the contemptible little army on the
retreat from Mons had no precedents from other campaigns to guide them,
and the somewhat vague dictum that their function was to gather
information had to be interpreted by pioneer methods. These were
satisfactory under the then conditions of warfare, inasmuch as valuable
information certainly was gathered during the retreat, when a blind move
would have meant disaster,--how valuable only the chiefs of the
hard-pressed force can say. This involved more than the average
difficulties, for as the battle swayed back towards Paris new
landing-grounds had to be sought, and temporary aerodromes improvised
every few days. The small collection of serviceable aeroplanes again
justified themselves at the decisive stand in the Marne and Ourcq basin,
where immediate reports of enemy concentrations were essential to
victory. Again, after the Hun had been swept across the Aisne and was
stretching north-eastward tentacles to clutch as much of the coast as
was consonant with an unbroken line, the aerial spying out of the
succeeding phases of retirement was of great service. Indeed, tentative
though it was, the work of the British, French, and German machines
before the advent of trench warfare proved how greatly air
reconnaissance would alter the whole perspective of an open country
campaign.
After the long barrier of trenches deadlocked the chances of extended
movement and opened the dreary months of more or less stationary
warfare, the R.F.C. organisation in France had time and space for
self-development. Aerodromes were selected and erected, the older and
less satisfactory types of machine were replaced by the stable B.E2.C.,
the active service squadrons were reconstructed and multiplied.
To the observation of what happened behind the actual front was added
the mapping of the enemy's intricate trench-mosaic. For a month or two
this was accomplished by the methodical sketches of a few observers. It
was an exceedingly difficult task to trace every trench and sap and to
pattern the network from a height of about 2000 feet, but the infantry
found small ground for dissatisfaction as regards the accuracy or
completeness of the observers' drawings. Then came the introduction of
aerial photography on a large scale, and with it a complete bird's-eye
plan of all enemy defence works, pieced together from a series of
overhead snapshots that reproduced the complete trench-line, even to
such details as barbed wire. By the infallible revelations of the
camera, untricked by camouflage, concealed gun positions were spotted
for the benefit of our artillery, and highly useful information about
likely objectives was provided for the bombing craft.
The frequent bombing of German supply centres in Belgium and North
France came into being with the development of aerial photography. Owing
to the difficulty of correct aim, before the advent of modern
bomb-sights, all the early raids were carried out from a low altitude,
sometimes from only a few hundred feet. For every purpose, moreover, low
altitudes were the rule in the earlier months of the war, as most of the
machines would not climb above 4000-7000 feet. Much of the observation
was performed at something between 1000 and 2000 feet, so that aircraft
often returned with a hundred or so bullet-holes in them.
Meanwhile the important work of artillery spotting was being developed.
New systems of co-operation between artillery and aeroplanes were
devised, tested, and improved. At first lamps or Very's lights were used
to signal code-corrections, but these were soon replaced by wireless
transmission from the observation machine. Targets which could not be
ranged on through ground observation posts became targets no longer,
after one shoot ranged from the air. As the number of available aircraft
increased, so did the amount of observation for the guns, until finally
the entire front opposite the British was registered for bombardment and
divided into sections covered by specified artillery machines.
Aerial fighting, now so essential and scientific a branch of modern war,
was rudimentary in 1914. Pilots and observers of the original Flying
Corps carried revolvers, and many observers also equipped themselves
with rifles, but the aeroplanes were not fitted with machine-guns. Such
scraps as there were consisted of one machine manoeuvring round an
opponent at close quarters for the chance of a well-aimed shot. Under
these circumstances to "bring down" or "drive down out of control" an
enemy was extremely difficult, though a very gallant officer, since
killed in action, once killed two German pilots within five minutes with
his revolver.
Soon the possibilities of aerial machine-guns were quickly recognised.
The R.F.C. adopted the Lewis, which from the points of view of lightness
and handiness was well suited for aircraft, and the German airmen
countered with a modified Hotchkiss and other types.
But the stable observation machines, while excellent for reconnaissance
and artillery spotting, allowed their crews only a small arc of fire,
and not until the German single-seater scouts and our Bristol scout,
then a comparatively fast machine, appeared on the western front in the
spring of 1915 did the destruction of aeroplanes become an everyday
occurrence. With the introduction of scouts for escort and protective
duties came formation flying and concerted attack.
Fighting craft continued to increase in speed and numbers. As the
struggle became more and more intense, so did the scene of it move
higher and higher, prodded by an ever-growing capacity for climb and the
ever-growing menace of the anti-aircraft guns. The average air battle of
to-day begins at an altitude between 12,000 and 20,000 feet.
The conflict for mechanical superiority has had its ebb and flow, and
consequently of its proportional casualties; but the British have never
once been turned from their programme of observation. There have been
critical times, as for example when the Fokker scourge of late 1915 and
early 1916 laid low so many of the observation craft. But the Fokkers
were satisfactorily dealt with by the de Haviland and the F.E.8. pusher
scouts and the F.E. "battleplane," as the newspapers of the period
delighted to call it. Next the pendulum swung towards the British, who
kept the whip hand during the summer and autumn of last year. Even when
the Boche again made a bid for ascendancy with the Halberstadt, the
Roland, the improved L.V.G., and the modern Albatross scout, the Flying
Corps organisation kept the situation well in hand, though the supply of
faster machines was complicated by the claims of the R.N.A.S. squadrons
in England.
Throughout the Somme Push we were able to maintain that aerial
superiority without which a great offensive cannot succeed. This was
partly the result of good organisation and partly of the fighting
capabilities of the men who piloted the Sopwith, the Nieuport, the de
Haviland, the F.E., and other 1916 planes which were continually at
grips with the Hun. The German airmen, with their "travelling circuses"
of twelve to fifteen fast scouts, once more had an innings in the spring
of the current year, and the older types of British machine were hard
put to it to carry through their regular work. Then came the great day
when scores of our new machines, husbanded for the occasion, engaged the
enemy hell-for-leather at his own place in the air. An untiring
offensive was continued by our patrols, and the temporary supremacy
passed into British hands, where it very definitely remains, and where,
if the shadows of coming events and the silhouettes of coming machines
materialise, it is likely to remain.
Judged on a basis of losses, the unceasing struggle between aeroplane
and aeroplane would seem to have been fairly equal, though it must be
remembered that three-quarters of the fighting has had for its _milieu_
the atmosphere above enemy territory. Judged on a basis of the
maintenance of adequate observation, which is the primary object of
aerial attack and defence, the British have won consistently. At no time
has the R.F.C. been obliged to modify its duties of reconnaissance,
artillery spotting, photography, or co-operation with advancing
infantry, which was introduced successfully last summer. On the
contrary, each of these functions, together with bombing and "ground
stunts" from low altitudes, has swollen to an abnormal extent.
An idea of the vastness of our aerial effort on the British front in
France can be gathered from the R.F.C. work performed on a typical "big
push" day.
Throughout the night preceding an advance, several parties, laden with
heavy bombs, steer by compass to Hun headquarters or other objectives,
and return no longer laden with bombs. The first streak of daylight is
the herald of an exodus from west to east of many score fighting craft.
These cross the lines, hover among the Archie bursts, and drive back or
down all black-crossed strangers within sight. Some of them go farther
afield and attack the Boche above his own aerodromes. Such enemy craft
as manage to take the air without meeting trouble from the advanced
offensive patrols are tackled by the scouts near the lines. The few that
travel still farther eastward with the intention of swooping on our
observation machines, or of themselves gathering information, receive a
hearty welcome from our defensive patrols.
The British two-seaters are thus free to direct the artillery, link the
attacking infantry with headquarters, and spy out the land. As soon as
the early morning light allows, a host of planes will be darting
backward and forward over the trench-line as they guide the terrific
bombardment preliminary to an attack. Other machines are searching for
new emplacements and signs of preparation behind the enemy trenches.
Several formations carry out tactical reconnaissances around an area
stretching from the lines to a radius twenty miles east of them, and
further parties perform strategic reconnaissance by covering the
railways, roads, and canals that link the actual front with bases thirty
to ninety miles behind it. When, at a scheduled time, the infantry
emerge over the top behind a curtain of shells, the contact patrol buses
follow their doings, inform the gunners of any necessary modifications
in the barrage, or of some troublesome nest of machine-guns, note the
positions held by the attackers, collect signals from the battalion
headquarters, and by means of message bags dropped over brigade
headquarters report progress to the staff. If, later, a further advance
be made, the low-flying contact machines again play their part of
mothering the infantry.
Machines fitted with cameras photograph every inch of the defences
improvised by the enemy, and, as insurance against being caught
unprepared by a counter-attack, an immediate warning of whatever
movement is in evidence on the lines of communication will be supplied
by the reconnaissance observers. Under the direction of artillery
squadrons the guns pound the new Boche front line and range on
troublesome batteries.
The bombing craft are responsible for onslaughts on railways, supply
depots, garrison towns, headquarters, aerodromes, and chance targets.
Other guerilla work is done by craft which, from a height of anything
under a thousand feet, machine-gun whatever worthwhile objects they
spot. A column of troops on the march, transport, ammunition waggons, a
train, a stray motor-car--all these are greeted joyfully by the pilots
who specialise in ground stunts. And at every hour of daylight the
scouts and fighting two-seaters protect the remainder of the R.F.C. by
engaging all Huns who take to the air.
Doubtless, when sunset has brought the roving birds back to their nest,
there will be a few "missing"; but this, part of the day's work, is a
small enough sacrifice for the general achievement--the staff supplied
with quick and accurate information, a hundred or two Boche batteries
silenced, important works destroyed, enemy communications impeded, a
dozen or so black-crossed aeroplanes brought down, valuable photographs
and reports obtained, and the ground-Hun of every species harried.
The German Flying Corps cannot claim to perform anything like the same
amount of aerial observation as its British counterpart. It is mainly
occupied in fighting air battles and hampering the foreign machines that
spy on their army. To say that the German machines are barred altogether
from reconnaissance and artillery direction would be exaggeration, but
not wild exaggeration. Seldom can an enemy plane call and correct
artillery fire for longer than half an hour. From time to time a fast
machine makes a reconnaissance tour at a great height, and from time to
time others dart across the lines for photography, or to search for gun
positions. An appreciable proportion of these do not return. Four-fifths
of the Hun bomb raids behind our front take place at night-time, when
comparative freedom from attack is balanced by impossibility of accurate
aim. Apart from these spasmodic activities, the German pilots concern
themselves entirely with attempts to prevent allied observation. They
have never yet succeeded, even during the periods of their nearest
approach to the so-called "mastery of the air," and probably they never
will succeed. The advantages attendant upon a maintenance of thorough
observation, while whittling down the enemy's to a minimum, cannot be
overestimated.
To determine how much credit for the brilliant achievement I have tried
to outline belongs to the skill and adaptability of British airmen, and
how much to successful organisation, would be difficult and rather
unnecessary. But it is obvious that those who guided the R.F.C. from
neglected beginnings to the status of a great air service had a
tremendous task. Only the technical mind can realise all that it has
involved in the production of trained personnel, aeroplanes, engines,
aircraft depots, aerodromes, wireless equipment, photographic workshops
and accessories, bombs, and a thousand and one other necessaries.
Many thousand pilots have been trained in all the branches of war
flying. The number of squadrons now in France would surprise the layman
if one were allowed to make it public; while other squadrons have done
excellent work in Macedonia, Egypt, Mesopotamia, East Africa, and
elsewhere. Mention must also be made of the Home Defence groups, but for
which wholesale Zeppelin raids on the country would be of common
occurrence.
How to make best use of the vast personnel in France is the business of
the staff, who link the fighting members of the corps with the
Intelligence Department and the rest of the Army in the field. To them
has fallen the introduction and development of the various functions of
war aircraft, besides the planning of bomb raids and concerted aerial
offensives. On the equipment side there is an enormous wastage to be
dealt with, and consequently a constant cross-Channel interchange of
machines. The amount of necessary replacement is made specially heavy
by the short life of effective craft. A type of machine is good for a
few months of active service, just holds its own for a few more, and
then becomes obsolete except as a training bus. To surpass or even keep
pace with the Boche Flying Corps on the mechanical side, it has been
necessary for the supply department to do a brisk trade in new ideas and
designs, experiment, improvement, and scrapping.
Although free-lance attacks by airmen on whatever takes their fancy down
below are now common enough, they were unknown little over a year ago.
Their early history is bound up with the introduction of contact
patrols, or co-operation with advancing infantry. Previous to the Somme
Push of 1916, communication during an attack between infantry on the one
hand and the guns and various headquarters on the other was a difficult
problem. A battalion would go over the top and disappear into the enemy
lines. It might have urgent need of reinforcements or of a concentrated
fire on some dangerous spot. Yet to make known its wants quickly was by
no means easy, for the telephone wires were usually cut, carrier-pigeons
went astray, and runners were liable to be shot. When the British
introduced the "creeping barrage" of artillery pounding, which moved a
little ahead of the infantry and curtained them from machine-gun and
rifle fire, the need for rapid communication was greater than ever.
Exultant attackers would rush forward in advance of the programmed speed
and be mown by their own barrage.
Credit for the trial use of the aeroplane to link artillery with
infantry belongs to the British, though the French at Verdun first
brought the method to practical success. We then developed the idea on
the Somme with notable results. Stable machines, equipped with wireless
transmitters and Klaxon horns, flew at a low height over detailed
sectors, observed all developments, signalled back guidance for the
barrage, and by means of message bags supplied headquarters with
valuable information. Besides its main purpose of mothering the
infantry, the new system of contact patrols was found to be useful in
dealing with enemy movements directly behind the front line. If the bud
of a counter-attack appeared, aeroplanes would call upon the guns to nip
it before it had time to blossom.
Last September we of the fighting and reconnaissance squadrons began to
hear interesting yarns from the corps squadrons that specialised in
contact patrols. An observer saved two battalions from extinction by
calling up reinforcements in the nick of time. When two tanks slithered
around the ruins of Courcelette two hours before the razed village was
stormed, the men in the trenches would have known nothing of this
unexpected advance-guard but for a contact machine. The pilot and
observer of another bus saw two tanks converging eastward at either end
of a troublesome Boche trench. A German officer, peering round a corner,
drew back quickly when he found one of the new steel beasts advancing.
He hurried to an observation post round a bend in the lines. Arrived
there, he got the shock of his life when he found a second metal monster
waddling towards him. Alarmed and unnerved, he probably ordered a
retirement, for the trench was evacuated immediately. The observer in a
watching aeroplane then delivered a much-condensed synopsis of the
comedy to battalion headquarters, and the trench was peacefully
occupied.
Inevitably the nearness of the enemy to machines hovering over a given
area bred in the airmen concerned a desire to swoop down and panic the
Boche. Movement in a hostile trench was irresistible, and many a pilot
shot off his engine, glided across the lines, and let his observer spray
with bullets the home of the Hun. The introduction of such tactics was
not planned beforehand and carried out to order. It was the outcome of a
new set of circumstances and almost unconscious enterprise. More than
any other aspect of war flying, it is, I believe, this imminence of the
unusual that makes the average war pilot swear greatly by his job, while
other soldiers temper their good work with grousing. His actions are
influenced by the knowledge that somewhere, behind a ridge of clouds, in
the nothingness of space, on the patchwork ground, the True Romance has
hidden a new experience, which can only be found by the venturer with
alert vision, a quick brain, and a fine instinct for opportunity.
The free-lance ground stunt, then, had its origin in the initiative of a
few pilots who recognised a chance, took it, and thus opened yet another
branch in the huge departmental store of aerial tactics. The exploits of
these pioneers were sealed with the stamp of official approval, and
airmen on contact patrol have since been encouraged to relieve boredom
by joyous pounces on Brother Boche.
The star turn last year was performed by a British machine that captured
a trench. The pilot guided it above the said trench for some hundred
yards, while the observer emptied drum after drum of ammunition at the
crouching Germans. A headlong scramble was followed by the appearance of
an irregular line of white billowings. The enemy were waving
handkerchiefs and strips of material in token of surrender! Whereupon
our infantry were signalled to take possession, which they did. Don't
shrug your shoulders, friend the reader, and say: "Quite a good story,
but tall, very tall." The facts were related in the R.F.C. section of
'Comic Cuts,' otherwise G.H.Q. summary of work.
Fighting squadrons soon caught the craze for ground stunts and carried
it well beyond the lines. One machine chased a train for miles a few
hundred feet above, derailed it, and spat bullets at the lame coaches
until driven off by enemy craft. Another made what was evidently an
inspection of troops by some Boche Olympian look like the riotous
disorder of a Futurist painting. A pilot with some bombs to spare
spiralled down over a train, dropped the first bomb on the engine, and
the second, third, fourth, and fifth on the soldiers who scurried from
the carriages. When a detachment of cavalry really did break through for
once in a while, it was startled to find an aerial vanguard. A
frolicsome biplane darted ahead, pointed out positions worthy of attack,
and created a diversion with Lewis gun fire.
At the end of a three-hour offensive patrol my pilot would often descend
our bus to less than a thousand feet, cross No Man's Land again, and
zigzag over the enemy trenches, where we disposed of surplus ammunition
to good purpose. On cloudy days, with the pretext of testing a new
machine or a gun, he would fly just above the clouds, until we were east
of the lines, then turn round and dive suddenly through the cloud-screen
in the direction of the Boche positions, firing his front gun as we
dropped. The turn of my rear gun came afterwards when the pilot
flattened out and steered northward along the wrong border of No Man's
Land. Once, when flying very low, we looked into a wide trench and saw a
group of tiny figures make confused attempts to take cover, tumbling
over each other the while in ludicrous confusion.
I remember a notable first trip across the lines made by a pilot who had
just arrived from England. He had been sent up to have a look at the
battle line, with an old-hand observer and instructions not to cross the
trenches. However, he went too far east, and found himself ringed by
Archie bursts. These did not have their customary effect on a novice of
inspiring mortal funk, for the new pilot became furiously angry and flew
Berserk. He dived towards Bapaume, dropped unscathed through the
barrage of anti-aircraft shelling for which this stronghold was at the
time notorious, fired a hundred rounds into the town square from a
height of 800 feet, and raced back over the Bapaume-Pozieres road
pursued by flaming "onion" rockets. The observer recovered from his
surprise in time to loose off a drum of ammunition at Bapaume, and three
more along the straight road to the front line, paying special attention
to the village of Le Sars.
It was above this village that I once was guilty of communicating with
the enemy. During a three-hours' offensive patrol around the
triangle--Bapaume-Mossy-Face Wood-Epehy--we had not seen a single Hun
machine. Low clouds held Archie in check, and there was therefore small
necessity to swerve from a straight course. Becoming bored, I looked at
the pleasant-seeming countryside below, and reflected how ill its
appearance harmonised with its merits as a dwelling-place, judged on the
best possible evidence--the half-hysterical diaries found on enemy
prisoners, the bitter outpourings anent the misery of intense
bombardment and slaughter, the ominous title "The Grave" given to the
region by Germans who had fought there. An echo of light-hearted
incursions into German literature when I was a student at a Boche
college suggested that the opening lines of Schiller's "Sehnsucht" were
peculiarly apposite to the state of mind of the Huns who dwelt by the
Somme. Wishing to share my discovery, I wrote the verse in large block
capitals, ready to be dropped at a convenient spot. I took the liberty
of transposing three pronouns from the first person to the second, so as
to apostrophise our Boche brethren. The patrol finished, my pilot
spiralled down to within a 300-yard range of the ground and flew along
the road past Martinpuich, while I pumped lead at anything that might be
a communication trench. We sprinkled Le Sars with bullets, and there I
threw overboard the quotation from a great German poet, folded inside an
empty Very's cartridge to which I had attached canvas streamers. If it
was picked up, I trust the following lines were not regarded merely as
wordy frightfulness:
"Ach! aus dieses Thales Gruenden
Die der kalte Nebel drueckt,
Koennt' ihr doch den Ausgang finden,
Ach! wie fuehlt' ihr euch beglueekt!"
Of all the tabloid tales published last year in R.P.C. 'Comic Cuts,' the
most comic was that of a mist, a British bus, and a Boche General. The
mist was troublesome; the bus, homeward bound after a reconnaissance,
was flying low to keep a clear vision of the earth; the general was
seated in his dignified car, after the manner of generals. The British
pilot dived on the car, the British observer fired on the car, the Boche
chauffeur stopped the car, the Boche general jumped from the car.
Chauffeur and general rushed through a field into a wood; pilot and
observer went home and laughed.
Thus far the facts are taken from the official report. An appropriate
supplement was the rumour, which deserved to be true but possibly
wasn't, that the observer turned in the direction of the vanished
general and plagiarised George Robey with a shout into the unhearing
air: "Cheeriho old thing, here's a go, my hat, priceless!"
So much for past accomplishment. The future of war flying, like all
futures, is problematical; but having regard to our present
unquestionable superiority in the air, and to the blend of sane
imagination and practical ability now noticeable as an asset of the
flying services directorate, one can hazard the statement that in the
extended aerial war which is coming the R.F.C. and R.N.A.S. will nearly
satisfy the most exacting of critics.
The tendency is toward a rapid development of aircraft even more
startling than that of the past. Some of the modern scout machines have
a level speed of 130-150 miles an hour, and can climb more than 1000
feet a minute until an abnormal height is reached. It is certain that
within a year later machines will travel 160, 180, and 200 miles an hour
level. Quantity as well as quality is on the up-grade, so that the power
to strike hard and far will increase enormously, helped by heavier
armament, highly destructive bombs, and more accurate bomb-sights.
And, above all, we shall see a great extension of ground attacks by air
cavalry. The production of a machine specially adapted for this
purpose, armoured underneath, perhaps, and carrying guns that fire
downward through the fuselage, is worth the careful attention of
aeroplane designers. It is probable that with the reappearance of
extended military movement on the western front, as must happen sooner
or later, continuous guerilla tactics by hundreds of low-flying
aeroplanes may well turn an orderly retirement into a disorderly rout.
When and if a push of pushes really breaks the German line, I fully
expect that we of the air service will lead the armies of pursuit and
make ourselves a pluperfect nuisance to the armies of retreat. Temporary
second lieutenants may yet be given the chance to drive a Boche general
or two into the woods, or even--who can limit the freaks of
Providence?--plug down shots at the Limelight Kaiser himself, as he
tours behind the front in his favourite _role_ of Bombastes Furioso.