Fighter plane

“ In a recent article the editor of The Aeroplane referred to the erstwhile terror of the air as follows: "The best of air-ships is at the mercy of a second-rate aeroplane". Enough to make Count Zeppelin turn in his grave!
To-day in aerial warfare the air-ship is relegated to the task of observer. As the "Blimp", the kite-balloon, the coast patrol, it scouts and takes copious notes; but it leaves the fighting to a tiny, heavier-than-air machine armed with a Lewis gun, and destructive attacks to those big bomb-droppers, the British Handley Page, the German Gotha, the Italian Morane tri-plane. ”

“ But in they went, plunging squarely into the heart of the aero-subs' leading formation, which formation consisted of three aero-subs, flying a wing and wing formation.
The young American signaled with upraised hand, and the American pilots made their first move. Every plane started rolling, at dazzling speed, on the axis of its fuselage, while bullets spewed from the guns that fired through the propellers. ”

“ It has a steady gun-platform enabling the weapons of offence to be trained more easily and an enhanced accuracy of fire to be obtained. In order to achieve success it is practically imperative that an aeroplane should obtain a position above the dirigible, but the latter can ascend in a much shorter space of time, because its ascent is vertical, whereas the aeroplane must describe a spiral in climbing. Under these circumstances it is relatively easy for the airship to outmanoeuvre the aeroplane in the vertical plane, and to hold the dominating position. ”

“ All of us can fly now as we never thought before the war it would be possible to fly.
"Instead of rifles and pistols in the hands of the aviators every plane now has at least one rapid-fire gun, and some have two and even three. The position of the rapid-fire gun on an aeroplane has a lot to do with the success or failure of a fight in the air. All of you want to study that question carefully.
"But most fascinating of all to the new airman at the front is the actual handling of the machines when fighting. There lies the greatest progress of all. ”

“ When one is spotted they dash out after it, pursue it back to its lines and prevent it from performing its mission of reconnaissance. Nor are they satisfied merely to drive it off, they follow and give fight. Over there against the sky you see a little puff of smoke and flame that goes shooting down to the horizon. It is an enemy plane that will never again come spying upon Allied troops. ”

“ But in the air the man who shoots at you is coming after you, and intends to go on shooting at you until he kills. The moment when you see an enemy's plane, and realise that you have to fight it, must be one to set even the strongest nerves tingling.
Generally the aeroplane with the black crosses on its wings is very high—barely visible. Sometimes, when the other planes are near it, it swoops steeply to earth behind the German lines. ”

“ If the leader has missed then the next airman may correct his error. One after another the machines repeat the manoeuvre, in precisely the same manner as the units of a battleship squadron emulate the leading vessel when attacking the foe. The tactical evolutions have been laid down, and there is rigid adherence thereto, because only thereby may success be achieved. When the last war-plane has completed its work, the leader swings round and repeats the dash upon the foe. A hail of bullets may scream around the men in the air, but one and all follow faithfully in the leader's trail. ”

“ This biplane with the Aviatik is remarkable for the amount of space provided for pilot and observer. The fuselage is protected in front with aluminium. The upper plane is not made to join in the centre, as in most German machines; instead, there is a short immovable central plane, which is permanently attached to the fuselage by four tubes ”

“ It carries nothing apart from the pilot except machine guns and cartridges.
The giant plane is a colossus. Its only duty is to carry as much weight as possible and it is able to do this owing to the huge surface of its planes. It is worth while to look at the gigantic English plane which landed smoothly on the German side of the front. [47] The giant plane can carry an unbelievable weight. It will easily fly away dragging from three to five tons. Its benzine tanks look as large as railroad cars. In going about in such a colossus one has no longer the sensation that one is flying. ”

“ Guns and bomb tubes—Launching a plane from a ship at sea—Transporting troops by aeroplane—Battles in the air.
Nations, in their preparations for war, make a succession of moves and counter-moves. For instance, a torpedo-boat is perfected; immediately it is launched, and ready for its deadly rôle, a larger and swifter craft is built which may sink it or chase it off the seas. A huge battleship, supreme in its might to-day, is eclipsed to-morrow and made to appear obsolete. ”

“ The observers are protected from attack from above, first by the heavy fighting planes, flying at ten thousand feet, carrying two men to the plane and able to keep the air for four hours at a time at a speed of 110 miles an hour. They are supposed to use every possible vigilance to keep the enemy's fighters away from the slower and busy observing machines. ”

“ When, some five years ago, work on this annual was first commenced, the military aviator was an idle dream. Fighting men in dirigibles were a bare possibility; but nothing more than that. Every amateur building an aeroplane (or even merely intending to build one) in his back garden was a possible "conqueror of the air." The aeroplane was going to oust the motor car as a sporting vehicle—everyone was quite certain about that! Beyond that, nothing!
To-day everything is completely changed and except as a war machine the aeroplane is of little interest or use to anyone. ”

“ Yet in the present stage of development such a desideratum is difficult of realisation. The airman must start from the ground or return to it every time he wants to overhaul his engine or replenish his reservoirs. That is his touch with solid realities: otherwise one might suppose him flying for days, never setting foot to earth, the modern Guardian Angel, hovering eternally in the heavens.
The aeroplane has completely revolutionised warfare, inasmuch as it has deprived strategy of its chief weapon—surprise. As the eyes of the army the aeroplane played its most important rôle. ”

“ As has been heretofore stated, the airplane considered in all its developments, is the newest and most important of factors in modern warfare. It photographs the enemy positions, it detects concentrations and other movements of the enemy, it makes surprise impossible, it is a deadly engine of destruction when used in spraying machine-gun fire upon troops in the open. As a bombing device, it surpasses the best and most accurate artillery. ”

“ The aeroplane stood out, almost motionless as it seemed to me, over the German lines, while with a “pom-pom-pom!” the German anti-aircraft guns ringed it round in puffs of white smoke. Like the hawk that continued to hover over the valley, it was watching—watching. Like the hawk’s, its searching glance plunged down into the animate life far below, the life that pursues its normal round unperturbed because it knows it cannot escape from the eyes in the sky.
[Pg 320]
The aeroplanes are the eyes of the army. They alone have made possible the war of positions. ”

“ At the front they are in the sky by the hundreds on both sides to direct the fire of the artillery and to observe the enemy’s operations generally. They are consequently made the objective of the aeroplane, and many are brought down every day. The aeroplane dodges along from cloud to cloud, and when he is just over the saucisse suddenly swoops down, and with a tic-tic-tic from his machine-gun the bag crumples up in a cloud of black smoke and flames, the observer jumps out with his parachute, and the aeroplane dashes off pursued by many shells. ”

“ It is an undeniable fact that the aeroplane has, in the present war, been able to give information of the positions and movements of the enemy such as would have been otherwise unobtainable, and in a few cases it has enabled points to be attacked which could not have been reached by any other means. ”

“ Imagine that a battle impends, and that the Commander-in-Chief of one army seeks news as to the movements of some division of his enemy; so he orders the air-scouts to ascend. But the wind may be blowing hard; and if it is, and the aeroplanes are only fair-weather machines, they will have to remain on the ground till the wind drops, and perhaps miss their greatest chance during a whole campaign. ”

“ The aeroplane is such an essential part of the Intelligence in modern war that no detailed survey of the methods by which the Royal Flying Corps fulfils its functions as the eyes of the army can safely be given until the war is over. I have had to content myself, therefore, with seeking to impart to you at home some of the admiration with which the gallantry and endurance of our airmen in the field have inspired me, who have been privileged to see them at their work. ”

“ There will be the long-distance scout—a machine capable of flying for [Pg 202] many hours at moderate speed and surveying wide tracts of country. Then there will be a flotilla of very fast, single-seated machines, used for a dash above an enemy’s force. These high-speed scouts will run the gauntlet of the enemy’s destroyers, rushing into the danger zone and sweeping out again, rather like a torpedo-boat in naval war. Then there will be the fighting squadron—machines armoured and carrying powerful guns, which will fight the enemy’s war-planes and give battle to hostile airships ”

“ In addition to the tactical and strategical importance of the aeroplane in war, it is also a weapon not only of offence, but of defence, against aircraft. It can carry out bombing raids on fortified positions, factories of munitions of war, aviation centres, railway-stations, barracks, bivouacs, and batteries. It is the only really effective weapon of defence against aircraft, both aeroplanes and airships. One of the principal duties of our aeroplanes at the front is to go up and chase away German aircraft reconnoitring or bound on bombing exploits. ”

“ Famous Allied Airplanes
Airplanes, like men, are not all alike, even when they are in the same line of work and performing the self-same duties. In war time, every gunner has his own little peculiarities, every sharpshooter has his personal ideas about catching the enemy napping, and every infantryman who goes over the top, in spite of his rigorous training in the art of war, meets and downs his opponent in a manner all his own. ”

“ There is no gainsaying that stunt flying, or aerial acrobatics, was absolutely essential to the flying of scout and combat machines in the Great War, for in order to survive in the war in the air it was necessary for the pilot to be able to manœuvre and dodge about in the sky as easily as a fish in the water; otherwise, the flier would be shot down by a more agile machine or clever aviator. ”

“ Airplane construction and use developed more rapidly than any other feature in the war. After the observation machines, came the battle-planes, whose first purpose was to clear the way and protect the observation planes. Later, heavy machines for bombing expeditions [Pg 110] were constructed; and squadrons of airplanes now took part in every battle, preceding the attacking party, and firing with machine-guns and bombs upon the enemy's trenches or his massed troops back of the line. ”

“ To-day the airplane that is used for general service duties over the lines is a dreadnaught of the air, and although it may still take along with it on its errands a few scouts to give battle to the faster airplanes of the enemy, yet on the whole it is self-reliant and has little to fear. ”

“ And this war, which continually has spurred man to new murderous inventions, has also seen the airplane in action. While at the start of the war the comparatively few airplanes in use were employed as scouts, a few months saw them fitted with machine guns and devices for dropping explosives. Hand in hand with this came the rapid development of the airplane itself. To-day we can truthfully say that a journey, even a long one, by airplane is less dangerous than an automobile ride through a densely populated district. ”

“ Scout planes would cut the sky into a great four-hundred-mile-wide pie and each would take its own sector of air and sea for a close search. Lucky the scout-ship pilot who could announce, “Enemy task force a hundred miles north by east.” Even the discoverer of a Jap snooper, a huge four-motored flying boat, would receive his reward, and besides, with luck, might send the air giant flaming into the sea. Little wonder then that Jack’s fingers trembled as he gripped the controls and waited for the flight officer’s signal for the take-off. ”

“ The arming of an aeroplane, to enable it to defend itself against hostile attack or to participate in raiding operations upon the aerial fleet of the enemy, appears to be a simple task, but as a matter of fact it is an undertaking beset with difficulties innumerable. ”

“ A light and very speedy machine is the scout, and it is his duty to make reconnaissances, report upon gun emplacements, the numbers of the opposing troops, the movements of the enemy, and the disposition of his trenches. But the aeroplanes used in warfare are not all alike. The tendency is towards differentiation, and while the scout is swift and light, the battle-plane is extremely powerful and heavily armed with cannon or machine-guns, sometimes also carrying a spur for ramming enemy craft ”