MAKING OF AIRMEN

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 59, 4 December 1918, Page 7

MAKING OF AIRMEN

THE FOUNDAfION OF OUR VICTORIES CADETS FROM OVERSEAS (ISy P. L. AVesloii 'Kdwards, Special Correspondent of the Jouipi.ru I'iesa Union;. London, October 1. A party of pressmen have just *pent ;i week in learning how men' at Home lay ■ the foundation of our successes at the front. We have followed tlie cadet from tho recruiting office to the training ground, where he is made into a military nian, lo the schools whom he attains his knowledge of cngincs-aml aeronaiilic.-, maps, photography, signalling, lUHuhme-gunning, and bombing, Uiroiigli the aerodrome where ho first (lies ;i duulconlrol machine, to tho Acceptance J'ark, near the Straits of Dover, from which ho finally sets out for l'toince—and death or glory. The man lo whom (he cadets of the Royal Air Force all coino is a brigadiergcn6rnl, the youngest man of his rank in tlte British Army, n Canadian, with a punch in everything ho doe.?, assisted by a Canadian .staf'i captain, with all tho belief in him that enables a good <stalt' to double a good man's value. The doctrim; he preaches to the cadets is "Wbittcvor you do, do wilh a snap," and we say boys—Hie vast majority of Jhe several thousand c<idel,s there were nineteen or under—with only a few weeks' training, doing their manual exercises .with a smartness lliat would have earned high praise at a Long Valley review in peace time. They are taught that discipline is of more imiiortaucc to them than to the Army or'llic .Navy, and that making this service the best disciplined of tlin throe is I heir affair. They must discipline themselves on the public school system, the flight oliicer corresponding with the prefect. The hard fact behind this discipline question is that more than half the flying accidents that happen nowadays can be traced lo the breach of some rule or other. Mo instruction in Hying is given here, the wholo object at this stage being to make the cadihV and M)ldiei« and into men, and to cultivate a lighting t-pirit—heiicu compulsory boxing lessons for all. They must not only be'men, but men .suitable to make into officers—GO per cent, of tlioni arc expected to get'commissions— henco their messes have ante-ruoius provided with some, of tho refinements of life. "Tliny must live like officers,'" siys. their brigadier, who is a great man on practical education. Classics may be good, twt a knowledge of life, incliufing such subjects as smoking, drinking, and CI), in. relation to the phy.'icHl. fitness that is his;''essential bu«\ ; he. holds to bo better. Pe. really.fit man will .not'be nervous ivheii'.'.lio coines to liy, and the brigadier-himself, I'l-in-jc Albert, leading his .'squadron in the march past, and the wliole body of cadets, looked as if tho right I'Pginic to make them inunlnlly and physically fit for flying and fighting had been found. , >

: Tho marvel about the purely Air l-'orce. ■iiielruction.that follows is'that so much in so little time. The secret, of it, "running \throi!to'h all our war-time .instruction, alike in 1 -the Services and the munition works,'is the abolition' of mysteries' The special Unguiigo that every science 'or skilled, trade has builtup for itself has to go; -the plan that a ■■trained nian can read 'is supplanted by tho picture-that is clear to everyone, by : the cardboard or wooden model, or at times by the-machine itself with, some of its parts cut away 'that, its' actual working -may be seen. This' sort of thing, combined with a hundred ingenious devices, including kinema films taken from a, pilot's, seat over the sights of ft machine-gun, '.ensures that: before tlm ca.dot.flies hq knows as much of what flying is.like as one- can possibly learn on tho ground. He is even taught in air fighting to inako uso of trigonometry without, hearing the word "sine"—the fruits-are given him without his treading thu thorny path because many of the cadets have not "done trigs" at sd'hool,. and technical terms not appertaining to aeroplanes are among the discarded mysteries. Thnft brings one to the question of- material. These boys are drawn now from/the public school, the coal mine, arid everywhere in between. The reservoir of first-class material, tapped iii the beginning of the war has run, dry, so the standard of education now kept in mind by the interviewing officer, whose .verdict may turn down a -would-be cadet at the outset,. scarcely extends beyond the three It's. This >js. whore the overseas -Britishers' come to the rescue. ■ The younger nations can.still provide the material used up at Home in the. early stages, and a recruiting officer asked about overseas candidates gave tho gratifying answer: "Oh, they're always all* right." In one of the schools South African and Australasian uniforms abounded, while at a, seaplane centre quite half those under instruction were overseas men, nininlv Canadians.

To appreciate how well and carefully this material is now used one must look back to bad old days, when a man snatched- a. little flying as he could, got his wings, and went out, to fall or perfect himself, as fate fnight ordain, in fnce of the.enemy. Reform■ has taken place at; both ends. The neophyte is firstput into a dual-control machine, knowing as much as his predecessor? did when they went \to Trance, and■ even when lie has been allowed to "go. boIo" he must pnt in a prescribed number of hours'-dual .that Ms faults may-be corrected and he may ,not get,into a slipshod way of'.flying. Thus he leaves his training depot station a much, more capable airman. Meanwhile an other at the front,' impressed with the tolly of men's coming out ablo to keep in' the air somehow, but having learned nothing more, obtained permission to como homo and found a school for finished flying, which has become a model, not only for our own but for Allied countries. It is now a finishing school, sending out its best men all over the country to spend Jsoine month? in training others before Inking their turn at the front. To see these post-graduate students throwing their fa.st small machines about in tlie air, and learn from their cc/wemtion how lightily they .Vogtmi their wonderful "stunts," is a revelation of the extent to which man has : mastered hid new .element. To these men, trained far above the German standard, and to tho older ones—keen, capable, and untiring—who o speedily shape .them to the best, pattern in spirit, knowledge, and skill, we owe "Haiti's dailv record of successes and the small total" ol' 'British machines that have "failed to return."