IMPORTANCE OF AIR FLEETS

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 7, Issue 345, 15 January 1918, Page 2

IMPORTANCE OF AIR FLEETS

The new year will doubtless witness a vast extension of aerial fighting. The importance of air fleets has long ago been definitely established, and, although the aeroplane as a weapon of war was in its infancy at the outbreak of hostilities, it has made such progress that there are many who seriously regard it as the probable decisive factor of the future. In this respect, also, the intervention of the United States will undoubtedly have a big effect, and her provision of the large total of 640 million dollars (£128,000 000) for the construction of aeroplanes and the training of pilots, observers, and mechanics, cannot and has not been disregarded by the Central Powers. Writing in the "Contemporary Review" of September last on the subject of " The American Aviation Programme," Mr T. Farman stated that this huge sum showed that, though the American aviation services had to be created from top to bottom, the determination of our new Allies to carry out their new programme was most serious. ''The voting of the big aviation grant," he says, " is no bluff ; but the task they have undertaken will probably prove more difficult to perform than they imagine even now. Admitting that it is possible for them, with their powerful industrial organisations, to construct the 22,000 aeroplanes, as they hope to do, by the end of June, 1918, in spite of the inevitable delays resulting from the modifications which future experience in the war will render advisable, and even indispensable, and that the necessary motors suitable for the various types of avions can be provided within the time limit, there still remains'the difficult and delicate task of training the great number of pilots who will be required. The aerodromes for their instruction have to be created, the machines on which the pupils will have to practice flight do not exist in anything like sufficient numbers, and the professors have to be found. The ' out- | put' of pilots, if that expression be permissible in speaking of such brave men men, would have to be 100 per week to provide 5200 pilots in twelve months." In order to show, however, that the United States does not under-estimate the nature of the task ahead of her, the writer quotes General Squiers, who had charge of the execution of the American aviation programme, and who said it was no secret that the 640 million dollars voted for the creation of the American aviation services "is only the forerunner of another grant equally big. He also said: " The conception I have of my duty is not only to launch an attack by way of the air, but to create a veritable ' inundation of aeroplanes.' We intend to furnish the ' cavalry of the sky,' which will contribute "to the final victory." Since this article was written America has been steadily proceeding with the gigantic task which she set herself, and we should gain a fair idea during the present year as to whether her ambitious aims are likely to be achieved.