The Romance of Aircraft

by Laurence Yard Smith

In carefully standardizing those first airplanes there was one point which the crafty Germans overlooked: which is, that you can't make a dray horse run fast, nor a race horse draw heavy burdens. The same thing holds good with the “steeds” of the air. A plane which is designed for great speed is never as good a burden bearer as one which is built to lift heavy weights at the expense of swiftness in flight. As soon as the duties of the airplane began to be specialized, the airplane itself began to appear in certain definite types.

Now of course the duties of the airplane in wartime are numberless, but out of the early confusion three types of machines were finally evolved, which, with the addition of equipment, such as a camera, machine guns, etc., are suitable for practically any sort of work over the land. They are:

1. The high speed fighting machines.

2. The reconnaissance machines.

3. The bombing machines (including the day and the night bombers).

Of all military airplanes there is none so fond of “aliases” as the high speed fighting machine. Possibly in order to baffle the uninitiated, or to surround itself with an atmosphere of uncertainty and romance, it goes by first one title and then another. Most often we hear it called a speed scout, perhaps for the reason that it does no scouting! At other times it masquerades proudly under the fine French titles of “Avions de Chasse” or “Avions de Combat.” It is referred to as a “chaser,” a “pursuit machine,” a “battle plane” and a “combat machine”—but whatever it is called, in type it is the small, fast airplane, usually a single seater, quick in climbing, agile as an acrobat, able to “go” high and far,—for its duty is to run every enemy machine out of the sky and sweep the board clean before the heavier service machines begin their tasks of the day. It should be able to reach a height of from 18,000 to 23,000 feet, or in the language of the air, it must have a high “ceiling.” From altitudes so tremendous that they awe the mere earthly pedestrian it swoops down upon its unsuspecting victim, opening upon him a stream of machine gun fire. For its pilot is also a skilled gunner and a crack shot. Upon his ability to maneuver his machine swiftly and cleverly and hit his target unerringly depends his own life and the life of a costly military airplane.

The reconnaissance machines and the bombing planes may do valuable service,—and indeed they invariably do—but it is the “speed scout” that covers itself with glory. The reason is that its career brings it nearer to the “personal combat” of the knights of old than anything in modern warfare. Driving his swift Nieuport scout as a knight would have ridden his charger, the beloved Guynemer went forth to challenge the German fighters,—and other Frenchmen and Englishmen and Americans have followed him. It is a fact beyond all question that this branch of the service has produced some of the most truly unselfish and heroic figures of the whole war. The “speed scout” pilot did not need to be a man deeply versed in military affairs—as for instance the pilot and observer of the reconnaissance machine must be,—but he did need dauntless courage, unfailing nerves of steel, dash and daring and contempt for his own safety. So wherever the “speed scout” has blazed its trail of fire across the sky, there have sprung up the names of men whose heroic deeds have made them the idols of the whole world. Usually they have been very young men—young enough for their ideals to have kept fresh and untarnished from the sordid things of life, and thus they have written their names among the immortals.

Less appealing to the imagination, perhaps, but no less vital to the progress of modern warfare, is the slower flying reconnaissance craft. This machine is always a two-seater, and sometimes a three, for at the very minimum it must carry a pilot and an observer, while a gunner is a very convenient third party in case of an attack from enemy scouts. This type of machine is used for photographic work, for artillery “spotting,” and for many general service duties over the lines. In the early days of the war it was customary for the photography airplane to be escorted on its mission by a group of fighting machines, who hovered about it and engaged in battle any airplanes of the enemy that might seek to interrupt its important work. But the last year or so have brought many improvements in airplane construction and it has been found possible to build a machine which can not only carry the heavy photographic apparatus and a couple of machine guns, but which can also travel at a good speed and climb fast enough to escape from the anti-aircraft guns. Instead of the rather helpless, clumsy, slow-flying reconnaissance machines of the early part of the war, we now have powerful “aerial dreadnaughts,” which no longer need to run away, but can stay and fight it out when they are interrupted in the course of their air duties.