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The War in the Air
The Men
Man has always been the prime element in war; he initiates
it, directs it, fights its battles, and designs and builds its weapons.
In any military operation the leader is likewise all important, but
World War I found its fledgling air forces practically leaderless. Military
aviation was less than 10 years old. Military history and doctrine were
replete with examples of great generals and famous admirals, but in
all the annals of warfare there was not a single page on the planning
and conduct of air operations. Officers and men were as little tested
as their equipment. Leadership had to be established by competence and
survival in action.
From the first this challenge attracted men of daring
and energy from other branches of the armed forces and from civil life.
The aviators of the opposing armies were volunteers, picked for physical
fitness and eager to match themselves against the risks of this new
sort of war. They rode frail, underpowered craft into a strangely different
field of battle, where the impersonal forces of wind, weather, and lack
of oxygen could be more deadly than the human enemy. There were no trenches
for protection but only a chance cloud or the sun's glare for momentary
concealment-no safe place to hide-in the empty reaches of the sky. The
aviator often fought and died alone. Even his training was full of hazards:
more fliers lost their lives in training than in combat. Typical of
the breed of fighting men that air warfare attracted was the Lafayette
Escadrille, composed of American adventurers and idealists who volunteered
for service with the French early in the war and established an excellent
combat record.
The air force commanders who came up through this stem
testing were mostly young, enthusiastic, and aggressive. The outstanding
personality among them undoubtedly was Maj. Gen. (later Air Chief Marshal)
Sir Hugh Trenchard of Great Britain, now generally recognized as the
founding father of modern airpower. A commander of intelligence, vision,
and method, able in presenting his views, he built the Royal Air Force
into the most efficient air service in Europe. Brig. Gen. Maurice Duval
of France, the expert Lt. Gen. Ernst von Hoeppner of Germany, and Col.
(later Maj. Gen.) Giulio Douhet of Italy all achieved distinction as
skilled air force commanders and prophets of the coming greatness of
air power. Brig. Gen. William Mitchell showed considerable talent in
directing the operations of the American air units in France; a convinced
disciple of Trenchard, he later devoted his life to championing the
airplane as the decisive weapon of future wars.
Initially, air fighting was a thoroughly individualistic
affair. Fliers kept scores of their kills, those in the Allied air forces
with five or more to their credit being termed "aces." Some
became legendary figures-William Avery Bishop, the Canadian; Georges
Marie Guynemer, the French ace who scorned maneuvering, always attacking
with headlong fury; Manfred von Richthofen, the "Red Knight"
of Germany; Albert Ball, the deadly Englishman; the Americans Raoul
G. V. Lufbery and Edward V. Rickenbacker-and Edward Mannock, Oswald
Boelcke, Max Immelmann, Rene Fonck, Frank Luke, Jr., and many others.
Less publicized and therefore seldom known to fame were
the pilots and observers who performed the humdrum but vital tasks of
adjusting artillery fire, photographing enemy positions, and scouting
far behind enemy lines, their slow lumbering planes often easy victims
for enemy fighter pilots. The bomber crews, harried by enemy fighters
and antiaircraft guns by day and risking weather and navigational errors
(their instruments being few and crude) by night, also served largely
unnoticed. Possibly the most risky of the airmen's missions was that
of the crews of the observation balloons, hung defenseless between earth
and sky as they watched for telltale enemy activity and directed artillery
fire.
Through all this dangerous duty, above the bloody grapplings
in the mud below, ran a thin gleam of the chivalry of older wars. An
opponent whose guns had jammed in an aerial dogfight might be (if rarely)
spared. Messages might be dropped over an enemy airdrome, telling of
the fate of a pilot missing from it. The average aviator might occasionally
be charged with indiscipline, but he normally was nevertheless a ready,
self-reliant fighting man.
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